REBELS AND SAVIORS

Fastigium

They moved across the surface, scrambling for high ground. The night skies of the foreign world were illuminated by the endless firefight. Michael looked to his right and then grabbed Hanson, dragging him over the barrier as he searched for his team. Max was still missing.

~~~

“How much longer?” Serena asked.

Max looked at Serena and shook his head. They were scheduled for evac in less than 30 minutes, and those minutes would fly. Chances were they weren’t making it. He should have left her on the transport. He watched irritation and anger flood his wife’s face. She hated losing.

Setting the charges, he tossed another pack to her. The substation was key in the planet’s defenses. If they could remove it the sub-field protecting the planet would fail, and the invasion would begin. Their holding planets were already weak, and the Empire now ruled more than three-quarters of the known star systems. The war was going badly, and its end was near. Max swallowed the bitter pill that the Alliance was losing, and thus the Clone Wars would end soon with their surrender. But that didn’t matter. This planet was theirs.

~~~

Michael felt the whistling of incoming before it hit. He moved to his side and folded into a ball to protect his softer parts. He cussed as the impact was almost directly on him, and he could feel the sting of something burning as it pierced his side. The Imperials weren’t budging. They were fighting back and holding the Royals in check. Sitting up, Michael reached behind him and pulled out a large hot piece of shrapnel. It burned his hands and took three tries to remove it, but leaving it in would have been worse. The material was a liquid heat alloy that melted into the skin and poisoned the blood supply.

“Hanson, let’s move. Dust-off in twenty, and we’re going to have to haul to get there.”

Michael reached for his Com officer to pull his hand free of his body. Looking down he registered the smoking remains of Hanson and the fact that the incoming round had torn Hanson's body into three parts, with pieces everywhere. Taking the com unit from his dead friend, Michael also took Hanson's dogtags and placed one in what might have been his mouth. Didn’t know if they would or could clear the field and process the bodies, but just in case it would be nice to return Hanson’s genetics home.

Michael rushed the field, creeping along the embankment, using its higher rise for cover. It was the movement of Sean over the top that caused him to pause. Grabbing Sean and pulling him next to him, they sheltered for a moment.

“You set them?”

Sean nodded, gulping a harsh breath to fill his lungs. He had breathed in the gas as he infiltrated into enemy lines to bury the live rounds under their feet.

“Yeah, along the ridge and three clicks in. The detonation sequence is set to go in eight minutes so we need to haul ass.”

“I’ve got boomers on the left crawling into the field. Hanson is down; Jolly took it back sixty feet and I haven't seen the B-boys.”

“I saw them. Bark and Brine are both toast. They took the left ridge down and out. The Imperials were using the targeting laser as a heat seeker. They never stood a chance.” Sean bent his head forward as the rush of air in his tortured lungs made his dizzy. “Cap?”

“I don’t know. He and Serena went into the access port. We’ve got to hold the line and maintain the right until he can set the charges. This substation sub-field will be re-enforced after tonight if we fail.”

“Michael.” Michael took the com unit and inserted it in his ear at the sound of Max’s voice.

“Go, Cap, what’s your twenty?”

“Charges are set, but the Imperials are moving fast. We’re coming out. Dust-off in ten. Get your men there.”

“Aye, Cap. Don’t be late, Maxwell.”

Michael took out the unit and looked at Sean. “My men? Guess that would be you.” Everyone else was dead. Hooking an arm through Sean’s arm, Michael hauled him to his feet and dragged him along the bottom of the ridge, back to their landing location and the evac transport. Along the way he spotted Kyle, still working on their boys who had been in the initial spill from the transport, thus taking the first direct hits. Three hulls of other transport ships were burning in the distance, their fires lighting the sky.

“Kyle, it’s time!”

Kyle just kept working, applying pressure to a wound that was pumping out blood at an alarming rate and ignoring Michael’s voice, .

“Kyle!” The man was unrecognizable, covered in the blood of their massacred team. Sean looked at Michael and nodded. The two men each grabbed an arm and dragged Kyle away.

“No!”

Michael stopped and grabbed Kyle by the face, his burned hands stinging. “Read the field, Kyle. Feel it! Is there anyone left alive?”

Kyle concentrated, reaching out to his fallen comrades. Nothing. Sweet death hurled them in the flight of angels, and the field was rotten with their decaying flesh.

“No,” he said quietly. They took his arms and continued to move him to the transport.

The deck officer came down the loading ramp. “Sir, Command has ordered dust-off in three. The fleet is jumping the portal. Imperial battlecruisers just entered the system.”

Michael looked back over his shoulder. All these men laid waste in the field, and for what? Before they could take the world, they were fleeing.

“Cap is on his way. We wait.”

“But, Sir!”

“We wait!” Michael pushed Sean and Kyle into the transport, and shoved Sean in a seat.

“Kyle, Sean sucked in the creeper gas. His lungs are fried.”

Kyle hurried over to Sean and went to work. He was a first class healer, but the fellowship of death was shutting him down. Empaths such as Kyle rarely survived battle. Witnessing the fleeing of men’s spirits as they died painfully, usually drove them insane.

The pilot came forward to inform him that they had to leave or miss the hyperjump. Michael just swore under his breath. He was normally the pilot and tactical officer, but because the mission was a "Red Mission" and all bodies were needed on the field, the pilot and flight officer were loaners. This had been a suicide mission from the start.

Peering out in the dark, he could see the boomer creeping forward slowly along the back ridge. Taking out a control box, he hit the switch and detonated the live mines they had set. Maxwell, get the lead out!

~~~

“Serena, the back corridor is filling with Imperials! We have to go around.”

Serena nodded and reaching into her pack, she took out an explosive charge with a delay nitro switch and tossed it down the escape corridor. Max swore and grabbed her body, slamming her hard against the wall and shielding her as the charge exploded. The complex was deep in the earth, and the charge could have collapsed the support struts. They needed to leave. Max looked at his timer. No time. They had less than two minutes to get out.

“Corridors cleared, honey.” Max laughed at his wife’s tone.

Max kissed his wife quickly and then dragged her behind him down the clearing corridor as the smoke and debris dispersed. The upper girders were groaning under the stress of the weakened substructure caused by the explosion. Rushing forward he could see the access port and freedom.

Serena heard the sound first. The strain and then crash of the rallying Imperial soldiers rushing the corridor behind them, not taking heed of the already dangerous situation. She could feel the heated pulse of their pulsar rifles laying down the pursuing fire along her back. Max turned and looked at his wife in confusion as she staggered. Reaching into her bag, she pulled out another detonating charge and he shook his head no. It would bring the mountain down on their heads.

Serena simply turned in her last act of life and tossed the charge down the corridor they had just cleared. Max looked at his wife’s back in horror. She had taken a pulsar blast in her back and half her torso and head was gone. All that remained was bloody pulp. He grabbed her close as she sank to the ground.

“Serena!”

“Go!” Her voice was already far away and he watched her eyes roll back in her head as she slumped into death.

It was the explosion of the blast that sent him propelling towards the access port, as the mountain roared and the corridor collapsed. A burning sheering pain moved across his face, and he fell forward into nothing.

~~~

Michael looked out towards the access port as the explosion was heard topside. The evac shook as a mini seismic event rumbled the ground beneath it. Michael felt the strain on his connection. No!!!!

“Sir, this ground is unstable. We have to go!”

Michael took out his gun and put it in the man’s face. “We go nowhere!” Michael turned to look at Sean who took up his weapon and took out the deck officer with a single shot.

“Sean?”

“I got them! Go!”

“No one leaves until I’ve got Cap.”

Sean sneered at the pilot. “We’re not going anywhere.” He lifted his gun and motioned for the man to take a seat coughing. “Michael!” He turned back to Sean. “I can’t feel Serena.” Michael nodded and ran.

Michael was through the loading doors and into the access port before Kyle could look up. The area was covered in smoke and debris, and Michael coughed as the materials hit his lungs. Working his way forward he came to the caved-in corridor and found his twin, Maxwell. Reaching down he felt for a pulse, already knowing that Max was still alive. He couldn’t have felt him if he wasn’t.

Max was unconscious and barely breathing. Michael knew that Serena was lost. Her body was nowhere to be found. Scrambling to dig his brother out, Michael pulled Max free and turned him. He had a large piece of shrapnel embedded in his face. Michael, cussing against the pain in his hands, pulled it out and ripped off part of his shirt to wrap around Max’s head to stop the bleeding.

Picking up his brother in a fireman’s hold, he slowly moved them out of the tunnel and back to the transport. Coming up the last rise to the ship, he noticed boomers moving in from the right. They were toast. Suddenly he saw the core of them explode and a barrage of fire fight. Looking at the loading doors, there stood Kyle laying down a suppressing fire to give him cover.

Quickly he climbed onboard past Kyle and dumped his brother in a chair, belting him in. Rushing back to the door, he pulled Kyle in and hit the airlock. The doors sealed as Michael propelled Kyle with him to the forward compartment.

“Kyle, see to Cap.” Michael rushed forward pass the pilot and Sean.

“Michael, Serena?” Sean asked. Michael looked at Sean and shook his head. Sean’s twin was dead. Sean had known it, but he had to ask, to hope. Buckling into his normal seat, Michael ignored normal dust-off procedures and punched it, leaving that world of death behind and rejoining the Royal fleet.

“Tango Roger transport, do you copy?”

“This is Tango Roger transport one. We are air, and five by five.”

“Transport what is your twenty?”

“Eight parsecs and ten on the outside.”

“Transport, we’ve got you in our field, but hyperjump is in two. Can you make speed to coordinates zero-two-twelve-mark-one?”

“Negative, command. We are floating armor. Best we can haul is in four.”

The command deck com officer looked at his commander. They weren’t going to make it before the fleet jumped to hyperspace.

“How many on board?” The fleet commander asked his officer quietly.

“I’ve got six, Sir. The other three ships were lost.” The commander nodded. The abort operation was a wash. Over a hundred men had gone down with only six coming back, and now they were forced to abandon them as well.

The door to the command deck opened and a figure dressed in black Royal robes entered the room. All the men cleared his way as he came forward. He was the Eminent.

“What is the situation?”

“My Lord, the final assault crew has cleared the planet, but they left dust-off too late. They won’t make rendezvous in time for the jump, and they'll be pulverized in the wake.”

“What unit was deployed?”

“The Twins.”

Alex looked at the starfield and the monitor showing the fast-moving transport. The entire monitor glowed, and he turned to search the field for them.

“Can the onboard set jump be aborted?”

“No Sir, we’re locked into the fleet's central command. The entire fleet will jump at the same time. Controlled jump is the only way to make sure that the battlecruisers and armor don’t collide on the other side of the stream.”

Alex felt the glow and pull again. He needed those men. “Give me the com.”

An officer came quick and handed Alex the receiver and scurried away quickly. “They disturbed the matrix. I need them.” Alex put the com on and called through. “This is command. Tango Roger, proceed to the following coordinates...” Alex looked at the monitors to confirm. “Three-two-two-mark-seven. Do you copy?”

“Affirmative, command. That’s three-two-two-mark-seven.”

The operations officer looked at his monitor and frowned. “Sir, that will place them within the engine’s backwash. The hyperjump will fry their portal cells and their hull plating will buckle under the heat.”

Alex looked at the man. “Jump is in one. They can ride in the wake and maybe they’ll fry, but either way they’re dead. This is a chance.”

The planet below suddenly exploded and the sub-field protection grid was offline. They looked at the open planet and then turned away. It lay there - all ready to be taken - and no one available to do the job. It was nothing but waste.

Michael double-checked the coordinates and made for the backwash area of the larger battle cruiser. They would fry in the hyperwash as the engine heated to hyperjump. He increased all energies to his shields and disengaged his engines. He wouldn’t need them. They could ride the wave and either they made it, or they were dead. He could use the extra power to re-enforce his shields.

“My Lord, Tango Roger has reached the coordinates and cut their engines.”

Alex nodded. “Brave man. When we come out on the other side, I want a full-spread search for them. His energy will be gone, and life support will be offline. We'll need to find them fast.”

“My Lord.” The man affirmed as he began programming the search mode into his consul as the count down began.

“Hyperjump in seven, six, five, four, three, two, one…..” Alex stood firmly upright as the ships moved into the slipstream and the ship elongated. In an instant all the molecules of his body seemed to dissolve and coalesce on the other side.

Michael could feel the pull of space as the larger ship dragged them forward. The last thing he felt was ripping of oxygen from his lungs.

~~~

“He’s waking, My Lord.” Alex turned to the hospital cubicle and watched as Michael’s eyes slowly fluttered open.

“Good, you have returned.” Michael just frowned at Alex . An Eminent One.

“My brother? The rest of my men...” His voice was deep and rough as it whispered against the dryness in his throat, stripped by the loss of oxygen.

“They are recovering. Your brother, the Captain is in surgery. They are trying to save his eye. The other two are in regeneration. One man’s lungs were ripped to shreds from the inside. They submerged him into regeneration fluid. He should be recycled in about four days. The empath was removed to protective sheltering. He sustained emotional trauma from his empathic links. They’re giving him a neutral environment so his internal balance can be restored.”

“Thank you.”

“Your injuries were not light either. You took three rounds to your back. They removed residual shrapnel and want to submerge you in a regeneration tank too. I forestalled them so you could know how your crew is. I take it you are not interested in the two loaner flight crewmen?”

Michael just shrugged. They didn’t belong to him. Was he supposed to care? His eyes narrowed at the mythical creature. An Eminent One.

“You were the one. The one that told me to ride the wash.” Alex just nodded. “Why?”

“You bent the matrix. I could feel a movement in the fabric. Someone, or perhaps all of you on that ship are important. Why is unclear, as are all things unseen. Time will play the game and the journey’s walk will write the yarn.”

“You're definitely an Eminent One. Damn riddles and parables.” Michael just shook his head.

Alex just smiled at that. Yes he found it irritating too. He could almost remember a time when he was normal, before his body was altered for the higher purpose. Now the visions and words tumbled from his body almost without his control, as if he were two people sharing a single form.

“ Alex . Call me Alex .” Alex sat next to Michael’s bed. “Our lives are joined. The threads are unclear, but the twists are there. This war is over. The Imperials will win, and the star systems will run red from Khivar’s tyrannical reign.”

“You see all that?”

“Yes. It was apparent since the last full cycle.” Michael swore. A whole damn cycle?  A year?

“Then my men died for no cause?”

“No. They did not.”

“You should’ve stopped the operation. Ended the mission. What's the use of being able to see the future if you don't do anything with the knowledge you gain? My men, my brother, his wife...none of them needed to be sacrificed.”

Alex just gazed at the man and felt his anger. “Seeing a path is different from walking it. You are mistaken if you think I can alter what fate has already designed. It was my fate to save you and your remaining men; that is the truth I see. We have a journey to fulfill. This war is over and the Empire ruled by Khivar will reign in terror, but we’re far from through. The One will come.”

“The One?”

“All is not clear.” Alex stood to leave and the men around them bowed to him. He frowned. A tall man, thin and lanky, he stood impressive and strong, cloaked in black with the emblem of the offices of the Eminent around his neck. He was a genetically altered humanoid, designed to have increased mental abilities both in power and thought. Such beings were alterations of a construct and feared by most, because their power and the extent of it were unknown. Alex looked back at Michael.

“You and your brother, you are Attilaan?”

“Yes. And my one crew member, Sean. He was…his twin was my brother’s bonded mate.”

Alex nodded. “And your mate?”

Michael just shrugged. So what? He was a freak. “I don't have one. I never bonded.”

Alex stopped at that and looked back at the man. Interesting. An anomaly. “That is unusual, a rarity. I thought such situations to be a myth.”

“Might as well be. One in every sixty billion births is born unbonded. Just my birthright.” Michael looked at the tall man with his neat slight beard and eyes brimming in power and intelligence. “An Eminent One. I thought you were a myth as well.”

Alex understood the man's bitterness, to be a freak among his own kind. Attilaans were a warlike race that took their species to the brink of extinction over a hundred thousand years ago. They fought everyone and everything - killing their own clansmen and brethren. Civil war and blood feuds almost eradicated them.  On the eve of their extinction they initiated a new system of breeding which bonded the members to a mate almost from childhood. At eight the bond would initiate and each person would find their intended. When they came of age, they married. All females on the planet produced two eggs at every ovulation cycle so all the births were twins. Same-sex bonds were outlawed as was genocide, and Attilaans never bred outside their own race.

“It is legend that an unbonded male would have strengths untold and a special destiny.”

Michael just shrugged. Yeah, those Eminent creatures searched through ancient prophecies, always hoping to find an answer to all the chaos and bloodshed. He could care less. His own circumstances occupied his mind. It was a source of dishonor, a blight on his family name and bloodline, the humiliation of being a freak. When he came of age and his brother married, the great houses of his world hid their daughters from him to prevent him from wanting to ally with their houses without a bond. His only destiny was to be a freak and alone.

“It doesn’t matter. My world was one of the first taken by Khivar.” Alex nodded. That was true. But at least his world still existed. Enslaved, but they existed. So many others did not.

Khivar had destroyed numerous worlds, entire solar systems and those races had ceased to exist. He took Attilaans for their warrior genetics. Khivar was a collector of genetic material. He took the best from the genomes, and then destroyed what he didn’t want, genetically altering his next race of clones until there was nothing left except to fight his created super race.

“Did he take your genetics?”

“Most of them. Those he didn't, he destroyed. The rest he enslaved. We, a few of us, were already engaged in the war effort for the Federation hoping that the Royals could restore the balance to this galaxy. Sean’s wife was on a penal colony, one of the first destroyed.”

“I am sorry.”

“Not your fault, and Sean seemed to care less. He bonded to his wife at eight, married ten cycles later, and on their wedding night she tried to strangle him to death. He tied her to the bed, finished his wedding night, and the next morning called authorities to have her arrested for attempting to murder a member of our race. She had been there ever since.”

“Real love match?”

Michael was confused. There was no word for ‘love’ in his race’s vocabulary. They married for alliances, to build bonds and strength and to breed, but for emotions? Emotions were what brought their world to the brink of extinction. They were forbidden.  It was the bond that kept a man and wife together, and in the best case scenarios there were hoped-for feelings of fondness. Michael’s own parents spat at each other when entering a room. Michael couldn’t believe that he could envy that, but he did.

Alex stood to leave as a med tech came with an injection. Michael was going to be taken to the regeneration chamber. He was scheduled for a three day cycle.

“It is time for you to sleep, Commander. I will keep watch over you and yours, you have my promise.”

“Wait!” Michael looked in irritation as the hypo spray administered the drug, and he saw nothing.

~~~

Six years later….the present.

Max sat up in his bed sweating, as his heart raced out of his chest. The last thing he saw was her face. Serena.

Michael stirred on his side of the room at the sound of Max’s nightmare.

“You okay?”

Max sat up on the side of his bunk and sank his head in his hands, fingering the scar that marred the left side of his face from above his brow to his jawline.

“Yeah.”

“The old dream?”

“Yeah. Sorry to wake you, Michael.”

Michael just laughed and tried to instill some humor in the situation. “You didn’t. I was already up, and trying to get it down so I could sleep.”

Max chuckled. “I would appreciate it if at next port you find some way to get some of the tension out. I’m sick of trying to sleep to the sound of you messing with it. Damn, I’d have thought it would fall off by now.”

Michael just shrugged. He was sort of a lusty guy, and being unmated, he really had few options. He could pick up a bay whore who’d work him over for twenty credits, or he could use his own hand. His own hand didn’t cost him, and as far as he knew was disease free. The bay whores were on-the-spot convenient, but looking down at them mouthing a vital portion of his anatomy had him worried where the hell that mouth had been. Kissing was unheard of, and he wasn’t sticking any part of his body in a well-used hole that more than likely would cost him lots of drugs and a real crippling disease. Problem was that Michael really liked kissing. It was something he hadn’t done in forever, and thinking of sex occupied all his free mental time. That and gambling, drinking, and...yeah more sex.

Max stood and stretched. It was still early, but he had lost his desire for sleep. He had lost his desire for everything. No sense just lying there in the dark listening to his brother jerking off.

“Maxwell?”

“No. You sleep - or whatever it is you do. I’ll be on Conn.” Max left the room, as Michael rolled over in his bunk. Closing his eyes he could picture her...Serena. What a bitch. Cold, heartless, and undeniably one of the best demolition experts in the known Universe. Max had mourned her and in his own way, Michael did too. He had felt her, known her through his bond to his twin, where the emptiness in his brother's life made itself known.

A hot-blooded race that was emotionally cold.

~~~

“Captain.” The ensign on the deck stood up from Max’s chair.

“Sam, how’s the night?”

“Quiet. A Tollerian trawler was stopped by Imperial security and searched.”

“Results?”

“They didn’t find what they were looking for, but they destroyed the ship with all hands.” Max just nodded.

“Sir, would you like something to drink?”

“Stand down, Sam. Go get some shut-eye. I’ll keep the watch.” The other workers on the night Bridge were stunned. Especially when their Captain turned and looked at them. “All of you. It’s only a little time left in your shifts. The morning will be coming on soon. Take a break. Go.”

After they filed out, he sat and watched the skies. Nothing out there. No movement. It was always the same. Nothing happening. It was in these moments of the early morning when he liked to be alone, with nothing but the feel of the ship under his command, and the slow hum as all the day systems automatically came on line one by one.