Crineal Chronicles 1: In Hera's Service

by Raymond L Jennings

  Crineal gave a bark of laughter “I’m sure that report will be blank, Major. Apollo has some good pilots.” Cyndora watched surreptitiously as Major Quenna straightened proudly at the praise. “Something that came up after I was out with Hypnos. How do you feel about letting your second in command do the debriefing for practice? Have him nominate an assistant to give him a hand in the same way he does for you. Hypnos’ second asked if she could do it and thinking it over it seems like a good idea.”

  Quenna nodded in agreement. “It is. Laball could use the experience. I’ll give him a heads up.” The major glanced over as she noticed Cyndora paying attention to the conversation as she worked out.

  Crineal followed her gaze. “Oh, this is Assistant Cyndora. I had her assigned to me from Rec Division. Cyndora, meet Major Quenna, leader of Apollo Squadron.” Cyndora thought that the major was about to fall over in shock.

  She slowed her pace on the trainer and tried to come to an awkward sort of attention. “Pleased to meet you, Ma’am,” Cyndora said respectfully.

  Quenna gave her a small nod of acknowledgement and turned a quizzical look on Crineal. He caught it and shrugged. “She needs to keep in shape and it seemed stupid to send her down to the Rec dorm every day when I’m coming here.” It probably wasn’t the answer to the questions Quenna really wanted to ask, he thought, but it would suffice.

  The major nodded again. “Makes sense to me, Sir. I know a lot of officers don’t look after their assigned... assistants very well.” Cyndora spotted the pause and wondered what word Quenna had been about to use. Pet? Slave? Toy? She’d heard them all.

  Crineal’s look agreed with Quenna’s opinion of how RA’s were treated. “So, where are you headed on leave?”

  “I’ve heard about something called the pyramids. I thought I’d give them a look,” Quenna told him.

  “Good choice, they’ve fascinated Earth historians for centuries. I’m sure you’ll enjoy yourself, just take plenty of sun block,” he advised her with a smile and a glance at her fair skin.

  “Already packed, Sir. I read the travel guide. Well, I better get going and, please, be as hard as you like on my squadron. Perhaps I can get them as good as you have Hera.”

  “Heh, I’ll let Major Strieger know that you’re aiming for top squadron spot. I’m sure she’ll have Hera knocked out of any complacency they might be wallowing in.”

  Quenna grumbled, “Giving her warning isn’t fair, Sir. She doesn’t need any help.” She came to attention briefly once more and then moved to leave. The major paused before Cyndora. “You look after our general, young lady. He deserves the best.”

  Cyndora straightened. “Yes, Ma’am,” she replied.

  Quenna nodded to herself at Cyndora’s answer and then left the gym, leaving Crineal and Cyndora with no one close to them.

  She looked at Crineal. “Do they all adore you like that, Sir?”

  Crineal pondered that for a moment. “I wouldn’t say adore, I think I have their respect though.”

  Cyndora thought that the difference between adore and respect in this case wouldn’t feed a mouse. She looked at the door through which the major had exited and sighed heavily. “I really envy the Galactics their figures. I’d kill for legs like that.”

  Crineal looked over at her legs that were glowing with sweat as she pumped them. “Don’t sell yourself short, Cyndy. Yours are pretty good too.” He saw her blush and put her head down at his reply. “Well, I think we can call it good for today,” Crineal said, as he slowed and then stopped. Cyndora did likewise and they stepped off their machines, toweling their heads and shoulders dry as they made their way out.

  They arrived back at Crineal’s quarters a short time later. Crineal waved Cyndora towards the bedroom. “Go ahead and shower first. I need to get some messages out.” She nodded gratefully and disappeared into the bedroom. Crineal caught himself staring at her shapely figure as Cyndora headed to the shower. He mentally slapped himself and forced his attention to the data pad in his hand. He forwarded messages to each of the other squadron leaders to arrange a quick meeting tomorrow before they went on leave. Once that was done he sat back in his chair and contemplated breakfast. The door to the bedroom opened and a soggy-looking Cyndora squelched out with a towel wrapped around her and an annoyed expression on her face.

  “What’s up?” he asked as he looked at her wet towel clad form.

  Cyndora padded past him to the replicator unit. “I forgot that you wouldn’t have any woman’s accessories in your bathroom," she explained a little grumpily, her long chestnut-red hair dripping water onto the floor as she stood at the replicator unit. He watched as she hit a few keys and came away with a toiletries bag.

  “Ummm… nope, not much call for that recently,” Crineal said as he watched her go back to the bathroom. As he thought about it some more, ‘not recently’ was in fact far too long. But then, at the rank of general, his pool of available partners was incredibly small, apart from one night stands during shore leave. So much for the privilege of rank, he mused. Fifteen minutes later, Cyndora was out of the shower and fixing them breakfast whilst he was washing himself down. Once he was done and dressed, Crineal joined Cyndora for breakfast. She was already nearly finished with hers and broke off eating to serve his. Cyndora polished off her remaining breakfast and sipped her kafe, whilst Crineal attacked his food. He cleared his tray and pushed back from the table, doing up his uniform jacket.

  “Another exciting day of admin work,” he grumbled good-naturedly. “Have a think about anything else you might need and go ahead and use the replicator,” he paused for a second, “Are you still ok for credits?”

  Cyndora looked at him over her cup of kafe. “I think I’ll be able to get by,” she said with a wry smile. Yesterday’s purchases had barely dented what he’d allocated her.

  “Ok, good. You’ll also find a movie and music library on the entertainment unit. I think there’s a good choice there. Can’t say that I look that often though.” Crineal checked the clock. “Ok, time to go. Try not to have too much fun.” He gave her a quick wave and was gone.

  Crineal’s day was largely spent in paperwork. He completed his commendations report and forwarded it to the admiral along with his battle report. It looked as if his squadron’s ships would all be fully serviceable by the time the Annihilator pulled out of Earth orbit. Now he just needed to get two replacement pilots. He put a request through to Personnel Section but he wasn’t hopeful about getting anybody before they reached their next stop over. That left him with the sad duty of arranging a memorial for Bannerman and Rochelle. He scheduled it for after all his pilots were back from leave and they’d left orbit. With that done he decided to take lunch in med section with those unlucky enough still to be held there. He promised them all faithfully that, if they weren’t out in a week, he’d arrange a prison break for them. Feldea pointed out that she might not be capable of digging the required tunnel. Crineal was buoyed to see that she was in good spirits and it made his afternoon easier. The only black spot was a terse and almost accusatory note from Commander Del’Tarim to report that some of the major repair work to the flight bays had been completed and that they would be fully operational again before they left Sol system. Crineal snorted at that. He thought that if Hantos had been aboard the bays would be back up and running within the next ten days. Crineal logged the report in disgust without even bothering to reply. Finally the day was over and he felt that he’d made some progress in clearing the backlog. When he got to his quarters he found Cyndora sitting in an easy chair watching another news feed. She had her legs tucked under her whilst nibbling a lock of hair and appeared a little out of sorts.

  “Hey you,” he said, “What are you watching?”

  Cyndora looked up and glanced past him to make sure that the door was shut. “Hey, Crin,” his name sounded awkward coming from her, “I’ve been trying to catch up on stuff that’s been happening since I was imprisoned.” She shut down the entertainment unit and got
up. “So, what are we having for dinner?”

  He pondered that for a second. “Hmmmm… steak pie sounds good I think. I have a preset meal on the replicator.”

  Cyndora brightened a little. “Sounds good to me, too. I’ll get it punched in.” As she went to the kitchen, he took his jacket off and hung it up in the bedroom closet. By the time he got back, Cyndora had two trays of food on the table. They sat and started to eat. When their trays were empty Cyndora spoke up. “Crin? Do people really believe the Imperial new shows?”

  He shrugged a little. “Probably a lot of people do. Some take it with a pinch of salt and some don’t believe a word.”

  She frowned at his answer. “But a lot of it is so obviously false. I saw some reports about the situation on Earth that aren’t even close to the truth. Happy, smiling citizens continually celebrating the Emperor, and then being viscously attacked by rebels with tear gas.” She reddened slightly as she remembered that Crineal had lost his whole family in a rebel attack. “Who would believe all that?”

  Crineal shrugged again. “People who haven’t been to Earth. You can’t verify what you don’t see. If I told you that the flamingos on Pallonus IV have two heads, would you believe me? Even if I showed you a picture?”

  She thought about that. “Well, no,” she looked at him curiously, “do they have two heads?”

  He nodded. “Surprisingly, they do. A really odd evolution. But that’s the point, not everything in the news feeds is a lie. The rebels do carry out attacks, so it’s easy for people to believe reports that another incident has occurred. I’m sure if your rebel leaders had told you that an Imperial strike force had attacked a rebel base, killed all the men, raped all the women to death and eaten all the children, you’d probably believe it. The Imperial propaganda is no worse than the rebel stuff.”

  Cyndora looked upset by his answer. “The rebel newscasts stick to the truth. Ok, they may exaggerate a bit sometimes, but you account for that.”

  Crineal shook his head in amazement at her naivety. “Cyndy, I’m not going to argue with you on this. There’s a lot more you haven’t seen. Yes, the Imperial stuff is hardly accurate, but then neither is the rebel stuff. In the end you believe what you want to believe. Why don’t we shelve it, tidy up and watch a movie?”

  Cyndora still looked ready to argue, but decided to let it go for the moment. She cleared the table whilst Crineal took a quick shower. He came back in a long silk bed robe, the pale yellow color seemed to shimmer and it had some odd looking markings on it.

  Cyndora looked at the markings a little more closely. They were silhouettes of birds with long legs and…

  “They’re two-headed flamingos!!!” she exclaimed.

  Crineal smiled. “Yep, got it on shore leave on Pallonus IV.”

  Cyndora giggled in response, which Crineal thought made her sound really cute, and she went and changed into her pajamas. They watched an Imperial action movie with a highly improbable plot before retiring to their separate beds. Crineal felt Cyndora was still unhappy about the news issue. If only she knew the truth, he thought sadly.

  The next day started the same as the previous one: exercise, shower and breakfast. Crineal went to his office and cleared a few more reports before meeting with the other squadron leaders in the Hera ready room. He outlined the idea about having their seconds do the debriefings during the current leave cycle and then proposed that it might be a good practice to have them do it on a regular basis, perhaps once a month to help with their development for promotion. The discussion on the subject was short and all were in favor of it. With the matter settled, Crineal wished them all a relaxing leave and then made his daily visit to the med bay. The afternoon was more reports and he filed a record of the mornings meeting to be sent to all the squadron leaders and their seconds. By the end of the day, he was glad to get back to his quarters. That feeling lasted for all of five seconds. Cyndora was sitting in front of the entertainment unit again and this time she was fuming.

  Crineal looked at the display and saw it was showing more news. “I take it that they’ve been stretching the truth again?” he asked, thinking that he might as well trip her explosion early rather than let it simmer.

  “A celebration rally in Leicester. Saying how much they love they Empire,” she snarled, her green eyes flashing angrily.

  “I’m assuming that’s not the case?” Crineal hazarded.

  “Leicester is practically an internment camp. Or was when I was there last. I really doubt that it’s changed that much in a year.”

  “Probably not,” he agreed not wanting to stretch the argument out at all.

  She looked up at him in disgust. “You really don’t care what they say, do you?”

  “Not much. I don’t believe it, so I don’t pay much attention to it. My job is to fight the enemy combat forces, not get involved in civil political discussions.” He headed to the kitchen. Crineal had hoped that they’d got past this ideology rubbish, but apparently not. Suddenly he wasn’t very hungry, so after dialing up a sandwich he took it through to the bedroom to eat in there. Crineal left Cyndora seething in the lounge and he was asleep before she even came to bed.

  Exercise the following morning was short because of his scheduled patrol. Cyndora didn’t say much and he didn’t stop for more than a bite of breakfast. He changed into his flight suit and left his quarters with a bare “See you later.” If Cyndora replied, he didn’t hear it. The patrol was a long one and he was glad of the quiet friendly chat of the Apollo pilots. They proved as diligent as Major Quenna had promised and he wondered if they really had been studying. But their flying didn’t show any text book stiffness, just the smooth competency of veteran pilots. Although he was tired when they finally touched down in Delta Bays, he almost wished he could stay out there in space. Instead, he remained with the pilots and had dinner in the Apollo mess hall whilst getting to know a few of the newer pilots a bit better. The younger ones seemed a bit awed that a general was sitting with them; the old hands just took it in their stride. They always liked to give the impression to outsiders that Crineal was hard as nails and his combat reputation reinforced that, especially the way he ruthlessly dealt with rebels. But those who worked closely with him were aware that he cared very much for the pilots under his command. They knew he would do whatever he could for them, unless they broke the rules. Those people who were dismissed from the carrier’s squadrons only furthered his legend of toughness.

  Once the meal was over he stopped in at med bay to find that two more pilots had been discharged during the day. Only Captains Saymes and Treynar, Lieutenants Feldea and Arralyu, and Pilot Officer Wakred were left. He chatted with each and then headed to his quarters. He stepped in the door, saw Cyndora still looked angry and just gave her a “Hi” before taking a shower and going straight to bed.

  When the alarm went the following morning, they both rose without a word although Cyndora kept glaring at him. Their exercise was conducted in silence and he didn’t even bother to stop for breakfast after his shower. He decided that with his foul mood today he may as well take a tour of the Alpha flight bays. He checked in with Commander Del’Tarim who was only too pleased to let him wander around on his own. He certainly didn’t want to spend time with the general; especially not in the obviously poor humor Crineal was in.

  Crineal visited each bay and spoke with whoever was most senior on duty in each one, ending up in Alpha Bay Ten. The impression that he got from them was that they were working hard despite Del’Tarim and, if there were any delays, the root cause was the commander. It was about as Crineal had expected. The work crews did seem a little lifted by his visit, though. A stop at the medical bay just after lunch revealed that Arralyu and Wakred had been discharged as well, leaving just the two captains and Lieutenant Feldea. Saymes and Treynar had been told that they would be released in the next few days. Crineal made a mental note to make sure that any pilots back early from shore leave would make regular calls on Feldea once she was the only on
e left in there. He commed a quick message from his office to Cyndora that he would be working late and she should fix her dinner when she felt hungry. He received a reply, but deleted it without even looking. He was not going to play her stupid games of recrimination, he told himself. He finally finished up his paperwork about twenty hundred hours and headed to his quarters. This time he didn’t look at her or even speak, just got a shower and went to bed, exhausted from the long hours he’d put in.

  Crineal struggled out of bed with a massive headache. He killed the alarm and stumbled out of the bedroom to the kitchen. He dialed up some water and a painkiller from the replicator. As he swallowed the tablet with a gulp of water he saw that Cyndora was leaning against the bedroom door wearing a long bath robe that he hadn’t noticed before. His head was pounding and she just stood there glaring at him.

  “Going to be another long day at the office, Sir?” she asked with a voice laced with venomous sarcasm.

  Crineal put the glass down and leaned on the counter. “Cyndora, you really don’t want to do this,” he said tiredly. Actually, today was a rest day for him.

  “Do what? Remind you of the lies that the Empire puts out to cover up its brutality? Remind you that you’re fighting for a corrupt system that beats innocent people and tortures its prisoners? Remind you that you don’t really care what they do?” she was shouting by the time she reached the end of the sentence. “What are you going to do? Have me thrown back into the slave pit you call recreation to be raped every day?” she shot at him.

  Crineal stood up and looked at her, enraged but absolutely ice cold. His pilots would have all been backing away from him and the person he was focused on, at this point. Cyndora mistook it for plain anger but still backed up a little as he came around the counter towards her.