Jethro: First to Fight

by Hechtl, Chris

  Briefly his hand drifted to the loose necklace around his neck. It was made up of teeth from that Neo, other Neo's, aliens, a couple of the Dilgarth they had recently encountered, and even a few human traitors. He sported earrings made out of bear canines too. He had some of the Dilgarth claws, skulls, and teeth on ice, he was planning on cleaning them up and then selling them to other Horathians as souvenirs when he had time.

  “These pussy's don't know what they're getting into, so we'll just tear em a new one, right?” he snarled. They had heard rumors of the Marines, but they also knew that the Marines were unblooded. Combat veterans knew, if you created enough shock and awe, new meat froze up or bolted. Either would work just fine here, frozen they'd make for great targets, running around like chickens with their heads cut off would just make cutting them down more fun.

  He was still smiling as he flipped his visor down, just in time for the hull to shake and then explode near the lock. It tore inward, then the explosive decompression sucked screaming men and equipment into a tumble as the incoming fire tore at them. Their bodies filled the holes briefly before the hull gave way and they exploded out into the dark void beyond.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  The Ensign grinned savagely as he held off about a kilometer from the lock. He took it carefully, letting his copilot and gunner hose the hull along their side of the lock. Within moments they had hit piping and gasses vomited out of the holes they were tearing in the hull. Soon tumbling bodies and equipment followed. He jigged to avoid a tumbling body.

  “Now that we've knocked, let's see who else is home,” the bear said dryly. “You may dock when ready Ensign,” he said simply.

  “Aye aye sir,” The Ensign said, moving in once more.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  Valenko felt the bump as the shuttle made dock and then watched with eager eyes as the ready light went from red to yellow, and then with a blink green. The cargo master had been gesturing the countdown as well as the docking clamps locked on and they pumped down the shuttle's bay. He made a mental note to next time do that before docking to save a few seconds.

  When the light hit green orderly chaos broke out. The crew were facing the lock, it cycled open and they hit the interior doors. They had been spot welded and bent shut, but a breaching charge solved that problem.

  Kovu took point, charging through the breach even before Valenko signaled to go. The lion roared over the tac link, making a few wince. He did stop at where the bear had indicated though.

  “Eager isn't he?” Asazi said, eyes cold as she leapt over the torn door and followed. “Right and left clear!” she called, moving to her cover point.

  When half the squad had made it through the door Valenko took his turn. He moved quickly to cover behind Asazi, trying not to crowd her as people stacked up behind them. When he was certain of no incoming fire the bear took a moment to scan left and right.

  The ripped section of hallway wasn't quite inky black, here and there a suit light tumbled, giving eerie lighting to the mess of bodies, glittering ice, and shards. Flickering lights from the overheads sparked then died. His reading told him a majority of the men and women who had been set to ambush him were dead. One tumbled nearby, his arm ripped off. Blood had frozen at the breaking point. It didn't matter, his visor was shattered. The bear saw the person's head briefly, and noted the necklace of teeth. Good, he thought, growling softly. Good.

  With the hull breached, emergency doors had slammed shut to contain the damage and atmosphere. Gases floated around with the bodies, but it seemed the vents had been shut as well. Damage control still functioned, Valenko noted in approval. He turned to see two squads of elves working on a closed air return vent. One pair was busily working on the vent while the rest of the group stacked up eagerly behind them.

  All twenty four elves took up less room then three humans of the same mass even when their heavy weapons teams carried modified weapons a bear like him would carry as a side arm. Each elf carried spare oxy, ammo, and battery packs on their backs. They even had a pair of elf engineers with them, two nervous looking enlisted carrying massive equipment packs. Another pair of squid elves were riding probe bots. Four other probe bots had been outfitted as donkey's they had cables attached to equipment boxes and would apparently tow the gear behind or under them. He shook his head.

  The elves had smaller weapons and couldn't easily tangle with a human pirate in hand to hand, but what they could do would be a nasty to the enemy.

  They quickly got the bolts out and then yanked the vent up. Air had sucked it shut from the vacuum, he imagined somewhere a valve was cutting the tunnel off. The only way the elves could have opened it was with their enhanced strength. The elves yanked the filter out, peered inside for a moment then the squad leader waved his team in.

  The bear grinned nastily. The elves would get behind the enemy and snipe them from the air ducts or report on positions. He set up a secondary objective, secure the air plants. He doubted they could do it, but it was possible. Ensign Blackberry nodded to him and then climbed in after his people, letting the vent fall shut behind him.

  “I've got two, no make that three vital signs. They're shaky boss,” Asazi reported. The bear grunted in irritation. “What do you want me to do?”

  Valenko was tempted to let them drift, they might drift out one of the holes in the hull like their compatriots. Or they'd run out of air. Or they could wake up and become a nuisance. That he couldn't allow. He frowned then shrugged. “Fonz, form a detail of you and two privates and secure the enemy wounded.”

  “Me? Why me? And what do we use?” the human argued, looking up in annoyance.

  The bear growled over the link. The human's annoyed face went slack. “Um, I mean yes sir. Right away sir.”

  “Use rigger tape kid,” Asazi said as Kovu motioned all clear. Asazi exchanged hand signs as Valenko gave the all clear to move forward.

  “Why me,” Fonz grumbled, grabbing at a drifting ankle. He checked for vitals, then when he found none he spun it off.

  “Take it easy Fonz, you'll get your chance at getting your ticket punched, just do the job. And remember, some of these yokels might wake up...” Asazi said just as Fonz found another pirate body. The body twisted and a weapon fired, shocking everyone in the area into a freeze. The Marines all turned to Fonz. The pirate who had tried to shoot him had forgotten he was now in zero G. Firing a weapon like a Gauss pistol wasn't as simple as he had thought, the weapon's recoil kicked him backwards into the bulkhead with equal force.

  The round fortunately missed, going between the Private's legs. Fonz snarled and clubbed the man as he bounced off the torn bulkhead and spun out of control. Fonz was anchored to the deck by the magnets in his boots, his smack down forced the pirate to slam into the deck hard. “Shoot at my balls will you?” Fonz snarled, hitting the man a few more times before he rolled him over and knelt on his back. “Frack around with me will you?” he snarled pulling rigger tape out of pocket. The guy's arms were already going behind him as he surrendered. “Yeah, that's right, give it up pussy,” the Private snarled.

  “Geeze Louise that was close, did you see where that round went?” Private Al Alvin said, shaking his head. “A little higher Fonz...”

  “Just can it and get to work,” Fonz snarled, wrapping the guy up in a cocoon of tape.

  Valenko watched Fonz tape his first prisoner to the deck as two privates in basic skin suits passed him and went to work and then turned to his map HUD. He checked an IFF and got a quick burst. Good, Jethro was about to join the party.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  Jethro used his experimental rocket pack to get over to the station and to a different airlock. Firefly had been moving at one hundred thousand kilometers per second past the station at over a million kilometers out. What he was technically doing was decelerating as the layman in him thought. Acceleration, deceleration, to him it didn't matter as long as it worked.

  What he actually did was trust in his implants and
the computers to figure out the math and get the job done. He knew he was no pilot, the rocket pack was just a tool to get him to where he needed to go. For the most part he had to hang on and enjoy the ride.

  He looked to his left as he hit the ten thousand kilometer mark and noticed the shuttles tearing into the hull, that hadn't been planned but apparently someone had thought it was important. It didn't matter, all the Marines were in suits or skinny's. At the half way point his wings moved, shifting to now point the thrusters in the opposite direction. It made him look like he was back winging as they fired to arrest his forward momentum. Puffs from the RCS kept him balanced and oriented on the lock of his choice. His HUD danced with images, a circle reticule danced about, identifying various features around the lock. He didn't want to do a hard scan, but there was a feed going out from the station. His suit picked it up and he smiled wolfishly. Someone had just made their job much easier, one of the feeds was a map of the location of every pirate on the station. He shunted that to the bear and the other officers and noncoms as his boots touched down in the lock.

  He looked down to the hazard striping briefly, glad they had gotten the bugs out of the wings. He hit the release, then frowned when he noticed the pressure on the other side keeping the lock from opening. Something happened though, a command from inside pumped the lock down.

  Wary he turned the wheel opening the lock door. He was tempted to go to another lock. The light came on making him flinch. He awkwardly moved inside, the wings were now a hindrance, bumping into things. Once inside he shucked the drained rocket pack in the lock. The door closed behind him. He ignored the drifting pack and turned to the inner door and scanned it. No one was within thirty meters of the door. Carefully he opened it and then stepped out. When he confirmed no one was around as a welcoming party he then headed out hunting. He had an objective to secure.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  The pirate leader Major Zimmer cursed as the guts of his initial plan were torn out from under him. His blocking force had been torn apart by the shuttles accurate fire, and with it any hope of bottling the enemy up in the lock and keeping them there. Already he was getting reports of the Marines moving inward.

  He should have anticipated full combat marines but he hadn't. Stupid of him he realized, a stupid oversight that was costing him big. He scowled. Each of his suits could hold one or two weapons, most of them crew service or Gauss rifles. These Marines each had four to six weapons, some had heavy weapons that made his heavy weapons look like toys! Their infantry weapons were useless, even the Gauss rounds just bounced off their energy shields or armor! His people were out classed and out gunned and there was nothing he could do about it.

  “Pull back to junction two forty Alpha. Leap frog. Keep moving back,” he ground out. He hated giving ground, but he didn't have a choice. Now it was about numbers. He had more people and the station was vast. They had limited numbers and objectives they couldn't ignore.

  He felt the irony, a week ago he had been the attacker, ripping open this prize for the Horathian empire. Now here he was the defender, defending said prize. Prime had been his biggest prize, the hardest thing he'd ever taken. It had been hard because his orders required him to take the station intact, with minimal losses to the human crew. Now he knew the enemy wanted it intact, he had hostages, but he wasn't sure how they'd react to him using them as such. The little incident in the airlock told him not well, from the looks of it, they hadn't even stopped to consider station damage or casualties.

  They definitely weren't going to back down, that was pretty much a sure thing. Really, all he was doing was buying time for the fleet to get its collective act together and knock that damn ship out.

  The Major studied his still incomplete blueprints of the station and frowned. He'd have to come up with something fast.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  Meanwhile the people in the station were hiding out in the engineering corridors or bunkered down in safety zones. Ralph ordered the surviving fighters to guard the civilian populations. They had to sit it out, the Marines didn't need the added complication of trying to figure out who was who in the firefights. Nor did they need any friendly fire incidents to haunt their consciences.

  Some like the Taurens hid in engineering and kept fighting a guerrilla war, causing accidents or sabotaging systems. The pirates had quickly learned it wasn't safe to go alone anywhere, even in so called safe sections of the station.

  The Taurens had kept the critical station controls out of the hands of the pirates, and even used locks and explosives to collapse corridors to keep the enemy at bay. Accidents and packing entire corridors with raw material from the industrial plants had helped channel the enemy away as well.

  Any aliens or Neo's were killed on sight by the pirates. It was rough for the people on the station. Being occupied under the boot of oppressor was harsh. Humans captured were locked down or put to work. Those that were deemed too old or unfit were shot in firing squads or dumped out an airlock.

  Gwen, Riff, and Torg had spent the better part of ten days trying to do their normal jobs of keeping the station functional while also fighting the intruders the best they could, there was no other alternative than death. They were dirty and passed the ragged edge of exhaustion, but hope hovered just outside the station.

  Just as the Marines were about to board the Horathians managed to get around a barricade and into power room three. A gloating pirate lifted his plasma barrel and pointed it at the female Tauren. “This'll be fun watching you burn. I haven't had a decent barbeque in months!”

  “Roast cow!” Another pirate called. “I want a burger! Roast her!”

  “No! I won't let you!” Torg snarled, moving in.

  “You and who's army?” the plasma rifler said, laughing an ugly laugh as he switched targets and pulled the trigger. Torg charged when Gwen was threatened and was set ablaze by a plasma rifle. He bellowed in rage, wind milling his flaming arms before he fell.

  However, the intentional suicidal charge had been a planned distraction, one he worked out with Riff over his objections. Torg's death bought Riff time to finish hot wiring the deck plate the pirates were standing on. “Barbeque this you bastards,” Riff said, plugging it in and electrocuting the bastards. The humans screamed in pain, jerking as thousands of watts of power ripped through their metal armor and soft tissue. One pirate squeezed the trigger in a reflexive action but he was already dead. They fell as if in unison, smoking corpses.

  “That's for Torg,” Riff snarled, looking over to his still flaming buddy. He felt tears prick his eyes as Gwen reached for Torg, then dropped her hand and head. After a moment she turned. “Get the fire extinguisher. Put him out and then cover him with something. Someone get the door, weld the sucker shut. We've got work to do.”

  ...*...*...*...*...

  For the past ten days a few of the cybers had used holo tricks to distract the pirates. They were getting wise to them though, so only the most sneaky of holos worked anymore.

  Some of the more pacifistic of the station's ruling council had tried to negotiate with the pirates. Two of their organic number, both humans volunteered to take their terms to the pirates.

  “Now look, we both know it's hopeless. We're offering you an honorable way out,” Francis said, shaking her head. She piously put her hands together. She'd been roughly searched when she had presented herself to the pirates. She wasn't sure where her companion Darlena was.

  “Right,” Major Zimmer said distractedly. Even though the space battle was lost, he still went about, business as usual. A pirate put his hand up under Francis's skirt. She slapped it away. The man gloated, laughing as he reached for her.

  “Keep your grubby paws to yourself!” she growled. “I'm a member of the station's ruling council! I was appointed to the position by Governor Randall himself!”

  “So?” the pirate asked.

  “So I'm a person of some importance. As is Darlena,” she sniffed, nose high. “Do have some respect.”


  “Respect must be earned,” the Major said, then turned to a video feed. Francis's eyes cut to the screen in time to see Juliet sheltering a bunch of alien and human kids behind her. “What are you doing? What's going on?”

  “Nothing much,” the Major said. “You may fire,” he said, then turned to another soldier.

  “Fire! What did he mean...” She gibbered when she saw the pirates open fire, cutting Juliet and the kids apart. She stared, blank eyed. The pirates would talk about something as if they were civilized, but then calmly order children to be executed on a side channel.

  “You're barbarians,” she said in an awed voice.

  “You have no idea what we are. Take her to see what's left of her friend. We'll send their heads back as a message to the stationers.”

  The woman screamed as two men grabbed her roughly and then started ripping her dress off as they hauled her out. She kicked and writhed, but there was nothing she could do to stop them. Finally she broke down into sobs and let them drag her away.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  The council had watched the entire incident through Francis's implants. They had been tempted to warn her of Darlena's fate, but had in the end hoped it wouldn't be the same. Obviously they had been wrong.

  Sid and Emily Berkheart called the council's attention to the executed women and children. Silently Sid put up a freeze frame just before the firing squad had fired. Between the alien kids and the Horathians was Juliet.

  “No,” Emily said softly. “Who's going to tell Romeo?”

  “He's dead. He died an hour ago,” Taylor said gruffly.

  “Did she know?”

  “She may have. I don't know. It doesn't matter now.”

  Two of the pacifists committed suicide rather than see their home torn apart by barbarians once more. They left notes saying they just couldn't handle the violence anymore.