Star Brigade: Odysseys - An Anthology (7 page)

“Or worse,” Sam continued, insolently tossing her hair, “you’d be picked up by some black ops outfit. Would there be missions? Absolutely. But after six months,” her russet-brown eyes narrowed, looking like chips of burnt auburn under the cargo bay’s halo lighting. “Maybe a year of that, and all the immoral shit you’d be forced to do for this ‘great’ Union would eat you up inside and make you want to kill yourself.”

Khal was so stunned he briefly couldn’t speak. “Y-you can’t know that,” he finally said, but with no confidence backing his retort.

Sam crossed her arms and studied him contemptuously. “I know it for a fact, young man. But hey, if either of those options appeals to you, I’ll have Captain Nwosu get the transfer order signed tonight.”

A protracted silence followed while Khal digested Sam’s words.
You’re valuable, but not invaluable
, she all but said. More than once, she had been less than forthcoming with him, but in this instance Khal knew Sam was shooting straight from the hip.

“I’ll stay,” he shook his head and sighed, defeated. “I just…I want to be out in the field. I haven’t done much with my life, but I feel I can do this well if given the chance.”

His frustration reached Sam, and her hard edges melted away. “I know,” she said in a husky whisper. “And you will.” She caressed his cheek tenderly, like a lover would. Her warm touch made Khal’s skin tingle, soothing away his unease, distracting him. Just for a moment.

Sam only displayed this type of affection with Khal when it suited her.

“When?” he asked peevishly, pulling back. “It’s been almost a year.”

Sam leaned in closer, eyes alight with fiendish mischief. “I’ve got big plans for you, pretty boy,” she declared, suddenly playful again. “And it all starts tonight.”

She wants something
, Khal realized. Of course, another task that brought him no closer to combat-team placement than before. Instead, he hid his suspicions behind a mask of calm. “What do you need from me?” Maybe the task might be interesting, and she’d reward him like all the other times.

Sam pulled out a 5-inch datapad as slim as a paper sheet from her belt. She keyed in a code across its typepad. Instantly, the viewscreen was filled by a squid-faced Rhomeran with maggot-white skin. “Meet Glu Zlliosho.”

Khal stared at the holoimage blankly, not recognizing this ‘Glu Zlliosho.’ “Who is he?”

Sam made a rude noise. “That’s for
you
to find out.” She flicked off the holoimage and slid the datapad back in her belt. “I sent the image and the name to your Union TriTran account.”

“You want me to find dirt on this guy?” asked Khal.

“Find out everything you can about him,” Sam nodded. “What does he do for a living? Where does he live? Does Glu have family? What’s his favorite food? What’s his political affiliation? Who’s his favorite polymaero player? Does he even like polymaero? Everything, anything, and then some.”

“What for?” Khal scrutinized Sam as she stood up. He wasn’t sure how spying on some Rhomeran would get him on a CT.

Sam leaned near the shuttlecraft’s side exit. Khal could not deny the suggestive way that she carried herself: relaxed in posture yet oozing confidence and an irresistible feminine allure. “Get me all that and be patient,” Sam kept her husky voice at almost a whisper. “Keep improving and follow my lead these next few months. You
will
be placed on a Star Brigade combat team.”

The phrasing confused Khal. “But we only have one Star Brigade combat te—” The import of Sam’s words sank in then.

She gave him a barbed smile. “Still mad at me?”

A combat team.
Meaning that this first combat team would be Nwosu’s…and then Captain Ishiliba would get his own. Khal shook his head, and felt a smirk pull at his lips.

“Good,” Sam sassed, like a teacher giving a student a pat on the head. She whirled around and out of the cargo bay with a mesmerizing sashay. “You got till the day after tomorrow,” she called over her shoulder. “And tell
no one
.” Her departure was marked by the hissing open and shut of the shuttlecraft door.

Half an orv later, Khal was on a return course to Hollus. As his ship hurtled through Zeid’s roiling emerald clouds, he had already started a detailed search through official and unofficial databases on this Glu Zlliosho. So far, nothing. Was he a covert agent of some sort? Working for the Rhomeran Acunet maybe?

Searching for a needle in an asteroid field,
Khal considered with a smile. Not unlike the test Sam had tasked him with after their first meeting, to ensure he was worth poaching from UIB’s grasp.

Khal had no complaints then or now. He always excelled at cracking the challenging mysteries. Meanwhile, he sent a transmission to a data analyst friend posted on Star Brigade’s nearby Cobalt Waystation. After almost a month of training and no sex, Khal needed some action tonight.

“Hello?” answered a young human female with a faint Martianborn lilt.

“Hey Gigi.”

“Hi, sunshine,” Genesis Delgado’s voice instantly brightened.

“Still on your shift?”

“Just got off,” she replied blithely, “About to fly up to Hollus for dinner with the girls. What’s up?”

She’s coming to Hollus
, Khal perked up. That saved him the trouble of flying down to Cobalt. He recollected the wonders Gigi could perform with that sweet little mouth of hers and smiled wolfishly. “Come over after dinner.”

A sharp intake of breath could be heard on the other end. “Sure,” Gigi replied after a charged moment, barely hiding her eagerness.

“Luminal! See ya soon.”

“Bye handsome,” she whispered.

Khal ended the transmission, still smirking. He’d gone through his share of extracurriculars amongst Hollus’s female personnel, but Khal enjoyed Gigi’s company the most. While plainer and plumper than his usual type, Khal couldn’t get enough of her unflappable positive outlook of the universe. Plus Gigi always came whenever he called, had zero complaints about their arrangement, always made time to help him on intelligence tasks, and could keep her mouth shut. In short, Gigi was perfect.

Khal glanced at his ETA to Hollus: 10 macroms. He expected Gigi in about two orvs, more than enough time to get some headway on this task.

Right then, data from his Glu Zlliosho search began to appear—the boring personal minutiae, of course. Then he spotted Glu’s connection to Bhoryus Corp, a renowned military defense contractor.

“Okay, this just got interesting,’ Khal murmured, pointing and clicking to access the data packet.

Surje could no longer feel his arms, his legs, or even his head. Not in the physical sense, at least.

That’s because at the present time, he had no arms. Or legs. Or head. In the physical sense.

Having shifted from his solid humanoid form into plasma form, the Voton had no need for corporeal extremities. Surje felt disembodied, as if floating in zero-G, yet connected to everything—the metallic tang in the air, the dim luminosity from the halolights above overpowered by the light leaping off his now shapeless body. All of Surje’s senses amplified tenfold, even though he had no physical means to touch anything. 

This never gets old
, he mused. Surje’s thoughts were shared by the Voton couple joined with him.

You both ready?

More than ready,
Jabei thought.

Qarm’s joy was like an actual sunrise.
I’ve been waiting for this since the moment I met her.

Let’s proceed then.

Right now the Star Brigadier was a fluid mass of glowing red, joined with two other Voton, also in plasma state. Qarm burned bright orange and Jabei throbbed with pale blue shimmer. Together the trio formed a sizeable floating sphere of brilliant plasma energy, flooding the small quarters they were in with blinding light. Surje, Qarm and Jabei were joined in mind, body and soul.

On its own, a joining transcended tactile sensation or individualism. But a joining under the radiance of the Living Light, allowing that hallowed glow to fill them up and guide them… Surje could find no words in any dialect to describe how that nourished his soul.

Even though I walked away from that life.

His mother was a Sun Matriarch, his father a high-ranking Joiner celebrant. They had taught their son everything he knew about the Living Light, pushing him into becoming a certified celebrant in hopes that he would one day take over their ministry. Surje remembered the training, getting the certifications, yet feeling no passion for that path. He wanted to contribute his gifts to a more active calling. A long, difficult stretch of time passed before his parents accepted his choice to enlist in UComm and then become a Star Brigadier.

Correction—
attempted
to become a Star Brigadier. Surje’s father had come around first, seeing his son’s maximal gifts as bestowed by the Living Light itself. For all the good that did. A pang of resentment twisted his insides.
Lights be gone.

Excuse me, Pleiad?
Jabei’s bafflement bled into Surje’s past memories.

Apologies
, Surje stammered.  He’d let his private thoughts taint into the Joining. With a thought, he steeled away that part of himself from the Joined sphere.

Despite his refusal to become a Joiner celebrant, in times of doubt or fear or sadness, the Shining Faith remained Surje’s refuge. Like it was tonight, after finding out he hadn’t made the new Star Brigade combat team.  At least Sam D’Urso, his superior officer, had told him herself. For a human, D’Urso was at times unorthodox, but her frankness was appreciated.

Still, Surje needed time to clear his head. So he was spending his evening at Roosevelt, one of many gas mining cities floating inside of Zeid. Roosevelt also had a number of Living Light sources which he’d grown familiar with since being stationed on Hollus Maddrone Starbase.

But right now, he brushed aside his needs and failures. Surje focused on Qarm and Jabei, the young Voton couple he’d just met at a modest Shining Faith source, not two orvs ago. They were missionaries, about to start a new journey on Kheldoroth. The two, so dutiful to the Living Light, so drunk with love for each other, were desperate to become merged before their mission started. Surje had officiated Mergings before. How could he refuse them?

Qarm and Jabei had already exchanged fragments of life energy with one another, then interweaved their senses. Now was time for the bright words.

Do you Qarm,
Surje began,
pledge to join your life with this female, protect her from the Infinite Darkness, guide her down the path of radiance until she leaves this plane and joins the Shining Host?

Qarm beamed, showering the sphere and the room with his love.
I do.

Do you Jabei, pledge to join your life with this male, protect him from the Infinite Darkness, guide him down the path of radiance until he leaves this plane and joins the Shining Host?

I so do,
Jabei replied eagerly, her inner light as luminous as her partner’s.

Through the illumination bestowed in me by the Living Light, I now pronounce you Merged.

The ensuing light flooded the room entirely, chasing away all and any shadows. Little by little, Surje separated himself and felt the Joined sphere lose its cohesion.

Moments later, the multi-colored radiance faded. The three Voton stood in their solid, naked humanoid forms where the Joined sphere once floated.

Surje returned to his reddish wiry and trim physique, three roundish crests jutting proudly from his skull. Jabei was a lithe and lovely sight, bearing only two round greyish crests atop her head. Her glow burned deep blue with love for her new Merger partner and gratitude to Surje. The male Voton had a strong-jawed face and three blockier gold crests atop his head. He was a bit doughy in physique but carried his weight well. Qarm shone as deeply with love and gratitude as his wife. “Thank you, Pleiad Surje for doing this,” he gushed. “We wanted to start our mission together on Kheldoroth the right way.”

“It was my honor,” Surje smiled with genuine happiness. “We are all One with the Living Light.”

“We are all One with the Living Light,” Qarm and Jabei repeated.

Jabei slipped into white robes matching those of her partner, though more form-fitting than Qarm’s. Surje pulled on a blue button down shirt and grey slacks, all of fine nanoclothe crafted specifically for a Voton.

After Qarm and Jabei left the source, Surje stepped outside the place of worship and onto the preceding walkway. It was night time according to Surje’s chronometer. He placed his hands on a rail, leaning forward, and began zoning out on the foot traffic of beings bustling through Roosevelt’s Teddy District. The ring-like and multi-tiered locality had been crafted with angular high-tech artsy elegance to resemble an actual city-state downtown. An odd location to have a Living Light source, but the contrast always fascinated Surje.

“I knew it!” The sharp, metallic voice from Surje’s right snapped him out of his reverie.

Can’t be.
He whipped around and gaped. Two very non-Voton figures approached him. The short, burly being was clearly Thulican, his skin a silvery casing of living metal that few weapons could pierce. The taller and lankier being, a Cryonite, resembled a sculpture of ice crystalline with large spikes jutting backward atop his head. Even in their night-black UComm jumpers, Surje knew them both at a glance.

“Khrome? Tyris?” he realized how annoyed he sounded, how angry his body glow came across, and tempered his voice. “What are you doing here?”

“Looking for you, Sparky,” Khrome replied with his typical broad and easy smile. “Figured you’d be here since this is the Living Light source you frequent the most.”

Tyris looked less amused, though with no visible mouth or nose, the Cryonite’s mood was always a cause of speculation. “You vanished on us, WHOOSH!” he said, his voice a high, crisp breeze. 

Both Tyris and Khrome had been placed on the new Star Brigade combat team. Even Liliana Cortés, away from Star Brigade for over a year, made the cut.

Surje hadn’t. He just needed a night without Star Brigade, to figure out his next move.

“Been so immersed in training,” he sighed, planning to go faith heavy to ward off any suspicion of bitterness. “I needed a reconnect with the Shining Faith…” He realized only two of his best friends were present. “Where’s Jan’Hax?”

“Keeping the shuttle warm while we get you.” Khrome’s smirk grew obnoxiously large, which Surje thought was impossible. “Us four are going out to relax and reprieve.”

“Not tonight!” Going out to rabble rouse was the last thing Surje wanted. “I’m not in the mood for any…” Surje’s frustration and fatigue had left him tongue-tied.

Tyris arched a non-existent eyebrow. “Chicanery?”

“Yes, that,” Surje gestured at Tyris’s apt word choice. “I’m taking part in a Joining ceremony, then it’s back to Hollus for some sleep.”

“Except that you’re NOT,” Khrome countered merrily. He sidestepped a gaggle of clucking Galdorian girls either heading to or returning from a fun evening. “We’re all hanging out away from Zeid for a spell.” A nearby musical concert must have just ended, as the wide walkway Surje and his friends were on had suddenly flooded with beings of all species. The three friends moved their conversation away from the traffic stream and into the Living Light source’s foyer.

“We deserve a night out,” Tyris’s enthused voice resembled wind chimes. “Star Brigade is operational again! We’ll finally get to go on live field missions!”

Their jollity sent a stab through the Voton, darkening his body glow. And the bitterness boiled through. “Easy for you both to say, since you got on CT-1.”

To their credit, Khrome and Tyris didn’t appear surprised by his reaction. “Not everyone could get on one team,” Tyris stated with breezy firmness. The halolights above twinkled off his ice crystalline body. “And it’s not like you bottomed out like Bevrolor. You really stepped up during these last training sessions.”

“Good,” the word tasted like ash in the Voton’s mouth. “But not good enough to get on a combat team.” He shook his head, recalling the dialogue he’d had with his mother not two weeks ago. Maybe she was right. “This may be a sign that Star Brigade might not be where the Living Light is guiding me.”

“Wait. A. Macrom!” Khrome cut him off, his deep blue face no longer smiling. “You don’t actually believe that, do you?”

“What I believe doesn’t really matter, if the Living Light illuminates a different path for—”

“Surje,” Tyris’s approach was calmer than Khrome’s, but just as blunt. “What do
you
think?”

For an instant Surje hated them both. Not for making CT-1 when he didn’t. Both were talented and deserved their placement. He hated them for knowing him so well and realizing he was using platitudes to hide from unpleasant truths. The Voton sighed. “I don’t know. I really want to be a Star Brigadier. But…”

“You’re not thinking about becoming a full-time Joiner celebrant, are you?” asked Khrome. This idea clearly bothered him.

“Well…” Surje really wished they had not come. He didn’t have the headspace for this conversation right now. “Being a celebrant is what I’m good at. Plus, I’d be doing something worthwhile. What is so bad about that?”

Khrome choked back disbelief. “How about
a lot
?”

Those words drew disapproving looks from Voton coming and going from the Shining Faith source, so the trio wisely strolled away from the place of worship. They finally found a nook of space not far from the source and pedestrian traffic.

“Weren’t you telling us that life was too restrictive?” Tyris continued his interrogation.

“And that your maximal abilities should be used for something good instead?” added Khrome.

Throwing my own words back at me.
The Darkness swallow you both!
“No, I just…I guess I expected something after being a year of almost nothing,” he admitted. Nwosu coming back had been the first gasp of anything good for Star Brigade in months. To be so close, and drop the ball. He failed. “What if I never make a combat team?”

“You will, Sparky,” Khrome made a face. “For someone with such staunch faith in the Living Light, you really don’t believe enough in yourself.”

Surje turned away in shame. Again, the truth in his friends’ words struck home.

“At least Khal didn’t get on a combat team either,” Tyris chided as they began to walk.

That made Surje laugh. “True,” he agreed through his chuckles. Khal Al Abdullah was the other intelligence field operative under Sam D’Urso. Thank the Radiance that arrogant, self-absorbed worm didn’t get on CT-1.
What about the next combat team?
And just like that, the Voton’s good mood sobered. “Khal will probably get on a combat team sooner than me.”

Khrome shook his head stubbornly. “Only if you let that happen.”

“Are you going to let that happen?” Tyris asked, leaning so close that Surje could feel the cold air wafting off him.

Surje had no faith in what he was about to say, but said it anyway. “No.”

“Can’t hear you.”

“
No
,” the Voton barked.

Khrome’s massive hand covered Surje’s shoulder when he grasped it. “We will all be field active and on a combat team someday. Say it with me.”

“Khrome—okay, fine,” Surje grumbled in annoyance. His friends would never let him lose confidence. “We will all be field active and on a combat team someday.”

“Someday,” Tyris waved a finger in the air. “But tonight, we head to the Peloponnesian and marinate.”

Khrome’s round yellow eyes sparkled with ridicule. “You mean ‘celebrate,’ right?”