by Renee Bond
Jensi laughed.
“She’s got a point there, fearless leader,” he said.
Travan chuckled.
“I’m sensing a theme with you, little woman,” he said.
“She’s a featherweight who thinks she can fight with the heavyweights,” said Jensi cooly.
“Don’t forget how big this galaxy is,” said Daxen, “and how small you are, little woman.”
“One person may not be able to change the galaxy,” I said. “But I know I can make a positive difference for just one person. One person can always make at least a little difference.”
“The question is,” Travan said, “whether you’re making enough of a difference for it to really matter in the long run. Or whether you’re making the kind of difference that will end up making things worse later on.”
“Why don’t we ask the woman from the cafe whether or not I made a real difference. Isn’t it possible that she’ll be better off? There’s got to be at least a chance that she’ll escape reprisal.”
“I’ll tell you what I tell rookies when they start asking questions like that,” said Travan. “When in doubt, follow orders. Do what’s expected of you. If the military’s taught me one thing, it’s that too much thinking can get people killed. And if that’s not enough of a reason to convince you… just think about how we’ll discipline you if you ever screw up again.”
“After what happened earlier,” said Jensi, “I’m beginning to think we should encourage her to think for herself more often.”
“Don’t give her any dumb ideas,” Travan growled. Thankfully, that was met with laughter, which served to deflate the tension.
I was already getting to know Travan well enough to know when he expected to be listened to.
So I stayed silent.
Chapter 33
Daxen
Occupation duty on a relatively peaceful planet is tricky. 99.9% of the time, it’s so boring you wonder why you’re even doing it. Walking down peaceful streets in full combat gear. Standing outside strategic buildings like hospitals and banks, which nobody is attacking. Staring down ordinary citizens who don’t bother giving you more than a brief, polite smile before hurrying on with their busy lives.
It’s so dull, so routine, that the other 0.1% of the time can really sneak up on you.
And those are the times you really don’t want to sneak up on you.
Thankfully, just a few days into our six-month deployment, it had so far been pure 99.9%. It was a milk assignment, on a planet with a population that had long since learned the stupidity of armed resistance against off-world invaders who had access to spacecraft capable of orbital bombardment.
Which was fine by me. You see as much war as I have, and you learn to appreciate the slow times.
Unless, of course, you’re Jensi. Crazy fucker.
Per planetary protocol, we ran our patrols in twos. Today I was with the crazy fucker. Neither of us were big fans of regulation. As such, we veritably strolled down our assigned route, rifles comfortably on our shoulders. Jensi had even taken off his helmet and clipped it to his belt. The weather was right on the verge of being spectacular - pleasant temperature, no humidity, plenty of sunshine from the system’s red-giant sun, and just a hint of cloud cover providing the occasional shade. The roads were dusty. The neighborhoods and business centers we traversed were mostly poor, but semi-clean and clearly maintained to a functional standard. There was little pollution or even litter to speak of. The whole place had a quaint air to it.
Hell, it actually was almost like being on vacation.
“I absolutely fucking hate it here,” said Jensi cheerfully.
“Of course you do,” I said. That was Jensi. He never could go long without having something to kill, or at least something to focus on trying to kill. “If it makes you feel any better, we could get some hunting in on our next free day.”
“The only thing I want to do on our next free day,” he said with a wicked grin, “is think of new ways to discipline a woman. And new things to discipline her for. That is, unless we’re in the process of actually doing it.”
That was Jensi. Creature of conflict, deliverer of pain.
“You know,” I said, “you sure do talk about her a lot.” It was true. Over the last couple of days, the normally serially silent Jensi had verbalized an uncommon number of things about the newest, sexiest member of our little squad. “I’m starting to think you’re falling deeply, madly in love with our mate-prize.”
Jensi veritably whirled on me, anger in his eyes.
“Thoughts that stupid could get a man in real trouble,” he all but hissed, nostrils flaring.
That was Jensi. Always trying to cover up the fact that he wore his heart on his sleeve, in a way that just brought more attention to it.
I raised my hands.
“Hey, this isn’t a locker room, tough guy,” I said. “And there aren’t any macho-ass rookies around to judge. There’s a reason, other than the fucking, that we risk our lives to earn our mate-prizes.”
The younger soldiers, all so eager to prove themselves, oh-so-often attempted to demonstrate their toughness through socially-enforced emotional repression. As if that had anything at all to do with war. It was stupid. Illogical. But in any hierarchical organization, status counts, and it’s always easier to just go along with the prevailing bullshit that it is to think for yourself. Or, even worse, buck the trend.
“Don’t project, smart guy,” Jensi said testily. “Or are you falling so madly in love with our fuck doll than you can’t even tell that you’re the one who’s in love with her?”
We walked in silence for a few minutes.
“I think it’s pretty obvious that we’re all developing feelings for her,” I said. Which was perfectly true. We were all overly interested in what she was doing, or what she was feeling. We were all giving her glances that were far longer than necessary. All our voices shifted an octave whenever we spoke to her directly. I couldn’t be the only one who was noticing it - so why bother denying it?
To his credit, Jensi didn’t bother trying to deny it.
Chapter 34
Rachel
On the fourth day of our stay on Exonious, I found myself alone in the ship.
Again.
Picture a fairly big yacht, parked in a desert, surrounded by other fairly big yachts, surrounded by a fence, and you’ll have a pretty good idea of both what the airfield looked like, and the size of the vessel our squad called home.
Thing is, military space yachts are mostly filled with guns and bombs and things for killing other military space yachts, so there’s actually less room inside than you might think.
There was a cargo bay, like a big two-car garage. There were a few equipment storage rooms, mostly full of more weapons, or support systems that would empower the use of said weapons, or emergency rations and survival gear and other various military whatnot. There was a small exercise room, a small kitchen, a small hallway space that connected every area of the ship, and a small cockpit.
And I was responsible for keeping all these areas clean.
At least, in theory. In practice, that job amounted to supervising the onboard cleaning drone, and getting into the corners, nooks and crannies it was too clumsy to properly dust or scrub. Between that, daily exercise and meal prep duties using the ship’s mostly automated kitchen, I was booked solid… for about three hours of each day.
The rest of the time, painfully quiet, unmercifully slow, I was just bored.
I wasn’t technically allowed in the cockpit. But it wasn’t locked or anything. I went in there on day three, and just stood there for a minute, just to see if any of the men would know I’d been in there.
If they knew, they didn’t let on.
So the next day, even more desperate for some form of stimulation, I went back. Even dared to sit in the captain’s chair.
Once there, I activated the ship’s central computational and display system, using the voice code I’d he
ard Travan use.
“System active.”
Worst password I’d ever heard of. But convenient.
The ship’s console came to life, an utterly impressive matrix of glowing buttons, trackpads, touchscreens and holo-projections. I felt like I was in a science fiction movie.
Which I then supposed I actually was, minus the movie part.
“Display… something,” I commanded confidently.
I didn’t have any objective in particular. I was kind of imagining that there must be like an internet, only for the whole galaxy. I mean, think of all the entertaining ways to kill whole days there are on a global computer network on a little backward planet like Earth. Now picture that, but the size of a galaxy! I didn’t actually know if there was a galactic internet or not, of course. But seeing as how I lived in a freaking spaceship now, I kinda expected there to be one.
If, that is, I could find a way to access it.
The men all have personal computing devices, but those only respond to their specific voice’s. So I was out of luck there.
Luckily for me, the ship’s central computer responded to me straight away, and spoke to me in an androgynous monotone:
“Please identify user.”
Hm. Ok.
“Rachel.”
No response. Ok, then.
“Woman,” I said, trying to think like Travan or Daxen.
Still nothing.
“Mate-prize?” Worth a shot.
A picture of me popped up on the large screen, along with a load of information about me: height, weight, age (I think - the units of measurement were alien to me), home planet, and a bunch of stuff relating to my DNA profile and individual bio-system - I think. I couldn’t actually read most of it, but it seemed like that was what I was looking at.
More than a little creepy.
Then again, I could think of bigger ways I’d been violated recently.
“New message, from Lieutenant Jansen Doyle, Everlasting officer in good standing.”
I… had a message?
Hm. I guess I had a message.
“Open it,” I said. Hoping the nomenclature of my input command conformed to the computer’s operating system.
It did not. Nothing happened.
“Receive message.”
Nothing.
“Play-”
A holographic image popped up into the air in front of me. An image of the scumbag Everlasting officer from the cafe, who’d nearly beaten an innocent waitress to death in a drunken rage. His uniform was pressed, his back was straight. He looked every inch a figure of authority. He’d obviously sobered up before recording this message. His face was plain, pale, his expression lax but seemingly ready to sneer at any moment. Though he was tall, he quite obviously lacked the well-muscled frame of a fighting soldier.
“This is a message for the woman who so arrogantly and stupidly thought she could strike an officer of the Everlasting military and get away with it!”
The man in the holograph stepped aside, revealing himself to be standing in a stark, metallic room. Behind him, a brown-haired woman was tied up in a standing position, her hands suspended above her head with thick chains. She was wearing clothing that struck me as out of place: denim blue jeans, a black tee-shirt, and flat sneakers.
The kind of clothes I hadn’t seen since leaving Earth.
“Look into the recorder,” the Everlasting officer ordered. His captive, a woman, didn’t move. Appeared to be crying, even trying her best not to look up.
The officer took hold of the woman’s hair and yanked her head back.
And my whole world froze solid.
My stomach turned into a depthless pit. My knees felt like lead. I could barely breathe.
It was Ellie. My sister.
She has this expression she gets when she’s trying her hardest not to cry, but not quite pulling it off. There were bruises on both sides of her neck. As her head snapped back, my baby sister let out a gasp of pain.
“As the property of our Triumphant allies-to-be,” said the bastard officer, a wicked, hungry grin spreading on his face, “I don’t have the authority to give you the retribution you so richly deserve. Not directly, anyway.”
He reached up to caress my sister’s quivering face with one hand.
That. Fucking. Bastard.
“But I have many friends,” the bastard continued, “including among our planetary exfiltration squads. Acquiring this little beauty was so, so easy! Triumphant data and planetary defense systems are not nearly so robust as they think!”
I was still reeling. And was starting to feel very sick.
“Don’t worry,” the scumbag said, “I haven’t abused her. Much. But I will. Unless you turn yourself over to me. I don’t care how you do it - sneak away, lie, kill your men and leave - but if you don’t present yourself at our base, I’m going to take out my frustrations on your dear little sister. And trust me when I say that I will not be gentle. You have one week. Then your sister is fair game. Not only for me, but for any of our soldiers who needs to blow off a little steam.”
I couldn’t believe this was happening.
This couldn’t be happening!
How had that bastard kidnapped my sister so quickly? How had he even known about her? Then again, was that even important? After my own mind-bending experiences during the last week, I was fully prepared to admit just how little I knew about the galaxy. Who knows what kind of connections and technology this asshole had access too?
However he’d done it, he had my sister. Her image was right there, in front of my very eyes!
He leaned in toward her. She tried to pull her head away, but he wrenched her head back towards him.
Stuck his nose into her hair. Inhaled deeply.
Then held up a brutal-looking combat knife.
“Oh fuck! Please don’t!”
My baby sister’s begging continued for a moment before she was silenced.
“In case I fail to make my point clear,” said the officer, “I’ll let you in on a little secret: I’m quite the sadist. There’s nothing more arousing to me than a woman begging for mercy!”
The knife dropped away.
“It’s the sort of treatment you can look forward to, should you turn yourself over to me. Your owners won't even want to look at you after I’m done with you! So, what will you do? Will you come and take the punishment you’ve earned? Or will you let your sister take it for you? Oh, and if you’re thinking of asking your pathetic owners for help, just know that my crypto-communication friends will be monitoring Triumphant communications on this planet very carefully. If we get even a hint that the Triumphant military is becoming involved in this, the deal is off! This is between you and me. Anyone else gets involved, and your sister starts screaming for real!”
The holographic image of the metallic room winked out and was replaced by a map of the nearby town. A point on it, on the other side of the town from the airfield, was clearly marked - the Everlasting military base.
The ice in my stomach somehow turned even colder.
Just when I’d started to feel like my new life wouldn’t be the horror show I’d initially thought it would be… just when I was starting to actually look forward to the future, a future with four amazingly strong and caring sexy men… for this to happen now was beyond cruel. I wanted to scream. I wanted to cry. I wanted to run away, far away, and pretend that this wasn’t happening. That this sick fuck hadn’t kidnapped my sister.
But in my heart, I knew I couldn’t do that.
I couldn’t leave my baby sister to that animal. She didn’t deserve that. Nobody did… but she especially didn’t.
And if he had the ability to kidnap my sister, to have her delivered to this planet, then I had no doubt he would be able to tell if my men got involved. Hell, he might have somehow bugged this very ship, and was listening to everything that was said onboard.
“Fuck. Fuck!”
Swearing helped. A little.
I walked
out of the cockpit in a daze. I’d finally been starting to feel like my new life was some sort of dream, instead of a nightmare.
But with one holo-message, the nightmare had returned.
Chapter 35
Ellon
Travon and I got back to the ship a bit earlier than usual. We’d skipped the last part of our patrol route, which would have taken us through the nicest areas of the city. We’d heard from some of the other soldiers stationed at the airfield, who were also running patrols, that it was a waste of time. And that some of the merchants in that quarter paid nice bribes - which we could collect a cut of - to keep armed soldiers away. Seemed harmless enough. And who could say no to a few extra credits?
Or an extra hour back on our ship, tending to our new woman.
“Shower first… or after?” I asked as we walked back up the boarding ramp of our ship, our home for the foreseeable future.
“I’m getting cleaned up,” said Travan. “Fell free to start without me. I think she’s got a soft spot for you anyways. Or should I say, a wet spot.”
I laughed.
“Don’t mind if I do,” I said. “That way we can switch off. It’s nice to get her all to yourself sometimes.”
“I hear that,” said Travan, as he began pulling off his helmet and combat gloves. The planet’s ever-present dust flew off as he did. Thank goodness for the cleaning drone.
Privately, we’d started making bets on who’d be the first one to get our woman pregnant. We didn’t want it to happen too quickly - the birth-control measures we’d taken back when we’d first acquired her wouldn’t wear off for another couple of months, at least. But the feeling among the squad was that we didn’t want to delay it for years either, like some squads did. We all liked the idea of our woman being the mother to our children. Of course, any children she did bear would be treated as collective children of the squad - paternity tests were strictly forbidden. Helped with squad unity, and children always do better when raised by a fully intact family unit. But, honestly, you could always tell who the biological father was.
Not that it mattered in the slightest.
