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Prologue

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

10/3242

It was a holographic meeting; people sat around a desk, and there were three chairs where there had been five just 25 years ago. All the representatives were cloaked in shadow, their features and voices obscured.

“The representative from Osdal has the floor,” a commanding voice said.

Luke knew the representative from Housapel, he had been the one to teach him about Harmony. How to get people to do what he wanted with a small incentive and the right leverage.

“From our communications with Mintran, it looks like the Harmony forces there were not able to secure their positions before the Troopers appeared,” Luke said, his voice coming out deeper and slower.

“We knew that the EMF had many carriers in limbo, so it is not a shock that they had carriers close to at least one of our systems,” Fernix’s representative said, sounding monotone and tinny.

“It will mean that we do not have the materials we need for more weapons and armor,” Luke explained. Osdal supplied the majority of materials to the other systems, but Mintran had fuel and specific metallic materials for building. Items that would take time to get to Mintran from Osdal.

“It looks that Nivad has caught on to Fernix and Housapel, he is rerouting shipping away from our systems in a bid to recreate strike station he says. I think he just wants to keep the materials away from us,” Housapel said.

“It might make sense to let our presence be known soon,” Fernix mused.

Luke and Housapel waited for Fernix to continue.

“We already control all that we would need; we do not need to convince anyone to join our cause. We can also get the propaganda machine going and turn Osdal into a show of what the company forces will do when we try to work for equality. We don’t start with enforcers, we start with chosen, and start making militaries. They will need time to get better and to prepare to fight Troopers. If Nivad thinks that we are already Harmony, then there is no issue,” Fernix said.

There was silence. Luke thought it was a good argument, but Harmony had started in Housapel, and Housapel’s representative was the leader of their movement.

“I think you might be correct, Fernix. With proper militaries, that look to protect the people instead of exercise their power in any way possible, our systems will support us more fully,” Housapel said.

Luke didn’t comment; Masoul and Osdal were proving grounds for tech to be used against the EMF. He cared little for the systems, they weren’t his own. He would make sure his forces bled the EMF as much as possible. That was his role, to weaken the EMF before Housapel and Fernix.

“So shall we move ahead with our plan?” Fernix asked.

Housapel replied, “Yes we shall, send word out to our people to put our plans into motion. Osdal, have the EMF appeared yet?”

“Not yet, though I have freighters out for them,” Luke said.

“Be careful, these ones are smarter than I thought. Using an EMP to blind our sensors and communications - no other EMF Carrier has done that before. Destroying the Earth’s Military Force Carrier Reclaimer is your highest priority,” Housapel said, and even with the voice modification there was no denying that the words were an order.

“I will see to it. Measures have been taken to make sure that we are not blinded by another EMP strike,” Luke said.

“Good. We have lost valuable information being unable to see the performance of new weaponry,” Fernix said.

Luke had had more than one conversation with the other Harmony system heads about how they were building weapons that they didn’t know were still effective or not.

“I think that is all we have to discuss, see to your tasks.” Housapel disappeared from view. Fernix similarly dissolved.

Luke let out an amused snort.

Housapel never said “For the sake of Harmony” around the other system leaders, it was a saying for the useless peons that did their bidding.

Being a CEO for nearly four hundred years and getting sidelined by other systems, Luke and his fellow ‘Harmony leaders’ had conspired to use the lower ranks anger to collect the power and control of other systems. When they were done, they would control Earth. No longer would they be sitting in backwater partnership worlds; they would be the CEOs of Earth.

Luke stood and left the conference room, a hungry look on his face as he pictured Nivad Selvra begging for his life at Luke’s feet.

Chapter 1

Tower

Earth, Sol System

10/3242

Nivad looked at the reports from Housapel and Fernix.

He was a simple looking man, with black hair, light colored skin and a flair for expensive suits. He did not look like Earth and Her Colonies’ power broker. He was the go-between for companies, and he ruled the EMF and intelligence ministry. Information was his trade, and money was his score card.

Company takeovers, and the latest scandal he could use to leverage shares from a prominent CEO, were far from his mind.

His office was large; it held an obsidian black desk, a liquor cabinet, opulent chairs with couches beyond them and wall-length view screens that showed Mega City.

Everything was designed to display both his power and personal wealth.

Dalia and Wallace sat in the chairs in front of the obsidian desk, their faces hard as Nivad held his chin and read reports on his surface.

Harmony had been hit almost overnight. They had removed the CEOs from their systems and called for democracy.

It was a sham, like Earth’s own presidential election. The voice pieces of Harmony were elected; there were a number of them and they even made it look like a fight between them all.

Nivad wondered if Harmony might have had an actual election. With all of the options being Harmonies anyway, whichever one got elected they would spout Harmony’s words.

They’d brought back religion, they’d raised the wages and then asked for people to join their military.

Nivad felt his face tighten as he put the surface down.

There was a light buzzing in the air, telling Nivad and his company that no one would ever hear their conversation.

“It seems that they have finally shown their hands,” Nivad said, looking from Dalia to Wallace. Any other person might have fidgeted or been scared. These two simply sighed and nodded.

Wallace pulled out a cigarette as Nivad sat back in his chair. He offered them to Nivad and Dalia, and they both took one.

Nivad allowed the practice to center his mind as he thought.

“What are our recruiting numbers looking like?” Nivad asked.

“We have three thousand potentials going through every day,” Dalia said.

“Move all Limbo carriers, except the four surrounding Earth. How is that contract for Carriers coming along?” Nivad asked.

Wallace exhaled smoke. “Now we have ‘The Yard’ working for us, we should have twelve carriers produced in a year.”

“What about the new survey ships?” Nivad asked Wallace.

“The first is already in transit to Masoul to track down the Harmony’s FTL communications. The second and third are moving through the uninhabited systems.”

“What can we expect at the end of this?” Nivad looked to the other two.

“Masoul is still rebuilding, Mintran is firmly on our side, Osdal is in opposition. The chosen are still nothing but a large gang that intimidate people. While that works for individuals, for populations it makes them restless and angry. The civilians want them gone, but they’ve been around for so long that they’re used to them. Humans get used to a new situation quickly. They won’t help us but they won’t go against us. It will take new colonists and new CEO’s to get the planet running.” Dalia smoked on her cigarette, bracing herself for the worst parts.

“Fernix and Housapel are doing something similar to Sacremon; they’re giving power to the people, and they’re raising a military with a stake in their future. It looks like they want to create a professional military, like the EMF. One that has tactics, weapons and gear that are on level with our Troopers, if not above.” Others would have shied from this admission, but she knew how Nivad needed the information, and withholding it from him would only make him angrier when he found out. And he would find out.

Nivad smoked and looked to his view screen, staring down on mega city. “If we win, what will happen to the systems?”

Dalia hid her wince at his choice in words.

“There will be groups that will work for the new CEOs, but it will require a complete colonial reseeding to get the systems into production,” she said.

“Have the partnerships for Housapel and Fernix been approached yet?” Nivad asked.

“Through unofficial channels. They want to know how much this will cost them. They understand it will be high,” Dalia replied.

“They won’t have any profits until the new colonists and CEOs arrive. We should have them picked and transported to the systems, waiting and reseeding the systems as soon as the Troopers clear them. Still, it will take at least thirty years of profits to pay off our fees, so we will have to run them on credit.” To Nivad, the business side of these things was simplistic, relative to everything else. “What about the EMF?”

“Losses are expected to be high; we don’t know all of the tech Harmony is building, but Fernix builds freighters and was where a number of Carriers were made. They know the ships, their armor and armaments. Estimates put us at losing half to three quarters of our forces. We simply don’t know,” Dalia wasn’t optimistic.

“There’s something more than numbers we have to think on. What will the Troopers be like after surviving the war against Harmony?”

“I guess it is a war now, so what do you think, Wallace?” Nivad asked, throwing his cigarette into a disposal chute.

“We’re going to have heroes, and that’s something I think that we should embellish. We want people to get behind us and support our war? We want more people watching the feeds? We need heroes. Hell, that group that infiltrated Masoul… they’re already heroes. We need real leaders, none of the politicking CEOs in EMF uniforms. We’re going to have to remove most of that crust and let Trooper leaders, real leaders, step into that space.” Wallace paused. “But we have to remembered that these leaders will have their people’s loyalty, so we have to make sure that we always have a way to control the situation, some kind of charges, medical release, retirement and so on. We’re going to have to run a balance, there will be hundreds of thousands of Troopers working together. We need to make them as effective as possible as they face down millions. We also need to make sure they don’t turn that confidence against us.”

“So we balance the heroes with our strategies to remove them from the limelight, but we also have to deal with a disparity of forces, and the fact not many will be of use to us,” Nivad said.

“Essentially,” Wallace agreed.

“You said that they will be facing millions, on Osdal there are twelve million people. Housapel has fifty million and Fernix has twenty-seven. How do we know that any Troopers will survive?” Nivad asked.

“Look at EMFC Reclaimer, the carrier has gone through two bad systems, statistically those that survived Sacremon survived Masoul. Their overall survival rate, compared to EMFC Fearless, was higher - other than in units primarily staffed by Reclaimer Troopers that had been transferred,” Wallace said.

“It’s the reason that they are going to be reinforced, instead of reinforcing other units,” Dalia supplied, remembering the conversations they’d had on the subject.

“So if the Troopers survive their first engagements, then they should survive the later ones?” Nivad asked.

“It will get rid of the worst Troopers, only increasing the effectiveness of the units left behind. Accidents happen and they will die, but they will have a greater effect,” Wallace said.

They had all needed to learn about the EMF and their Troopers in order to combat the threat that Harmony posed to their system. Wallace had studied unit tactics as Dalia dealt with the numerical side of the situation.

Nivad trusted Wallace’s judgement. “Status of our carriers headed to Osdal?” he asked, and Dalia glanced to her surface.

“They are a year and a half away from the system. Five carriers are waiting.”

“The others?” Nivad asked.

“We need to make the decision to have them go to Osdal or hit Fernix and Housapel,” she said.

“Have forces move to Housapel and hide outside the system. We have limited intel coming from the ground, so having scans on the system will be of utmost importance. If we see a weakness, we’ll hit them, and I want forces stopping any traffic leaving or entering the system. However, I want the full force of our EMF focused on taking Fernix. We cannot let them get carriers and start attacking colonies,” Nivad said, pressing his finger on the table to punctuate his point. He sat back in his chair as he continued. “I want our carriers intercepting freighters to Fernix, and sending them to Masoul. Once we control Osdal, I want to shift all of our forces, except those around Housapel, to hit Fernix and then Housapel. We’re going to need freighters and carriers to revive the economy, we don’t need household goods and electronics.”

“Intercept all materials moving between the systems, and have forces gathering intel as we move forces to hit them en masse,” Wallace summarized.

“Exactly,” Nivad said.

“We’ve also shut down the connection to the banking system; the leaders will probably figure another system out, but it puts their funds now at our disposal to use against them,” Dalia said, pushing something up on her surface, and it appeared on the obsidian desk.

Nivad looked over the numbers; three systems’ worth of wealth at his fingertips.

The thrill he usually felt looking over the sheet was dulled by the reality that he would much rather have the systems back to the way they were instead of having all of that wealth at his disposal.

Chapter 2

EMFC Reclaimer

Moving from Masoul System to Osdal

1/3266

Mark woke up from cryo for the sixth time in his life and, unlike the last time, he wasn’t suffering from the effects of being ripped out of cryo by drugs.

He grabbed the bars of his pod and pulled himself out.

His platoon were all stretching, working their tongues and spitting on the floor to try and get rid of the cryo aftertaste. After Masoul, there weren’t even enough of them to make up a half platoon.

Not even Dashtund, the most vocal person in the platoon, tried to make a joke. For the universe, 23 years had passed since the EMF had cleared any resistance from Masoul System.

The Troopers that had been there got two weeks leave to get over their loss, pull themselves together, and walk into their cryo pods.

No time passed in their cryo pods, so they woke with the losses of their friends still fresh.

Tyler caught Mark’s eye, and even he looked downcast as he nodded.

No one yelled to get people moving, like they had on Mark’s first deployment. There weren’t any new recruits, only veterans with hard eyes and lined features.

Mark turned his implants on, his view showing the same Heads Up Display his helmet would. Everyone was healthy, and the battle net confirmed that there were no enemy locations in the area of Reclaimer.

Mark turned to the net where information and orders were passed through, and where there was a chat room for all Troopers.

The post he was looking for was at the very top.

Orders:

Check Troopers’ status.

Prepare for reinforcements.

Commence training.

Proceed to Osdal System.

Mark let out a sigh as they exited the spine in a press of bodies. The spine held all of the enlisted Troopers in a central area, running the length of the ship.

“’Sup?” Jerome asked, sounding tired and bored.

“No indication of how much time we’ve got to train, or how long it will take to get to Osdal,” Mark said.

Jerome was a shorter, tanned man, but training and augments had turned him into a hefty slab of corded muscle. He could easily carry his armor, ammo and two other Troopers with the same load out.

Mark and Tyler had accepted him into their brotherhood; they’d fought together on Sacremon and that friendship had only grown with time.

“Awesome,” Jerome said, his eyes smoldering as he ground his teeth in annoyance.

Second Lieutenant Haas turned as they were walking so he could include the 18 Trooper platoon in his announcement. “Captain Ortiz wants to see us.” Haas was a solid man, heavyset like everyone else, with sandy blonde hair and eyes that had been dulled by loss, anger and fatigue.

The platoon didn’t ask questions, but straightened as they followed.

People talked here and there, but there was little to talk about. They were only ever woken up to fight someone. They all knew that the group calling themselves Harmony had been using Masoul as a testing ground, and it had taken two Earth Military Force Carriers to destroy Harmony in Masoul.

Some eighty thousand Troopers had died to secure the system.

If that was just their testing ground, Osdal’s going to be hell, Mark thought as the lift stopped.

Their platoon had lost thirty-two people in Masoul.

Second Lieutenant Haas sat at the front of the conference room, and Warrant Zukic sat next to him. Their entire Platoon was arranged around the conference table, waiting for their orders.

Captain Ortiz was a fire-plug; short, strong as a tank, always pissed off and just waiting to snap. Yet, under all that, he was a good tactician, and he knew when to stow the anger and look at the situation in front of him.

He cared about his Troopers first and foremost, and people respected the man.

“Smoke them if you got them,” he said, pulling out a cigarette and lighting it. Others did the same, if for no other reason than to remove the taste in their mouths.

Mark chewed on gum and pulled out a pack of chewing tobacco.

Ortiz sank into a chair, and Mark had his chew encased in gum when Ortiz started talking.

“Osdal is in open uprising; thing’s a shit show.” His eyes unfocused before a hologram appeared in the center of the table, showing the Osdal system. There was a sun, five planets and a thick Oort cloud. The first two planets from the sun were uninhabitable. The third planet was covered in organic materials - it was called - and the fifth was an iron-based planet, high in rare metals, called Osdal Actual. Refining facilities lay across the planet, and in-orbit processing stations took the materials from Osdal3, Osdal Actual and the Oort cloud, and then turned them into whatever their clients needed.

The whole system had been turned into one massive material supplier.

“Been doing it in the open for Twenty-One years. They didn’t spread like they did in Masoul; they were already in every area across the system. The entire fucking thing is hostile.” He took a drag of his cigarette. “There are twelve million people in all of Osdal. The cryo facilities were the first things to be destroyed. We are getting some information, but it’s slim; they control all of the information here. We know that they have powered armor and they can use it to bully people, but I don’t know if they’re any good with it in a fight.”

Mark pulled an empty water pouch from his leg and spat into it.

Here’s why he called us up here. Mark thought,

The whole room was focused on Ortiz. “Your platoon is the only group of Troopers that have used powered armor, ever. We will be linking up with five other carriers, not including Fearless and Reclaimer. Higher wants people to be trained to take down powered armor. We’re supposed to get more in a few years, but it will probably be too late.”

“So you want us to train people to take down powered armor?” Haas confirmed.

“Yes. Be prepared to be used for clandestine operations, and bring your platoon up to strength. Nerva’s cooking up something,” Ortiz said, pausing, looking conflicted by what else he had to say. He looked up at the men and women in the room.

“You need to understand that these are five different carriers, that’s five new generals and sets of people we need to deal with. Nerva is going to be doing his best to get us the best Troopers. Reclaimer and our people have shown that we’re good, time and time again. We look good. That makes other generals and Troopers look bad, so be ready for hostilities,” Ortiz’s voice was light, but all of them saw the warning in his eyes.

***

Tyler ran his finger over Alexis’ new stripes on her smart clothes, two bronze lines over a bronze dot, identical to the insignia on his own arm.

She wandered out of the shower drying her hair, naked as the day she was born.

She was the most beautiful woman Tyler had ever met, and not just for her body, but for her mind and smile too.

“Husband, clothes,” she said, towelling herself and holding her hand open.

He grabbed her hand and pulled her down.

“Will you two please get a room!” Waz, her second in command called; the rest of her section were out and taking in the last of their leave, sleeping, reading or playing a card game.

Alexis hit Tyler’s arm.

“Way to make me look like a sergeant,” she said. She got off of him, putting on the shirt and pulling her pants out from under him.

The section didn’t even bat an eye lid; they’d fought across Masoul, they’d bled together and seen their friends die, so a bit of nudity might get a few interested looks, but communal showers were nothing to get excited about. It was just a shower. There were handsome guys and beautiful women and the showers had been used for more than just casual looking.

Troopers respected one another like brothers and sisters. They usually saw people outside of their platoons as possible one night stands and a bit of fun, but few committed to anything serious, and sexual misconduct got you shot. No one wanted to have a would-be rapist on board.

Tyler and Alexis had gone down the commitment route, as shown by the tattoos they’d got on their ring fingers. Rings got in the way of their armored gloves, but tats were fine.

She sat on the bed and pulled her boots on her smart clothes, which clung tight to her form. Tyler sat there with his hands behind his head, smiling the entire time.

She crawled on top of him and kissed him, and Tyler felt his arms wrapping around her, pulling her body to his own.

“Maybe we should go to the library tonight?” he asked, biting her ear.

He felt her body tense in pleasure, but she pulled away.

“You know we have to do all of the paperwork for the transfers,” she said, and her eyes went distant for a moment. “Two hours till they arrive,” she said apologetically.

“Plenty of time to go right now,” Tyler grinned.

She tried not to smile, her face betraying her as she bit her lower lip and moved against him.

“What do you say Mrs. Victor?” he asked, his large hands resting on her hips.

“That you better hurry the hell up!”

“Have fun, try not to get it on the upholstery, feel sorry for the bastards that have to clean the library,” Waz said, getting laughs from the section and Tyler.

“You should try telling Helen that a library is meant to be quiet,” Alexis shot back.

“Not my fault if she had a good time, oh, come on Horley, you and your goddamn Ace,” Waz complained, as Horley smiled happily at disrupting Waz’s attempt to go it alone in Euchre.

Alexis and Tyler escaped to the hallway, holding hands.

“So, what have you heard about the newbies?” Alexis asked.

Tyler’s smile faltered. “It looks like they’re new, so we’re getting their Troopers that just completed basic. The other generals want to look good so they’re sticking with their veterans.”

“Why the long face? We’ll get them into shape,” Alexis said, hitting him with her hip.

“These ones didn’t go through the basic we went through; they just had to meet the Bare Minimum, none of them have been shot,” Tyler said, seeing Alexis wince. “But we’ll change them, though it’s not going to be easy.”

“When are things ever easy?”

“Ummm, can I get back to you on that one?”

She laughed, the rich noise making Tyler’s grin turn into a full fledged smile. They shared everything, and she always made Tyler feel better for it. There were no lies, they told each other what they were thinking and that was why Tyler could never think to be with another person. He loved being with her, and time apart hurt him more than he would have thought possible.

When they met they had been rival gang members, but joining Earth’s Military Forces and becoming Troopers together had turned their casual interest in one another into fully fledged love.

“I love you,” he said, squeezing her hand slightly.

She looked to at him, her eyes shining. They had only a trace of the veteran in them; the sad part that knew that their relationship could be ended by one stray bullet.

“I love you too,” she said, accepting that vulnerability as he had, and brushing it aside.

Tyler kissed her cheek.

“Morning you two,” Mark said, looking sweaty.

“Hey Mark!” Alexis smiled.

“Bro!” Tyler beamed.

Mark gave one of his rare, proud and pleased smiles. While Mark and Tyler didn’t share a mother or father, they were brothers, and they’d taken on the same last name to make it official.

Mark was possibly the deadliest person Tyler knew, but he knew the soft-hearted bastard that lay under all of the muscle and training.

He didn’t fight to inflict pain; he did it to save the Troopers around him.

“Remember two hours, don’t be late Tyler!” Mark said, glancing to Alexis, clearly relying on her more than Tyler to get him to the shuttle bay.

“He’ll be there,” Alexis said, looking to Tyler.

“Have fun,” Mark rumbled, laughing as he walked past.

“So why doesn’t he get another girlfriend?” Alexis asked when they were past. Mark saw her like a sister, and she was invested in seeing he was okay.

“After Lucille hooked up with a med tech a week after they broke up, and she said she couldn’t deal with him being away, it cut deep. I don’t think he trusts anyone romantically.”

“He’ll find someone,” Alexis said with a smile.

Tyler smiled as well, pushing those thoughts aside as he put an arm around her and squeezed.

“Then he’ll never want to let them go, he’ll want to wake up beside her every morning and kiss her all day, to hear her giggle.”

“You talking about Mark or you?” Alexis asked, smiling.

“Who’s Mark?” Tyler gave her a confused look.

“I heard that!” Mark said from down the hall, not even looking back.

***

Jerome found Mark in the cafeteria, and he sat down with the big man, taking a bite of his bagel.

“You look over the messages from the yard yet?”

“Nope, I was hoping you did, and we need a better name than just ‘The Yard’,” Mark said, shovelling cod into his mouth.

“That stuff is so bland,” Jerome said, pointing at the fish.

“I think eating paper would be more interesting, we’ve had this stuff for three weeks straight,” Mark said, automatically dismissing the time he’d been in a cryo pod in between.

Jerome’s face wrinkled in distaste as Mark made a grunt of agreement.

“So you read it?” Mark asked.

“Yeah,” Jerome said, his voice quiet. “Quentin is dead.”

Mark paused between bites, his fork lowering to the table. His jaw worked and he sighed. “It was bound to happen at some point while we were out here.”

Mark had lost a great number of people. Death made him numb, but he understood his feelings, knowing only too well that he would get over the loss. He would remember Quentin as the man that had looked after him and Tyler. He pulled himself together and ate the fish by rote repetition. “What else?”

“The yard got a contract to make two carriers every year for the next twenty years. The mines have expanded, and we’ve recouped our losses. The greenhouses are expanding; we control eighty percent of the market. There were some larger companies that tried to lean on us to take power and other items from them, but with the contract to make the carriers, they’ve backed off, and a bidding war has meant less overhead costs. A subsidiary has been created, as per our plan, and we’re not just making ships now, we’re also trading across Sol and offering repairs to other ships in the system. We’re hiring people right out of the EMF,” Jerome went over the high points, and he still couldn’t really believe how their investment and their people’s work had turned into a fledgling corporation.

“Well it sounds like everything is going well.”

“Yes, Madeline Costa has also requested to buy another abandoned yard. With the hostilities in the sphere, there is going to be an increased need for shipping once systems are reclaimed; apparently Masoul is producing more than current ships can move. Seems Harmony’s put a fire under everyone’s ass. The CEOs are using it as an incentive to push production higher. Costa wants to make freighters, the biggest Earth and Her Colonies have ever seen, tens of times bigger than the regular freighters,” Jerome said.

“Does it look like a good idea to you?”

“Even before the war, the freighters were barely keeping up, having larger versions on a constant rotation and based in Earth instead of out here in the sphere... I think it’s a good idea,” Jerome confirmed.

“Okay, do it,” Mark said.

“I haven’t even gone over the numbers!”

“Ahh, I trust you,” Mark smiled, and finished off his fish. “We should get a move on to greet our new people.”

Jerome stuffed his bagel in his mouth and grabbed his tray.

At one time throwing food away would have been criminal; food on Earth was a costly thing, and anything remotely like real food and not supplement bars was premium product.

They walked for the lifts that would take them to the flight deck. EMFC Reclaimer and the other carriers that were waiting for them were matching speeds, seven carriers, the largest force assembled heading towards their next battle.

“I’ve heard that the officers are going to get moved around; Ortiz might be taking Dalton’s spot as Division Sergeant Major.

Dalton would be shifted to Major and Nerva gets a Force Sergeant Major. Nerva doesn’t want to be stuck behind a desk. Heard that he threatened to get in a fight just to get demoted and put back with his people,” Jerome grinned, proud of his commanding officer.

“Who would replace Ortiz?” Mark asked.

“A newly promoted Regiment Sergeant Major from the Indomitable,” Jerome said as they stepped into a lift.

“We got any info on him?”

“As much information as we have on the replacements.”

“Well that makes me feel fucking awesome,” Mark grumbled, and a few looked in their direction.

***

Nerva kicked the command door open, and the Lieutenant that made to stop him got pushed to the side as Nerva continued in.

His face showed nothing, not the simmering rage beneath his calm exterior or a sigh from releasing at least some of his anger.

She probably didn’t deserve that, he thought as he moved through.

In the Trooper’s race, sexuality and sex didn’t matter, and there was no such rule as do not hit a woman, they’d damned well hit you.

Domashev looked up from the latest reports.

“I’m going on the ground or I’ll make you bust me down,” Nerva’s eyes cold as he, stopped a few feet away from the man.

Someone, one of the old politicking officers, made to talk, and Domashev cut them off with a look.

“Understood, it should have said that on your promotion slip,” Domashev said, his eyes looking over the others in the room; one of them must have changed the slip.

Gazes averted. They were all favor callers and corporation wannabes. They couldn’t even take a stare like a Private.

“I have a special project I need you and your old division to look into,” Domashev stood and waved Nerva to follow him.

The others followed.

Nerva was taken out of the command center and to an adjacent office. Daniel Moretti, the Intelligence Ministry’s current expert on Harmony and former right hand man of Harper, the leader of Harmony resistance on Masoul, waved them greetings as he smoked a cigar, his feet up on his desk and a surface in his lap.

“He needs to get surface side so we can start messing with Osdal’s lines. Masoul taught us that information from the ground can make sure we don’t get NRs right as we’re launching,” Domashev said.

“Well we’ve thought that for a number of years, but it would be an expensive clean up; are we being given clearance?” Nerva asked.

“That would depend on what our plan is,” Moretti said, as the door locked behind Nerva and Domashev. He put down his surface and pulled his feet off of the desk.

“After seeing the tactics we used on Masoul the higher ups are interested in developing small groups to insert themselves into Osdal, get the lay of the land and then turn it into chaos before the main body even arrives. I don’t think it will work on Fernix or Housapel, but Osdal, the population seems to be split, something we can use to our advantage.”

“You said we?” Nerva said, as Domashev took a seat.

Moretti let out a rush of smoke and pulled the cigar from his mouth. “That’s because I’m going down with the Triple Twos.”

Nerva nodded slowly, a plan forming in his mind. “So we best think of a way to get you in-system without onlookers.”

“Thankfully we still have a few shuttles we grabbed from Masoul,” Domashev said.

“So what’s the objectives?” Nerva asked.

“Find out what Harmony knows, see what their capabilities are and prepare to hit all of the areas controlled by Harmony at once. Hell, if we can get into their sensor grids, then we can get our forces right next to Osdal3 and Actual. We don’t give them any time to react, and drop Troopers right on them while they’re still scrambling,” Moretti said.

“Ambitious plan, but any information we have can save lives,” Domashev nodded.

“And I’ll be going with my people, not sitting back on the carrier?” Nerva asked.

“We’ll be bringing Reclaimer into the Oort cloud, we’ll hide it in the asteroids and send shuttles out to start working their way through the system. You will report to me only. I wanted to make you a higher rank to give you the most control. I want you to break your new Force into two groups, one to create chaos and the other to report information higher. Once they’re out in Osdal, they are to act on their own and carry out their tasks without any need for extra orders. You’ve got nine months before Reclaimer is in position and ready to deploy our first units,” Domashev said.

Nerva tapped his fingers on the chair he sat in. “Then I’m going to need to know a lot more about Osdal, go talk to the Triple Twos and let them know that you’ll be along for the ride.”

“Yes sir,” Moretti gave him a sloppy salute.

Chapter 3

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

2/3266

Castillo hadn’t wanted to believe it, he couldn’t believe it, but the news had finally reached him. He had taken a shuttle to Mining City Twenty-One within the hour.

Now he stood in a large living room in Mining City Twenty-One’s central tower. Couches were dotted over the three long steps that reached down to the interactive glass window.

Outside it was black, except for the towers of the city and the lights that lit up the strip mines in the distance. Guy used the interactive screen to zoom in on them, making people seem like they were standing right in front of him instead of kilometers away.

Strip mines pocked the area, and trucks ran materials to processing plants outside the city. People and mining machines worked through the night, connected by chains, and Chosen were quick to lay punishment into any that they deemed worthy of their attention.

He’d heard rumors about the ‘camps’. He’d brushed them off as nothing but boogie man stories; that was until his idiot son had started bragging about how he had educated four women.

In that moment Castillo had forgotten he had a son, and he’d stormed into the family room where his son and daughter, Majors in the Chosen military, drank beer and joked about their exploits.

“The fuck did you say?” Castillo had been stunned by the words coming from his own bloods mouth. He truly thought he’d heard wrong. Now he only wished he had.

“What, Dad? They tried to escape, would’ve been a waste, they were belly-full with one of the Chosen’s babies. They might be Earth lovers, but we could raise their kids up,” Dean’s head had snapped sideways as Castillo’s hand smacked him across the face.

“You mother fucker!” Castillo yelled. His son had looked offended, hell, he’d looked like he wanted to kill his own father.

“The fuck? What was that for? You were the one who told me that Harmony is the best for us! I did this for you, you ungrateful fuck!” Dean Castillo had spat on his father’s shirt while Emilie, his sister, looked at her father with disdain.

“Those are our people, and you’re here drinking beer and gloating about raping women that had been impregnated by your fucking guards!” Guy Castillo was thirty years older than his son but he had been a brawler, and he hadn’t had a gun to hide behind when he’d got into fights.

Those hands had pushed Dean, fire renewed in his eyes.

“Don’t push me,” Dean had warned, his voice cold. Guy would have cried hearing that harsh tone from his son some time ago, but it had served to fuel him.

“Get the fuck out of my house, I don’t have a son any more.”

“The fuck you say to me, old man?” Dean had demanded, disgusted.

Guy could see it now; his son and daughter had changed from the kids that loved to play outside, to run around the halls of the tower he’d lived in his entire life, their laughter filling the corridors.

Harmony had seduced them with power, with riches, had warped their minds with propaganda. They saw the people of Osdal who didn’t support Harmony as nothing better than Earthers that wanted to control them.

Harmony had turned his loving children into warlords, with little care for the people. They did as Harmony said and they were rewarded.

“Get out of my house,” Guy had said, grief filling him as tears rolled down his cheeks.

“Fucking weakling,” Dean had snorted, shaking his head.

“Fuck you, old man,” Emilie had got up off of the couch and tossed a bottle lazily across the room, beer spraying everywhere.

As the door slammed behind them, Guy Castillo had never felt more alone in his life.

It had taken him time to pull himself together, but then he’d ordered a shuttle and gone to mining city Twenty-One. His head enforcer had tried to argue, but Guy was not to be swayed.

Guy now looked out on Mining City Twenty-One.

It was the largest mine on all of Osdal Actual.

People worked the strip mines tirelessly, and they looked little more than skeletons.

Guy used the zooming features of the main tower to see people, there must have been hundreds of thousands, and Enforcers and Chosen whipped them, beating many.

There was little to no fight in the people, the Chosen and Enforcers did it for fun.

He’d seen shuttles drop off new people, and an enforcer pulled a girl out from line and used her in front of everyone.

What have I done? he thought as Luke wandered into the room.

He wanted to yell, no, he wanted to kill Luke; this was his plan coming to fruition. In that moment Guy saw Luke for what he was, and he wasn’t just a tough come to make the Chosen. He was the planetary CEO.

He ruled the planet, nothing went on without his say so. He wasn’t even from Osdal, but he was surely its ruler, more so than any SEO the Osdal partnership had placed in control.

Guy wanted to see the man dead, but he knew it would do nothing. His actions against the man would be for nothing.

“Guy?” Luke’s voice was questioning.

“I was wondering why the production numbers had been so high,” Guy said, forcing his face to not snarl, resisting the urge to try and beat the man into a pulp.

Luke didn’t say anything for a time, obviously trying to figure out what Guy was thinking.

“Rather good use for sympathizers,” Guy said, feeling his stomach rebel as he smiled.

Oh God, I’m going to do it, I’m going to support him. If I don’t he’ll throw me down there, he’ll throw Stella down there with the grandkids. I can’t see that. I can still save these people once Harmony wins! Tears itched in his eyes. I wonder how long that lie will last before Luke destroys it? He remembered Tsik’s drunken stupors, he’d thought them to look bad on the rest of Harmony, but he saw it didn’t matter.

Harmony had offered a way away from the corporations and Earth’s politics, and he’d jumped for it like an idiot, not thinking how his situation could be worse, so much worse. It made him want to just drink and push it all away.

“Quite. We’ve increased production to a level where the other true Harmony supporters don’t have to take on their labors. Their faith is rewarded with our kindness. I admit that I thought that you would have reacted… differently…” Luke said, stepping down from the tallest step and forward the few feet to the next one.

“Anything to stop the companies.”

“Their labors will serve to fuel Harmony’s war machine. Funny, that the blood of those that support the EMF will be used to destroy it,” Luke said with a laugh.

Guy made his lips move to form a smile, disgust rolling through his stomach.

Always talk about the EMF but never of Earth and Her Colonies; why is it important for them to destroy the EMF and not Earth and the Colonies? If you don’t want Harmony for the people, then what does it mean to you? A thought struck Guy as he looked back to the mines.

If you were to supplant your own people for the EMF, then you would become the most powerful person in Earth and Her Colonies. Hell, these bastards aren’t trying to pull down the system, they’re just using it in a different way. Turning the population into Chosen, who are really just slaves that think they have power - slaves that have no rights!

Castillo felt a chill go through him; it was a terrible but functional system. The Chosen felt empowered because they could do what they want. Those that didn’t like the way of things were turned into free labour to keep Harmony’s war machine moving. They didn’t care about the Chosen or the people, they were just using them.

Chapter 4

EMFC Reclaimer

Moving from Masoul to Osdal

2/3266

“Morning boys and girls,” Moretti said, breezing into the conference room.

He had been the Ministry of Intelligence’s source of information on Masoul, and he’d engineered the battle of Gas Planet in favour of the EMF.

He’d also worked with the Triple Twos for a year to put the final touches to Harper and Harmony’s downfall and, in that year, he’d become closer to the triple twos than with anyone else.

“Hey Eye,” Dashtund quipped; that fucker had put an eye on Moretti’s powered armor since Moretti didn’t want to broadcast his name to everyone.

The others greeted him as M or DM, respecting Moretti’s wishes to keep his name from everyone.

“Thank you, thank you,” Moretti said waving his arms to stop the hellos, getting grins from the others at his antics.

He pulled out a device and pressed a button, and buzzing filled the room. “All right. Seeing as we did better than the people back on Earth expected, they’re sending us back in.” Osdal Actual appeared on the screen behind him. “Pretty much the same thing as last time, except we don’t have any people that we trust on the surface, so it’ll be us working solo. Though I do have a present…” Moretti moved back to the door, and pressed a button.

Serious faces turned into grins and greetings as Bobbie, Young and Yu walked in.

Their faces lit up, despite the circumstances under which they were meeting again; they’d piloted Combat Shuttle One-Four-Nine. They’d been the crew to get them to Masoul Actual without detection. They, like Moretti, had been around the team and actively working with them for a year. That kind of close quarters brought people together like few other things.

The trio took their seats and Moretti made to continue.

“In Osdal Actual, we’re going to be forward of any other teams, which means we get the run of the place to get trained up. We get to have whatever we think will be important, including implants that I’m going to have to make mandatory. It also means that you will not be getting any new recruits. It takes too much time to get them up to speed and the lot they’re sending over…” Moretti shook his head. “They’re about as useless as a fucking air conditioner in space.”

Everyone winced for the fate of the people they’d be leaving behind on Reclaimer.

“From the reports we’ve been able to get, Harmony controls all, but there are many sects, making it look more like a gangland you might see on Earth. Seeing as you fine people are a product of such ganglands, I hope that we can use that prior experience to fit in with the local population,” Moretti said.

“What’s your part in this?” Haas asked. It was a genuine question, not one made to show how Moretti wasn’t doing anything for the team.

“I’ll be there to see how Harmony has grown from Masoul. Higher wants me to gather information, assist your efforts and try to figure out what Harmony is looking like up the ranks.”

“Damn, that sucks,” Haas grimaced.

“As much as I would like to be back on Earth looking at metal storms, it seems my unlucky ass is stuck with you jackasses. It does indeed suck.” Moretti grinned, and the rest of the room laughed or smiled.

“All right, smartass, more talky less jokey, else Dashtund will be jealous of you taking his position,” Haas said.

Dashtund blew on his hand and rubbed it on his nametape as if polishing it.

“Please squeeze my head back into normal proportions if that ever happens,” Moretti said, continuing on before anyone else could interrupt. “We expect that they will have armor, could be powered, definitely plates. They’ll have the heavy machine guns, and probably rifles that have something like the E-12’s abilities. Fun fact, Housapel makes your E-12s,” There were groans from around the room, “They shouldn’t have good ammo or grenades; Guaranak makes those and, since they’re on our side, they shouldn’t be as powerful as our weapons. We don’t know what else they have, but from reports, Osdal is actually producing more material than ever, and shipping it off to Fernix and Housapel.” Moretti paused; the next piece of information was troubling, even to him.

“They’ve turned a third or more of the population into slaves. They’ve got them working the strip mines, asteroid belts and Osdal3. The reports are grim. Violence is normal, Chosen don’t care who dies, sometimes they torture people for fun and display it to the other workers to motivate them. Rape and malnutrition is the norm,” Moretti looked over the people in the room and their faces tightened; all of them were killers and they were good at their craft.

Tension in the room was raised, but all of it was directed outwards. They listened, the knowledge would serve to keep them alive, and anger would serve to end their enemy. He had seen them within Masoul; they had kept that murderous rage just below the surface, hidden from everyone but one another.

When he’d gone in the research and development area once they’d killed everyone in it, he’d seen the controlled violence they were capable of. Their actions to get to friendly lines made him happy he had never pissed them off.

“We want to get as much information on that as possible and disrupt their work. If they’re so focused on getting people to mine, then it’s in our best interests to fuck with that. We need to have them stretched thin, pissed off and tired before the main force shows up. Now, we’re going to be inserting by inter-system freighter, and that’s up to our flight crew,” Moretti said, looking to the three Combat Shuttle pilots who nodded. “The rest of us are getting packed with implants, augments, and going through training to kill everything from powered armor to people. Nerva has requested your aid in teaching people on weapons systems and giving briefings on the enemy.”

“How long until we leave?” Tyler asked.

“How did I know the newly-wed was going to ask that?” Moretti said, giving Tyler a small smile. Tyler had been married for a while, even if you didn’t count the time in cryo.

But he’d been doing operations under Harmony’s nose and hadn’t been able to spend much time with his wife.

“We have four months to get prepped. Then we’ll get inserted, and the carriers will wait until we clear out the sensor grid before moving in. The idea is to hit both planets and the asteroid belt simultaneously,” Moretti said.

“Fat chance of that,” Dooks muttered.

“Pretty much what I was thinking,” Moretti agreed, “Now, questions?”

Hands shot up and Moretti sighed, but kept an affable smile on his face as he pointed to Holm.

***

Mark took a large pull from his beer glass; already there were unfamiliar faces filling their mess, and he didn’t know how to feel about it. Yet he knew he wouldn't have much time in the coming months to give a rat’s ass. He had other things to think on.

“Fucking camps! What is this, the goddamn Third Reich?” Jerome asked. He had taken Mark’s suggestions to look into military history seriously.

“We’ll make Harmony pay,” Mark promised.

They shouldn’t care about the colonists, but they’d been in Masoul, they’d lived with the resistance, and seen Harmony’s real face. Even then it hadn’t been as bad as Moretti had explained. They cared now, and they couldn’t think of colonists under Harmony’s thumb as anything but victims.

“They’re pulling out all the stops to get this thing pushed ahead, we’ve got less than a year to get trained, and get our asses over to Osdal Actual,” Holm said.

Mark had learned a while ago that these meetings usually bore rare fruit that might actually help their mission.

“Hopefully the flight crew can speed that up. I’m thinking that we can get our training done faster than that, and have something to do on the flight, like remember our cover stories. We don’t need to do that here as long as we have paper copies and we burn them, hell, we could just toss them out of an airlock,” Mark said.

“I don’t think we need to go over the weapon familiarization course,” Holm said.

“And we can do enough of kicking one another around the inside of the freighter, so cross off the hand-to-hand familiarization,” Jerome added.

They went through training objectives, seeing what they could condense, since they knew everyone’s strengths and weaknesses, it was almost intuitive by now.

It didn’t take long for them to slim the list right down, four rounds of beers had came and went as they plotted and planned. People still owed them beers after Masoul. The triple twos had a large credit in the mess.

New people looked to them with questioning eyes, those that knew them raised a glass in greeting or gave a wave, seeing that the three were working.

Mark heard the accusatory whispers and disbelief from the new people but he didn’t care; people could know what he did or not. Those that really knew what he’d done were alive today, and that was all the gratitude he needed.

Tyler and Alexis walked in and Alexis ordered two more beers from the Trooper who was picking up some extra pay working at the mess.

“Coming right up Alexis,” Claire said with a smile, her eyes darting to Mark, who chose to not pay attention as he sipped from his beer.

“Why don’t you ask her out?” Alexis asked Mark when Claire left.

Because if she dies I’ll lose another part of myself, Mark thought, remembering Sylvia. They’d had some good times and hooked up, but she’d died on Masoul Actual.

Even though people tried to not get attached, it was easier said than done.

“I’m not that interested,” Mark shrugged.

“Come on, Claire’s a good looking girl, she’s funny, smart and she could kick most people’s ass,” Alexis said.

Mark smiled, liking how Alexis was looking out for him.

“Oh dayum looking good there, the things I would do to you,” someone said from behind Alexis. Mark knew that it was directed at her and he put the glass down carefully, precisely.

“Screw off,” Alexis said back, her face clouding over with annoyance but she didn’t turn to look at the talker. Trying to keep the conversation with Mark going.

“Oh, I’d love for you to help me,” he laughed and the new people laughed with him.

“Hey buddy, the lady doesn’t like that talk,” Tyler said, irritated.

Mark felt warm coals in his stomach heating his frame, his muscles tensing as he turned off his augments that wanted to pump a fighting cocktail through his veins.

He didn’t know how to deal with the loss of his friends and his flings, but someone trying to hit on his sister-in-law. He knew how to deal with that.

“What? I’m just talking to the pretty girl; damn thing shouldn’t be let out with those looks.” The talker wandered over, his rank slips showed that he was a Captain.

He was closer, and Mark saw the excitements on the other’s faces, looking forward to a fight. Mark only felt a calming chill run through his body.

Mark clenched his hand, newly reinforced with metal coverings over his bones.

“Come with me honey, I know how to treat you real good, you won’t be able to walk when I’m…” Mark got out of the booth intercepting the man’s hand that was making for Alexis’ ass.

“…done with, hey!” Mark ripped the man towards him and brought his forehead into the other man’s nose.

It crunched, the man’s hands going to his face as blood flowed and he fell to the decking.

Mark’s fist moved like a press, punching the man so hard that his head rang off of the decking.

“Don’t you ever talk to my sister-in-law like that,” Mark said to the unconscious man.

He grabbed the man’s collar and started dragging, then the load got easier, and Mark looked back to see that Tyler had the man’s legs.

“The fuck?” One of the new guys asked as people went back to talking and living their lives.

“Don’t fuck with the triple twos, and never fuck with the Victor brothers,” Mark heard someone else explain.

“You guys are fucked, you know that, fucking Reclaimer fucks,” another newbie said.

There was a loud noise and someone yelled out in pain.

Mark looked back to see the loud mouth was face first in the floor with a Relcaimer trooper holding their arm in a hold.

Mark felt nothing but pride, recognizing the hold he’d taught.

There was a spine tingling sucking and popping sound as the man’s shoulder came out. They screamed in agony, clutching their hand, the Reclaimer trooper stepping back to their table like nothing had happened.

“Better watch your back out there, boot,” Jerome said. “Cause if you ain’t one of us, you ain’t fucking nothing.”

The door to the mess opened, and Mark and Tyler dropped the man on the floor.

Tyler checked his pulse as Mark watched; he didn’t much care if the man was alive or not.

“Well shit,” Tyler said, looking at the rank on the man’s arm. “This fuck is a goddamn Captain.”

“Didn’t want you punching him out and getting in shit for it,” Mark said, the two of them going back into the mess.

“Thanks man.” Tyler said, clapping him on the shoulder.

“Don’t mention it bro,” Mark smiled. “Hey Claire, what time do you get off?” Mark asked as she handed out beers.

“About an hour, if you’re not totally drunk,” she said, dimpling cutely.

Nothing quite got Mark’s blood up like a fight, or reminded him that life was short and he’d best embrace it. Sylvia was gone, as much as he missed her he needed to move on.

“Oh, I think I can stay sober for you, though you’re going to need to get some drinks to get on my level,” Mark said with a smile.

“That won’t be a problem,” she said, taking the beer from his grasp and drinking half of it. “Though only if you’re buying.”

“Doable,” Mark said.

She smiled again and went back to the bar, Mark’s eyes following her the entire way.

***

Ortiz looked at the Captain standing in front of him; he looked woozy on his feet but the medics said that he was functional and they’d sorted his concussion out.

Ortiz took a breath, pinching his nose as he looked at the man. Captain Heok had just pissed off Mark, Tyler and Alexis Victor and, by extension, the entire company he commanded.

“Do you understand the policies that the EMF has about fraternization?” Ortiz asked, keeping his voice level, mostly through a power of will.

“Yes sir: don’t ask, don’t tell,” Heok said.

“Good, so you know the other one about, if it causes a problem then higher ups will come down like a sack of shit?”

“Yes sir!” Heok said, the man looked pleased.

“What do you think that will mean?” Ortiz asked, genuinely curious.

“That since the lady’s in a relationship with the man that punched me, they will be separated,” Heok said, barely restraining a smile.

Holy shit, Nerva was right when he told me they were scraping these people from the bottom of the barrel.

“Wipe that fucking smile off your face! First, the big man was her brother-in-law, second she’s married dipshit and third - I was talking about you!” Ortiz said, his famed anger rising to the surface.

“Sergeant Alexis Xin has been an exemplary Section Commander; she led her section across Masoul and has recommendations for upward movement. Hell, I’m looking to have her as a warrant by the end of this! Mark and Tyler Victor, as well as all of the people that were at the table drinking with them, are the reason that Fearless and Reclaimer even have Troopers on them right now. They went behind enemy lines and they secured our victory. The fucking Ministry gave them a recommendation and want to give them fucking medals and you, a brand fucking new Captain with two drops under his belt and less than three years of being awake, just pissed them off.” Ortiz sank back into his seat.

“I pulled the recordings from the mess; your people from back on Indomitable allowed you into the mess, but your actions are bordering on sexual misconduct. I can’t have an officer that’s hitting on my sergeants and pissing off the others. Your advances were unwarranted, but you continued without finding out further information on the system. You didn’t have alcohol in your blood but still you deemed it appropriate to treat one of your Sergeants as a sexual fucking object,” Ortiz slammed his fist into his desk, making the Captain wince. Heok’s face had drained of all color as Ortiz had been talking.

“I’ve talked to your former chain of command; they’re not willing to take you back, so you can sit this out in cryo.” Ortiz said.

“Major!” Heok started, but Ortiz cut him off.

“You just pissed off a section that currently has the gratitude of two veteran carriers. The Victors are fucking war heroes, as much as they would hate the title. Hell, all of the triple twos are. You undermined your command and position with that stunt. Agree to what I say and you’ll be shuffled off to some job not on the front lines. As it stands, the Troopers are more likely to shoot you than follow you.” Ortiz was tired and done with dealing with this jackass and his shit.

“Sir, I…”

“Think really carefully about what you’re going to say. You take my offer and you wake up after all of this and do something menial. You don’t, and you go through Osdal and can’t even trust the people you’re fighting alongside. I will also let the case of sexual harassment go through; do you know what will happen if you are found guilty of sexual harassment?”

The other man swallowed, and his face would have given an albino a run for their money.

Yeah, you go into an air lock and you don’t get a mask, Ortiz thought looking at the man sweating in front of him.

“Yes, sir. I will take your offer.”

“Good man,” Ortiz sighed. “You’ll have the information about being put into cryo soon. Dismissed.”

Heok saluted and left the room.

Ortiz used his hands linked to his implants to open a channel he saw on his projected HUD.

“Need a new Captain?” Nerva asked as the line connected.

“Yeah, you want to talk to Mark?” Ortiz asked, knowing how Nerva regarded Jerome, Mark and Tyler like sons and Alexis as a daughter.

“You bust him down and I’ll have a talk with him,” Nerva said.

“Gotcha. Hell, I hate doing this shit, he was in the right! He’s been fighting for his life for so long now that punching someone barely feels like it warrants a dressing down.” Ortiz sighed.

“We’ve been at war since we arrived on Sacremon. With only a few weeks of rest at Earth and leaving Masoul, and the rest being filled up with training, I don’t expect he’ll be the last person to react a bit aggressively to situations. He’s not even the first case I’m dealing with. People are stressed, and they know this is only the beginning,” Nerva said.

“Yeah,” Ortiz said, weary from fighting and heavy with the knowledge that there was no end in sight.

Before, Sacremon rebellions hadn’t been all that well organized, and most times it had just taken one Earth Military Force Carrier showing up in a system to get the rebels to agree to their planet’s partnership terms. Few had real weapons, and certainly no grenade launchers, or heavy machine guns.

Chapter 5

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

2/3266

Caroline Evers was woken by the banging on her lean-to. Harmony didn’t waste their time transporting people to and from the strip mines, they simply had them build lean-tos around the strip -mine, and they collapsed there into sleep while others worked.

She pulled herself up, feeling worse than when she’d gone to sleep. The metallic taste of Osdal Actual’s air filled her lungs; thankfully she had an augment to clear out the metals before they got into her system. Too many of her fellow workers sounded like they had metal lung, judging by their coughing.

She touched her face, and felt the disfiguring scar which ran from her forehead down her nose and through her lips.

Bored Chosen with guns watched from inside their air conditioned air car that floated above the ground. Caroline didn’t look at the Chosen, instead she pulled up the rags around her face. A pretty girl like her was just prey for the Chosen. The scar across her face had been self-inflicted, a promise to her parents and a way to get passed over as ugly.

The pretty ones had it the worst. So far she had escaped their attentions, and she hoped to keep it that way.

She looked at Ellie who was rubbing sleep from her eyes, she was older and wiry, she wasn’t beautiful, but sometimes the chosen weren’t picky.

Ellie and Caroline smiled at each other. They’d survived the night and they were alive. There wasn’t anything else they could look forward to.

She trudged with her shift, some went into the bottom of the pit, and she took over her place on a massive truck. She had been a shuttle pilot, and she loved the freedom of space. Now, just looking at the stars made her eyes itch, and made her want to cry out at the unfairness of it all.

Instead, she pressed the start-up button on the truck. Her mobile prison. It rumbled to life and a route was overlaid on her glass window.

Turning her truck, she saw a Chosen beating on a small boy. It would be so easy for her to run them over with her truck, but she didn’t do it. Shame built in her; it would end the boy’s life, but sometimes, most of the time, she thought that death would be better than living. Yet, she still woke up, ate her meager bar each day and continued on.

Her mother and father were dead already, and her brother had screamed for days as the Chosen tried to skin him. She had wept with guilty relief when his screams had died on the ninth day.

Her truck rumbled after the others in line, and crushers with massive rotating bits ate into the walls of the strip mine and it was scooped up and dumped in passing trucks. Then the trucks ran back out and dumped their load off at the processing plants.

Those that didn’t know how to drive carried fuel, oil and parts, they kept the machines in working order.

Harmony, in their infinite wisdom and need for specific materials, were using shaft mines across the planet. With the entire planet being made from metal, it was just a matter of time until the strip mine got what they needed.

The mining gear on Osdal wasn’t made to create shaft mines. Thankfully the infusion of Earth Sympathizers meant that there were plenty of people to swing pick-axes. The rate of people contracting metal lung was astronomical. Workers did two runs in the shafts for every run in the strip.

Caroline saw a commotion at the side of the mine as she descended, people were running away from it as a rising plume of dust told the reality. Another shaft mine had sunk.

Caroline felt pity for those that were undoubtedly stuck in the mine. Harmony would have people in the mine within the hour, not to save lives but to clear it out and continue their progress.

They were lucky that they hadn’t aggravated one of the few native species still left on Osdal. The Diggers lived off of the metal of the planet, there were tunnels all over the planet. Diggers crapped out rare metals, making them a CEO’s wet dream.

Problem was Diggers didn’t give a shit what they ate and they were massive, kilometers long and with skin made of whatever metals they’d eaten.

Some days Caroline wished that a Digger made it past the countermeasures and ended her hell.

Caroline looked away and focused on driving truck, trying to not think of the stars, or the Chosen, or anything. Reality was a place she seldom wanted to live.

Chapter 6

EMFC Reclaimer

Moving from Masoul to Osdal System

2/3266

Mark walked into Nerva’s office, and after Ortiz’s tongue lashing he didn’t know what to expect from Nerva.

“Sit,” Nerva said, his arms crossed on his desk. Nerva took a breath, revealing a momentary break in his almost manicured features. He looked like he was about 35, but his eyes and manners pegged him as older. Those eyes were tired, they’d seen a lot, little of it pretty.

“So I guess that Ortiz told you how you could have easily killed that man, and that you better think about your actions before you carry them out? Probably something about striking someone in a higher position?” Nerva said.

“Yeah,” Mark said wincing; he looked up to Ortiz and Nerva, they were leaders, the kind of person he hoped to be. Hearing those words from them hit home.

“I think it’s time we had a talk about shit,” Nerva said, standing from his chair and moving to the couches. Mark rose and followed.

“Shit?” Mark asked.

“Life, troubles, worries.”

Mark sat on the opposite couch, pulling the beret from his head and stuffing it in his leg pocket. He didn’t really know what to say.

“We’ve been at war for longer than most carriers are operational in a given decade. None of our fights have been anything less than wars. Which means that’s a lot of stress and little down time. Throw in the fact you were down on Masoul Actual in the midst of things… That stuff tends to wear on the mind.”

Mark didn’t feel pressured to speak; he knew that Nerva was just making it clear that if Mark had something to say then he’d listen.

“I think I’m losing it,” Mark said, leaning forward and looking at his clasped hands.

“Losing what?”

Mark looked him in the eyes, his fear clear.

“My humanity,” Mark said, fear chilling him to his core, but also feeling the seductive release of letting go of rules, pushing them aside.

Without rules he would be free to kill, free to wage war. He felt alive when he was fighting, it was exhilarating, the universe’s sickest joke on the human being. Humans hated war, but a part of them, a part of them loved the thought of violence, a part of them showed their best and worst qualities in war.

Mark had seen people do amazing things during war, but he had also seen terrible things.

He no longer looked at it as some kind of honorable fight. It wasn’t clean or pretty, and people didn’t just slap medals on you like he’d seen in holo-movies.

People died, brutally, accidentally, from being in the wrong place at the wrong time, all of that shit, and he was tired of it. He’d embraced the fact that he would probably never see retirement, even the 35 years that the EMF gave a Trooper before kicking them out.

He’d come to embrace his anger; it was his shield, the thing that kept him going. Anger and care, anger at his enemies and care for his brothers and sisters.

“I don’t know what I would do if I lost them,” Mark said, crying. Nerva made no move to comfort Mark. For that Mark was grateful, he didn’t want a hug, he didn’t want pity, he just wanted to be told how to fix the scars that lined his mind instead of his body.

Mark restrained his simmering, his need to destroy his enemies totally, else he might drive away his section and the people he cared for. His resistance was slipping away, and as Harmony got crueller, he continued to become numb.

His anger was starting to feel justified, and that scared him.

Mark wanted to kill all of the Chosen, he wanted to kill those that had come up with Harmony. He wasn’t just a Trooper any more, he actually cared about the colonists.

What he’d seen on Masoul he wouldn’t wish on anyone, it was worse than any slum back on Earth.

Mark let it all out, his fears and doubts for controlling himself. If he let himself slip an inch, he might fall a mile. The anger inside him was just looking for an excuse to be released.

Nerva listened, and the weight of it all lifted from Mark’s shoulders.

I never knew that just talking about things could help so much.

***

Jerome got up from the medical table, and checked his implants, the settings had changed over from his first set to his second.

While augments improved things within the body, like a person’s chemical outputs, accelerating healing, improved lung capacity and so on, implants referred to everything else. Things that didn’t necessarily improve the body, but gave someone more tools.

The implants that Jerome had been given were made to look like another part of his body, they were thin and with sensor baffling equipment throughout. He could now talk through his implants without ever moving his lips.

Better sensors dotted his skin, microns big and unseen, others were linked to his hands and arms so he could change things on the HUD, which was being relayed into his optical nerve, without using voice commands or specific gloves or non-stealthy implants.

Moretti made them all mandatory, and augments were usually small and worked in someone’s body, few people were looking for them. Implants connected someone to the net and allowed communication across the known universe, if you had the credits to pay for a FTL relayed message.

Harmony would be looking for them. Those that they found with implants they disabled, usually by pulling out the command chip that was located in the collarbone.

Jerome checked himself over; there weren’t even any scars from the surgery, just those left behind from Sacremon and Masoul.

He pulled his clothes on and stepped out of his cubicle. He’d seen these floors awash with blood and bodies crying out for aid. Now it was almost empty, with bored medics at the desks.

Memories hit him as a wave, he knew it had been coming, but there was nothing you could quite do to protect yourself from the emotional turmoil of seeing so many injured people, knowing only too well that it could be you, or that under that blood they might be a friend, someone you’d shared a beer with, or talked to at the gym.

He pulled his smart clothes tight, letting them connect themselves, and made his way out towards the training areas.

Jerome was going to head to the cafeteria but he no longer felt like he had an appetite. His implants alerted him to people in his platoon in the auditorium, they had added their green icons to his view even through the doors and a level down. Holm was going over the heavy machine guns that they’d seen on Masoul and they even had a few hundred of the weapons.

Holm was talking about the heavy machine gun in detail; one was mounted on a crude tripod, the other was pulled apart into its component parts.

“Anything interesting?” Jerome asked, using his sub vocal implant as he looked at the stage, his lips unmoving.

“You sound like a Resolute Station hooker,” Dashtund said, hearing Jerome’s voice garbled as he got used to the sub vocal implant.

“And you would know?” Dominguez asked. The two of them had a thing but they kept it on the down low while they were in the same section. From what Jerome had seen they were more open about it now they were in separate sections, but they were still testing the waters.

It was odd to see the strict Dominguez and snappy Dashtund’s verbal sparring.

“Course he did, all of us do,” Niemi responded, the whole platoon clearing their throats to hide their smiles and laughs.

Dominguez couldn’t quite hide her own smile as she shook her head.

“To answer the original question, no, we already know these things as well as our own E-12s, it seems from Moretti’s back checking that these are not only heavy machine guns but really crude versions of them. They’re so big because Masoul wasn’t able to produce the proper materials. Bigger breeches, barrels and tripods to make up for the weakness in the materials. Each one was made individually, where every E-12 is identical, these ones are all different. The barrels only work with one gun, and a firing pin will only work on one gun. Once a gun goes down they have to replace the entire thing or remake the part perfectly, and that’s why Masoul’s Chosen could only bring 40% of their guns to work. Holm believes that Osdal will have smaller and lighter versions,” Mark said.

“Great, so less carts needing to move the thing and more two or three-person groups,” Jerome said.

“Exactly,” Dooks agreed.

“While he’s just thinking about that for the gun, I’m wondering about the rounds, their regular rifles and armor plates.” Ko’s lips didn’t move but he looked to the group.

“We’ll have to assume the worst. Better to go in thinking we’re going to be up against the worst instead of underestimating our enemy,” Mark said.

“You been reading Sun Tzu again?” Sasaki asked.

Mark shrugged which seemed to say Maybe, so what? “I just hope that they don’t have full-body armor,” Tyler looked to them all no one wanted to fight people who could have the same armor as them.

“Heard that they’re going to let us have Anti-Material Rifles,” Dooks countered, there was a few grins at this. Including Tyler who rubbed his hands together like Christmas together, getting a few chuckles and snorts.

“Damn, those things are like a credit a magazine,” Dominguez shook her head.

“Yeah, I must have forgotten to tell you, I’m looking for volunteers to shoot on the AMRs and then train up others, any takers?” Tyler asked, a smile on his unmoving lips. It widened as Jerome and the others agreed with a twitch of their pinkies.

“Alright, looks like I’ll have plenty of volunteers!” Tyler shook with a laugh, his screen looking like Christmas really had come around, a few pressing accept and not multiple times.

Jerome and the rest of the platoon turned their attention back to the front of the auditorium. Holm was finishing up his briefing and invited everyone to come down and look at the weapons and ask questions.

Jerome watched who went up first, and it was mainly veterans and those in higher ranks that he’d heard good things about in passing conversation.

The information, while dull, could help out in a firefight.

Holm’s section of only four people spread out around the weapons to answer questions and discuss the machine gun and other insights they had into Harmony.

“Mind giving us a hand?” Holm asked, looking to them all as the stage and the area around it filled with people asking questions.

“Come on ladies and gents,” Mark said, pushing through the crowd to get to the front. The rest of the platoon followed, happy to share their knowledge.

***

Mark slapped a new clip into the AMR and pulled the cocking handle back. Augments in his ears were reducing the deck-shaking and ear-drum bursting noises of twenty Anti Material Rifles firing.

“I’m gonna have a fucking bruise from this,” Bairamov complained. The man was a Repulsor gunner, and he was a decent shot, mostly due to Tyler’s tutelage, but his baby was the Repulsor with extra ammunition.

“Oh shut up yah big crybaby,” Iliev said, happily firing away at the targets.

They all wanted to be the best, which made them listen to the better shooter’s advice with a keen ear. All of the best shots welcomed a challenge. It was a good dynamic, but one that pushed people to do their best in a friendly way.

“Alright, timed reactive shots. I’m going to give you each a scenario in your lanes, and you have five minutes, so prep. Enemies will react to your shooting,” Tyler called.

They were shooting dummy rounds, which simulated the kickback of the rifle, but the range did everything else. They were segregated into ‘tunnels’ five meters wide with view screens along the walls, roof, floor and directly ahead.

The screens could make up a scenario, fans would simulate air and the view screens would show it, adjusting to make the target appear further away or closer.

The platoon swapped out magazines, and Mark took extras and put them next to his gun.

“Ready!” Tyler warned, people finished up their last touches, Mark peered over his scope, the tunnel black.

“Begin!”.

The tunnels came to life; Mark was looking at a slum of some kind perched on a raised building.

He saw movement, and bringing up his scope he locked onto the movement, counting people and watching their paths. He heard someone start firing.

Someone else started moments later. Mark waited, he had ten minutes and he took his time, marking targets and estimating where they were going to go.

He breathed, slow and careful.

He checked his targets; there were fourteen, meaning he’d need to change magazines.

Time to rock and roll. Mark thought, remembering all that Richter, his training staff for basic, and Tyler had drilled into his skull.

He fired, expelling air as he changed targets, fired, changed targets, fired, let out air, new target.

The enemies started running for cover and chaos ensued.

Mark was fixated on his targets, but he missed a few times reloading, with only eight targets down. He got another three before the scene froze.

“Clear weapons!” Tyler yelled.

Weapons were unloaded and breeches left open as they waited for the results of their shooting. The view screen in front of Mark showed a replay of his rounds and placement. Mark made mental notes as he watched, data on correction, trigger pull, breathing, all of it was there.

Mark looked for a few pieces of key information, using his implants to go back and forth through the shoot to see what he’d done well and badly.

“Bring it in,” Tyler said a few minutes later, and everyone left their weapons where they were and gathered around Tyler, and Haas and Zukic were also there. Not about to let their egos get to their heads that they were the best shots around, they too were learning from Tyler.

It made Mark respect them more, rather than think any less of the two leaders.

“Alright, so this exercise was to see how well you were able to adjust to multiple targets that reacted like they were being shot at. It was an exercise in precision, your ability to think about the situation and adjusting on the fly. Some of you decided to start shooting as soon as you saw a target, not taking the time to search out the other targets in the area. This meant you got at least one good kill, but the others were sloppy. Others took too much time planning out the moves of their targets and didn’t have much time to actually shoot. Some of you made the right kind of estimations, and with educated guesses matched with knowledge of the weapon system, did well.” Tyler looked at everyone, his eyes never resting on anyone to single them out.

If people wanted to reveal their scores, that was up to them, otherwise Tyler wasn’t going to put them on the spot. They were all adults, they knew what they had done wrong and what they had to do next time.

“We’ll do another reactive shoot and then go grab some food?” Tyler said, looking to Haas and Zukic.

“This is your show Tyler,” Haas said, waving to Tyler with a grin.

Haas was happy to just be another Trooper for a while, sometimes being a leader was a lonely business.

“Alrighty, get behind those guns, same rules as before, but this will be a different scenario.”

Mark was hungry, but shooting guns, it was cathartic and fun when there wasn’t a real person at the other end of the barrel.

Over the next shoot Mark improved and Tyler called a food break. People locked their AMRs in the armories and headed off to the cafeteria. Mark found himself in a group with Sergeants and above, talking about the AMRs and best practices.

Mark saw a familiar face.

“Ollie?” Tyler said first, and Mark saw the boy’s face go through recognition.

He wasn’t a thin boy any more, he was a well-built young man with his hair cut short and his uniform crisp.

“Tyler?” Ollie asked.

Mark waded through the people, grinning.

Ollie held out a hand, and was wrapped up in a bear hug by the two brothers, laughing as he was lowered to the ground.

“The Victor brothers, fuck I’d never thought I’d see you two! Been a lifetime!” Ollie said.

Tyler smiled, introducing them all. “Ollie, this is Jerome, another Victor, Second Lieutenant Haas, Warrant Zukic and this is our resident gun nut, Sergeant Holm.”

They smiled and nodded to the young man who looked a bit overwhelmed to be talking to higher ranks so casually.

“Good to meet you,” Ollie said, looking nervous.

Ollie looked past them, seeing people from his platoon waving to him.

“We’ll catch up later,” Mark said, tapping Ollie on the back.

“Yeah, we should catch up, heard that you boys have been through some shit,” Ollie said, pitching his voice low in commiseration.

“Yeah, it hasn’t been pretty,” Mark said feeling older.

Ollie nodded, the smiles from before dissolved into grim nods and looks. “See you guys, good to meet you all,” Ollie said, nervous he’d fuck up in some way and get reamed out.

“He’s so new he squeaks,” Tyler said as Ollie raced to catch up with his platoon.

“Yeah, that’ll change,” Mark said, remembering a lifetime ago when he’d talked to Ollie about the first time he’d killed and seen his friends die.

It didn’t feel like that life was real anymore.

Chapter 7

Mining City Twenty-One

Masoul Actual Masoul System

5/3266

Caroline heard the screams first, then the grinding noise of the Diggers. She had heard the older people refer to it as fingernails on a chalkboard; it sent razor blades down your spine.

The shift siren went off and didn’t stop. She could hear shooting, and it wasn’t just the loud cracks of the Chosen’s rifles, but heavier thuds that brought back images of the Chosen’s last end to a riot.

Green lines spat out from their muzzles, cutting through humans, leaving their remains unrecognizable.

Then she was up and running, and adrenaline made her alive.

People were running in every direction; most were headed towards the towers that made up Mining City Twenty-One.

She looked to the strip mines, where a Digger came up from under a truck. They looked like an octopus with a squid’s head. That head had teeth capable of eating through Osdal Actual’s metal crust.

Its head smashed through the bottom of the truck and vibrated, cutting the truck apart. The truck exploded, but the Digger was unaffected, protected by its metal scales.

The rounds fired by the heavy machine guns hit the scales, bouncing along the Digger’s body, and rounds that hit its head went careening off.

Ellie, one of the few people that Caroline had become friends with, pulled on her arm.

“Let’s go!” she urged, trying to get her to go in the direction of the city.

“If we get to the sonic pad we’ll be fine!” Caroline said, pointing to the cermite pad where most of the machines were charged and worked on. There were three large towers with what looked like a bell on them at each corner of the pad. It was only a few hundred meters away, instead of kilometers.

Caroline looked to Ellie as another Digger vibrated to the surface in the middle of the people fleeing, its teeth cutting anything it touched to shreds.

It let its head fall, crushing hundreds as its tentacles lashed out; this one was as large as an in-system freighter, each tentacle eight foot wide.

Other Diggers were rushing out of the ground.

“Trust me Ellie!” Caroline said.

“Alright, go!”

Caroline turned and ran for the maintenance pad.

They got there unscathed, but Diggers were bursting out of everywhere, the night sky filled with lines of tracers.

A digger convulsed, and its teeth stopping moving as it came crashing down like at tree in a storm.

Two others joined it, but there must have been twenty Diggers, ranging from as big as an air-car to mountainous ones, the size of inter-system freighters.

Caroline and Ellie huddled on top of a powered down truck, watching the horror as Diggers disappeared, only to reappear in front or among the running Earthers.

The Chosen scrambled into their air cars and flew for the city, and the heavy machine guns in the city’s towers opened up on the Diggers, occasionally hitting Earthers as they got in Diggers way. The Chosen didn’t care, everyone down in the strip mines was just cattle to them.

Ellie started crying, and Caroline felt hot tears on her own cheeks. If the Chosen and their mines didn’t kill her, then the Diggers would.

It was all meaningless and all so useless, and they fell asleep on the truck crying. It was the first time in years that they’d been able to sleep undisturbed.

They woke to the noise of air cars roving through the sky.

Caroline looked out over the windswept plains that ran from the strip mines to Twenty-One.

There were holes all over the place, and a dozen dead Diggers lay over the landscape from the strip mine to Twenty-One.

Colored bundles broke up the red landscape that made the planet look like Mars before it was terraformed. Caroline’s chest tightened, knowing that those bundles were her fellow slaves.

She heard rifle fire in the distance, and at Twenty-One, air cars were moving around a bundle of colors. The Chosen were already herding them back out to the strip mine.

An air car came out of the sky, the wind whipping at Caroline’s coverings and waking Ellie up.

A Chosen stepped out from the air car with a snarl on her face. She kicked Ellie, who was still prone.

“Get the fuck back to work, lazy Earthers!” She spat, climbing back up into the air car.

Caroline saw the heavy machine gun welded to the bed of the air car track Caroline and Ellie as it rushed away.

Caroline ran over to Ellie, who held her head in her hands, her nose a broken mess as she whimpered into her hands. Caroline pushed it back into place before Ellie could say anything, and Ellie screamed, shoving away from Caroline.

Caroline felt her chest contract as she thought that she might lose her last friend.

“Thanks,” Ellie said a few moments later, her eyes already puffing up.

“Come on, I’ll give you a ride down to your excavator,” Caroline said, not wanting to be on the truck’s roof when the Chosen came back.

Ellie nodded numbly.

Caroline had seen it time and time before, but she just hoped Ellie hadn’t given up on life yet.

Chapter 8

EMFC Reclaimer

7/3266

Training continued. The veterans bestowed the knowledge that they’d gained from the other carriers on the new boots.

Ortiz had turned Second Lieutenant Kim into Captain Kim, shuffling Alexis from Sergeant to Warrant. It was a big move and she felt odd in her new position, but she listened to newly promoted Second Lieutenant Che.

It didn’t take her long to learn her position and then start learning Che’s. The more she knew about how he worked, the better they could interact and get their platoon performing.

The boots had needed to be brought down a few levels and built back up again, they were used to the lax rules on their carriers. Now they listened to their peers with open ears.

They hadn’t earned their place at the veteran table, but they were being treated like adults for now.

The Triple Twos had been in meetings, training themselves and others, and giving lectures on everything they could. Alexis knew that Tyler was leaving shortly, and it made her gut tighten in fear.

She worried about him as he worried about her. It was hard being married in the EMF, it was harder than anything she had done before, but the moments they got together made it worth it.

She buried herself in reports, looking at her people’s strengths and weaknesses, looking at ways to get them into classes that they might need.

A tray lowered in front of her. She glanced up and her frown turned into a smile.

“Hello there Warrant Officer Victor Ma’am!” Tyler said, coming to a half-assed position of attention.

“None of that mess,” she said leaning across the table to kiss him His smile was infectious. “I was trying to get my classes sorted out, I want to get some extra training with the Repulsors for my two section.”

“Ahh, just throw them in with Holm, he’s doing shooting in two days, Repulsors and those heavy machine guns,” Tyler said.

Alexis gave him s kiss, “Thank you, babe.” she said, before opening her implants and fired off a message to Holm.

“So what will you do with all that free time? I was thinking of watching a movie and cuddling,” Tyler said.

“I couldn’t think of a better plan, but I need to check into our gear stores and do paperwork for everyone’s new qualifications.”

“So I’ll watch the movie, you snuggle and do the reports?” Tyler asked.

She knew she’d be distracted by the movie, but she also knew his departure date was coming up soon. “Okay.” She could think of nothing better than curling up with her hubby to watch a movie. “I’m picking the movie, though.”

“You’ll be working!” Tyler protested.

“Yes, but we’ll be in my quarters.”

Tyler sighed and scooped spaghetti and meat sauce into his mouth.

“I know you like rom-coms,” she said, her face stretching into a wide smile at his accusatory expression as he tried to finish off his food. He knew she’d picked when he had a mouth full of food to hit him with that bit.

“No, I just get stuck watching them with you.”

“And you love me so you love rom-coms.” She batted her eyelashes for extra affect.

“You are terrible,” Tyler said.

“I’m your terrible though.”

“All mine,” he agreed with a grin, leaning over and kissing her again.

With her new rank as Warrant she shared a room with Second Lieutenant Che.

Tyler was a regular guest and having somewhere that the two of them could just be themselves, that wasn’t the library, was a nice change.

***

Mark flipped the blade around in his hand, it buzzed, but the grip negated the thousands of vibrations along the blade that occurred faster than a human could see. It was about as long as his own arm and a tenth the weight of his E-12.

It was well balanced and made, and Mark was impressed.

“Well? You gonna hit the thing?” Dashtund asked. Everyone stood watching Mark, they were in a classroom with a piece of armor plate from Masoul strapped to the desk.

Mark held the blade with two hands, preparing to saw into the armor to see if he could blunt the edge.

He pressed down and it went right through with only a little resistance.

“Huh,” Mark said, looking at the rough cut.

The strap at the end of the sword’s pommel allowed him to flip it in his hand idly.

He did it a few times then the handle rested in his hand, and he struck down and to the left, his left arm grabbing his right’s bicep.

The armor, its clasp and the desk all had a cut through them.

He didn’t pause, bringing the pommel coming back to his stomach as he stabbed forward through the plate, and it took him a few seconds to pull the blade free. He twisted the pommel and the buzzing stopped.

“So we can get through the armor, now we just have to figure out how to use that against people wearing powered armor,” Zukic said.

The Platoon fell into silent contemplation.

“I doubt it’s something that we’re going to learn in a day. We are, however, going to work on using Vibra-Blade s, Mark; I believe you and Tyler have a decent background in fighting with blades?” Haas looking to Tyler and then Mark.

“I can think of one person that schools both of us,” Mark said, and Tyler let out a snort and nodded in agreement.

“Who?” Haas asked.

“Force Sergeant Major Nerva,” Mark said.

“For being an officer on a spaceship with people that fight on different planets, the man lives and breathes ancient fighting styles. I would never want to fight him unless he was five kilometers away and I had an AMR, and he was tied to a post,” Tyler said, looking thoughtful before shrugging. “Hell, maybe not even then,”

“Well hopefully the Sir is bored of doing paper work,” Haas said.

***

“You leave the Roma Legion to gather more recruits, leaving the swords, shields and damned ancient crap behind, and somehow, out here someone wants you to go and swing a sword around?” NIDenise sighed in his head as Nerva felt amusement touch his lips.

“Something the matter?” he thought-spoke back.

“Second Lieutenant Haas is requesting that you train the Triple Twos on fighting with swords. They tested them out against the armor plating from Masoul. Seems that it cuts through. They were looking at ways to defeat powered armor-wearing Chosen. The AMR took three shots, but the Vibra-Blades cut right through with some extra pressure.”

“Do you need me for any more of this paperwork?” Nerva asked.

No, go have fun.”

Nerva got up from his seat, checking over the message Haas had sent, and fired off a quick reply on his way to the classroom.

***

Jerome got out of the squat rack, his legs visibly shaking as he took a seat on a nearby bench.

Mark got into the rack, squaring off with the squat bar. He pulled the bar off the rack, stepped back and dropped down, and with an exhale he pushed himself back to standing.

He repeated the motion, gritting his teeth by the end of it, his legs shaking.

“Just a few more,” Jerome said, more to assure Mark he’d help him if he started to fail.

Mark pushed again and got those few more, and Jerome helped him get the bar back into the rack.

Working out cleared his mind and let his worldly troubles slip away, it was his meditation.

“Only a few days to go,” Jerome said.

“Yeah.” Mark was ready, mentally and physically, and his people knew what they were doing and were well versed in their roles.

They hadn’t even decompressed from Masoul, there was no time for that. Instead, they’d rushed through weapons training.

“I thought that Nerva was just showing off when we were doing that extra training to become Master Corporals,” Jerome said, rubbing his neck, feeling the bruises that his augments had already healed.

They’d been fighting with Nerva for the last month; the man moved with grace and surety, as if he had been born with a sword in his hand.

Every fight was a learning opportunity and he was far beyond anything that the Triple Twos had started off with. They were a hell of a lot better, but he could still call out their problems as they were fighting and Jerome hadn’t even seen the old man get near to being out of breath.

Other units quickly joined in on the sparring sessions once they learned what the purpose was. Everyone did drills with swords and they were strapped onto every Trooper’s ammo pack.

Carriers other than Fearless and Reclaimer didn’t make it mandatory, and they kept holding back their screamers, everyone Corporals and up had at least one screamer.

Screamers were Hypervelocity Missiles. They went really damn fast and made anything in its path have a really really shitty day.

If they were facing powered armor, they needed to put them down as fast as possible.

The powered armor from Masoul was still in a cleared out ammo bunker. Reclaimer and Fearless’ people had a familiarization course with the armor so they could use it if they found it, and understand its weaknesses.

In demonstrations by the Triple Twos and others with some decent time in the powered armor, the newbies from the other carriers understood the need for screamers, Vibra-Blades and anything that might put powered armor down.

“Four days,” Mark said.

“Can’t wait.”

It would take them possibly months to reach Osdal Actual, and in that time the EMF fleet would be moored out-system, all of the Troopers and non-essentials rotating from readiness to cryo, waiting for a signal or going at a pre-set time that the insertion teams didn’t know. If they got captured, the EMF didn’t want the enemy to know when they were attacking.

Jerome got in the calf machine and started pushing himself into the shoulder pads and pointing his toes to lift the weight.

On the freighter they wouldn’t have any equipment to work out, so Mark and Jerome had been getting the most out of their workouts before they left. But that was half the reason, the other half was that gym allowed them to get away from thinking about their upcoming deadline.

Chapter 9

EMFC Reclaimer

Osdal System outer limits

7/3266

Young, Yu and Bobbie had gone through the entire freighter and checked it all over at least three times in the last week. They did it again before their flight.

Bobbi checked the work spaces and his cargo hold, Young ran electronic checks and probes, Yu wandered around the craft checking the engines, the ports that hid weapon systems that he only knew about because he’d seen the weapons deployed.

He had four auto-cannons along the craft’s belly, and five auto-turrets; one on each side of the freighter, others at the forward and rear of the ships belly, and another on the roof.

There were also two missile launchers fed by internal magazines, though he only had twelve missiles in total and their rate of fire was one every three seconds.

He checked the wings. This inter-system freighter was rated to land on planets, and had nice sloped back wings and an aerodynamic frame.

Yu knew it would be a bitch to fly in atmosphere, but the engines were as strong as a combat drop ship’s, which sounded nice, when you didn’t think of the fact it was nearly three times the size of a Combat Shuttle.

“What the hell did we do to get stuck driving these buckets?” Yu growled as he saw Bobbie head deep into an ammunition bunker hidden under the decking.

“We were too good at flying a Combat Shuttle, so giving us this tin can is higher ups idea of job satisfaction. You know, the whole, ‘we’re not happy unless we’re pissed off and complaining’ bit?” Bobbie said, climbing out of the bunker.

“I hate driving this thing,” Yu said, wandering through the large cargo hold, which looked nearly the same as the Combat Shuttle’s, minus the drop hatches under the seats.

He couldn’t think of piloting the freighter as anything more than driving; sure it entered atmosphere, which would be interesting, but was something Yu did not want to do with the lumbering beastie.

Being in a Combat Shuttle was living, this, this was doing the goddamn milk run.

“Looks like our passengers have arrived,” Bobbie said, looking past Yu.

Yu looked behind, and saw the Triple Twos stepping across the hangar deck.

A flash of memory surfaced, of seeing them walking across another hangar deck and climbing aboard a shuttle destined for Masoul Actual, at a time when he hadn’t known them that well.

He waved, biting down his emotions. He’d come to know them all very well, which made seeing that there were three Troopers missing hurt all the more.

Some of the Triple Twos waved back.

Yu turned and wandered up to the cockpit where Young was checking her downloads on one screen and her diagnostics on another.

Yu heard Bobbie close another work space and move to the power plant under the cockpit, his final check.

The Troopers walked across the cargo decking, dropping bags and setting up their gear, and the hatch remained down, trying to get the last bits of fresher air inside the freighters.

Bobbie came out of the power plant and mechanical center of the freighter.

“Got room for our weapons?” Zukic asked, dragging a large green locker with him.

“Right over here,” Bobbie guided Zukic, Mark, Dooks, Holm and Bairamov to deposit their lockers in compartments under the decking; once secure they looked like nothing but real flooring, but within them they held the entire platoon’s weapons, and a hefty amount of ammunition.

Thankfully no one would be finding out that surprise, or the others built into the freighter, until the carriers were in the Harmony controlled planets and asteroid belts’ orbits.

Moretti entered through the hangar’s air lock, wearing a ragtag space suit and duster combo like the rest of them.

Yu, Young and Bobbie had put theirs into storage as they got in the way of flying and having stuff fly around if they were in zero grav was a pain in the ass.

Moretti greeted everyone and grabbed a place to set up his sleeping gear.

Everyone was friends, and there wasn’t much special about going on platoon only mission. They’d been there, done that, got the scars.

“Looking good here,” Bobbie said poking his head into the cockpit.

“Last scans show we’re operational,” Young replied.

“Let’s power everything up and prepare for departure, seal hatches last,” Yu said.

Bobbie’s head disappeared back into the cargo hold as Yu fired up the power plant on the freighter and opened a channel to flight control. “Flight Control this is Bandit two, sealing up and prepared for departure.”

“All sealed up!” Bobbie reported.

“Understood Bandit one, depressurizing hangar,” Flight Control said, and Yu saw dust and a wrench being sucked towards the walls; someone had forgotten their tools.

He sighed to himself.

“Depressurized and opening hangar doors,” Flight Control said.

Yu held off putting power to the vertical thrusters.

The hangar doors opened, showing space beyond. There wasn’t any sign of Osdal System in the inky darkness.

Young anticipated his request, a checkpoint by checkpoint map showing where they were going.

“Bandit Two this is Flight Control; you are cleared for launch.”

“Thank you Flight Control, see you later.” Yu powered the vertical thrusters, and Reclaimer was pointed away from Osdal, its engines firing to slow the carrier down and bring them to stop outside the system’s Oort cloud. As they were losing speed, the shuttle still had inertia, and it wasn’t braking.

They slid out of the hangar without any thrust.

Yu looked to his flight plan; he wouldn’t need to fire his engines except for minor corrections for a few weeks.

“Now all we have to do is get to Osdal Actual,” Young said.

“Fuck, I hate this part, so goddamn boring,” Yu sighed, getting comfortable in his seat.

He’d changed the freighter’s seats out, after the flight on the shuttle, he’d learned that good lumbar support and a comfortable chair were key items to staying sane. It was odd the things you changed and appreciated after adversity, or too much exposure to the opposite.

“That’s why I got Reclaimer’s movie and television database.” Young grinned.

“Isn’t that illegal?” Yu asked, looking at her with a smile.

“Well, we are Harmony supporters, I don’t think anyone’s going to give a rat’s ass that we aren’t paying the corporations to watch their movies while fighting their war.”

Yu let out a snort. “You may have a point there. I’ve never thought of what we do as a war, sure, we were clearing the worlds of rebels, or just scaring the shit out of them by simply showing up. Before Sacremon we didn’t have that many slug-them-out fights, but even those were just battles. It all sucks, don’t get me wrong, but this, this war is not just a group of people that want more money or benefits from their planet’s conglomerate partnership. It’s a hell of a lot uglier.”

“And it feels like it’s not going to go away any time soon,” Young said, looking out at the stars and darkness that surrounded them.

“Yeah,” Yu said, shaking his head to try and get off the subject, but it was hard to. Everything they did was done to prepare for fighting Harmony. All they talked about was Harmony.

“I’ll take first watch, go play some card games or something if you want,” Yu said, checking his navigation controls, though they didn’t need to change their trajectory for another couple of days.

“Holler if you need anything,” Young said, pulling off her seat straps, and walking through the cockpit and into the cargo hold. Yu heard her talking to someone at the bottom of the short ladder that separated the cargo hold’s floor to the cockpit, then he heard footsteps coming up.

Yu looked around. “Hey Haas.”

“Hey. I was wondering what information you might have for me on the last sensor logs and our time to destination. I was also thinking we should go over how we’re going to impersonate a group of cargo handlers. I know Jerome’s got experience moving cargo, the rest of us, well we’ve probably stolen from cargo haulers like this, but load and offload one… not officially.” Haas grinned.

“Well, Bobbie would be the best for the cargo handling stuff, and as for the sensor logs and time estimates…” Yu used his implants to bring up the information on his mix of screens and holographic display, and slid them over to Young’s seat where Haas was.

They sat in companionable silence, Haas looking over information as Yu checked that the ship was still operating like it was supposed to be. Then he went to the list of movies, books and series. The freighter would get them to Osdal System fine, Yu’s role was simply to make sure that they were on track and to react if a situation came up.

Goddamn driving.

Chapter 10

Tower

Earth, Sol System

7/3266

Wallace walked into Nivad’s office.

“So they’ve left for Osdal?” Nivad asked.

“Yes, they should be there within a few months.”

“And the carriers?”

“So far undetected.” Wallace remained standing by the door.

Nivad stood. “When will the other teams start being inserted?”

“Over the next three months.”

Nivad nodded and walked out from behind his desk and over to the door. “Let’s go and see what our sector heads have to say.”

Wallace opened the door for Nivad, following behind.

Their guard detail all wore the powered armor like that which they had sent off to the carriers around Osdal. They fell in around Nivad and Wallace without a word.

In the conference room. Dalia, the head of the EMF and the intelligence heads of every system sat around the table.

Faces had changed, and the heads of Fernix, Housapel and Mintran had all been replaced. Those who filled their positions were determined to do better than their predecessors, or they too would vanish from Mega city.

“It would be disappointing if those units that the other carriers gave Reclaimer and Fearless were seen to be sub-standard. After much study, I have come to see that veterans prove to be almost invaluable. I believe that the cross training that Reclaimer offered Fearless was a large part of why they were such an effective unit. I have not seen the other carriers request access to the wealth of information that Fearless and Reclaimer have,” Wallace said as they walked to the head of the table.

Nivad felt satisfaction at the expression on the head of the EMF’s face as she worked her surface.

“I will have to look into that more. I do believe that the veterans are earning an additional stipend for their knowledge? They also got a percentage of the price for the freighter and infrastructure that they recovered undamaged, right?” Nivad took his seat.

“I believe so. Keeping their mind off their credits and on destroying Harmony is a good idea.” Nivad sensed some serious undertones to Wallace’s words.

“Let us begin,” Nivad said.

Systems were hurting from not getting the materials and supplies from Osdal, Fernix and Housapel. More freighters were reported stolen, as they hadn’t shown up at their intended destinations. It was assumed that Harmony had control of them.

Mintran was doing all it could to look like a model planet; the people were working their assess off and the companies were putting money into their people and infrastructure, not only to keep them happy, but it looked like they wanted to take Osdal’s position as a fabricator of compound materials.

Earth and Her Colonies were having a massive issue with transporting materials. Shipping Station was still being repaired, and could only hold a percentage of its old capacity. Most companies didn’t want to send their products there, and were instead shipping direct to other systems.

The subscriptions for the Harmony War were way up, and workers, not just company officers, wanted to watch the war.

Masoul was recovering quickly. They were going through a population boom and they were looking at building more housing.

The Gas planet and Asteroid belts production was up.

The sale of the last cargo on shipping station and the shipping station itself back to the Masoul partnership was confirmed.

There were Ministry of Intelligence agents on Masoul still, but they hadn’t found anything of note in the cities.

Fernix and Housapel were firmly under the control of Harmony.

Their military was growing, and camps for Earthers, or those that didn’t agree with Harmony, were constructed. Someone made the reference to segregating camps. Harmony gave them the bare minimum to sustain themselves, and worked them hard. They built their weapons, kept the systems working and provided for the people who supported Harmony.

No information came out of the camps, and they were located away from population centers. Both Housapel and Fernix were highly developed worlds; they had sprawling colony centers and nearly five hundred million people combined.

The majority were living with minimal work, other than those in the camps.

Harmony’s propaganda machine was in full force and their military had swelled to ten million. It was expected to be closer to fifty times that by the time Troopers showed up. The heads didn’t think that they would be able to give all of them good gear, but people trained to use even a simple rifle and who were driven with the knowledge that their plight was right and their cause was righteous could do some hellish damage.

Harmony wasn’t just a group in Fernix and Housapel, they were a system, and it was working. The people were getting a taste of the freedom that company officers got, while others were taking up all the slack and being the focus of anger and propaganda.

Some people likened it to the Nazi’s system, but with a focus on communist sharing and pride in one’s group.

There were leaders, but they were all puppets. No one knew who the real leaders were, or where they were.

Then they got to the EMF head.

“Right now, we have four hundred thousand people joining Earth’s Military Forces every month. In four months, we will have 35 million personnel in transit to Housapel.” The head of the EMF looked proud of her numbers.

Nivad knew them already, and he knew the plan. It wasn’t elegant but it was simple, something that he’d learned from the military texts. It was better to have a simple goal than a complex one.

Forty five limbo carriers had been awoken, trained on new gear and told of the situation on Fernix. To them, upon waking up, they had only just finished fighting battles across Earth and Her Colonies, from pirates to rogue colonies and everything in between. They would fly outside of Fernix’s sensors and patrols, and would send in their own operatives like the forces at Osdal were doing, then they would secure Fernix system, installation by installation, clearing out Harmony.

Fifteen Carriers close to Sol had been recalled to make up training staff for the new Troopers. Nivad had created incentives for people to start up ship yards and given the industry a huge push; two hundred and ninety Earth Military Force Carriers were to be built over twenty years. As soon as the carriers were finished and crewed, they were to be sent hurtling off towards Housapel. In four months, the last carrier would leave on the 51 year journey to Housapel.

By that time Osdal would either be back under Earth’s control, or Earth and Her Colonies were in for a world of troubles.

Nivad was already talking to the Osdal partnership about getting colony ships together to reseed the planet with working colonists. He was doing the same with the Fernix and Housapel partnerships, because when the EMF cleared the planets there wouldn’t be enough people to keep the systems productive. They needed workers, so another colonist drive was in order.

It was Nivad’s plan to group the carriers outside the systems, then rush in, fresh and ready for battle. They would clear out the systems, then as soon as they were clear, the colonists that had been shipped from Earth would move in and start getting the system back to work for Earth and Her Colonies.

Dalia was last to go. She dealt primarily with activities within Sol and whatever else Nivad wanted someone he trusted to look over.

“While people are angry with the war, they’re angrier with Harmony. They’ve seen the videos and they want to destroy Harmony. They’re willing to put up with a few hardships to get through the current conflict. Our ability to move items throughout Earth and Her Colonies is becoming pronounced. Fernix is the biggest ship builder in the EHC and it’s hitting us hard. Earth is the only other system that makes system to system ships. All of our production was focused on carriers and we have all of our freighters running full out, but Harmony has over sixty percent of our freighting ships. We’re reclaiming them slowly with carriers spread out along the main routes between systems. It’s slow, and to get all of those carriers back, it’s going to take decades.”

Nivad saw that fact was sinking into people’s minds. They needed to think beyond this war. It had taken a massive chunk out of the economy already, and if they didn’t plan it out then they could be stuck in a depression like after Earth’s World Wars.

“People are quickly looking to change to freighters, and the large companies are being slow, probably looking for more incentives from the EHC government. I believe it’s best that we give them some incentives, but also take a cut of the profits they make on the carriers. We’re going to need money later to keep the economy up as the impact of Harmony’s systems not supplying materials and goods hits us.” Dalia took a breath, not liking what she had to say next. Nivad knew what was coming, and carefully kept his features calm and relaxed.

“It will be another 24 years until the real impacts of Harmony’s uprising is felt. With the distances between systems, a lot of freight is moving while this is going on. Our deliveries for the next couple of decades are already underway, but after that it’s a mess,” she admitted.

“Start up a committee to look into past recessions and depressions. I want us ready to face that when it comes to it,” Nivad said. “We will have to keep people’s minds off of the woes back home and focused on our battles across the stars. Wallace has made a recommendation, and I agree with him.” Nivad looked to the man and nodded his head.

Wallace bowed his head at the praise.

Nivad continued. “The EMF will start giving out medals for actions in the Harmony War, as well as pieces for valor and injuries. Medals grab people’s attention and show that our Troopers are doing something. That said, I don’t want them to be handed out to just anyone. Wallace, I want you to look into medals and form another committee that will look into awarding them. Make sure that you have people that have been in real combat on the committee. I want those awards given to those who are not only seen as role models by the people, but by the EMF.”

“I’ll get it done,” Wallace said, looking to Nivad and then the head of the EMF. They nodded to one another; they’d talk later.

“Very well, let’s go win a war,” Nivad said, standing.

Chapter 11

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

7/3266

Caroline woke to the sound of gunfire again. The Diggers had showed up twice in as many months since the first attack.

She felt the others in her lean-to shuffling around nervously.

“Just a runner,” someone said, the words passing around as people went back to sleep.

Just a runner, she thought, wondering why she didn’t care more.

She’d seen so many people die over the months that it barely registered. Someone was running in the daytime, just so that the Chosen could end their lives.

They’d finally given up hope, and believed that dying was better than living.

Caroline hoped that they found peace, and settled back onto the hard Osdal ground. But something kept her from trying to sleep; something was missing, something was wrong.

Where’s Ellie? She immediately she knew who the runner was.

“Oh no, Ellie,” Her weary body pushed up and out of the lean-to, and people grumbled as she opened the cloth coverings to look outside.

She saw the chosen sitting in their air car, and she could hear their laughing.

One fired at Ellie, who was only a few hundred meters away, and the laughing told her everything. They were toying with Ellie.

Caroline wanted to run over there and beat their heads in, make them dance as rounds flew beside their heads or at their feet.

She collapsed onto her knees whimpering to herself, angry at Ellie for leaving her, angry at herself for being angry at Ellie. But most of all she was sad, knowing that she was totally alone, that one of the pricks would hit her and then Ellie would be no more.

Caroline wanted to crawl back into the lean-to and curl up into a ball, pushing the world away, but she couldn’t move from watching Ellie walk away and jump as another round hit the ground near her feet.

She wished that there was something she could do to get Ellie to come back, to make this all a bad memory, to go shopping, to laugh and talk about which boys they liked and what they wanted to do with their lives, as if they had a real plan.

Another air car came down and someone stepped out, and the laughing slowly died and then stopped suddenly as the new arrival started barking orders. The shooters got into the air car and took off, heading for Ellie, and hit her with the front of the car. She collapsed on the ground. The air car continued on, guards getting out and walking back, Ellie was still moving.

No, just let her die, please! Caroline might not agree with Ellie’s decision to get herself killed, but it was her decision to make. A bullet would be simple and easy, but instead they were beating and kicking her.

Caroline could only imagine the pain they were inflicting on the frail girl with their vicious kicks and punches.

Then they stopped, grabbed Ellie, and dumped her in the back of the air car, then turned around and headed for the lean-tos.

They dumped Ellie out on the ground in front of the confused group; they never brought the runners back, they just shot them.

“No more runners! You run we’ll get you over to the educators, and they’ll take weeks letting you die!” Caroline heard one of the Chosen said to the residents of the shacks. Caroline scrambled to her feet and headed towards Ellie.

“Fucking Earthers,” the man said, kicking Ellie again.

The air car took off and people continued on with their lives, no one caring about Ellie’s broken form. They had their own worries.

Caroline looked over Ellie’s body; her arm and ribs looked to be broken. Her face was swelling badly.

“Kill me, please just kill me,” Ellie said, her voice filled with pain, her body too broken to do it herself. She pulled a knife from her clothes, pushing it into Caroline’s hands.

She stole one of the Chosen’s blades! Caroline thought, the blade trembling in her hand.

“Please, Caroline, please, I can’t do this any more,” Ellie cried, choking on blood and broken teeth.

The blade shook in Caroline’s hands.

It’s her choice, what can she expect? She can’t go back to work like this, they’ll never give her medical aid… Caroline’s mind was a mess of emotions and cold reality.

“Come on Ellie, I need you,” Caroline said, her voice barely a whisper.

“No, you don’t. You’re stronger than me. I’m just holding you down.”

“No! No, you’re not!”

“Please,” Ellie coughed, spitting blood and teeth out on the ground, but her broken jaw didn’t allow most of it out.

“I can’t…”

“Do it, fucking do it you coward!” Ellie urged, fire in her eyes as they locked on Caroline.

The fire died and Ellie reached for the knife with her unbroken arm, fingers broken and bent in ways that made Caroline wince.

“Either you do it, or I choke on my blood and teeth.”

Caroline couldn’t imagine letting her friend die like that, and she saw Ellie’s finality. Either Caroline did it, or Ellie would find a way.

“I’ll do it.”

“Thank you.” The relief was palpable in Ellie’s voice.

Caroline wanted to yell at her for saying thank you at such a thing, but there was little fight left in her. “How do I do it?”

“Hit me in the temple, or the kidneys, or a main artery, just make it look like they killed me. Thank you Caroline, you were my best friend,” Ellie sounded peaceful.

Caroline couldn’t take it any more, and she drove her hand forward, the blade sinking into Ellie’s temple. The broken woman’s body tensed and then went slack, her arm falling and her chest ceasing to move.

“Goodbye Ellie,” Caroline said, tears running tracks through the metal dust on her face. She kissed Ellie’s head, pulling the blade out and wiping it on Ellie’s clothes. She tucked it into her sleeve and looked at her friend. After a few moments it was too much, she turned and left for her lean-to, remembering the times they’d hung out at one another’s living units, their parents also close friends.

Sure, they’d had their problems with school and parental authority, but looking back it had been perfect.

Now they were all gone, Ellie’s parents, Caroline’s and now Ellie too.

The shift siren went up, and Caroline turned from her lean-to to the parking lot of trucks. For the next 22 hours she’d be running ore from the mines to the processors.

The work never ended on Osdal Actual.

Chapter 12

Bandit Two

Entering Oort cloud

11/3266

It had been two months since they’d left Reclaimer, and even with their imparted velocity they were still heading towards the system at a decent speed.

For the last couple of weeks Bandit Two had been bleeding speed, approaching velocities that the freighter was actually meant to work at, not really suited to a system to system transport.

Everyone was thoroughly bored with one another; they worked out, practiced fighting, played cards, read and did whatever they could to keep themselves from being bored.

Thankfully, they had all gone through the training course with Combat Shuttle pilots so they were also working on their Shuttle qualifications.

It was easy enough putting the freighter into simulator mode and running them through the various tests. In return, the Combat Shuttle crew learned how to fight with everything from their fists to an AMR.

Hell, they’d even got bored enough to join in on the Vibra-Blade sparring.

Doing anything was better than nothing.

Thankfully, no one had decided to pack their bags with explosive spicy food, and instead they’d brought as much fresh food from the cafeteria that they could beg, borrow or steal. It gave them something to enjoy other than the bland food bars.

There was no smoking allowed on the freighter, so gum and dip were the normal currency of poker games and barters.

“Watch out for that one,” Young said, pointing to an asteroid that was thousands of kilometers away. He sounded as bored as Yu felt.

“Thanks, tips,” Yu said. The Oort cloud in any system is a sparse sphere of asteroids that hangs outside of a solar system, some were denser, others not so much. Osdal’s was really dense, but in space terms that still left hundreds of thousands, or even millions of kilometers between groupings.

The closer they got to the system the more asteroids they’d find.

“Once we wrangle ourselves a rock and mine, then we’re just a week away from civilization. I need a shower,” Young said, stretching in her seat.

“Uh huh, will Haas be joining you in that shower?” Yu asked, and her stretch stopped mid-way.

She was a good looking athletic woman, a bit short, but smart and adventurous. Yu was honestly curious if she liked men, or was more inclined to the same sex, like him.

“Wha? How did you… Uhh? Have you told anyone?” She pitched her voice low as she looked to the hatch that led to the cargo hold, as most people were getting some rack time.

“No, I haven’t told anyone,” Yu said with a smile.

She sighed in relief.

“They already know,” Yu added, laughing as the tension that had left her body came racing back.

“Shit!”

“They don’t care; you’ve seen them with leave in the mess. They’re horn dogs, don’t matter much to them,” Yu reassured her.

“Start with that next time, I nearly had a heart attack.”

Yu just smiled and laughed, doing his best to keep it down.

A boot flew into the cockpit. “Shaddaup! It’s like sleeping next to the fucking gossip girls,” Dashtund complained, his way of telling them he could hear them.

“Stop moving, dickhead!” Dominguez muttered.

“Sorry babe,” Dashtund said, his voice low.

Yu pressed a button, closing the hatch to the cargo hold and Yu and Young burst out laughing.

“Holy shit, I think my sides are going to break,” Young said, panting.

“Watch out he’ll throw another boot!” Yu said, both of them breaking out into laughter again.

Some time later they wound down, feeling a hell of a lot better.

“Seriously though, we’re all happy for you two. After the last time you two were off talking in the mess alone we thought something might happen,” Yu said.

“Well thank you.” She gave him a genuine smile.

“Better be, took all our tricks and sticking you together in a freighter for two months!” Yu said, pointing at her, his serious face dissolving into a smile.

Young was about to say something, when her screen sent up a warning signal.

They turned their chairs to face forward, and Young’s hands danced in mid-air, the implants in her hands attached to her eye, making a hologram that only she could see.

“Found a nice rock,” She said, tension evaporating as Yu’s hands moved away from the alert button and weapons console.

“Miners would give up ships for these scanners. This asteroid’s got a good concentration of rare metals, and heavy platinum content. Not all that far in either,” she said, her hands moving out and rotating in the air.

She pinched the air and threw it at Yu.

Yu got a copy of her view and opened it up with his implants, and he looked over the asteroid; out here they were bigger than the inner rings.

He looked at the varying scans that turned the asteroid into a layered diagram showing the different materials throughout. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a really good guesstimate.

“Now we just need to find somewhere to land,” he said, keeping an eye on the better deposits and searching for an area that could fit the freighter, and didn’t have frozen materials underneath.

The freighter was good at regulating its heat, but it still had bled off, in vacuum it didn’t go anywhere. If it was on a rock, then the struts would act as a heat sink, pouring heat from the freighter into the ground. But if you were on frozen materials that could mean a really nice bang as it sublimated and exploded. Not the best plan.

“How does this look?” he asked, marking a point and sending it to Young.

“Looks good to me, flight plan in five, going to need to burn off this speed.”

“Okay, run a check on that surface, don’t want to be on any ice pockets, of anything.”

He was a great pilot, but Young’s area was sensors. She’d have an answer for him that could be etched in stone.

***

“Join the EMF they said, it’ll be fun they said. You’ll see cool planets and asteroid belts! I fucking hate recruiters,” Tal growled, broadcasted to the entire platoon.

“Bunch of assholes,” Sasaki agreed.

“Never wanted to be an asteroid miner?” Jerome asked, smiling.

The responses came in, ranging from No, to Go fuck yourself.

Jerome laughed in his helmet as he worked the grinder at his feet. Most people were on them, they were collapsible units with a power and extraction tube that fed into a processing machine that separated rock from useful metals. The were on EMFCs, in case they needed to grab materials for the machine shops that lined their hull. Cheaper to mine an asteroid than pay for refined metal.

He made sure that the drill didn’t go nuts, and others moved around checking lines. Bobbie was checking through the processor and making sure the rocks being spit out were going away from the asteroid and their freighter.

Mark and Dooks were shifting good material from the hopper to the freighter. Thankfully, the freighter was on zero grav and the asteroid’s micro-gravity was minimal, making it easy to carry hundreds of pounds of separated metal.

It also made things like walking around a tad difficult, and everyone was wearing magnetic and pick boots. If the magnets didn’t work, then the picks dug into the ground on contact.

Jerome didn’t want to be an asteroid all of his life, so it was interesting.

He opened a private channel to Mark. “Wonder if our people are doing this back at The Yard?” Jerome said.

“Well, from those reports, it sounds like we’re processing asteroids a hell of a lot faster. Madeline was talking about making tugs to rope asteroids and bring them back to the smelters. I don’t think they have this kind of operation on anything but test asteroids. I’m gonna see if Moretti knows a few tricks to get the plans and software on the scanners back to them. Do them more use than us”

“Upstanding citizens that we are,” Jerome said.

Mark let out something between a grunt and a laugh.

“Well, for right now we need this to keep up our cover,” Jerome said, slowing down his grinder’s blades as he found a good vein. No sense in keeping the blades sped up and wasting good material.

“Fuck, I think I’m getting the hang of this,” Jerome complained on the platoon wide channel.

“Before I met you guys I was a good-to-do CEO, then the second of an uprising, and afterwards I’m a glorified asteroid miner and I can’t even smoke!” Moretti complained.

“Just got to get used to dipping,” Holm said, spitting.

Jerome worked the bit of chew in his own mouth and spat into the squeeze bottle he’d rigged in his helmet.

“Savage,” Moretti said.

Holm and others laughed.

Even though being a miner wasn’t the most fun, it was something different. It wasn’t sitting around in a cargo bay; now that was boring as shit.

“Moretti, we’re picking up some signal traffic, thought you might want to check it out,” Young said from the freighter’s cockpit, where she was watching the scanners and communications systems.

“You truly are a goddess in human form.”

“Intel nerd,” Iliev muttered.

“Don’t knock it till you try it!” Moretti said, and Jerome saw the man push off his grinder and float above the ground, using outcroppings to propel himself into the freighter.

“Someone got music?” Dooks asked after a time.

“I got some, mostly metal and such though,” Mark said.

“I’ll give it a go, getting bored as fuuuuck out here,” Dashtund complained.

“It ain’t everyone’s tastes,” Mark warned.

“Put it on, I can hear Bairamov’s heavy breathing already, and it’s worse than his snoring,” Zukic said.

“Low blow, Warrant,” Bairamov complained.

“Mouth breather,” Zukic shot back.

“Skinny bastard,” Bairamov returned.

Jerome laughed in his helmet. Zukic was a higher rank, and they respected that, but being all uptight about it all the time was enough to get anyone bent all out of shape. When the time called for it they would do what he said without question, but here with little to no threat around, shooting the shit was perfectly fine.

The sounds of a piano tingled across the platoon’s implants.

“Mama,” The song started, and there was knowing laughs from the crowd.

“Bohemian Rhapsody, you sneaky fucker.”

Jerome smiled as he listened to the timeless song that had for some reason been adopted by military personnel ever since it had been first released.

By the third line everyone was singing along, smiling and half-dancing on the asteroid surface. They looked like a bunch of idiots, and it was great.

Chapter 13

Bandit Two

Oort cloud Osdal System

12/3266

For two weeks they’d had decent hits on the grinder, and on the third they’d found the platinum and copper vein they’d been searching for.

They’d filled all but the bare areas they’d need to sleep in. It was tight as hell, but doable.

“Okay, let’s get this show on the road, next stop, a fucking shower!” Yu announced to tired cheers. They’d worked themselves ragged to finish mining, and the refining centers and the stations around them were so close.

Just a week to go, Yu thought, pushing off with the thrusters and putting power into the engines.

He swung wide off their asteroid and headed for the nearest refining station.

Young was on sensor watch; the further they got into Osdal, the more asteroids they’d come across. “Beacon is good on the asteroid.”

They’d left a marker on the thing that would only respond to their codes, that way they could come back if they needed it.

Moretti insisted that money was the most useful tool in the information business. Since credits weren’t going to be accepted in a system where the banking system was down, they needed to trade or get some monetary equivalent in order to get themselves outfitted like Osdalians, and grease the right palms.

Moretti took up one of the two seats that was behind Young and Yu. He used his implants to go through different information channels, confirming that the camps existed, and he also believed that Harmony had instituted a monetary system. They were buying up materials, he believed to make tools meant for war, and also materials that they were shipping to Housapel and Fernix.

He was working on building profiles of the key players and the different systems in place. All of it was being beamed back to the carrier fleet, which was slowly moving towards Osdal. There were tens of other groups trying to insert themselves into Osdal.

Some of their goals were to lay down sensor nets so that the Carriers knew where the Osdals were, so no one could get a sensor reading of them, or see them.

Others were there to enter the Chosen’s ranks, still others worked the organic planets and asteroid belts or refiners.

In an ideal situation they would have a person in every major area Harmony used.

None of the people with Yu believed that would happen, but anything was better than nothing.

***

Mark was in the cockpit with Bobbie when the refinery and it’s attached station came into view.

“Fuck it’s ugly,” Mark said.

The Refinery looked like multiple rough boxes stacked together. At one end there was a massive docking platform. On the other side there were large freighters with robots moving to them, loading them with refined materials. One freighter lit up it’s drive, pushing away from the dock and heading towards Osdal Actual.

The station seemed to have built off of the side of the refinery. Boxes came together at odd angles and sizes, built into a rough pyramid with docks and slips jutting out here and there. It was built for function over aesthetics. Leading to a very ugly looking station.

Lights blinked erratically and solar panels reflected light as they tried to gather as much energy as possible.

Shuttles and mining tugs moved around the station, moving lights and the readings from the view screens showing them against the inky dark of space and the grey boxes of the station.

Inter-system freighters twice the size of Bandit Two were hooked up to what looked like tubes. According to the information brief, that was where the refined material was pushed out from the refinery and into the collecting freighters. They’d then take it off to designated stations, which would turn them into compound materials and send them off to shipping stations dotted around the system.

“Looks like paradise to me. Showers, beds and less recycled air,” Bobbie groaned and made his eye twitch.

“Yu, I think I need a replacement Cargo Master, this one’s broken!” Mark complained. Eying the clusters of antennae’s docks, and parts of the station.

“Dick,” Bobbie said, laughing.

“What, you two… shit!” Yu halted as he turned to face the cargo hold. “We’re less than a few hours away!” He said, getting excited cheers to ‘About fucking time’ and “I swear I should have gone on the direct flight,”

“Oh shut up Dashtund,” Tyler sighed.

“Yes boss, right away boss, shutting up boss!”

“Yu you, fuck that sounds weird as shit,” Mark said.

“Get it more times than you’d ever want to dream of,” Yu said.

“Sorry dude, but you want to take the stick?” Mark asked, indicating his seat.

“Nah, nothing like doing it for real. You’ve done tens of landings, you didn’t even crash on the last three,” Yu said.

“Thanks, really helping my confidence here,” Mark sighed, resigned to his seat.

He corrected the flight plan as the refinery called to the craft, and Moretti took the message, talking to the crew. Ten minutes later and Mark’s flight plan adjusted to put him on the correct offloading platform.

Mark took deep breaths as he got closer, remembering to focus on the screens instead of relying on his eyes. Numbers and schematics were his friend; his eyes could misjudge things badly at the speeds he was travelling.

He input a burn rate on the shuttle’s thrusters, bringing their speed down.

The burn rate went up, the main engines firing heavily when they were twenty feet above the offloading platform. Mark adjusted to meet the refinery’s motion, then it was simply using thrusters above the craft to push it down onto the offloading platform.

He got down, letting out his breath in a rush, and the landing crew came out, securing the freighter to the deck. Another man came to the door and a flurry of robots moved to the rear of the freighter.

“I’ll handle the stuff,” Moretti said, grabbing his helmet and jumping into the cargo hold.

“Good job Mark,” Yu said, slapping Mark’s shoulder.

“Thanks.” Mark slumped into the pilot’s seat.

“Helmets on!” Yu called out to everyone. Moretti was using the airlock, but if the robots were coming in to offload the metals then they’d have to flush the cargo bay.

Mark grabbed his crappy civvie helmet and connected it to his equally crappy space suit.

“Alright, looks like we’re probably going to get screwed for this haul because we don’t have any tokens, their version of creds. Though with the load we’ve got, we’ll have plenty of spending money. I’ve got a lead on a hotel and real food,” Moretti said. “Let’s get this stuff unloaded; I need two people to stay back with the gear and make sure everything goes smoothly.”

“I’ll stay,” Mark said.

“I’m the cargo master of this tub, so I’ll stay back.”

“Thank you gents, the rest of you are with me. If this thing isn’t unloaded in an hour we’ll send someone else out here to swap out,” Haas said. “Grab your gear bags and follow me.” Haas led the charge out of the airlock, the rear hatch to the freighter opening as robots started coming in and grabbing the containers holding barely processed compacted metals.

“I’m going to have a talk with the foreman, wanna come?” Bobbie asked.

“Sure,” Mark said, happy to stretch his legs.

The foreman watched her surface with interest. She looked up as Bobbie and Mark approached; she was a good-looking curvy woman, with blonde and brunette hair.

“That platinum?” She asked without preamble. Her eyes fell on Bobbie, staying there for a moment.

Probably that fine beard he loves, the ladies do seem to love the look of it, Mark thought.

“Maybe,” Bobbie said, drawing the word out. “Name’s Bobbie, what’s your name?”

“Carly, nice to meet you,” she said with a smile. “Who’s your friend?”

“Mark,” he answered for himself, nodding to her and spitting into his squeeze bottle, moving his chewing tobacco around.

“Well, if that’s plat, you boys are in for one hell of a payday.”

“Hopefully it ain’t the only plat we pulled out of that damned thing. Our surveyor said it should make up for our bills and expenses,” Bobbie said, falling right into his role as asteroid miner.

“Yeah your Foreman was saying. Maybe you should spend less money on the wrong kinds of girls.” She smiled.

“Hmm, but you seem like my kind of wrong,” Bobbie countered.

“Tell me that again after a few beers when I’m off.”

Bobbie pulled out a surface. It was twenty years since Harmony had taken over, and Moretti had bet that, like Masoul, quite a number of people didn’t have implants, or their maintenance up to date, so everyone carried a surface.

“If you were able to send me your contact. then I could see about those beers,” Bobbie said.

“I’m going to check on the ‘bots,” Mark said, wandering around the back of the freighter. The door was closed and locked, and the robots were moving gear from the cargo bay as quickly as possible and Young had already checked the braces that connected the freighter’s struts to the landing pad.

Mark checked them again and left Bobbie and Carly to get acquainted as the robots reduced the freighter’s cargo hold down to the decking in a number of minutes. What had taken weeks to fill, took them less than a half hour to unload.

Mark grabbed his gear bag and Bobbie’s, then sealed up the ramp and checked everything was secure.

“Ship’s all locked up, I need a shower. You coming or want me to go on ahead?” Mark asked, giving Bobbie his gear bag.

“Go on ahead, I’ll catch up.”

“Alright, make sure you get a receipt, lover-boy!” Mark said, wandering off, pulling out his surface to checked where the hotel was supposed to be.

He got inside the station, and the airlocks automatically closed and opened, admitting him into one of the sleaziest stations he had ever had the pleasure of being inside.

A smile grew across his face as he saw the neon signs for beer, women, mining equipment, loans, food, hotels and everything in between.

Mark moved in through the busy open areas where people hawked their wares from their stores, whether that be actual gear, or themselves.

Mark pulled his helmet off and it smelt like fried food, cold air, perfume and mechanical machines.

He took in the sights, declining people’s wares and slapping two sets of pickpocketing hands away, then the third time he broke their pinkie. The word spread after that, and no one tried to steal from Mark.

Sure it would hurt but a splint and a few creds worth of medical aid, and they’d be fine.

Mark reached his hotel, and felt at home with the functional appearance of the place. He almost laughed at the bullet proof glass that surrounded the hotel’s front desk.

Shit it feels like Earth, minus the metal dust, he thought as he walked up to the front desk.

“Mark, got a key? Crew of Bandit Two.”
“Two tokens,” the plump woman behind the counter said with a bored expression.

Mark frowned. He knew it was all paid for, and there were no extra charges; someone would have messaged him if that was the case.

“This ain’t my first rodeo. Key,” Mark said, his features hardening.

The woman seemed to think it over for a minutes before handing him a piece of plastic the size of a button.

“Thanks,” Mark said, flipping the button over to see his room number.

It was four to a room, and he was with Ko, Niemi and Dominguez. Already Niemi was towelling off, Dominguez was in the shower and Ko was stripped down to his pants, with a beer in hand.

Mark looked to Ko, raising an eyebrow.

“We’re supposed to blend in, I’m blending in,” Ko said.

“Not too much,” Mark warned, dumping his gear on a bed.

The shower stayed on, but Dominguez got out, steam coming from the bathroom as Ko rushed in. “Beer shower!”.

“S…, Mark,” Dominguez said, catching herself before she said Sarge.

“We’re all unloaded and Bobbie’s talking to the foreman,” Mark pulled off his boots and space suit.

He looked at his shoulder, and it was missing his tattoos; synth skin covered it up. Everyone’s Trooper tattoos were covered up.

“Will you please put some pants on, Niemi?” Mark sighed; Niemi seemed to be air drying.

“Stop staring then,” she said with a mischievous grin.

Mark shook his head, smiling as he pulled his wife beater off and lay on the bed. It felt like heaven compared to the decking they’d been sleeping on for the last two months.

“Beer shower, awesome idea,” Ko announced, grabbing a towel.

“Beer me,” Mark said, and a beer appeared from Ko’s bag and he tossed it to Mark.

“I owe you one,” Mark shut the bathroom door and washed two months of sweat and grime off. Wipes just weren’t enough.

He came out with a slight buzz and feeling like a million credits.

His implant pinged, letting him know that Haas wanted to have a meeting in his room in ten minutes.

In Haas’s room, the door was shut and a noise cancelling buzz filled the air.

“Alright, we’re in civilization and we’re supposed to be miners back from a massive haul. Moretti tells me that we’re going to have a good amount of tickets, and he’s even got an advance on some of it to line our pockets. We’re going to let you free, but stay in at least groups of two, don’t get stinking drunk, and look out for one another. Have fun, but remember the mission,” Haas said, looking to them all.

It was a hard order, letting them have fun and go drinking, yet trusting them to keep their mouths shut so they could continue with their mission.

“There aren’t that many Chosen around here, but they are here. They act as peace officers, though their version of peace is beating the shit out of you if you don’t follow their rules. Keep out of their way and live it up like miners back from a big score,” Moretti added.

“We’re going to have two weeks here, the first three nights go out, have fun, and build contacts, we might need them later. Work the station, then we’re going to do rotating shifts of mining. We need to figure out a way to Osdal Actual, that is our primary goal,” Haas said, making sure that sunk into everyone’s minds. “Now go have some fun, but not too much.”

There were whoops and cheers as they left the room in a rush, all grins and excitement of Troopers that hadn’t done anything but live with other Troopers for the last three years, with few chances to really let loose.

***

Tyler grabbed a few beers with everyone else at a food place that promised to be authentic East sector food.

Tyler didn’t know if their claims were true, but it was edible and the beer was better than what came out of Dashtund’s still.

They smoked, drank, ate and made plans, and as dinner was finished people started filing out, going to live it up on the town.

Haas was waving everyone on, until Young got a hold of his arm and dragged him out with her.

There were hoots and hollers as Haas went an interesting shade of red, only adding to the laughter of the others.

“We’re gonna go bar hopping,” Mark said to his group. “Wanna come?”

“Nah I’m good thanks, have fun,” Tyler said, waving them away.

“Will do,” Mark said, a smile spreading across his lined face.

Tyler would have found the adventures interesting when he’d joined the EMF, but without Alexis it wasn’t as exciting. He knew that he’d be thinking about her the entire time.

Since they’d been married he’d been on more ‘special’ missions than ever before, keeping them apart more than ever.

There were times when he wished that he didn’t have to go on these missions. Those thoughts were short lived though, this was his platoon and his people, and he wasn’t going to let them go into danger without him right by their side.

“I was going to take a wander of the place, grab some beers and then go back to the rooms and get some sleep,” Zukic offered. He seemed to be the only one not interested in going drinking and partying it up.

“Sounds like a plan to me,” Tyler said, pulling out the paper token money and putting it on his table. “Let’s hit the town.”

“I’m getting too old for this shit,” Zukic grumbled, shaking his head.

Tyler grinned as they walked out of the food stall and headed into the bustling station, lit up by garish neon signs as it entered its night cycle.

Tyler felt a hand reach for his tokens, and he absently hit the pickpocket in the ear, making them stumble and cry out in pain.

“Next time I’ll break your wrist,” Tyler said as he kept walking.

“Been some time since I dealt with pick pockets, want to hold onto this for me?” Zukic said, giving Tyler his money.

“Sure, I used to be one, though I lifted guns and weapons,” Tyler said, tucking the roll into his other pocket.

He remembered how scared he’d been the first dozen times he’d stolen, but then it became as easy as breathing.

Tyler let his fingers dance, stumbling into people and cursing others nearby as he took a mark’s cash roll.

He’d have an animated conversation about something with Zukic, waving his hands around, and a surface would appear in them.

“Will you look at that; it’s still linked to their implants, but they haven’t used them in years. Probably don’t want to draw attention, or know that they function. I wonder…” Tyler opened up the different signal bands on the surface and started to pick up dozens of implants that were working but unused.

Tyler sent a message using his own implants to Moretti; if the users weren’t using their implants then Tyler bet Moretti would be interested in them.

Tyler ditched the surface.

“Remind me to not be around you when you’re in a pick pocketing mood,” Zukic said, his voice low. Bars openly sold alcohol on the streets, and the entire place was getting their drink on.

Tyler whistled at a trio of good-looking women strutting their wares on the sidewalk. A group of big thugs who had been drinking earlier looked at them.

The trio caught Tyler’s eye, one of them winking and blowing him a kiss.

Tyler winked back, at just the right angle so one of the thugs thought she was looking at him.

I forgot the rush of stealing people’s shit, Tyler thought, twitching his triceps, and dropping a blade into his right hand, cutting the thug’s sling off and catching the resulting machine gun in his left hand, swiftly tucking it into his own jacket.

Tyler brushed past the man and continued down the main way.

Zukic went a different route.

Tyler nodded to an alley and Zukic nodded, a beer in his hand, looking like a local.

Tyler scratched the back of his head, his blade sliding back into place.

In the alleyway he discarded the sling and checked the sub-machine gun. It didn’t have a magazine in its grip so Tyler twisted one of the three barrels, it clicked and he pulled it out, and the connector at the base of the barrel told him what he needed to know.

“Ah shit,” Zukic said, reaching the same conclusion.

“Metal storm tech,” Tyler agreed. The barrels were magazines as well; he didn’t know how many rounds were in each of the four barrels, but he knew their rate of fire was astronomical.

Electronic signals transmitted to the charge behind the round. The more barrels the greater rate of fire, and for the fist few seconds you could fire probably eight rounds before recoil started kicking you back. A four barrel didn’t have the ammunition capacity of an E-12 or a Repulsor, but if they went for punch over capacity then they might have a harder hitting weapon at an incredible rate of fire. Sure, they’d need to reload frequently, but have a few of them with a shooter and a loader…

Tyler secured the barrel into place and tucked it back into his jacket just as the alley way darkened with the shadows of the trio of ladies.

The one that had winked at Tyler, and the clear boss, rubbed her fingers together in the universe-talk of money.

“You got something, I want something,” she said smiling, but there was a threat in those words.

Tyler pulled out a medium sized roll from his pocket and tossed it to her. “Just having a bit of fun.”

She opened the roll and looked over the tokens appreciatively, her smile not fake in any way as the money disappeared into her skimpy clothes.

“Well, you let me know anytime you want some more fun,” she said walking up to him, sashaying her hips and biting her lip.

“And if you need a hook up,” she tapped where the machine gun was suggestively, “Find me at the Pink Goose. My name’s Eliese.” She ran her finger over Tyler’s chest and cast a smoky look at Zukic.

If Tyler wasn’t married he would have been very interested in the first offer, but the second, a promise for weapons, was much more seductive.

With that she gave them a smile and sashayed back to her girls, her high heels doing a wonderful job of showing off her rear.

“I’m going to have to give that a look over later on,” Zukic said, watching her and her girls leave. “Damn. But first we need Moretti to check it out, so let’s go get some more beers and you can continue to make friends.” He stretched his fingers out. “It’s been a while since I’ve lifted people’s stuff.”

“Oh, it’s always more fun with a bit of competition,” Tyler smiled as they went back out of the alleyway and into the crowds.

***

Bobbie had woken up with Carly in his bed, and Yu shaking him to get up for work.

Carly and Bobbie threw stuff at Yu until he retreated. Finally, Bobbie had woken up and more got water, and told Carly he’d phone her later. He left her in his bed and viewed the room; it was a mess of clothes, beer bottles and sleeping people.

Bobbie pulled his space suit on, grabbed his helmet and downed some water.

“You coming?” Yu asked him.

“On my way.”

“Good, Young’s still stuck under Haas.”

“I would still have Carly draped over me if you hadn’t woken me up!” Bobbie complained.

Yu frowned. “Someone tried to access our freighter last night. It seems that we made quite the haul and people are trying to get our gear. I want to make sure that we’re set for fees and such, and try and get people’s tokens. Hopefully we’ll have enough. Then I want to check the freighter over to make sure no one got in.”

“Alright,” Bobbie said, heading to the next room, knowing that everyone in his room had spent all their credits.

His implants opened the door for him and he found Zukic with a hooker, Holm with two ladies and Ali with one on the floor; it looked like they’d fallen off the bed.

Bobbie wandered around, looking in pockets, and found that Zukic had a bunch, most of them tucked into jacket pockets.

Tyler’s jacket was buried under the bed with his gear bag, opening it, Bobbie found three different pistols and a submachine gun, and a wad of tokens. There were more tokens in his jacket pockets.

Bobbie stuffed them in his pockets and stood up to shake Tyler.

“What?” Tyler said into the pillow.

“Taking your tokens.”

“Sure, was a good game,” Tyler said, rolling over and going back to sleep.

It looked like Tyler had been doing some pick-pocketing; Bobbie piled the money together, using two paper clips to keep the stacks together.

Yu was waiting for him in the hall. “Tyler and Zukic seemed to be having quite the time last night,” Bobbie said, holding his leg pocket open.

“That should be enough to get us sorted out. Let’s go check on the freighter.”

The station was cleaning up after the night before, with morning food places doing a brisk business as people nursed hangovers or went to work.

The lights were slowly coming online across the station and they unclipped their helmets from their hips, securing them and walking out into the walkways. Bobbie’s hangover was in full effect as they made it out of the second air lock.

They checked over the freighter, and someone seemed to have tried to use a crowbar to get in the airlocks and the lock showed burn marks, probably from it electrocuting whatever tumbler had been put on it.

Yu went up to the cock pit and Bobbie checked the hold, confirming that no one had gotten in.

“Looks like they’re trying to find out where our asteroid is,” Yu said over their implants.

“How do you know?”

“They tried to hack our systems; they were looking for location data. Unless they know we’re EMF already, I’d say someone is trying to break in on our find. Oh, we’ve got company. Looks like station staff.”

“I’ll go deal with them,” Bobbie said, heaving himself to his feet and waiting for his head to stop spinning. “Thought my augments would have this hangover gone by now.”

“They probably would, but unless we’re in combat they’re in sleep mode. That was part of the whole implant experience,” Yu said.

“Ah fuck, those pricks,” Bobbie said, stepping out of the airlock.

Four station staff were approaching. “Good morning, my name is Alec, I’m the station’s docking master. I was hoping to talk to your cargo master.”

“Found him, name’s Bobbie, what can I do you for?” Bobbie said, letting the hangover color his words.

“It seems that there is a discrepancy in your paperwork. We are sorry for the inconvenience, but credit in the form of tokens for unrefined materials has gone up.”

He was good, Bobbie thought, he actually sounded sorry.

“It’s a thousand tokens for a hundred kilos of pre-refined materials,” the man said, and Bobbie could see the smile on the man’s face and the dark looks of the others.

“Let’s take this in to the station.” Bobbie muted the channel and sighed.

A thousand tokens for a hundred kilos. We took out a hundred and fifty thousand, making that fifteen thousand kilos, and I’m guessing he’ll pick it over, probably going right for the platinum, which is worth hundreds of thousands, maybe even a few mil, Fucking pricks.

“Certainly,” the docking master said.

Bobbie pulled out his surface, sending a message on his implants while opening up the docking fees and pay back rates of loans on the surface. There wasn’t a mention of unrefined material against a loan. The freighter had been put up as collateral, with its estimated worth set at 1.5 million.

These pricks were just trying to pull one over on someone with a killer hangover.

Bobbie took his helmet off, rubbing his forehead. Making a show of his hangover and making amenable noises as he looked through the information. Stalling for time.

The docking master’s helpfulness lessened as Bobbie found less things to ask questions about.

Bobbie could have kissed Moretti when he finally showed up.

He must have been running ever since he got the message.

“Hey Bobbie thought you were doing checks?” Moretti asked. Tyler and Jerome were rubbing sleep from their eyes, but Bobbie sensed that their act was more for the benefit of the docking master and his people than themselves.

“These people say that our agreement is all messed up,” Bobbie said, sitting on some pallets ready to watch Moretti at work.

“That’s correct, the rate of unrefined materials for docking charges and loan against it is one hundred kilos to a thousand tokens,” Alec said again, looking well fed and accommodating.

Fucking con artist.

“Bobbie, what have you got on you?” Moretti sighed, holding out a hand to Bobbie.

Bobbie pulled the stacks of tokens from his pockets.

Tyler looked pleased with himself, but Alec looked confused.

“Jerome count that would you?” Moretti tossed a stack to Jerome and held one himself. They went through slowly, making it look like they were counting, but using their implants to do the real work.

Then Moretti pulled out his surface, and Bobbie could see that he went to a banking interface and was sending a large deposit to someone. “I’ve deposited one hundred and six grand back to the docking authority, and I’ve got thirteen grand here. Jerome, how much do you have?”

“Twenty-two and change.” Jerome pulled off a few bills and pocketed them.

“So, with that, we then owe you 29 grand including docking fees, which we can get to you in a number of hours,” Moretti said, taking the bundle of cash from Jerome and holding it out to Alec.

The 29 still needs to be covered by retainer, coming out to 2900 kilos,” Alec said, his smile slipping as the docking toughs made themselves look mean.

Tyler and Jerome looked bored and tired, not a good sign for the toughs.

Moretti looked thoughtful. “See, I would agree, but we’re from Elekt Sector, and we give Harmony 20 percent of our materials for no tokens, in a measure of good faith. I wouldn’t want to take that tithe from them, I already promised it to them last night over beers,” Moretti said.

Alec’s demeanour changed. Moretti was basically paying the Chosen to make sure no one fucked about with small bullshit like this. Alec had obviously thought that with them being new to the station, they wouldn’t have protection, or know how things worked. They had a big haul and he’d thought they were easy pickings.

Moretti also mentioned they were having beers; Chosen didn’t like to drink with anyone but the hardiest Harmony supporters. Fanatics were scary, no matter if you were fighting them or doing a deal with them.

Alec’s affable smile returned. “Well, I hope you have a good stay and continue the patronage of our docks,”

“Ah, with the deposits we’ll be bringing in, we’re probably going to have to use the refinery’s direct docks,” Moretti said. This would cut out the docking authority completely.

Alec smiled to them, turned and left.

“Prick,” Jerome said as they disappeared through the airlock to the walkways.

“Let’s get on the freighter and go by the refinery. We can get our credits and move the ship before Alec and his buddies get any ideas,” Moretti said.

Bobbie sighed and got to his feet, heading for the freighter where Yu was already powering up the engines.

Onboard, the noise canceller was turned on as Tyler and Moretti talked about inactive implants and the weaponry in Osdal.

“Sealed and good to go,” Bobbie said, climbing up into the cockpit.

“Moving to refinery,” Yu said.

Bobbie slumped into what was usually Young’s seat usually and plotted a simple route, but Yu was already going in the right general direction.

There wasn’t much traffic, as most people were still nursing the aftereffects of the night before.

“I can’t believe that they do that every night,” Yu said.

“I can, I’m looking forward to doing it again,” Bobbie said.

“Sure you are, with that hangover.”

“Just need some water and to get my augments working to clear this crap out.”

“Alright, let’s go and see what the refinery has for us,” Yu said, powering down the freighter, bleeding heat and checking the locking mechanisms on the landing struts.

Bobbie grunted, getting up and heading into the cargo hold. The implant channel didn’t sound fuzzy any more as Jerome, Tyler and Moretti were up and walking through the open airlocks.

Bobbie followed them and looked around the craft making sure that it was good.

“Moretti see if you can wrangle up some fuel,” Yu said over the implants net.

The station had been built around the refinery to keep the workers who kept the refinery going close by. It was mostly operated with a few thousand people keeping up on maintenance and making sure the robots didn’t fuck up, which pretty much only happened due to human error.

Bobbie focused on going through his mental checklist, but being commando in his space suit was starting to rub his body weird. He needed a shower, a gallon of orange juice and probably a few hours with Carly under the sheets.

***

Jerome’s head wasn’t doing the best. Dashtund and Dominguez had been on a shot binge, taking any kind of liquor they could put into their glasses.

His breath tasted like alcohol and battery acid.

Tyler was looking better, he’d only had some casual beers, and pick pocketed half the population of the station.

“What the hell is this place called?” Jerome asked Tyler.

“I dunno. Hey, Moretti, what’s the station called?”

“Oort Cloud Refinery Seventy-Seven.”

“Hmm, thought it would be something cool. Companies take all the fun out of naming shit,” Jerome said as they entered the airlock into the refinery.

They were greeted by a thin man who seemed to be brimming with excitement. “Moretti!” He squealed. “You, my good friend, are a boon to Seventy-Seven! That’s the best load I’ve seen in three years! You Elekt Sector people sure do have luck on your side!”

“Thank you, Johnny,” Moretti said. “These are my friends, Tyler and Jerome.”

Johnny pumped their hands with enthusiasm. “Procurement officer and boss of this here refinery, Johnny Walker,” the man beamed.

“Shit, I think I had enough of that last night,” Jerome sub-vocalized to Tyler.

“It’s very good to meet you,” Tyler said with a too-wide smile.

“And manners too! I’m already half way to Elekt now!” Johnny smiled, and the man’s energy was infectious. “Now, we’re not just here to chinwag, let’s get down to numbers and business.” He pulled out a surface.

“We totaled everything up, then retained 20 percent as per your donation to Harmony’s cause. The brings you to 7.3 million. An incredible haul indeed, and enough to get you four more freighters like the one you have out there,” Johnny said, pointing to the freighter where Bobbie and Yu were completing their final checks.

“So, I was wondering what your rate was for fuel?” Moretti asked.

“Well, we don’t have fuel here but my cousin Ping owns a fueling rig,” Johnny said.

“Would you be able to get me in contact with him? We hope to be running for a while and we’d be interested in getting our contractors sorted out,” Moretti said.

“Right away. He’s usually an early riser, so I’ll see if he can meet you this morning,”

“What about the docking fees?”

Johnny waved his hand and the docking fees disappeared.

“Waived. I am so sorry that the docking authority were being troublesome.” Johnny looked pretty displeased but hid it quickly.

Moretti pulled out his surface, checking on Ping’s contact information and bringing up the freighter’s accounts.

“We might need parts and a few more ships to haul our loads… could we also rent a dock so we don’t have to keep jumping around?” Moretti asked. Johnny rattled off names and promises.

“Thank you Johnny, you’ve helped us out a lot,” Moretti said, sending something on his surface.

“Oh, wow, thank you Moretti, I appreciate it, but I didn’t do it for the tickets. I’m actually sorry about the Dockers, they’ve been getting worse.”

“Take it, you’ve saved us that and then some,” Moretti said with a smile.

Watching an intelligence master at work, Tyler thought. Even this simple gesture and conversation was telling them about how Osdal was functioning.

“Well, thank you very much. I will get back to you about those other queries.” Johnny’s surface made a noise. “Oh, Ping is coming right over, if you like he can meet you on the landing pad and go over fueling numbers and such. So let me know if you need anything, and have a good day fellas! Keep bringing in those rare metal loads!”

“Tyler, Jerome, you can head back to the hotel, might be an idea to move to a place closer than that one. The money is already in the shared account. Bobbie, Yu, I think we should talk to Ping about our fuel situation,” Moretti said.

“Uggh, I just wanna go back to bed,” Bobbie complained, making up for a good night.

Tyler, taking mercy on the man, pulled out an electrolyte drink and tossed it to him.

“You are a God among men, Tyler,” Bobbie pronounced.

“Just get some of that in you, should feel better. We’ll see you at the old hotel, or message you the new hotel info.”

Tyler and Jerome were having breakfast when Tyler saw the thug that he had swiped the sub-machine gun from. He didn’t bother trying to hide, it would only make things more suspicious. Instead he ate his breakfast bar as if he didn’t have a clue about anything going on. He most certainly did not make eye contact or keep glancing at the goon. From the way he held himself Tyler pegged him as Chosen, the weaponry had already pointed to that.

He was just thankful he wasn’t just a street thug, if the street thugs were getting that kind of hardware then the Chosen’s weaponry would be a lot worse.

“We need a place closer to the refinery,” Jerome said, and Tyler agreed; it was a good 15 minute walk between their hotel and the refinery, not the best if they needed to make a quick getaway.

A furious Carly was waiting for them in the hotel room.

“Where the fuck is he?” she demanded.

“Bobbie?”

“No, my fucking doorman. Yes, Bobbie!”

“He’s with the freighter,” Tyler said cautiously.

“Well tell him to go fuck himself, and tell Moretti the same. The docking master is all bent out of shape because he’s made only 20,000 tokens off you guys. Since his scam didn’t work he fired me for obeying the fucking rules,” she growled. “Apparently people saw us living it up last night and they’re saying that I gave you a lower rate because Bobbie and I were flirting.” Her angry resolve crumbled away; not having a job on a station was like not having water in the Sahara. If you weren’t paying your fees, then you’d get kicked out.

Companies would re-task you; a person was another worker looking for the right job fit. Here, they’d just kick you out into space and someone would probably pull your corpse in, take anything useful and chuck you back out.

She rushed past them, and Tyler’s stomach dropped - and not from the previous night’s liquor - as she disappeared into Seventy-Seven’s morning crowd.

“I feel like shit.”

“Yeah, maybe we can get Moretti to find her a new job. The Victor Corporation is always in need of resourceful people,” Jerome said.

“Why are you talking about that now?”

“Cause Madeline Costa’s plans call for a shit load of specialist materials. If we have someone here running supplies after the war is all done, we’ve got a foot in the door. This war will end one way or another, and we need to prepare for when it is over. Even if we’re not here, the corp keeps 30,000 people employed. Getting them any help we can will not only give these people a future, but those back home, too.”

“You and Mark have been talking again,” Tyler observed.

“Yep. We need to talk to Moretti and probably bring him in on the Corporation, but it would be a good nest egg for all of us,” Jerome said.

“One minute you’re all blow this up, shoot that, the next you’re all numbers, long term planning and business,” Tyler sighed.

“Blame your brother, he’s filled my head with Corporation stuff. After Nerva’s talk about always having a backup plan, he’s looked into ways to secure a good retirement for us all. I think he even has a plan to pay for us to get out if it comes to that.”

Tyler couldn’t even start to think of how much that would cost, but he knew that Mark wouldn’t care. If someone in their platoon decided that they couldn’t be a Trooper anymore, Tyler knew that Mark would help them to get out of their contract, no matter what. He looked after his people, money, time, his life, but he would lay it all down for others.

Chapter 14

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

2/3267

You’ve got this, just a quick run in, grab the rocks, and right back out, easy, Caroline lied to herself as she took her truck in to one of the deep mines that headed right to where rare metals had been detected.

Harmony didn’t want to have a crane blocking the mine as supports were put into place, so people with large forklifts pushed the metal bars and bolted them into position as trucks rushed past. More than one person had fallen under a truck’s wheels while connecting the supports together.

Truck drivers would get a hellish beating for stopping, as it would back up the entire line of trucks rushing in and out. There was a reason that truck drivers and shaft miners lived in different areas of lean-to city.

Metal dust was everywhere, shining in her lights as she followed the truck in front of her.

The shaft was seven kilometers long, with six shafts breaking off at different intervals, and she was to go to the third to last shaft on the left.

The truck ahead of her peeled off into the first shaft to the right, but she continued on, trucks passing her, fleeing the shaft mine and its unstable walls and ceiling.

Her truck rumbled, bouncing over the uneven ground, and she finally got to her tunnel and swung around in the larger area made just for trucks to turn.

“Shit,” she said, seeing the end of the tunnel. There were only so many drills in operation and the Harmony loyal crews that still worked on the planet used them, and hell, they even had proper supports in place and air circulation! Earthers, however, were nothing more than cattle.

The crew in the tunnel were using picks and sonic blasters to tear into the wall. It was slow going, but there were hundreds working, all of them breathing the same air.

Caroline could see the signs of oxygen depravation in many.

The Chosen wearing air packs whipped them, as if that would do anything to help.

Caroline turned her truck. A person with flags guided her back to the large conveyor belt where all of the cuttings from the wall had been pooled.

Caroline looked at the air canisters beside her. She had a filtration system, and it worked, sort of, but she was in a truck, not doing labor intensive work.

She waved the flag person up, and they climbed up the ladder to her door as the conveyor belt ran, starting to fill her truck bed.

The flag person grunted, using the railing of the truck to keep themselves up. Caroline looked around and then stealthily passed them two air canisters.

“Take them and get me empties, you need it more than me. I’ve got some water too, pass it around.”

They were all in this together, fuck the Chosen.

Wordlessly, but looking shocked, he took the canister, hooking it up to his own mask and taking a deep breath before shutting it off. Life seemed to return to his body as he wandered back to the workers.

Another person came up and she repeated the same, tossing him a water bottle she’d filled up.

“Get me that back and I can fill it up on my next run,” she said, pointing to the water bottle.

“Thank you,” the worker said, heading back, passing out the water and air, away from the Chosen.

Two more came, leaving empty canisters of air, until she had just one left and a half-liter of water for the entire day.

The flag person waved that she was free to go, so she powered up the truck and rumbled away.

She started the filling process on the canisters, but most of them leaked and she had to switch them for working ones as she raced back towards the surface.

She came out of the tunnel, following the lines of trucks that were moving towards the refinery. It was a massive building; on one side there was a raised platform where the trucks dumped their loads, and chimneys and ovens populated the main mass of the building. Opposite the building there was a railway leading to the Mining City.

She got to the refinery, pressing the controls that started the dumping process, she ran out to the nearest bathroom, water bottles in hand, and she filled them up.

“What the fuck are you doing away from your truck?” A Chosen shouted as she was running back.

Caroline wanted to keep running but she stood stock still, water bottles in her hand.

“You thought you could get some extra water?” The Chosen asked with a disgusted look on her face as she walked up to Caroline.

She smelled like she’d had a shower just that morning, and she had a full water bottle and looked well-fed.

“I was just…” The air rushed out from Caroline as the Chosen punched her stomach, and she collapsed on the ground.

“I didn’t ask you to talk, Earther, get back where you belong: on the ground,” The Chosen took the largest water bottle, took a drink from it and then threw it away, water pouring from its opening.

Caroline started getting back up, knowing that was enough water for twenty people just draining away into the ground. She didn’t dare to go get it.

“Get the fuck out of my face, Earther!” The guard kicked her in the side and Caroline felt something break as pain lanced through her.

The guard left and walked away, kicking another water bottle into the distance as she went.

Caroline gathered what she had and made her way slowly to her truck, pain preventing her from running.

Climbing the ladder to her truck hurt like almighty hell. She dumped the water bottles and heard someone walking up her ladder, so she fired up her truck and got it ready to move.

Her door was ripped open, and she looked up in time to see a big Chosen man punch her in the face.

Her head rocked back and dehydration, heat and lack of sleep coupled with the hit made the world shaky.

The Chosen grabbed her shirt, pulled her forward and punched her two more times in the face and then once in the stomach. She tried to put up her hands to defend herself but it didn’t stop the man.

“Get your fucking truck moving you lazy Earther piece of shit!” She knew that voice, it belonged to Dean Castillo, the foreman of the refinery. She’d heard the tales of young girls going to the refinery and coming back beaten and pregnant.

She nodded. “Yes Mister Castillo.” She prayed he would leave her alone.

“Bitch.” Dean hit her in the side, thankfully the opposite side to her broken ribs, but the bones still grated against one another painfully.

He let her go, slammed the door and headed down the ladder.

Fear pushed Caroline back into her seat. Her left eye was already swelling, but she pressed the accelerator on the truck, heading towards the shaft mines.

Every bump moved her broken ribs, making her whimper and gasp for short breaths, as if that would reduce her pain.

Chapter 15

Asteroid claim BT1

Oort Cloud Osdal System

3/3267

“See you in two weeks,” Jerome said to Young. She, Holm and his section had just finished their rotation on the asteroid. The Bandit Corporation that Moretti was creating had grown to five ships strong, two of them being the largest hauling inter-system freighters he could find.

Bobbie and Young were using Bandit Two to search for another claim, and they had picked out three possibilities but the people of Seventy-Seven were watching closely, so they wouldn’t move on the asteroids until they could control them.

Moretti was getting a good idea of the system, and they’d made tentative connections with a few of the insertion teams without telling them what their cover was or their real location.

Haas and Zukic were vetting people to take over the work of Bandit corporation. Their cover as miners was working well, and Moretti was pushing Johnny to take some of the runs from Seventy-Seven to Osdal Actual.

Johnny was a good man and didn’t want to cut anyone’s agreed contracts. So Moretti worked on a different angle, working the freighters doing the runs. If they passed vetting then they would move materials from the Bandit corporations claims to Seventy-Seven when they weren’t transporting goods to Osdal, picking up regular and higher paying work.

For right now everyone was putting their flying qualifications to work as they transported people to the asteroid, and whatever they pulled out of the asteroid back to Seventy-Seven.

Haas, Zukic and Moretti had cleared Carly, so when Bobbie got back to Seventy-Seven he could offer her a job working for Bandit Two corp.

She had the contacts they needed and would help to identify people that they could bring into the company to create the face, as they worked to spread across the system.

Jerome and Dooks were on first shift, so they powered up the grinders, moving between them, checking the lines were good.

They’d managed to get some robots to pack ore containers, but the rest of the machines could be run from a surface. Fifty grinders worked non-stop, with fifteen replacements ready in case one of them went down.

Dooks finished his checks and started working on a grinder that had stopped working. Jerome linked into the sensor network, making sure there weren’t any ships nearby, and sent and encoded data stream to the EMF fleet that should be now finding their hiding places among the Oort cloud.

Chapter 16

EMFC Reclaimer

Oort Cloud Osdal System

3/3267

Nerva looked over the reports that were coming in from all across the fleet. The carrier fleet was spread out over millions of kilometers to hide behind the massive asteroids that littered the area.

The net of sensors that the insertion groups had sown across space allowed them to see what was in the area, but they were running on low emissions to make it harder for sensors to see them. Still, no one was taking chances.

All of the Troopers were to be on high alert for a few months while the carriers settled into position, and the sensor grid was working overtime to make sure that no one came up on them.

The carrier’s actual sensors were only running on passive so that they didn’t ping a Harmony ship or one allied with them.

All of the Troopers were training but it was now diminishing returns, and they were repeating lessons over and over again, which was making them agitated instead of interested.

Nerva had pushed on Vibra-Blade training, and the ships heading to Housapel were getting powered armor, but armor wouldn’t get to them for another forty years if they requested it. They didn’t have forty years, they had fourteen months until they moved into Osdal, whether the insertion teams sent word or not.

He looked at the latest information dump that was being funneled through a grid of stealth communication systems. While people weren’t using their implants, it didn’t mean that they’d turned them off. Moretti was in the process of downloading all of the saved information and sending it back to the fleet, who were then sending it back to Earth. It was a gold mine for the Ministry of Intelligence, as any implants connected to the communications network gave them an idea of how Harmony had grown into being and their ongoing actions.

New mission parameters had been sent out to the insertion groups. Their sole mission was to create a plan of attack for their area of operations and then do what they could to identify priority targets, disrupt the enemy’s ability to counterattack, and create chaos among the enemy command structure.

If they could do that, then any action the EMF took would hit them hard. He just hoped that things were going well with the insertion teams. Anything they could do would save lives.

Chapter 17

Oort Cloud Refinery Seventy-Seven

Oort Cloud, Osdal System

3/3267

Mark checked the sub-machine gun and pistol. The pistol was a simple mag loader; the sub machine gun was a metal storm variant.

This would be a risky move by Mark and Tyler, but if it paid off then they could get some Chosen weapons, which were not only less eye catching than their EMF hardware, but it would help them figure out the Chosen’s capabilities.

They were wearing space suits and jackets. Mark missed his duster, but that was a thing for Masoul and Earth’s slums it seemed.

“We’ll be listening in and ready,” Dominguez promised, and she Dashtund and Ali had their E-1’s on them.

“See you in an hour,” Mark said, shifting his jacket around before looking out of the hotel room door. It was cleaner and nicer than their old hotel.

They passed through the lobby, and there was no one around. This one didn’t have the armored glass around it, and drew people of better means.

A doorman opened the door for them. Mark nodded to the man but his eyes were looking for Chosen and threats. They were well protected with their payments; twenty percent was enough to allow them to get away with nearly anything.

They were in a nicer area of the station, less neon signs and outside bars, more boutiques and food places. But Mark and Tyler were rougher than most people, and their muscle mass and scars revealed them as different to most of the people around.

People moved out of their way as they crossed through streets and caught an elevator down a few levels, coming out in their old hangout. Here, no one gave them a second look, they were just two more miners that had got into a few brawls in their time off, and they blended into the crowd.

Mark saw Niemi and Ko, who were enjoying an afternoon beer, talking about random shit. He didn’t make eye contact, and he and Tyler walked into the Pink Goose, where a bored old lady was smoking in an armored booth.

“Ten Tokens,” she said, her voice sounding like too many cigarettes.

“I’m here to see Eliese,” Tyler said.

The woman seemed to glance over them a bit more. Mark thought he saw her eyes dart down to something he couldn’t see.

“Ten tokens,” she said again.

Tyler pulled out his surface and sent it to her.

“She’s got a camera feed, looks like outside,” Tyler said sub vocally as the door to the Goose opened, where pink lights that barely lit up the strip club, and old music with a beat, and dark corners invited them in.

Mark made to go through, but the old lady cut in. “Ten a piece.”

Tyler sent her more tokens. “He’s with me.”

She put out her cigarette and started to grab another, waving them on.

A guard looked them over. “Anything I should know about?”

Two pistols, one stunner,” Tyler said, holding his arms up.

The man fished them out of Tyler’s clothes and expertly tucked them into a box to his side. “You’ll get them after.”

Mark raised his arms, his shirt wasn’t meant to hide his bulk, but now it stretched across his chest. “Pistol, machine gun.”

The man pulled them off and gave him a quick pat down. “Have a good time,” he said, turning as the club’s door opened and a group wandered in.

Tyler found Eliese first. “There,” he said, his lips not moving. It reminded Mark of the first time he’d been on a mission in Westerly Three. They had been killing off an opposing gang, and he remembered how the low odd lighting had messed with his ability to find targets.

Mark pressed his arms together, feeling the blades under his arms.

Tyler sat in a booth and waved to Eliese, who swaggered over from the table that she’d been heckling.

“Heya boys, I could ride you all day and night long,” She said, dropping into the booth and smiling.

Mark looked her over; she was a good looking girl and he might take her up on that offer later.

“Our meeting still a go?” Tyler asked.

The guys that had been at the other table approached. “Hey, look, it’s the big shots from BT! Think you can just come in here and steal our girl?”

Miner, decently drunk, smaller build, brawler, Mark looked over the man and his pals, as he automatically classified them.

There were four of them, one next to the end of Mark’s bench, the talker was leaning on the table and the other two were a few feet back with their arms crossed, looking tough.

“Don’t be like that! Tyler here is just a good friend of mine, comes all the way from Elekt, trying to educate me on the ways of sharing,” Eliese said, her hand rubbing down Tyler’s side and smiling at the other men.

They didn’t seem mollified in the least.

Mark kept his eyes on her, but he felt the locks on his augments falling away. A slow smile spread across his face. It had been months since he’d done any real fighting.

“Here’s four tokens, show us your tits!” the talker said, throwing the paper tokens and grabbing at her bra ripping it away.

Mark punched the man blocking his exit, in the balls, crossing his left over and hitting the man that had had a handful of bra in the head.

Tyler grabbed the back of the man’s head as he tried to stay up, using the table for support.

“Night night,” Tyler drove the talker’s head into the table so hard that there was a dent in the metal.

Mark kicked the man he’d punched in the balls, in the head. He heard their jaw break as he ducked by instinct, catching a blow on his shoulder instead of his head.

He punched the attacker in the chest, the man who’d been standing backwards gasped like a fish out of water, all of the breath and fight out of him.

Mark heard a chair hitting Tyler.

Tyler grunted with pain. Mark kicked the chair wielding dickhead in the kneecap.

There was an audible pop as the man screamed, collapsing to the floor. Tyler grabbed the discarded chair, beating his attacker with it.

The man Mark had winded, got up, cracking Mark in the back of the head with a bottle.

“Fucker,” Mark yelled, back-handing the miner, he got a lucky hit, catching them in the ear.

The stumbled, punch drunk and in pain.

Mark drove a fist into the side of their head, dropping them to the floor, out cold.

“Well fuck,” Tyler said, holding his head.

“Little fucker cut my head open,” Mark felt his head, feeling blood on his neck.

“Come here,” Tyler turned him, looking at the cut and checking it. “Looks clean to me.”

“Turn,” Mark said, Tyler did so, sporting a nasty cut on the side of his head, he’d saved most of his face by raising his arm, but he’d got cracked good on the top of his head.

Mark pulled out a tube of glue, putting Tyler’s skull back together. Using sealant would be suspicious, it cost a ton for anyone outside of the EMF and the glue would work just fine.

“My knights in shining armor,” Eliese purred, not caring about her state of undress.

Mark grinned as Tyler sealed up his cut head.

His grin faded as security came out to deal with the situation.

“They’re okay,” Eliese said pointing to Mark and Tyler.

Security nodded, and started checking out the miners none to gently.

As Eliese led them away, tossing away what was left of her bra.

“Ah shit, two of them are dead.” One of the security guys said.

“Fucker tried to jump the Chosen’s biggest contributor on the entire station; they’re not gonna give a shit.” Another growled.

The door closed behind Mark as Eliese took them past the women’s changing room, where most were just walking around in the nude without a care. There were different kinds of bikinis and flashy clothing. Mirrors lined the room with lights and women conversing.

They smiled at Mark and Tyler as they passed.

I think I should come back here later.

“Fucker broke my top; prick deserved a good beating.” She scowled, pushing into a room at the end of the hallway.

It was a private room with a table to the left, a mirror with lights ringing it at the back right of the room. Racks of clothes separated it from the Couch that took up the right side of the room closest to the door.

Eliese went to the mirror, tossing her panties into the trash.

Mark couldn’t do anything but admire the view.

“No worries,” Mark shrugged, taking a seat at the table. Adrenaline and combat hormones were still rushing through his system. He looked to Tyler, and saw the exact same rush in his eyes.

Mark took a calming breath, ordering his augments to clear his system and then go back into lock down.

Eliese caught him peeking, giving him a coy smile and a wink.

Mark’s grin reappeared as she put on a new bikini ensemble and grabbed a house coat. “Got a smoke?”

“So the meeting still on?” Tyler asked offering her a pack of cigarettes and a light.

“Yeah, they’ll be here in ten minutes,” she said, taking the cigarette and lighting it. She let out a breath of strawberry smelling cigarette smoke.

Mark pulled out a stubby he’d been saving and lit it up.

“I do like me a cigar man,” Eliese mused.

“I do like a girl in a bikini,” Mark shot back, letting out a puff and putting his lighter away.

She was wearing blue eye-shadow and glitter that emphasized her curves and guided a person’s eyes from her chest down to her groin.

Mark didn’t try to hide where his eyes were going, smiling at Eliese who seemed to revel in the attention.

There was a noise from behind the rack of clothes.

The rack moved to the side and a man stepped through. Mark tensed up, the clothes the man was wearing marked him as one of the Chosen goons.

“Hey Eliese.”

Mark’s eyes thinned as he saw a familial resemblance between the two. The Chosen man didn’t look at all interested in her get-up, instead his eyes turned to Mark and Tyler.

“I’m Alan,” the man said, nodding to Mark and Tyler, making his way to the table.

Eliese sat on Mark’s lap and rubbed his chest, ignoring Alan’s sighs.

“He’s Mark, I’m Tyler. I heard you had some products for us?”

“I heard you’re in the Market for some protection. I’ve got a few things right out of the factory,” Alan said, pulling weapons from under his jacket.

“Alan works with shipping for the Harmony Forces, can find all kinds of goodies in the right places,” Eliese said.

“Got to make a living somehow, and there’s no love lost with me and Harmony,” Alan said.

Mark nodded, looking over the wares the man was putting on the table.

He had an impressive display of pistols, sub-machine guns like the metal storm, and rifles, one bolt action the other a metal storm variant but about a meter long with six barrels.

“May I?” Tyler pointed to the rifles.

“Go ahead.” Alan said shrugging.

Tyler pulled out the barrels and started breaking the weapon down.

Eliese squirmed in Mark’s lap eliciting a response as she smiled up at him coyly.

Table full of guns and a certifiable ten on my lap. Yup, I could die happy right now. Mark looked at her with a raised eyebrow and grabbed a pistol, breaking it down and putting it back together. It was rough, but functional. It would need some filing to get it functioning perfectly, but it would work.

“How many rounds per barrel?” Tyler asked, putting the machine gun down and picking up the rifle.

“Twelve.” Alan said, sitting down at the table.

“Nice. We’d like to take one of each, best to try them all out, then we’ll place an order for more. I’m thinking a few of those rifles to be sure, those things are sweet.” Tyler pulled out his surface, and wired the credits. The man nodded and a smile appeared on his serious face.

“Good doing business with you. Let me know when you’re ready to order and I’ll get you anything you just bought today,” Alan said, standing. Tyler and Alan shook and Mark made to get up, but Eliese pouted.

“Don’t worry, I can see you’re occupied. I hope to see you again. Later Eliese,” Alan said walking away.

“Later A-boy!”

Mark head the man sigh as he let himself out of the back room.

Tyler started strapping guns to himself and Mark stood up, holding Eliese up as she stretched herself to full height.

“You got a long jacket?” Mark asked, looking at the guns.

“Course, for all those flasher moments,” she winked.

“Good, cause we’re in need of a gun mule, and you look just about perfect,” Mark smiled, putting the stub of the cigar in the side of his mouth, and tucking weapons into his waistband and jacket.

“You flatterer, you just want to get me back to your hotel,” she purred, leaning back on the table and arching to present herself more fully.

“I’ll even throw in a hundred credits, and a room to ourselves,” Mark said, rolling the cigar around.

“You got yourself a deal,” she said, kissing his cheek.

53 fucking virgins! The very thought of 53 fucking virgins… it's a nightmare! It's not a fucking present, it's not a prize - it's a punishment! Give me two fire-breathing whores any day of the week. I'm a slut man! Mark grinned at the line that ran through his mind; it had come from a Scottish comedian almost twelve hundred years ago when religious fanaticism was rampant on Earth.

She threw on clothes and a fancy coat, and she didn’t need any help hiding the guns under her jacket. She wrapped her hands around Mark’s arm and guided them out.

Tyler followed. The security guy at the front gave them their weapons back discreetly.

“Tell Joey I’m going to be out today,” Eliese said.

Then the door was open and they were back out on the street and heading towards their hotel.

“Going back, got the stuff, stay back, make sure we aren’t followed,” Tyler said over a channel to their section.

Another lift ride and more of Eliese’s thinly veiled remarks, and they were up on the level where they hotel was.

Eliese seemed to go overboard with the play on words and teasing, and Mark smoked his cigar, smiled and teased right back, both of them loving to annoy the self-important people.

Mark and Tyler nodded and greeted the roving Chosen, who greeted them in return and walked on. Mark heard people asking why they weren’t getting thrown into the camps, that surely they must be Earthers to be that disgraceful. Mark doubted that they even knew what that meant. They and Harmony had insulated themselves from the realities.

They thought of the camps on Osdal Actual as prisons, where the undesirables and those who disrupted the way of things were sent for punishment. Earthers were the reason that they were never allowed to have more freedom. In their minds, the people of Earth lived in paradise, and some of them did, but the vast majority, twenty billion of them, lived in slums across the planet.

Mark and Eliese’s room was opulent and, as soon as the door was closed, Mark and Eliese’s hands were over one another. Their lips met as they ripped at clothes.

They never got to the bedroom, the main room was comfortable enough, and Mark was right, Eliese knew some tricks that Virgins would never think of.

Chapter 18

Gold Runner

Oort Cloud, moving to Osdal Actual Osdal System

5/3267

Mark dumped his bag in the hold of the Gold Runner.

Most miners had called their rigs something dumb, and Gold Runner wasn’t even the worst. That wasn’t the reason that Mark’s face was screwed up into a scowl.

“Will this thing even fly?” Mark asked as he looked over the surfaces that were scarred with honest to God rust, which didn’t happen unless someone had basically power washed the entire section with salt and water.

“She’s just got a lot of character,” Moretti said, thumping on the side of the large freighter.

“So probably,” Zukic surmised, dropping his gear bag off. There were quarters underneath the nose of the freighter, and they would be hot bunking it. The Gold Runner’s owner, Felicia, was nothing to write home about. She was a miner through and through; she liked a big payday, and she liked the drinking, brawls and bartering that came with being a freighter captain.

She didn’t care much for the Chosen, but she kept that knowledge to herself. Mark wouldn’t even know that if Moretti hadn’t told him.

Though she was also old, about seventy or so, she hadn’t had many life-extending treatments, so the big scores were let go as she settled into a regular paycheck with the refiners and machine shops which took refined materials and turned them into specialist items.

Well, until Moretti had hit her up with the potential to get back in on the hitting a big win and keeping her regular paycheck.

They'd gone through the bartering more as a formality. Moretti had had her in the bag as soon as he’d explained his position.

She might be older, but that didn’t mean she didn’t want to have some fun.

Felicia seemed to have sensed that they were talking about her as she came down from her cockpit. She’d lived a hard life, but she’d had fun doing it. She was a large woman, with brawn that hid the brains underneath.

She slid down onto the cargo deck with practiced ease.

“Mr. Moretti, I guess this is the cargo?”

“That’s right Felicia, just taking a ride to Osdal, hopefully get set up there and start figuring out a few ways to get the Bandit corp turning up some pretty tokens,” Moretti said.

“Tokens, creds, as long as it works at the bar I’m a happy woman,” Felicia said, slapping Moretti’s back, a genuine smile on her face.

“Oh, looks like Johnny’s here,” Felicia said, walking out of the large cargo bay and waving to Johnny who was working on his surface, an army of bots coming in after him, all of them holding sealed containers. Each of them were loaded with refined and processed metals.

Some of them were probably from Bandit Two’s asteroid claim.

I’ll get you sorted out. Name’s Kale.” He was a hardy looking man, and the way he moved showed that he was used to working in zero grav.

Moretti said that he was an old hand at the whole mining thing, and had stayed next to Felicia for the last twenty years or so. They were as thick as thieves and he was her second in command.

Mark got his gear stored and then wandered back out to the cargo hold. It was five times the size of Bandit Two’s hold. Robots kept coming in, securing the containers to one another and the modular supports in the cargo hold.

I hate these long distance flights in freighters and shuttles, he thought, remembering the shuttle that had taken him to Masoul Actual. It had seemed a neat idea at first, but by the end it had been a royal boring pain in the ass. He laughed as he thought of the toilet breaking down, the various antics they’d got up to, but his smile soured as he remembered those that hadn’t made it out of Masoul.

“Good to go!” Felicia said, and the cargo hold’s doors were already closing. Johnny waved good bye, Mark waved back, smiling only slightly. With a reminder of what was on the line and how they could die at any time, it was hard to be cheerful.

All of the stuff to make sure that they went undetected was tiring and annoying, but when he arrived on Osdal, he could start getting the real work done. He could go back to being a Trooper. They could start figuring out how they were going to have Osdal Actual go the same way as Masoul Actual.

There was no sign of a smile on his face by the time he returned to the freighter, only dark longing. He would destroy Harmony; they’d hurt and killed people he cared for. That kind of action was enough to warrant their deaths. In Mark’s mind the carriers couldn’t come soon enough.

He would do everything in his power to turn Harmony’s control into chaos.

Watch out Harmony, I’m coming for you, run away now from the big bad Trooper, he sing-songed badly in his head.

Chapter 19

EMFC Reclaimer

Outer Limits Osdal System

5/3267

“Fucking dammit, Waz!” Alexis cussed as the man crashed into the wall again.

She had much better control of the powered armor they were all using, so she used her implants to dial down his power and override his systems.

“Sorry, Warrant,” Waz scrambled to his feet.

“Eska move it, don’t be scared of the damned thing!” Eska, a newbie from another carrier, was making Alexis age with her slow movements.

The fuck have I got myself into? Alexis thought. This was the third training session they’d had with the powered armor.

It was the first time that they’d been woken up from cryo since the fleet had moved to their ready positions in the Oort cloud surrounding Osdal.

They were a lot better than their first time, the second time they had been with the Triple Twos guiding them. But that was months in the past and they were still confident in their skills - some of them a little too much.

“We’re going back to basics; seems your heads have a damned hole in the back of them!” she growled.

The sergeants got their sections together, Che was watching from the sidelines, and he saw that there wasn’t enough of the powered armor to go around.

They weren’t all getting powered armor before they got into contact with the Osdal Forces. While it hadn’t been confirmed that the chosen in Osdal were operating the powered armor, it was better to know how to use it if they could. It would at least help to counteract them in the field.

Sword fighting had come back in a big way thanks to the Vibra-Blade s. Nerva hadn’t gone into cryo; he was staying up to keep an eye on the situation in Osdal and also training any and all Troopers that were awake.

They had done a few fights with the powered armor against people with Vibra-Blade s, and it made her feel more confident, but it took concentrated time and effort to not just use the powered armor, but to fight in it. There was a reason that the powered armor back on Masoul had been using Repulsors instead of rifles. With the Repulsors they could spray and pray, it was a lot easier than actually aiming, plus the fine motor controls it would take to reload was a practice in the ‘annoying as fucking hell’ department.

Sergeants started to get people walking and moving easily, coaching them through the moves, and Alexis took her time checking them out. She was good, but over-thinking was a mess waiting to happen when you fought in powered armor.

Reacting and doing were a lot easier than just wandering around and realizing you were basically in a different body and it didn’t necessarily want to obey you. You had to learn how to just do, not think about it.

Alexis tried to take her mind off of it, her thoughts turning to Tyler.

He was off again in the middle of danger and there was nothing that she could do. It hurt, a bit less than last time, as she knew what to expect and had made the most of their time together. Yet it still pulled at her heart when she started thinking about the kind of danger he was in.

They had confirmed the existence of work camps that were used to keep the majority of people happy as a small percentage were thrown into hard labor and toughed it out.

There weren’t any official reports from the camps that they had picked up, but implants showed it all. Some of the things that she’d seen happening in those camps made her want to take the carrier to Osdal right that minute.

An anger burned in her, an anger that she hadn’t felt on Sacremon. Sacremon had been about surviving. Masoul had been about killing the bastards that had killed her people.

Osdal, Osdal was a mix of guilt, shame and anger. These people were just normal everyday folk. They might have been miners, cleaners, CEOs… it didn’t matter, they were peaceful and probably didn’t cause that many issues. They were just living their lives, until they were turned on by their neighbors, family, even loved ones, and thrown to Harmony.

Any freedom they had disappeared as soon as Harmony got hold of them. They’d become Harmony’s slaves and true workforce.

Those that professed loyalty for Harmony were given more freedoms. They got more food, less work, even air cars were available to them. Their work had been taken and dumped on the slaves and they didn’t give a fuck, because it wasn’t them. So what if some Earther died?

It wasn’t them, the loyal Harmony supporters.

It was surprising with what the human mind could come up with to rationalize their treatment of other humans.

The Harmony supporters with previously undreamed of luxuries, commented how disgusting the Earthers were when they had visited the camps, as if it was their fault for the conditions they lived in. Alexis saw that for what it was; people were making up excuses for why they could have a charmed life and watch as others died.

It boiled down to a few simple words: they must be bad because they’re not me. They deserve what they get. Yet the reasoning, for all of it, that went right out the fucking airlock.

So when Alexis felt anger, it was the all consuming rage she had seen take Mark. It made her want to punch, scream, it made her want to kill.

When the EMF got there, they wouldn’t just kill Harmony and be done with it. No. They were recording every person that supported Harmony, who had turned in someone that they cared about, or who had seen the suffering in the camps and done nothing.

Earth and Her Colonies had their reasons for doing this. Alexis’s were simple: she didn’t want to live in a universe populated by useless snakes who would change what they said at the drop of a hat and turn the blame onto those that couldn’t defend themselves.

Chapter 20

Processing Station Five

Osdal Actual Osdal System

6/3267

The ride hadn’t been as bad as Mark had feared. Felicia and her crew were a lot of fun, and they had booze for the days when it got really boring. The people on watch didn’t partake, but the others got a nice buzz on, played cards and bonded.

By the end, Mark knew that Moretti had picked a good freighter and crew.

He was almost sad as Processing Station Five came into view, looking like a scaled up version of Refining Station Seventy-Seven.

Felicia took over the comms channel and talked to the foreman, chatting like they were old friends and catching up on the latest gossip. More people were going to the camps. Seemed that there were Earthers everywhere. The Foreman and Felicia didn’t sound like they agreed with the situation, but they knew that to cross the Chosen was to get themselves thrown into those camps.

Moretti had made it clear that neither him nor the rest of the Bandit Two Corp cared for the Chosen, actually hinting at the fact he left Elekt was to get away from the Chosen and Harmony lovers, and Felicia’s barriers had fallen.

They’d talked about the Chosen with open disgust. They were nothing but bully boys with too much power and a chip on their shoulder against anyone they thought had any power.

Felicia had openly said that she was just looking forward to the EMF wiping the floor with the Chosen and getting back to working. The companies gave order, and she knew it was going to be hard when they came back, but she knew there was the possibility of upwards movement. She kept the Chosen at a distance and, when the EMF showed up, she and a lot of people she knew were going to hide out the battles and then start getting the economy rebuilt.

It would look good for the CEOs when they came back and their people were already looking to get the system back in working order and pumping out product.

“Fuck those inner system fuckers, some like Olson, the processing facility foreman, are okay. The rest are just uppity fucks that use Harmony to feel better about themselves and sit back on their asses. They don’t care about the fact others are being turned into slaves, as long as they get to have time off their happy.

“As soon as the EMF comes they’ll rush to show that they were faithful. In reality, they make up most of the Chosen. They like feeling powerful and important! I can’t wait to see what happens when powerful and important means being soldiers for Harmony against Troopers.

“There was a small pirate group here about fifty years past, the Troopers came in from Strike Station. I’ll never forget the broadcasts, they didn’t even wake up the entire carrier, only about a company. The carrier pounded the asteroid base and their ships to shit, then the Troopers went in. Mean fuckers them, come from Earth’s slums, they’d kill you for your shoes there you know.” She drank her green coffee squeeze bottle.

Yeah, or just because you looked at them the wrong way, Mark thought, knowing the truth to her words.

“Anyway, they went in, looking like damned killing robots in the holo-vids. Could tell the pirates were screwed as soon as they dropped out of their Combat Shuttles.

“Four hours later, and the Troopers emerged, got on their Combat Shuttles and back onto their carrier. No more pirates. They continued through the system showing off their guns and power. Those Troopers were probably asleep already. Hell of a way to live, sleep for decades only to be woken up to fight.” She shrugged and took another drink from her bottle.

“Gold Runner, slip seven is clear,” a voice said through the center console.

“Thanks Raquel,” Felicia said, powering up her drives and following the waypoint that appeared on her HUD.

“The chosen might be bully boys and a few of them are actual fighters, but the EMF has numbers and killers. The chosen kill out of boredom.” She looked at Mark. “Boredom, how much of a fuck low life do you have to be to kill out of boredom?”

“A new kind of fuck up,” Mark replied, reclining in his seat.

“Got that right, anyway; while they kill out of boredom, the Troopers kill to survive, kill for one another. You fuck with one, you fuck with all. Think that’s a motto or something. But yeah, Troopers are trained to kill and destroy, Chosen are just dumb pricks with too much time on their hands, propaganda in their heads and not enough brain cells to be anything but cruel. Fucking waste of air if you ask me.”

The slip coming into view and it was a cage type thing with clamps all around it. Felicia brought them into the cradle, reducing their acceleration to zero. Moments later the clamps connected with the Gold Runner’s hull.

“One delivery done,” she said, pressing a button that connected her with everyone on the ship. “Helmets and suits!”

“All good Felicia,” Kale said back over the main line.

“Venting,” Felicia said, and air was pulled back into storage tanks. It didn’t take long but all background noise disappeared, as there was nothing for it to transmit through.

Mark felt rather than heard the large rear cargo door opening. The ‘roof’ of the large freighter was also opening, and arms reached down and started pulling containers out before the roof shutters were open all the way.

An extendable walkway connected to the airlock and the airlock lit with a blue light, saying it was connected.

“Power lines and fuel lines connected,” Felicia said.

It had been but a few minutes but they were already a fifth less of their cargo. The station was not one to wait around.

Mark adjusted to the lack of gravity, his augments stopping his inner ear from making his guts roll around. Dominguez tossed him his gear bag, and he slung it over his shoulder, making sure he didn’t mess up his space suit. Thing was more patches than actual material.

“Alright you lot, good meeting you, see you soon enough, make sure to get into as much trouble as possible!” Felicia called.

Mark smiled and waved, saying goodbye to the rest of the crew. They’d become close over the last two weeks.

Then Holm was leading them through the airlock, down the docking tube and into another airlock, some walking on their boots, but Mark used small touches to push himself around. With no air or gravity, he was enjoying the freedom.

Once through the airlock gravity returned and they found themselves among the various machinery that turned refined materials into complex compounds that were capable of making kilometer tall towers, or holding the power of a miniature sun, or micro-meteor impacts. These were the basic building blocks of any space-faring race.

Moretti took the lead, talking to someone that was waiting for them. They were escorted through the working machinery, while pressed hammered, and materials were sorted, heated, stretched mixed, formed and changed.

They came out of the facility into an area that was similar to Seventy-Seven’s living areas. There weren’t as many glowing signs and the place looked to be in better standings than the outer levels in Seventy-Seven. Moretti guided them through as if he’d been there all of his life.

Moretti did some more bargaining at a kiosk, and they dropped off their gear.

“Shuttle leaves in two hours, do whatever you want,” Moretti said when they got to the observatory.

Mark moved past him and looked out of the observatory’s crystal matrix, it had a really complex name, but everyone just called it glass. He looked out at Osdal Actual.

It was a red planet, red ground, red clouds and the tell tale swirls of colony cities, which sparkled under Osdal’s sun.

The red that covered everything wasn’t dirt like Mars, it was metals. Osdal Actual was an iron silicate world with ice caps, and was just far enough away from the sun to be habitable. Its day temperatures ranged from 40-50C.

Massive circles around the towns told of strip mines that had been cut into the planet. Everything was useful, and most of it was used by Osdal itself, only the rare metals were worth shipping up to the processing stations that hung in orbit.

There were rail accelerators dotted around the planet, which shot special containers to the stations. It was feasible due to the planet’s gravity being only three quarters of Earth’s.

Mark’s implants identified the different mining cities he was looking at, as well as the various launch sites. There was also a pop-up that told him about Diggers, animals native to Osdal. They heard vibrations and ate metals, using them as skin and organs.

They were hellish things to kill, but use a sonic blaster at the right frequency and they’d fuck off.

“Looks like Earth, less clouds and smaller though,” Ko said.

“Yeah, when I got into the history records and I saw Earth when it was still green and blue, I thought it was a colony. We killed the damn thing by importing so much metal and polluting the atmosphere to hell. Not much we can do now,” Mark said, even as a small part of him hoped that, with the program he had started with the different greenhouses across Earth, and his finds on Sacremon, they could help to reduce the carbon in the air.

Chapter 21

Mining City One

Osdal Actual Osdal

6/3267

Guy Castillo looked at his glass, somehow it had emptied himself.

He stood and stumbled.

Maybe it didn’t just evaporate, he thought, laughing at his own joke as he let the glass drop and wandered through his office and to the fridge. He grabbed a beer from the door, taking a big draw from it.

Tsik was on the couch, looking out of the windows at the strip mine that lay outside of Mining City One.

“Oh, don’t worry Tsik, we didn’t send our slaves to that mine,” Guy said, drinking. He saw Tsik wince and take a long drink from his own glass. He had a broken nose and a black eye. Guy had done that one night when he couldn’t take the shit any more, and he’d punched the man who had drawn him into Harmony with his nice words.

Tsik had let it happen; he felt as betrayed by Guy, and he knew that he was the reason Guy had become part of Harmony, and he’d dragged down the people that had followed him into it.

Guy had stopped after a time, crying as he realized he should be punching himself. Tsik was a wide-eyed optimist, but he was supposed to be a businessman. He had wanted to break into the CEO levels; he should have listened to Tsik but checked the facts.

He sunk into a seat, absently drinking his beer, his weakness, and for a time he could forget what he had brought on the people that had followed him. Many of his friends and their families had been shipped off to Twenty-One.

“Fucking Harmony and their fucking lies,” Tsik muttered.

“Ah, you’re finally learning Tsik. That’s not the right way a dog of Harmony should be acting,” Guy chastised the man. The noise cancellers were on all the time.

“Fuck you Guy, I didn’t want this to happen,” Tsik shot back, anger in his eyes.

“But you let it! You came in here, all pretty fucking words and promises, and told me that Harmony would make things better. You didn’t tell me that they would make fucking slaves out of the people that wanted to change the system, not just make it easier on those who ate Harmony’s shit up!” Guy’s words turned to yells, and he pointed a finger at Tsik, shaking with anger. “I should have just pushed you off of a tower and been done with all of it, but no, you came to me when I was at the bottom and you gave me hope. You piece of shit.” Guy spat on the floor, adding to the stains and beer bottles around the living room. He drank heavily from his beer.

“You should have,” Tsik said, taking a drink himself, looking dejected, a shadow of his former self.

“Look at us, just two drunks who can’t deal with reality any more,” Guy said, guilt and anger writhing in his gut.

“Don’t worry, when the EMF comes they’ll kill us both anyway. They don’t leave any rebels behind,” Tsik said, emptying his beer and grabbing another.

“Well it’s not like they mean this system to be anything more than an exercise at slowing the EMF. Luke’s got a system freighter ready to go at any time and I’m sure he’s not going to want to take the likes of us with him. He’s Harmony’s real golden boy. Once EMF arrives, he’ll run off to his masters and we can die for all of the shit Harmony stuffed into our heads.” Guy tapped the beer to his head and then pointed at Tsik. “And we spouted that like Harmony’s perfect fucking mouth pieces!” Guy threw the beer in a moment of rage and it broke, satisfying him.

He looked out at the strip mine, knowing that the people down there were living a charmed life compared to those at Mining City Twenty-One.

“I need another beer,” he said, standing and moving to the fridge, as impotent and useful as a pogo in space. Luke didn’t know what was going on with Guy, but Guy’s bodyguards were all Luke’s people. If Guy looked to pushing back, Guy would probably find himself in Mining City Twenty-One too.

His own cowardice stopped him; when he’d watched those in Mining City Twenty-One fear had rippled down his spine. It still chilled him whenever he thought of it.

Unlike the majority of people, he didn’t think of the Earthers as people who deserved their punishment. He saw them as the innocent, atoning for his sins.

Earthers. He snorted at the word, pulling out another beer. Fucking stupid name; all of them were born and raised in Osdal. Most of them have less connection than the people sitting on their assess and saying Harmony is great.

So Guy Castillo, grabbed more beers and sunk into his seat, looking over Mining City One, his thoughts becoming muddled and messy. Just how he liked them. In this world of pain, his only retreat was inside the bottle he took a long drag from.

Chapter 22

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

6/3267

Luke looked over the numbers in front of him; they denoted the production levels of the various mines around the city.

He flicked the air. He was one of the few people that not only had implants but they were up to date. It was one of the privileges that came from his weekly chats with Housapel and Fernix’s heads.

The next page denoted number of workers compared to production levels. Another broke down the various machines that were being used and reports on their conditions.

Luke couldn’t give a fuck about the people behind the numbers, he had two jobs: keep Harmony supplied with the materials they needed to build their war machines, and bleed the EMF that arrived to take Osdal.

Of course, he wouldn’t be there when that happened, he would be in a ‘command center’ observing the battle. For the first few days or weeks they would think that he was just secured away giving orders, instead of aboard a freighter heading for Fernix.

“Gather the work vehicles that you need from other sites; the people of Osdal seem to be getting lazier as time goes on. Remind them that there are places within the ranks of the Chosen, then also remind them that we are looking for Earth sympathizers,” Luke said to Dean Castillo, who was sitting in the chair across from him.

“Yes sir.”

“I see that you are also having an issue with workers, especially after the four Digger incidents. I know that there are Earth sympathizers out there, so see if your sister would be interested in heading up those investigations. I am not satisfied that everyone is being caught. The laziest among those that profess themselves to be Harmony supporters make me suspicious. If they did want to help Harmony, then they would work harder in the time that they can,” Luke said, knowing very well that Dean and Emilie Castillo would take that to mean, round them up, accuse them, and use them as an example for others to work harder, then toss them into the work camps.

The Diggers were a pain in the ass, but Osdal had a lot of people, and with new sweeps he would fill the camps back up and production would be higher than ever. He had a decade or less until the EMF arrived. In that time, he would work the people of Osdal until none but the Chosen were left, or till the EMF arrived.

“I will pass the message on personally, and Emilie will be more than happy to look into those people.”

“Good, I expect to have another shipment going out in four months,” Luke gave another wave and the images only he could see disappeared.

“What about the asteroid miners?” Dean asked, his voice curious, but Luke saw the anger in his eyes. Dean came from Osdal Actual and thought of the miners in the asteroid belts and those on Osdal Three as slackers.

Luke tried not to sigh, the entire population of Osdal Three were working in camps to collect organic materials for the processing stations. It was slow going, due to disease, bad conditions and native creatures killing the workers. Despite that, their production numbers were matching those that were coming from Osdal Actual and the asteroid miners.

They had a smaller population to begin with, so it was easier to cut them out of the loop. They kept to themselves, so now communication had stopped with them no one seemed to care. They had enough to worry about with the Chosen around and Mining City Twenty-One.

“One refining station in the asteroid belts pulls in more raw materials than two mining cities. It might not be rare metals that the cities get, most of the time, but they pull their weight and then some,” Luke said. He saw a flash of fury in Dean’s eyes; it was a slight against his planet and people. Luke hoped that it would serve to light a fire under the young man’s ass and get him to kick the other Osdal Actual people into working harder and faster to out do the asteroid miners.

“I see what you’re saying about people on Osdal not understanding their need to work. Emilie will find those that are not working for the good of Harmony,” Dean promised.

“Good, now I have a meeting with the heads of Harmony, so let me know how things are going and I hope that you and your camp administrators will join me for a meal tomorrow evening?”

“We would be honored sir,” Dean said, bowing his head. “For the sake of Harmony!” He gave a proud salute.

Luke returned the salute and words. He didn’t like eating with Dean and his camp administrators. All they talked about was the people they’d tortured, killed and raped, they took joy in sharing their sadistic tales. Luke would smile and laugh, but he didn’t care, they were just pawns, and their purpose was to give him and the heads of Harmony the means to attack Earth and take over Nivad Selvra’s position.

Luke walked to his conference room. The lights dimmed, no light from outside coming in. Two shadows waited for him.

“Sorry for my tardiness, I was dealing with a personnel issue,” Luke said, his voice warbled and changed as he took a seat.

“I take it that it is no longer an issue?” the head of Housapel asked.

“No, sir. I expect that the production numbers will be the highest they have ever been in the coming months. Why corporations didn’t think to do this before I never know.”

“Bylaws, the fact that workers would rebel, and they didn’t have a military to themselves. Nivad likes to use the EMF as his threat. People do as he says and he keeps the peace. Well, until we fucked the little bastard’s plans,” Fernix’s head said.

“Now that is sorted, shall we look over production numbers?” Housapel said. “Would you like to go first Osdal?”

“Certainly sir. We are on track to fill a freighter every four months with the requested materials.

“Production has ceased on the powered armor units, as well as machine guns and heavy machine guns. We scrapped the bolt action rifles. There will be groups with the weapons to check their abilities against the Troopers’ armor. But finding people that can put the weapon to use are hard to find on Osdal.

“We have taken the plans provided for the shuttle upgrades, applied them to the ships and have made several remote launches in Osdal Actual’s atmosphere. We have switched production to make more, and sensor units,” Luke said, sending them reports that backed up what he was saying.

Fernix and Housapel were silent as they reviewed the information.

“Everything looks to be advanced compared to our original timeline, you are to be commended Osdal,” Housapel said. Fernix made noises of agreement.

“Fernix, could you go over your production and recruitment numbers?” Housapel asked.

“We have started working on the battle ships. They take up a lot of production time and resources from other projects, but it’s estimated that they will take eight months to make one as we continue on with the armed shuttles and powered armor. Based on the results from Osdal’s engagements, we are capable of making adjustments to all of our projects. We have a limited run of weapons coming out. They will be adjusted according to Osdal’s reports.

“We are putting a sensor grid into place, and defensive missile systems are being put around Fernix Actual and the shipyards as they become available. It will take years to cover them both adequately and then move to the procurement and machine shop stations,” Fernix said.

Luke looked over the reports; Fernix had a larger population and Harmony had become a popular group through their propaganda and the making of a faux system government. Politicians dealt with making Harmony looking good, and the heads dealt with the real power of Harmony and looked to taking over Earth and Her Colonies.

The numbers they were impressive. By the time he reached Fernix it would be a stronghold the likes of which no system had seen before. The EMF wouldn’t be prepared for it. Osdal would be a teaching ground, Fernix and Housapel would be a bloodbath.

The diagrams of the battle ship showed that it was seven hundred meters long, with metal storm heavy weapons sprouting from it. It didn’t have the automated systems of an EMFC, those were installed when the carriers made it to Earth, though it had more weapons, missiles and all-round armor. It also had thirty shuttles with missiles and scaled down metal storm weapons. They didn’t have the punch of an EMFC, but they had numbers.

“Recruiting numbers for the chosen?” Housapel asked.

“Doing better than expected. We have made a holding group, people that do physical training before they are admitted into the units. As we are making this up as we go along, the first graduates are the best and brightest, and we are having them go through the military history we have, and even science fiction novels, to try and pick up tactics and ideas of how to engage the enemy. I do not believe that they will be as effective as the Earth-born Troopers, but their numbers are impressive and they should have better gear Trooper,” Fernix said.

“Masoul and Osdal have and will teach us valuable lessons in defeating the EMF,” Luke agreed.

“Quite, we will go from having more personnel and less tech to better tech and more personnel. The numbers and projections look good for our victory,” Housapel looked to Fernix.

“My own analysis agrees with that,” Fernix nodded.

“Now onto my own production numbers,” Housapel touched something in front of him. The same reports appeared in front of Luke, just different numbers and graphs.

“Recruitment is working well; the public relations people have outdone themselves. We are seeing a join up rate of 30%. Conditional on their completion of training, some will be full time military, with the others training and working to keep Harmony going, changing over to full time as the EMF gets closer.”

Luke looked over the chart, it was indeed impressive.

“We are producing E-12 variants, as we have more precise machine shops. Though, I believe it’s in our best interests to look at the performance of the weapon systems on Osdal and see what we can do to improve our own. Thanks to Fernix’s assistance, we are getting our first hulls that we will outfit with electronics and our best targeting systems, as well as the necessary items for a finer detailed factory production,” Housapel said.

Luke nodded. Fernix made massive machines, freighters, carriers, and build-a-station kits, while Housapel made household electronics, ranging from surfaces to the electronic circuit boards in an E-12.

Fernix supplied Housapel with massive hulls and the larger pieces, Housapel outfitted them with the control systems and packaged up a factory or two and sent it to Fernix. The first small part factory was complete and operational. A second would be complete by the time the parts for another factory arrived.

This would make each system with some of the others abilities. Housapel would get ships, Fernix would get the ability to add in the finer details to ships, weapons, powered armor and such.

A large majority of the ships would still need to go to Housapel as Fernix, even with its new factories, wouldn’t be able to produce all of the tech needed to get the carriers operational.

“Our own powered armor needs should be met soon though, as we all know, Nivad will probably try to cut us off from one another, so I am also sending the majority to Fernix, as detailed in last week’s memo.” Housapel paused and a new report came in, this one showing Housapel.

“We are working on weapons systems that are being placed over our most vital areas. Our sensor grid is located around the Oort cloud, moving in it is spotty, but it is better to know when the EMF is coming, instead of telling us when they’re right on top of us,” Housapel said. This was the opposite what Luke had done.

Luke had way more traffic moving through his system, so he would need a lot more sensor operators to go through all the possible targets. He wanted to see how the defenses worked with good sensor reads of the enemy ships. So, with his limited sensor drones, he’d set them around Osdal Actual with defenses linked into them.

“I know that doesn’t work for you two, as you want to hammer the EMF if they get close to our assets, and to also see the functionality of our weapon systems with good sensor linkage,” Housapel conceded. “With time, I hope to replicate that and have the forewarning system up. Now on to dissident numbers, I hope everyone is under the notable five percent of the population?”

“We are holding at around three percent, we’ve gone along with proceeding to let them talk, and the public relations are undermining them easily. It shows us as benevolent for giving them time to talk, but they’re asking why we don’t just throw them into jail. We’re holding off actions, allowing the workers to turn on those that want to go back to companies. I am looking at recruiting a number of them if they survive this. We will need people to replace those that believe in Harmony,” Fernix said.

When they gained control of Earth and Her Colonies, they didn’t want people uprising and throwing their numbers all over the place, it would be the exact kind of chaos they had made. Using Harmony as a front for their hostile takeover allowed them to use the people for a righteous cause to overthrow the companies. Then, when they had control, they would use a new EMF to kill all of those that had supported them. Incite the rebellious faction to fight, then clear them out so they wouldn’t threaten their position at the top.

It was an ingenious plan and a reason why they kept such clear records of those that were mindless drones working for whoever, and those that actually believed in Harmony, or the companies. It would make the clean-up easier.

“Osdal?” Housapel asked.

“My dissident numbers are at two percent and will decrease with the latest round of forced workers; fear of being thrown into the camps prevents people from raising concerns and keeps them focused on their work,” Luke said with some pride.

“I am holding at four percent. I believe it is because people see that we are making weapons for war when they are used to making desks, surfaces and lamps,” Housapel said dryly.

“We are working on the numbers and doing as Fernix is, it is working well. The problem we have is that we have to turn many of those that support the companies away from jobs which deal with armament. This leads to them becoming a jobless, rowdy faction. My Human Resources Department believes that there will be riots in a few years, but by then the military should be functional. The PR department will use the military putting the riots down in a peaceful manner to increase recruiting numbers, and hopefully reduce the number of dissenters,” Housapel said, his shadow turning to the others.

“I believe that is all for this conference, we will stay in contact by memo if anything arises,” Housapel waited, and, sensing no questions he disappeared, as did Fernix.

The lights returned to the room and Luke started going over the varying reports. People were just ones and zeroes waiting to be applied in the correct manner to improve his production and decrease his costs.

Chapter 23

Mining City Seventeen

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

6/3267

Mining City Seventeen wasn’t much to look at. It featured identical swirling towers that got taller closer to the center, the difference to other colony cities was that kilometers away there were strip mines with rail roads running to the city. There they’d be processed and sent to collecting cities. They’d pool refined materials together before firing them into orbit.

It was just a short shuttle ride from there to holding stations in orbit.

Mark hiked up his gear bag, feeling the weight of the machine gun in it.

People from Osdal looked at them with open disgust.

Moretti led them through the central tower to an office that was now owned by the Bandit Two Corporation, and Mark could hear the people talking.

“Asteroid miners, they’re no better than Earthers. Just pull in rocks and drink till they pass out, while us honest workers have to go and cut it out of the planet.” A couple of women were whispering and, by the way they looked Mark, he doubted that they had ever stepped in a strip mine. They were probably office workers, or plant runners.

Mark cared little that people tried to make a point of getting in their way.

Moretti, who’d been an adept student with close combat, was working on his surface when one pompous asshole walked in front of him, choosing to cut him off. Moretti didn’t even look up; he slapped the man in the face with the surface so hard the man stumbled back cradling his nose.

“Watch where you’re going,” Moretti said, still looking at his surface.

Chosen moved to intercept them, and unconsciously Holm and Mark moved to Moretti as their section spread out to give covering arcs.

“Hello, For the sake of Harmony!” Moretti said, giving them a salute and a smile.

“Who the fuck do you think you are, an Earther?” The lead Chosen woman snarled, looking at them all with disgust. Obviously she was from Osdal Actual, and her prejudice towards other people had only been exaggerated by Harmony.

“I am the numbers guy for the Bandit Two Corporation,” Moretti said with a smile.

“Look at this, Pel, this guy says he’s from a Corporation. He thinks that the CEOs still own this place, huh?”

Pel was a pudgy man, he spat on the ground. “Fucking look like Earthers to me,” Pel said.

“You’re under investigation, come with us,” the woman said, her people fanning out around them, toting their weapons and making it clear they were looking for a reason to open fire.

“Excuse me miss, but I have a very important meeting,” Moretti said, his smile slipping.

“So report me; get moving Earthers,” She used her gun to poke Moretti.

“Let’s go and see what this is all about,” Moretti said to the Troopers.

They let Moretti lead on, and Mark readied himself to release the controls on his augments.

They were hustled into an office that had been turned into a detainment area, where people were crying and scared. The Chosen looked on them with disgust, they looked like they could have been walking around the corridors of the tower. They were unremarkable, just people that the Chosen had picked.

Their gear was taken and tossed into a corner without a care.

Well, I don’t have a good feeling about this, Mark thought as they were locked into their own containment area.

The woman left, leaving just three Chosen behind.

“That one looks fresh, unlike those camp girls,” Pel said pointing to Niemi. “Let’s have some fun while Zia is off getting Emilie. We all know where they’re going. Better than waiting and getting her while she’s all dried up.”

“You lot, get up against the other wall, we got you covered, Pel,” one girl said. “You’re next pretty boy.” She pointed at Holm.

“Wouldn’t mind me a piece of that,” the third guard agreed.

Mark felt a smile come over his face as he walked back to the end of the cell, his triceps twitching.

Pel left his gun behind and advanced into the cell, licking his lips as he advanced on Niemi.

The other guards held their guns up, but they weren’t aiming, just watching as Pel advanced.

The door to the area they were in opened, and Zia came in, with a new woman who looked better fed and in command. The guard’s weapons lowered as they looked over.

“The hell ar...” The woman in charge, started to say. Mark walked forward, and his hands came up, blades shooting out and catching the two guards in their necks.

Mark jumped for Pel, as the man back pedaling. Mark grabbed his head, digging his hands into his jaw.

“Shit, shit!” Zia shouted. Pel screamed as Mark pulled his jaw out and stabbed Pel’s chest with his own jaw.

Mark stood, covered in blood and gore, dropping the dead Pel.

“You want to fuck with my sister, you fuck with me,” Mark said. Emilie had a metal storm pistol pointed at him and he waited for the rounds to hit, knowing he was a dead man.

Zia looked like she wanted to take Mark’s head off. Emilie’s gun went from pointing at Mark, to pointing at Zia’s head, and then it went off. Her head caved in with three rounds in a blink of an eye.

“Juarez, Greg, get the fuck in here!” Two people ran into the room.

“The fuck?”

“I am sorry about all of this, Zia told me that she had brought in some asteroid miners claiming to be Bandit Two, so I came over here as fast as possible,” Emilie said.

“And your man intended to rape a to-be ship captain,” Moretti said stepping forward, getting Pel’s blood on his shoes.

“I am sorry,” Emilie said.

“I guess I should tell you who the surprise meeting I was having today was going to be with,” Moretti said, looking to everyone. “It was going to be Leader of the Chosen, none other than Luke Choi himself.”

Emilie was grinding her teeth.

“So what exactly am I going to tell Mister Choi about this Emilie Castillo?” Moretti spat.

Mark’s eyes passed over her with renewed interest. She was one of four lieutenants Luke used to exercise his power, and Emilie controlled getting people into the camps, while her brother Dean ran the camps on Osdal Actual. Goles ran the camps on Osdal Three and Patricia ran the asteroid mining and refining centers.

“I am sorry for any inconvenience. I will release you immediately, though I’m going to have to hold him,” she said pointing to Mark. “No matter what, he killed Chosen.”

“That is unaccept...”

Mark put a hand on Moretti’s shoulder. “I killed them. They might be a terrible demonstration of the Chosen, but we wouldn’t kill chosen in Elekt, we’re not Earthers from the slums, I will take my punishment. We will see one another later.”

“Get the fuck out of here while you can, and kill the bastards whenever you can. I won’t let them kill me. I’ll be ready. Just move your plan up a bit, I don’t think I’m going to be able to stop myself from killing too many of them before long,” Mark subvocalized.

Moretti looked to be waging an inner battle.

“Follow Moretti’s orders, don’t get me unless everything else is in place,” Mark continued, looking to the others, his lips never moving.

“Well spoken, now if you will, I can get you on your way,” Emilie said.

“I’ll see you later Mark, we’ll get this sorted out,” Moretti said, moving to the cell doors, past Pel the two guards and facing Emilie.

“We’ll be watching out for you,” Tal said, making a circle with his fingers. Mark knew he meant watching with his rifle that was packed in his gear bag.

“We’ll get this sorted out,” Bairamov said, clapping hands with Mark and embracing, “And they’ll all be fucking dead,” Bairamov’s voice was only heard by Mark as he walked out.

One of the guys Emilie had called in shut the door and Emilie walked out, the others following her.

“I’m going to the camps aren’t I?” Mark said to the one Chosen still with him.

“You fucking bet.”

“Well it’ll be nice to have a vacation,” Mark said, Pel’s blood drying to his face, and he scratched it off, red flakes falling on the ground. He took a seat on the bench bolted to the wall.

The guard snorted and shook his head.

Chapter 24

Refining station Seventy-Seven

Oort Cloud, Osdal System

6/3267

“He fucking what?” Tyler demanded, a dangerous look in his eyes as veins started throbbing on his neck and his fists tightened into white balls.

Most people would have backed away from Tyler, but Haas knew that he was relatively safe, though any Chosen in the area definitely weren’t.

Tyler had just come back from finishing his two week shift on the claim.

Carly had got enough people together that they trusted, so it was the last time that they’d be on the claim. Felicia and her crew were still on the way back to Refining Station Seventy-Seven.

“He got sent to the camps at Mining City Twenty-One. Moretti rescheduled his meeting with Luke, and the others are getting the lay of the land as fast as possible. Bandit Two is getting fueled right now. Myself and Jerome’s section are staying here to manage things, but you and your section will be going to Osdal Actual,” Haas said.

Tyler sighed, anger making him twitchy as he took a seat on the couch in the apartment hotel.

“What’s the plan?” Tyler asked.

“We continue as planned, but as fast as possible. We’re going to send messages out to the other teams and see if they can move up the timeline. If they can’t, then we sit and watch. Mark knows what he’s in.”

He didn’t promise that Mark would be okay, they all knew that he couldn’t promise that. Mark was in the enemy’s hands. Now they had to continue on their mission, their only hope lay in completing it. First came the mission, then Mark.

It hurt Tyler but he knew that his brother would agree with the priorities. He was in danger, but if they rescued him then carriers of Troopers just like him would be in danger.

“You take Bandit Two and hang out, there’s a slip already paid for at Processing Station One, that’s where Moretti thinks the sensor grid is being run from. I want your team to find out Harmony’s capabilities on the station, and figure out a way of shutting down the sensor grids. Once that’s done you’ll have a part of your team stay on the station prepared and ready to shut down the sensor grid. The rest of your section will move to assist the other operatives as needed,” Haas looked to Jerome.

“Don’t worry, we’ll be joining up with them soon enough,” Haas assured him.

Jerome nodded, and he and Tyler looked at one another. Tyler felt understanding in those eyes. He could feel the dark tension in the room. They wanted to grab their gear and blast away anyone that got in their way. Tyler sensed that Haas wanted to do the same thing, yet their discipline and trust in Haas and Moretti held them back.

Mark was strong, and if anyone could survive the camps it was him.

“Once everything here is running smoothly, Jerome’s section and myself will grab a ride with Gold Runner or Bandit Two and head to Osdal Actual,” Haas said.

No one looked pleased, but that was the plan.

Chapter 25

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

6/3267

Luke listened to Emilie’s report, and he sighed and rubbed his head, his expression pained. Bandit Two was pulling the majority of rare metals out of Refining Station Seventy-Seven’s operating area,

The situation was bad, First, the Chosen, acting like the air heads that they were, had threatened the Bandit Two Corporation, then they’d threatened to rape one of their founding members.

It seemed that another one that had taken offence to them trying to carry out that second act, and had reacted. He’d killed three Chosen, one with his own jaw. Luke was more impressed by that than angered. He didn’t care what happened to the Osdal Chosen, after all, they were just a testing platform for Harmony’s weapons.

If he was back working a CEO on Housapel this would have never happened; Bandit Two knew their place, they paid their dues and followed the rules.

Now they were actively selling their materials to stations that needed it for repair work. They still gave Harmony 20%, but that was all.

Luke had looked into cracking down on them, but Bandit Two Corp was deeply entrenched, and they owed a third of the ships that ran around Refining Station Seventy-Seven. They had thirty claims already staked out, and had provisional contracts with all of the large haulers at the station. They shipped materials to Osdal Actual’s Processing stations, and then also hauled the raw materials from the claims to Seventy-Seven when not doing those runs.

People were flocking to Seventy-Seven as they offered contracts to miners. They mined and got a solid return on their time.

Luke could try to bully them, but then it would show how much Osdal Actual was prejudiced against the asteroid miners. If that happened then he could lose all of the productivity of the asteroid miners, and they contributed thirty times, in weight, the metals of Osdal Actual.

As it was, the Chosen killer would be just another number moved from general population to Mining Camp Twenty-One.

Hell he was already in the population. Luke couldn’t pull him out and send him back to Bandit Two now. He would get word out to the asteroid miners and, as much as they were a group of weirdos and could only be among one another for short periods, they stuck up for one another, not something he wanted.

“So you’re telling me that you don’t think that the miners will lose their shit over this?” Luke asked, sitting back and resting his chin on his hand.

“Yes sir, it was an isolated incident, I don’t think it will have too much of an effect,” Emilie said.

“You arrested him two days ago, right?” Luke looking at her and, accessing his implants, used his right hand to glance through different images.

“Yes sir.”

“Right, definitely not enough time for this to become much of an issue. Nice and quick, in and out. No one the wiser.” Luke found the image he was looking for and threw it against the wall to his right. Emilie looked at it, her eyes widening as she saw the graffiti.

“Now, what does that say?” Luke asked.

“Sir I...” Emilie started.

“Say it,” Luke’s voice became dangerous; he had enough augments in his body to overpower her with brute strength and take a couple of stabs and pistol rounds. Her eyes snapped to the image.

“Fuck Harmony,” she said.

“This one,” Luke threw up another image, this one a poster.

“What did Harmony ever do for us, except try to rape our people and throw them in camps?” She read, her jaw working.

“The EMF is coming, Chosen fucks,” she said looking away.

“That was yesterday,” Luke said.

“Sir, he’s just one man,” Emilie said.

“Oh it doesn’t matter; the asteroid miners don’t care. They don’t care who’s running things, as long as they can get drunk, have a good time and be left alone. I was fine with leaving them alone as long as they met their quota and allowed us to prepare for the EMF. Now we look like a bunch of rapists who throw their people into penal camps for defending their own.”

Emilie flinched. “He wasn’t going to...” She couldn’t look Luke in the eyes.

“What, rape her?” Luke demanded, slamming his fist into the desk and startling her. “I saw the fucking video, Emilie! Look me in the fucking eyes!” He had sat through enough dinners to inspire the Chosen, and he saw what they were on Osdal; they were rapists, murderers and liars. It disgusted him just being around them. He’d taken satisfaction from seeing that fat fucker get stabbed to death with his own jaw.

Emilie’s eyes snapped up to his.

“Your people, hell, your fucking brother, you’re all fucking rapists and murderers. If you thought you could hide it, you would have killed them all and buried their bodies. That’s what happened with the Dudayev family.” Luke taunted her and she flinched at the name. “Thought you could hide that, did you? Your people seemed to have a lot of fun killing the father slowly, while raping his young wife, daughter and son. You looked extremely happy afterwards when you were gutting the young boy.” Luke’s eyes bored into hers and she looked away.

His hand pushed into the desk, cracking the glass surface with the pressure, then he slumped down and waved his hand, as if to make it all disappear.

“Get the fuck out of my office and find your brother those slaves he needs. Don’t take any asteroid miners, and let me deal with Bandit Two Corporation,” Luke said, looking at the glass windows that looked out onto the mine camps.

“Yes sir,” she said. “For the sake of Harmony.”

Luke parroted it, not looking it to her as she hurried out of the door.

Luke was losing it, he hoped that the EMF came soon, much longer and he’d start shooting the Chosen himself, the inept stupid motherfuckers. Couldn’t do anything without fucking up his plans.

He wondered if she was ashamed by what she had done with the Dudayev family, or if she was just embarrassed he had found it. In the end he didn’t care.

He pulled up the reports coming in from Dean, and the influx of slaves was yielding some results, though it would take a few weeks until they were conditioned properly and worked without complaint, or at least learned to keep it to themselves for fear of retribution.

Luke wasn’t a murderer or a rapist, he was a businessman, and a businessman knew how and when to use all the tools at his disposal to get the job done.

***

Mark, like the rest of the people who had been declared Earthers, was dumped out of the air-truck and onto the ground in front of rows of scaffolding that had been covered in plastic sheeting to protect it from the elements.

Mark got to his feet. His hands were bound and the landing hadn’t been expected or gentle.

Quite a few of his fellow passengers were taking their time getting to their feet. A whip cracked, cutting through a man’s shirt and leaving a bloody streak behind.

He let out a wail and collapsed into the dirt. Mark helped those that he could get to their feet, mostly by just picking them up. They were all as tall or taller than him in the reduced gravity, but none of them had the muscle density he did. They felt like wiry puppets in his arms.

But he was used to carrying other armored Troopers in nearly three times the gravity of Osdal.

“Get those clothes off, Earthers!” Someone barked, more whips cracking as people screamed and cried. It wasn’t just men and women being dumped, there were seniors and children.

Mark wanted to take those whips and turn them on the Chosen.

But they were too far away, and the Chosen loafing on the air cars nearby would cut him down before he could do much more than punch their fellows. So he stood there, watching the Chosen and the Earthers.

“Strip, Earthers!” The person demanded, losing their patience, and a whip cracked again, this time it hit a kid in the head. The child went down, no sound coming from their lips.

Mark closed his eyes and let out the sigh as the wails from his mother started up.

“Fuck sakes, Hendricks, we need to keep some of them alive,” the one giving the orders protested.

“Sorry boss, the kids always fuck me up, fucking midgets,” Hendricks said.

Mark looked at the man, his implants taking a picture.

Hendricks, he said, remembering the name. He would make sure he was one of the first to die.

“If they don’t have their clothes off, help them,” Hendricks ordered.

Mark started pulling off his clothes, shirt first, and that elicited some stares from the Chosen. His tattoo of the EMF was hidden, but his familial one was still visible.

He pulled off his pants. Chosen were going through ripping people’s clothes off.

“The fuck you think you’re doing?!” a woman yelled.

“Oh, we’ll be getting acquainted real well, Earther,” the fondling Chosen said, and he ripped her clothes, getting a shocked shriek as he tore the front of her dress off and pulled the back away. The woman tried to cover herself, but she only had a bit of fabric on her shoulders.

Mark averted his eyes, she was a good-looking girl, and the Chosen would quickly break her down. He had seen enough of the non-active implants recording to know what happened in these camps.

“Now I have your attention; this is your lesson. Since you Earthers like to make others work so much for your precious credits and sitting back on your asses, you’re now going to work for your living,” the Chosen talker said. There was still fire in his voice, righteous anger lingering there, but Mark could tell the man had given the speech a number of times before.

“Fuck you I’m no...” a man cried out, and a whip caught him, a bloody line appearing down his chest.

“Earth isn’t here, just Harmony, you try to disrupt Harmony and will learn that your actions have consequences. You will each be given a person to follow, so do what they say and don’t get in the Chosen’s way. You slack off, you start reverting to your Earther ways, then the Chosen will look to sort out your ways. Sykes, get them paired up.” The speaker turned away and headed for an air conditioned air car.

People were crying, scared, with their worlds turned upside down. They were led by Sykes to a row of people who looked half-starved, their eyes lifeless and bored.

Someone started running away, and an air car started up, hitting the person with their bumper, and knocking them to the ground. The chosen beat the person, chucked them in the back and threw them off of the air car as they passed back around.

The person fell in a lump, rolling on the ground. There was a thin dust of metallic sand, and underneath was solid steel and other metals. It did not make for an easy landing, but they got up.

Mark looked to the person he was paired with.

“Hi,” she said, seeming confused as she looked him over.

“Never seen a man before?” Mark growled, reaching down and pulling his pants up. The Chosen wanted to humiliate people, and as long as he didn’t give them ammunition then he wouldn’t get any extra beatings. Some of the threats he’d heard as he was being transported made him sure that the beatings were coming.

It wasn’t a matter of if, but when.

He let his shirt drift back down over his chest, then held his zip-tied arms high, and swung them down, bringing his elbows out. The zip ties broke and he was free-ish.

“Just not one like you,” she said.

“Well I’d keep that to yourself,” Mark said, his dark eyes glancing over her and then continuing to take in the rest of the strip mine that the lean-tos were perched on. Long ramps disappeared into shaft mines. Mark could only make them out by the trucks that were rushing to and from them. Everything went to the large factory complex and then back out to the strip mines and underground mines.

“I’m Mark.”

“Caroline,” she said, sounding tired.

“So what do we do now?”

“Now we get what little sleep we can until our shift siren goes up.” She led the way back to the lean-tos and Mark followed. His eyes were still searching, and he made out basic bathrooms, holes in the ground, and a food line at one end of the lean-tos, opposite the strip mines.

Maintenance areas were dotted around, with mining equipment and bell looking things on poles.

Caroline looked back at Mark, suspicion in her eyes, but he couldn’t see much other than her eyes and a scar that ran from her forehead and across her nose.

Mark looked at her in question.

“You think about trying to get lucky and I’ll open you right up,” Caroline said.

“Have you ever killed anyone before?” As soon as he asked the question her face gave the answer.

“Yes, I had to kill my best friend.” Her eyes were haunted and distant as she walked through the shack’s plastic sheeting. Inside it wasn’t much cooler than outside, and people were all over the ground passed out. Caroline and Mark found a spot and lay down.

Caroline kept away from Mark, watching him, her hands inside her sleeves, probably holding a blade. Mark lay down and closed his eyes, firing up his implants.

“Situation?” Holm asked, his voice tight and professional to cut off personal feelings.

“In the camp, I’m fine. Nothing to report, I’m going to try and get some sleep,” Mark sub-vocalized back.

“Understood, we are working on things on our side. We will be getting eyes on the area shortly. SWAS is coming in for a visit,” Holm said, easing out of his professional voice.

“Tell him and everyone to not do anything stupid or rash. We need to finish the mission first,” Mark’s voice was firm.

“We know, we’ll get it done,” Holm promised.

“Talk later, stay frosty, Triple Twos,” Mark said, turning off his communications. He needed to stay in somewhat capable condition until the fighting started, so he went into his augments and adjusted them to keep him as healthy as possible for as long as possible. Thankfully they ran off of batteries that would last a lifetime.

With the rations that the people at the mine were getting, he was going to have to stretch out every meal bar he got. Mark started trying to get to sleep only to have a siren go off.

Caroline moved from her position, she’d passed right out in a matter of minutes. Without any real thought, she and the rest of the camp dwellers started to move out of the shacks to start another day of working in Mining City Twenty-One.

Mark followed Caroline, and Chosen walked through the shacks, yelling and brandishing shock and night sticks. Anyone they caught, or deemed to be slow, went down with a crackle of electricity, or yelled after a brutal hit from a night-stick.

The Chosen beat on people, and Mark saw that few people that had been in the camp for a while paid any attention to the cries.

I wonder how long it will be before I stop caring about their yells and screams? Mark wondered. His famous anger was simmering under the surface, but he held off, biding his time, his rationality grating against his wants.

***

Caroline walked back to the shacks where Mark was waiting. He’d grabbed water, she’d gone to get food.

“I don’t have it,” she said, expecting him to accuse her of eating it. She didn’t know what she would do when he accused her of that.

She liked Mark, he never made any advances and he was a reassuring presence.

She wondered why a strong man like him was staying around a woman like her. She had seen others do it to use them, but Mark treated her as an equal, listening to her when she talked.

He was a good listener; she’d finally told him about Ellie and the blade, and he hadn’t judged her as they lay on the shack floor, he’d just listened, giving up his sleeping time to hear the fears and tears that she thought she was done with.

When she was done he pulled her to him, his beard touching her head as he hugged her.

“You did what Ellie wanted, what she needed you to do. If you didn’t do it then she would have just suffered,” he said, his voice reassuring, like cold water over her inflamed worries.

“What happened?” Mark said, pulling her down to sit. There wasn’t any accusation in the words, just curiosity.

“Someone took them,” she said, looking away, ashamed. She should have gone the long route, but she’d wanted to get back to the shack quickly and nestle up next to Mark. She felt safe sleeping next to him.

“Who?” He tilted her chin, and his hands were rough but gentle as he lifted her face.

“Some guy with blue pin-stripe shirt, new guy, shack three. I’m sorry, I just wanted to get back quickly.”

“Don’t apologize for the assholes in the world, Caroline,” Mark said standing, the shack’s floorboards creaking.

“I’ll be back, drink some water.” He smiled.

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to get our dinner back,” he smiled as if he was just going to the cafeteria.

She drank water and waited, her anxiety growing, and frustration boring in her stomach.

Is he going to come back? He might just be leaving to sleep in another shack. Doesn’t want to sleep with someone that loses his food, her fears and doubts plagued her.

The shack’s plastic boards creaked and Mark walked in a smile on his face.

“Worried about me?” He asked, amused and maybe happy as he sat down and gave her ration.

She noticed his scarred knuckles looked rough. “What did you do?”

“I made sure that he doesn’t steal from anyone again.”

“Are you okay?” The question seemed to catch him by surprise.

“Yeah, yeah I’m fine,” He put the bar into his sleeve to eat it when the next shift started.

With that they laid down and went to sleep. Mark started tossing a few minutes into sleeping, talking in his sleep and sounding panicked.

He rolled over, his arm pulling her on top of him so she was lying on his chest. His face looked pained, scared and close to tears.

Whatever he had been through, it had never left him.

She made reassuring noises, her hands caressing his face. She laid her head down on his chest, making the noises and rubbing his face until she fell asleep to the strong beats of his heart.

There was something different about Mark.

Today they were on road clearing duty. They ran out between trucks, using picks to cut grooves into the slopes that went into the mines.

Caroline and Mark’s shift got hard labor in the shaft mine, and they lost two newbies to truckers. Mark snarled, but he kept on working.

Caroline realized what was different about Mark; he was dangerous. The way he held himself, the way he looked at people, and that body… he didn’t have the body of a person from Osdal Actual.

“Where are you from?” Her voice was low as she slammed her pick into the ground, cutting through the rock. It was hard work and metal flecks hit her arms. Pain was something she’d just got used to, living around Mining Station Twenty-One.

Mark looked at her, his eyes thinning as he struck the ground again. His blows were powerful, sending metal and sparks flying.

“Somewhere far from here,” he said, looking up as the sound of picks died down. A truck was coming out of the mine.

He and Caroline rushed to the side, and a truck came rushing past, then they went back to their lines and continued them across to the other wall.

It was hard work and Caroline’s further questions fell away as they moved lower into the mine, repeating the same grooves and running away from trucks.

Eleven sirens went off and Caroline started to wander back to camp, it would take ten minutes to walk there, ten minutes she couldn’t eat or sleep. She slogged it back, Mark staying with her.

“You going to hurt me?” she asked Mark.

Mark took some time before responding. “No, little Caroline, I’m here to protect you.”

“Okay,” she said, and somehow she knew he was telling the truth. She saw it in the hard lines of his face and the darkness in his eyes. He might be a dangerous man, but having a dangerous man around was comforting to her now. They went through the food line, and Caroline ate the bar on the way to her shack, but it was hard going. Her head was pounding from too little water and too much labor.

She fell onto the shack floor and made to go to sleep.

“Water,” Mark said, pouring some down her throat. She drank it thirstily, half of her already asleep.

Once he was satisfied, he set her down and hid her food bar in her clothes.

She happily passed out, the worst of her headache abating a bit.

That night she dreamed of Mark’s body. The siren came too early and she woke up to find Mark pulling himself up.

“Let’s get this day over with,” he said, holding out a hand to her, and she took it, her scarf hiding her blush as she remembered her dreams.

Even in a place like this her mind tried to escape.

Though why couldn’t it be a spaceship leaving this place and not the hunk I slept beside?

Thoughts on her dreams fell away as they moved to the reporting board. Caroline frowned at the board but it told her and the truck drivers to report to one of the maintenance pads.

She trudged off, Mark following her.

Time to see what these fuckers have lined up for us today.

Chapter 26

EMFC Reclaimer

Oort Cloud, Osdal System

6/3267

Nerva looked up at the priority report that came across his view, and he stepped back from the sparring that was happening.

He opened the message and scanned it quickly, his feet moving before he knew it. He turned from his class and started jogging.

“Gangway!” Nerva yelled, and people moved out of his way as he got to a lift. He punched in a priority code, and it shot down.

He got out of the lift and was running again. He got the to command center, looking to Provisionary General Domashev.

“Something up?” Domashev asked. Nerva was keeping tabs on the insertion teams and he updated Domashev and his staff every week. This couldn’t wait for the meeting.

“They’re moving the schedule up,” Nerva said, pinching the message from his view and throwing it at Domashev. His eyes went blank as he reviewed the message.

“Louise, connect me to the Captain of Reclaimer, priority one,” Domashev said, his eyes still unfocused.

Captain Conti came on screen in his bridge a few moments later.

“Nerva, Domashev,” Conti said, nodding to the two of them. He had got a lot of berating from the Troopers and learned his lesson from Masoul. Instead of getting reprimanded he was commended and made Captain of the ship, meaning he was the highest authority for operating the ship. He was then given tactical control of the fleet that was now hiding outside of Osdal.

“We have received a message from our operatives on the ground, it looks like they are moving into the final phases. Something has come up and they are accelerating their plan in case their cover is compromised. I suggest that you talk to the other Captains and have them and their crews ready for action within the next couple of months. I am going to wake up half of the Troopers on Reclaimer and I suggest they do the same. Once the plan is confirmed, and we are moving in system, we should wake up the remaining Troopers,” Domashev said, his eyes clearing.

“Very well, have there been any other developments that might affect our planning?” Conti asked.

“They have missiles, and a launcher grid that we can assume is linked to the sensor network. A group is investigating claims that there are shuttles with missile systems attached to them,” Nerva said.

Conti’s face was grave as he held his beard. “We will have half of the Combat Shuttles on offensive operations to keep the skies clear. As we’ve been perched on our asteroid I’ve had the engineers and Trooper volunteers filling up our ammunition stores. We’re back to a hundred percent on everything but missiles. We still have about a hundred locked away. I’m going to get those loaded and prepped; do you have anything else for me?” Conti didn’t need to tell them his plan, but it helped them to understand what the conditions were going to be like when they were carrying out their own operations. Conti had indeed learned more than the benefits of waking up his Troopers earlier. He’d learned to value their judgement.

“Not from us, we’ll keep you updated if the situation changes,” Domashev promised.

“Very well, then I have some Captain heads I need to knock together,” Conti said, closing the channel.

“You know that the plan Haas is presenting is promising a hell of a lot, but all he has is a company of miners,” Domashev said to Nerva. What he was really asking was how in the hell are they going to pull this off, can they?

“Yes, and apparently Moretti has just the thing to light a fire under their asses,” Nerva replied.

Damn fucking right my people can pull this off. Especially with one on the line.

“Alright, I’m just saying that the asteroid miners have been perfectly fine with the Chosen staying out of their way and doing as they did under the companies,” Domashev said.

“I don’t know what Moretti has planned, but he did say that once he let it out of the bag it wasn’t going to be pretty,” Nerva said.

Chapter 27

Processing Station One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

6/3267

Holm moved out of the vent, his pistol up and a silencer firmly attached. A Chosen tech was lounging in a chair with some television show blaring.

Holm kept an eye on the woman he held onto the edge of the vent he’d painstakingly removed, letting his body drop slowly. His pistol never wavering as he released his hand, dropping into a crouch. Only a thin see-through wall separated him and the tech.

The room was simple, at the front there was a workstation with a wall behind it, separating it from the multiple servers humming. He quickly made his way deeper into the servers. Keeping his ears open in case she decided to walk about.

Holm moved quickly his pistol ready as he studied the servers and the room.

There wasn’t anyone else on shift, and if Holm had his way, no one would know he was ever there. He moved into the server farm, which chugged away with fans whirring and cold air pumping through the entire area.

He couldn’t see the tech anymore but he still didn’t put the pistol away

He got to the third server stack, fourth from the left. He reached down between it and the next server, fans whirring beside his ear. He found a grip and twisted it in the floor. The grate opened and Holm felt footsteps through the decking.

He released the grip to the maintenance hatch and pulled back into the servers, then he turned around a server and saw a closet full of wiring.

Either this works, or I get enough juice running through me to turn me into human popcorn. Holm hid in the wires, and held his pistol up as the woman came to the back of the servers, three meters from where he hid and went through a door.

He waited, his legs starting to tremble thanks to his awkward position. He didn’t dare move.

He embraced the pain, waiting. A toilet flushed and the woman came out a few moments later, heading back for the desk.

Holm put his left hand on the decking, feeling the footsteps disappear and hearing the door close to the work area.

Holm moved forward carefully pushing the wires out of his way.

He moved back to the maintenance hatch, pulling it off, revealing piping and wiring. Holm took large grey lines of putty out of a plastic bag, and put them around the pipes the wires went through. He attached a circuit board with an antenna to the putty, then did the same to five other bundles.

He checked his handiwork before moving to the grate he’d opened.

He pulled out a block of the grey putty with a circuit board and antennae on it and found the tube labeled COOLANT. He spread the putty under the tube, out of sight. The maintenance hatch went back on and he locked it with a quick twist.

He went to three other hatches with the same COOLANT pipe in them and repeated the process. Then he opened up a server and pulled out what looked like a cooling coil wrapped into a ball, with a big battery underneath.

Home made EMP grenade, never leave home without one, he thought, tucking it away in the far reaches of the server.

“Complete, am I clear?” Holm asked.

“We’re on the move. We’ll tell you when we’re in place,” Tal replied.

Holm grabbed his pistol and moved back out of the server farm. The Chosen tech was still watching her show. He scaled a server to get back into the vents.

He put the vent covering back in place and started crawling. Using his hands and padded feet to grab the sides of the air duct and climb upwards. It was difficult and slow, Holm was breathing hard and sweating by the time it leveled out.

He moved through the straight air duct by careful inches, his knees, elbows hands and feet moving slowly and carefully so as to not scrape the air duct or bang it.

He came over a grate agonizing minutes later.

It was in a corridor, and up ahead there was a 30ft climb up to his original entry point. That was out, as the office they’d used was now occupied. So they’d improvise.

A big cleaning car appeared, and Iliev was dancing like crazy, pulling out a broom and a step ladder.

“Good, hurry,” Bairamov vocalized.

Holm kicked the grate open from under him and let himself drop he fell into the thick yellow material garbage bag.

He hit his right elbow on the side, cradling it as he internalized the pain.

“Right on the fucking funny bone!” he sub-vocalized, He grabbed the vent covering and held it above his head. Iliev grabbed it, closing the lid on the garbage container Holm was now in, nursing his elbow.

“The hell did you do?” a woman asked, getting closer.

Holm carefully pulled out his pistol with his good arm.

“Sorry, hit the grate off, damn thing is filthy,” Iliev said.

“The hell are you using mop for?”

“Looks like one of those big old dusters, thought it might get some of the grime that I saw on the grate.”

“Just put it back in place and try not to break anything else,” the woman sighing as they wandered away.

“Sure thing boss lady!” Iliev replied.

Holm heard Iliev’s ladder creaking and the grate being put in place.

Iliev put his tools away, and then Holm was moving.

Chapter 28

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

7/3267

Mark had quickly learned to get as much sleep as possible. In that respect, working in the camp was similar to being a Trooper; get whatever sleep you can, whenever you can. He tucked his food away and passed out; he could eat between working the next day.

He was already losing mass, but that was to be expected. He and Caroline still hung out, looking out for one another, and they had been working in the maintenance yard for the past month. They were pulling the massive battery racks from the older machines and replacing them with new ones.

Tires and brakes were also getting replaced because they didn’t work any more. While the Chosen didn’t seem to care one way or another, it looked like they were following orders from on high. The mines were meant to keep running, having faulty equipment meant that it would only decrease production.

Mark had barely closed his eyes when someone ripped open the plastic sheeting. He couldn’t be alert all the time and he started to look around as a shock stick hit him in the head. He let out a piercing yell as his vision danced and he thought they’d burned his eyes out for a minute. The Chosen kicked and beat him, and he felt bones breaking under their batons and boots. Someone got a loop around his leg and he was pulled through the side of the lean-to plastic sheeting, whipping around as he was dragged on the ground. The Chosen laughed as his back was cut ragged on the metal ground.

The air car kept moving, with Mark being thrown around like a pendulum on the end of a rope.

The Chosen called out, but Mark couldn’t make out the words as he twisted and yelled out, metal cutting through his back, shredding it.

He could tell from their tone they were laughing at him, enjoying torturing him and calling him names.

Then they swung him again, and this time he hit a parked air car and he blacked out.

He came to later to find they’d dropped him off somewhere; he could see the camp. A bullet kicked up the dust around Mark’s feet.

His head was pounding, his skull felt fragile and his augments were focusing on reducing the brain bleed he had going on.

“Seems you lost your way Earther, get back to camp!” A Chosen called out to the snickers of the others.

“Come on Earther, time to get moving,” another said.

Mark felt pain killers flooding his system his augments were going full out, but the damage was severe, His back was a deep open wound, with only strips of skin left. Metal shavings filled the wounds. His legs were in better shape just because they’d been up in the air. The skin around his legs was bleeding from the rope.

His arms and hands were open and bleeding, and his chest and stomach also showed bleeding. He could feel teeth were missing and his face was a mess.

“Don’t worry I have the bastards in my sights,” Niemi said.

“No, I’m okay, hold your fire,” Mark said, his voice harsh and odd due to his broken face.

It took a herculean effort to free himself from the rope around his legs. A bullet went past his head, one of the chosen was shooting at him. He twitched at the bullet’s near-miss.

Mark’s head swam and his implants angrily told him to get the fuck back down and let the augments work.

“Holy shit Mark,” Niemi sounded like she was close to tears as rage built in her.

“You hold your fire Corporal.” The painkillers were slurring his words.

Slowly he got to his feet, and he heard the air car power up. He didn’t look around as his head swam, and the air car hit his back.

He grunted in new pain as he fell to the ground again, his kneecaps complaining as his ruined hands sunk into the ground, and he noticed he was missing two fingers.

Metal dust filled his wounds. It was a familiar feeling, and it reminded him of Earth. The air car was already away as Mark got himself to his feet again and shuffled forward. His hip felt weird, his ribs were smashed, and metal dust shifted in his bloody wounds like someone was rubbing a metal pad into his flesh.

The painkillers made him woozy as he walked towards the camp.

The Chosen laughed and commented, and more in air cars cajoled around, yelling and shooting. Mark was their night’s entertainment. Randomly they’d fire at Mark or hit him with an air car, sending him crashing to his knees.

He got up and continued on.

The continued to hit him, and yell insults, and some gathered metal dust in buckets and poured it on him. He couldn’t look for a time when they did that, and had to shake his concussed head else the dust would get in his eyes and start scratching them away.

He had learned the lessons about what to do and not to do with metal dust on Earth. He stumbled on, blind with pain and the occasional metal dust cloud.

Soon the Chosen lost interest and a few flew on.

Mark continued his walk, and found out that at some time he’d bitten into his tongue.

But I’m alive - and they’re gonna fucking regret that.

***

Caroline heard the shooting, she heard the yells, and she felt it as Mark was ripped out of the shack from beside her.

She had no more tears as she heard the Chosen playing with Mark. She heard something hit an air car. She went outside, she didn’t want to, but Mark had been nice, and she didn’t want him to die alone.

Mark was tied up to the back of an air car, and the chosen were milling around. He’d hit another air car and was out cold. The Chosen made up their minds, and the air car took off, dragging Mark away from the camp.

She heard a gunshot some minutes later, and other air cars went out there to go and watch their entertainment.

Mark got up; she couldn’t believe it; she was sure he was dead.

An air car hit him from behind, just as they had done with Ellie.

No, not again, why does everyone die around me? She watched as Mark got up and walked on, bullets hit the ground around him and he walked on, other air cars hit him down, yet every time he got back to his feet and kept walking.

He ignored them as if they were nothing but a bad wind.

Caroline felt herself chanting for him as he stumbled on defiantly, half alive and wounded badly.

Other camp workers watched Mark’s progress. The Chosen were also watching with interest and joking.

Caroline wasn’t joking, she was gripped by the sight before her. Mark should have been crying on the ground and begging for death with those injuries. He cried out in pain as he hit the ground again.

Then he got up again and continued walking. Mark had made his peace with death, he would die or he wouldn’t, but he wouldn’t give these bastards the satisfaction of killing him.

She felt resolve harden in her. She had thought him as a protector, for his muscles and those dark eyes which watched the Chosen when they didn’t know it.

But his strength wasn’t his body; it was his determination. Pure and utter anger and hatred pushed him forward. She wondered what had happened to him to make him this way.

Maybe nothing happened to him, but he was just done watching others suffer. She didn’t know when her thoughts changed from hoping the Chosen would give him a quick death, to her silent encouragement.

***

Niemi didn’t think she had wanted to kill so much. She knew which Chosen she would take out and in what order, and her magazines were ready but her finger stayed off of the trigger.

Only Mark’s words kept her scanning instead of killing.

Ko took a pained breath, just watching through his spotting goggles. Niemi knew he wanted to kill the bastards as badly as she did.

She glanced to Mark’s side, they were up on an abandoned floor of Mining City Twenty-One’s towers. They’d been watching Mark and the Chosen, and figuring out how to best mess up the Chosen’s defense. Mining City Twenty-One was the chosen’s biggest area of operations, and no one but Chosen lived in the city.

They had figured out valuable intelligence and they had a good idea where the powered armor was being stored.

Still, Niemi wanted nothing more than to be allowed to pull her trigger and cut down Mark’s tormentors.

She could see his side profile and it was bad; he was covered in cuts all over his upper body, and the back of his shoulder showed the white of bone underneath. His hands were mangled as were his arms. He was covered in blood and the red metal dust. Niemi had got metal dust into more wounds than one would back on Earth, it was one of the most uncomfortable experiences she had ever suffered through. She rubbed her arm subconsciously, a nasty scar running down her forearm.

But that was just a small wound, and most of Mark’s body was cut open in some way.

Niemi looked to her nose, where there was an infographic on Mark’s augments.

They were working all out to keep him conscious and moving. They’d stopped most of the blood loss and were focusing on producing more blood. The brain bleed was stopped and they were finishing up dealing with the swelling. His spine was also being fused back together with a nano-mesh.

She would have been surprised by the number of augments in his body at any other time, he was a lot of cyborg. Right here and now she was thankful he had them all, and understood why he’d pushed for them to get the same augments.

He needed three months of best rest and EMF medical care, but Mark moved on.

“Fucking legend,” Niemi said.

“Fucking right,” Ko agreed, his voice harsh.

Niemi could feel their pride in Mark. She knew she couldn’t do that, just Trooper on, even after all of that. Another round hit the ground ahead of Mark.

Niemi didn’t know if Mark didn’t see it, or didn’t care, but he kept going.

This is what it means to be a warrior, to be a fucking Trooper, she thought, making sure she recorded everything.

Chapter 29

Mining City Seventeen

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

7/3267

Moretti accepted the message as soon as it came in from Niemi.

“Holy shit,” he said, breathless as he watched Mark come flying out of a shack, hitting the ground and writhing.

“Something up?” Dominguez asked, her voice tight and tense. She’d been that way since Mark had left.

Moretti turned on his sound canceller and sent her the file.

Her face went stony at the images. Both of them watched Mark as he trudged back into camp. The air cars broke up, bored with Mark’s defiance, and as one rode past, someone leaned out and hit Mark with a sun stick in the back of the head.

They laughed and pointed as Mark dropped onto the ground, convulsing.

There was silence in the room. Mark stopped convulsing and Moretti thought that his heart might burst with tension.

A woman moved to Mark and she checked his breathing and pulse. Three others gathered Mark up and carried him into the shacks. The chosen were heading back to Mining City Twenty-One; it looked like their shift was over.

“They were just having some end of shift fun,” Dominguez growled and hurled a surface into a wall. “The fuck are we even doing?! Sitting here, sleeping in big old fucking beds and he’s out there getting dragged across this fucking metal planet, shot at and beaten to fuck!” She voiced what Moretti felt.

“I think it’s time we started a rebellion,” Moretti said, accessing his implants. He focused on one thing: Emilie Castillo’s implants.

Chapter 30

Oort Cloud Refinery Seventy-Seven

Oort Cloud, Osdal System

7/3267

Eliese looked around the restaurant, a hush had come down over the place as the view screen’s volume was increased.

“Again, it looks like we have received a video from an anonymous source connected with the disappearance of the Dudayev family. It was believed that they went to Osdal Actual to work in the strip mines around the mining cities on Osdal Actual,” the reporter said, their face grim as they looked into the pickup.

“I have seen the video and it is being released onto the net. I ask that you all download the video so that it might never again be erased. I expect that myself and my crew will not be around much longer to report on the factuality of this report, but dammit someone needs to!” The reporter lost his professional calm.

“Alright, so you know all of that stuff about people being tortured and shit in Masoul, how it was all the companies making it up and lying to us… Well, guess what, that was all Harmony. The Dudayev family wanted to go to Osdal Actual and work to aid Harmony. They hated the companies, Mr. Dudayev lost his ship four times on a hard graft with just him and his girlfriend at the time. See, Tim didn’t want to bring kids into the world until he knew that he would be free and clear of his debts, he didn’t want his kids taking them over. Lucky for him, Harmony came in and debt disappeared. He and Natalie were overjoyed, and they’d found a good claim! Every asteroid miner’s dream!” He paused to bring himself together and continue the story. Eliese could see it was hard on the man, but she didn’t know why.

No one asked for the view screen to be turned off or down, people were riveted to it.

“So Tim and Natalie got married, they worked that claim, they got their tokens and they started a family. The claim ran dry as they always do, but Tim and Natalie had a plan. They were going to Osdal Actual, and they were going to be miners for Harmony.

“Harmony had given them so much freedom, and they wanted to give back.” A picture showed on the screen of Timothy, a man that looked to have had rough times but was smiling, genuinely happy as his little boy and girl stood between him and Natalie. You could see the excitement in their faces.

“This is the last known picture of the Dudayev’s.” The reporter paused, his features hardening in a way that made Eliese’s scalp dance and a cold sensation go down her spine.

“Until now.” It seemed like everyone in the station was watching the broadcast.

A video played, and it was grainy, but Natalie and Tim were carrying their family’s belongings, and the kids ran in front of a Chosen patrol, eager to see outside the tower.

The Chosen started barking at Tim and Natalie.

Tim and Natalie were apologetic, bowed under the weight of their family bags.

Then, out of nowhere, a baton struck Tim Dudayev in the face.

“Holy shit.” Someone’s shock made their voice weak. Others looked away, but Eliese kept watching.

Natalie screamed out but she was pulled back, and then there was no sound. Tim and Natalie’s kids stopped starting at the landscape outside and the boy and girl rushed back, and the Chosen clubbed them down, laughing as they went sprawling.

The reporters face came back, and there was noise off-camera.

“This is what we invited in Osdal. This is what we allowed ourselves to be. It’s time that we stood up and stopped fucking complaining about the extra credits we get a week. I will not show what these animals proceeded to do. Somehow, the person that gave us these videos got a recording from none other than Emilie Castillo, Luke Choi’s personally appointed Lieutenant. The scene is graphic and despicable. I could only wish that the Dudayev family had died quicker and faster,” the reporter admitted. The yelling in the background was louder.

“This may have been the first time, but it was not the last. Some of you may have heard of Mark Victor, the man from Bandit Corporation Two, the people that are offering steady jobs out around Oort Cloud Refinery Seventy-Seven. These Harmony fucks tried to rape his friend, and he killed them - as any rapist should be killed - and you know what they did? This!”

The screen cut out, and it showed Mark in a camp being pulled out by the feet and tossed around for entertainment. The Chosen, those fucking jackals, were laughing, enjoying watching as he hit an air car.

Eliese’s breath caught in her throat, surely he was dead.

Then Mark was getting up from the ground, and the image resolved and there was a pained gasp through the crowd. His once strong body was a bloody mess.

It showed Mark being hit by an air car and shot at before cutting to him getting to the camp and being hit in the head. People who wore clothes as if they were curtains rushed to his aid as the Chosen drove off.

“He took a stand against these bastards, and I choose to stand with him,” the reporter said. The noises became urgent and someone fired a gun.

“Turn that shit off, grab that Earther fuck!” someone yelled, and Chosen moved to grab the reporter.

“Fuck Harmony, fuck them all!” the reporter shouted, and the Chosen’s batons came out and flashed as they hit the man. He yelled out, the noises turning shocked faces into hard lines.

“Bout time we shoved these fuckers out,” an old regular said, standing. “Thanks for the coffee Betty, I’ve got some Chosen hunting to do.”

In that moment, Eliese knew that he was speaking for all miners. They were a rowdy bunch, but they looked out for one another. Kids were a rare gift. Mark had stood up for one of his crew members, Tim and Natalie had done nothing wrong.

Out in the edge of Osdal, system justice was quick and clean. Murderers, rapists, child touchers, all of them were hunted down and thrown out of an airlock. Osdal Actual might let that kind of shit happen on their planet, but the miners wouldn’t let it happen to their people.

Chapter 31

Gold Runner,

Oort Cloud, moving to Osdal Actual Osdal System

7/3267

Felicia was sitting in her cockpit when she got a message from one of her good drinking buddies. She watched the same broadcast as Eliese.

She forwarded it on to the rest of her crew, white hot anger curdling in her stomach. She had never had children, but a number of her crew, both former and current had children, and most of them named her as an honorary grandmother.

She berated them for calling her an old lady, but when those little ones gathered around and listened to Grandma Felicia tell a tale of her and the Gold Runner, those were some of the best moments.

She thought of them as she watched the video that showed the Dudayev family get struck down by the chosen.

“Kale, take over will you.” She needed to break the video to the rest of the Bandit Two original crew in her hold.

Haas, Jerome Sasaki, Dooks and Kojo were sitting in the hold. Their faces were hard as they looked up to her.

“There’s a video circulating about Mark,” she started, softly.

“Yeah, we know, Niemi got the video,” Haas said.

Felicia felt the hair on the back of her neck rise and her spine chill, some part of her animal instinct making her back away as she took in the eyes of the others. There was murder in those eyes.

“What are you going to do?” She was suddenly alarmed. She didn’t want this to be her last run, she needed to get back to the Oort cloud, regroup and figure things out. They couldn’t charge right in.

“We’re going to burn Harmony to the ground,” Jerome said.

She wanted to tell them to come with her back to the Oort Cloud, but the words died in her throat. She’d lived long enough to know when an argument was dead before it started.

“We’ll get you to the processing station. I’ll see that you get to the ground. I can’t promise anything else.”

“Get us down there and we’ll do the rest,” Haas promised.

Chapter 32

EMFC Reclaimer

Oort Cloud, Osdal System

7/3267

“Well shit, it looks like they did it,” Domashev said, looking through the various networks that the carrier was linked into.

Courts had been ordained in the asteroid mining facilities within hours, and the Chosen were pulled out and the people decided their fate. Not many of them survived as people learned what kind of monsters the Chosen were. People that would have been dismissed out of turn were now coming forwards.

The rage was building in the asteroid rings and production had ground to a halt.

There were stations here and there that were still under Harmony control, few of them willing. Only in the Elekt sector were people standing with the Chosen. Their Chosen had largely come from the asteroid rings.

However, the Chosen there were burning their uniforms and donning space suits. The asteroids were no longer under the control of Harmony and all of that anger was focused on Osdal Three, Osdal Actual and the stations around them.

“All of the carriers are on alert and half of the Troopers are active,” Conti reported looking around the table. There was only Nerva, Conti and Domashev in the room, and they were in effective command of the fleet.

“The teams report they need a few more weeks to get the final measures underway. I think that it might be a good idea to move in on the routes we’ve picked,” Nerva said, looking to Domashev and Conti.

If they were spotted as the fleet moved in from across the Oort cloud, then the jig would be up and Harmony would know they were out there. If they pulled it off, then they could be right in Harmony’s back yard when their sensors went down.

Of course that’s even if half of our plans go in the right direction.

“They have three weeks, then we’ll be over Osdal Three and Actual,” Domashev said, and Conti nodded in agreement.

“Very well, I’ll send the messages,” Nerva promised.

Chapter 33

Tower

Earth, Sol System

7/3267

Dalia burst into Nivad’s office as he was looking over the reports from the hundreds of analysts and machine learning software that had gone through the implants, and the wealth of information that the Masoul agent had found and transmitted from Osdal.

One screen showed a person in a steel chair, and if you squinted you might have thought that the man had a similar appearance to Harper, one ex-leader of Masoul’s Harmony.

Well, you would be right. Nivad had got the man secured in a facility in Landing City Masoul, once it had been cleared. His people were not only looking for more information on Harmony in the facility, they were using it as a place to question the higher-ups that were captured.

Harper had been tortured for many hours until he learned how to answer the Intelligence ministry’s questions. No matter the person, everyone succumbed to torture. It was the reason that Nivad had most of his agents add augments that would allow them to kill themselves. There was a large bonus for them if they activated it.

They also wouldn’t be hunted down by Nivad.

She threw a video up, replacing some data sheets, which showed the reporter and his speech, sped up to get through it all, then Dalia threw in a video that showed the reaction in various stations.

“So someone incited the asteroid miners to attack the inner system?” Nivad asked.

“Our agent did.” Dalia widened the frame of the video on the stumbling man and froze it.

“And that is our man, one Sergeant Mark Victor, served on Masoul, part of that unit that worked with our agent, the triple twos. Westerly Sector, Complex Three. He’s our war hero,” she said, looking to Nivad.

“What’s our angle?” Nivad leaned forward.

“We tell the story as it is: he joined the EMF, feeling a duty to his species to keep the peace. He joined with his brother and served with honors on Sacremon. Went to Masoul, exemplary record, we allude to great things, and hell, we won’t even be lying. Then we say that he went to Osdal to gather intelligence, and when he learned about the people of Osdal and their plight, he revealed the darkness that lays under Harmony. He’s a regular worker’s hero.”

“What if he survives?”

“We parade him around; we act as his mouth piece. He’s shown an affinity for his people, so we use them and his brother against him. If he comes back, which I doubt, we have two more planets to clear. We can easily get someone to make sure he disappears,” Dalia said, shrugging.

“Good, heroes will keep the people and the Troopers going, they need something to see. Have this broadcasted across the colonies, add in the video with the family,” Nivad said, waving away the names of them, he’d already forgotten.

They were just ploys to be used in the public opinion sphere.

“I have also a number of people that have received commendations on their record for their actions, stuff that would have warranted a medal with government militaries,” she said.

“Pass them on to Wallace and let him deal with it.” Nivad felt a sliver of excitement run through him. Now they could pull a big one over on Harmony. Getting public backing was a powerful incentive.

“With the asteroid miners, the fleet is moving in. They are trying to remain undetected but they put their timeline at three weeks until they reach their targets. They will no longer be focusing on any stations, except those that are being contested between the asteroid miners and Chosen.”

“Good, it will show that we are united in taking down Chosen. How long until the colony ship arrives?” Nivad asked.

“Twenty years.”

“Have the CEOs bargain with them, better terms than before; they keep their equipment, no charges. We want them to welcome the Osdal partnership back, not be angry at it. We will also need to have the EMF disarm them. Have a carrier stay behind to secure the system. We need to have Osdal producing for Earth and Her Colonies as soon as possible. If the Osdal partnership starts to even look like they’re fucking up the transition period, I’ll deal with them,” Nivad said, locking eyes with Dalia.

She nodded, her face grim and understanding. This was a delicate situation, and fucking it up could make the system go rogue, leaving only the option of killing all the native inhabitants off. They needed to look good for the next couple of decades. Killing those that had help to fight against Harmony wasn’t going to do that.

Chapter 34

Processing Station One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

7/3267

As soon as Bandit Two landed, Tyler and his section were grabbing their gear and heading off the shuttle. It was only a section of three, but Yu knew the damage that those three could do.

Ali, Dashtund and Tyler all carried heavy gear bags out of the airlock and they changed into the local dress of the people on the station. Holm had sent images of how the people dressed, they left the craft looking like three bored workers.

“Well let’s go and see the sights,” Yu said, Young took over shutting down the craft as He slid down to the cargo bay. Bobbie was waiting, wearing his civilian suit and helmet.

They exited, heading into the station. They separated, Bobbie meeting up with Iliev and Bairamov in a restaurant as Holm waved down Yu.

Yu waved back and made his way over to him, knowing Tal was hiding somewhere.

When did we get so good at blending in and making it look like we weren’t planning to blow everything with a signal? Yu knew that Bobbie, Young and himself had got better at fighting under the triple two’s tutelage. It made him appreciate just how destructive and deadly the Triple Twos could be - in an instant.

“Damn, I think the view screen is out,” Holm said, wincing as white noise filled the room. Yu knew that it was a noise cancelling device in play.

“Can I get two coffees and could you see about doing something to that view screen, it’s making my ears ring,” Holm asked a passing waitress.

A man gave the view screen a few slaps and Holm turned the cancel device on and off, then on again at a lower setting. Blaming the view screen would draw less attention to the noise and their conversation.

Yu leaned in as Holm’s face became serious. “Power systems, sensor server farm first and secondary, don’t know where the missile launcher controls are. We’ve seen some converted shuttles, don’t know if it’s all of them,” Holm said, sitting back.

“Sorry about the view screen,” the waitress said, coming back with drinks and looking at the screen. The man that had been hitting on it seemed to have given up.

“No worries, just happy to see my boo,” Holm replied, smiling to the waitress and laying a hand on Yu. Yu blushed; he knew Holm was straight.

“Ah okay,” The waitress said, smiling and moving away to give them privacy.

Yu grabbed a coffee. “So you think it’s worth Haas and Jerome hitting another station? Or go straight to the ground?”

“We’ve got some thirty other teams in place, hopefully they’ll get something we don’t. I’ve already found signs of them, seems they know who we are,” Holm sent Yu a picture.

It was a coolant tank, and in an obscure corner there was the grey clay-looking incendiary putty with three twos next to it.

“Best to stick to messing up the chosen’s operations on Osdal Actual instead of stepping on the other team’s feet,” Yu said. They were mostly alone and it was easy for him to forget that there were other teams of Troopers and Combat Shuttle crews out here too, working to bring Harmony down.

“Damn right, they’re going to have their hands full with Tyler seeing just how good their rifles are,” Holm’s voice was low and his eyes were dark.

They looked after one another, and the images of Mark made him feel like failure, even though he knew there was nothing he could have done to stop it. But here he was, sitting in a station drinking coffee, while Mark was working the mines.

Chapter 35

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

7/3267

“I no longer think that the situation is tenable in Osdal. Once the processing stations have completed their latest runs, I will have the freighters sent to Fernix and start shipping out our original development team,” Luke said to the shadows of Housapel and Fernix.

“It is unfortunate that you were not able to stop this leak,” Fernix said dangerously. “However, we will adapt and overcome; we are using the same idea that we used with Masoul. The EMF want someone to blame and they are fabricating these lies to make people angry with Harmony. We are censoring most of the feeds coming into the system.”

“We are doing the same. I believe that we are seeing Nivad’s handiwork here, so be prepared if this turns into something more than it seems,” Housapel warned.

“Yes sir. Now, if you will excuse me, I have matters to deal with in-system before I depart for Housapel,” Luke said.

“Certainly, we will be seeing one another soon enough,” Housapel said.

Luke cut the channel, knowing that they were not pleased with him. He had failed due to his subordinate having her implants record; an incident he thought he had cleaned away.

Chosen were deployed on all of the stations. He’d reinforced Processing Station One, it controlled the missile launchers and linked it to the sensor grid.

There were pitched battles going on in various stations. Chosen were running where they could, in others they were being reinforced. Luke left that up to them, he cared little.

As long as he got his materials and he got the hell off this shit hole of a planet, he didn’t give a fuck what those that had sworn their lives to Harmony did.

***

Mark woke up in Caroline’s lap. She’d cleaned his wounds with precious water and it stung, because his painkiller reservoirs were running low. He checked his implants, and his head wasn’t as bad as it had been. His augments had pulled him out of the worst, but he had really bad surface wounds, a break in his wrist, and in his skull, ribs and jaw.

A red hot poker showed how she’d cauterized most of the worst wounds closed and sealed the missing fingers.

He still had his trigger finger, and in the daze of drugs and pain he found great joy in that, promising himself he’d need it later. If it was okay, then he would be okay.

He was trying to trick himself into thinking his wounds weren’t as bad as they were.

The siren for next shift shrieked. Caroline started awake, her eyes turning pained.

She was just a woman caught up in Harmony’s shit. Mark side hugged her and indicated for her to come to his level.

“Thank you,” he said, trying to not move his broken jaw.

She smiled, and Mark wished he could have seen her entire face, but it was covered by her scarf. He respected her to let her choose when she decided to show her face to him.

“Let’s get to work, lover boy,” she said, easing her legs out from under him.

Mark felt his heartbeat speed up as he started getting up, finding her helping him to his feet. She was kind and caring and it burned something intense in his heart.

“You should look into some weight, your heavy butt sent my legs to sleep!” She used humor to counteract what had happened just hours ago.

She gave him a weak smile, for his benefit rather than her own. He saw the worry in her eyes, the worry for him, and it touched him in a way he hadn’t known before.

Many saw him as a statue, resilient, unfeeling, a Trooper’s Trooper. She saw him for the man with the insecurities, one that could be hurt, and she cared for him.

He ruffled her hair, getting a pout that made her squint and the corner of her eyes tighten.

He laughed, and the motion hurt his mouth.

“Jackass, come on, trucking time,” she said, her face lightening in a hidden smile. It fell away as concern replaced it and she made him walk first. She was protecting him in her own way.

Mark looked at her dumbly, his mind and emotions all over the place.

“Come on slow-poke,” she said, putting her fingers through his and pulling, forcefully but not enough to hurt him. Mark followed, looking at their hands. It felt good.

She looked to him and their hands, and Mark saw her cheeks turn pink and she started to pull away in embarrassment, but Mark squeezed in reassurance and caught up so they were side-by-side.

She didn’t try to break away again and stayed close to him.

They didn’t say anything but Mark promised that he would get her to smile, for real, just once. He didn’t try to hide his emotions from himself. The way he’d looked out for her, how they’d slept beside one another, the reason that they were always together.

Mark cared for Caroline deeply, in a way he had never found with his past lovers or flings. Sure, he had offloaded his life story onto them; he had never done that with Caroline and it didn’t matter, he could see she didn’t care for that.

She stayed around based on what he had done, and she cared for him. Not because she should, hell, she should be on the other side of shack city rather than being around him. She cared for him because she wanted to.

For the first time she saw Mark Victor the man, not the gangster, or Trooper.

It was irrational and stupid. His body was broken, terribly so, his skin was a mess of bruises and friction burns, and his skull was broken and his fingers were missing. Pain was something Mark had become used to.

But this, this was something different, something new and almost magical.

He didn’t see rainbows and butterflies in the future, but the tiniest sliver of hope filled him. He glanced down at their entwined hands to make sure it was still real.

She helped him up and half dragged half carried him up his truck ladder.

Mark knew that she had just made herself a target for him.

He let out a grunt of gratitude, his jaw closed shut by the medical augments.

“Don’t pass out, and we’ll see about those wounds later,” Caroline said.

She checked on him through the day when she could, and then helped him out of his truck when it was quitting time.

Mark cried silently as she cleaned his wounds with water.

She crunched up his food and fed it to him and fed him water. He would have died if not for her care.

That had been a few weeks ago. Mark woke up, nightmares making him tense and sweaty.

He found Caroline next to him, making soft noises, her eyes closed as she tried to get some rest, her fragile hand touching the parts of his face that weren’t badly cut.

Mark pulled her next to him and sank back into sleep.

One new man had hit Caroline and taken her and Mark’s food.

Mark slipped out in the night and found the man; he took the food back and most of the man’s too. The man never stole again, and no one messed with Caroline.

From then on that was how it went, she made sure he stayed alive and acted as something to calm his raw nerves and stop the nightmares.

Mark stopped anyone from looking at her with anything other than boredom.

The Chosen had thinned out a few days after the incident. There was news that the asteroid miners were rebelling against Harmony, siding with Earth.

The camp workers who decried that they were not Earthers now didn’t care if the asteroid miners were backed by Earth, they just wanted to be set free.

Mark and Caroline were doing maintenance on the trucks, and it was grueling work. Mark moved hundred pound drums of coolant, and Caroline worked electronics and batteries.

Straining, Mark felt some of his wounds open. He had a new rag shirt and it covered his wounds that were healing much too fast. He already had skin forming again and his bones only needed a few more weeks before they were finished.

“Three hundred meters, your right hand side, air car turret.” Tyler sounded like he was right next to Mark.

Mark felt strength returning to his body and his heart beat faster. He looked at the man lounging behind the air car’s turret, harassing people as they went by.

Suddenly, his head rocked back in a fountain of blood and he slumped into the turret.

“Two hundred meters, pisser,” Tyler said in Mark’s ear, and a hole appeared in the side of the chem toilet’s wall.

So it went on; Tyler called out targets and holes appeared in them.

The Chosen started reacting diving for cover and running, but the camp workers kept working, paying no attention.

“Truck, twenty meters, hiding,” Niemi called out, and Mark heard the bullet whiz as the Chosen stumbled backwards and then fell to the ground. Mark looked around, the Chosen were in a panic and the camp workers were looking around with vacant eyes.

Mark moved to the downed Chosen, pulling off their knives, and tucking their holsters and pistols into his pants and grabbing the extra magazines.

The Chosen were firing wildly, and a camp worker went down with a cry. Everyone got low, and Mark scrambled back to the coolant barrels.

The panicked Chosen’s yells were cut short as rounds found their targets.

“We’ll be seeing you soon, bro,” Tyler said. Chosen stopped falling and Mark knew that Tyler, Niemi and their spotters were already vacating their shooting positions.

“What was that?” Caroline asked, her eyes looking to Mark’s waistband, implying the pistol underneath.

Mark smiled at her.

“Just don’t do anything too crazy, I put a lot of work into putting you back together.” Her voice was gentle as she touched him.

Mark nodded sincerely, emotions making his guts twist. He knew at that moment that he liked her, that she’d put her life on the line for him, though he’d never seen her full face and he hadn’t talked for weeks. Yet he wanted to make her smile and laugh freely. He’d seen a few rare moments and they made his heart leap.

Their relationship wasn’t sexual, yet it was fulfilling. They looked out for one another and cared for one another, and those actions had led to feelings. He watched her as she continued to work on electronics.

She might have a scar across her face, but those eyes captured his heart. They saw him for the killer he was and they didn’t care, to her he was her defender.

He kept moving barrels as his mind started spinning. He wondered if she liked him in that way, or if she simply wanted his protection.

He hoped it was the former.

Chosen ran around scared, and a few fired off their machine guns in random directions, but none of it did much good. The Chosen leaders were hiding in air cars and barking orders at other Chosen. Camp workers tried to help those that had been hit by Chosen rounds, but many wouldn’t make it.

Mark pushed his thoughts of Caroline to the back of his mind. He was a Trooper, and if he survived he would be fighting across Osdal, and then wherever the EMF sent him next.

Chapter 36

Mining City One

Osdal Actual Osdal

7/3267

Guy Castillo looked at the news channels. He’d seen the video of his own daughter torturing a family to death. He was ashamed to have had such a child.

He now sat facing a pick up in his office, a drink in his hand.

“Hello people of Osdal, and you Harmony fuckers, hope you’re sitting comfortably because I’ve got a story for you. Don’t mind me and Mister Beam here, by the end I’m going to have got through a lot of this,” Guy said with a smile, tapping the large bottle of whiskey on his desk.

“My name is Guy Castillo, and I was deceived by Harmony, like many of you. I could have at any time made this video, at any time, I could have admitted my mistakes, but it took me until now to do that. I thank the brave asteroid miners who are fighting for their families and friends, fighting to stop the oppressive regime of Harmony. Those people you call Earthers are the people who wanted the best for Osdal, they were the ones that spoke up against people being thrown into camps to make up for the quotas the rest of Osdal didn’t reach. Harmony needs supplies, and they used our people to take it from us. The rest they kept dumb and stupid, as their Chosen bully boys murdered and tortured their way into power.” Guy’s hand tightened on his glass.

“My own son and daughter became Harmony’s monsters. No sign of the children that I raised still rests in their souls. All I can hope for is that they receive a quick death, unlike those that fell into their clutches. Only my love as a father makes that wish possible, but I know many who will want to prolong their deaths. I ask that you do not. Not for me, or for them, but for yourselves. The Chosen became the disease that they are by allowing them to do what they want. Fight them, reclaim Osdal, but do not let yourselves become the creatures that they are.” Guy paused and took a drink.

“Now, I said I would tell you a story, so here it is: the story of how Harmony deceived me through a man you all know, Tsik. Let’s pull the shadows out of the closet, shall we?” Guy started the story of how Harmony came into control of Osdal, and how he had helped them achieve it.

***

Tsik got a message on his implants from Guy. He blinked, trying to focus his eyes on the message.

He jumped at the sound of a gun going off, and poured beer on himself.

“Guy?” he yelled, rolling off the couch and heading to Guy’s office.

There at his desk was Guy Castillo, a bottle of Jim Beam empty on his desk and the back of his skull covering the wall behind him.

Tsik threw up at the sight, and guards rushed in. Calls were made, and someone guided Tsik back to the couch.

People kept coming and going from the room. No one made to move Guy Castillo’s body.

Tsik remembered the message, so he opened it to see Guy addressing the camera. For the first time in a while he looked alive, and new purpose filled him.

Tsik listened, sobering as Guy laid out all that Tsik had done, the Trojan horse, as he called it, for Harmony. How he had let Luke in and the idea of having a policing force, the Chosen, and how that policing force had been turned into a group of bullies and psychopaths.

“There it is folks, that’s how you turn a system into a Harmony-loving cess-pit. Let’s not kid ourselves; it’s not like we’re even really Harmony, we’re just a system that they’re using to get the materials they want to fight the EMF. As soon as the EMF show up, Luke and his people are going to go home and we’ll be left to bleed the EMF, because that’s what we are: a road stop on the EMF’s path to the real Harmony.” Guy pulled out a gun.

“Never really liked these things, but they seem to do the job. I realize now that I’m a coward and, well, it’s better to find that out now rather than later. All I can look forward to is the Chosen making an example of me, or making me admit that all I just said is a big lie, and I’d have to be tortured into that admission. I have one last fuck you for the Chosen. Ain’t going to get me alive, you fuckers! I’m truly sorry for everything that I did, and I know that I do not deserve forgiveness. I will not make you watch my last moments, good by people of Osdal. I hope that you do what I couldn’t: tell Harmony where to shove their Chosen and their plans.” Guy cut the message.

Tsik looked to where the video had been posted; the simple explanation was everywhere.

Chapter 37

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Mark rolled, a shock stick hitting the floor where his head had been moments before. With his motion he pushed Caroline away from him, away from the threat.

He took a strike on his arm, the whole limb going numb, and he took another to his leg before he turned, trying to fight the bastards from the ground.

But there were too many and he was too weak and tired.

His limbs flailed, useless and numb. He twitched, unable to protect himself as they continued to hit him.

Mark barely heard Caroline shrieking and he could see her getting dragged away from him.

Mark was limp from the shocks, shaking with the volts that were making his muscles twitch painfully.

They lessened up the beating; they didn’t want to kill him yet.

“Seems that you’ve taken a liking to her,” one of the chosen holding Caroline said, stroking her face and looking at Mark.

He pulled the scarf off her face, revealing the scar that sliced through her features. Mark had seen scars throughout his life, and he could tell that Caroline was a good-looking woman before she’d cut her face up. She’d told him why she’d done it.

Another grabbed her shirt rags and ripped it down.

Mark made to move and got shocked again, and he fell to the ground panting as they bound Caroline and tore at her clothes. She screamed the entire time, kicking at them, and they laughed and pushed her down.

The other camp workers moved away from them tussle, watching with pity but not reacting, knowing that they would become the center of the Chosen’s attention instead.

They were so scared that they were going to watch instead of acting. Mark’s guts rolled, he was powerless to stop it.

A Chosen took a knife, and Caroline’s motions stopped as the woman’s blade touched her stomach. Caroline’s shrieks turned into a scream.

“Hold her down, won’t get a good strip otherwise,” the woman said, and the other Chosen pinned Caroline down even harder, leaving just one holding a stun stick above Mark. They hit him between the shoulder blades, opening recently healed wounds and making Mark cry out in pain.

Caroline screamed as a blood red line appeared down her side. The Chosen was fucking skinning her!

“Tyler, fucking kill them, fucking kill them all! Mark yelled, his mouth still unable to open.

“What happened?” Tyler asked sounding confused.

“They’re fucking skinning her, they’re fucking killing her! Mark cried as he watched, and another blast hit him and he went back down, panting on the dust floor as he looked at the woman pull her strip off.

Blood was streaming down Caroline’s side; she was going into shock. The woman started on the other side.

Caroline was panting, her eyes rolling back in her head.

“Better get in while she’s still alive!” one said, dropping his pants.

Anger flooded Mark, unlike anything he had felt in his life. His vision went red and his augments opened up, fully releasing everything they had into his system.

The one hitting Mark leaned down. “That’s a picnic compared to what we’ll do to you.”

Mark rolled, and pain lanced through him, but he embraced it, and used it to focus his actions. His hand dropped to his waistband and he pulled the pistol from his pants.

The Chosen was trying to get second hit on Mark, but their eyes widened in shock as Mark presented the pistol and fired, the Chosen’s head blowing out. Mark rolled to his knees.

Time seemed to slow down, with the mixture of feelings and chemicals in his system. The Chosen turned as if in molasses, and they were too close to miss. To Mark, it was like he was at the firing range. He fired his weapon, an extension of himself, and Chosen dropped with screams as he moved sideways. When the gun was empty he grabbed a fresh magazine, reloading and firing in seconds. He had trained for years, his only goal to protect his brother and kill anyone that threatened him.

He reached out and ripped the plastic sheeting off of the shacks.

“Right, blonde,” Tyler said, and the blonde woman crumpled backwards. Her rifle was up, but her rounds passed feet away from Mark.

Mark dove into the woman who was skinning Caroline with blood on their blade and hands. He shot her as he ran, and he felt the blade drive into his back but it was someone else’s body, numb from feeling, from caring.

He grabbed the woman’s rifle turned and fired at the Chosen that were ducking and running.

He cut them down, not one of them remained.

The man who was about to rape Caroline was crawling backwards with his pants around his ankles, shock on his face.

“Do you know who I am?” He demanded, strength coming back to his voice.

Mark saw his nametag, and he glanced at the man, his pistol pointed at him casually.

“Dean Castillo, commander of this fair mining camp,” Mark said, his voice cold.

“That’s ri…” The gun cracked and Castillo’s head rocketed back into the floor, his body going limp.

Mark moved to Caroline, tossing the Chosen away, they didn’t deserve to touch her.

Caroline was panting, and pain marred her features. The wounds on her sides were deep and painful, and blood was pouring out of her, she didn’t have the augments that could clot her wounds up. Mark ripped his shirt off and wrapped it around her sides, but they quickly reddened with blood.

He looked around, grabbing a water bottle and a bottle of narcotics that the Chosen liked to use.

“Sniff this,” he said, his jaw opened less than a centimeter as he cradled her in his lap, holding the bottle up. She did so, her face relaxing. “Stay with me!” Her eyelids were closing slightly. She kept them open but Mark could tell it was hard for her.

He gave her water and she drank it coughing after a few moments. He took it away and ripped a shirt off a dead Chosen and used it to cover the rest of her.

Tears clouded his vision. He’d always wanted to see her face, to see her real smile, not just the way her eyes crinkled.

Her small hand reached up and touched him, and he held it to his cheek and rubbed his face on it.

“My protector,” she said with a smile that sent new tears streaming down his face. His anger was lost, only pain filled him. He wished he didn’t know the truth, but he’d seen too many people die. She was losing blood too fast, and he didn’t have medical supplies and she didn’t have augments.

“I wish we had gotten out of here together, would have liked you to take me to the asteroid belt, could’ve had something together. Would’ve been pretty sweet,” she said.

Feelings that Mark had hoped she had for him flourished in his chest.

“No, please, stay,” Mark begged, his mangled hulk shaking with tears.

“We both know I’m not going to make it.” Tears flowed down her face.

“This is my fault,” Mark said, bowing his head, hate filling him.

“No, never, don’t you ever think that! You were the only good thing about this place. It was Harmony’s fault, never yours.” She squeezed his hand, and it was weak, so weak. Mark cherished it. He had thought himself numb to this.

“Please kiss me,” she said.

Mark took her gingerly and lifted her head kissing her lips, tasting the salt of his tears through his beard.

“Beard feels weird,” she said, giving a coughing laugh, her body stiffening in pain. Mark held the narcotic up again, but she shook her head no.

Mark dropped it.

“Just hold me, please,” she said, her face breaking as she cried, scared for death, scared to let go of what had been the possibility for so much more. Mark held her to him, wrapping her in his arms, tears falling freely. He thought of his large arms as protectors against the world. Holding it all at bay.

It wouldn’t be enough.

***

Tyler took down another Chosen. Dashtund, Ko and Niemi were all silently marking and taking down their targets.

There was nowhere for the Chosen to go. They ruled the camp now. Chosen ran for cover, panic setting in as four rifles used the Chosen’s panic and confusion to turn the camp into a massacre.

Tyler glanced to his readings of Mark’s augments and implants. They were going all over the place. Mark he was cradling a woman to him, she seemed to have severe wounds. The camp workers were looking at him.

He’d been like that for some time.

Tyler was about to look away when Mark moved. He moved gently, slowly lowering the woman to the ground, and he made sure that she was wrapped up then kissed her forehead. Tyler watched, wondering what he was seeing.

Mark got up, drinking water and eating bars, pulling the blade out of his back and grabbing rifles.

He pulled on armor plates, and checked the metal-storm rifle his grip. Four more were draped from him, as well as a sub-machine gun.

Mark stepped out of the room and started firing, the metal storm shredding through targets. Mark moved like a robot and it was like watching a simulation at work; he and his weapon moved, and Chosen fell as they ran around or hid from Tyler and the other snipers.

Tyler returned to taking out Chosen.

“We won’t be able to help for three days, so look after yourselves,” Zukic said, talking to the sniper teams, Mark, Moretti and Dominguez.

“We’ll kill them all,” Mark said, his voice making Tyler feel a chill down his spine. He had recognized Mark as a dangerous man, but he had never been scared of him before. Those four words sounded like they were from a different man.

Tyler saw air cars approaching from the strip and shaft mines, and he took out a Chosen that was aiming at Mark. He pulled the bag off of the Anti Material Rifle at his side, and set down his Chosen bolt-action rifle.

***

Mark dropped the first rifle it’s barrels out his hand dropped to the sub-machine gun, a chosen was hiding in a shack, their barrel firing out at the distance.

Mark fired where they would be, the barrel dropped and something dropped to the floor. Mark let the sub machine gun swing on it’s sling, he pulled up a fresh rifle, he turned firing on an air-car that was taking off, he emptied the barrels in seconds, the three people inside dead, he pulled the guns sling off and tossed it he ran up the air car and dropped into it’s turret, it still worked, he turned it pulling the charging handle back, rounds moved into the gun and a live round dropped out. It was good to go.

He pressed the trigger, and the gun boomed, shaking the air car as heavy rounds left the weapon’s barrel.

He cut down two other gunners before Chosen started to realize what was going on. There were Chosen bodies all over the place and more were approaching from the mines.

Mark used the traversing systems to bring the heavy machine gun to bear. He pressed the butterfly trigger, and three air cars grouped too close together went down, one turning into a fireball.

The distant noise of an AMR firing reached his ears.

He guided tracers across the air cars.

An air car’s front rotors were destroyed, the front of the air car dipping uncontrollably, and the back end flipped over the front, ripping itself apart as Chosen went flying from the rear.

” Mother fucking Harmony piece of shit,” He yelled, his hands moving to clear the stoppage. A round was sticking at an odd angle in the breech. He hammered on it, against everything he’d been taught, it came out.

e re-loaded and pulled back on the charging handle.

Workers were stumbling out of the shacks, some bearing guns. Mark gestured at the other air car turrets and some seemed to get the idea. One looked shocked as they accidentally pressed the trigger, but Mark didn’t have the time to teach them. He heard the whine of air car motors and felt the heavy machine gun firing, so he used one hand to crank the wheel that moved him side to side, and the other twitched on the trigger, firing on the swarm of air cars.

They had all grouped together, eager to close with the enemy. They’d shot machine guns but they’d never learned that the enemy being nice and close together was a machine gunner’s paradise. They’d always thought that they’d be killing anyone running at them. Mark barely blinked as his barrel heated up, the blued metal turning slowly cherry red.

Air cars exploded, their shrapnel and carcasses causing other air cars to crash into the shacks. Others were flipped due to poor flying or weapons fire.

The shacks were torn apart by heavy machine gun fire; the Chosen were bad at aiming and they were moving quickly.

Mark and the other camp workers only had to point and shoot. An unlucky few were hit with rounds but the majority were fine as they yelled, screamed and fired, freedom and defiance flowing in their veins.

Three air car turrets were firing on the fifteen moving Chosen air cars. It was a slaughter; the fifteen air cars were spread out over six hundred meters of ground. Three escaped, one trailing engine smoke. The air cars weren’t armored or meant to be hit by heavy machine guns. The three were running straight for Mining City Twenty Seven. When Mark ran out of rounds he opened the gun up and tossed the old ammo box, and a boy handed him a fresh box. He slammed it into the old one’s place and put the first round in the gun, slamming it closed and racking the first round into the chamber.

He grabbed his shoulder, finding the edge of the synth skin. He pulled it off, his Trooper tattoo clear.

There were Chosen moving in the air car wreckage and he fired at the movement, his implants magnifying the area as he followed his tracers onto target.

He heard the AMR fire three times, and he knew the three air cars that had fled weren’t going to make it to Mining City Twenty-One.

“Moving position,” Tyler said.

“I’ve got them down here,” Mark said, cutting down any Chosen that dared to show their faces.

Chapter 38

EMFC Reclaimer

Oort Cloud, Osdal System

8/3267

Conti got a message from Nivad and he opened it immediately, pausing his constant checks of the scans.

“Sound battle stations, full burn for Osdal Actual. The Triple Twos need our help,” Conti said.

His crew turned to their battle stations. They had stood beside him as they arrived in Masoul, the first action that an Earth Military Force Carrier had been in, ever.

“Full burn, roger,” Lieutenant Tamm said from his position at the front of the bridge. His readings climbed as he worked to decrease the flight time to Osdal Actual.

“Sending to the fleet, all ships on full burn,” Neves confirmed, his voice calm and professional.

“Weapons are checked, ready and loaded! I’m picking up contacts on sensors; looks to be the asteroid miner fleet moving to Processing Center Five” Lieutenant Denaski said, hungry and ready.

“Let them see us, it’s about time we got back into the fight.” Conti’s people had come a long way since Masoul, and they had learned from their mistakes. All of their decisions affected those that they were transporting, but they had matured into a fine crew. He was proud to be with them as they surged ahead to meet Osdal Actual.

Chapter 39

Gold Runner

Asteroid Cloud Two

Inner system, Osdal System

8/3267

“Holy shit,” Felicia said, chills running down her spine at her sensor plot. She was at the right angle to see the engine burn of five massive freighters that had snuck into Osdal system by aiming their thrust away from sensors and stations.

She looked down to her sensor logs.

“Who the fuck are they?” she asked Kale, who was riding shotgun. In her hull she held four hundred armed, armored and pissed off miners, ready for the asteroid miner’s first offensive aimed at Processing Station Five, the biggest station that Harmony controlled.

Kale brought up an image, light flashing on the lead hull of the ship.

“EMFC Reclaimer,” she read out loud.

“Holy shit, that’s the one from Masoul!”

“What are their trajectories?” Felicia demanded.

Kale snapped out of his reverie and started looking through the different information that was killing his screens. “They’re headed towards Osdal Actual and Osdal Three.”

“Are any of them heading for the Oort cloud or our mining settlements?”

“No, they passed through the Oort cloud without being noticed. All of them are focused on the processing stations and the planets that Harmony controls.”

“Gold Runner, this is the EMFC Reclaimer. If you don’t tell Harmony, we won’t,” the communications operator said, breaking into the cockpit’s channels.

“What, how?” Felicia started.

“You’re using a vessel built by some corporation, and we’re the Police Force of Corporations. We can break in as we need to, so do we have a deal?”

“You going to attack the asteroid miners?” Felicia asked, her voice and features hardening.

“No plans for it, but you guys seemed as pissed off at Harmony, as are most of the people on the ship. We’re fine with letting you raise hell. A word of advice, though, don’t shoot at Troopers. We don’t take kindly to having our own hurt.”

“Understood, I’ll pass that on to the other miners. Good hunting.”

“Oh, hunting would be too nice for these bastards. Welcome to the extinction, Felicia.” The communications officer cut the channel.

Kale and Felicia looked at one another.

“And she was just the communications officer?” Kale asked.

“Remind me to never cross a Trooper,” Felicia said. “Now, check to make sure we’re still on course, can’t let the EMF get all the fuckers. Emilie Castillo’s still on Station Five.”

“Yes ma’am, though I’ve got to say, that’s one hell of a sight,” Kale said, pointing to the main view screen between them that was showing a close up of the EMFC Reclaimer’s guns as its engines pushed it further into the system.

Felicia nodded. You’re right, that is one hell of a sight, one never seen before. One carrier was enough to subdue most planets’ rebellions. She hadn’t believed that Harmony and Earth had been at war before, she’d just thought it was people blowing things out of proportion.

Now she knew it was a war, and she knew what side she was on. Emilie Castillo’s fate would be too nice, but wiping her and her name from the universe would be good enough for Felicia.

Chapter 40

Mining City Seventeen

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Moretti had sent messages to the other insertion teams as soon as Tyler opened fired on the camp. All of their plans were a go.

Tyler and most of Mark’s section were out in Mining City Twenty-One, causing chaos and moving from one tower to another, hitting Chosen that were trying to mobilize to quell the full-on riots that were happening in the camps outside the city.

Mark had got people semi-organized, putting air cars around a maintenance yard. The air cars were on the ground, their turrets waiting for Chosen to show up. Mark was still fortifying the area. It was making for one hell of a distraction.

Reports started up that different processing stations were being hit. Propulsion systems on Processing Station Nine were failing, and the station was moving into deteriorating orbit, mass panic overtaking it.

Moretti switched to feeds in different mining cities, where Chosen were being fired on and tower complexes were exploding.

It looked like chaos to many, but Moretti saw ammunition depots and powered armor storage areas being hit.

Another report told of powered armor fighting the Chosen. People didn’t seem to be able to believe it. They had supported Harmony and a part of them realized that they were spitting in the face of the companies that they had worked for. Now they were seeing the reality of swearing themselves for Harmony.

Earth and Her Colonies had declared war on Harmony.

People understood what that meant, but few could understand what it truly was.

Now they were in the middle of combat, putting their blinders on and ignoring the issues around them. Their own prejudice was useless if they walked into the path of a round.

Moretti had little care or mercy for them.

Zukic and Dominguez walked into the room, wearing Trooper armor that Yu had dropped off with Tyler.

“Young says that Bandit Two will be ready to pick us up shortly,” Zukic said, checking the E-12 in his hands. Dominguez tossed Moretti a rifle.

Moretti checked it and then himself; he too was wearing EMF smart clothes and the armor plates that went over top. The Triple Twos had drilled weapon handling into his brain as firmly as his teachings as a Ministry of Intelligence Officer.

“Then we shouldn’t keep them waiting,” Moretti said, wiping his implant projected screens away with a wave and standing.

“I’ll be up front, you’ll be center, Dominguez will pull up the rear,” Zukic said. Now the combat had started, this was his show.

“Lead on,” Moretti said.

Chapter 41

Processing Station One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Holm pressed the activate button on the implant screen. His signal was transmitted through Bandit Two’s communication console.

Fifty six charges were activated. The putty grey like substance was an incendiary, and burned as hot as a dozen plasma torches.

Whatever they were on melted. Wires turned into misshapen metal and plastic, fuel lines started spewing all over the place, the same as hydraulic lines coolant lines and sewage lines that the section had thrown in for good measure. Air recycling systems failed, the thrusters that kept the station from falling into Osdal Actual’s gravity well failed.

Power plants went into shutdown as they didn’t have enough fuel. Airlocks and hangars refused to open.

Then the EMP grenades went off. Some worked, others didn’t. Newly made sections of the station blacked out because they hadn’t been made to guard against solar winds.

Yu pressed buttons and flicked on the power to Bandit Two’s engines.

Young did the same.

“Sensors are good and clear,” Young reported.

“Power plant good and stable,” Yu looked to the side of his view.

“We are sealed and good to fly.” Bobbie announced.

“I’ve got a good read on thrusters and main engine, moving to exit,” Yu’s hands and feet moved as the freighter rose up off of its launch pad, turning towards the doors behind it.

The doors to the landing area opened, showing open space beyond it. Yu pushed power to the main engines, exiting the landing area and the processing station.

“All weapon systems report ready and active,” Bobbie said.

“Sensor are getting a good read of the system, linking to FTL network,” Young said as Yu put some space between himself and Processing Station One.

Yu used his implants in his hands to change his view and bring up information on the sensor network around Osdal Actual, and he sent it to everyone else. “Well it looks like the sensor grid is inactive, their positioning is already becoming a mess.”

Before all of the sensor platforms had held perfect position from one another, now they were drifting with no overall commands to separate.

“I have connection to the fleet and their sensors.” The view screen populated with information, including the asteroid mining fleet heading towards Processing Station Five.

“We have modified shuttles leaving Processing Station Five, it looks like they see the asteroid miners. We have a hangar bay opening on One with modified shuttles.” Young’s voice was clipped and professional.

“We’ll hit one first and see if we can’t even up the mining fleet’s odds,” Yu said, using thrusters to turn the freighter around and powering the engines up to counteract his original inertia.

“Buckle up ladies and gents, our Captain has Harmony in his sights!” Young said, pulling her harness tight.

Yu could hear Bobbie telling the Troopers to man different weapon systems.

“Targets?” Yu asked.

Three red dots appeared on his HUD.

He orientated to them, and Young plotted an intercept course that would get them to pass right by the shuttles without braking.

They would never see the freighter’s engine burn which would alert them to the fact they weren’t the only ones out around Processing Station One.

“Lock them up, I’ve got Bravo,” Yu said, lining up the freighter on the middle shuttle.

“Opening weapon coverings,” Bobbie said, and the paneling that had been hiding the freighter’s weaponry pulled back, the weapons pushing forward and locking into position.

Yu edged the freighter around, making it dance with the slightest touch of his feet, fingers and legs.

He squeezed the trigger on his acceleration control. A line of rounds lanced out from the freighter, connecting it to target Bravo, and the other guns being controlled took it as their signal. Several other tracer lines met up with targets Alpha and Charlie.

Bravo exploded, Yu catching on the rudimentary missile launchers on its side. Charlie went haywire, and Alpha showed tracers going through it. Then Bandit Two was past and Yu was altering his trajectory to bring them around on Processing Station Five.

Alpha suddenly exploded and Charlie stopped dancing around space, drifting and spinning away.

“Refining route,” Young said, getting them the fastest time route right on top of the modified shuttles of Processing Station Five.

“They’re firing,” Young said.

Yu couldn’t put on more speed; if he did then his gunners wouldn’t have the time they needed to shoot down Processing Station Five’s shuttles.

All he could do was watch as the missile tracks cut across his displays, heading for the hundreds of contacts that made up the asteroid miner fleet.

They spread out, getting away from the missiles as much as possible, but they had no exterior weapons.

“Missiles ready,” Young said.

“Fire when you have a lock!” Yu said, lining up for the best run on the Harmony Shuttles. The gunners were tagging which shuttles they had in their sights and red targets turned to purple when locked on halos.

“Missiles away,” Young said, and Yu felt the missile magazine clunk to pull a rocket from internal storage and into the launch tubes, though his eyes were on the missiles that closed in on the miner fleet. The missiles blossomed, a few prematurely, some too close to one another.

But with the twenty rockets that had been fired, fifteen miner’s ships were destroyed.

The rockets in Bandit Two’s hold were purpose built weapons of war, tried and tested on battlefields across the colonies.

They hit the Chosen shuttles, burying themselves into the shuttles’ unarmored skins before exploding.

Yu fired his cannons, and the turrets along the sides of the freighter sent lines of ignited fury at the Chosen shuttles.

The confident, predatory advance of the shuttles turned into disorganized chaos.

“We have call from Gold Runner,” Young said.

“Patch in, going for burn,” Yu said, warning the gunners as he flipped the freighter, cutting their inertia and heading towards Processing Station Five.

“Yu, is that you?”

“Captain Yu of the Combat Shuttle One Three Nine at your service ma’am. Thought you folks could use a clear entryway,”

“Jam!” Iliev barked over the freighter’s communications network. It took a few moments before the gun was back up.

“You sneaky bastards,” Felicia said, sounding equal parts shocked and pleasantly surprised.

Yu made his own flight plan, Young was too busy shooting Chosen. He was a bit jealous, but flying, even this tin can, fuck it felt good.

“Thank you ma’am. Get your people to follow me in, I can get you to a hangar and open it up, but beyond that it’s up you. I have a date on Osdal Actual.”.

“Understood, we’ll be right behind you, we have to talk about my going rate after this,”

“Ah Moretti will get everything sorted out,” Yu said.

“That bastard can wrangle a deal out with the best of them,” she said, and Yu could hear the smile in her voice. Yu was happy, Felicia was good people.

The Chosen shuttles were cutting and trying to get back to Processing Station Five.

Young exhausted their missile magazines and their turrets went on self-defence as the Chosen’s missiles aimed at them.

Yu did some creative flying and threw out counter measures. There were some close calls with the freighter getting thrown around and shrapnel peppering the cargo hold. A few thrusters went out, but Young got a working solution going on the fly. The freighter handled even worse than before, but it was functional.

“Unknown freighter this is EMFC Reclaimer flight control. You are showing up on my screen as friendly, give name and ident code,” Flight Control asked, coming through Young and Yu’s implants.

“Flight control this is Bandit Two, former flight crew of Combat Shuttle One Three Nine, flashing ident code,” Young said, dealing with that mess as Yu focused on plowing through the Chosen shuttles. The miners were racing behind them, turning their engines to face the station in order to burn off their speed to make it for the station. Bandit Two wasn’t going to be stopping.

Yu flew and pulled up a schematic of the station.

“Ident confirmed, cleared for access into EMF controlled space. Those unknowns following your tail hostile?” Flight Control asked.

Yu highlighted a hangar door on the station and tossed the rest of the station away, and the waypoint showed up on his HUD. He fired the last two remaining missiles and fired his cannons for a good five second burst.

“No, they are friendly forces, just coming to join the Harmony ass-kicking party.”

“Understood, marking as friendly until deemed otherwise.”

“Flight control I am sending a package containing information on the planet Osdal and its orbit. It contains markers for three freighters that are also docked with said stations. They might be of importance to the higher ups,” Young said.

“I’m getting the info package now, will transmit higher, using it to update my sensor fields.”

Flight Control snapped off just as Yu’s missiles reached the hangar doors, blowing them wide open. Apparently they’d been pressurized, and ships, debris and sections of the station were enveloped in a brief fireball as air was thrown out into the vacuum of space.

The debris spun away from the opening, and the rounds Yu fired made the hole bigger and hit the interior of the station.

“Gold Runner this is Bandit Two, looks like a good run to me. Catch you later.” Yu turned away from the station, clearing his view and pulling up a bookmarked location.

“Understood Bandit Two, thanks for the assist and good luck!” Felicia said.

“Next stop, Mining City Thirty Five. I hope Jerome and Haas haven’t been having too much fun without us,” Yu said, turning the freighter and bleeding off speed. He wanted to get to them quickly, but turning into mush from too much speed was just going to fuck everyone’s day up.

“Hopefully they left enough for us,” Young said.

Chapter 42

Mining City Thirty Five

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

“Covering!” Dooks yelled, firing bursts from his metal storm. It was only too easy to drain the thing of rounds, something that the Chosen were finding out.

“Moving!” Jerome and Kojo said, running for new cover. The Chosen weren’t expecting them to advance at them.

Jerome slid on the flooring, crashing into a planter, and dust and debris were already coming off the thing as Chosen fired into it.

Jerome waited a few seconds and then peeked out, firing at the Chosen positions.

To his right were glass windows looking out onto Mining City Thirty Five, to his right lay a dining area with chairs and tables and a food court around it. They were in the walkway filled with planters that separated the viewing area of couches, and in front of him it wrapped around, the food court turning into housing units. Past that there were offices and maintenance areas, then the fucking landing pad that was his section’s goal.

Jerome’s finger barely twitched on the metal storm’s trigger; with four rounds per second it only took thirty seconds to spend all a hundred and twenty rounds.

“Covering!” Jerome and Kojo yelled, the Chosen hiding from the fire coming in over their heads.

Jerome peppered one Chosen peeking around a planter and yells went up as Chosen fired wildly. Jerome just continued firing; if he stopped then the others were in danger.

“Moving!” Haas said, and Dooks and Sasaki moved past Jerome and Kojo, sliding on the floor into planters and then firing at the beleaguered Chosen.

The Chosen had only played with their guns, they’d seen the respect they got for simply holding their firearm and any caution or tactics that they’d been taught had been washed away with the knowledge that no one messed with them.

But that had been around unarmed civilians who knew that the Chosen were their own policing force.

Every man under Haas’s command was a blooded veteran who had done nothing but fight for their lives for nearly a decade. Their tactics had been ingrained into their thinking. They moved with purpose, with deadly intent, and that was the difference between the Chosen and Troopers.

On Earth, the Troopers might have been the same way, but you had to fight to stay alive, you didn’t make it off Earth without blood on your hands. The EMF refined that killing talent and pitched them up against anything that looked like it could be a potential combatant.

“Covering!” Haas, Sasaki and Dooks called as one.

There was no hesitation, and Jerome ran forward into the Chosen’s fire.

“Moving!” He and Kojo yelled, the coppery taste of adrenaline in his mouth.

Jerome came up on a planter, poking over to put fire down range, and a Chosen jumped up from behind the planter, eyes wide with fear and panic. They grabbed Jerome’s barrel and Jerome pulled the trigger and they fell away. Another Chosen just a few feet away was getting to their feet, but rounds hammered into them; Jerome’s people were looking out for him as he fired at the Chosen just feet away now.

“Covering!” Jerome called a second after Kojo.

“Moving! Line up together, we will advance up the center and split to clear the planters,” Haas said. “Jerome, Sasaki left, Dooks, Kojo, me right.”

Someone stepped up next to Jerome using the same planter as cover, and Jerome didn’t look, he just kept firing.

“Out!” Jerome yelled, ducking behind the planter and grabbing the barrels of the metal storm. He twisted and pulled them free, his gloves melting from their heat. He grabbed a quick loader with all the barrels attached and he drove it home, twisting the barrels until they locked, pulling the quick loader out.

He stood up and pressed the trigger, and recoil and planter shards greeted his pull.

“Back in!” Jerome called.

“Move it!” Haas said.

Jerome had point and he moved quickly, coming out of cover and firing at any Chosen that looked to put their heads up. He passed over dead Chosen, saw Sasaki right behind him on his HUD, and he could feel Haas shooting beside him and pointed to the right. His HUD confirmed everyone was up and good, only Kojo’s indicator showed yellow instead of green.

They reached large planters where the remaining Chosen were hiding. They were still five meters away from them.

Jerome and Haas ran forward, the rest following. Jerome dropped his shoulder, sliding into view of the Chosen behind the planters who were just peeking up as the fire had reduced. Jerome held down the trigger on the metal storm, guiding a red stream of tracers down the Chosen.

Sasaki kicked him, letting him know she was there as she fired over him, catching any targets he missed

“Clear,” Haas said from his side.

“Clear here,” Jerome said. Kojo was covering in the distance as everyone else put in new barrels on their metal storms.

“Enemy in depth!” Kojo said as he fired, cutting down reinforcing Chosen.

Jerome snapped his barrels into place, rolling on his stomach, firing at the running Chosen.

It was a bloodbath; they didn’t use cover and stared blankly as their friends dropped.

“Moving!” Haas said, but there didn’t appear to be any of the thirty or so Chosen left alive.

Haas, Dooks and Kojo moved up, Kojo reloading as he did so.

“Covering!” Haas said, looking over the planters but not firing as he didn’t see any targets.

“Moving,” Jerome got to his feet and ran forwards, trying to wipe blood off his gun from rolling on the floor.

“We’ll move up in teams until we come under contact,” Haas said.

Jerome slowed his pace, aiming and stepping forward carefully as he went, looking for any threats.

They were now moving into the housing units.

People started opening their doors and looking around, their faces paling at the dead Chosen and advancing Troopers.

“Get the fuck back inside!” Haas shouted. Thankfully most listened, others moved to the Chosen. The Trooper’s guns fired, they couldn’t let them grab the Chosen’s rifles. The people that were watching screamed and hid inside their homes, as if the doors and walls could protect them.

Jerome didn’t care what they did as long as they didn’t try to fight him and stayed the fuck out of the way.

The Troopers quickly advanced, with Dooks trailing making sure nothing came up behind them.

They turned away from the housing units and towards the office units.

“Heavy machine gun!” Kojo yelled, the first one to see the weapon as he pushed Haas down.

Jerome dove for cover behind a planter and the heavy machine gun’s rounds hit Kojo’s breastplate.

It was a terrible sound.

Jerome pulled out the homemade explosives he’d made, throwing what looking like a water bottle at the emplacement. He waited a few seconds and activated the chip inside with his implants.

An explosion ripped through the corridor, and the glass blew out, wind whipping at the room as they were a kilometer and a half up. The office’s lobby and walls opened up, the air throwing them and the contents of the office everywhere.

“Move!”

A glance to Jerome’s HUD showed Kojo as a red blip.

Jerome and the rest of the section listened, running forward into the chaos Jerome’s bomb had made.

They fired at the gun, which was set up in a big planter, and the Chosen scattered around it.

Jerome heard a wind cracking boom outside of the tower and he ducked for cover as the heavy machine gun started firing again.

“This mother fucker is pissing me off!” Jerome hollered, aiming and firing around the side of the planter, catching a Chosen in the leg and then head.

His gun clicked empty.

“I’m out!” Jerome said, tossing the gun away and grabbing the submachine gun he’d taped to his chest.

He turned the corner again, catching two more Chosen before the heavy machine gun found him. He ducked back into cover, but not fast enough. His left arm caught a round. It hit him in the forearm, ripping it apart, pulping his elbow and lower bicep. His wrist and hand went spinning away.

“Fucking mother fucker!” Jerome fought through the pain, ripping his shirt up to his upper arm where the smart cloth and the blade that Mark and Tyler gifted him lay. He pulled the blade and sent commands to the smart cloth which tightened painfully. He tucked the blade away as his augments pumped him up with endorphins and go juice, the smart cloth wrapping acting as a tourniquet.

“This is Bandit Two, targets sighted, fire mission incoming,” Young said in Jerome’s headset. A moment later and the glass side of the tower disintegrated under the converted freighter’s fire. Tracers cut into the Chosen and left holes in the office walls.

All Jerome could do was huddle down against that firepower.

“Meet you at the landing pad,” Young reported.

“Move it!” Haas barked.

They rose up into the howling wind and flying debris, rushing towards the chosen positions.

Jerome shot at anything that was moving.

They continued on, and Jerome saw that Kojo’s red marker was being carried by Dooks. He would have felt bad about leaving the man behind; he didn’t want to know what Harmony would have done with the body.

The freighter was waiting for them, all of its weaponry out and looking for targets.

Yu spun the craft so the rear ramp touched the landing pad. As soon as Jerome and his people were in the cargo hold, the freighter’s engines kicked in and it went into a dive, losing altitude for speed.

Jerome collapsed on the floor as the rear cargo door was sealing. Someone produced a blanket and put it over Kojo’s body and secured him to the wall.

“Good to see you Jerome,” Tal said, pulling out a med-kit and a printer.

“Ah shit, this is gonna suck,” Jerome said, holding his stub out to Tal.

“We’ll get you sorted out quick as you can say Fuck Harmony,” Bairamov said, holding onto Jerome’s shoulders.

“Let’s do it,” Jerome said, psyching himself up and grabbing the underside of the collapsible seat racks.

Tal put a piece of wood in Jerome’s teeth and pulled out a Vibra-Blade, making a clean cut, as fast as possible. Jerome yelled out, trying to stop his thrashing.

Tal got his upper arm in the printer and the heads got to work, making him a new forearm, wrist and hand. It hurt where they were testing out the nerves and muscle to check for where the printer would graft on the new limb. Jerome lay on the ground, knowing that it would hurt like a bastard when it was connected. The printer worked fast, and it would only be ten or twenty minutes until he had his lost limb back.

“Plan is we’re going to get suited up, grab Moretti, Zukic and Dominguez, then we’re headed to Mining City Twenty-One. Seems like there’s a little rebellion going on there that we can help out with,” Haas said in everyone’s implants.

“The fleet is in bound, they should be in orbit within four hours,” Yu said.

So we just need to hold out for four more hours, that’s not too difficult, Jerome said, knowing that he was lying to himself.

Chapter 43

EMFC Reclaimer

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Alexis checked her armor one last time before tucking her arms into her ammo pack.

Her sections were pulling themselves together. They were all armed, armored and running final checks. She moved her helmet, getting her hair caught in the locks was a bitch.

She was clear and her helmet was sealed.

“Two, four section, let’s move,” Alexis said, walking past them, and the sections fell in. Even the new people were looking good. She just hoped that it carried over on the ground.

They passed through the airlock, the flight deck was still closed and pressurized.

Alexis moved into a jog, the sections following her. Second Lieutenant Che already had one and three section on board their shuttle.

Everyone filed into their spots, taking their seats and locking in their harnesses. It might be four hours until the ships were in orbit, then it would take the Combat Shuttles two to get to the planet, and they didn’t need to slow down too much before their landing.

Half of the fleet Actual were headed for the stations; the others were going to the ground.

Fleet Three, which was made up of only two carriers, was already entering Osdal Three’s orbit. There was fierce fighting on the ground, but Alexis expected nothing less.

The carriers had pounded the ground before they sent down their Combat Shuttles, and Alexis just hoped that it had given the Troopers the cover they needed to close with the Chosen.

“We’ve got reports of powered armor battalions mobilizing, and we’re going right into the thick of it, so remember your Vibra-Blades and hammer the fuckers,” Major Ortiz said over the main command channel.

“Ten minutes until deployment,” Force Sergeant Major Nerva said, calm as ever. Alexis knew that he was going to be on the ground with them. He was the only person ranked above Major on the ground. She also knew that nothing less than being knocked unconscious would get him away from the front lines. It was reassuring to have Ice Man going out with them.

Alexis remembered the video that had been circulating when she had been pulled out of cryo a few days ago.

There was no mistaking the man in the video as anyone other than Mark.

Her hands tightened on her harness, her eyes bleak.

She hoped Mark was still alive, but it didn’t seem possible. She had a job to do, kill Harmony, and she would do everything in her power to complete that mission.

***

Nerva looked over his HUD which showed the entire force under his command, ten thousand men and women, all waiting. None of them were really ready to close with the enemy, that was a lie every soldier told themselves before a battle.

They were as ready and well trained as they could expect. That was all that Nerva could hope for as he settled into his harness, checking the feeds of the Combat Shuttle.

“Depressurizing!” Flight Control said, and the lights went off to warn crews and personnel. People left, others ran final checks on Combat Shuttles.

The last stragglers got into their Combat Shuttles as cargo ramps started closing.

Finally, the air was sucked out, and in the eerie silence all around, Nerva could only hear his own movement in his smart clothes and the cargo master’s footsteps through the cargo bay’s decking.

The lights changed color and the armored doors opened, showing the star-speckled skies of space.

There were four other carriers out there in that darkness, but they were hundreds of thousands of kilometers away, too far to be seen without magnification. Nerva could see them on a section of his HUD that relayed the fleet’s positions.

Light from outside of the carrier illuminated the flight deck. Nerva knew that the carrier was firing, but there was no noise to accompany the weapon’s fire.

“Launching,” the pilot said, and the first line of Combat Shuttles rose as one, pushing forward out of the carrier. They angled away, getting clear of the carrier and heading past the rear.

The carrier’s engines were at full burn to slow it down before it reached Osdal Actual, but the Combat Shuttles didn’t need to slow down that much. They formed up into their pyramid and diamond fighting formations.

Nerva changed sensors; he could see Reclaimer’s relatively small Close In Weapons Systems or Seawhizz firing streams of tracers ahead of the Combat Shuttles, shifting their fire and shooting again.

The pilot didn’t announce it, but Nerva saw the missile launch from the orbital batteries around Osdal Actual. It seemed that someone had panicked and fired them at the oncoming fleet and their Combat Shuttles. The fleet’s turrets were searching out the missile platforms and hunting them down. The missiles numbered in the thousands, but the fleet had distance and time. The Seawhizz twitched from one target to another, firing clouds of rounds at the oncoming missiles.

Explosions blossomed ahead of the Combat Shuttle formations. Their own small turrets were on missile defense, taking strain from the Seawhizz and letting them deal with the platforms.

It was an incredible show of people working together against the enemy, but the enemy had too many missiles and the EMF didn’t have enough turrets. The first shuttles started winking out, missiles reaching the forward ships.

Nerva could have stopped watching the sensor feeds, but he didn’t because he was a leader. Those people dying might not be under his chain of command, but he still felt loss seeing them blink out, knowing all too well that those ships could have been his own.

Then he didn’t have time to worry about it because his shuttle was getting tossed and thrown about. Missiles were exploding around the craft, and the Combat Shuttle’s crew fought for their ship, for the people inside the shuttle.

Fuck this shit, Nerva thought, gritting his teeth against the jostling.

Then the front left section of the shuttle disappeared, light blinded Nerva, and his helmet darkened enough to stop the full light of the explosion sear into his eyes.

Nerva found himself pushed into the wall, the shuttle was in a spin, and outside, stars sped past.

People were flopping around, dead or unconscious. Nerva fought against the nausea, against the panic, trying to get his blood moving normally.

Is this it, is this the end? he wondered seeing more missiles explode outside of the craft. A thruster must have fired as the gravities pushing him into the wall suddenly pushed him against his harness and he passed out.

Chapter 44

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Luke looked at the reports coming in; the EMF was on his doorstep. The asteroid miners were fighting across Processing Station Five and multiple charges had gone off through stations, towers and cities all across Osdal Actual and Osdal Three. He couldn’t even contact Osdal Three, either the communications satellites were out, or the ground stations were out of action.

They had completely lost control of one camp, and the camp workers had fired on the Chosen, killing about fifty. The rest had fled for the city itself.

He looked out of his office window as he stuffed various data cubes and surfaces into a bag.

A section of a tower blew out; he saw powered armor falling from fifteen stories up. The powered armor was impressive, but not that impressive.

“We need to move you sir,” a bodyguard said, bursting into the room.

He was one of the people that Luke had brought with him from Housapel, and he knew the real plan.

“Okay, torch the rest,” Luke said, grabbing his bag and walking out of the office.

His implants were updating with different damages.

Processing Station One confirmed that their servers for the sensor system were out of action.

Someone had fired the majority of their missile platforms at the EMF fleet, wasting them. Only a few carriers had been actually hit; one had a hole in their unarmored side, the others didn’t even seem affected other than losing a few weapon systems.

Converted shuttles were being flushed out of stations, and they were much more effective than the emplaced systems. They weren‘t the best pilots by any stretch of the imagination, but they were dedicated and almost suicidal.

They rushed the carriers, many of them getting cut down, so they changed tactics and hit the Combat Shuttles. The first missile launch had done the most damage to the Combat Shuttles, and the converted shuttles just added to those losses.

The problem was that a converted shuttle rarely lasted long enough to get off their missiles and escape. They got close, dumped their missiles and ran for it, getting cut down either getting to that point or as they tried to escape.

Bodyguards fell in around Luke as he walked out of his living unit. It had been the planet’s CEO’s and he had enjoyed them, but on Earth he would have living quarters even more opulent.

He strode through the hallways, the bodyguards guiding him, they all wore powered armor and toted metal storm rifles that had been carefully maintained. Anyone that got in their way was thrown aside.

Luke quickly got to his shuttle, and they all loaded in, taking off as the last person hit the close door on the hatch. Five other shuttles moved around them.

Luke took time to look at the reports. Osdal had turned to chaos, it had stared in Mining Camp Twenty-One. Apparently someone in the camp had overpowered and killed a dozen people, then proceeded to incite a full-out rebellion. Everything else had snowballed into the current cluster fuck.

“The freighter Kelas is moving to rendezvous with us, the other freighters are loading what they can and proceeding to exit the system,” the bodyguard said.

“Very well.” Luke was partially relieved to be leaving the shit hole of a system behind. It was necessary for Harmony’s goals, but he was a numbers man, dealing with people, mining, he was happy he was done with it.

***

Tyler fired on the approaching chosen, their powered armor shoulder breaking.

He turned and ran through the abandoned housing units. A piece of powered armor came crashing through the wall and Tyler threw himself out of the housing unit through a hole.

He looked over to Ali, and the charges littering the housing units went off. They were directed at the incoming powered armor, but they still managed to hole the walls that the rest of the section were hiding behind. They’d booby-trapped most of the city and then locked it down with their codes.

The powered armor was still getting free and raising havoc. There were even more units than they had feared.

“Fifty rounds left,” Tyler said, as they all scrambled up and ran for the nearest bank of elevators. Dashtund and Niemi took the front, their bolt action rifles slung with their metal storm leading the way. Ko and Ali were right behind them with Tyler bringing up the rear.

Tyler heard something come crashing out of the housing complex, and there was powered armor; it was beaten to hell but it had survived.

Tyler took quick breaths, planted himself and fired at the armor’s crotch. The head was a brick of armor, but they didn’t have much in the groin area.

They went down, blood pouring out of their leg. Tyler hoped he’d hit an artery as he made to catch up with the rest of the section.

Dashtund and Niemi fanned out covering the area, and Ali jammed a crowbar in the elevator doors and opened them up.

“Move it!” Tyler covered the lobby, while Dashtund and Niemi got on the rope and started their descent.

Tyler looked around again before grabbing onto the wall. He let his AMR hang between his legs as he put them against the elevator doors.

He grunted, the elevator doors closing.

He heard more armor running around, and hoped the closed doors would give them more time. He checked the counter on his HUD, ten minutes to go before their ride arrived.

Tyler jumped for the elevator cables and followed the section down. They had been hitting and ambushing Chosen all over the city for an hour, and the fleet was still three hours away. The Combat Shuttles would break atmosphere in ninety minutes.

“Get that door open, got some Chosen to kill,” Tyler said, and Ali drove his crowbar into the elevator doors as Dashtund made stirrups with his hands.

Ali got the door open, and Dashtund boosted Ko up, while Niemi and Tyler were looking for targets.

Seeing no one, Ko stepped onto the floor.

“Seems the bastards in the East sector got out, should have a line of sight, down,” Tyler checked his HUD before pointing through the elevator and into an office space. “Ko you take point, let’s move.”

***

Mark was in bad shape, but he just plain didn’t care. He’d taken the med kits and used as much as he could on himself. His augments took the extra aid and were speeding up the process, but he needed weeks, not hours for them to get him back to combat ready.

He moved from position to position, giving quick and brief lessons on the weapon systems. People saw the tattoo and listened. When your life is on the line then you listen the hell up.

This was their chance at freedom, and they were doing all they could. People dumped their truckloads around the air cars, usually crushing them. Mark didn’t care, as long as the turrets were able to function.

He’d set fire to the shacks, and most people had cheered. He’d done it to clear their line of sight and to make sure that no one got their hands on Caroline’s body, or the bodies of anyone else.

On one side of the maintenance area there were massive hauling trucks making a row down the length of the kilometer long maintenance patch, and there was a space between them and the workshops that littered the center, with supplies that kept the machines going resting there.

On the other side was the mining machinery, the conveyor belts and the Diggers that ate into the sides of the strip mines. Parts lay all around them, ready to be rushed down to the strip mine to keep production up.

Mark had the truckers crush all of the trucks in a line together, and the supplies were thrown underneath so no one could crawl in. The roadways were blocked off with more trucks.

Rocks had been poured over the parts and mining machinery on the other side of the lot.

Mark had taken oil, painted the barrels black, put them in the sun and mounted them to the trucks.

The massive batteries that ran the trucks and machinery were buried around the defensive positions. Rubble and rocks were everywhere, breaking up the plain surface of the planet.

Mark dropped into his turret on top of a truck, and there were five others up in the trucks. He put the people he was most confident in in those turrets. They would see the enemy far away, and he wanted their shots to count before the turrets along the strong points in the defenses found the enemy.

A turret started opening up. Small bursts dickhead, Mark thought, following the tracers to find where the rounds were going. His implants zoomed in on the powered armor and air cars that were racing towards his defenses.

“Cut them down!” Mark cranked his turn wheel, bringing the weapon on target.

He used the stubs remaining of his fingers and fired on the approaching enemy, and other turrets added in their fire. Mark adjusted, using his implants to guide his fire across the forward Chosen.

He wouldn’t be able to hold out long without support. He wanted to see Harmony fall for Caroline, but if all he got was a dozen of their lives, he would be satisfied with that.

Chapter 45

Bandit Two

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Picking up Zukic, Moretti and Dominguez had been easy. Yu barely stopped, opening the hatch and hovering as the three ran in. Then he’d been off again, heading as fast as he could to Mining City Twenty-One.

The situation there looked like a hell of a lot more than just a simple pick-up.

“I’m tracking multiple targets heading from the city, I’ve got shuttles spinning up and moving out to other cities, there are powered armor units in the streets,” Young said as Yu flew, no longer driving the freighter.

“I’ve got a convoy of air cars and powered armor moving on the camp,” Young said. Yu could see it, to his right lay Mining City Twenty-One, to his left there were the massive open pit mines all around the shack city, refinery and the maintenance pads. Smoke from the shack city clouded the sky, heading towards the dust cloud of the advancing powered armor and air cars racing along the conveyor belt that ran to the city.

Lines of tracer fire came from one of the maintenance pads. Yu used eye twitches to zoom in on the maintenance pads, and he saw makeshift defenses around the perimeter, and heavy machine guns fired into the advancing cloud of Chosen.

Air cars were thrown and tossed and powered armor was knocked back, taking a few hits before the heavy rounds penetrated.

The mounted heavy machine guns on the air cars tried to return fire, their firing off-balancing the machines they were mounted to and making them weave dangerously.

Yu knew that Mark was down there, but he didn’t know how long he and the camp workers could hold out for.

“Incoming!”

Yu saw the tracks on his HUD and threw the freighter into a dive and banked. The turrets underneath the belly of the freighter opened fired on the heavy machine guns trying to take the freighter out.

Yu dismissed the image of the maintenance pad, for now he needed to pick up Tyler and his bunch of vagabonds.

“Tyler, where the fuck are you?” Young left Yu to deal with the flying part, and he could hear rounds hitting his hull like hail off of a tin roof.

“Fuck sakes Yu, I don’t want another fucking skylight!” Bobbie barked.

Even with rounds hitting the hull of freighter, Yu had to smile at that one. He powered the engines and went high.

“Moving to a rooftop,” Tyler said, and a Marker appeared on Yu’s HUD, but he continued to fly higher and erratically to throw the heavy machine guns off. They continued to miss as the freighter’s turrets fired down into their positions.

“Time estimate?” Young asked.

“Fifteen minutes,” Tyler said.

“Hurry that the hell up! We’ve got converted shuttles on us,”

“Ahh fuck,” Yu barrel rolled as some of the shuttles were heading for them.

The auto-turrets fired, and the crew fired from their implants, strapped into the freighter’s harnesses.

“Hey, I’m getting a new fucking arm here, mind going easy on the roller coaster ride?!” Jerome didn’t sound like he was in the best mood.

Yu flipped and came back at the shuttles, firing his larger auto cannons. They pulled the shuttles apart as they dove past them, their explosions making the freighter shake violently.

Yu found himself pointed at the convoy going towards the maintenance pad, and he fired down onto them, hoping that it helped Mark out some.

“Five minutes! Got some powered armor chasing us though!” Tyler said.

Yu changed direction and headed for the waypoint. He used his thrusters and flaps to break his speed, the freighter wasn’t any Combat Shuttle so he broke off on his approach and circled, cutting more speed.

Tyler and his section came out onto the covered landing pad and smoke rushed out of the stairwell they’d cleared. They ran full out for the edge of the building.

Yu brought them in; they were too high for most of the heavy machine guns, or towers were in the way.

“Ramp down!” Bobbie said, the wind whipping through the freighter from its own engines and the altitude.

Powered armor climbed out of the stairwell. Yu didn’t hesitate, he fired into the powered armor-wearing Chosen. The heavy rounds cut through even their chest plates.

The stairwell lit up as rounds turned it to ruins, and tracers bounced through the small enclosure.

“Good to go,” Bobbie said. Yu didn’t need to be told twice. He fired the engines and headed for the edge of the platform, then he fired at the glass, and the cannons tore it apart as the freighter pushed through, and they escaped through a waterfall of glass.

Chapter 46

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

The gun jammed again. Mark ripped on the charging handle a few times, but it still it didn’t work.

I don’t have time for this shit. The powered armor was just minutes away from reaching the forward lines.

He had thought that the camp workers would have broken, they hadn’t, not yet. Mark checked his implants, they were linked up the sonic noise systems around the maintenance yard. He was running out of hope.

He opened the machine gun, ducking by reflex as rounds pinged off of the rocks piled around the turret for armor. One of them sent a shard of metal up his cheek, leaving a red line.

He grabbed a rock, hammering the messed up round out of the chamber, and finally it dropped, and he tossed it away. It might not work, but he didn’t trust shit that didn’t blow up the first time.

I’m not going to have the time to load another box. He dragged a new box from his side and, pulling out the linked rounds, he slapped it into the gun, slamming the tray down and pulling on the charging handle. He held the belt of rounds with his left hand as he fired with his right, and a fresh line of tracers greeted the Chosen.

Rounds from above hammered into the Chosen’s lines, air cars exploded and powered armor fell apart under the barrage.

Mark didn’t stop firing, knowing that this was an opportunity he wasn’t going to waste.

“Moving to you, Mark,” Young said over his implants.

“I need support, danger close, did Tyler get those bells working?” Mark yelled.

“I did what you asked.” Tyler said.

“Good.” No matter if he was there to see it or not, the Chosen were going to have a very shitty day.

The first sets of powered armor made it to the barricades and the turrets inside the maintenance pad opened fire, holding them back for a time.

One of the powered armor landed on a turret, killing the gunner and anyone around them.

Mark didn’t dare to shift his fire but the camp workers did, they were scared and panicked. More than one person was killed by friendly fire, but there wasn’t anything Mark could do.

People fired their metal storm rifles at the powered armor, but it had no affect unless they found a joint or a weakness in their armor. They weren’t expert marksmen, they were scared people with a gun and people that wanted to kill those running at them.

Mark lined up a shot on a barely seen white dot. His tracers raked the area, and the battery packs under the ground burst into fire, their flames as hot as a plasma torch.

People wearing powered armor that were on those packs or who went over them were cooked alive in their armor.

Air cars opened fire, now close enough to actually hit the maintenance pad without throwing the whole thing off target. Mark fired at them, carnage between them and his own position. Armor wearers screamed and howled, trying to get out of their armor, or run away. Too many of them had survived the battery trick.

Weapons fire ripped through the rear of the Chosen group, and air cars were cut down from above and by the maintenance pad’s defenses.

Mark heard the engines of the freighter as it came through the massive dust plume made up from the chosen’s advance. The auto turrets were blazing, working independently to cut down Chosen. The freighter banked, coming out around the pad, circling to cut its speed down. It came back in from behind the camp workers, clearly firing on the Chosen.

The ramp lowered down and Troopers jumped out. They spread over the trucks, firing onto the Chosen. Two ran over to Mark.

“Hey boss, let Niemi take that, I’ll do what I can,” Ko said.

Mark got out of the turret, tired, like he was moving through a swamp, and Niemi jumped in. He saw the chosen fleeing their air cars, realizing that they were the bigger target. The oil that had been baking in the sun for hours was poured out, new screams filling the air.

Mark sat down and immediately Ko was pulling off his shirt and making unhappy noises, then he stabbed Mark above his collar bone. Mark barely felt it, but felt reassured seeing the clear line leading to an intravenous bag. Ko fired needle after needle into the in-valve.

“Drink,” he said, giving Mark a water bottle.

Mark drained it, salty and sweet at the same time. Ko gave him two more different tasting water bottles, injecting more drugs and spraying most of Mark’s body. Mark was numb to it, doing as Ko said, but watching as the Chosen were cut down.

The powered armor ripped through people, but the Troopers were quick to put the remaining Chosen down with their AMRs.

Mark felt bone-weary fatigue fill him as he leaned against the turret. Niemi was still firing, she was a good shot, but he wanted to get up, to go fight. He knew that his brothers and sisters would kill the bastards. He wasn’t close to avenging Caroline, but he would. He would make sure every last member of Harmony was good and dead. He looked at the sunset, no tears came any more, but a hardness built inside him, an anger. He had cried enough.

His eyes closed, hearing the beeping and whirring of the various machines connected to him, the IV attached to the turret’s ring.

Chapter 47

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Acting Major Ortiz looked at the readings coming from the Combat Shuttles. They’d lost fifty thousand before even entering atmosphere, one of them being Nerva’s shuttle. Major Dalton’s shuttle had been ripped apart by a converted shuttle. None had survived.

Now everyone was looking to Ortiz to take up his place. Thankfully, the Majors were dispersing some of the problems, but he was now the Commander on the ground.

There was little he could do as the shuttles raced down towards the planet. The fleet’s guns were firing on hardened positions outside of mining cities, and trying to cut down the converted shuttles that seemed to have sprouted from every processing station and mining city on Osdal.

As the Combat Shuttles came into contact those that had no Troopers in their hold, but massive ammunition lockers put their weaponry to use.

They broke away from the Combat Shuttles to fend off converted shuttles if needed, but most of them were staying with their loaded brethren as they started hitting Osdal Actual’s atmosphere.

Ortiz shook with the turbulence, chewed his gum, thanked Mark for his augment recommendation and kept his hands moving as he managed the inserting force.

Mining City Twenty-Two was just entering night, tracers could be seen on magnification. Ortiz switched to looking to the city instead of the camp. It was a hive of activity; powered armor was running out of there at full sprint, positions were being put into place and machine guns were pointed to the heavens and fired up at the Combat Shuttles. Meteors cut through their dusk sky.

Other cities were also a hive of activity, but less so. Mining City Twenty-One was the headquarters of Harmony, the other cities were just population centers.

Combat Shuttles diverted from their main path heading towards their targeted mining cities. Positions had been marked by the insertion teams, red dots covering cities. Ortiz felt the buffeting of entering atmosphere fall away, replaced with the noise and vibrations of weapons fire. Feels like growing city all over again.

On Sacremon, Ortiz’s Alpha Company had marked up the enemy positions in Growing City, while the rest of their forces had drawn the attention of the rebels. Many had died for that deception. It had paid off as the Combat Shuttles descended from Reclaimer, firing on the rebel positions before they ever came in range of the rebel’s guns.

Auto cannons and turrets fired on the pre-selected targets with cold, computed precision.

Red dots started blinking out as tracers ripped into mining cities. The Chosen’s rounds couldn’t reach the Combat Shuttles, but the Combat Shuttles could sure as hell hit them.

“I’m getting some funky readings from the ground,” Sholtz said, one of Ortiz’s captains and his second in command for now.

“What you mean?” Ortiz asked.

“All around mining city Twenty-One, it’s like there’s an earthquake going on, though Osdal never had earthquakes.”

Ortiz felt the Combat Shuttle level out as they made their approach on Mining City Twenty-One. The Combat Shuttles fired onto the trail of Chosen that were approaching the beleaguered camp. It was a mess of fires, oil, powered armor and close quarters fighting. The Combat Shuttles threw the Chosen back, but their powered armor cleared the defenses.

Ortiz looked at the readings Sholtz had sent him. “Have everyone stay on the cermite pads, the ground looks like hell.”

“The ground is lava, got it,” Sholtz said.

“Smart ass,” Ortiz shot back.

“Thank yah Major sir!” Sholtz said. Ortiz could imagine the grin on the younger man’s face.

The Combat Shuttles were moving in on the mining city fast, heavy machine gun rounds pinged off of the shuttle’s armored sides, auto-turrets and cannons cut down any that were getting too close for comfort.

“Holy shit!” The pilot skewed the shuttle.

Ortiz switched to sensor views. The ground seemed to be throwing up peaks of moving blades.

Diggers! Ortiz thought, seeing the massive beasts crest the planet’s surface.

They sped out of the planet’s surface, the metal cone combination of teeth and mouth rising out as their sack-like body trailed behind and their tentacles pushed them forward. They came crashing back down, their white tentacles moving as they pierced the ground again and went back under.

Ortiz pulled back on the view, looking at a birds-eye of the mining city. All around it Diggers, hundreds of them, were rising out of the planet’s surface, anything in their way was tipped apart by their digging cones. Not even the heavy armor was able to stop them. They massed anywhere from two pounds to six hundred. They were massive beasts.

The Chosen switched fire from the Combat Shuttles to the Diggers. They didn’t know the Troopers, but they knew Diggers and feared them even more.

“Take us to the rooftop landing pads!” Ortiz said to the pilot.

“Understood, passing the word,” The co-pilot said as the pilot banked onto a new heading. The weapons never stopped firing on Chosen positions, there were so many of them. They’d started making them fifteen years ago and never stopped, the city was a fortress.

The information from the insertion teams was invaluable and scary. These people were prepared to fight and die for their cause.

The shuttle cut its speed, seats retracted and everyone was hoisted into drop-positions. Ortiz cleared his views as much as possible and checked his E-12. The cargo master did a quick check before the hatches underneath the Troopers’ feet opened. Ortiz ‘assumed the position’, arms to his side, chin against his chest and his legs straight.

“Ready!” The co-pilot said. “Drop!”

Ortiz wanted to hold his hands out as he fell, many did on their first drop, and it led to a lot of broken bones and useless Troopers on the ground. Ortiz followed his training, dropping out of the craft, and as he was clear he readied himself for impact.

He hit the ground, rolling, and his harness came away and headed back up into the Combat Shuttle. He came out of his roll, pulling his E-12 from its clips on his waist.

He looked around, there weren’t any targets or incoming fire, yet.

Other sections were moving to the edge of the landing platform, carrying mortars, screamers and AMRs. The section Ortiz was with headed for the nearest stairwell as soon as they were all down and accounted for. Ortiz followed, the first floor was clear.

“Alexis, get a casualty collection point set up here,” Ortiz said, marking the area. His Division Sergeant Major was a drafted Platoon Warrant; Ortiz didn’t want to pull people from their units as they were hitting the ground. Eckal’s platoon was filled with veterans and her Lieutenant Che said that she’d be fine.

Ortiz and Alexis were good friends, despite their difference in rank. Calling her Sergeant Major Victor would have felt weird, so he used her first name like with the Victor brothers.

“You got it Ortiz,” she said. She might have been a Sergeant on Masoul, but she had dived into her new role with gusto. She started barking out orders and getting the area set up to transfer wounded, as well as a supply point for ammunition coming in.

Ortiz left her to it as he looked at the big picture. Captain Sholtz’s forces were just coming in at the maintenance pad, getting right into the fight with powered armor.

He let Sholtz run his own battle as he looked at the forces deployed all over Mining City Twenty-One. They were all in the center of the city, and controlling the high ground was essential. Sniper teams and Repulsor teams were already setting up positions and hitting Chosen moving in other towers.

Shuttles trying to get into the fight with the Combat Shuttles were greeted with portable screamers and Combat Shuttle missile launchers.

Platoons and companies were coming together and advancing down into the tower he was standing on. Intelligence types were getting connected into the city’s network to give them a better picture of the enemy threat. It didn’t look like they were going to get much from the different tower’s sensors, but most access had been locked down by the insertion teams, messing up the Chosen’s deployment and giving the Troopers an advantage.

So far, no one except the camp workers had fought powered armor in close combat, and Ortiz was not looking forward to it. He absently touched his Vibra-Blade, making sure it would come free of its scabbard easily.

“I’m going to head to the front,” Ortiz said to Alexis.

“Don’t do anything stupid, and take your detail with you. Need to keep people pushing in the right direction. You’re running this battle, make sure that they know it. They’re looking to you,” she said. She was making sure he wasn’t an idiot and acting like a regular Trooper and telling him that others relied on him.

Shit, when did she get so good at managing people? Well she’s married to Tyler with Jerome and Mark as brother-in-law’s. Might explain it.

He rounded up his aides and wisely followed his Sergeant Major’s warnings.

***

When Mark came to his senses, the turret next to him was firing. His augments said he was still pretty messed up but he was a hell of a lot better than he had been.

Dominguez was stepping away from his IV bag, dropping a needle.

“Didn’t think you’d want to miss this Sarge,” she said. Mark saw smart clothes, armor and an AMR next to him.

“Get to your position, thanks Dominguez,” Mark said, tossing off his rags and pulling the clothes back on. There was even two of his blades. He slid them into position under his arms and threw the armor on, getting the leg and chest pieces in place. He pulled it tight with the various straps and catches.

Ammo was already loaded up, so he pulled a helmet on his head and it came alive, the HUD changing to his own settings. Everything was sealed and good to go. He grabbed the AMR, checking it was loaded, and then moved around the turret.

He sighted Chosen wearing powered armor moving through the mining equipment and rubble, attacking any workers they could find. The workers were firing and running, their metal storms did little but dent the powered armor.

Mark sighted Chosen armored moving through the camp, shooting up workers as they ran.

“Take this you PAC fuck,”

The first round made their left shoulder useless, the second hit the helmet. He’d been aiming for the joint, it was weaker than the entire helmet, but it was also hard as fuck to hit.

The PAC stumbled, looking at their arm. Mark bet they were feeling the concussive forces in that tin can helmet. He fired again, hitting them in the knee.

The freighter came in low and dangerous, turrets ripping up the pad and tearing into the powered armor that had made it onto the pad. Their reinforcements were all running back to Mining City Twenty-One, and Diggers were all over the place, ripping the bastards to pieces.

Mark moved onto a new target, firing rapidly at their weak points, they fell and Mark continued on. It was hard to kill someone in powered armor, but easy to maim them. Mark just hoped that his rounds were hitting the fleshy bits inside. Blood loss was a shitty way to die, but the powered armor didn’t have a system to stop bleeding or administer first aid without coming out of the armor fully.

“They’re starting to get organized, make sure your blades are good to go,” Haas said.

Mark looked, seeing a Vibra-Blade beside him as he reloaded.

Haas was right, the powered armor weren’t just jumping all over the place, back handing and shooting people down. They were pushing for the trucks, and the Troopers that lay on them.

Mark kept firing at them, trying to find the ones giving orders, but it was hard to do when everyone was using internal communications instead of plain old shouting.

Mark felt it before he saw it, they surged forward as one, shooting, running and jumping. One went high, Mark knew he was the intended target, and he fired up at them, hitting them twice. They covered their face, instinct taking over instead of training. Mark dropped the AMR and grabbed the Vibra-Blade, it vibrated in his grasp, letting him know it was ready.

The powered armor landed, bringing up their rifle with one hand.

Mark cut up from his side, taking the arm off, then coming down and across the Chosen’s chest then driving it up through. He pulled the blade free, the Chosen falling. Another powered armor wearer landed at Mark’s side. This one didn’t even have their weapon out. They hit Mark’s arm as he turned, their blow bruising him under his armor, but not breaking it. He drove the blade at the Chosen, his left hand behind the pommel acting like a machine press as it cut through the Chosen’s hand. They tried to bat the blade away, and ended up impaled. Mark dragged the blade down and sideways, and the Chosen fell. Mark heard the next powered armor coming at him firing, and Mark jumped, a round hitting his lower leg.

He landed, the Chosen running out of rounds and throwing the gun at Mark. Mark batted it aside, breaking his left hand from the force it was thrown at.

The powered armor jumped, throwing their fist forward to catch Mark unaware, distracted by the gun.

Mark ducked right, bracing the blade with his right hand and left forearm. The blade caught the powered armor in the chest, cutting down to the leg. The Chosen fell, and Mark could hear them screaming inside the armor.

Mark flicked the blood off of his blade and ran towards Niemi who was fighting from the turret, caught in the ring that the heavy machine gun moved on. Mark drove his blade up through the first Chosen’s lower back. Wearing armor, they were all a foot or two taller than Mark.

The first yelled and jumped away, but with their kidney punctured they wouldn’t last long.

Mark cut another’s leg off at the knee and stabbed through the back of their helmet; they dropped lifelessly. Others turned to face Mark, and Niemi took advantage. Using the lower gravity, her jump put her on top of a Chosen’s shoulders. She grabbed their helmet to steady herself and drove her sword into the helmet chest joint.

She jumped off, cutting another’s arm off, turning and slicing down their back.

Nerva had said how fighting with a sword was a dance, with your fists or shorter blades it was a frenzy. Fighting with a sword you needed to disengage, make sure the blade didn’t get caught. It had greater reach, but once it was committed, stopping your attack was almost impossible. With your fists and small blades, you hammered the person fast and quick, and did as much damage as you could, keeping in the person’s sphere.

So Mark danced. His armor was stained red as he jumped sideways onto the ball of his foot, only to come back, point first into his attacker’s side, then continue past, his blade coming around to take a hand off, ducking low, a foot, back up gutting another Chosen.

He and Niemi cleared their attackers, then they looked at one another, nodding before turning to their comrades.

They ran, jumping a dozen feet before they came down behind the rear of the powered armor. Mark felt rounds hit his armor, and he jumped sideways, his HUD picking up the shooter. He ran and leaped, throwing his sword at the man.

Ah shit, Mark thought the man was aiming at him and he didn’t have a blade able to penetrate his armor on him any more.

The Chosen crossed their arms, and Mark’s blade went right through them and into the chest. Mark hit the ground, absorbing it with his legs and rolling, but he was panting from the fighting. The camp had worn him down; he wasn’t anywhere near the condition he should have been. None of the people in the camp were, but they were all fighting.

Mark pulled the blade out of the fallen Chosen, and he saw another powered armor wearing chosen rushing from position to position. Mark ran after them.

A shadow passed over the camp. Combat Shuttles were coming in, and hatches dropped Troopers.

Mark’s target turned, bringing their rifle up. Mark threw himself at the Chosen, hooking his elbow around his neck and driving his blade into their back.

They dropped sideways, and Mark pulled himself up. The Troopers moved through the mess, putting dozens of rounds into the powered armor, and under that, concentrated fire the powered armor broke, with rounds making it inside.

Troopers on top of the trucks were engaged in fighting, with the triple twos at the center of it.

Mark looked around. Diggers were still turning the area around Mining City Twenty-One into a shit show. The shacks were smoking away, lighting up the night sky, and tracers were flying all across Mining City Twenty-One, from tower to tower, to the Combat Shuttles that were strafing the city.

Combat Shuttles looked like thousands of meteors descending from the heavens, with brilliant white flashes back lighting them or turning Combat Shuttle into burning debris.

The maintenance pad was a mess of close combat between powered armor wearing Chosen, un-armored Chosen, Troopers and camp workers.

He entered the fray, cutting someone’s leg off at the hip and putting his blade through their stomach. He was more tired than he’d ever been before, but anger and desperate energy filled him.

***

Jerome dropped onto the powered armor wearer, sinking his blade into their back. They fell, their spinal cord severed, and Jerome jumped away. His blade was stuck in the armor, so he came up with his rifle, firing into a PAC’s helmet.

They stumbled backwards from the impacts, and Jerome continued to move on them. After a dozen rounds the armor cracked and the Chosen started dancing as rounds ricocheted through the internals.

“Clear in my area,” Jerome said. Green Markers were expanding across the maintenance pad, the Chosen’s reinforcements cut off by the excited Diggers.

Combat Shuttles had returned to the carriers and were bringing down supplies, the sky filled with groups of them. Tracers spat from their guns as they raked the Chosen’s positions.

Bandit Two came into a hover over the maintenance pad, its guns twitching to find targets, but no red markers greeted them.

Jerome heard the screams and yells of the workers, all too many of them had been struck down.

Troopers were securing the defenses and working on the workers, and the medics were already inundated with wounded.

“This is going to act as our rest and recovery station. Armorers and techs are inbound to turn this into a defensible position, and see if we can’t use the powered armor laying around. No one steps outside the pad unless you want to become Digger food. All transit is to be done by Combat Shuttle,” Captain Sholtz said, taking command of the area. “Triple Twos meet with me at the main work shed in five.” Sholtz ended the channel.

Jerome, Sasaki and Dooks jogged towards the largest work shed that served the massive mining machines for the shaft mines.

The rest of the section came in, and Mark took a seat on a barrel, pulling off his helmet.

“The hell do you think you’re doing, Sergeant?!” Regiment Sergeant Major Halls barked at Mark’s relaxed position.

Cold anger ran through Jerome as he moved to intercept the man.

“You’re not even wearing your full armor, and you look like you’re barely combat ready. You’re a fucking disgrace to the uniform! Should have you shipped back up to Reclaimer to get back into cryo!” The Regiment Sergeant Major said.

Jerome picked up his pace as Mark stood, and there was something different about him. He didn’t yell at the Sergeant Major; his anger was cold instead of hot.

“Halls,” Sholtz started.

“Take your fucking uniform,” Mark said, ripping off his helmet and armor and tossing it at the man.

“Arrest this man and take him to Reclaimer!” Halls yelled, looking to the Troopers acting as his and Sholtz’s aides.

Some made to move, but stopped as his shirt came off. Seeing the damage to Mark on a video was one thing, seeing it in the flesh was something else. There were scars running all across his back and head, his chest was less scarred but from the way Mark was breathing it was clear he still had broken bones. Even the Sergeant Major looked at Mark in shock.

“Don’t you ever think about trying to stop me from killing Harmony, or I’ll fucking come for you,” Mark said, and it wasn’t a threat, it was a promise. He grabbed his E-12 and walked away.

“Mark,” Captain Sholtz called.

“Go fuck yourself, I’m going to Mining City Twenty-One.”

“Mark!” Haas called. Mark turned towards the man. There wasn’t any emotion on his face, and the sight rocked Jerome to his core.

“Get yourself fixed up. Tyler, go with him,” Haas said.

“Yes sir,” Mark said, nodding to Haas.

“Why that little…” Halls started, his voice growing in volume.

“Shut the fuck up, Halls,” Sholtz said, his voice sharp and low, cutting the Sergeant Major off.

Halls looked to Sholtz in alarm.

“While we were up in our carrier, he was down here in the camps. That video of the man getting towed behind an air car, that was him. So just stow it,”

Jerome and the rest of the platoon grouped together, away from Halls. Jerome knew most of them wanted to take the Regimental Sergeant Major round back and feed him a few punches.

Jerome’s implants told him that the Sergeant Major had been in one combat drop that had consisted three months of conflict and five years of making sure the population got the idea that the Corporations and Troopers were not to be messed with.

Fucking pencil pusher.

***

Tyler caught up with Mark, and hesitated for a second before patting Mark’s back.

“I’m glad you’re safe,” Tyler said.

“Thanks,” he said, his voice dry and low.

The old Mark would have made some quip to show he was okay, even if he wasn’t. Tyler knew something was different. People changed and what Mark had been through; Tyler couldn’t even imagine it.

They walked in silence, happy that the other was okay but also wrapped in their own thoughts.

The medics got hold of Mark, dosing him up, sticking his hands in printers and putting him off to the side.

Tyler went off and grabbed some gear, and returned to find Mark had passed out. The first techs and armorers had landed and they were working to turn the pad as a midway point between the front lines and the carriers. Tyler sat with Mark, he’d looked over him for so many nights while he’d been in the camp that he didn’t want to let him out of his sight now.

Tyler could tell that Mark was different, but he was his brother and he was alive. The rest could wait.

Chapter 48

System Freighter Kelas

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Luke walked into his quarters aboard the Kelas. They were well-appointed, with most items that people wouldn’t have in their normal housing units.

He accessed his implants and the view screens in his office came to life, showing the EMF fleet around Osdal Actual and Osdal Three. All of the communications networks were still working, so all of the information was being sent to Fernix and Housapel, too.

He opened up another window that showed a launch sequence and targeting parameters. He changed the parameters to target one ship, he would get one shot and he didn’t want to waste it. He activated the firing sequence, changing the missile platforms from silent running to firing mode.

The target would see all of the missile platforms, but there would be little that they could do. Luke made sure to check the communications channels against it; he didn’t want this information to go missing. If they were to win the war, Harmony needed to know the strengths and weaknesses of the EMF. To do that they needed to run tests, like shooting a carrier up, or fighting against Troopers with powered armor. Only when they had done that could they learn how to defeat them.

“The freighters are all headed out of the system, we don’t anticipate that any will be stopped on their exit,” Luke’s head bodyguard said. He was staying with Luke until they were clear of the system and well on their way to Housapel.

“Very well. Have lunch prepared, I’m feeling a little hungry, and get the freighters to report their inventories to me,” Luke said.

“Yes sir.” The bodyguard turned away, using his implants to carry out Luke’s orders.

Luke let a smile spread across his features, he was clear of Osdal and he would be going to Housapel. He would have the information they needed to defeat the EMF.

Victory was assured, all they needed to do was wait for the EMF to come to them and crush it.

Chapter 49

EMFC Reclaimer

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

“We’ve got missile platforms coming online!” Denaski said frantically, her hands running across the various control surfaces and using her implants as weapons changed targets.

Conti switched his view to hers, his eyes wide with shock. “How?”

“Must have been lying dead, waiting for a command. Hard to see as anything other than the dead sensor grid, or the hundreds of satellites out here,” Denaski said.

“The fleet is working to cut them down.”

“We’ve got launch!” Denaski said, looking at her screens. The tactical computer had its orders and the weapons were firing, there wasn’t much she could do but watch now.

Conti watched with her, holding his beard to hide his quivering chin.

There were nearly three hundred launchers, each had five missiles. The guns were cutting them down, but many had gotten at least one missile or more off. Most had gotten off their entire magazine.

Every single missile was targeted at EMFC Reclaimer.

Conti slapped a control that made him carrier-wide. “Abandon ship!” Just a few of those missiles could do a lot of damage, and there were hundreds coming at him. “Do everything we can to buy them time,” he said, looking to his bridge crew.

They knew what he was saying and they bent to their tasks. There wasn’t enough time for them to escape and they knew how fragile the bridge was, based up on the exterior of the carrier.

They might be able to get more people off the ship, but they wouldn’t survive.

Denaski turned security firewalls off and ran the computers as fast as they could go. The sensor was tied directly into guns, and as long as a target met the requirements they fired, there was no pause to check.

The other carriers were lending their firepower but EMFC Reclaimer was in the center of the missile launches.

They only had one armored side with guns, they couldn’t fight a battle on two sides.

Combat Shuttles fled the carriers, supply lockers and power plants were thrown free, the most expensive items of the carrier would be recovered by a team later.

The carrier turned to red lighting as it ran on battery power.

Conti looked out of the armor covered glass. The view screens attached to them gave him a panoramic view of the fighting deck. Sea whiz and rail cannons didn’t stop firing, tracers disappearing into the black of space. Missile tubes lit up with missile launches.

Conti had never been prouder of his crew.

The first missile exploded off of the bow, Conti saw it flash into brilliant light, and the carrier shuddered. People were thrown against their harnesses, and the hull was stripped bare of weapon emplacements where the missile had hit.

Another hit to the rear of the ship, in the unarmored side. Red lights lit up the hologram of Reclaimer, they were leaking atmosphere and there were multiple decks open to space. The main engines were down.

Another missile hit he belly of the carrier, ripping up through the hangar blisters, eating through decks.

But the carrier kept fighting, guns blazing away into the darkness of space, leaking atmosphere and debris across Osdal’s orbit.

Conti never saw the missile that exploded off of his unarmored side. It cut through the decks and the bridge as fast as light.

The carriers continued to fight, her bridge crew dead. The tactical computers kept going.

Four missiles slammed into the flight deck. They cracked the carrier and sections tumbles apart.

Still those guns fired, running on batteries. They cut down missile after missile until they were out of ammunition and a missile finally reached them.

Chapter 50

Processing Station five

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

The fighting was fierce. There were powered armor-wearing fucks everywhere; the metal storm rifles weren’t that good at taking them down, but they took the Chosen bastards without armor just fine.

There weren’t many Troopers but they were deadly bastards, as Felicia was learning. They ran at the powered armor bearing fucking swords.

The swords cut through anything they touched with enough force. The Troopers didn’t always fare that well, but then they could actually kill the powered armor wearing units. The mining groups kept them and the unarmored Chosen pinned down and the Troopers ran from engagement to engagement.

Alarms started going off on Felicia’s implants because she was still linked to Gold Runner. She got into cover and started changing her barrels out.

“Shit,” she said as she watched Reclaimer’s dying throes as missile after missile hit the massive carrier. Debris and ejected resources were all over Osdal’s orbit.

Missiles were exploding all over the place, they’d all been targeted on Reclaimer and they weren’t smart enough to try and find new targets, thankfully. They smashed into one another or were destroyed by EMF weapon fire. They hit shuttles and debris here and there by dumb luck.

Felicia didn’t keep watching, she made sure all the barrels were seated in the rifle and turned the corner, firing on the Chosen.

PAC’s advanced, firing from the hip and spraying from the hip.

Cocky fuckers, she thought, ducking into cover, rounds hammering on the corner she hid behind.

Grenade launchers went off, their dull thumps belying their effect.

Powered armor staggered the explosions, throwing them back, Repulsor gunners fired at the stunned PAC’s, adding to the major concussion most of them were probably going through. The powered armor did the ‘dead man’s dance’, a term that had been coined by many.

She saw more powered armor come from behind her position and she was about to fire on them when she noticed they had Trooper ranks and symbols on their shoulders and their names printed on their fronts. They had extra armor on them and used cover; the Chosen in powered armor acted like bullets couldn’t hurt them any more. The fact that the metal-storm rifles couldn’t get through anything except their joints kind of made that an annoying reality.

The powered armor ran past the miners and Troopers, bearing swords, and crashed into the Chosen forces.

The miners cheered, and the Troopers moved up to cover their buddies.

Some guys wearing less armor and a cart came and grabbed the powered armor Chosen and started hauling them off.

They’re converting them for use, she thought, not wanting to get in a dead man’s armor.

The miners followed, adding themselves to the fray, and the fighting was quick and furious. The powered armor wearing Troopers bowled through the Chosen and kept going. Felicia called a rest; the miners had been fighting for hours and it was draining work.

“Alright, let’s clear this damn station,” Felicia said, getting to her feet as Troopers carried in a disheveled looking woman, her space suit was torn and burnt, her lip was cut and there were multiple wounds on her already. She was yelling and trying to hurt the powered armor Troopers with her fists and feet.

“Thought you might want this one,” one of the Troopers said.

“Hello, Emilie Castillo,” Felicia said, stepping on a barricade and leaning forward at Emilie.

Emilie’s eyes went wide as she looked at the asteroid miners. Felicia could feel them moving closer, like a pack of asteroid miners right before a beat-down.

“Throw her out like the rest of the trash,” Felicia said, her lip curling in disgust.

“Very well,” one of the Troopers said, and the woman’s struggles increased with panic.

Felicia and her miners followed, a few recorded the moment, and Felicia let them get a better position.

The Troopers tossed her into the airlock, the door shutting behind her. Felicia worked the panel, turning off the safety features. Emilie hammered on the airlock door, screaming and crying.

“For your crimes, we the people of Fernix sentence you to death,” Felicia said, looking Emilie in the eyes, and pressing a button on the airlock’s controls.

Felicia knew she would never forget that moment as overwhelming fear filled Emilie and she disappeared from view, the vacuum of space ripping her from the airlock. Felicia watched as she tumbled out into space.

It was a hollow victory. Felicia felt somehow tainted with the experience, but she would have done it a hundred times again. The image of the Dudayev family still filled her mind.

“Come on, we have a station to clear still.”

Chapter 51

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Ortiz felt his jaw grinding as he looked up at the dissipating explosion and new meteors that tumbled through Osdal’s atmosphere. They were the only remaining markers of EMFC Reclaimer. Other than the supplies that had been evacuated and the Combat Shuttles that got free or were on operations, there wasn’t anything left of the Reclaimer larger than an office desk.

It had been Ortiz’s home for twenty-seven years, now it was gone.

Don’t have time to think on that. He looked back to his maps, which were telling a nasty story. His forces were engaged with powered armor, they were in close combat, blades against armor. There were too many of the powered armor wearing Chosen to make it a fair fight, and his forces were getting hammered and pushed back.

Everyone was erecting fall back positions to channel the powered armor and reduce the amount that they had to fight at one time.

Ortiz ducked as a screamer went off, exploding in the middle of a group of powered armor Chosen that were running from one tower to another.

Eight times out of ten they could make it from tower to tower, their armor was good enough to take a few hits from the Repulsors and E-12s, hell it took a few shots to the chest plate to even get through.

He looked to the maintenance pad where Captain Sholtz was. They were quickly cleaning out the powered armor they had, slapping armor-up kits they’d made, and installing new operating software. It wasn’t the fastest process, but the Troopers would be better armored and have better control than the Chosen. They were also trained and bloodied in real fights. Ortiz was hoping that was enough of an advantage.

He looked to Alexis’s direct feed. It was a constant rolling update on supplies she had, the wounded and dead as well as when Combat Shuttles were moving all of the above.

New Screamers had come in, so he sent priority orders to have them distributed to his hardened position on the one hundred and seventy third floor.

Ortiz tried to ignore that number. God, I fucking hate heights.

He glanced back up to the meteors falling from the carrier. He took a moment, remembering the people up there, and then went back to his reports. He needed to focus on the wounded; the tears and pain could come later.

***

Mark’s eyes snapped open, and he looked around. Most people were looking up, so he fired up his implants and followed their gaze to the cloud of debris. His implants showed him the last minutes of EMFC Reclaimer, sped up.

He got to his feet, and his body was better than it had been in months yet he felt heavy, the familiar feeling of knowing he wouldn’t see people ever again running through him.

He remembered the bridge crew, he knew that they wouldn’t have left the bridge, in order to buy the crew every second they could.

Tyler was there next to him, he stood as well.

Mark grabbed his brother, hugging him tight, emotions welling up inside him. Tyler held onto him thumping his back.

“Fuck, I was scared Mark,” Tyler said, his voice thick with emotion.

“Don’t worry, I’m here now,” Mark said, they embraced one another again before releasing.

“Should probably stay away from Halls from now on. We’re getting powered armor and then moved to support Mining City Twenty-One. It’s Sacremon all over again, but this time they’ve got powered armor and weapons that’ll punch through our armor,” Tyler said.

“Much better than shotguns that shoot explosive shells,” Mark sighed, pulling a smart cloth shirt over his frame. The printers had been already taken away, other people needed them more than him. His fingers were back in place, and he barely even noticed that they had been replaced.

“Course,” Tyler said, starting to walk towards one of the work sheds, getting out of the way of wounded that were coming in on Combat Shuttles landing on a cleared section of the maintenance pad. Wind from the engines blew dust everywhere.

At one side there was what was left of the previous operators and techs, cleaning them out to get to the servo motors and other bits they needed to get the powered armor in working order. Then there were other techs taking off the armor, leaving the exoskeleton bare, and techs checked the systems before the new operating system was uploaded and better batteries connected. Armor kits, basically armor that covered the entire exo-skeleton, were welded into place.

Then the whole thing was booted up, tests run and you had one functional Trooper grade powered armor.

The suits came out with stronger armor covering the weak points that they’d never learned about from Masoul and an operating system that made controlling them a hell of a lot easier.

An ammunition pack was also connected to the clips that one would see on normal armor. These were connected to Repulsors with a sling that allowed the user to drop the gun but not lose it. Vibra-Blade

Troopers were already climbing into them, and someone was coming around with a laser cutter, burning names into people’s breast plates.

The Triple Twos were armoring up and grouped around a mess table, devouring hot food, slapping on ammunition and getting ready to go out. Tyler dropped off his armor in some bins that had been set up, passing his gun to an armorer that went to secure it in the portable weapon racks they’d brought down to the planet.

Mark stepped backwards into a set of powered armor roughly his size. He didn’t care for the red stains inside from the last user. The armor closed around him and locked into place easily enough, then his helmet came down. Tt wasn’t the metal hat that the Chosen were using.

It was based on the Troopers’ regular helmets, padded and with the same HUD, extra armor and no visor, but with armor plates and interwoven cermite layers.

Inside it looked like Mark had just put on his regular helmet. He moved the actuators, his hands a few extra inches long.

His checks read good as he stepped out of the charging cradle and walked forward. He checked the Vibra-Blade came free from the left side of his ammunition pack and checked his Repulsor had good movement as he walked over to the rest of the platoon. He opened his helmet up again as the person with the etcher came over.

“Name?”

“Diablo,” Mark said, keeping his arms out of the way.

The person’s eyes flickered, but they got the etchers working, carving the name into the armor.

Tyler got his S.W.A.S. across his chest.

Haas signaled Mark to come to the side, away from the others. “Mark, I need to know if you’re good or not. We’re going right into the deep end as usual, and I need you at 100%. They need you at 100%.”

“I’m good to go, Sir, just give me some Chosen to fight and you’ll see a happy man.”

Haas looked at Mark, slowly nodding to himself. “Alright, don’t do anything stupid,” he said, tapping Mark’s shoulder. “It’s good to have you back.” Business done, he became Haas the man, not the Trooper.

“It’s good to be back,” Mark said, turning, the two of them moving to the platoon.

“Alright, we’re getting a ride right into the middle of Twenty-Two Division. They need help and we’re it until they can scrape more Chosen out of these things,” Haas said.

Mark saw that Moretti wasn’t around; he assumed that he was off in some office pouring over information and trying to get it to the leaders on the ground.

Mark grabbed meal replacement bars, nodding to Jerome, greeting the others that caught his eye silently and joining his section.

“Our normal ride is banged up to shit, so we’re taking whatever Combat Shuttle is hea...” Haas paused, his eyes going blank. “Our ride’s just in, let’s move it, we’ll brief as we go.”

Mark stuffed the bar in his face, closing his helmet and following Haas out of the work shed.

They naturally broke down into sections, Mark chewing furiously. Someone seemed to have sorted out the worst of his broken teeth by simply removing them.

“Fuck this, if I ever lose all my teeth I’m eating soup for the rest of my life,” he growled, using mostly his gums to try and pull the bar apart. The others laughed, and Mark sensed relief in that laughter.

“Shit, open channel,” Mark apologized as he kept trying to get the obstinate bar down his friggin’ throat.

Gonna have heart burn today, he thought, knowing that he was trying to distract his own brain from worse thoughts.

“The Powered Armored Chosen, or PACs, are newbies, think they’re fucking God, haven’t been tried and tested in anyway.

“Thing stops their guns, so they wade into oncoming fire, all shooting from the hip and shit. I don’t want to give them time to learn. We need to stop their advance and then get on the offensive. The more we kill of them, the more sets of armor we can convert. We have enough armor kits to change out 300,000 powered armor units. Ortiz doesn’t want them to go to waste and neither do I,” Haas said, stopping as medics ran between, moving stretchers to where wounded Troopers lay, or for the occasional walking wounded that had lost a limb or two.

Mark understood their faces. Losing a limb wasn’t a big deal, most people had done it more than once. They were just pissed that they had to be pulled back from the front lines to get patched back together.

“How many Troopers we got in the PA?” Jerome asked, referring to the powered armor.

“About a thousand, we’re a valuable resource for the time being,” Haas said, walking out as the tail of the medical cases left. He double-timed it to the cleared area, where the Combat Shuttles were setting down. Two haloed shuttles came into view.

Haas continued on his dash. “One and three with me, two and four with Zukic.”

They slowed down, each step was taking them a couple of feet in the air. Jerome and Mark were the last to board, taking the seat closes to the edge of the loading ramp. They were off and flying before their asses hit fabric.

The ramp didn’t even fully close as Osdal passed underneath, the shuttle’s engines howling. The Diggers had calmed down now that the sonic noises had been dialed back. They’d been tuned to make the Diggers think it was mating season.

Mark looked at the burned out shacks, a black Mark on the red landscape. He could pick out where he’d lived for the past months, where Caroline’s body was.

He looked away; he couldn’t let those emotions cloud his judgement.

A few quick breaths and those tears were pushed into submission. Anger filled him, he would destroy Harmony so that Caroline and people like her could live their lives peacefully. Whoever dared to shake that peace using violence as their terms, Mark would be there, rifle in hand and anger in his heart.

“Two minutes!” the Cargo master said, and Mark felt the weapons systems of the Combat Shuttle open up, the wind coming in from the open ramp making it nearly impossible to hear.

He checked his gear, taking a breath and clearing his mind. Then he checked his gear again, and looked over the information coming back on his HUD, showing different real time tactical maps of Mining City Twenty-One.

Chapter 52

Tower

Earth, Sol System

8/3267

Mark wasn’t the only person checking those tactical screens. Nivad would know he was looking at the varying feeds of millions of people watching the fight going on at Osdal Actual.

He took a sharp intake of breath as he saw the EMFC Reclaimer hit with hundreds of missiles, turning the proud and historic carrier into nothing but an expanding fireball. He hoped that the resources from the ship could be recovered. It was not cheap to make carriers.

He kept watching, though the video was being heavily censored, he didn’t want to give the enemy more information than possible. He wanted to keep people inspired. They were running the tapes of the miners and the Troopers working together.

There were clips of the camp workers, emancipated people that had been hard worked and barely fed, hugging Troopers in full armor and carrying loaded weapons. It was a moving sight to see, at least that’s what the Public Relations people were saying. They were spinning this for everything it was worth.

He watched a video of Mark Victor firing a machine gun from the defensive position he had apparently erected. He looked like hell, but even then he had engaged in fighting PACs with a vibra sword. The man was a natural born killer. His feeds had the largest viewing out of any other Trooper. There were various forums where people were talking about him, but his information hadn’t been given out. They wanted to hold that off until later, maybe it would make a fitting reveal if he died after all of this.

Nivad made a note and continued to scan through the various maps. While it looked like the battle was only going for the Troopers, the reality wasn’t as pretty.

On Osdal Actual, 50,000 Troopers had already died, not including the ones on the carrier Reclaimer. The numbers from the various stations were messy, but were believed to be around 5,000.

Osdal Three was going better than expected, the damp climate was hell on the PAs systems. Most of the units worked, or barely so. The Troopers were rushing through the enemy lines, smashing key locations then moving to another location and doing it again. The Chosen could only react to the Troopers, making them unable to counter attack like in the mining cities on Osdal Actual.

Troopers in PA were getting tossed into the front; they needed to turn the Chosen’s powered armor away. There was an estimated 3,000,000 Chosen in Osdal, and about 700,000 of them had powered armor. The Troopers only had 600,000 Troopers left and only a thousand of them were wearing powered armor.

Turning the Chosen’s armor against them was a stroke of genius; it also saved Nivad having to produce it.

He opened up a running report, and even with their current losses Nivad was still making a good profit off Osdal.

He checked the progress of the Colony ship. It was still decades away, but now Nivad was largely certain that the asteroid miners and the camp workers could get the colony moving in the right direction.

He was still wondering how the transition would go once the high powered CEOs reached the system. Nivad knew that certain accommodations would have to be made, probably putting a number of the mining leadership in CEO positions as well as forgiving most debt.

If we work it right, then we might be able to start some competing businesses in the system. Competition was good for business; it meant more money going into Earth and Her Colonies government coffers. It also meant that Nivad had more opportunities to broker power between the groups. If the Osdal partnership weren’t doing the best, then Nivad could threaten them with another company already set up in system taking over contracts.

He glanced back at the tactical maps and feeds. He didn’t really care how many Troopers died, as long as they put that planet under EHC and his, control.

Chapter 53

EMFC Fearless

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Yu made sure that his smart clothes were good. He felt like he needed a shower and a case of beer, but now wasn’t the time for that. He made sure that the freighter was powered down and its maintenance hatches were open. Young got out of her seat and slid down the railing that ran from the cockpit to the cargo bay.

Yu followed her out; Bobbie had the ramp and airlock open, and he was already out of the freighter and moving towards their new ride.

The hangar was a mass of movement. Combat Shuttles landed and took off, wounded were pulled off, lines were run to the shuttle’s magazines and supplies were shoved in.

A few Troopers that had already been put back together by the carrier’s medics were coming out of the massive air locks with new armor and smart clothes.

Yu checked his E-12 as he followed Bobbie to their new Combat Shuttle Three Seven Eight, their original shuttle had been on Reclaimer, being used as parts. When the carrier had been blown to bits, their shuttle had gone with it.

Yu glanced back at the freighter, it was still a large beastie. Holes riddled her sides and her weapons lay out, deadly and waiting for action.

Burn marks showed where her missile ports lay. Bandit one had been one hell of a lady, but Yu needed something able to hit harder and fly faster to keep his Troopers alive.

He ran through the cargo bay, it was loaded with medical equipment and ammunition. Bobbie was checking the tie-ins to the decking, and Young was up in the cockpit, turning the bird on.

He could see consoles coming to life as he hauled himself up the cockpit ladder. He stowed his rifle and got into his seat, pulling a harness over him. Young was running start-up tests already. Yu moved different controls and looked out of the windows and used his sensors to make sure that all of the right stuff was moving according to his inputs. Everything looked good.

“Cargo is locked in and good to go, sealing up,” Bobbie reported.

“Weapons are good to go,” Young added.

“Power is looking good and controls are responsive,” Yu said, opening a channel to Fearless’ flight control.

“Flight Control this is,” Yu paused, looking for the Combat Shuttle’s number for a moment. “Combat Shuttle Three Seven Eight, requesting clearance,” Yu finished.

“Sending flight plan now,” Flight Control said, in clipped tones, cutting the channel. They had a lot to deal with.

“Flight plan looks good, going to be a bit close in places,” Young said looking the plan over as Yu applied power to the shuttle’s engines and thrusters, threading his new ride through the wire-frame check points that showed up in his HUD.

It felt weird flying the Combat Shuttle, he’d got used to the freighter.

They came out, a Combat Shuttle flying past them just a few feet from their side. Yu wanted to jerk away but then he’d be in another shuttle’s way. Space might be big, but the room on a carrier’s flight deck was at a premium at any given time, and in combat operations it was a carefully ballet, with multi-ton Combat Shuttles loaded with enough ammunition to make anyone have a really bad day.

Yu continued on his path, two more close encounters and their wire-frame checkpoints got larger and Yu applied the power, throttling for Osdal below.

The cities looked like they had when he’d first seen the planet, just another colony town of towers turned into a swirl.

Now he knew that instead of people walking around those towers, there were Chosen and Troopers fighting it out. Anyone that was smart was getting the hell out of their way. He didn’t have much mercy for the people that were in those cities anyway. They’d allowed their friends or, at the very least, people they knew, get thrown into camps that had worked them to death.

Yu put that to the back of his mind as he hit atmosphere. He needed to get used to the shuttle’s controls again, and fast.

He looked at his heading, he was going to Mining City Nine. He knew it was only a matter of time until he was sent to Twenty-One. The city was an entire war zone, and unlike the other cities, there were no civilians running around.

Though I don’t think anyone is caring that much about civilians in the other cities either.

Chapter 54

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

8/3267

Alexis saw the PA Troopers storm past her position, but she couldn’t give them more than a glance, as she barked out new orders to a Trooper hauling in their buddy. They took the person to the triage area.

A hole had been blown into the landing pad above the floor, Troopers hauled wounded up through the hole instead of tackling the stairs.

She checked her implants, there was a new alert of an incoming shuttle, so she made sure that a new load of wounded were ready to go with the shuttle. They were dropping off armorers, techs and their tools.

They hauled off their own gear and Alexis ran through reports, checking who needed to go to a carrier and who could be sent to the maintenance pad, who could be fixed in her Casualty collection area.

While the other officer ranks dealt with the forward battle, the Sergeant Majors and Warrants dealt with the battle at the rear, getting the supplies up to those on the front and taking those that could no longer fight up there. It was fast as all hell and kept her on her feet.

Another two shuttles came in, with more powered armor. She set up another transfer, these ones were going to the maintenance pad.

The platoon ran past her room, at least they were supposed to be a platoon, but they looked to be a quarter of their full standing strength. She looked at her reports, and her breath caught in her throat as she focused on the powered Armor. They were gone faster than she could call up their identification chips.

Give them hell, Triple Twos, she thought, pushing her emotions aside. She couldn't think on the people in that platoon, the wounded and ever-piling supplies needed her attention.

***

“Triple Twos on station and moving into position,” Haas said through Ortiz’s helmet.

“Good to hear you’re hanging around Haas, move up to the forward lines and be ready to press forward. Link up with Lieutenant Szerba, I’m working to get you some air support,” Ortiz said, checking his request with Flight Control to higher.

A green light flashed over Haas’ name as he cut the channel.

Ortiz peered around the corner of his defenses. The level he was on was hell, tracers tore through the air, Troopers were being thrown back, casings were all over the ground. Explosions shook the floor, ripping walls apart and throwing dust everywhere.

They were in an open office space getting pushed back into the cafeteria on the floor. Techs were already working, spraying everything they could with their spray-ite.

Screamers ripped through the air and smashed into the advancing powered armor. They were one of the few weapons that actually worked. The Troopers stayed low as they moved, so as to not get in the way of the AMR users that were hitting the powered armor.

E-12s and Repulsors spat out rounds, but it took long, concentrated bursts to cut through armor. Few if any were taking their time to aim carefully and hit the joints of the PACs, they were too scared, pulling back and firing everything they could to try and slow or stave off the ever-advancing powered armor.

“Major Ortiz, this is Combat Shuttle Three Seven Eight; heard you need some fire power on target. We are inbound to your location. Heard your message over the wide band,” the co-pilot said, telling Ortiz that Flight Control hadn’t given them permission, but they were ready to go for it if Ortiz needed it.

“Understood Three Seven Eight, be ready for targets momentarily,” Ortiz said, keeping the channel open and linking his tactical views to them. The co-pilot could refine them down to her pilot and cargo master.

“Szerba, how are we looking?” Ortiz said, breaking into the Sergeant’s channel.

“Ready and waiting sir.”

“Very well, you have the green light, Combat Shuttle Three Seven Eight is on standby for fire mission, linking you to them,” Ortiz said, doing so.

A Trooper tapped him, signalling they needed to move or else they would be caught on the front lines.

Ortiz fired short controlled bursts at the PACs, pulling back when they started firing on his position. He turned, keeping low and running. The office seemed to be coming apart, the PACs had come through the line in several places, turning it into chaos.

He turned a corner, finding PACs rushing through office cubicles. He fired his grenade launcher at them, his aides doing the same. A round hit the aide in front of Ortiz. Ortiz grabbed them and kept going.

“Linked up and good to go, moving forward,” Szerba said.

Ortiz looked to the man he was carrying; his vitals were black, his head just held on by tendons.

“Fuck,” he spat, letting the man down and grabbing his E-12. The PAC’s burst out of the offices ahead of Ortiz and his aide’s.

“Get down!” a Trooper yelled to Ortiz and his aides.

Ortiz dropped to the ground, firing at the trio of PACs focused on him.

A screamer ripped down the corridor they were in, blowing out the windows with the pressure wave.

The PACs were backlit by the screamer, and the floor and roof had impact craters on them from the explosion. The PACs were burning metal and cooked meat.

“I’ve always like my meat a little charred, get moving Troopers!” Ortiz said. When death just gave you a smile and you kicked him right back in the face, there’s not much you can do but smile back at the bastard.

Not yet, you wide toothed bald mother fucker, Ortiz thought, the Trooper aides following him down the hall.

“Gangway!” Speakers cut through the weapons fire and explosions that were tearing the building apart.

Ortiz moved to the side of the hallway as powered armor came careening around the corner, overlapping armor plates, etched symbols and their IFF reading them as Troopers.

While they were moving fast they weren’t hip-firing their weapons, they toted their Repulsors as if they were E-12s up and ready.

Powered armor that must have seen the trio get washed away by the screamer appeared out of the massive hole that had been expanded by the rocket’s explosion.

The PA Troopers didn’t give them time to react, they fired and moved forward. The PACs took their hits, firing back wildly, a few rounds found the Troopers but they just left dents and scorch marks on their armor.

Ortiz sent them silent luck, turning to his feeds once again. The non PA wearing Troopers were sitting back behind the cafeteria defenses and through the offices and school on opposite sides. The PA Troopers were moving through, cutting off the PACs where they’d broken through the lines and giving Troopers time to reorganize.

Once they had a firm line, Ortiz was going to get platoons to trail after the PA Troopers and start hauling PACs to the techs and armorers. They needed the armor and they weren’t above stripping it off of the Chosen to get it.

***

Jerome moved up with his platoon, they were acting as the reserve for Lieutenant Szerba. He was from another carrier, and in his conversations with Haas he didn’t sound like he knew how to use them.

Jerome and the rest of the platoon wanted to prove themselves, having the Lieutenant think of them as a liability instead of a strong platoon grated on their nerves. They weren’t about to disobey orders to do so, so they trailed after the leading PA sections that were quickly engaging and clearing behind the Trooper’s lines.

“Spread out right, we’re past the other section that are being held back by PACs,” Haas said.

In their eagerness to close with the enemy and push them back, the sections were rushing past their fellows, leaving openings in their rear.

All of the triple twos worked as if they were in their regular armor; it was slower going, but they were in more cover, harder to see and hit, and they could react and fire at threats easily.

Jerome was far left, opposite where the forward section was engaged with PACs. There wasn’t much fighting going on, he was just ten or twenty meters from the front lines but it seemed like he was in a twilight zone as he peered out of an office cubicle, looking out over the dozens that were strewn about the place, some intact, most showing bullet holes and blast radius from explosives.

“Contact, five PACs moving from my position rearward,” Jerome said, seeing PACs wandering through the offices, not even trying to hide their extra height.

Jerome fired at the lead PAC’s head, on his HUD Sasaki and Dooks moved up to either side of him, adding to his firepower.

The PACs sprayed the offices, and as their guns ran empty the PACs charged, Jerome’s first target went down and he switched to one charging him.

His and Sasaki’s rounds took them down, Dooks’ gun jammed and Jerome saw his Vibra-Blade come free in the corner of his eye.

Shit, too late to pull my blade, Jerome thought, firing on the two that were charging him and Sasaki.

Then they were on top of him.

“Check fire!” Tyler said.

“Don’t you fucking dare shoot me in the ass!” Dashtund added. Ali followed his two section mates crashing through the offices around Jerome, and hitting the PACs. The PACs were so focused on Sasaki and Jerome, that they were caught off guard.

Blades swung and plunged. Tyler cut one along the side and then buried his blade in their back. Dashtund and Ali had cut the other down.

The final PAC that had charged Dooks went flying back.

“Motherfucker,” Dooks said, cleaning his blade with a flick.

“Advancing,” Mark said, Repulsors raised and moving towards where the PACs had come from.

Haas and Zukic were checking everyone over, Haas reporting to higher and Zukic checking that Dook’s gun was in working order.

Tyler’s section cleaned their blades and put them away.

“Thanks,” Jerome said.

“No worries,’ Tyler shifted his Repulsor back into his hands.

“I’ve got movement on the right flank,” Holm reported.

“Tyler, help them out, move in and make sure they’re not more PACs breaking through the lines,” Haas said.

Tyler and his section moved quick and low towards Holm’s position.

“Gun’s good,” Dooks said, him and Zukic fixing whatever was wrong with it.

Jerome kicked himself for not ordering them to draw blades when the PACs had charged, he’d been too focused on shooting, thinking that would take the bastards down. “Looks like we’re going to have to go medieval on these fuck heads,” he said, checking his blade would come free if he needed it.

“You got that, Sarge,” Sasaki agreed.

“Looks like there aren’t any more of them,” Mark sounded almost disappointed.

“Stay frosty, we’ve got holes all over the place, people are charging down the enemy that they see instead of advancing in line,” Haas said.

“Like a fucking sieve,” Dominguez growled.

Units from sections to platoons and the company at large were all over the floor, engaged in various firefights. Their job had just become to make sure that no one got past their position, or they’d be right in the rearguard of the Troopers lines. Having PAs among their wounded and supply areas was not a happy thought.

“Well this is messy,” Ko volunteered, Mark’s section moving back to Jerome’s.

“Contact!” Bairamov called out, Repulsor fire ripping across the right flank of the platoon’s front.

New targets appeared, and Jerome’s instinct was to turn and help his buddies out, in reality he stayed where he was and looked out over the left flank. If he turned and looked, then the PACs could come in behind them.

He had to trust that Holm and Tyler’s section were able to defeat the enemy to their front.

“Zukic, start getting to work on a defensive posi...” The entire level shook, dust and debris blew out through doorways to the platoon’s front.

“Get that position set up so we catch the stragglers, and send someone to find out what the fuck that was,” Haas said, heading to Holm and Tyler’s side to control the fire fight there.

“Mark, Niemi, find out what that was. Jerome, take the remainder, put out security and start making defensive position. I want it along this line,” Zukic said, making a line that went across the offices they were in and up the side facing a large open hallway.

“Ko, I want you to remain here, clear yourself a firing position, Dominguez I want you to act as link man, Sasaki take the corner of the offices, Dooks I want you along the office wall ready to cut people down using that school or corridor to run through on our left,” Jerome said, placing them over the roughly L-shaped area.

They passed through the wide doorways, their glass doors flung off into the hallway between the office they were holing up in and an identical set across the hall. There was heavy weapons fire up ahead.

“Shit,” Zukic said. Jerome checked positions and helped to break open walls and office cubicles so the gunners had good views.

“Clear on our side,” Holm reported. Iliev was showing yellow, but everyone else was brilliant green.

Just how I like it, Jerome thought.

“The PACs just blew a hole in the floor and they’re moving to the rear of the rest of the company,” Mark yelled. Jerome could hear his and Niemi’s Repulsors opening up.

“Understood, I’ve got reports of the PACs using vibra swords and crude melee weapons. They’re not that good with them, but they have enough strength to pierce our armor,” Zukic was calm and reassuring.

“I’ve just talked to the section to our right, they’ll secure that area and hold,” Haas said.

“Going to have to pull back soon,” Mark muttered.

Jerome saw that Holm and Tyler were moving down to add to the rough line he’d created.

“We’ll draw them to us and then call the bird in that we have ready on fire mission,” Haas said. It was a simple plan, Jerome liked simple plans, less to fuck up.

New markers were added to Jerome’s view; the powered armor had just run into the Chosen’s heavy machine guns. Thankfully not many of them had been fully set up, but they were a right bitch to deal with. They didn’t have the punching power of a Repulsor, but their weight was enough to ring anyone's bell inside an armored helmet.

Zukic ran out to the opposite hallway, tossing breaching charges on the walls, their putty backing made them stick.

“Pulling back, they’re not happy,” Mark said.

He and Niemi must have thrown out sensor sticks; Jerome could see the oncoming PAC’s halos through the cubicle he was squatting next to.

“Contacts,” Sasaki said. Dooks was the better gunner, but with his Repulsor being funky, Jerome wanted him to have time to fix his gun if he needed to.

So Sasaki, laying down under a desk, got to see the corridor running between the open area, school and offices, as well as the hallway that cut across their front and made their forward line.

Jerome saw more red haloes appearing on his HUD, so he moved in between Dominguez and Sasaki, laying down and punching out a murder hole.

He saw Mark and Niemi come bursting out of the opposing offices, most of the walls had been ripped apart showing the strewn offices in the other side. Mark and Niemi quickly got down and facing the direction that they’d come. Rounds ripped through the offices’ remaining walls and well above the prone Troopers.

A few PACs ran out of rounds, Jerome only knew because of the metal storm rifles being thrown like javelins at where the PACs thought Mark and Niemi were.

Fine motor skills in powered armor were atrocious, reloading was an absolute bitch and it seemed like the PACs didn’t even want to reload.

They almost made it to the edge of the offices, and the breaching charges went off, throwing the armor back.

No one needed to give an order, the entire line opened up on the PACs just twenty feet away.

They were stunned and shocked seeing their buddies go down in their invincible armor. The real panic and anger set in after a few seconds, when more people started going down under the red-lines of tracers.

The PA surged forward again, picking up momentum, and they were cut down in the tens. They had little to no cover and the Troopers could see them, even if they were hiding.

“Blades!” Haas called.

Jerome surged to his feet, grabbing his blade.

Seconds later, a PAC came flying through the wall he’d been hiding behind. He was swinging his metal storm rifle like it was a club. Jerome moved to the side and cut at the PAC, blood staining their armor and his blade. Jerome moved in, slashing at the downed PAC, ending it by cutting through the PAC’s helmet.

Another tried to jump on Jerome, but he turned in time, interposing his blade and letting them skewer themselves. He hit the ground, dust and debris thrown away by his weight and the weight of the PAC on top of him.

He threw them off, but his blade was stuck and a PAC’s metal storm rounds were pinging off his armor.

Jerome grabbed his Repulsor, swinging it on target to the PAC and opened fire. The rounds hammered into the PAC, cutting them down. Jerome stood over the PAC with his blade still in them, firing at the PACs as they charged.

It was a melee of weapons fire, blades; hell, people were even punching one another in their powered armor and tumbling around the ground.

Jerome didn’t see any more targets he could fire on without hitting one of his own people. He planted a boot in his old opponent’s breastplate and heaved his blade out.

A PAC smashed into his side, sending Jerome sprawling. They hammered on Jerome frantically, and Jerome had lost his sword, holding his arms up trying to stop the PAC from breaking his helmet and then his head. “Risk it for the biscuit!” He slapped the floor with his servo enhanced strength, leaving dents in the floor. The PAC bastard had their legs around Jerome’s midriff. Instead of getting clear, Jerome was now the one on top.

They hit one another frantically, both of them fighting to stay alive. Jerome felt something bang against his side.

Repulsor!

He threw himself sideways, grabbing the Repulsor. The PAC turned to face Jerome as Jerome pulled the trigger.

The person was yelling. Jerome took mercy and shot upwards. Their screams stopped and Jerome got to his feet, grabbing his sword from nearby and charging into the fray. He could see more PACs coming from the hole they’d made in the floor. Right now, his platoon, barely a section all told, were between them and the rear echelon. The cafeteria was still a hundred meters in front. The armored company of Troopers was spread from there to two hundred meters in front of the main lines.

There were no more defensive lines, the entire level was one big fray of fighting. There wasn’t any rear, meaning no fresh supplies could get in, or wounded out.

Jerome hoped that they could hold long enough for the newly armored people from the maintenance pad to form up and storm through the lines.

***

“Fuck,” Young said, looking at her screens.

“What?” Yu focused on flying the Combat Shuttle, one heavy machine gun position seemed to go down and two more took their place. As long as the gunners survived, then they had dozens of positions to pick between. It was giving Yu a headache.

“Bastards broke through the floor and are jumping up into the rear of the Troopers. There’s two sections of PA holding the PACs back, but they’re on borrowed time. I don’t see any firing solutions on the floor,” Young’s frustration was palpable.

A new heavy machine gun tired to tag Combat Shuttle Three Seven Eight. Her new paint job was being broken in nicely, with an array of blast marks and weapon dents.

The auto turrets reacted and fired on the position; Bobbie seemed to be using one to rake a floor as they went past.

“What about the floor below?” Yu asked.

“That’ll work, just dump missiles in, stop more getting in and reinforcing. Hopefully they can hold out for reinforcements,” Young said. She didn’t sound all that hopeful.

“Well, let’s do what we can to help them out. I’ll get the cannons on the office space they’re coming out of, hopefully that’ll be enough,” Yu said, throwing them sideways, then banking hard right around a tower and pushing the throttle to the max to gun it out of the city.

“You’ve got a minute,” he said, banking around and coming back at the city. He was supposed to have dropped his supplies and returned to Fearless. But everyone was well stocked for supplies and the Troopers needed a fire mission. If someone had a problem, they could court-martial him later.

“I’m good to go,” Young said.

“Loaded and ready,” Bobbie said. The turret rarely stopped firing, just switched targets, throwing tracers at the heavy machine gun’s competing lines.

“Here we go,” Yu said, pushing the engines past their limits. They were always underrated by about twenty or thirty percent of their true high speed, but it burnt out their engines in a matter of hours instead of years. Reaching those top speeds required a handy little hack that all self-respecting Combat Shuttle crews knew.

The Combat Shuttle roared into the city, cutting past towers that got ever taller in their spiral up to the central tower.

The missile racks ripple fired as Yu got a firing solution with his auto cannons. Missiles ripped into one floor, tearing the windows apart and sending plumes of fire out of the opposite side and up through the different stairwells. Auto cannon rounds ripped into the floor above. Yu didn’t see if they hit anything but he knew if they did they were nothing but mangled armor and pink mist. More missiles hit the lower floors. Yu banked and dropped, cutting his forward speed, and throwing everyone into their harnesses. Their attack run seemed to bring every heavy machine gun in the city onto their tail.

Yu’s racks read as empty and his ammunition was getting low, so he pulled out of Mining City Twenty-One low and fast, tilting his nose upwards, and turning down the power on his engines.

“Prepare for vacuum,” he warned. The adrenaline still rushing through his veins as his crew moved to make sure that the Combat Shuttle was good for vacuum.

“Sealed up tight, good run,” Bobbie said agreeing with Yu’s choice to disregard orders and fly a fire mission.

“Looking good, engines are a bit warm. Hope it was enough,” Young said.

“So do I,” Yu looked at the glass as the front of the shuttle started to turn into a white cone of water vapor and then the meteor-like appearance that came with entering and exiting atmosphere.

A few seconds later and that fell away, and the sounds of atmosphere disappeared. He followed Young’s flight plan back to Fearless.

“Ah shit,” Yu said, the adrenaline coming back as his hands danced and his legs moved, shifting the shuttle out of a debris cloud. One of those objects in the wrong engine port or intake and they would all be having a very bad day. “The hell is all of this?”

“Broken up shuttles, sensors, missile platforms, Reclaimer’s, you name it, it’s all coming down. I’m linked into sensors and tracking the worst. We’re going to have to go slow and steady so we don’t hit anything bad, the rest of the stuff will just bounce off,” she reassured Yu.

“The fuck is that?” Bobbie asked as a piece of debris hit the side of the shuttle. Without air, they didn’t hear it as much as feel it through the decking.

They continued on their path heading for Fearless. It was going to take them some time, but they would be back soon enough.

***

Mark moved through the PACs with adrenaline in his veins and hate in his heart. He was alive, this was where he belonged, killing the bastards that had taken Caroline from him. The bastards that had done that to an entire fucking planet.

He was hammered and beat on, but he didn’t care, all of them died under his rounds or by his blade.

The alarms went off everywhere as the Combat Shuttle auto cannon’s fire tore through the area between the Troopers in the cafeteria and the Troopers Mark was fighting beside.

The rounds cut down the PACs in droves, leaving fist-sized holes in their armor.

Then the missiles hit, and the glass that had survived seemed to explode through the level.

Rumbling explosions could be heard and felt through the floor on the level below.

Mark felt his stomach drop as he saw whole sections of the floor give way and then felt himself falling.

Mark let his legs take the impact. The entire level was a smoldering mess. Black smoke was pouring out of the level. The missiles had blown the windows out and tossed everything that wasn’t bolted down or part of the structure out of them or across the level in a chaotic mess.

Mark slammed his sword into the ground, turning off its vibrating function so it didn’t eat its way through.

He pulled up his Repulsor, moving under all that debris was powered armor, and he saw more of the bastards coming up the stairwells and other access points.

Mark fired on them, his stream of tracers throwing the PACs backwards. Other PA Troopers with him added their fire into the mix, stopping other PACs getting through different access points.

Troopers not wearing armor started jumping down, laying in the rubble and on the remainder of the floor, firing on the PA. Here they had the advantage. Screamers ripped into those that were now getting to their feet. The Combat Shuttle had stunned the PACs and given the Troopers what they needed: room.

Up close, the PACs’ strength could cave in a Trooper’s helmet, far away and they had to close that distance. They were bigger targets that weren’t good with their weapons and didn’t have the training to reload their weapons in their Powered Armor.

Sure, they caught some Troopers by firing at everything with their metal storm, but the tides had turned. The PACs were now at the disadvantage and weapons fire could be brought down on them with impunity.

“We hold here,” Haas said.

Mark felt more powered armor dropping from the floor above. The tactical views of above looked a damned sight better, and the rest of the powered armor Troopers were now able to push forward without worrying about their rear guard.

“Spread out and concentrate on the access points,” Haas said.

“Just don’t fall off the edge,” Dashtund added.

“Dick,” Tal said, and Tyler laughed. Mark agreed with Tal, he fucking hated heights. He wanted to keep shooting the bastards coming up the stairs but there were three Repulsors covering his stairwell already. He moved close to the edge of the level, and kept away from where the edge had cratered under the missiles’ impact. It reminded him of Sacremon and the rebels fucking launchers. There was a rough circle of broken glass all around the missile impact area.

Hell, the fucking structure’s probably right fucked, thing’s probably going to fall and we’re all going to be fucked. Stop thinking of that shit Mark. Fuck, I swore the fucking floor was moving. He pushed his fears away, that’s what you did as a Trooper. You took your fears and you pushed them away into a tiny little box. You were the best of the best, no one was going to tell you different and you sure as hell didn’t want to show anyone else that.

Showing them that would be admitting that you weren’t a perfect warrior. Who doesn't want to be in a trench and know that the guy next to them is a killing machine, ready to lay down their life no matter what?

Though everyone knew everyone had their doubts and fears, they played on them. Not to expose them all the time, but to get them to work on them. The ability to push one’s boundaries was a good thing to have in a Trooper. So Mark got close to the edge, and laid down gingerly and slowly.

Fucking shit, that’s a long way down, he thought, looking at the rubble he’d pushed off of the edge, and it seemed to just keep on falling. He thought about the floor tilting and him falling, or his gun going and dragging him down.

He put the Repulsor’s bipod on the ground and lined up on an open stairwell which connected offices below to the floor he was on.

A PAC peeked up, and Mark sent a burst into them. He didn’t know if he’d killed the fucker or just made them duck back. He kept up his fire, making sure no one else came up through the hole.

Someone landed a grenade in the stairwell. Mark waited a few seconds before firing again. An enemy that couldn’t shoot back was effectively useless. He just hoped that they didn’t start blowing holes in the floor again.

He fired bursts, one eye looking for movement, the other looking at Mining City Twenty-One beyond the smashed up glass front of the tower.

Combat Shuttles moved through the city, coming in to land on rooftop landing pads, their weapons ripping into the towers. Firefights were punctuated by explosions ripping out of towers. It only went to show how this was a war, not some simple rebellion.

All of the might of the EMF was pitched against these bastards, and they were pushing back and pushing back hard. This was their home city in Osdal, and it had 100,000 Troopers dedicated to just it, and they were getting swarmed.

For the first time Mark was scared, not of dying or fucking up, but that they wouldn’t be able to kill them all. All of their preparation and mayhem, and they were up against a military with on par or better gear. Sure they weren’t trained, but they were determined.

Mark hated them with a passion, but he didn’t let that hate blur his ability to analyze his enemy. He was wholly focused on killing Harmony, and putting the blinders on and running in would only fuck up his chances of killing more of the bastards.

If this is just their roadblock, what is Fernix and Housapel going to be like?

Chapter 55

Revival City

Housapel Prime Housapel System

8/3267

Peter Quinn walked from his office through his living quarters and to the separate area of his level that was dedicated to parties and meetings.

Bodyguards wearing powered armor made a loose square around him as he walked. People turned and looked, but only the most powerful in the crowd were able to approach and have a private word.

He seemed to be the perfect conversationalist, talking for only as long as necessary and leaving people wanting to talk to him again. He was cultured, smart and lovable. He looked like a prince, perfect teeth and hair and a blue suit that complemented his dusky tan and East Sector looks.

He was also the real head of Harmony.

He had looked over the reports of Osdal and they would lose the city, but they had taken down a carrier and the Troopers would be hit hard. The PAC weren’t as effective as they had hoped, due to their inability to reload their metal storm rifles. Quinn had already sent a message off to Hector, his military manager, to find a way to deal with this issue.

Hector and all of his staff were living with their eyes glued to the different readings and outputs coming from Osdal.

They had to learn all they could about the Troopers now, when they were already in Housapel it would be too late.

Staying in his office to look over the displays would make him look anxious, and with Harmony, everything was about looks. Make it look like a religious order that was pushing off the corporate hierarchy, instead of a hostile takeover, the likes of which had not been attempted before.

Peter felt a flush of enthusiasm run through him as he thought of what Nivad Selvra must be thinking of the whole thing.

Osdal was becoming a footnote in the war in Quinn’s eyes. It had served its purpose well, they had transported trillions of tons of pre-made materials to Housapel and Fernix, something that would have taken years to do in the systems were now coming express delivery. This allowed the two systems to concentrate on what they did have and work to build up a military that would defeat the EMF and then take its place.

Peter took an offered hand from a woman who had got way too close to him. She was complementing him on his home and the level where there were bedrooms, great large verandas, pools, hot tubs and all measures of entertainment.

Peter kissed her hand, looking up to her, she blushed and dimpled nicely, she as good at the seducing game as he.

“Come, let us greet some others,” Peter said, pulling her through the invisible barrier that the powered armor detail made.

“Oh Mister Quinn,” she said, her laugh making him smile even more. This was what he had dreamed of, being the center of it all. The master and purveyor of all. He was a natural orator, his looks were dashing, and he always achieved a greater output from his workers than other CEOs.

Those facts had made the higher CEOs keep a wary eye on their rising star, and cut his growth. They had pushed him onto Housapel and given him a mid-level management position.

“To have the CEO of Housapel as my date, this will cause quite the scandal,” she said into his ear.

Quinn smiled wider, he was liking this girl even more.

“Mister Quinn it is good to see you, have you been seeing Osdal recently, we’re pummeling those EMF dogs, right and good,” David Ramos, a beefy CEO, his bulk achieved from implants and augments rather than actual working out, said as Quinn passed, and he put his hand out.

“Yes, it is good to see such ability in our chosen. I think that Housapel’s own forces will put them to shame though, Hector has promised me that,” Quinn said, reassuring the man who had backed his rise to his position.

“It’s good to hear. I have been looking at the market, and you predicted the rise and fall precisely. Thank you for the information,” Ramos said.

“A favor for a dear friend,” Quinn said, looking into Ramos’s eyes and smiling. Cementing their bond was key in getting his further backing as he made his play for control of Earth and Her Colonies.

“If you will excuse me, I find I have a need to get a drink, and one for this fine lady as well,” Quinn said, indicating the lady beside him. His implants listed her as Dominique Choi.

“I wish you a good night Mister Quinn,” Ramos said, tilting his head and giving a knowing smile. He was a few decades older than Quinn but he identified him as his superior.

Quinn practically beamed as he glided away. Ramos picked up one of the two girls he’d come with, and she squealed in delight, the other saying things in his ear.

“A drink Miss Choi?” Quinn asked, walking to the bar. People greeted him, but this was the upper echelon; they saw that he was entertaining a lady and forwent any conversations, knowing it would be rude and looked on unfavorably.

A path cleared to the bar and the bartender came over with practiced grace.

“Most certainly Mister Quinn,” she said, putting her arm through his and pressing her body against his, alluding to the treats that hid under the silver dress which served to emphasize her figure and full assets.

“Two Scotch,” Quinn said.

“A Sex on the Beach might be more appropriate,” she said just to him, her voice low and husky.

Quinn’s eyes thinned in lust as he looked her over, and she didn’t flinch from his gaze but seemed to preen under it.

“I will have to take you up on that later, but first a little business.” He winked, the two drinks appearing.

Quinn took his glass and Dominique’s and handed it to her.

“I do love seeing a man in action,” she said sounding genuinely pleased.

Quinn clinked glasses with her and took a drink from his glass. The scotch was of the highest quality, direct from Earth and space aged.

He led her away from the bar and began working the various rooms, from the seating areas to around the theaters where people were watching Osdal. People loved to watch violence, and Quinn was no exception. Then they made their way through the buffets, greeting and talking to the higher crust of Harmony and Housapel’s society.

Chapter 56

Free City

Fernix Prime, Fernix System

8/3267

Omoti Akani cared less for parties and frivolities when he had work. He sat at his office, looking over the various reports coming in from across Fernix, they dictated where the materials coming from Osdal were going to go. They also showed the work schedules on various projects that were ongoing.

Fernix was the biggest manufacturer of large products in all of Earth and Her Colonies, she boasted over two billion humans, multiple factories and stations, shipyards and space based structures. Her one planet was turned into a pleasure planet with oceans, sandy beaches and was seeded with palm trees and other exotic life; everything except predators and mosquitoes lived there. It was if the old Caribbean had been supplanted onto the planet.

Towers dotted the larger islands, the smaller ones held advanced small homes for the wealthiest percent of people outside of Earth and Housapel. Fernix and Housapel were always competing to be the more powerful system.

Omoti Akani was a factory tech, he looked to streamline projects and production. He had lived in Housapel for many decades, closely with Peter Quinn, they were up and coming CEOs and they looked after one another. A favor here, a good word there. It was a beneficial partnership for both of them.

“Elliot, I want to have the revised schedule of the Housapel Factories and the numbers we’re pulling for the rail cannons. I want to go over resource management and book a meeting with the research and development team for next week. They’re going to have plenty of data to go over from Osdal, I want to see what they have,” he said, using his implants to connect him to his third assistant that week.

“Yes sir,” the assistant said. Akani cut the channel and perused his reports some more. The assistant’s name wasn’t Elliot, but Akani wasn’t bothered with trying to find it out.

He glanced up from his enclosed deck, looking at the streaks of incoming and outgoing freighters and shuttles. Past them in the sky were the massive factories, stations and yards that kept Fernix going. The planet was a luxury, but space was where the real money was made.

He checked his personal accounts. Even though there was a war going on, there was always a way to play with the market if you had the right amount of money, it was Earth and Her Colonies. Though many called them Earth and her Companies.

Maybe when Peter’s in power we can rename it, Akani said. He had no illusion who would be the head of the EHC if they won. He liked being firmly in the shadows, helping to push Peter’s plans and get his just rewards.

His current account balance showed just how beneficial that had been already.

While people were using Harmony Tokens their credits had been transferred to the higher members of Harmony. The people didn’t care, they had a money that worked within their system.

Akani had a money that could be used to buy and trade stocks, and it could buy information from Earth.

There were few people that were willing to sell the kind of information that he had, but everyone had a price. Nivad Selvra was scary, but his rise to power was centuries in the past. He was weak, laden with power and unknowing of Harmony’s true face. Both Peter and Akani took more pleasure in that than intermediary fighting between the Chosen and Troopers. They, like Nivad, didn’t care about their fighters.

It was a numbers game to them, positioning and pushing their advantage where they could. It was the great game, the game of war, contracts and money.

Akani had never felt so alive. A warship was just a new kind of design, its function to exude the power of Harmony, just as a company used a freighter to change the balance of power, tallied up by credits they were worth.

“Just a few more decades and I’ll be sitting on Earth in Mega City with entire partnerships at my whim,” Akani promised himself, his eyes shining as he imagined his position.

It would take time, but the payoff would sky rocket him into the highest position in Earth and Her Colonies.

Chapter 57

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

9/3267

The fighting had died down some. The Repulsors were still firing on the stairwells and grenades were tossed down them whenever the Chosen tried to push forward. But no human could fight indefinitely.

Weapons fire rang through the city here and there, the Combat Shuttles with their engines, missile racks and other weaponry were the loudest.

Their positions and the floor had been reinforced so that the Chosen couldn’t blow another hole up between the Troopers.

The powered armor had been pulled off the front lines, their armor charged, their ammo packs reloaded, then they were fed and the officers got to talking about plans and strategies.

Every so often the PA wearing Troopers were needed to push back the PACs’ advance, but for the most part they were at a stalemate, a situation they needed to change desperately. The other mining cities were quickly being taken, but Mining City Twenty-One was still largely in the Chosen’s hands.

It had been that way for three weeks now. Tyler still hadn’t seen Alexis yet, even though she was just a few floors above him. He was frustrated and praying for a mission to hurt the Chosen. He sat up his armor, the upper half open so he could eat the thick and chunky warm soup and the crusty bread it had come with. It was pure ambrosia to him.

The platoon was dotted around what had been turned into a charging station. It was a park of sorts, with hills and a stream that had dried up as the pumps had been turned off decades ago. The green grass and plants were dead, but there was still a nice view of the rising sun over Osdal Actual. The heat was already climbing, but with there not being any windows any more, a breeze was making the morning cool, the sweat on their faces chilling them further.

The armor was hooked up to a bumbling fusion generator, the thing was an armored box the size of an air car, with an equally large coolant and fuel supply box hooked into it.

Tyler drained the last of his food, putting it down and laying in his armor. It still smelled funky, but Tyler’s nose had smelled worse. He sealed his armor up, turned off his screens and got some sleep, following the motto of soldiers throughout time: if you can sleep, sleep.

He only got a few hours until he was pulled away by his screens coming online and a voice in his ear.

“Rise and shine Troopers, we’re going to go have some fun,” Haas said.

Tyler checked his time; it was midday and the temperature stat looked high enough to make him sweat even in the air-conditioned powered armor.

The Troopers got to their feet, disconnecting power lines and checking weapons by ingrained instinct.

“What’s the plan sir?”

“Major Ortiz wants to give the briefing himself,” Haas said.

The sections rose, following him and Zukic towards some of the intact rooms on the level where a command post had been made and spray-ite added in liberally so no snipers could hit those inside.

The Chosen didn’t have many of the bolt action rifles, but those that did have them were good, or dead, leaving only the good ones that had some natural talent but no formal training. They were annoying enough without it. Only powered armor went near the edges of the towers now, unless there was spray-ite cover.

The command area looked like it had been a collection of housing units on the edge of the park that Tyler and the rest of the triple twos had been sleeping in.

Any walls left standing had been demolished, making a large open area, one side with command consoles and table, while the rest was filled with Troopers wearing powered armor. All of them were bulky and awkward in the space, helmets open to reveal their small-looking heads with armor plating all around.

“Triple Twos, get over here, you mutts,” Ortiz said, waving them over before turning back to the table he was standing over. People parted for them as they walked through.

“Haas, you’re going to be Captain Sook’s Sergeant Major,” Ortiz said, waving to a fierce looking woman across the table.

Tyler felt anxiety growing in his stomach. Ortiz looked to Zukic next.

Tyler had always feared the Triple Twos getting broken up, even though he’d known it was going to happen. They’d had the most time in close with Harmony and had spent the most time in powered armor. Other platoons needed to know what they knew. He just wished that their platoon had been kept together.

“Zukic, you are now a Second Lieutenant of the reinforced first Powered Armor Company, two platoon,”

“Holm, you and your section will join the two platoon. Mark, you will be the new Warrant for Three platoon. Jerome, make sure he doesn’t fuck it up. Both of your sections will be following.” Ortiz looked to the Section Commanders and their independent sections. He knew which of them belonged in which sections by heart. “Tyler and the rest of you misfits are in one platoon. I suggest you all check out your new ranks, for now I need you in the positions you are in. Later, if I can, I will be putting you into Bravo and Charlie Company of PA.” He looked to the people that weren’t getting a higher rank.

Tyler felt the meaning behind that. They had all shown that they were worthy of moving up in rank, proving themselves on the battlefield. For now, they were bulking up the ranks. If they kept up their performance, then they would find themselves attaining higher positions.

“Now that’s done, go and meet with your platoons and sections. Be quick about it, we’ve got work to do, you can get acquainted afterwards,” Ortiz said.

The Triple Twos shared looks and promises with one another silently. They might be going to different platoons and sections but they would remember their brothers and sisters any time, any where, they’d be right next to them again.

Tyler looked to Dashtund and Ali.

“Dashtund, best behavior,” Tyler said with his sub-vocals so no one else could hear, as his implants showed where his new platoon was standing. There were three platoons instead of the regular two to a company, the reason that Ortiz was calling them a reinforced company.

Tyler nodded to the people in the platoon, the three other Sergeants and two Officers nodded to him, and he could see them sizing him up and trying to judge if he would be an asset or a strain.

Tyler and his three stood a bit away from the rest; Tyler didn’t want to get mixed up in the platoon just yet.

“Alright, as you know we’ve got the bastards pinned in most towers. In a few we’ve needed to pull back, hammering the hell out of them with Combat Shuttles.

“We don’t have many of you armored bastards, so you’re hot commodities right now.

“Our first goal is to divest the Chosen of their powered armor, we’re getting reports that the dumb bastards aren’t recharging. Seems that a dead battery in your powered armor is a bad thing,” Ortiz said, his voice as dry as the planet outside the tower.

A few of the Troopers snorted and snickered.

“Seems that the majority of the bastards are running back downstairs to get into their charging cradles in the cryo-pod bunkers. I want to cut them off from that ability,” Ortiz said. A hologram showed the city floating in the middle of the room.

“At the base of every one of these towers is a cryo-bunker, just like every other colony city. The Triple Twos have been kind enough to point out where potential charging sites might be.” The holograms showed the different charging stations.

“We need to hit these stations, and stop them from charging their damned armor. Without their armor they’re just a bunch of untrained pricks with armor plating and guns. Still not a fucking walk in the library, though once the lights turn off in that place it’s a fucking minefield.” Ortiz shook his head, getting a few laughs from the Troopers.

“The armor gives them an advantage that we cannot afford for them to have: the ability to move unimpeded through our lines. We take out the charging stations, we get them to fight us in their armor plate, and we have a chance of winning this.”

“Insertion will be done with Combat Shuttles, so you will come in low and dangerous, drop off, and then guide fire into those charging positions. You’re too big to go through the drop hatches, so you’re going to have to charge out of the ramp. If we can’t hit the target with a Combat Shuttle, you are to move in and destroy the bunker,” Ortiz said, the hologram showing Combat Shuttles coming in and dropping out Troopers before flying off again. “Questions?”

Mark’s hand rose lazily.

“Mark?” Ortiz said.

“Major, we all know that those Combat Shuttles are bullet magnets right now. Getting off of them is going to be a bitch, and everyone and their best friend’s cousin is going to know where we are. What if we come in via the refinery conveyor belt?” Mark asked.

Ortiz looked to his aides. “Is that thing working?”

“Don’t know,” one of them replied.

“Well get someone with a scope to check out if the Diggers didn’t fuck it up,” Ortiz said.

Everyone waited, moving with agitation and the need to do something.

“It looks to be intact, it’s on a pad, and the spotter thinks that’s why it isn’t messed up,” the aide said.

“Good, then we’ll use that, get you in with hopefully less visibility, and thoroughly mess their day up. Anything else?” Ortiz looked out, no one said anything. “Good, get acquainted and you’re grabbing the next lift to the maintenance pad,” Ortiz said, turning and moving towards Haas and Sook.

“Sergeant Victor, I’m Second Lieutenant Hoi, this is warrant Mac, Sergeant’s Eristaz, Monte and Wong,” Hoi said, pointing to the others.

“Call me Tyler everyone does,” Tyler said, looking to the others.

“Against regs,” Mac said. He was bald, hard faced and mean looking, and those blue eyes looked merciless rather than just cold.

“Well there’s me and my two name brothers, Sergeant Jerome and Warrant Mark,” Tyler said. “Make things less confusing.”

“Very well,” Hoi said, overriding Mac.

Mac didn’t look pleased with it and Tyler couldn’t give a rat’s fart.

“What can you tell us about the city?” Monte asked. She had black hair shaved down the sides and pulled back in a pony tail, and intense brown eyes.

“It’s a fucking shit show. Twenty-One is where they kept all of the good gear, hell, they made most of it around here. They’ve got three quarters of their powered armor here, the rest is spread across the processing stations and the other cities,” Tyler talked about the various garrisons that he’d spotted, went over where the conveyor went underground and then broke apart to funnel into the various towers’ processing centers, or up to the landing pads.

It took some time but the whole platoon was listening, and Ali and Dashtund added in their own information, as they’d caught a lot of things that Tyler had forgotten.

“Well this ought to be interesting,” Hoi said after the briefing. The rest of the Troopers looked grim. Tyler found out that he had more time in than all of them, Mac was the closest to his own time, having the same as Dashtund. Ali still beat him by a few months. Mac seemed to be pissed off by this, more than find it cause to respect Tyler’s expertise.

If Tyler wasn’t on-mission and tired, he would’ve asked to have a private word with the Warrant and see just what the hell was sticking out of his ass.

The rest seemed to grasp that the more they knew the better. They were from the carrier Dauntless, they were Bare Minimum Troopers. Tyler didn’t want to be taking them into a firefight, they were too cocky and sure of their skills.

The armor was acting as a crutch, rather than a force multiplier. There were good apples among them, but most had been in long enough without sustained combat to still underestimate the Chosen.

Tyler hoped that they would live until he had time to train them up. He would have to go into battle with them under-trained and unprepared, but if he was on the same carrier as them, he’d break his foot up their asses getting them up to snuff.

He kept his personal judgements to himself, and the looks shared with Dashtund and Ali showed that they thought the same as him.

They broke apart and Tyler met his new section, who greeted him with nods and were amicable, but their Sergeant had just died the day before. The loss was rough especially for a unit that was used to showing up in a system and having the colonists put down their spears and go back to working for the companies.

They moved upwards through the cleared levels.

The pace increased as word got passed down; their rides were coming in on the landing pad. The powered armor Troopers’ big frames hit one another as they moved up the stairs.

Tyler kept his irritation to himself, and his helmet and his section’s helmets were closed against Osdal. Other section leaders were allowing their people to keep their helmets open to get some fresh air.

Tyler heard it before he saw it. A Trooper was joking one minute, the next he didn’t have a fucking head and blood was covering his buddies. They stopped, yelling and screaming, and another went down.

“Close your fucking helmets you fucking idiots!” Haas ordered, seeing the same thing, his shoulders pushing people out of the way, slamming helmets shut as people looked out for targets.

“Keep moving Troopers!” he barked. Walking to the two dead, a round pinged off of his armor, and he disregarded it, looking at the two dead Troopers.

“Whose are these?” Haas demanded; he knew whose they were already, his implants were feeding the information to him.

“They’re mine Sergeant Major,” Hoi admitted.

“Get your fucking shit straight! No one fucking opens their helmet unless we’re in cover. This isn’t a fucking carrier and we’re not out for a fucking stroll!”

Tyler had never known Haas to get so angry, but it matched his own feelings. He’d advised against it, but only Monte had listened.

“I didn’t…” Hoi started

“I don’t want to hear your fucking reasons, Second Lieutenant. I want your people to drag these suits upstairs!”

“Sir?” Hoi sounded confused.

“Well they’re not going to need them any more,” Haas said, looking at the Troopers.

“But that’s wrong, Sergeant Major,” Hoi said, struggling with the words.

“No more wrong than the bots doing it,” Haas said, his voice turning thoughtful. “You have seen the bots strip a battlefield, right?” Haas asked.

“No?” Hoi said, still confused.

Haas took a moment, probably pulling himself together.

“Understood. Well, detail someone to get these two upstairs,” Haas said, moving on.

The Troopers had flowed around them, making their way upstairs.

“Tyler, how fucked up are they?” Haas asked on a private channel, his question not the most delicate, but they were friends even thought different ranks.

“Fucked, all Bare Minimum for this bunch. I’ve got more time in combat than all of them put together, by a large margin. They’ve done three drops, on all of them the colonists weren’t using more than shotguns and they quickly gave up. Month’s the longest they’ve been under contact,” Tyler said.

“Ho-lee-fuck,” Haas drawled.

“Got it in one, sir,” Tyler agreed.

“I’m pushing this to higher, no wonder we got cut off, these boys were hard charging up front with barely any more training than the Chosen. They see an enemy they’ll probably chase it like a dog after a rabbit,” Haas said, sounding tired.

“I think so.”

“Shit, wait five,” Haas said, ending the channel. Ali and Dashtund had been given the crappy old time of hauling the dead bastards out of the armor and then slinging it on their shoulders and climbing upwards.

Tyler ordered his section to keep going as they made it to the level before the landing pad, and wounded were all around the level, close to the main stairwell that went up. There were now other casualty areas on lower floors to get people stabilized and then pushed upwards to the secured landing pad, though all of the supplies and most of the wounded needing evacuation to more substantial medical facilities were up on this floor.

Tyler walked in, looking for someone to take the powered armor off Dashtund and Ali’s hands instead of them traipsing it all over the place.

He walked towards the marker, turned and ran right into a very familiar Trooper.

She seemed to shake herself out of a daze, then looked at his armor and up at his opaque armor-covered helmet.

“Babe?” she asked.

“Miss Victors, I’m assuming,” Tyler said, opening his helmet. They were at too much of an oblique angle for a sniper to see him, let alone hit him.

She jumped, wrapping her feet around him and pulling her helmet off. Her hair fell down and she kissed him. It was desperate, her smiled mingled with relieved tears, not all of them being hers. He was careful to not let his emotions overtake his control. He wanted to squeeze her to him.

“Well, Warrant, when we came up here we weren’t expecting this.” Tyler knew the voice, and he turned seeing Second Lieutenant Che.

“Heya Che,” Tyler said.

“Hey Tyler,” she said with a smile and a nod. She looked tired, and happy for them both.

“Stop going on stupid ass missions you hear me,” Alexis said into his neck, not caring who saw her clinging to his armor like a damned monkey.

“I’ll try not to, love,” Tyler promised.

“Don’t worry, we’re going to be with him on his next stupid mission.” Che got both of their attention. “Ortiz got a call from someone about the PA platoon you’re with, they’re right fucked up and my platoon is rested and good to go. You can call me Warrant Che, Second Lieutenant Victor,” she said with a smile.

“Ah shit, sorry Che,” Tyler said.

“You know what’s going on better than I do. I’m fine with the demotion. I would have suggested it. I’ve been promised that when we get a few more sets of powered armor that I’m going to get my platoon back and you’re going to get your shot at being a Sergeant Major, you’ll have to compete for it though. You triple twos are rank climbing monkeys if I ever did see,” she said with a grin that belied any harsh intent.

“Thank you Che, we do try our best,” Tyler grinned. “When will you be ready?”

“Ten minutes. We’re gonna have some pissed off people, but we need this to work, people’s egos can get fucked,” Che said, her eyes hard and unwavering.

“Good to hear,” Tyler said, looking back to Alexis who was listening to the exchange.

“Now do you mind getting off me, my little limpet?” Tyler asked her.

“Fiine, but you owe me dinner,” she said, her eyes thinning.

“Okay.” He tried to make it sound like a chore, but was smiling all the same. She punched his armor, her face turning serious.

“How is Mark?” Alexis asked as Che left them to go get the armor sorted.

“I don’t know,” Tyler said, the words heavy on his soul. Mark’s condition worried him. He was driven, he’d always been driven, but now he was cold. He’d joked before, and he’d always had something soft under that rough exterior. Now, there was something haunting in his eyes. It was as if he had seen something that had taken his soul and twisted it into something nasty and dark.

“You think he’ll be okay?” Alexis said, worry in her voice; she cared for Mark deeply.

“I don’t think it’s something we can help.”

Alexis could read the emotions in his eyes and face as surely as he could read them in hers. Her lips pressed together in a worried white line as she looked away. “We’ll help him where we can.”

“Yeah,” Tyler said, wishing that there was something that he could do to alleviate some of the pain his brother was going through.

Mark, seemingly summoned by their words, stalked into the room. There was a heaviness to his actions, and a predatory way that he looked at everyone and everything. Tyler hadn’t noticed it before. He knew his brother was a killer, Tyler was too. But the cold look in his eyes was of someone who had seen so much death that they had become immune to it. Tyler had seen it a few times, and it was the kind of look that scared a man to the core.

Osdal had changed Mark.

“Hey Alexis, got you your party-going outfit. Shuttle lift in fifteen,” Mark said, setting the armor down next to a pallet of supplies. It was open and waiting for a user.

“Thanks Mark,” she said with a smile.

A touch of something warm opened his features as he nodded to her, a slight smile on his lips. “I’ll see you two later.” His helmet swung shut and locked as he turned and made for the doorway again.

Alexis and Tyler shared a worried glance.

“We look after our own,” Alexis said, kissing Tyler’s cheek and getting into the armor. The panels closed around her and started locking together.

“Lee, you’re good with everything around here?” she asked an armored Trooper who was moving his hands in a way only someone using their implants would.

“I’ll be fine, Warrant. The Major’s aide’s contacted me saying that they needed you for a mission.”

“Thanks Lee.”

“No worries Victor, good luck.” His hands were moving before the last word left his lips.

***

The flight to the maintenance pad had been fast. Figuring out how to get the conveyor running was a pain but they got it working eventually.

Jerome was the first section at the front of the belt. The belt was ten feet wide and ran from the refining station to the city.

There was little to do but sit back and wait, hoping that no one started looking too closely at the refined ingots that were coming out of the refinery. Jerome stayed down not moving an inch, just talking to his section, getting to know them as they rolled past the kilometers. Diggers were still edging out of the ground here and there, but none of them were actively throwing themselves out of the ground now.

“I see the ramp down,” Jerome said after some time. The towers were a hell of a lot closer and the conveyor belt was sloping down and under the city.

He tensed as they went down. It was dark underground, but his powered armor made up for the lack of light, giving the area he was in a greenish glow.

“Up and at ‘em,” Jerome said, getting to his feet. He jumped and rolled, losing the momentum of the speeding conveyor. He got up a little dizzier than before but none the less worse for wear. Another section jumped off of the conveyor on the other side.

Jerome pushed up a fire team made of Feng and Av. They moved for the only door nearby, and Jerome was pointed down the length of the platform.

“Good, no sign of Chosen. Dropping censors and rigging the door,” Feng said.

“Understood. The rest of you fan out, we’ll move in extended line up the platform, the section below will clear the doors as we pass them,” Jerome said, including Hama, the Sergeant of four’s section who was right behind him.

A green light showed that Hama got the message as he flicked off the channel, probably talking to his own people. They advanced, a platoon on either side clearing up the platform and checking doors. They made quick progress, heading for the doors that would take them up to their targets. The powered armor made the few kilometers disappear.

There were three doors, each getting a platoon’s attention. A tower could easily take in an entire force and spit back out a platoon, that’s just how urban ops went. Their job was to hit hard and fast, then fuck off to the next target.

Then, somehow, get to one of the towers that the Chosen have left behind and get the fuck out of here.

The plan had a few flaws, but if they got these chargers then the PACs should be fucked. The AMRs had been blasting solar panels for the last couple of days, all the Chosen had left should be their emergency batteries.

“Execute,” Lieutenant Sook said.

Jaz’s section was quick and efficient in their movements. They made through the floors quickly to the lobby, and red haloes started appearing. The red haloes were removed and Jerome saw that Mark and Sasaki were among them.

Jerome followed up behind, the platoon moving to the cryo bunker. The first red halos looked like they had been cut down by Vibra-Blades instead of much louder Repulsors.

The first weapon fired, and the platoon continued to advance. Jerome’s section stayed back in the lobby to make sure they had a clean escape.

The cryo-bunker was separate from the conveyor belt access point, with only one way in and out.

There was more muffled shooting in the bunker. Hama’s section was sent back out to assist Jerome’s because the Chosen, if they were around, had heard them by now. It didn’t take long for someone to show up; unfortunately, those someone’s were PACs.

Jerome didn’t hesitate, opening fire on the PACs, and the rest of his section added in their fire. Hama kept his section back, ready to be deployed if necessary but not wasting rounds.

Jerome’s people knew how to shoot, and their Repulsors took the PACs down quickly as they came around the corner. Jerome heard a deep thump of explosions in the distance and checked his HUD, the rest of the platoon was pulling back.

“Jerome, Hama, hold position, cover the rest of the section out,” Kumer said.

Jerome greened up, his section were firing in sequence so there were always rounds hitting the target, but they weren’t all firing at the same time.

The two sections moved past them, and someone tossed a grenade in the general area where the PACs were coming from. Three or four PACs ran out, getting cut down.

The grenade went off, crap coming out of where it had gone off, and Hama’s section pulled back to the conveyor belt access.

“Peel back,” Jerome ordered. His people were waiting for it; in fire teams they ran back a distance, turned and fired on the point where the PACs were coming from.

PACs appeared, but there was always someone waiting for them. The cocky armored up bastards were cut down. People seemed to be getting the idea that there was a threat downstairs.

Jerome shut the door behind him tossing mines all over the place.

“Move it Troopers, got more battery stores to fuck with!” Mark sounded almost happy.

The Troopers got moving to their next target.

“Hama, Jerome, your section’s on me, we’re splitting the platoon to hit more targets,” Mark said a few moments later, and they were sprinting on the platform, their weapons up and ready for threats to their front.

“Understood,” Jerome and Hama said.

“We’re working with four section, we’ll be splitting off from two and three with Mark,” Jerome said. Saying Warrant Mark sounded weird as hell.

Green lights came back on Jerome’s screen, his people were dialed in and on mission. Hama was on point, leading the way up the stairs.

“Blades if you can,” Mark said.

Jerome checked his blade, and Hama gained access to the lobby, same as the last one, except a bit bigger, and it was clear. Jerome still stayed to make sure they could exit.

There wasn’t any gunfire, just the noise of a charge going off and Hama’s section booking it back to Jerome. They merged, ran back to the tunnels and Jerome peeled after them.

For two more towers it went that way.

The third time, Jerome was on point.

He heard a noise in the lobby and readied his sword, preparing to take down the Chosen with a quick execution. As he turned the corner, he found Chosen sleeping, eating and hanging out around their powered armor units, which were stuck into charging cradles.

The Chosen seemed to look at him in alarm; his armor was different to theirs and his name was carved into his breastplate, not something the Chosen did.

“Contact,” Jerome yelled, hugging the wall and opening fire.

Dooks took over, getting people into firing positions on the access point into the lobby. It was a slaughter. Hama moved around the back of Jerome, moving to the other access to the lobby, closer to the stairs that would lead to the bunker.

They ran into the lobby, firing at the Chosen. Already Jerome’s section’s fire was slackening, and the Chosen were dead or dying.

“Dooks, get a detail together, start hauling those things towards the bunker, then lock the thing down once Hama’s done,” Mark said.

Hama showed some red contacts, but a few bursts of weapon fire and they were no more. Jerome had four of his section on security, the other six were helping Dooks grab powered armor, tossing it to one another and into the bunker.

PACs showed up, and got hosed by Jerome’s people on watch.

It seemed to call the bloodhounds, as more charged down the halls. Jerome’s people didn’t stop firing as they concentrated their fire, only shifting targets when their tracers were rattling around the first targets’ armor.

In the long corridor it was a bloodbath.

They didn’t have time to sit around hitting their objectives was more important than killing the Chosen right now.

Hama and Dooks finished their labor and they filed back into the conveyor belt areas.

“We’re grouping together and hitting central tower, the hope is that we can get control of the computer systems and control the rest of the city,” Mark said.

If you could get to a tower you could control it, and only it. If you got to the central tower of a city, you could control the entire thing. The lockouts were on the first floor, right in the middle of hundreds of Chosen that used the central tower as their barracks, and were trying to kill the Troopers above.

Well, shit.

***

Mark’s three platoon were to the rear, two was ahead, and one platoon was up in front. All of them were running full out along the platforms.

The first PACs made it into the conveyor area behind the Troopers. Mark didn’t need to say anything, Jaz’s three section turned and fired on them.

“Covering!” Dominguez yelled out as her section fired past Jaz’s section.

Hama’s fourth planted, three section running past them and giving them clear sight.

“Covering!” Hama barked, his section firing.

“Moving!” Dominguez said, her section running back. So it went, the sections covering one another and running, their fire keeping the PACs back.

Most of the PACs still not used to being affected in their powered armor ran into the fire, and were getting cut down. They were learning though, and too fast for Mark’s liking.

“Two platoon is making entry,” Mark called out, passing information to his Troopers.

“Keep moving and keep that fire up,” Kumer added.

It was a slow process, pulling back and keeping the pressure up on the PACs. They were firing their metal storm rifles, but they didn’t have the power to get through the Troopers’ additional armor.

Mark could see that they were already under contact, and even the lower areas of the building were a hectic mess of Chosen.

“Any combat shuttle, this is Captain Sook requesting fire support mission on these coordinates,” Mark heard the conversation, but didn’t see where she wanted the air support to come in.

“Understood Captain, inbound on your position, hold out,” a pilot replied.

“One section hold your position, three get up next to them. Four and two be ready to assist,” Kumer said. The sections made two lines, firing at the PACs that were still rushing them.

Someone in three section got winged in their shoulder joint. The section behind was already pulling them out and looking at the damage. Mark could tell from the readings that as long as the Trooper wasn’t wounded then they should be good to go. They would need to cut the helmet off though.

There was a rumbling from above as heavy ordinance hit the tower, and Mark was thankful he was under the tower instead of at its peak.

“Move in!” Captain Sook barked.

“Three section move up, mine the area behind you,” Haas added.

“Two, four section, get moving, Mark coordinate, tell me when you’re clear,” Kumer said.

“Sir!” Two and Four Section followed Mark and up the stairs. “Clear!”

“Coming in!” Kumer said, and the rest of the platoon rushed in. Jerome’s section stayed in the rear, tossing down mines to make whoever came in behind them have a very nasty day.

Mark continued up after two and four platoon.

The lobby and the first floor were chaos. There were Troopers and PACs everywhere, the Troopers were in firing lines holding the PACs back, and slaughtering the Chosen not in PA.

Tracers ripped through the twenty or so meters between people. Troopers were falling, not even their armor could withstand that much firepower so close. Joints were being wrecked and people were fighting with whatever was still functional.

Two and four section made to reinforce one platoon and, just as they pulled out their blades, the PACs hurled themselves at the lines. Their fists caved in armor, but so did the Troopers’.

Vibra swords came free and it turned into a violent frenzy of hammering on one another’s armored shells or plunging a blade into them to try and kill the human inside.

Mark fired on the PACs closest to him, pushing some of them back. He got hit by a fist, sending him tumbling, and ripping his Repulsor’s ammunition feed.

He threw the weapon away and grabbed his blade, rushing his attacker, and they punched him again, but he buried his sword in their gut and pulled it upwards.

He turned, letting the PAC fall, punching another PAC in the face.

They rocked back with the vicious attack and Mark sliced across their front, opening their ribcage and dropping them to the ground.

The melee on the first floor didn’t look anything like a modern battle, it looked like a medieval battle of armor hammering on one another until the enemy gave in.

Vibra swords were a clear advantage, slicing through the armor instead of just denting it.

A PAC tackled him from the side, and it felt like a Combat Shuttle had run into him. The breath went out of him as he felt his ribs crack against the armor. He hit the ground, his head fuzzy from the impact. There was no time to recover as the PAC mounted him.

Blows raining on his armor, denting it. Mark used his left arm, hammering on the bastard’s knee. The PAC just continued to hit his forearm, not even the joint. His instincts were taking over rather than his brain.

Mark broke through the armor and smashed the PAC’s kneecap. They stopped beating on him, moving to protect their knee. Mark grabbed their helmet, viciously chopping into their neck-helmet joint, powered by the frenzy of survival. The PAC hit on him again, panicked now, but unable to land any good hits.

Blood fell on Mark’s helmet and the PAC went limp as his hand broke through the join and pierced the Chosen’s neck.

Mark tossed the PAC away, bashing into another PAC that was winding up their attack and grabbing his blade again.

They came in again and Mark slapped them away, the PA turning them. He stabbed with his blade, catching them in the helmet and pulling out quickly, their lifeless body dropping to the ground.

There was a rumbling explosion, and Mark knew that it was the cryo-bunker being hit with chargers.

Mark shook off the pain, his augments giving him a perfect mix of chemicals to keep him in top fighting condition. Then he checked his platoon; five were dead, four wounded, and Kumer was one of the dead, making him platoon commander.

Fuck.

“Jerome, I want a casualty area where the command center is, see that the wounded get there. Dominguez, I want you covering the lobby, Jaz assist. Hama, you’re reserve,” Mark said, giving his section’s tasks as he looked at the battle. The other platoons were fighting in a rough circle around the command center, one taking the pressure off two as they returned from their tasks.

It was close and dirty fighting, the PACs rushing in taking down Troopers with their charges. Troopers fired back until the last possible moment before drawing their blades, most were holding their blades in one hand, using their forearm to steady their gun in case they needed their blade.

Mark looked over the sections, but his ammunition feed was broken and messed up. He moved to Kumer, accessing his ammunition pack’s controls, unlocking it from his back.

Mark’s pack slumped off and he hooked Kumer’s on, locking it to him.

He pulled out the old ammunition feed and threw in the one to Kumer’s pack.

“Contact!” Dominguez called out. The lobby was the easiest and biggest open area on the first floor, making it easy for anyone on the second floor to throw a ton of PACs down it. Dominguez and Jaz acted as a stopper in the bottle.

“Coming to you,” Mark said, opening a channel to Haas. “I am in control of third platoon, contact in the lobby, second floor.”

“Understood,” Haas said, cutting the channel. He was dealing with all of the platoons, keeping them together and firing on the enemy.

Their 152 strong company was down to 135. Somehow, they had to hold out for a rescue.

Mark pushed that from his mind as he rushed to meet Dominguez and Jaz who were up the lobby’s main sweeping staircase. Dominguez’s section was facing the left corridor, Jaz to the right.

Mark moved to Jaz’s line, he didn’t know the man as much as he wanted to, and he knew Dominguez could handle herself.

Mark laid down on his belly next to a support column at the corner of the stairs and the corridor. He held his fire, the Repulsors were keeping what primarily looked like Chosen regulars back, three guns focusing their fire on any PACs that showed up.

For now, it was manageable. Mark checked ammunition counts. They were conserving their ammo as much as possible, but it wouldn’t last forever.

He heard auto-cannons firing on the floors above and missiles detonating. The Combat Shuttles were trying to take as much pressure off them. Mark knew that they were delaying the inevitable, but he wasn’t going to go down without a fight.

One more dead Chosen was one less that could hurt his fellow Troopers.

***

Moretti’s implants pinged a piece of news from the battle net he was tied into, and he pulled it up. He took a sharp breath as he looked at the information: the Triple Twos were pinned down. They had successfully hit a number of charging stations, and their last attack had been on the charging stations in central tower.

Information was flooding in from mining City Twenty-One’s servers, and the Troopers had control of the entire city now.

However, it looked like the company of PA Troopers was not going to get out of the area.

There has to be something we have! Moretti searched frantically, looking for something to help the Troopers, then something to just kill the Chosen. Other than an EMP, he couldn’t take down the powered armor, because that would take down the Trooper’s armor as well.

He absently scrolled through the munitions aboard the fleet, and he sat up as he started seeing items that weren’t on the official list. Not just the nuclear missiles, but ones with biological payloads, tailored to kill everything but Troopers.

Moretti remembered the stories about Sacremon, how they had used gas to turn Processing City into a cemetery. The city was the barracks and headquarters of Harmony, anyone that wasn’t a Trooper would be killed. Leaving them alive was a liability.

He set up a message and sent it to the FTL network. It had a very long way to go, and Moretti just hoped that it was in time.

Chapter 58

Tower

Earth, Sol System

9/3267

Nivad’s implants blinked incessantly, it was a message from Dalia. He had left the office to spend some time congratulating himself with some female company, but he waved the girl away. She had been trained well, and she gave him a sultry look as she got off him and headed to the bathroom connected to the lavish room.

“We have a priority message from Osdal,” Dalia led with as their implants connected.

“Go on,” he said, knowing that there was only one person capable of reaching them direct: the agent that had been on Masoul Actual.

“They’re asking to use the biological weapons.”

“For what purpose, when and where?”

“He wants to use the ones that are attuned to the Trooper’s immunizations. It will only kill people that are not in the EMF. He wants to get the authorization to hit Mining City Twenty-One with the weapons.” She held her breath waiting for his response.

“Thoughts?” he asked, knowing that she had already looked the situation over, knowing he would ask her for her input.

“I believe it’s a stroke of genius. Mining City Twenty-One is a Harmony refuge. In one stroke we can take out the majority of their military forces and then turn to have our forces re-dedicated to taking out the remaining Chosen in system.”

Her thoughts were in line with his and Nivad looked over the attached plan that had come with the call. “Very well, he has authorization.”

“Understood sir. I will have a report ready in your inbox with updates,” she said, making it clear she wouldn’t disturb him unless something of vital importance came up.

“Good.” Nivad cut the channel and clicked his fingers. The woman that was Nivad’s company for the night came out of the bathroom, hugging the doorway, showing off her assets and giving him a look to ask if he wanted her.

Few things could get Nivad’s blood racing anymore, but this woman was very good at her art. He motioned for her to come over, a small smile playing on his lips.

The smile had less to do with the woman and more to do with the fact that possibly millions of Chosen would die in just a matter of hours.

He was looking forward to the reports.

Chapter 59

EMFC Dauntless

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

9/3267

General Jones was looking over the various screens that showed the battles happening from Osdal Actual’s Mining cities, to their processing stations and Osdal Three’s Organic cultivation areas.

He was originally from the Central sector, and his dark skin still made people from the East Sectors look at him as if an oddity.

No matter, all of them were under his rank and he took his time making sure that they knew they were under his command.

His curly brown hair was a fine fuzz on his head and his beard had stylish streaks of white and grey running through the black. He looked like a 20-year-old in good health, only his beard showed something of his real 113 years of age.

Seeing the carrier Reclaimer turn into orbital debris had been a shock, but it had only been a single carrier. There were eight more in-system.

He was looking at the benefit loss ratios of his Troopers and their supplies, and they were burning through them like nothing else. He had already cut off some supply runs. He wanted to have the highest cost/benefit ratio. So what if the Troopers had less screamers? Each of those screamers cost a heft chunk of change.

If he had the lowest cost to benefit ratio, then it could only look good in the eyes of those that were watching. His Troopers would just have to deal with their losses.

He had got a message from some upstart agent that had come from the EMFC Reclaimer, and the little bastard was trying to get him to drop ordinance that was worth more than an entire force of Troopers. No way was General Jones about to do that.

He had made a note to look into who the person was and have them brought up on charges; it would not do to have people thinking that they could tell him what to do.

An incoming message from EMFC command on Earth blinked for his attention.

He felt a warmth move through him, it was undoubtedly a report from Earth commending him for keeping his cost to benefit so low.

His smile disappeared as he started reading the message; it was short and sweet. The warmth that had been spreading through him now turned to icy fear.

Just who the hell is that agent?” he thought as he opened a channel to the Captain of the Carrier, Remblant.

“General?’ Remblant asked, opening the channel. He took a few minutes to do so; undoubtedly a power game. It always occurred between the carrier’s crew and the Trooper’s Commanders.

He was pale, something that his black hair only served to emphasize, with a wispy mustache on his upper lip and a look of gloating in his brown eyes.

“I have a priority call for these weapons, forward targeting information and clearance,” Jones said, his voice brisk as he sent the information to the Captain.

“General, this ordinance is highly expensive,” the Captain said, knowing that it would reflect on his reports that he had allowed something that costly to be fired.

“Unless you want to deal with the Ministry, then you better get those weapons loaded and deployed fast as,” Jones said, looking to the Captain.

“Understood,” The Captain said, his gloating turning into action.

He was already passing out orders as Jones cut the channel. He started going through the dossier of the agent who had asked for clearance. It was completely blank, there was just a number and the letter M. He looked at it, ingraining it into his mind. He would not make the same mistake again.

He didn’t know who the agent was but it was clear that he had talked with the authority of the Ministry. That made him the most powerful person in the entire fleet.

In the space of ten minutes his supplies were pouring out of his carrier. Every request the agent had made was fulfilled and a message was sent making up an excuse for the supply runs being slow. Hopefully that would put Jones in the agent’s good graces.

Chapter 60

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual Osdal System

9/3267

“Pull back!” Haas yelled. They were getting hit from every side, most of the powered armor was in hand to hand fights with the Chosen. There were just too many of the PACs.

There was nowhere to run, and the shutters now sealed the building from the outside.

Tyler looked around, it was chaos, but even then the Troopers were working together, talking and communicating to try to pull back towards their waypoint, the cryo-bunker.

“Covering!” He fired at the Chosen that were just meters away, his tracers hammering into their armor, dropping them. They were like a swarm, jumping over one another, coming through the walls, doing anything they could to get to the Troopers. Tyler could taste the Chosen’s hate for them. Propaganda and the people that they had looked up to for their entire lives had told them that the Troopers were despicable creatures, and they had listened. As the Chosen hated those that had been called Earthers, they hated the Troopers more.

They attacked with abandon. More than one Trooper had been dragged away, screaming as the PACs hammered their crude weapons into their armor, torturing them.

The Troopers could do little but mercy-kill their friends instead of letting the PACs get them.

“Move it Tyler!” Mark called. They were all now in the lobby, clearing out of the offices and hallways, unable to hold them and keep the PACs at bay.

Tyler turned and ran through the lobby and to the stairs that gained them access to the cryo-bunker.

Mines exploded where the Troopers had been. The PACs didn’t seem to care, rushing forward, firing here and there, most of them wielding melee weapons, and a few of them with Vibra-Blades in their hands.

Tyler ducked into the stairwell, there were Troopers firing past him and into the Chosen. Tyler didn’t slow, continuing on past more Troopers positioned to slow down the Chosen.

A lucky round hit his left leg, getting through his armor and cracking the servo-motor. He tumbled down the stairs and into the wall.

“Motherfucker,” he sighed, pushing himself up with his hands. He locked out the exo-skeleton, half-dragging, half hopping down the remaining stairs.

He got to the bottom, and a large room made of cermite stretched a hundred meters to a hatch. Broken lights and charging cradles lay around the room.

He ran into the hatch and almost stopped in awe. He had never been in a cryo-bunker and it was one hell of a sight. It looked like a missile silo with catwalks all around its various levels and more crossing over from one side to the other.

Pods lined the walls on runners, stacked one on top of one another.

“Holy shit.” Looking over the place, it was supposed to hold over a million souls for a few centuries. White lights illuminated the area and the forty floors of cryo-pods.

It was more impressive than the cities Tyler had found.

Troopers continued to pour into the bunker, and Tyler got his platoon organized, calling a rally point on himself. They had lost Edwards, Miller, Cheung, Ibrayev, Pablo, Anton, Arud, Ericson, Kouri, Tahkan and Iskakov. Ali’s left arm was out of action.

It took his platoon of 53 to 42, but it was better than two and three platoon. Three had lost 15 people, two had lost 28.

Tyler checked the tactical screens. Sook was running full out for the bunker with a wounded Haas over her shoulder. Mark and his fourth platoon were taking up the rear behind them, covering down the hallway.

Jerome’s one section was covering the hall, hollering for them to hurry up. One signal moved away from the pack and Tyler almost didn’t need to look at the name to know who it was. He turned and started running the other way. Tyler made to move for the entrance to the cryo-bunker, but Alexis stopped him.

“Tyler, wait,” she said, her voice pained saying the words.

Those two words held him as he watched Mark charge the enemy, buying his fourth section and the company Commanders the time that they needed to get into the bunker.

***

Mark pulled a blade off Hama’s pack and turned.

“Warra...,” Hama started, slowing. Mark pushed him on.

“Keep them safe, I’ll buy you some time,’ Mark said, knowing that this was one hell of a play, but also knowing that the armor on their backs was the weakest. There was a good chance that the PACs would just cut them down as they were running, and he needed Captain Sook and Haas to get to the cryo-bunker.

His people would die if he didn’t do what he needed to do.

“But Ma...,”

“Move it Sergeant!” Mark barked, his voice angry and desperate. “It’s a good day to die!” His body went wild, coming alive with the augments. If one wanted to they could remove the limiters on the little puppies, and make themselves invulnerable to pain, able to push past their body’s normal restraints. They could become adrenaline fueled machines, but the cost was that your body wouldn’t survive.

Mark had a plan, it was a rough one, but hopefully he could pull it off. If not, then his people would be safe. He saw that Hama was listening to his order and charging for the cryo-bunker.

He grabbed a grenade from his waist, his last one, and he tossed it into the stairwell. It went off, dust and debris came out of the stairwell, followed by screams.

Mark pulled a block of grey putty from his leg pouch. He slapped it onto his ammunition pack and un-hooked his Repulsor.

The first PAC came screaming out of the stairwell, their armor a mess with blood spurting out of the rent in their side.

Mark parried the block of metal that they were swinging like a bat at his head. The PAC missed their target and spun. Mark sliced across, cutting the Trooper’s upper chest open. His right hand grabbed the sword on his pack and he moved forward, moving two blades in his grasp. Checking the rest of his section, he saw they were nearly all in the cryo-bunker.

PACs rushed through the stairwell, running at him. Mark laughed, it was a deep, terrible thing. His blades moved his brain, which was working faster than it ever had, and his reactions and training were becoming instinctual.

He was hit and hammered with melee weapons, and the odd metal storm rifle was unloaded in his direction. He continued on even as it got hard to breathe because they’d dented his chest. His right arm stopped functioning properly; one of the fuckers had dented his armor into the joint.

Then his left elbow stopped working, so he had to lock it out. He broke his right hand, the armor shattering. He screamed, the pain focusing him as he hit harder; they were pushing him back into the open room, allowing them to get more people to fight him at one time.

Motherfuckers, you are making me work for it, aren’t you?

They didn’t make it an inch without a fight for their lives. Mark might have been called Diablo back on Earth, but he had changed since then, and he had been taught ways to kill people without thought.

This is what I am, a killing machine, a man of death. He didn’t feel the cold chill of realization, he felt the exhilaration of understanding. He would take on this pain, on the killing. He would be Diablo. The demon of the EMF.

He fought with renewed energy. His body was broken and beaten, but his will was strong, and he overcame his pain with chemicals and augments.

One of the bastards got smart and drove a metal rod into his left leg.

He grunted in pain, knowing that it was the end. It was time to play his ace, so he turned and jumped away on his good leg. He tossed a blade at the bunker, and it buried itself in the wall next to Jerome’s head.

Mark released the pack’s locks, hanging off its fabric. Rounds rang off of Mark’s back, and he jumped again, cutting one of the fabric loops and pulling the release on the other. The pack dropped behind him, and he gave it a kick at the Chosen, hitting one of them with it and sending him sprawling. He’d forgotten about his leg and the piece of rebar sticking out of it.

He dug the blade into the floor, and threw himself forward. The Chosen were gaining on him. He called up a command prompt on his implants, and tossed himself forward on his hands and one good leg.

Jerome fired over him, covering him. Mark raced on. He wouldn’t let this be the end of him.

No, he had many more Harmony to kill, and a promise to keep. He thought of Caroline and threw himself onwards, even though he saw them getting within feet of him.

“Activate,” he said, unable to move his hands to do anything but throw himself forward.

The implants sent a signal to the incendiary charge he’d slapped onto the pack. It melted through the pack, reaching the rounds inside, and it went off like the universe’s grenade.

Mark was tossed forward, shrapnel peppering him. He landed a few meters from the cryo-bunker and felt arms grab him and haul him in. The hatch shut behind him and he heard the whine of auto-turrets opening up on the Chosen that had survived his pack’s explosion.

Mark felt someone opening his helmet; he was feeling funky from breaking his body and the augments effects were wearing off.

“God dammit, can you try to make the explosion bigger next time?” Jerome complained, opening the armor to get to Mark’s body underneath. He had a medical kit in his hands.

“I will if you and every goddamn medic stops stabbing me with fucking needles!” Mark whispered. He found it hard to focus, and pain started beating out the pain killers.

Jerome made an unhappy face but laughed as he went to work, stabbing those needles into Mark.

“Give the man some room people,” Captain Sook said, her voice strong and commanding. The shadows behind Jerome moved away.

“Good job Warrant.”

“Ah, had to make sure that you lot got home safe,” Mark said, sighing.

“Thank you.” Her voice was less Captain Sook and more the woman underneath it. She knew how close she had come to getting shot in the back, if not for Mark’s actions.

“All in a day’s work, now if you don’t mind I think my good buddy Jerome here is going to let me pass out.”

“No such luck, your head looks like you put it in a machine press and the concussion’s going to be a mean one. I can treat it, but I can’t give you the all clear until a real medic goes over you,” Jerome said.

Mark sighed and settled into his armor, knowing that they had left all of the medics in the tower above them. They had been going on a suicide mission and medics were too important to lose.

“Okay, just get me able to fight,” Mark said, the light tone of moments ago turning serious. He still might die today, and it sure as hell wasn't going to be on his back.

Jerome and Mark made eye contact.

“I got you buddy,” Jerome said, reassuring him.

“Thanks man.” Mark looked at the ceiling. Jerome was checking out his hands, thankfully he had some numbers working as he started putting him back together.

Mark felt eyes on him, he turned to find Tyler and Alexis looking at him. He gave them a smile and a wink, looking back to the ceiling, realizing that if he had died it would have torn his friends apart.

Guilt welled up in him, unbidden. He wanted to shake it off, thinking that it didn’t matter if he lived or died. But he saw Jerome working on him and felt the care in Mark and Alexis’ eyes, and he couldn’t push those thoughts away.

He thought of the rest of his old platoon, thinking about losing any of them.

He sighed; he didn’t need anyone to berate him on his actions. He already felt like an idiot.

***

Moretti looked to the sky as his implants alerted him to the incoming ordinance. A group of sleek looking meteors was arching overhead.

He watched them wishing they would hurry the hell up. The powered armor Troopers were still locked in the cryo-bunker under central tower, and there wasn’t any way that they were going to get out of there without killing all of the PACs in their way.

The auto-cannons that were in every cryo-pod bunker were currently keeping the Chosen back, but they wouldn’t hold forever. The Chosen were getting their hits in, and two of the four weapon systems were already broken.

You don’t even know if this will help them. The PACs could all be sealed up and they won’t get anything in there. Sure, it might get the regular Chosen, but the PACs are another story…

His worries made him make noises with his breath as he wished those missiles would just hurry the hell up.

Major Ortiz opened a channel with Moretti.

“Major?” Moretti said, his voice tight with concern, wondering if something had happened to the Troopers locked in the cryo-pods. He checked his implants to see that they were still okay.

“M, I am hearing that you called in the ordinance coming towards Mining City Twenty-One,’ he stated.

“Yes sir,” Moretti said, waiting for Ortiz to spell out his question.

“What the hell are they?”

“Biologicals. From what I’ve heard you experienced a similar kind of weapon on Sacremon.”

“Ah shit, do we have the immunization?’ Ortiz started to sound panicked.

“All of the Troopers and EMF personnel have the immunization.”

“Good,” Ortiz said, grim. “Damned dirty way to do things.”

“Yes, but it will save Troopers’ lives and allow us to go and fight in places where there are civilians.” Moretti didn’t understand the Troopers’ ethos. They hated fighting and seeing their people dying, but to them, using biological weapons was somehow dirty, like a stain on their honor.

Moretti thought it might have something to do with them never wishing to have the weapons used on them. He had learned that governments had signed a charter that regulated war in the past, and the whole thing was wildly interesting. Now the EMF decided how they fought war and it came down to cost/benefit ratios.

But here they were, diverging from that in order to keep more Troopers active and ready to fight in Fernix. This was a war, they couldn’t lose people here, it would take too long to have reinforcements from Earth arrive.

Ortiz grunted, neither agreeing or denying Moretti’s words. “How long until they hit and how effective will they be?”

“They will hit in seven minutes, and it will take up to fifteen minutes for them to complete dispersion. At that time, many of the regulars should be incapacitated,” Moretti said, feeling little mercy for the Chosen.

“Understood, I have some planning to do.”

“Good luck Major,” Moretti said. Back on Masoul a few years ago he would have found it odd to be wishing Troopers luck, they were just tools, but being stuck in Harmony’s midst and spending so much time with the Triple Twos had changed his way of thinking radically.

He took another glance at the missiles and then headed into his work shed. It was away from the main landing area and the work sheds that were refurbishing powered armor.

Inside, there was a section of Troopers who made sure he was safe and five desks with large computer stacks. There were seven other analysts in the room, pulled from Reclaimer. Moretti had worked with them since leaving Masoul. They knew him well and anticipated his needs.

“Alright, we need to secure a place in this fleet for our people. Now there is no Reclaimer, we need to make sure that our people stay together. Having them thrown all over the fleet is not going to be good. Rasheed, I want you to make sure that we have somewhere to go, preferably headed to Fernix instead of here on over watch.” Moretti looked to the deeply tanned small man who looked up from his holographic screens to acknowledge Moretti’s words before diving back into his work, his fingers moving rapidly.

“What is it, Daher?” The small woman was a coiled bundle of energy, with a tanned appearance and a short crop of hair and striking green eyes. She and Moretti had a less than professional relationship when they weren’t working. He could almost sense when she needed to say something.

“Processing station Five has been cleared, we are in control. One is broken and decaying. Fearless is holding position with it, shooting anything that leaves it. Stations Four and Seven are also under our control. On Processing Station Seven someone seemed to have forgotten to delete a flight path computation from Osdal to Fernix,” she said proudly, pinching something off her surface and throwing it to Moretti.

He opened the file and looked at the information within. “Good work Daher.” A smile crossed his features as he took the message, the latest reports, and sent it direct to Dalia. “I’ve submitted it higher, hopefully the EMF moving to Fernix can cut off some of those supplies.”

Daher nodded, her proud smile becoming grim. She had known people on Reclaimer when the ship had been hit by missiles, and she’d known people that had died on Masoul and were fighting on Osdal. Hurting Harmony in any way was a worthy mission in her eyes.

Don’t think you’re much too different, Moretti thought. He had been a loner before all of this, but now there was no denying the way he cared about the Triple Twos, Daher, or the other people fighting alongside them. Mark had once talked about how the Troopers were the family he’d never had. Moretti had snorted and joked about how they were the biggest misfit family ever.

Mark had just smiled, nodding, as if he knew that Moretti had already found his own way into that family.

Moretti tapped his leg pocket where his cigars were. The tipping point of the battle was coming; he could feel it in his bones.

Chapter 61

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

9/3267

Ortiz looked over the holograms that were showing the rough sketches of the plan he and his people had thought up in five minutes. It was ballsy.

“Well, either this will work or we’re going to royally fuck ourselves,” Ortiz said, watching it again. “Not gonna know until we give it a go.” He opened his implants and sent out the messages he and his aides had pulled together. They didn’t have long until the biological weapons hit.

Ortiz’s HUD started filling with green dots, denoting people understanding their orders and moving quickly.

He looked to the varying flight plans that were showing on his tactical displays, Flight Control had got his requests and were diverting Combat Shuttles to him in the tens. He would need them all to carry out his move. He just hoped to hell he was doing the right thing.

I wish that Nerva was here. Ice Man had fallen off the map when his Combat Shuttle had been hit with a missile. People had been over the shuttle, and no one had made it out alive.

Ortiz had kept that information to himself. Nerva was well liked by the Troopers, he needed them clear headed and on task, not thinking about their dead Commander.

If you’re up there, or still around in some way, give us a hand, will yah? Ortiz asked. He wasn’t a religious man, but he would take any help he could get.

***

“Did you check these orders?” Yu asked. His Combat Shuttle was on stand by on central tower’s landing pad.

“Twice, they’re from Ortiz, it looks like this is our final push. The other cities are making headway but they have too many losses. They need more Troopers to secure the cities, they can’t do it without the Troopers in Mining City Twenty-One,” Young said.

“Idiots tried to hit too many places at once. Would have worked better moving from one place to another,” Bobbie growled.

“Yes, but then there have never been this number of Troopers at their disposal, and they thought that it would be easy,” Yu sighed, shaking his head at whoever had come up with the initial landing plan.

“We have Troopers incoming,” Bobbie said. The shuttle’s sensors pinged the arriving Troopers, and they were split up into two groups; those with powered armor and those without. They made for the shuttles quickly.

Yu looked at the incoming ordinance, it was taking its sweet time so that it didn’t burn up in atmosphere or break before it was supposed to.

He focused on that, while Bobbie got the Troopers settled in, and Young planned different flight routes and talked to other Combat Shuttles.

The missiles spread apart, coming right at the city, and a few machine guns opened up, catching one missile. It didn’t even explode, it just disintegrated, its components heading for the city.

The other missiles disintegrated under their own power, turning into a dozen smaller missiles which accelerated into the city.

They passed through, breaking apart and scattering across the city before hitting the ground. They didn’t seem to do anything, just hit the ground and broke up. The toxin was invisible to the naked eye, but Yu’s sensors picked it up. The gas had started spreading as soon as the missiles broke apart and reached the city limits. In his view the gas was quickly falling through the city, the wind carrying it through the buildings.

A timer started counting down on Yu’s console.

He winced; the timer was counting down how long it would take for the gas to saturate the city and start affecting the Chosen.

Counting down the minutes until they die, he thought, feeling disgusted at himself for using such a weapon.

“We’re loaded up, sealing ramp,” Bobbie said.

“Understood, we have ten minutes until dispersion.” Yu looked to his wings, moving the different controls, checking that they were all functional no matter the holes through them and the scuff marks from rounds glancing off of the Combat Shuttle’s hull.

“We’ve been given the launch order,” Young said.

“Powering engines,” Yu said, bringing the shuttle into a hover. When a gust of wind blew them sideways, Yu expertly reacted, counteracting the breeze and powering off the landing pad, following Young’s route.

He dropped off the landing pad gathering speed and darting away, five other Combat Shuttles followed him in triangle formation.

They were a sight to see, eight flying war machines arching away from the city and gathering speed, taking a long lazy turn to face the tower that they had fallen from. A few machine guns here and there opened fire. The Combat Shuttle’s gunners fired missiles and lines of tracers at the weapon systems, but there was nothing like the numbers they had faced when first entering the city.

Yu leveled out, and started up an automated system that would make the shuttle drop and weave to make targeting hard. Young’s route made it look like they were going to touch down on several landing pads before finally lining them up with their intended target. Yu used his sensors to find Chosen and get an up-close look at them.

He got a view of them in central tower. People were coughing and wandering around. Others were trying to comfort them, not understanding what was going on.

His view changed to another group, the angle too oblique to see the first. There were a group of Chosen pointing weapons at the sick and dying. Yu didn’t know what was happening, but some of the sick were trying to get close to the healthy Chosen. The healthy ones opened fire on the sick, ripping them apart with their metal storm rifle’s fire.

Other Chosen started firing on them, turning it into a wild shooting match.

They were scared, and the toxin was deadly and fast.

Another view came into play; PACs were wading through dead and dying Chosen, who were looking around wildly, obviously confused.

The timer on Yu’s console hit zero as they passed over the last landing pad and Yu took full control of the craft, lining it up with the 75th floor.

He fired on the level with his auto-cannons, and the rest of the Combat Shuttles following him took this as their signal, firing on the level.

Combat Shuttles across the city were doing the same, heading right at a floor, and firing everything they had into it, clearing out any Chosen still left standing.

More shuttles were coming in from orbit, their tails streaking water vapor. More rose from the maintenance pad turned forward operating base, their engines at full power.

Yu applied his air brakes, slowing the shuttle. He winced as he went inside central tower. Still standing parts of the tower were smashed by the nose of the shuttle and its wings.

His landing struts came out as he lowered the craft to the ground, leaving divots in the floor. He fired his forward thrusts at full, bringing the shuttle to a halt. The other shuttles also piled into the level and auto-turrets fired on any Chosen that were in the area.

Ramps that had been half open dropped all the way, Troopers rushed out, circling the Combat Shuttles and taking control of the level. Yu fired his auto-cannons, clearing a hanging section of warped metal out of his way.

He powered his engines, looking at the torn up housing area and entertainment sector. He gritted his teeth, his shuttle’s wings breaking through the cheap walls, plowing an exit out of the tower for his fellow shuttles. It was painful hearing the damage he was doing to his shuttle’s wings. The chief engineer was not going to be pleased.

Finally, he was out of central tower and dropping, and he powered his engines and pulled up, scared that his wings would fall off.

He rose up, his air flaps complaining against the debris in their mechanics, but the air cleared it away.

Should have had more faith in the old girl, he thought, letting out a breath and patting the Combat Shuttle’s console for luck.

“Let’s never do that ever again,” Bobbie said.

“Agreed. I can only imagine how much work it’s going to take to get this thing cleared for service after all of that,” Young added.

Yu was just happy to have survived the whole ordeal. He headed for the maintenance pad, the Troopers were going to need supplies soon and Yu wasn’t going to leave them hanging.

***

Jerome watched as PACs started falling over - and not from the Trooper’s weapon fire. They were exchanging fire from the entrance of the cryo-bunker to the stairwell that went down to it.

Some of the smarter ones were using the Repulsors left behind against the Troopers.

Collins got hit and fell backwards, and Jerome was there hauling her out of fire. Her hip was fucked up. Jerome quickly unlocked her armor and got inside.

“You’re lucky Collins,” he said, covering the area in sealant. She had a small flesh wound, not two inches from the artery running through her leg.

“Doesn’t feel like it Sarge,” she complained, not looking happy at all.

“No I bet it doesn’t,” Jerome laughed, putting the sealant away. “You’re good to go, stay back though.” She would need to take time to let the area heal and hopefully see if her servo motor was working properly.

“Sergeants and higher link in,” Lieutenant Sook said. “We’ve got word from higher, apparently the city is getting coated in some kind of toxin that shouldn’t affect Troopers, but will kill Chosen just fine.”

“If it’s all the same, ma’am, I’m going to order my people keep their armor shut unless they’re wounded,” Mark said.

“Agreed. Now, this shit is supposed to kill the Chosen if they breathe it in. If we see a break in their ranks I want us to be ready to move. We don’t have the supplies to hold out for more than a few hours, it’s now or never. We might be able to get some shuttles to rush us out of here, but we need to book it, because our lives very much depend on this one shot. Get your sections together, I want a situation report and be ready to run if you need to. If that means leaving behind compromised armor, do it. You have five minutes, be ready to move after then.”

Jerome cut off the channel and quickly passed on the message to his section.

They started up tests on their armor, reported ammunition levels and Master Corporal Ko checked them over one by one.

Jerome saw Mark stepping out of his powered armor, and saw he was still wearing his plate armor underneath. How the large man had done it Jerome didn’t know.

It looked like a number of people had done it, and those with armor but functional PA gave it to Troopers without both. Ammunition was drained from the broken powered Armor’s ammunition packs, divided up to the other units. It looked like Zukic’s two platoon would be taking point on this one, getting the majority of the ammunition and moving into position around the cryo-pods entrance.

***

Ortiz’s plan was simple: take half of his people and insert them into different floors by Combat Shuttle. Sometime they were lucky and they had landing pads, otherwise they had to make their own.

They targeted floors with the least amount of activity based on what they could see on the city’s sensors.

The Troopers secured the floor and headed up and down.

The Chosen, whose people were dying all around them, would now be fighting on multiple sides, with the Troopers using the shock of the Chosen’s friends dying to take them unprepared. It was a good plan, one that used the toxin’s physical and psychological effects and capitalized on them.

Yet Ortiz couldn’t help but feel dirty using such tactics. He knew it would work to some degree, yet it was a terrible thing to do and a tactic he hoped to never use again.

His mind cast back to Sacremon, and he shook his head to clear those thoughts. He needed to be in the present, thinking of past battles wouldn’t help him. He could deal with his morality and nightmares later. He needed to win control of Mining City Twenty-One.

“The Combat Shuttles are coming in with the supplies now. We have fire bases set up in the majority of towers, at least two per tower, not including original insertion points,” one of the aides rattled off, and Ortiz’s tired mind took a moment to conjure up his name. Botsuei.

“Good,” Ortiz said, nodding and looking back at the hologram which showed the entire colony city. Slivers of green were growing up and down red towers, showing the Troopers’ growing area of control.

They had the Chosen reeling from the sudden attacks and they were pressing forward with everything they had. It had been an hour since the toxin had hit.

“How are the Troopers in the basement doing?” Ortiz asked.

“They’re holding out, Lieutenant Sook has them preparing to push through the PAC blockade force and attempt a rescue,” Skovgaard said.

“Thinks on her feet, good. Have a flight of Combat Shuttles ready and waiting to cover them, or haul them out. Make sure the Combat Shuttle crews know the risks,” Ortiz said.

“Yes sir.” Skovgaard got back to working her holograms.

Ortiz put his hands behind his back, hiding them from the aides as he squeezed his thumb nervously.

So this is what you were talking about, hating watching the whole damned battle. It does feel like you’re just throwing darts into a hurricane, hoping that some of them even come close to hitting the dartboard, Ortiz thought of conversations he’d had with Nerva.

Ortiz would give anything to be down with his Troopers, fighting on the front lines, instead of watching it on holograms, knowing all too well that his decisions could send people to their deaths while he shared little of that risk.

***

Mark rolled his shoulders and moved his head from side to side. He was wearing his powered armor’s helmet, and the thing wasn’t the best, but it was better than running outside without one.

It had been two hours since they had checked their gear and prepared to escape. A PAC had fallen over earlier, and more of them were falling and none of them were currently firing down the hall.

Sook had passed warning orders, waiting to make sure it wasn’t a hoax, and then placing a call to the Combat Shuttles.

“Two platoon, followed by one and three,” Lieutenant Sook said.

Zukic’s platoon rushed past one platoon, who were covering the entrance to the cryo-bunker.

His people made it to the stairwell and continued on, their sensors were being relayed back to the other people in the company.

No red halos appeared out of thin air and one platoon moved to follow.

“Well, let’s not get left behind,” Mark said after one platoon disappeared up the stairs.

The large room before the stairwell was covered in bodies, and he didn’t touch the floor on his way to the stairwell. It was even worse. Thankfully one and three platoon had shoved bodies and dead PACs out of the way.

Most of them didn’t even have a mark on their armor. Mark saw a few Chosen without powered armor, and their faces smoked lightly. He saw one person’s cave in. It looked like their bodies were dissolving from the inside.

Mark’s platoon was halfway up the stairwell when two platoon came under contact.

“We’ve got PACs that were hiding in the tower. They look to be healthy, probably not part of the original guys attacking us,” Zukic said, and Mark sped his pace up as red halos appeared on his HUD.

Mark came out into the middle of a firefight. One platoon was on the second floor of the lobby, two was on the first. Both were engaged with PACs hiding in cover and their earlier confidence was gone.

The Repulsor fire was sure to keep their heads down as tracers stitched holes in whatever walls and surfaces were left.

Mark felt the Combat Shuttles before he heard them over the weapons fire. Air swept in through the opening shutters to the lobby.

“Three move it!” Sook yelled, and Mark saw that she was on the first floor, side by side with her Troopers, firing into the PACs.

“Wounded and one section first, two and three on the second shuttle, fourth with me on the last.” He kept the channel open with Haas so he could coordinate the remaining lifts.

The shutters opened all the way and two shuttles were waiting, a third settling down. Two more shuttles rushed overhead, firing on the surrounding towers, missiles sending fireballs through buildings and auto cannons rolling fire echoing through the city.

The first shuttle barely had the last person up the ramp before it headed off, and the second followed moments later.

Mark followed the rest of his platoon onto the last shuttle. It rubbed him the wrong way to be on the last shuttle, but someone had to leave first.

The shuttles sped off and he looked at the tactical screens. One was pulling back to the first floor, two was pulling back to the entrance to the lobby. They kept up their fire on the enemy the entire time, their tracer fire lighting up the night.

***

“Two platoon, you’re next!” Haas barked.

“Understood!” Zukic replied.

A Combat Shuttle’s engines could be heard behind Tyler, and dust and crap messed up his powered armor’s night vision.

They were now at the outside of the lobby, firing in.

Tyler saw two platoon rushing off onto three shuttles that were waiting for them. More Combat Shuttles were holding position above, their weaponry making anyone moving around regret their decision.

“Close support!” Sook said, moments before two missiles streaked through the lobby’s two story windows, detonating inside.

The Troopers’ fire slacked as they looked for PA that had survived that onslaught. If they had, they weren’t brave enough to put their heads out.

The shutters to the lobby closed. PACs rounds sparked as they hit the armored shutters.

The last of two platoon’s shuttles took off, the first of one platoon’s touching down.

“Ali, Waz, first Combat Shuttle, Alexis, Dashtund second,” Tyler said.

The platoon ran for the shuttles. Some enterprising assholes must have sensed it was their last opportunity to hit the Troopers and opened fire on the shuttles.

Some thirty Repulsors and four Combat Shuttles opened fire on the offenders, ripping the tower’s facades apart.

“Move!” Tyler barked, as sections swarmed into the two remaining Combat Shuttles.

Tyler was the last in, holding onto the overhead netting Combat Shuttle as it took off, the ramp coming up as they climbed into the air. For a few moments Tyler thought he might fall out the back of the shuttle, then the ramp shut, cutting off the rushing wind outside. Tyler sank into a chair, sighing.

He looked over the list of dead and wounded. Five Troopers had died in their exit, including Holm.

There were no whoops or cheers in the Combat Shuttle as they left Mining City Twenty-One and headed for the maintenance pad.

***

It had taken two nerve-wracking days, but the Troopers that had been seeded throughout the occupied towers had linked up with the Troopers above them.

Ortiz sat down in what had been someone’s living room. There was garbage everywhere, the view screen had bullet holes in it and the bathroom was open to the hallway where Troopers were wandering around or taking a seat like Ortiz.

He’d seen what the biological weapon had done to the Chosen. The toxin had turned to an acid inside their systems and melted their innards.

In the end it had come down to three decisions for the powered armor wearing Chosen: either they suffocated in their armor, they opened it and died from the toxin, or they ran at the Troopers and got cut down.

Many had gone with the second option, thinking that they were immune or that what had happened to their friends wouldn’t happen to them. The smart ones charged the Troopers. It was the least painful of all the options.

Already techs and armorers were swarming the city, dumping out Chosen bodies and using the exoskeletons to install their upgrades.

There were 47 Cities on Osdal Actual, and all but nine were under the control of the EMF. Osdal Three had been cleared, with only a company staying behind to make sure none of the Chosen emerged from the forests.

Three processing stations still had Chosen in them.

Ortiz let his head fall backwards and sighed. His body hurt to his very bones, fatigue seeping through every fiber of his being.

Chapter 62

Tower

Earth, Sol System

10/3267

Nivad looked over from the reports that dominated his screen. There were unfiltered views coming straight from the battlefield, most of which the paying customer would never get to see. Well, Nivad was thinking of selling a special highlight reel once the war was done.

It would probably pay quite well and serve as a reminder for those that thought about pushing off the company partnerships that owned the planets they lived on.

“You called?” Dalia asked, closing the door behind her.

“Yes, I want orders sent to the carriers in Osdal. Leave one behind to deal with the remaining Harmony forces, the rest are to move on to Fernix. Have them take the powered armor that they need. They are to modify the armor while travelling to Fernix,” Nivad said.

“Yes sir, I will have the orders sent within the hour.” She made to leave.

“Also, make it clear that if they are to capture any of the ships that left Osdal for Fernix, they will be rewarded with a third of what the ship and its cargo earns at auction,” Nivad said.

Realization dawned in Dalia’s eyes and she smiled. “I will make a point of that with them.”

Nivad smiled as she left.

The carriers were faster than the freighters by a large margin. If they left soon enough, then they might be able to catch up with the freighters from the last five years, only giving Fernix 12 years of Osdal’s processed materials instead of 17.

It would also put all of those freighters under the control of Nivad, to be auctioned off to whoever had the credits for the cargo and ship.

Chapter 63

Mining City Twenty-One

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

10/3267

Tyler looked at CSM Haas in confusion. It had been three days since they had escaped Mining City Twenty-One’s Central Tower.

Their armor had been charged, serviced and given back to them. They’d pulled new weapons and ammo, and eaten, slept and prepared for their next mission.

“We’re going to the carriers?” Tyler asked, stunned.

“Orders from on high. They want us in Fernix as soon as possible. We control most of Osdal Actual, the processing stations and OsdalThree. EMFC Avenger will stay behind to clear the remaining Chosen, and make sure that there isn’t a resurgence in the system,” Haas said.

“It just feels wrong, leaving the bastards running around while we head off for Fernix,” Jerome said.

“There are just a few cities left; as long as they armor up and hit them one by one then they should be fine, it’ll be just like Sacremon was for us,” Mark said.

Not many people looked happy.

“Have your people ready to move in two hours, we’re going to be berthing on the carrier Dauntless,” Haas said.

“We staying together?” Tal asked.

“No, we’re getting split up to spread the pool of our knowledge to the other Troopers on the carrier. Hope is that we can help them get past the BM and turn them into real Troopers.” Haas sounded tired.

Chapter 64

EMFC Dauntless

Osdal Actual, Osdal System

10/3267

It seemed like they had barely sat down at the maintenance pad when they were being ordered to board Combat Shuttles that were going to take them up the EMFC Dauntless, their new home.

Fearless was going to be home for most of the people from Reclaimer. Ortiz, and those in the regiment under his command, were being pulled apart and sowed throughout Dauntless’ Troopers.

They were filling their gaps, and the hope was that they could pass their training on.

To the Troopers it all happened in a blur. Mark was sent to the medics, and he got the full go-over as a number of people tried to remove his scars. The quickly found themselves forcibly ejected from his stall.

Those scars were his memories, a way to never forget his past.

They all took Nerva’s death hard, but they understood why Ortiz had kept it from them. He was as close to a father figure as they had got. He had helped them all become the people that they were now.

In five days, they went from breaking out of Mining City Twenty-One’s central tower to being on the carrier with leave, their armor and supplies following on as they waited to be sent out into the abyss towards their next fight in Fernix.

Mark was quickly making his way through a bottle of liquor. It was the second day he had been on leave. The past two days he’d drank himself to sleep, but the nightmares still found him, and in the morning the hangover made him forget all about them.

He’d gone to the mess early and started his day off right, with a good ole bottle of booze.

He had a nice buzz going on when Alexis walked over and took a seat in the chair opposite.

***

“Hey sis,” Mark said, sitting back in his chair and taking a long swig of the bottle in his hands.

“Hey Mark, you okay?” she asked, not knowing how to ask the question any other way.

The way he looked at her made her wince. He didn’t try to hide his emotions with that much drink in him. There was hatred and sadness there.

“You tell me,” he said, his voice hot as he took another angry drink, looking away.

“Well, tell me what’s going on inside that thick skull of yours.” She cared for Mark, he had looked out for her more than once, and he was part of hers and Tyler’s family.

He drank, silent for a long time as if remembering something.

“I met this girl called Caroline in the camp,” Mark said, still staring off into space.

He laughed, a real smile on his face as he remembered something, then he took another drink as if to drown that memory.

“She looked after me, taught me what happens in the camp, taught me what to do and, and she was nice,” Mark said, his words failing him. He looked at Alexis, tears in his eyes and a sad smile on his face.

Oh shit, she thought, her heart breaking as she saw the one emotion she had only seen on her wedding day on his face: unconditional love.

“She didn’t care that I was a fighter, or a killer, and when I got the nightmares she crawled in closer and soothed my worries away. She cared for me.” He laughed and shook his head, blinking rapidly, tears falling down his cheeks as he took another swill.

“I protected her, looked out for her, and we would talk. She was as broken as me and I couldn’t care less. I never saw her face, just her eyes and this scar running across her face, called it a promise. A promise to avenge her family. She didn’t tell me the real reason was because she was so pretty she was scared about those fucking animals getting to her.” Mark’s hand tightened on the bottle. He took a few moments to calm down before forcing two mouthfuls of liquor back. He wiped some on his shirt that fell on his chin.

“She was the one that patched me up after I got dragged across the fucking desert. The Chosen saw, and when everything started to go to shit with those videos and Castillo blowing his brains out, they came for me again. Probably wanted to finish off what they’d started with towing me behind their air car,” Mark laughed, a harsh noise to Alexis’ ears.

Mark searched the table with his eyes. “Well they wanted to cause me some more pain before I died. Seems like they’d been watching how Caroline and I cared for one another, so they beat me using shock sticks so I couldn’t fight back.” He looked up into Alexis’ eyes, holding them there. His deep brown eyes almost looked black, filled with hatred.

“See, they wanted to hurt her to hurt me. They skinned her in front of me. I tried to fight them, they kept hitting me with shock sticks but made sure I was conscious to hear her scream as they cut her skin off. Fuckers didn’t do it right,” he snorted, shaking his head, his eyes finding Alexis’s again.

“See, they cut too deep, they took off most of her one side from her kneecap, up her ribs to her chest. Fuckers were touching her the entire time.

It was only when they were going down the other side when one of the Chosen was about to rape her, that I got my chance. The fucker watching me was distracted, and made it so I could kill him. Killed the rest of them good too.” He drank from the bottle, putting it on the table and looking at it.

“See, I was too late. They'd cut chunks out of her sides, and she was losing blood and fast, pain sent her into unconsciousness for a little bit, so I used some of the Chosen’s drugs so she could deal with the pain. If I’d had just a can of sealant, or a hot brand, I might have been able to save her, but all I had was some clothes.” His eyes drifted to Alexis and then away, his voice and body heavy.

A small sad smile that made tears well in Alexis’s eyes appeared on his face.

“She said she liked me.” He laughed; it was a painful thing, but full of wonder.

“Said that she wished we could have got an asteroid miner, just gone off and done our own thing. That was the first time I saw her face, and she was beautiful.” Mark slid in his seat, looking at the ceiling, wrapped in his memories, drinking from his bottle. He stayed like that for some time. Alexis knew that there was nothing that she could do for Mark right then and there. She knew she would be in the same place if Tyler died. It hit her close to home, and she held tears at bay, barely.

She reached across the table and squeezed Mark’s hand. It was hard seeing him going through this inner turmoil.

“Let me know if you need anything,” She said, holding his hand for a few more moments before letting go.

“Help me kill the bastards that killed Caroline, help me kill Harmony.” His eyes chilled her to the bone. There was no hatred, no love, just the eyes of a killer.

Chapter 65

SLS Furtim

Heading away from Osdal System

10/3267

His last memory was of being in a spinning Combat Shuttle with a hole revealing missiles going off in the distance.

He woke in a warm substance. He had been in it many times before, but never while he was part of Earth’s Military Forces.

He pushed himself out of the medical vat. It looked like a pool of swirling silver, but in reality it was a vat of nano machines that were small enough to work on the molecular level.

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask that you get back into the medical vat. This is our medical ward and we’re trying to…” The medicos in the room started. There were fourteen other medical vats chugging away that Nerva could see.

“Legate Nerva, Recruiting for the Legion. Why the hell am I here?” Nerva demanded. The medicos’s placating gestures disappeared.

“Nerva,” NIDenise started.

Nerva closed his eyes, rubbing his head and sighing at her tone. He felt like he wasn’t going to like this next part.

“Your enlistment within the EMF is over, it was the thought of myself and of Legate Aurelius that it would be best if you died in the eyes of the EMF. Nivad Selvra was taking a close look at you and the people of the carrier Reclaimer,” NIDenise continued.

“Who is Centurion of this ship?” Nerva asked, looking to the Medico. They looked almost puzzled as to why he hadn’t asked his Neural Interfacing Artificial Intelligence.

“Centurion Exceter,” NIDenise answered.

Nerva nodded and started walking out. The Medico shook his head and went back to looking over his charges through the holographic screens at the bottom of their medical vats.

NIDenise overlaid his view with instructions to get to Centurion Exceter’s position.

Nerva marched through the halls of the ship. People that saw him came to attention, slapping their chests in salute and bowing their heads. He returned the gesture, though it almost felt foreign to him, it had been 25 years since he had last saluted someone from the Legion. And those 25 years had been spaced out with nearly two hundred years of being in cryo-sleep.

Nerva traveled on a few grav-walks, taking him across the ship in minutes. He quickly found centurion Exceter’s room, and knocked on the door. A green light appeared in is view, the Centurion seeing who it was and agreeing to his entry.

Exceter stood and saluted Nerva from behind his desk.

“It is a great pleasure to meet you, Legate. I have heard tales of your feats since my childhood,” Exceter said with a wide smile.

“He is an old bastard,” Legate Aurelius said on a wall screen to Nerva’s left.

“Why the fuck am I on a Space Legion Ship headed away from Osdal?” Nerva asked, staring Aurelius in the eyes. He hadn’t seen his old friend like this in years, it had always been through NIDenise and Aurelius’ own NIAI.

He could see that his friend had aged heavily in the years apart. His dark hair was salt and pepper, but his face was still clean-shaven and his brown eyes were commanding as always.

“Because we need you back, and we don’t want Nivad Selvra sniffing around the Legion,” Aurelius said as if the argument was over.

“I never asked to be pulled, I have people depending on me over there!” Nerva’s anger built.

“That might very well be true, but you can’t go back now anyway, it’s been weeks since you died.” Aurelius said.

Nerva made to argue but Aurelius cut him off. “They’re still fighting one another for land and resources, just like when they first found Roma. They didn’t care that they entered us into a war for our very survival. All they care about is what they can get from the situation. The Legion is fighting for the survival of the human race; they’re just fighting for credits. The bastard that came up with Harmony is just a kid who doesn’t have the patience to play their power games. One kid and a bunch of CEOs looking to get rich, that’s what their war is all about. Millions are going to die because of those idiots’ games, and they don’t give a fuck,” Aurelius raged.

“We’re out in the black of space, killing and getting killed by the Maraukians, keeping humanity, including Earth and Her Colonies, safe. I need you Nerva.” Aurelius’s anger dimmed, showing a tired old man that had seen too much. “The Legion needs you, Legate Nerva.”