by Harry F Rey
Tenderly, I put my arm around her shoulder. Knowing it couldn’t provide even the slightest bit of comfort. I returned the smoker to her and she took a deep, deep draw.
“Then they made us bury his fucking body in the snow. He was ten years old. And we buried his body in the snow while that fucking priest stood over him and condemned his soul for blasphemy. Really, I hope they burn this fucking world to dust.”
We sat in silence for a long time. Passing the paper smoker between us and watching the searchlights in the sky.
“What’s was his name, the priest?”
“Agron.”
“And what’s yours?”
“Flo.” She put out a hand.
“Well, Flo,” I said, shaking it and giving her a smile. “It’s very nice to meet you. I’m Ales. And I’m so sorry about Jally.”
Flo shrugged. “Been a long time. Long time since I thought about him even. I don’t know why I did now. Maybe because we’re all probably going to die tomorrow.”
“Life isn’t easy,” I said for lack of anything better to say. “Nothing more than a gamble. What world you’re born on, if you’re rich or poor, good at something or not, like girls or boys.” I stared into the sky, feeling clear, awake. More than I had in a long time. Her hand crept ever so slightly closer to my leg, fingertips gently brushing my trousers.
“Flo, it’s been a pleasure, but I think I’ve got to go.”
“Sure, man.”
Carefully, I stood on the ledge, only now aware of my ass having frozen solid.
“Hey, Ales, take one of these.” Flo reached out and handed me a hand-rolled paper smoker. “You might need it when the world ends.”
I took it and clasped it in my hand. The gift overwhelmed me.. A thin white tube of paper, stuffed with this strange substance and hand rolled. It wasn’t a vial of bright blue chemicals. It wasn’t anything remotely sexual. It was genuine. Perhaps the most real thing I had been given in a long time.
“I think things will turn out okay tomorrow.”
Flo didn’t say anything, but observed me with at least the smallest bit of hope. I shuffled to the ladder, climbed down, and headed back to the hotel, my boots crunching in the snow while Flo carried on smoking.
Chapter Ten
I WAS TWENTY years old. A frustrated young adult, perpetually angry at the universe that I had the misfortune to be raised in war. What’s more, I was a virgin and becoming increasingly convinced I would die that way in the not-too-distant future. Nearly ten years of war robbed me of any chance I might have to love. I lived the daily struggles of an insurgent pilot. Stepping into a battered ship and flying off to harass the enemy amassed in our system, usually in vain, and always knowing I had barely a fifty-fifty chance of making it back alive.
Once an older pilot kissed my cheek when we were alone in the washroom, but he’d flown with my dad and said it was too weird for him to do anything further. Before I could convince him otherwise, he died in the disastrous defense of the western continent during a space bombardment.
Later on, I tried to pursue a young infantry conscript. He liked to spend time with me in the hangar, and I taught him about the mechanics of a ship and how to maintain it. One night, he came into my bunk, and we stayed up all night talking about his plans for when this war would finally be over. He wanted to train as a pilot. He wondered if we could set up a transport company together. I would be his captain and we would travel the galaxy, alone. It was a captivating thought. I wished I could be young and naive enough to still believe it could happen.
At dawn that morning, he finally finished talking and fell asleep for a few hours, tucked under my arm with his head on my chest. At midday, I woke him to get ready to report for duty. By sunset, Loukas was dead, along with ten thousand other young men and women, children really, trying to defend against a ground assault from mechanized infantry.
That was it for me. I could take no more. The resistance was falling apart. The enemy already had three-quarters of the planet under its control. Millions were dead. The end was only a matter of days now. I went to my commanding officer and asked her for whatever mission would inflict maximum damage on the Crejan invaders and result in my death.
She gave me the controls to my father’s old ship, the one they kept in the hall of heroes, and told me to pack it with explosives and fly straight at their command vessels.
“It might delay them by an hour or two, if you make it that far,” she told me, before drinking poison and dying in front of my eyes.
As I flew out, no enemy fighter even cared about my tiny ship. As I searched for the command vessel’s weak point, the place where I could inflict maximum damage, something strange happened. All of the enemy fleet started to pull away. Troop transports, battle cruisers, ships with heavy armor strapped to the side, all of them were leaving the planet like an exodus had been called. Had we won? Was their aim to grind us to a pulp, destroy our way of life, and then let us rebuild in order to teach us a lesson?
I flew out with the Crejan fleet, not wanting to draw any attention to my tiny suicide mission. They were leaving, and fast. We had nearly left the system before I realized what was happening. The viewer window on my ship zoomed in to the world behind me.
I watched in silent shock as the two polar ice caps flattened out and the planet’s middle seemed to grow fatter and fatter. The Holy Mountain of Souls detached from the ground and was hurled into space. For a few seconds, my world had grown rings. But it was the oceans and crust getting trapped in the outer atmosphere. Then the ice caps collapsed inward, as did the rings.
There was no fireball, as one might expect. It ended in a crumple. Only rock and dust left floating around, the matter lost in the sudden absence of what had been so much gravity. It would soon dissipate into big, empty space. In utter shock, I flew out with the Crejan fleet, waiting for the moment they entered the slipstream and I could pull away. Our world, for so long an independent system, proud and free, was gone.
I WOKE UP naked, butt to butt with Turo. He was still asleep and breathing softly. I turned onto my back and stared at him, tracing the curvature of his spine all the way under the sheet. The window let fuzzy light into the room, still darkly shaded but gradually reacting to the morning sun. For a second, I allowed myself to be satisfied in ignorance. Not caring about who he is, where we were, or what might happen next.
Silently, I got dressed, and he only stirred when I sat on the edge of the bed to pull on my boots. He turned, stretched, and pulled the sheets off to reveal only a smile and an early morning gift.
“Where are you going?” he asked, stroking himself. “I need attention. You left me unsatisfied last night.”
I smiled but finished getting my boots on.
“I have to get to my ship.”
The weight of what he wasn’t saying. Not whether I would return, not when or if we could see each other again. Not where would I go or what he would be doing. Not if the planet was going to be bombed. Not if I had the weapons they were searching for. Not if I wanted to end this war before it had even begun.
“Okay,” he said.
And with that, I left without a word. Another man, another memory, another night with nothing to show for it when morning came. Part of me wondered if I’d made a mistake not asking Turo about free passage off the planet. I only had the very first part of a plan in my head—get to the ship. The rest was still a cloudy mystery.
I couldn’t shake the sense I’d be seeing Turo again sooner rather than later. I yawned as I made my way from the hotel back to the space station; everywhere remained as crushingly empty as it’d been yesterday. My body slow, sore, spaced out. Like so many mornings after lost nights chasing fleshy dreams. Normally, those adventures preceded days when I could sit back and make a journey on autopilot. Today wasn’t likely to be one of those days.
In the deserted spaceport, I slouched along the endless corridor that circled the edge of the docking pods. I trudged toward pod 56 where the Loukas sat.
Barely two steps before it, I stopped. Something wasn’t right. A fabricated silence. A disturbance in the air, or perhaps soft voices coming from afar. The metal door would slide open the instant I placed my hand on the keypad, so I waited, trying to attune my senses to what might be over the threshold.
Silently, I stepped to the side and stood flat against the wall, filled with apprehension and the familiar pangs of nervous energy. If the door opened to pointed weapons, I might still have a second to run. With the same caution as I would touch a searing hot piece of metal, I placed my hand on the keypad. The door whooshed open, but no gunfire followed it.
Carefully, I poked my head around and breathed a sigh of relief. My ship sat exactly where I’d left it, but then took the relief straight back at the sight of six figures standing around it holding weapons.
Two of them turned to see why the door to the cargo they guarded had opened, and pointed their rifles straight at me.
“Hey, you. Get out here. Who are you?”
Hiding, I sized up the corridor. To run back to the entrance would mean crossing the path of the open door. They would shoot, or follow me at the very least. Even if I could outrun them, where would I go?
Before I could decide, two female soldiers clad in black with silver Union insignia greeted me with high-powered assault rifles at point-blank range.
“Come.”
One of them locked my hands into electromagnetic cuffs and led me inside. I preferred being cuffed by Turo, although the gear was exactly the same. I flexed my wrists against the tight constraints and circled my shoulder to stop it seizing up as they pushed me towards my ship. The one the Union now stood guard around. The noses of two weapons nudged into my shoulders when surely one should be enough. Four other figures with their back to me were inspecting The Loukas. The ship remained sealed however, as it would till I gave the command. One tall, well-built figure who seemed like the unit leader explained to his commander what had happened over his wrist-tech.
“No, the area is clear. We think it could be on one of three ships. Yes, we have them all secured.”
I recognized that voice.
“No, not an incident. We’ve apprehended the intruder. Yes, if it’s him, I’ll let you know.” The unit commander finished his update and turned to see the identity of their captured prisoner.
“Ales?”
“Ukko?”
“What the infinity are you doing here?” he demanded with genuine shock, like I was the very last person he ever expected to see. He noticed his two soldiers with their weapons raised to my head and got angry.
“Okay, that’s enough. Stand down,” he told them. “Come here.” He put a hand on my shoulder and guided me away from the others. “What the infinity are you doing here?”
I’d not expected to see Ukko like this. Not in these circumstances, not in a million years. Even though I’d known for the last day he had an involvement in the siege, to be confronted by him in broad daylight, surrounded by others when all this time I’d imagined our reuniting somewhere darker, with less of an armed audience, only emphasized how pathetic my situation now was. I’d left Baldomar with a sense of leaving behind the humiliation he’d inflicted on me, but now I’d traveled to the edge of the Verge just to fall at his feet.
“Seems like I’m under arrest,” I said, lifting my wrists.
He frowned. “We have to keep the area secure. Those are our orders.”
“Are those orders to also violate the rules of free trade? To illegally interfere with the free flow of goods? Ukko, if you want to be a pirate then shoot me already.”
“Really, Ales stop with this high and mighty attitude. You’ve flown right into the middle of an ongoing security operation. What do you expect?”
Nothing about this Ukko turned me on. His thick arms under the black uniform and handsome square face were meaningless in light of this petty, official side.
“I expect the Verge’s rules and regulations to be adhered to. I know my rights. You can hold me for twenty-four hours, but you can’t touch my ship. If illegal smuggling is suspected, then a Trades Council representative must undertake the inspection.”
“I’m here to make the inspection,” a voice said from behind me. Turo. I snapped my head around, and there he stood: every part the official with his gray tunic and long black coat. So different than the naked man I’d left in my bed half an hour ago.
“Commander Turo.” Ukko stood more upright and swiftly gave a salute, as did the other soldiers. “Sir, the spaceport is secure. The forward strike team will have the high priest in custody within the hour.”
“Do you two know each other?” Turo asked us.
I stayed silent, not planning to say another word. Ukko glanced at me from the corner of his eye. I guess it didn’t give the best impression to be associated with a man under arrest.
“Eh, uh, a little, Commander, somewhat. I didn’t know he would be here.” Ukko fumbled the words out and dropped his gaze to the ground.
Turo stepped closer to me. His expression gave away disappointment. Like he knew about Ukko and me, like I’d gone behind his back. Cheated on him, betrayed him.
“Somewhat,” he said to me, voice full of knowing. He turned on his heel and walked toward the ship, staring at it.
My mouth hung open in shock. Did he feel he owned me already? I didn’t remember being bought.
“Lieutenant, open this ship.”
“Sir, sir. There’s a problem. We can’t,” Ukko said, scurrying towards Turo.
I spluttered, half in disgust at Ukko’s groveling, half in the knowledge that I was the only one in the galaxy who could command the ship to open.
Turo marched over to me, displaying every bit of the confidence and authority that had made me melt in his arms last night. He placed a black-gloved hand on the back of my head, ever so slightly gripping my hair. It shot a familiar sensation through me.
“Six hours from now, the siege of Jansen will end with a demonstration of the full capabilities of the Union forces, for all the Verge to see. You can either be up there, with us and live or remain down here, with them and…”
“I’m not joining you.”
“I don’t care what you do. Open the ship, do what I say, and you can leave with the fleet.”
When I was out of options, my strategy was always to do what seemed like it would keep me alive the longest. I had no loyalty to Jansen nor to the Union. So Javer wouldn’t get this contract filled. It wasn’t my fault if the goods were confiscated. He couldn’t exactly report me to the Trades Council for failing to deliver the weaponized galinium they said was illegal.
I lifted the wrist-tech to my face, twisting against the electromagnetic cuffs that kept my hands slammed together. “Loukas netach-at.” The words were in a language they didn’t know. It was the answer Turo wanted, though. The ship creaked as the doorway on the side opened and a thin walkway extended to the ground.
“There isn’t room for all of you,” I said aloud. Turo’s face twisted into the most menacing smile possible. I couldn’t say I didn’t feel a bit turned on, just a little.
“Lieutenant Ukko,” he barked, “join us. The rest of you stand guard. Don’t let anyone inside this docking pod.”
Ukko held onto my shoulder and guided me toward the ship, following Turo who stormed in like a conqueror. There was tenderness in his touch, then a whisper of his breath against the hairs of my ear.
“Don’t trust him,” Ukko pleaded with a hushed, hurried whisper.
The doorway closed behind us as we entered the ship. My captain’s chair and the control panel took up half the space in the tiny main cabin with a ladder fixed to the wall behind that led up to the cramped mattress on the top deck and to the storage hold below. They would need me to get access to either.
Turo draped himself across the chair, my chair.
“Lieutenant, attach his cuffs to the ladder.”
Silently, Ukko guided me to the wall. Freeing one hand for a second, he broug
ht it through one ladder rung at the level of my head and reattached my hand to the invisible cuffs. Not too uncomfortable, for now. But with my hands tied above me, my arms would soon get sore. He didn’t look me in the eye, though, and went straight to Turo’s side like a dog to a farmer.
“If you have the high priest, why are you going to attack the planet?” I asked.
Turo leaned farther back on the chair, legs spread. “You’re going to give the galinium to me. You and your ship will be escorted to orbit, and then you will leave this system and never return.”
“So you don’t want to ever see me again? Is that it? Turo, there are better ways to dump me.”
“Enough of your shit, Ales. My orders were to execute you on the spot. Your friend Javer is being placed under arrest as we speak for organizing the smuggling of an illegal substance.”
I went cold and tried to change the subject.
“But why do you need to attack? You have everything you want. Why do you need to make others suffer?” The words poured out and I regretted it immediately.
Turo stood and stepped toward me. Short breaths escaped from his clenched mouth. He ran a gloved hand up my leg and squeezed my balls, hard. I yelled out, and he clamped my mouth shut with his other hand.
“Ukko, get your worthless ass over here.”
Ukko followed his orders.
