“Where are the Explosions?” Blazer asked as the shuttle lifted back off.
“They’ve already reached the ultimate goal,” sergeant Korto replied.
Blazer sighed in relief, then sat back up in disbelief. “How long ago did they get here?”
“They took a short cut.”
“How?”
UCSB DATE: 1001.023
Star System: Classified, UCSBA-13, Singularity Base
Blazer leaned back, listening to the shuttle’s plasma engines as the pilot took a lazy orbit to their next objective. Within a few pulses of coming aboard he identified the shuttle, the harmonic resonance from its port plasma turbine belonged to shuttle 183. When he’d worked the maintenance decks the annura before he attempted to tune the engine, but no matter what, he couldn’t track down the source of that vibration.
Rubbing his sore shoulder, he looked at the medics tending to the team. I haven’t seen a medic tending to anyone without washing them out yet, he mused. They didn’t appear to do much though according to the readout on Blazer’s macomm, just patched up any open wounds, broken bones, or dislocated joints, like’s Deniv’s shoulder. They left Marda’s sprained ankle and Chris’ welt untended. No surprise there.
The whine of the shuttle’s engines changed tone after Blazer’s clock ticked off the start of the next cycle, a subtle pull of gravity greeting him as it did so. He sat back up in his seat and a moment later felt the shuttle touch down. The light above the hatch cycled from blue to red and the door slid open, revealing a barren landscape beyond.
“Out Slaglicks,” Sergeant Korto barked, and everyone complied.
Blazer had to keep from launching himself when he took his first steps and looked to the G-meter in his helmet. “.26G” He found that curious as he looked at the horizon. That can’t be right, this place is tiny. He took a look up and around, noting the asteroid shell was uniform around them. At the academy he could see how much closer it was to one side of the asteroid shell. That left him with one inescapable conclusion. We’re at the core of the shell. Are we at Singularity Base?
Blazer turned to Sergeant Korto as he stood in the hatch. “Are we?”
“Welcome to Singularity Base.” Korto responded and slammed the hatch shut before the shuttle lifted away.
Blazer looked around in amazement. They were standing at the heart of the asteroid shell. He scanned its horizon and found the debris disk bisecting the shell. Activating the navigation systems in his helmet, he located the academy, the landing fields and the gunnery range in the distance.
He sighed and spotted a navigation marker nearby.
“I’ve got a nav beacon this way,” Blazer pointed. “Must be ours.”
Blazer trudged off towards the beacon, careful not to step too hard and risk launching himself. A short walk later, he found an airlock jutting out of the dust. He looked about—there was nothing else in sight. Even the airlock standing before him was featureless save for a control panel and a set of red and blue lights above the portcullis. The blue light shone, the airlock had pressure.
“Gokhead get it open and get us inside,” Blazer ordered, the low gravity doing nothing to help the fatigue in his aching muscles.
Gokhead set to work examining the simple controls of the door. Tapping a key on the control pad, the airlock depressurized and the red light extinguished the blue. The door popped open before them, presenting them with a dingy white space. Gray boot prints of hundreds of feet marred the once pristine floor.
Blazer didn’t care what lay beyond, sure it would be another test and motioned the team forward. They piled into the large chamber, Arion entering last and pulling the door shut before Gokhead worked the interior controls.
A hiss of air rose around them, and within a pulse, their suits indicated a confed standard pressure with a slightly lower than normal oxygen level. Blazer unsealed his helmet and took in a breath. The air tasted stale, with a hint of dust and the tang of an old air cycler, but it was clean and breathable. Sighing, he removed his helmet. The others followed suit, and breathed in air free of their own body odors before the inner door cycled open before them.
The door swung away to reveal Trevis and Porc. Blazer just stared at them. Free of their suits, they stood before the team in pristine underclothes, and most amazing, clean skin. Blazer rubbed his eyes. I’m dreaming, have to be. The shirt on Trevis looked two sizes too small, the one on Porc three sizes too big, but his eyes did not deceive, they’re clean.
“About time you slackers showed up,” Porc said with a smile. “We’ve been here a good hect already.”
Blazer stared at the pair, unsure what to say before his lips moved without consent. “We lost Datt.”
“I be sorry to hear that,” Trevis replied with a nod, before pushing the hatch the rest of the way open to reveal the remainder of his own team.
The Blade Force looked out upon the Explosions with suspicion. Their hair, their skin, their clothes, all of it was clean. There were no sweat stains, no dirt, no blood, no mud, no feces. After the decle they had been through, it looked more alien to Blazer than anything else.
Marda stepped forward, her helmet in her hand. Her sweat-soaked hair clumped against the sides of her head. “You all look suspiciously, clean,” she remarked, airing the words on all their minds.
Trevis smiled back at them. “There be a refresher in the back corner and the locker beside it be filled with clean clothes, enough for a full squadron. They all be the same size though,” he revealed.
The Blade Force needed no more coaxing than that, and piled out of the airlock into the bunker, rushing towards the trough-shaped sink. Trevis and Porc jumped out the way just in time to avoid them.
Blazer hung back and slumped against the wall. Thank you. His knees threatening to give way he watched his team as they stripped out of their flightsuits and tossed them onto a bench with the Explosions’. Blazer shook his head—modesty was not the order of the cycle as they all stripped out of their stained underclothes as well. No one leered though as they jockeyed for position to wash themselves in the basin, sloughing away a decle’s worth of grime.
The dingy white chamber didn’t afford anything he would call privacy. A pair of tables with low benches split the chamber. Lockers lined one wall, access ports and maintenance screens graced the opposite one by the refresher. Airlocks sat at either end. I wonder what’s on the other side of door number two? As he pulled off his flightsuit, he looked back at Trevis. “So, what’s the story here? Do we have any orders?”
Trevis nodded and handed Blazer a piece of plastisheet from a tray beside the outer airlock.
From: HQ-UCSBA-13 Commander, O-85 Jerlin Sares (Admiral), O-55 Tadeh Qudas (Commander), E-9 Quavin Mir (Command Sergeant Major)
To: Special Operations Cadets
Subject: Bunker Assignment
Teams are to remain in bunker until retrieved by training and/or command personnel. Teams will be monitored from remote location in case of emergency. Teams are to completely assemble components located in three lockers. Failure to do so will result in failure of test. Teams will determine size, nature and constitution of station prior to conclusion of exercise. Emergency release button located on Central Island. Pressing it will end test and fail all participants in bunker. Exiting of bunker via either airlock prior to retrieval will result in failure. Conduct unbecoming an officer conducted inside bunker will result in failure. Teams will pass or fail test as a whole.
Blazer read the orders twice to make sure he understood then handed them to Zithe as he approached from the refresher station. The bald dome of his head shone for the first time since their swim down in the deep ruts. Zithe took the sheet, read it, and handed it back. “So what’s in the lockers?”
“Rifles,” Trevis replied pointing at the tables, the red emergency button waiting under its glass dome in the center. “P-42-C light Plaser rifles to be more exact,” he continued.
Lind held one up in response. One whole side of the sim
ple bullpup-style rifle sat on the table—removed to allow her to assemble the interior electronics. Blazer recognized the weapons. He had used these same rifles during his time with the Mapper’s Guild.
“How far down have they been stripped?” Blazer asked.
“I would say depot level if they be having the solder joints undone, but those be intact,” Trevis replied. “It should be taking less than a cycle to be rebuilding them. But that not be what troubles me about them.”
Blazer looked on as Marda came over, pulling her shirt back down over her head, a relieved smile upon her face after getting cleaned up. Blazer tried not to stare, he had known but hadn’t even considered that she had been nude only moments before. After a decle at such close quarters, and having to change in front of one another several times a cycle, nudity didn’t seem the taboo it once was. Seeing her clean again, he took notice of her body and felt desire begin to stir.
She looked over the orders after taking them from Zithe. “What’s so troubling, Trevis?”
“The magazines, they be fully charged.”
Blazer, Zithe and Marda exchanged nervous glances as Arion walked over, toweling off his still short hair with an extra piece of terry cloth he’d stowed in his flightsuit. “I’m not sure I like the sound of that,” he chimed in. “Especially if we’re in here too long. Cabin fever might set in and I’m not sure I want anyone running around with a loaded plaser rifle at that point.”
“I be agreeing with you there, so we be locking those up then?”
Blazer nodded. “I agree.”
“What about our air and water supply?” Zithe asked.
“We be having enough air and water for eight cycles and that be counting on Datt being here. Without him, a bit longer.”
“What about food and medical supplies?” Marda asked.
Trevis deferred to Telsh as she stood beside the food storage locker. “If we be figuring on eating regular meals, then we be having enough for four cycles.”
Marda looked back at Telsh. “Okay, we can easily stretch that out to eight cycles or more than.”
Telsh nodded and closed the locker after laying out ration bars for each of them.
Blazer looked back over the group when he reached the refresher station. He added his grimy underclothes to the pile and then cleaned himself up. Marda stood beside him with a fresh shirt and shorts as he washed off as fast as he could, feeling like an animal on display now that he was the last to clean up. The warm water felt so good on his skin and hair that he wanted to crawl into the basin. Not wanting to waste their water reserves though, he finished and pulled on the shirt and shorts Marda held for him.
He looked up at his companions as he cinched up the shorts and smiled. “Hey they actually fit.”
No one smiled back. He read the fatigue in everyone’s eyes, even those who sat eating their bland ration bars. This was going to be a long test.
“Okay, I think we’ve all been through enough this cycle. Let’s all bunk down where we can, and we’ll get back to it in a few hects.”
Everyone agreed and started to find open spots on the floor to lie down on.
“We should keep watches just in case they decide to start throwing things at us,” Blazer commented, stifling a yawn. “I’ll take the first watch.”
“I be joining you,” Trevis responded.
Everyone else lay down, some so close they couldn’t help but touch each other, but no one argued. There were no blankets or pillows for them in the lockers, so they slept on their arms where they could. A few pulled their soiled linens from the pile and used them to cover up their eyes. Noticing that, Trevis turned off the lights, leaving on only a dim worklight on the table they’d laid the rifles out on. The giant red button illuminated in response, calling out to them.
Blazer sat down at the worktable. Should I cover that button up with something? Marda sat down next to him before he could then leaned over and lay down on the bench, resting her head on his thigh. She fell asleep in what seemed like an instant. You amaze me, keeping up with all of us despite your pain. He smiled down at her as he set to work, glad to provide her some measure of comfort.
For over a hect, the pair worked in relative silence, taking their time reassembling the rifles. As Trevis finished installing a power coupling, he set his rifle aside and looked up at Blazer. Blazer felt the big man looking at him, and set his weapon down as well. “What’s troubling you Trevis?”
“I just be wondering, wondering how you be doing it?”
Blazer raised an eyebrow at him. Too tired for games, he waved Trevis to continue.
“Look at the numbers Blazer. The Monstero Nach be losing fewer cadets than any other unit.”
Blazer shrugged his shoulders. “Your team is for the most part a veteran unit. You’ve already been to Sheol and back together. I’m only surprised by who you’ve lost so far.”
Trevis nodded in response. “That be surprising me as well. I really thought that Kallie be making it, and to be felled by a cramp. It be hurting us bad, worse than Samtriss, he be a maintainer before the academy. But Kallie, she be one tough soldier, it not be fair to lose her that way.
“But you, Blade Force, you only be losing two as well. That be an enviable number for any group.”
Blazer shrugged again. “I’m not quite sure what to attribute that to, really. I mean all of us had to prove ourselves to come here, you know that.”
Trevis nodded.
“Everyone here has a kill under their belt, no matter the situation that brought it about,” Blazer remarked, Lazith’s dead face flashing before him for a moment. Never again, he thought and ran a hand through Marda’s hair.
“I understand, but the numbers.”
“I know, and I can say that the four of us,” he said indicating himself, Arion, Deniv and Bichard. “We trained long and hard for this. Even before we left Anul for the Navigators Guild, we would go to the holo-sim gaming center in Capben. We would practice in scenarios my grandfather told us about, or that we read about on our own. It was nowhere near as hard as this, and they’ve had us do things here we were never warned about.”
“I be understanding that, and I know what be happening to your team before. I read your file. That be a test to get in here sure as anything.”
“It surely was.” Blazer nodded, trying to push the incident out of his mind. “Dag, has it been a full annura since then already?”
Trevis shrugged. “But what about the others?”
Blazer looked around. “I really don’t know. Chris is still a mystery to me, but I know she has some tragedy in her past. Zithe and Rudjick—I know their first kills had something to do with the dragon corps, but I’m surprised that Rudjick has made it this far. Datt and Treb—they got lost from their squad and stumbled upon a Geffer unit. They had more kills to their names than the rest of us, and we lost them—I never figured on that. And Marda,” he said looking down at her as her head rested on his lap. “She’s been through Sheol I know that.”
“How be her injuries?”
“I’m not sure. But I know she had to have aggravated it during the jump to the academy. Chris got patched up by the medics on the way here. But, that welt on her side will be with her a while,” he said and looked over at Chris, the injury showing in the gap between her shirt and shorts.
Trevis looked over at Marda. “You be having feelings for Marda don’t you?”
Blazer nodded and felt Marda’s hair. “Yes I do. I can honestly say I love her and I don’t know if I can really say the same anymore about any other woman I’ve even been with.” A shudder of guilt ran up his spine in response. I loved Lazith, but not like I love Marda. This is more, this is real, and I don’t think Lazith would object to that. Blazer caught a subtle glance from Trevis towards Telsh and couldn’t help but ask. “You and Telsh?”
“It not be love the way you be thinking of love. Tomeris love be all about breeding stronger kin and kids, and some cycle she and I be doing just that. But now not be
that time. Our blocks still be in and will still be in until we decide it be time. Funny, our families be more inclined to let us breed prior to the academy. But after we be graduating, our breeding potential be even higher.”
“About that, what’s up with Telsh’s name? I thought all Tomeris names were six letters long, the whole combination of parents name thing.”
Trevis stifled a laugh. “Most don’t know that, but Telsh,” he said looking back at her. “Her sire be disgraced, so her mother be cutting his vowel from her name. Otherwise her name be Telash, after her mother Telsin and sire Ashkil.”
Blazer nodded, figuring that to be the case. “What about Chertsin and Saldray?”
“Chertsin and Saldray be only half Telshin, on their mother’s sides. They be keeping with tradition otherwise, Chertsin’s sire be Chertinair of Polain, Anul and his mother Kalsin of Kaldig, Tomer. She be a cousin to Telsh’s mother, but don’t be mentioning that around her. She be considering it a bigger insult than her siring. Saldray’s parents be Saldkang of Bontock, Anul and Kimray of Haplig, Tomer.”
Blazer wasn’t prepared for that, forgetting for a moment how much genealogy played into Tomeris society. “What about how you got here ahead of us?”
Trevis’ laughed slipped out that time, “we be hitching a ride.”
Blazer raised a curious eyebrow in response.
“When we be figuring what the real goal be, we be deciding not to be making the jump to the academy. So we be jumping to grab the observer’s shuttle opposite Korto’s. Two of us be missing it, but we be taking it to grab them,” he explained with a wry smile.
Before they could say anything more, Bichard, Zithe and Porc sat bolt upright. The trio looked around, then rolled over, covering their heads and ears.
“Incoming,” Zithe called.
Not questioning them, the pair doubled over on the benches, covering their own heads, the sudden motion waking Marda up. She shielded her ears as well when she noticed Blazer’s position. The entire bunker shook a moment later and everyone awakened. As the shaking subsided, everyone raced into action, checking the nearest control panels, to assess their status.
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