by Ben Weaver
We neared the hatch, and Halitov appeared from the shadows and came toward us, his eyes glossed with tears, his jaw going slack in surprise? Anger? Suddenly, he cackled like a madman. “Have a look at this!”
Dim, overhead lights picked out a sweeping subterranean hangar. Our sleek fighters were, indeed, waiting for us, save for the fact that they had been reduced to a half dozen mounds of charred wreckage. Around them lay dozens of still burning bodies, most of them members of my battalion who had succumbed to acipalm-three grenades. The stench was beyond unholy, and the sight of limbs strewn all over the tarmac would rob me of many nights’ sleep. As we moved farther into the hangar, the full extent of the carnage hit home. There was Jimmy Chico, Mike Blair, Brenda Tax, Simon Kuhns, and Ripley Martin from Turbo Company. And there were, well, parts of Tina James and Billy Fitzgerald. Sure, I had lost people before—but never in such large numbers and never so brutally. At least three platoons had come for the SRTCs. I don’t believe a single Warden made it out. The Alliance Marines took no prisoners.
“Big time ambush,” shouted Halitov. “This place was clear. I sensed it. I’m not lying. I swear!”
“I don’t understand how they got past our cruisers—unless someone fed them our encryption codes. They knew exactly where to hit us,” I said.
“Doesn’t matter anymore,” Halitov snapped. “Nothing does.”
“You said the ships would be here,” cried Rainey.
I frowned at her, then realized that she didn’t recognize the rubble. “They are here.”
She looked at me, looked at the tattered, twisted lumps, then began to hyperventilate.
Halitov threw away his particle rifle and shook his head fiercely. “One minute, thirty seconds.”
“We’re dead,” Rainy said, her eyes bugging out. “We’re dead.”
I went to Halitov, put a hand on his shoulder. “We’re not going out in this hole. Let’s head up top, stand tall, and die like soldiers.” A chill broke across my shoulders as I uttered the words. I still had trouble accepting defeat, but death…I’m not sure why, but I wasn’t scared. I wanted to raise my fist in defiance at the enemy, let him know that I cursed him to the bitter end.
Halitov finally regarded me and nodded.
We mounted a pair of ladders, passed through a short conduit, and opened a tarmac hatch. The wind whistled and whipped over us as we pulled ourselves up and onto the broad stretch of pavement, the buildings behind us still burning, some in the process of caving in on themselves. The bodies of my people littered most of the walkways, and I found myself studying their positions and replaying how they had died:
That squad over there had fanned out near the wall. The sergeant had called for the first fire team to move up in an attempt to get the Alliance Marines advancing from behind that fuel depot to push back, falling directly into a crossfire. But there were just too many Marines. And despite losing his first dozen, that enemy platoon leader had ordered his people to press on. They overran my team’s position, and those young people—the very best the colonies had to offer—were swatted out of existence. I shut my eyes, but the firefights continued to play out with excruciating clarity until Halitov nudged me.
Crab carrier turbines reverberated in the sky, and there they were, burnished carapaces glinting in the sun and soaring into the heavens in a massive retreat.
“Guess they know about our core leak,” said Halitov.
“I think it was intentional.” I raised my arm, rolled my wrist, then thought better of shaking a fist. No one would see it anyway.
“Fuck you!” screamed Halitov at the departing troop ships. He turned and had trouble meeting my gaze. “All right, so I didn’t have a gut feeling about Delta. I sent our people away from here.”
“You did what?”
His tone grew defensive. “I sent them away—because you never listen to me. Because we should’ve had our own plan to get out of here.”
I ran up, got in his face. “We did!”
“What? Leave with the grunts? Part of the code, huh? We’re officers! And the grunts are dead!”
I grabbed his shoulders. “So what the fuck did you do?”
“I used our battalion as a diversion so we could get out.”
“No, you didn’t do that,” I said, my eyes feeling as though they would burst from my head. “You didn’t do that. Tell me you didn’t do that!”
“I sent everyone to the other pads, leaving this one open. I was hoping the Marines would jump them first. Those troops down below? They’ve must’ve figured out what I did and tried to get out, but the Marines beat them to it.”
“So you fucked over our people to save yourself.”
“Not just me. Us!”
At that moment, we were going to die anyway. I just wanted him to die first. And by my hand. I reared back, about to deliver a punch that would penetrate his combat skin, but he saw it coming, ducked, and delivered a blow to my abdomen, knocking me back.
“I’m sorry, man! I just had to!”
I clutched the fire in my belly and leaned over as Rainey shouted for us to stop.
“You lied to me, Rooslin. You lied! And when you did that, you fucked me over, too. You took everything we’ve done together, all we’ve been through, and just threw it out.” I was so upset that I couldn’t speak anymore.
He closed his eyes. “Nothing matters now.”
“How much longer?” asked Rainey.
“It’s better we don’t know,” said Halitov.
She nodded. “What’s it going to feel like?”
Halitov switched off his combat skin, then swung around, holding palms out, over the tarmac. “The ground will rumble. Then comes a pulse of light so bright that closing your eyes won’t help. Your eyelids will feel like they’re melting off. Then, in the next few seconds—”
Rainey waved a hand. “All right, enough.”
I lowered my head, thought of doing something, praying maybe, but I had never been a very religious man, probably because of my father’s break from the church, but mostly because I had trouble believing in a higher being that could create a species as violent as us. Instead, I asked questions. What was the point of my life? Had I made a difference? Had I understood what being a soldier really means? Had I lived with honor? Had I forced my best friend to lie to me? I still had no answers, but I did have one regret: I was going to die without ever being a father. And I believe that was the first time in my life that I seriously considered what raising my own family would mean.
“I’m so scared,” said Rainey. “I’m so scared. Isn’t there anything we can do? Anything?”
“Just make your peace,” answered Halitov.
“You guys are Colonial Wardens,” she spat. “We’re just going to stay here and die in the explosion?”
I glanced up at Halitov, who took a few steps back. He studied her, then gazed knowingly at me. “She’s right, Scott. So I have to give it a shot.”
He wanted to reach into the bond and attempt to will himself out of the blast zone. The drain could kill him. It would definitely kill me. “Take her,” I said, knowing that if he focused hard enough, he could hold onto her, and the two of them could streak along the bond between particles.
“I can’t,” he said, tapping his temple. “No one comes in here with me.” His childhood trauma, the one that involved him being locked in a storage container, once again reared its ugly head.
“What’re you talking about?” demanded Rainey.
“Don’t you leave without trying to save her,” I warned, waving off Rainey’s question. “You’ve already lied to me. Just do this. It’s…your…job.”
Halitov took another step back, wearing the face of a man whose world was splintering before his eyes. He visibly trembled as he took another step—
And dematerialized.
“Motherfucker,” I said under my breath.
Rainey jolted, then glanced around for Halitov. “Where did he go?”
“If there’s a Heaven,
he’s going to Hell,” I said.
She looked at me, then bared her teeth. “You. I have to die with you. Why not someone I love?”
“Tell me about it,” I said, then went to her, took her hand. “Let’s take a walk.”
With our backs to the oncoming blast, we started off down the tarmac, our faces lifted into the breeze. After a hundred or so yards, I glanced over my shoulder.
“We should be dead by now, right?” asked Rainey.
I froze. “Yeah.”
“What happened?”
“I don’t know. I remember some engineers were going in there to contain the leak.”
“Well, maybe they did!” she cried, grabbing my shoulders. “Maybe we’re going to…”
She broke off as the ground quaked.
I grabbed her, pulled her in close. “Just close your eyes.”
If I could only reach into the bond and take us out of there…I tried, but that warm, comfortable feeling was gone. The bond felt hollow, cold, and distant. I wondered if Halitov had made it out. The son of a bitch had broken my heart.
The ground shuddered even more, knocking us off our feet. Winds of hurricane force roared over us, accompanied by a roar that seemed strangely familiar. I rolled, strained to see anything through the sudden storm.
“Ten seconds!” someone boomed. “Let’s move! Let’s move!”
Hands snatched my arms, and suddenly I was dragged toward an ATC hovering just a few yards from us. Two Colonial Wardens had grabbed Rainey and were rushing her up the aft loading ramp. Through teary eyes I spotted a shockingly old Halitov, seated in a jumpseat beside three civilian engineers, all of them pale and thoroughly exhausted.
I was led to a jumpseat, collapsed into it, as the ramp whined rapidly up and the ATC’s crew exchanged rapid departure commands. I caught the attention of one engineer, a wiry, bearded man with a ruby in his ear. “You shut it down?”
He shook his head, checked a tablet in his lap. “Critical mass is imminent.”
“But we picked up a couple more minutes on the clock,” added Halitov.
I drew back in surprise. “You helped them?”
He raised his brows. “Figured I’d go down there and sit on the thing, like I told you.”
“I don’t know how he did it,” said the wiry engineer. “But he bought us the time, saved our lives.”
The disdain that hardened my expression lifted a little as I stared at Halitov until the ATC’s pilot engaged the turbines. We slammed into our jumpseats as the ship climbed in a forty-five degree angle away from the tarmac.
My heart sank, and not from the ride, as I glimpsed LockMar Randall from above. Twenty or more fires heaved great clouds of smoke into the sky, and I couldn’t find a single building or hangar that appeared intact.
“Here it goes,” said the wiry engineer.
Blinding white light swept over the porthole for a moment, even as our pilot engaged the tawt drive. The light narrowed to a pinpoint as my stomach groaned. The Trans-Accelerated Wave Theory Drive took us back to that moment when all matter was one, then a billionth of a second later—
It was over.
“Major St. Andrew,” the pilot called back from the open cockpit. “We’ve just tawted into the Tau Ceti system, sir. Lieutenant Colonel Diablo will debrief you aboard the Roger Harrington. We’ll dock and decon in five minutes.”
“Very well. Question for you, Lieutenant. Why the hell were you still on site when I ordered a full evacuation?”
“We were never on site, sir. We’re Force Recon, operating under your insignia but fully independent, sir. We were sent in to see if you were still alive. The orders came down from the security chief herself.”
“Really? Well, I’m not complaining.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Lieutenant, if you would, I need a tablet linked to satnet, and I need it now,” I said, as the sergeant sitting next to me thrust one into my hands. “Never mind. Got one. An efficient crew you have here.”
“Yes, sir,” replied the pilot, relishing the complement.
With trembling fingers, I punched up Fifth Battalion’s casualty and MIA report, which was still being revised as I accessed it. Our escape plan called for the civilian shuttles and our ATCs to tawt out and rendezvous with the Roger Harrington. I scanned the list of names of those who had already been checked in, and two names were painfully absent: Captain Taris Markland and Captain Katya Jing. Where the hell were they?
“She make it?” asked Halitov.
“I don’t know. My brother hasn’t checked in either.”
“That doesn’t mean anything. There are still ships en route,” he said, then took a long breath. “How many did we lose?”
“The number’s still unconfirmed,” I said, grimacing at the screen. “Five-eleven so far.”
His gaze drifted off, and for a few moments all he could do was sit and try to find his breath.
“Some of those people could’ve used Delta pad to get out,” I reminded him.
Halitov bit his lip and just nodded.
“Cut him some slack,” Rainey said from across the hold. “He knows.”
I smirked at her. “And I hope you understand that the Wardens won’t cut you any slack. You broke your media agreement, which now subjects you to a full scan. They’ll dig around your head and erase whatever they want. And unfortunately, there’s nothing you can do about it.”
“They can do that to a civilian?” muttered Halitov.
“They can, but they won’t,” Rainey said, narrowing her gaze on me. “They’re not even going to interrogate me. Because you owe me. I didn’t break my agreement. I just wound up in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
I considered her request. She had saved my life, and I would be an ungrateful bastard if I threw her to those thought-probing geeks in intell. “I get full approval of all reports you make regarding this incident. Nothing makes satnet without me seeing it first.”
“Deal,” she said quickly.
I regarded the ATC’s crew. “Gentlemen, what you just witnessed never happened.”
“No problem, sir,” said the sergeant next to me, a round-faced gum-chewer who seemed more bored with than intrigued by our conversation. “I don’t exist anyway.”
After doctors aboard the Roger Harrington patched me up, Halitov and I waited in the small debriefing room adjacent to one of five ward rooms. I kept checking the tablet for news about Jing and my brother. I must have pulled up the report twenty times, and as I called for a twenty-first look, Halitov placed his palm over the screen. “Just let it happen. Don’t try to force it.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked, prying off his paw.
“You have to pull back. Whatever happens is going to happen, you know?”
“You mean like you lying to me?” I said. “You’re my executive officer. I have to trust you. If I can’t, then you’re gone.”
He pursed his lips. “I know.”
“Do you know what you said to me by ordering our people away from Delta pad? You said, Scott, I don’t trust you. And I won’t follow you. And you didn’t.”
“But I did save your life. I went back there, nearly killed myself tapping into the bond and slowing down that core leak. But that doesn’t count for anything, huh? Look at me.”
I didn’t. He grabbed me by the jaw and pulled my head. I burst from my chair, wrenched out of his grip, and stood, falling into the rest position and ready to launch into any one of the quitunutul arts.
“Just like the old days, huh?” he cried, blasting out of his own chair and finding his own rest position. “But back then, I always kicked your ass. Ready for another ass-kicking? Let’s go. Because I am sick and tired of listening to you and your bullshit honor crap. We are more valuable than those grunts. You know that! I heard you say it to Jing! And if that’s the case, then why didn’t we have our own plan for getting out? But oh, no, you’re like the fucking captain of a sinking ship—have to stay on board till the end. We shou
ld’ve been the first ones out and conducted the evacuation from orbit. That’s what should’ve happened. Your plan was shit. The only reason we’re standing here is because of me.”
“No, you just delayed the inevitable. Ms. Brooks sent down that recon team. She saved us.”
“Oh, Jesus. I was expecting a miracle here. Ain’t going to happen. You’ll never give me any credit.”
“Screw credit, Rooslin. I need your trust. But you know what? I’m not sure you’re capable of being my XO anymore.”
“Oh, you’ll fix that, won’t you. You’ll report every move I made because it’s your duty and it wouldn’t be honorable if you tried to cover it up,” he said in a grating kid’s voice.
“The record will show what you did.”
“But you can interpret it. You can tell them we ordered those people away from Delta because we thought the Marines had already ambushed the site.”
I chuckled over the audacity of his request. “Are you serious? You want me to lie for you now?”
“You don’t have the guts to help a friend, do you? You know, if Jing was my girlfriend, I would’ve saved her myself. I wouldn’t have let her rot like you did.”
I charged him, wrapped my fingers around his throat before he could respond. I drove him into the wall, found the bond, and held him there. “I didn’t leave her to rot!”
His eyes grew wide as he realized that I might very well kill him. He could no longer breathe, and as I drew closer to him, I noticed all the grooves in his face and all the pure white hair around his temples. And my gaze traveled to my own hand, now dappled with age spots, the veins popping. I suddenly released him. He started forward, panting, a hand on his throat, the color returning to his face.
“Stop,” I said, putting a hand on my cheek, then touching my crow’s feet. “Rooslin, we’re dying.”
He hesitated, let the fact sink in. We were about to kill each other when, in fact, we might be dead within a week, maybe a month, a year. The aging was unpredictable, and our accelerated fates didn’t need any help from us.
“Ms. Brooks says they’re working on it,” he reminded me. “Well, they’ll still be working on it after they bury us.”
