“Ah, all right, let the old man through,” Leo said jokingly.
I nodded, ignoring the remark. I was thirty-four and that was barely puberty considering people now lived to be three hundred years of age. If they had the credits for the process, that is.
“Have a nice evening,” I said with relief but didn’t let it show.
I knew how young recruits could be so hot-headed. After all, I’d been one a decade ago. Staying away from them was usually the best course of action for a civilian.
Just as I was about to leave, the woman grabbed my briefcase and pulled me back a step. My black reindeer spilled over the glass and onto the floor, causing my heart to skip a beat. She didn’t just do that, did she?
“Wait, what’s with the hurry?” she asked with a smirk on her face. She could be considered pretty in comparison to most girls her age, especially after the nanite treatment. Long, blonde hair framed a pale face and big green eyes.
“I’d appreciate it if you let go of the briefcase,” I said, almost unreasonably composed.
“What’s in there, old man?”
Her grip was incredibly strong for a young woman her age. Even without the nanite injections, this girl could hold her own, so no wonder she was going around trying to get into a fight or scuffle.
“Work stuff.”
“Hey, Layla, that’s enough. Let the guy go,” Leo said again, this time his voice slightly stronger.
“What? I’m not doing anything.”
Her voice was calm yet filled with sarcasm as the smirk still hung on her face. Several of the regulars finally noticed something was off and I could feel their gazes linger on us. None of them were fighters, but they all knew me for years now and would most likely risk a brawl to help out.
The Lousy Scrag was like a gathering place for the family to many of them. In a city with thirty million people, this tiny rundown place served as an island in a sea of noise and anonymity.
“Need some help there?” old Flint asked as he got up from his chair.
He was 166 years old but still in decent shape for an old geezer. Layla burst into laughter as Timmy followed suit, and for the first time since it all started, a very subtle frown made its way up to my face.
“It’s ok, Flint, everything’s fine,” I said, trying to sound as composed as earlier, but I was starting to really lose it by now. “Guys, I know you’re having a blast tonight, and we all appreciate what you’re doing for all of us. I’ll pay for the next round and we can all enjoy our evening, how about it?”
I immediately noticed Leo’s face going from troublesome to mild-mannered and I knew the kid would leave it there, but neither Layla nor Timmy seemed to agree with him. They were out for trouble and nothing was going to stop them.
“All right, pay the drinks if you’re a man of your word.” Layla laughed as she let go of the briefcase in a dramatic motion. She turned to the waiter and spoke again. “You heard the man, six beers, and whatever these two want to drink!”
The waiter from earlier looked over at me and met my eyes, but I nodded slowly.
“Give them the drinks, all right?”
I turned away again and took another step when a hand tightened its grip around my arm, pulling me back for the third time.
“You won’t even toast with us, geezer?” Layla asked seriously.
“I will do this one last thing for you,” I said, but the tone of my voice wasn’t composed anymore. On the contrary, it was almost sinister.
“Oh? Are we getting serious now?”
“Let’s just toast. Layla, was it? To you new recruits.”
“And to a very serious… What are you anyway? A teacher or something?”
“I’m a Tech Master at Ion Industries.”
“To a very serious Tech Master at Ion.” She laughed mockingly. They all had a sip and what seemed like the end of a very uncomfortable conversation was just the beginning of a very uncomfortable situation.
“Have a good one,” I said for the last time and turned away from the group, sincerely hoping I saw the last of it.
Layla wouldn’t have it. She was out for blood that evening, and to her unrefined and overconfident senses, I smelled deliciously weak. She grabbed my briefcase for a second time and pulled again.
“You still haven’t told me what’s in there.”
My face turned sour and I said nothing for a very long moment as a dead silence fell over the whole bar. Only Old World music could be heard playing from the speakers in the walls.
She pulled the briefcase again, almost snatching it out of my hand. Everyone’s eyes were glued on the two of us. Just then my INAS flared up detecting the girl’s heightened adrenaline levels. She was a threat.
The damn woman was unnaturally strong without even having gotten her nanite injection or her INAS. Shit, she was going to be problematic to take on, let alone her friends as well, but I wasn’t going to take any more shit from a couple of drunk kids with a hero complex. No one could say I hadn’t tried the right way, but now it was time to show them why I was their senior.
“Let the briefcase go, kid,” I said with a warning tone. “You don’t want to push it any further than you already have.”
“Yeah, just let it go, Layla,” Leo said again. I appreciated the effort, but she wasn’t going to budge, no way.
“Just do as Leo there says. Let go so I can go home and lay down. It’s been a long day.”
Layla smiled viciously but it wasn’t her who threw the first punch, it was Timmy. Something in me stirred as Timmy’s fist approached. The nanites in my body rushed through my veins together with the increase in adrenaline, but it was a little too late though. The fist threw me back, causing me to almost lose my footing.
The regulars in the bar jumped to my aid but I held up my hand and they didn’t move. They knew I was able to hold my own, so they listened. All eyes were on me now.
“Do you really want to know what’s in the briefcase?” I asked as a feral grin crept up my face.
“Yeah, show us!” Timmy demanded almost out of his mind.
Using my INAS interface, I activated the nanites in the briefcase. An electric shock forced Layla to let go, but before it hit the floor, millions of nanites, which were part of the briefcase itself, shifted around in mere seconds and turned into a drone.
The drone attacked Timmy just as I ordered. It released its clamps and struck Timmy’s head, binding itself around the neck and forehead. The unsuspecting recruit tumbled, losing his balance just as the familiar slammed his head against the counter with such force that an audible crack resounded in the bar. His skull must have cracked, with such ease it made me almost feel sorry for him.
Utterly confused, Leo stood frozen in place, but Layla was already on my little helper. She grabbed the drone and tried to smash it against the floor, but an intense electric shock made her let go just before it slammed into the ground.
I tackled her to the ground and bashed her head into the dirty stone tiles.
I was outmatched when it came to pure strength. I went for a chokehold, keeping her down and pressing against her windpipe, but the young woman seemed to have been schooled in martial arts as she moved around, despite her health dropping at a rapid pace.
Layla dislodged herself and almost caught me in the same maneuver I was going for only seconds ago. We stumbled against the counter and she released me as I slammed her head into the wooden construct before I pushed off the ground. She grabbed for me and tore part of my shirt off, leaving me standing there in utter disbelief as a trickle of blood ran lazily down the corner of her mouth.
I jumped back and created some distance between us as I tried to cover the spot where the shirt had ripped, but didn’t have time to do anything as Layla got back up to her feet. Before she could do anything else, the young woman stopped and narrowed her eyes on me.
In the middle of my chest, just beneath the center of my collarbone, a circular scar glared right back at her. The place, which was an upro
ar mere seconds ago, was now deathly silent.
“That’s...” Leo began but stopped to take a deep breath. “That’s the mark of an ulyx rebirther. You were...”
I said nothing as I cursed inwardly. No one was supposed to see this, and they hadn’t for all these years, but now the cat was out of the bag.
“You’re right,” I replied calmly. “I was for years on the front line until I finally died. Now I carry the mark of one that was remade in his own image by Ka technology.”
The moment of silence that ensued didn’t last too long.
“So, what?” Layla snapped, still angry beyond reason.
“That’s enough!” Leo growled. “Are you stupid? Do you know what this means?” he asked, grabbing her arm. “He was in the Ulyx Cluster and died there fighting! The same place we’re going for! And don’t you remember what they said? Ordinary soldiers don’t get a damn revive!”
Layla, who suddenly felt the weight of judgment by several dozen eyes wouldn’t budge, however. In her mind, there was only one way she could end this, and that was by defeating her enemy. Me.
What I lacked in strength, however, I made up in experience and smarts. Even before I got up from the floor, I came up with an idea while remembering the words of a previous mentor.
When facing an overwhelming force, one can only win by overwhelming cunning.
It was a saying that was drilled into me over all the years of service, and now I had something to show for it.
“Don’t you wonder where the drone went?” I asked as the corners of my lips curled up slightly.
She snapped her head around, and only managed to spot the drone by the time he was done doing what I commanded. He hung there from the wall, connected to the power socket directly supplied by electricity from the Megapolis. The drone had just finished supercharging when she leaped for me.
Buzzard slammed into her from behind and discharged the stored electricity, scorching her pale skin and paralyzing the hulking woman. She stood there for several heartbeats, managing to stand on her feet but eventually dropped on her back, slamming her head against the hardwood floor.
For a moment there was nothing but silence in the bar and then… then the cheers came.
“Are we done here?” I asked the stunned Leo who was nothing short of terrified by the whole incident.
He nodded. “Yes, sir.”
“Get them out of here before I change my mind!” I snapped at him just to see the boy squirm for a moment longer.
“Sir!” he snapped back and saluted before dropping to his knees and slapping his friends awake. Timmy got up first and helped pick Layla up along with Leo. They carried the young woman out of the bar, but just before they left the place, I called out to Leo.
“Take care out there, kid. You’ll need it, trust me.”
2
In my experience, having a hangover was seldom the only punishment life threw at you the day after drinking yourself to an inch of… not death, but not far from it either. That Sunday morning life didn’t just gift me a headache like those from legends and fables. No, it wasn’t just the dozen black reindeers, and it wasn’t the black eye and unrelenting pain in my shoulder that a certain young woman awarded me with. Those things only seemed like a background to the orchestra of suffering that came with a big fat message popping into my INAS.
Incoming Message:
Sergeant Richard Stavos. Please report to the HQ for deployment at 0600 sharp.
For a good minute, I just stared through the half-translucent message, not really conscious enough to take it all in. Sure, I knew it wasn’t a dream and I vaguely remembered reading the same thing yesterday. The all-too-present and real pain was living proof of this being real, but my mind just wouldn’t accept the reality before me. Unable to force myself to get up, I turned over and fell asleep again.
Incoming Message:
Sergeant Richard Stavos. Please report to the HQ for deployment at 0600 sharp.
REMAINING TIME: T-62 Minutes
“No!” I snapped at no one in particular. “I won’t report to the HQ! I’m not a soldier anymore!”
I pulled the blanket back over my head and force-closed my eyes again. I muttered something I couldn’t even understand myself as I tried to fall asleep again, but I wasn’t having any luck. Especially not after the third message disturbed my renewed attempt at sleeping.
Incoming Message:
Any Specialist, Veteran, or Commissioned Officer who ignores the summons will be Considered AWOL and prosecuted per military law.
REMAINING TIME: T-56 Minutes
I knew from experience that having a hangover was seldom the only punishment life would throw at you the day after drinking, but what life decided to crush me with wasn’t punishment for drinking. It felt more like handing a giant rock to an already drowning man.
Deployment? The military? I was a civilian! I had already served my time! Why was this happening to me? I knew they weren’t joking about prosecution as the military generally lacked the humor. All I could do was hope, really intensely, even insanely, that it was all a big misunderstanding, but even then, deep down, I knew it hadn’t been. The military never made mistakes, and if it did, they would just say it was intentional from the get-go.
My whole body trembled as I stumbled through my one-bedroom apartment as I tried to reach the bathroom. It was an understatement if I said I didn’t throw up whatever was left in my guts from the night before. And then some.
I washed my face and limped to the kitchenette where I grabbed the handle of my foodie. It pricked my finger and instantly analyzed my bodily composition. They were handy machines that could concoct mixtures with all the nutrients your body was missing at that given moment. Sure was handy when you were drunk and out of your mind.
I gulped it down and waited for the protein, carbs, fats, and stimulants to enter my body and dissolve. Once they had some two minutes later, I finally regained some sense of myself. A sudden thought came crashing down on me as I stood there staring blankly at the window.
“Deployment?” I screamed at my unsuspecting TV, which was immediately turned on by voice activation, and began defining the term for me.
SEARCHING FOR TERM: Deployment
EXPLANATION: The movement of troops or equipment to a designated place of position for military action.
“What?” I said as my face changed into a frown. I stopped myself instantly as the TV continued in its neutral voice.
The term DEPLOYMENT is mostly searched along with the term ULYX CLUSTER.
Do You Want To Know More?
I couldn’t speak for a long minute as I just stood there, still like a statue of the world’s saddest man. The TV’s AI didn’t take up on the hint and went on as if I expected more from it.
The Ulyx Cluster is a star cluster consisting mostly of B-type stars in the Southeast Region of the Perion constellation.
“Shut up!” I hissed under my breath.
Shanah, a star within the Ulyx Cluster sporting a massive habitable zone—
“Shut up already! Turn off!” I cursed and threw the remote at the screen. It bounced off and hit the floor, but the TV finally gave in and turned off, the AI going dormant for the time being.
I squeezed the foodie cup vengefully while looking at the screen, but it didn’t even have a single scratch on it. Damn nanites repaired everything as quickly as they could.
“Sorry,” I muttered as my mind stopped racing and I processed what was going on. “I’m sorry for hitting you.”
I should never harm a piece of technology as I was a Technomancer. It was the first lesson they taught us. The Mongol had his horse, the Technomancer had his tech-gear. It was a relationship of mutual care and respect. I couldn’t believe I just snapped at my one and only friend, but it wasn’t as if he had any feelings. Or so I hoped.
It took another warning from my INAS to shake me into action. HQ wasn’t too far from my place and I decided that mourning over my fate was pointless. An
other thing the military taught us was to accept things without lamenting over them. Inaction was paralyzing and it created a reinforced loop. It was best to accept things as quickly as possible and adjust to the given situation. That was our motto, but however much I pressed down on my dreams and wishes, lingering hope remained that all of this was just a misunderstanding.
“This is not a misunderstanding, Sergeant,” Officer Liang said as he checked his own INAS at the entrance to HQ. “It says here that you have been re-enlisted as of last night.”
“Re-enlisted? I was honorably discharged three years ago! I’ve also received a medal for life’s sake! How can I be re-enlisted just like that?”
“Well, apparently the war effort is in dire need of Technomancers. Though I have no idea why they even bother calling you people back.”
“The war effort is in need… but what about my needs? When I died no one gave three shits about me being left with an ordinary body! And what was that about Technomancers?”
“I’m sorry, Sergeant, but I’m just doing my job. Please report to our superiors. I got other things to do.”
I sighed and walked past him, then dropped on one of the steel benches at the entrance. Then it suddenly hit me: the second carrier from yesterday. There was nothing on the news about it, but this situation at hand was all I needed to connect the dots.
The Alois Hegemony must have been making ground in the Ulyx Cluster, and what better way to stop them than to throw millions of humans at them. Of course, they wouldn’t run the information in human-occupied space since no one liked to talk about casualties.
Ever since we joined the Commonwealth, the Ka and the Imminies have steadily milked our worlds for soldiers. That was the price for Ka technology, a price most of our Astro Consuls were happy to pay. Especially since it wasn’t their children that were thrown into the meat grinder. But then again, they wouldn’t give a shit about them either as long as they remained in power.
Starblood: A Military Space Opera Series (War Undying Book 1) Page 2
