Retribution (4 page)

“Yes it is Sir.”

Dave followed her as she turned to starboard. Dave could see the big Life Support sign over the entrance as he entered. He had only been in here once before and that was during the familiarisation training back in Tumos. ‘Has it only been thirteen days?’ thought Dave since he took command of this brand new ship. The famil had been rushed with no real work up trials undertaken. ‘No, there had been an emergency – a planet to save and an enemy to defeat.’

“Sir” hailed Gunter as he saw Dave and Loraine enter “over here.”

Loraine led him out on the centre gantry. Below on either side were banks of machinery. Dave could see that the status light on five of the ten banks were no longer green. All he remembered from the famil was that each bank was capable of providing sufficient life support for one of the normal decks or half of the two double decks – ie F and G flight decks.

“Shit” said Dave as he came alongside Gunter. He could see the strain on Gunter’s face. The helmet’s internal lighting accentuated his furrowed brow.

“Yes Sir. A good description. I don’t know what possessed them to use this new carbon fibre for the scrubbers. Maybe it has amazing properties but each of these banks are KO’d. I don’t dare start them back up for fear they will burst into flames again.”

“Is it contained?”

“I think so Sir. We’re just in the process of sealing this bank here. But to be real sure I would like to remove the scrubbers and flush them out into space.” Gunter looked intently at Dave to ensure he understood the implication.

“Do we have replacements?”

“Had replacements. Two, but these were consumed after we put out the first fire.”

“So you mean we are on 50% life support till we get more replacements.”

Gunter nodded.

“Can we get these down below?” asked Dave referring to the planet Beta Phi around which they were now orbiting.

Gunter shook his head and then added “Not this new tech stuff Sir.”

“Fuck it” exclaimed Dave in frustration. “Alright flush the dud ones and I want monitoring 24/7 down here.”

“Of course Sir” said Gunter. He paused obviously trying to formulate his words.

“What else Gunter?”

“We need to close down more of the ship Sir. Currently we have 25% closed down. The air is going to get very stale very quick. We need to close down another 25% pronto.”

Dave knew he could only achieve this by closing down his main operational spaces on F and G deck. F deck housed his fighters and G deck housed the shuttles and vehicles. Cloaking was offline and their missiles all expended in the battle earlier today. In effect the Resolute would be unable to operate effectively. His ability to stay here and link up with the Ark Royal group was now rendered useless.

“Alright, I’ll have to recall all fighters and shuttles and close down the rest of F and G deck and the front of H deck. How long have I got, to recover our forces from down below?”

“If you recover the fighters now, we can keep the forward half of G deck open for say three hours.”

“OK…Looks like we’re going home sooner than we thought.”

Chapter 4. Assam 1830, 25 May

Commander Rihan Kabel swept her long auburn hair back from her eyes, where it had fallen while she dozed off in the chair at the Alliance Army HQ. The hail from her husband, Dave Warner, had startled her. She blinked her eye lids forcefully and gave a slight shake of her head as she re-acquainted herself with her surroundings.

“Yes Dave what is it” she asked.

Dave gave her the abridged version and ended with “So you need to round everyone up and have them all aboard by 2100.”

“Oh terrific. There’s just no rest for the wicked is there?”

“Afraid not honey. I’m sending the remaining shuttles back down to Niku. Use the one’s you have there now to load up from Assam. Expedite the extraction of the droids. The sooner we get them aboard the sooner we can close down the forward section of H deck.”

“What about the wounded down here?”

“We take them with us if they can be moved. I’ll ask Mary to send medical teams down to assist.” Dave made a mental note to himself to ask 1
^st
Lt Mary Chernside, his ships senior medical officer, to arrange for this. “I’ve just informed Kirkland. He’s not too happy about losing us. I have to arrange with Reinna to take over security of the Kunter. Got to go honey.”

Rihan begrudgingly started to think of all the things that needed to happen to extradite everyone. She called LCmd Jim Bucknell, commander of the 30
^th
Independent Marine Company, and told him to round up everyone in Niku and that included the 1
^st
Droid Bn. The droids would use their own pods to move back to the Resolute but the 30
^th
Coy would need the light and heavy shuttles.

“One of the shuttles will have a mobile med bay Jim” said Rihan. “Make sure you extract anyone who can move from the hospital.”

“Does that include the Commodore?” asked Jim.

“No, even if he can be moved he’ll want to stay here anyway. Oh and make sure you hand over responsibility for securing the spaceport to the local authorities.”

“Understood Maam. Consider it done.”

“Sue, this is Rihan.”

“Yes Rihan.”

“You still at the hospital?”

“Yes but Art’s asleep now. What’s up?”

“We have to mount up and leave right away; including all wounded who can be moved. Mary will be arriving soon with a med shuttle. Can you please ask the medical staff there if it is safe to move Art and Buster?”

“Oh gee. Why the rush?” Rihan explained. “Damm. OK, give me a few minutes and I’ll find out.”

LCmd Sue Chalker caught her reflection in the window of the hallway outside of the recovery ward. She instinctively brushed her fawn coloured hair with her fingers; though she knew it would do little to hide the strain on her face. Her hazel eyes looked weary, though the relief of knowing that Art would survive and that he wouldn’t lose his left arm had helped somewhat.

She found the surgeon trying to eat his dinner in his office. He looked up with a full mouth but his eyes said ‘yes?’ After listening he stood up, unceremoniously dumped the cafeteria meal in the nearby bin and said “wait here.”

A few minutes later he came back. “Your husband can be moved but not Sergeant Williams.”

“Are you sure it will be OK to move Art?”

“We’ll put his arm in a special cast. Your med team will know how to secure him and they will ensure the necessary drips are maintained. He’ll be OK.”

“And Sgt Williams can’t be moved?”

“It’s not advised. He’s lost a lot of blood. He’s still on transfusion. He could easily relapse or go into shock. So no.”

“Thank you doctor, the med team will be here directly.”

“I better go and see to the arrangements.”

Sue hailed Rihan and reported back. She ended with “Will you let Kali know?”

“Yes I’ll do it” said Rihan.

“Yes Maam” said Cpl Kali Chada, acting team leader in 2
^nd
Pl, 30
^th
Coy. “Anything wrong?”

“Buster’s fine but the Resolute has to warp back to Polaris in the next couple of hours. Buster can’t be moved. So he’ll have to stay here till he recovers and we’ll make arrangements then for him to be shuttled back to us.”

“Right” said Kali. There was a pause while she thought. “Any chance I could stay here Maam?”

“Sorry Kali but no.”

“I thought so. But it never hurts to ask.”

“No it never hurts to ask. He’ll be well looked after here. It won’t be that long.”

“That’s OK Maam. I understand. Thank you for letting me know.”

After terminating the call, Rihan looked around the room she was currently in. Her pack and pulse rifle were leaning against the wall along with another pack and a sniper’s rifle, which belonged to Specialist (Spcl) Akos Salaman. Akos had been with Art and Buster and Jade when they took down Bane. It had been Akos who had actually killed Bane.

“Akos” hailed Rihan.

“Maam” responded Akos. He was eating.

“We’re moving out. The shuttles will be here in fifteen.”

“Plenty of time Maam. Excuse me” he said as he swallowed. “I’m just round the corner in the cafeteria. Do you want me to bring you something?”

“No thanks Akos. I’ll get something back on board. Don’t forget your kit’s here. I’m going to say my goodbyes to the General.”

“Give him my regards Maam” said Akos with a cheeky smile on his face.

A smile came over Rihan’s face. “Will do Akos.”

She found Harry Kirkland in the operations room. He was taking a call. He waved for Rihan to take a seat, which she did. After a minute he terminated his call and turned to Rihan. “So you’re off then?”

“Afraid so Sir. I’m sorry to be leaving you so stretched.”

“Regrettable, but we’ll cope. It’s been a pleasure working with you Commander. I and everyone here on Beta Phi want to thank you and your forces for the effort and sacrifice you have made. We won’t forget.”

“Thank you Sir. I’ll pass that on.”

“You and your husband are a formidable team.”

Rihan smiled. “I think he’s the formidable one.”

Harry Kirkland gave one of his rare smiles. “I stand by what I said” and he gave her a wink.

Chapter 5. Resolute over Assam 2040, 25 May

Whiskey 4 touched down on G deck bringing the final serial of troops from 30
^th
Coy. The last to climb through the hatch was LCmd Jim Bucknell. He could not believe the reception.

“Present Arms” ordered 1
^st
Lt Tammy Jahir, the XO of 30
^th
Coy. The troops were paraded into three ranks, dirty, tired and dishevelled. But they stood erect, proud of what they had achieved, what they had been part of.

A smile appeared on Jim’s face as he returned the salute. He was genuinely touched by this honour. He scanned the faces of his troops and also caught site of Dave and Rihan off to the side. They were there but not upstaging this tribute.

“Thank you all for this honour” he said “and thank you for your support. We all did this.” Jim paused to gather his thoughts and then continued. “I was proud of what we all did down there before I walked through that hatch. Now I’m a tad embarrassed. It’s late, we’re all tired and we all deserve a rest.” Jim looked to Dave. “With your permission Sir I’d like to declare a rest day tomorrow.” Dave nodded. “Company dismissed.”

The troops grabbed their packs from where they were lined up and shuffled off the elevators. Dave and Rihan stayed till Jim appeared at the rear of the line.

“Thank you Sir” said Jim.

“Wasn’t my doing Jim. Tammy organised that. From what I hear, you deserved it and I’m grateful for your efforts.”

Jim smiled. “We did good, didn’t we?”

Dave smiled and patted Jim on the back, as they too shuffled forward.

“We should hold a service, tomorrow shouldn’t we?” asked Jim. “We lost some really good marines down there Sir.”

“Don’t worry about that now Jim. It can wait till tomorrow. Get some sleep.”

“I might get a feed first.”

“Haven’t you eaten?”

“No. We all had to drop everything and go.”

Dave looked to Rihan who rubbed her tummy with a sad smile. “Leave it with me” said Dave. He then hailed 1st Lt Val Gomez, the ships quartermaster. “Val, most of the marines and shuttle crews haven’t eaten yet. Can you ensure the messes know?”

“Sure thing Sir. Leave it with me.”

“Aubrey” hailed Dave “we’re right to warp.”

“Eye, eye Sir.”

Chapter 6. Resolute to Polaris 2215, 25 May

Rihan returned from the bathroom, with her long hair still a little damp and got under the covers of their bed. Dave turned out the light. They were lying on their backs. Dave felt the tender caress of Rihan’s hand on his. “Guess what?” she said. There was perkiness in the tone of her voice that surprised Dave, given how tired she had been when she came on board.

“What?” asked Dave.

“I had an awakening today.”

Dave wasn’t sure he had heard her correctly. “A spiritual awakening?”

“Yes” she said matter of factly.

Dave sat bolt upright and turned on the light. “What… shaktipat?”

Rihan also sat upright. “The one and the same. You won’t believe where and when it happened.” Her face was beaming now.

Dave knew that look of rapture and he knew how it felt for he too had received shaktipat many years earlier. Somehow this news had washed away his fatigue. He smiled in anticipation. “Go on!”

“It was at the spaceport in Assam when we heard the nuclear alarm. We had to run across the apron to Terminal 2, which had a basement. It was nothing but a mad race. I had no idea we would make it before the strike. I was racked with fear. It was Klaster all over again. I could hear that bloody klaxon, you know, the one that keeps waking me up in a sweat.” Dave nodded.

“I started to panic but somehow I remembered your advice about repeating the mantra.” She looked at David with a real intensity, her big green almond eyes were opened wide. “So I started chanting it out real loud to drown out that klaxon. There I was running at full speed and chanting the mantra. By the time I got to the terminal I had my anxiety in check. I was still repeating the mantra but silently.”

“Argha (2
^nd
Lt Arga Kahn), bless him, shepherded us down into the basement. We were crammed in and I sat up against the wall opposite Emilio (WO2 Emlio Shavez). He looked really stressed but we locked eyes for a second and I smiled and he smiled back.”

“And then I realised how calm I was. Not just calm, serene. Despite all the commotion and stress I felt terrific, completely at peace. At that moment I realised that this state of peace had been within me all this time and that it was and always will be with me. It was my true state, my true self.”

“So I just closed my eyes and revelled in that contentment for a couple of minutes. I remember asking myself what the hell had just happened but there wasn’t time to dwell on that then.”