Son of Justice (3 page)

Exhaustion threatened to drag Eli into sleep, but he fought the temptation. He waited until Benson finally reached the summit, then turned over and stared at the bottom of the other man’s bed. He went through a five-minute routine of horizontal stretching exercises, then slowly coaxed his aching body into a seated position and lowered his still-booted feet to the floor.

“What’re you doing?” The question drifted down from the top bunk. Benson sounded completely spent from the recent march.

“Gotta get these boots off, man,” Eli replied.

“Ah, hell. Should I even ask why? We gotta be outside again in an hour anyway.”

“That’s the reason. Do you want to head out on another march without taking care of your feet?”

“Crud, EJ! You waited until I got up here to tell me that, didn’t you?”

Eli grinned and began unlacing the orange-tinted boots. Benson had taken to calling him by his initials weeks ago, and to Eli’s surprise, he kind of enjoyed it. He had never had a nickname, and EJ was as good as any. He sighed when he kicked off his first boot, groaned in pleasure when the second one came off. The relief was immediate, but temporary. Both boots would be put back on shortly.

“Nah. Too tired to think of it before now. That’s all.”

“Yeah, yeah. Save it for the Minith. You just like to see me suffer, admit it.”

“S’what you get for talking me out of the top bunk on day one,” Eli chided.

“Yeah, and you refused to trade back on day two. But the offer still stands.”

“I’m good, but thanks. Still . . . you need to wash your feet and put on fresh socks before evening formation.”

“Crud.”

Despite their early, rocky start, the two men had come to like each other. Eli enjoyed the other man’s humor and his ability to do whatever was needed to survive the torture their Minith trainers put them through. He also knew the other man had come to rely on his experience and guidance. As their training progressed, more and more of the individuals in their unit dropped out, casualties of the stress and conditions to which they were subjected. Interestingly, whatever they were required to do, Eli always seemed to come out near the front of the pack. He wasn’t always the best, but he was never far behind the leader. Benson had quickly taken note.

Others had taken note as well.

As Eli limped across the barracks floor to the latrine, he saw several heads turn in his direction and take note of his actions. As he was leaving the washroom, his feet now clean, most of his unit—Benson included—passed him going in the opposite direction.

* * *

An hour later, the fifty-four men and women that remained in their training platoon stood silently in rank and file. The hot, Telgoran wind whipped viciously through their battered ranks, causing several of the soldiers to sway or stagger against the invisible assault. The hard-packed ground they occupied was kept clean by the wind, but rogue grains of sand and grit were regularly found by the invisible cyclone and cast angrily against an unprotected hand or face. Random yelps or flinches from his peers punctuated each occurrence, and gave notice that it was just a matter of time before another of the tiny missiles found a target. The anxious wait for the next surprising sting was worse than the sting itself, Eli thought, and he took a deep breath of hot air and forced his tense muscles to relax as best they could. This experience was temporary and wouldn’t last forever, he reminded himself. A sudden bite of pain to his left cheek reminded him that the experience, though temporary, had to be endured just the same.

The two sister platoons in their training company stood to the left and right of Eli’s platoon. Neither of the other platoons held more than fifty recruits each, Eli noticed. The forced march that weeded out five of his platoon-mates had taken a much heavier toll on the other two units. A quick peek showed the boots of all but a few in the other platoons were still covered in dust and sand. Few of them had bothered to treat their feet during their short break. A whisper of concern tickled the back of Eli’s neck at the oversight. It also resurrected the still-lingering question of why the Minith sergeants didn’t look out for them? Weren’t they invested in the health and well-being of their charges? Along those same lines, he wondered what had kept him from looking after his peers. It wasn’t his job to look after everyone, but if he could help, why not? He had been training to be a soldier for years, he knew things that those around him obviously didn’t. It made no sense to keep that knowledge to himself. With an internal nod, he made a decision to step up and fill in the gaps where he could. Maybe their instructors couldn’t be bothered, but he had no such qualms.

The assembled humans immediately snapped to attention as three Minith instructors exited the building to their front. The aliens were outfitted in the same dirty-copper colored uniform as Eli and his peers, but that’s where the resemblance ended. The giant warriors had greenish skin, stood in excess of eight feet, and weighed more than three hundred pounds. Their simian appearance was offset by large, batlike ears. Those ears were the reason they didn’t wear the black beret that the humans sported. It was safe to say, the Minith were intimidating and Eli had noted early on that the instructors leveraged their physical appearance to push, taunt, and torture their human charges.

Each was a sergeant in the Alliance Defense Force and all had several years of military experience. At least one of them had seen battle against humans on Earth, Eli had learned a week earlier. His instructor, Sergeant Twigg, had dropped that nugget of information during a class on hand-to-hand combat. The way his eyes had searched the recruits surrounding him seemed full of menace, as if he was daring one of his human charges to make a comment or offer an affront to his honor. No one had accepted the unspoken challenge. It was likely the other two sergeants had similar battle experience.

The three huddled in front of the assembled platoons and openly ignored the humans. Although Defense Force regulations required that all military personnel speak Earth Standard language whenever a second race was present, the three Minith sergeants set that rule aside in favor of their native tongue. It was apparent the Minith did not anticipate any of the humans could speak their language.

Interesting
, Eli thought as he strained to hear what they were saying.

“Stupid monkeys,” the soldier next to him muttered. A quick glance showed the soldier to be Private Jerrone, an orphan from Earth. “They’re supposed to speak Standard.”

“Shhhh,” Eli whispered. “I’m trying to hear.” The comment prompted a gasp and a sideways look from the other recruit. Apparently, he hadn’t expected any of his peers to speak Minith, either.

“. . . only five were lost?” Eli heard the Minith sergeant for First Platoon, Sergeant Brek, ask.

“That’s unacceptable,” Sergeant Krrp, the sergeant for Third Platoon replied. “We can’t let that many of these sheep pass.”

Sergeant Twigg’s ears twitched, and the look that crossed his face showed that he agreed with his fellow instructors. “What do you propose?”

“Another march?”

“Humpf! I’d agree, but what if the humans sitting in power hear of it? It could undo years of work,” Brek offered. “So what if we put an additional twenty humans in the ranks? It’s not as if they could harm us or change our plans.”

The three looked over the assembled humans once again. Eli, who had spent most of his childhood with Minith friends, and being tutored by Minith warriors, recognized the look of contempt on the faces of the three trainers. By nature, Minith were contemptuous creatures, so seeing the expression was no surprise. However, observing a Minith openly express contempt toward a human was a new experience for Eli. He wondered what it meant.

“Let’s put them through another ten kilometers,” Sergeant Twigg announced. He waved a large, greenish hand at the humans assembled behind him. “They look ready to drop, and that should be enough to weed most of them out.”

“And if we get questioned by the masters?”

“We’ll explain it away, of course. Just a standard training exercise.” It was apparent that Twigg was senior, and the other two nodded at the decision. “And stop calling them ‘masters.’ They’re sheep, just like the pitiful creatures behind us.”

“Very well. Shall we feed them first?”

“Yes,” Twigg replied. “They’ll be emptying their stomachs on the side of the road within the first kilometer.”

A cloud of anger passed through Eli’s being. He didn’t know what their motivations were, but it was apparent they were no longer bound by the Minith culture principle that dictated their subservience to the humans who had defeated them. Eli wondered if all Minith felt the same or if this new behavior was limited to a small group. Regardless, it was suddenly apparent why these three were blatantly ignoring their responsibilities as training sergeants. They wanted the humans who had been placed under their tutelage to fail.

They were released with instructions to eat quickly and be back in formation in thirty minutes.

“You’ve all put in a good day of work,” Sergeant Twigg announced before releasing Second Platoon for the evening meal. Typically, a comment of that nature could be accurately interpreted as confirmation the worn-out recruits would soon be done for the day. In this instance, though, Eli knew that wasn’t the case. The Minith sergeants were setting them up for failure.

As the recruits fell out of formation and began moving toward the mess hall, Eli debated quickly on what action he should take. Until now, he had managed to stay under the radar of the instructors. And while his platoon-mates may have recognized some of his actions as potentially noteworthy, he had resisted taking steps that would designate him as a leader to the training cadre or the other platoons. Basically, he’d kept his head down, his mouth shut, and done his own thing.

But now . . . now, he felt he had to take some sort of action—warn his platoon and the others of what was coming. Having made up his mind, he scanned the crowd and found the person he wanted.

“Yo, Benson,” he called. “Hold up!”

Benson looked back, saw who had called out to him, and waited for Eli to catch up.

“What’s up, EJ? I’m starving, and we’ve only got thirty.”

“Yeah, but we’ve got bigger problems right now.” Benson raised an eyebrow and waited for Eli to continue. “We’re going to have to march again after chow.”

“What! No way, man,” the other private argued. “You heard Twiggy. We’re done after chow.”

“He never said that. And you better not let him hear you call him ‘Twiggy’.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Benson countered, trying to sound tough, but not quite pulling it off. His quick scan of the immediate vicinity to make sure the big-eared sergeant wasn’t around gave him away. He was about to say something else when Eli felt a tug on his sleeve and turned to find Jerrone at his side.

“So, you speak the green monkey’s language, Jayson?” Eli bit down on his irritation at the question. He had a lot of respect for the Minith. Hell, his best friend, Arok, was Minith. As a result, he had come to despise the derogatory names many of his fellow humans used when referring to the other race. For the thousandth time, he reminded himself that few humans knew anything about the alien race that once enslaved Earth. And what they did know, wasn’t very positive.

“Well?” Jerrone persisted. “What were they saying?”

Benson took a step backward and looked at Eli anew.

“You speak Minith?”

“Shhhh, both of you,” Eli whispered and motioned for the two to keep it down. “Yeah, I understand a bit of Minith.”

Benson whistled and shook his head. Jerrone studied Eli’s face, apparently unsure if he could believe what Eli was telling them. As far as most Earth-born humans knew, the number of people that could speak an alien language could be counted on the combined fingers and toes of the three recruits standing in their small circle. It’s why Earth Standard was the official language of the Shiale Alliance—well, that and the fact that Earth had defeated the Minith in the Peace Wars a dozen years earlier. Victory carries its perks. Being able to designate an official language was one of those perks.

“How do you—”

“That’s not important,” Eli waved away Benson’s question before he could finish it. “What
is
important is that we let everyone know what’s going on. Our beloved sergeants are going to be putting us back on the road for another ten-kilometer march as soon as chow is over.”

“Is that what they were gabbing about?”

“Yeah. Apparently, we didn’t lose as many people as they’d hoped for on the last one.”

“What, do they have a quota to meet or something?” Benson asked. It was in interesting question and one that Eli wanted to pursue. But not now, there wasn’t time.

“Not sure.” It was all Eli could offer. “But we need to spread the word. Can you guys let the folks in our platoon know?”

“I guess.” Benson agreed. “What do I tell them exactly?”

“Tell them we’ve got another march right after chow. Don’t overeat. Take in lots of fluids. And stay away from the
chakka
.”

“They won’t like that. That stuff is pretty tasty.”

“Yeah, but it makes you sleepy, sits like a stone in your gut, and doesn’t provide enough calories. If they eat it right before we hit the sand again, they won’t make it to the halfway point.”

Chakka
was one of the few Minith foods that humans would touch, but those who tried it often overdid it. It tasted wonderful—offering a nuanced blend of alternating flavors that seemed to change with the eater’s particular palate. The first time Eli tried
chakka
, it tasted like a blend of dark chocolate and salted nuts. The second time, he could have sworn he was eating some delicious form of beef that had been perfectly seasoned. It had also provided him with a sense of mild euphoria, quickly followed an hour later by a two-hour nap on each occasion. He had sworn never to eat it again after that. Despite his personal abstinence, it was a popular evening meal for the trainees in their unit when they knew they were going to be done for the day. It definitely beat the pastelike foodstuffs that were the standard human fare.