All My Sins Remembered (11 page)

“Blackstar, Sitrep!” Hawke said again.  After a moment, Raijan’s weary voice came back over the command channel.

“Talon One, this is Black Star.  Everything is five by five.  We cleared out a few opfor with a mini.” Raijan reported.  Hawke shook his head.  The man was certifiably crazy to be shooting off mini’s inside a ship.  He must have really been in trouble to have made such a desperate call.  Not bothering to reply, Hawke checked the positions of both fire teams on the schematic, and planned his exit.  He had to get Tasha, Nathan, and Fire team Alpha out of the ship and back to the
Black Wave
.  That was his objective.

“Alright
Charlie, let’s go. Business as usual.” Hawke said over the general coms channel.  Charlie two took point as they continued their trek towards their exit.  He had chosen to go out another emergency escape hatch all the way to the front of the ship, and on the bottom, where a gator would meet them and cart them home.  Surprisingly, they met no resistance as they reached the emergency hatch, and piled into the gator, but Hawke was also listening in on Raijan’s general coms channel in the fifteen minutes it had taken for his team to make its exit and escort their charges back to the ship.  He heard another firefight transpiring, and another, and somewhere during the course of events he heard another Marine screaming “Mini! Mini! Cover!” just before a second mini had gone off.  After that, there were secondary explosions so powerful that the cargo ship rocked in its docking sling.  Smoke began rising out of the holes the Marines had melted into the ventral part of the ship’s hull, and fire alarms began blaring inside Gitmo’s docking area.  Hawke clenched his teeth.  He should be in there with his Marines.

“Blackstar, sitrep.” Hawke said.  The coms were static for a moment before Raijan’s voice responded.

“Busy sir. No new casualties, but they had a team in assault armor sitting in the engine room waiting for us.  We're-”  Raijan responded briefly, before cutting out.  On the general coms channel for his team, Hawke heard Raijan say, “Beta three and four, this is Blackstar.  Sitrep!”

“
Package has been retrieved.  Resistance was minimal after we stuffed another mini down their throats.”  Beta Three reported.

“Next objective and route.  Be there ASAP.”  Raijan commanded tersely.

“We’re on our way sir.” Beta Three responded.  Hawke used his command interface to pull a copy of what Raijan had sent to Beta Three and four and saw that he had given them a route that would allow them to enter the engine room from a second door two decks up.  The engine room was large, with the engine core spanning several decks.  It was common to have some automated defenses in the room to protect the engine core, but a Special Forces team in assault armor on board a ship was something else entirely.  Assault armor was about ten tons of armor and heavy weapons.  The Talons had precious few of them, though each one boasted a heavy gauss rifles held in each arm, and a mini-launcher on each shoulder.  Rejaian assault armor traded heavy gauss rifles for heavy laser cannons, and mini launchers for rocket launchers.  Assault armor could weather a hit from most ground-based weapons carried on the battlefield, and keep going.  It was used when a bigger club was needed.  Having one deployed inside a ship was bad enough, but four was just sheer madness.

“
Fire at will! Fire at…” Another large explosion interrupted Raijan, and Hawke jumped when a part of the hull plating rocketed outwards, and the remnants of someone in assault armor was thrown out over the dock to plummet lifelessly to the deck plating of the docking bay far below.  The crash shook the docks, and now dock workers were running, trying to get out of the docks in case there was a hull breach on the station.  Smoke and fire roiled from the hull breach towards the aft sections of the
Choyo
, and now the thunder of weapons fire could be clearly heard as it echoed throughout the dockyard.  Finally, Hawke’s team had arrived at the Black Wave’s cargo elevator, and he signaled the driver to stop.  Turning to his Marines, he made a decision.

“I’ve got to go back.” Hawke said.  “Your mission is complete.  If any of you wish to get on board, get out and into the cargo elevator.”  Turning to Nathan, he added, “Get your team on board.  Command of the ship is yours until I return.”  Nathan didn’t like it, but he nodded in agreement as he gingerly climbed out of the
Gator, with his team following him.  They weren’t in any condition to help, he knew, but he still felt he was abandoning Raijan.  None of the other Marines moved.  Instead, they began rechecking their gear, getting ready to help the rest of their squad.  Hawke nodded in satisfaction, pride clearly showing on his face as he gave the driver’s shoulder a slap.  With the roar of the gator’s engines, they shot back across the dock floor, towards the firefight, and the destroyed assault armor that burned there.

***

“Fire at will! Fire at-“ Rockets peppered the deck plating right next to where he had been hunched behind a particularly thick bulkhead, and the resulting explosion sent him flying backwards.  His team was using bulkheads and support beams as cover as they engaged the four SpecOps in assault armor that stood in a wedge formation, their rocket launchers and heavy laser cannons spitting death and destruction everywhere. Bardaccio was on point as they entered the engine room, and was hit right in the chest with a heavy laser cannon, disintegrating his midsection to ash.  The shocked look on his face could be dimly seen through his faceplate a moment before limbs and head dropped to the floor.  He hadn’t even had time to scream, and Raijan knew there wouldn’t even be enough left of him to recover.   The Rejaians were desperate, Raijan realized, but in their desperation they may very well destroy that which they are trying to save.

Raijan’s head cracked against the wall as he impacted against the bulkhead.  Had it not been reinforced to help protect the engine room,
it would have dented.  As it was, he landed on hands and knees as he tried to breathe, having the wind knocked out of him.  The HUD on his helmet began flashing red on an entirely new section of his armor, and he quickly realized that he must look a wreck.  Smoke rose from his armor, which was pitted and scarred with multiple hits.  It was a miracle that nothing had won past his armor to do him bodily harm yet.  With a scream of rage, Beta three, having just arrived with Beta four stepped out of cover on the balcony one deck above with his mini launcher at the ready, and fired a mini at the feet of the foremost assault armor, then dove for cover as the enemy tried to back quickly away.  With a deafening explosion the mini went supernova, and the assault armor at which Beta three had fired went rocketing backwards, smashing through the hull.  Workstations around the engine core exploded, and an emergency shield was put in place around the engine core as debris rained down and shrapnel pinged around the engine compartment.  Raijan’s armor became red hot, and his cooling systems kicked into overdrive again as a fresh wave of sweat stung his eyes, the salty taste of it on his lips.  Finally able to breathe again, Raijan labored to his feet, using his assault rifle as an aid.

The deck trembled as the three remaining
Special Forces soldiers either climbed back to their feet, or poked their heads out from behind cover to view the devastation.  One leveled his heavy laser cannons at them and fired, melting through the bulkheads behind them instead.  With that, the firefight was rejoined.  Rockets, lasers, slugs, and plasma grenades went flying back and forth, but Raijan knew that his team was overmatched.  While they could fire more mini’s to destroy them, it would definitely breach the energy shields around the core, killing everyone.

From one level up,
Beta Three and Four renewed their assault, their GUA-4X’s whirring as they sent a hail of slugs from down on high, and focused on the head of the nearest soldier.  For a moment Raijan watched with amazement as the helmet of the assault armor stood up under the withering barrage before finally cracking into a thousand pieces, along with the head inside it.  The assault armor’s heavy laser cannons continued to fire a moment or so more before the armor mimicked the soldier’s body as it stiffened then fell lifelessly to the deck with a loud crash.

The
turning of the tide was short lived, however, as one of the SpecOps soldiers turned its attention to the support beams under the deck Beta Three and Four was on, and wiped them out with a rocket barrage.  Shouts could be heard over the general coms channel as the deck plating gave way, dumping the two to the floor, and were chased down by debris from the deck that had been above them, burying them.  Raijan felt sick to his stomach as he realized he may have just lost two more members of his fire team.  He had not expected them to engage in such wanton destruction of their own ship, but then again, he did not expect assault armor either.  It was too his relief, however, that the rubble began to shift as beta three and four slowly climbed back to their feet, though beta four seemed to have difficulty walking.  It seemed he may have lost partial power to his left leg.

“Black…st…can you… me? Give…all you’ve got! “ Hawke’s
voice came over the command channel, interspersed with static.  The Choyo must’ve been trying to jam their communications net.  Raijan guessed at what Hawke was trying to say and gave the order to attack all out on the two remaining soldiers.  The Marines of fire team Beta did just that, driving them back and gouging craters in their armor.

Then
came the sound of thunder as five Marines in power armor burst through the hole in the Choyo’s hull on jets of plasma, weapons firing at the tender rear armor of the SpecOps soldiers.   One Marine jetted straight towards one of the SpecOps soldiers, colliding with him in a bone-jarring crash.  Reaching down, he jammed a plasma grenade in the gap between armor plates at the neck, and then jetted off as the plasma grenade detonated, engulfing the assault armor’s head in plasma, bringing the soldier inside to a spectacular end as the smoking armor collapsed.  The remaining soldier met an equally spectacular end as Beta three’s heavy laser finally won past layers of armor to sever his leg.  Screaming, the man rolled on the deck, trying to cradle his stump where his leg once was, forgetting that assault armor only had weapons on its armature, rather than a hand.  The canopy of the assault armor opened, revealing a bloody and bruised spec ops soldier as he struggled to disengage from the armor, blood seeping from his burned and cauterized leg, but then unconsciousness mercifully took him, never to awake again. 

Ha
wke landed not far from Raijan, his landing cushioned by a jet of plasma as the whine of his jet pack slowly died, bringing with it silence.  Even the alarm Klaxons had long since faded, replaced by the groaning of the ships superstructure as it attempted to compensate for serious breaches of its structural integrity.  Hawke's armor was brutish looking.  Much of the paint had been scoured away from fire, and what remained was scarred and pitted from the impact of gunfire and shrapnel.  About the only thing that remained was the unit insignia painted on his chest, though it too showed signs of having seen better days.  A cracked and battered faceplate flipped back to reveal the colonel’s smiling face, streaked with sweat.  From a pouch on his bandolier he slid out a cigar he had managed to tuck away, used his combat knife to snip off the end, lit it, lit it by pressing it against the red hot barrel of his GAU-4X, and then took a moment to puff on his cigar as if it was just another day at the office.

“How about you get those charges set so we can get out of here?  Our ride is waiting.” Hawke suggested.  For a
moment Raijan just stared at Hawke with disbelief in his eyes, then shook his head and waved wearily to his men to plant the charges.  He decided, not for the first time, that his commanding officer must be a little crazy for wading into battle like he did.  Yet it was that kind of courage that Raijan respected.  Crazy or not, he was an honorable man.

Dareem wiped the sweat off his brow as it slid down his cheek from under his shemagh
.  Small puffs of dust stirred with every footfall as he jogged down the dirt road.  The sun was harsh and unforgiving, as it always was in such arid climates, crushing all but the most hardy of folks beneath is heat.  The remote village of Misrati was far from one of the planet’s only Metropolises, a large city named New Bagdad.  His ancestors had settled here on Daroon a little over one hundred years ago now.  It was meant to be a place where their culture and beliefs could be observed without the bias that most people had towards them.  Thanks to a history of extremist views, their people, in times past, had become shunned, and nearly universally mistrusted or even hated.  On Daroon it was their chance to start over.

Every month, Misrati received a supply run from New Bagdad, and i
t was usually a day of happiness when they arrived.  The whole village would pitch in and help unload the trucks after the personal packages have been distributed.  Items that were purchased from the planetary net were delivered this day as well, which is why Dareem was especially excited today.  The holocorder he had purchased should have arrived in today’s shipment.  He was looking forward to taking holovids of his wife, children, and the rest of his family.  He had always wanted a way of documenting and sharing family life so that hopefully his descendants could one day meet him, in a sense.  After a particularly profitable season in which he was able to send more sheep to the slaughter than usual, he had finally bought a holocorder.  He could almost imagine himself watching the holovids years later with his two children, and perhaps his grandsons and granddaughters, and reminiscing of times past.

“Dareem!  The trucks are here!” shouted a shirtless old man with a long, gray beard.  It was Sarif, one of the village elders.  He was standing in the doorway of his traditional adobe house.  Though there were houses you could make with more advanced materials, few could afford them.  The people of Misrati subsisted on the raising of goat, sheep, and cattle, and by farming what they could in the surrounding area.  Dareem smiled and waved, but slowed his pace to a walk, realizing that sweating too much without water could easily dehydrate him severely.  After all, the whole planet consisted almost entirely of arid climates, the only exceptions being the snow-covered peaks of its mountain ranges.  The average temperature was between 29 to 32 degrees Celsius, with very little rainfall.  The only relief came at night, where temperatures could drop to as low as 10 degrees Celsius.  Yet it was home to those of Arabian blood, who were at home in the deserts, rocks, and sands of such arid climates.  It was his people who took a planet deemed untenable, and made it their home.  The desert was in their blood.

As Dareem rounded the slight curve of the dirt road leading into the heart of the village, he spied two trucks parked and idling at the circle, as they usually do when delivering supplies to Misrati.  Families, shop keepers, and crafters were gathered around the backs of the trailers, whose doors were flung wide open.  They eagerly awaited their deliveries while the drivers called out names to those whose supplies
were aboard.  When the recipient identified themselves, the driver would indicate the packages or pallets that were theirs. 

Dareem saw his lovely wife had already arrived, and stood near the back of the crowd, her shemagh shielding her from the brutality of the noonday sun.  He could not help but smile fondly as he noticed that she was standing on her tip toes to see over the taller people in front.  He walked quietly up behind her and furtively rested his hands on each side of her waist and whispered into her ear, “Need a boost?”  She jumped, startled, and spun around to see who had dared touch her in such a manner in public, and when she saw it was him, pushed him gently and playfully with her hand, favoring him with a mock scowl.  Had the others nearby not been so intent on getting their packages from the truck, they may have been more than a little shocked at such a public display
of affection.

“What are you doing here? I thought you were shearing the sheep today?” Isir  asked.  Dareem smiled, and shrugged.

“I decided to wait one more day.  Aasif is watching them today, much to his dismay.  I wanted to be here to get my holocorder.  I feel like a young boy again, awaiting a new toy.”  Isir smiled fondly at her husband, and surreptitiously leaned into him a little.

“I had planned to pick it up for you,
hayati
.” Isir said. “I would feel better if you would go to Aasif.  He is only a boy of twelve, and I am not comfortable with him being by himself tending the sheep.”  Dareem’s smile faltered, and he sighed.  It was a frequent topic that came up of late, and he was tired of it.

“Aasif is as old as I was, when I was given charge of the herd for short lengths of time.  You know this,
Habibti
.”  Dareem replied.  Though the conversation was over, Isir stopped leaning into him, and he knew that it had broken whatever romantic mood she had been harboring.  She had come from a family that had a bit more than his family had, as well as more children.  As a result, the children shared the considerable workload, and could afford to enjoy their childhood awhile longer.  Dareem’s family had no such luxuries.  Though Dareem had worked hard to change that by saving up some money each season in preparation for buying a second herd of sheep, they were not there yet.  He could not afford to hire the extra hands to care for the additional herd, nor did they have enough children to help out with the chores.  Still, a happy wife made for a happy life.  With a resigned sigh, Dareem placed his left hand on Isir’s arm, and squeezed it affectionately, drawing a sharp look from one of his neighbors who had joined them in waiting for his name to be called.  Isir looked at Dareem, her dark face set in an expression he knew only too well as an unhappy one.

“Ease the anger written on your face,
Hayati
.  I will go to him.”  Dareem said gently.  As quickly as that, the clouds went away, and the sun was out again as her face hinted at the loving smile hidden by her abaya.  As he turned to go, she caught his hand, and briefly pressed it against her cheek.  The memory of her touch, and his smile, stayed with him all the way back to the flock.

***

Eventually, the sun gained just the right position, and it sent its rays questing through the gap in the curtains hanging over the bedroom window to land right on Dareem’s sleeping face.  With a groan, he turned his face to go back to sleep, but then suddenly sat up with a gasp, realizing that he had slept far too long.  The first thought that occurred to him was that he had missed morning prayers.  While he was of a more liberal belief that Allah was both forgiving and understanding, he never liked missing morning prayers.  The second thought that occurred to him was that the house was strangely silent for it being morning.  Typically, the sounds of cooking could be heard as Isir worked on preparing a morning meal.

Curious, Dareem rolled out of bed and padded on bare feet to the kitchen only to find it empty.  On the table was a warm cup of Arabic coffee, and a plate of Shashukah
, a delicious recipe handed down through the centuries from Mother to daughter in Isir's family.  Next to it was a hastily written note.  Glancing at it, he saw that Isir had taken Aasif to the village to buy some items from the market.  Dareem smiled, knowing that she was probably intending on spending some of the credits she managed to hide away for something.  Now that the shop keepers had received a fresh supply of goods, the market would be particularly busy for the next week or so.  Isir did not often spend her credits frivolously, and he often turned a blind eye when he noticed a few credits were missing from their expense account from which they paid their bills.  After all, Isir had never once complained about marrying out of a wealthy family, into a poor one.  If anything, she seemed to treasure the simple things in life, and was less concerned with material goods so long as they had a roof over their head, and food on their table.  It was one of the reasons why he loved Isir so much.  She was his life and his breath.  As he ate, Dareem paused as an idea occurred to him and smiled.

Finishing his breakfast, not even caring that his coffee was less than hot, Dareem quickly changed his clothes, put on his shoes, and grabbed his new holocorder.  After checking in on the flock
still in their pen, and noticing that Aasif must have fed them before he left with his Mother, Dareem set out towards the village.  At best, they had only been there an hour.  He was sure he could catch them before they left.  Maybe he would take them to one of the few restaurants for a mid-day meal before returning to sheer the sheep.

As he neared the village, the smile that had been firmly fixed to Dareem’s face faltered as his pace slowed as he realized that he was missing the sounds of the village that he had always welcomed over the years as he neared it.  In its place was silence.  It was something that gave him a sense of dread as he realized that something was happening, or that something was wrong.  In the distance, as he approached the village, he would always see old man Jawdah either sitting in his chair beside his door, or standing in his door.  His porch overlooked the northern approach to the village, and he always enjoyed watching the wildlife passing by in the distance, or watching for travelers coming from that direction, though it was a rare occurrence.  He could see Jawdah there, sitting as he always was, but it seemed he was asleep with chin resting on
his chest as he leaned against the wall of his abode.  Yet something was not right, though Dareem did know what.

Dismissing the thought, Dareem had a better idea and pulled his holocorder up to record Jawdah sitting there, sleeping as the sun warmed him.  Old man Jawdah was a weaver of baskets and hats, though of late he slept more, ate less, and worked less.  Many in the village knew that he had begun the slow decline of health that would finally end in his passing, but he was a sweet old man, always ready with a smile or a funny story.

As he neared Jawdah, though, Dareem’s gentle smile faded as he realized that Jawdah’s chest did not rise and fall with the steady rhythms of life. Disturbed, Dareem called to him, lowering his holocorder as he ran the rest of the distance to Jawdah.  As he drew near, Dareem stopped, shocked at what he saw.  Dareem’s lips were blue, his eyes open wide in what looked like the desperation.  Worst of all was the old man’s expression, which reflected fear.

“Oh Jawdah, I am sorry.” Dareem whispered
sadly as he gently slid the old man’s eyes closed.  It seemed that somehow the man may have had a heart attack or something.  With a sad sigh, he knew he must bear the news to the rest of the village, so that they may give him a proper burial.  Standing, Dareem resumed his walk towards the village, but grew increasingly troubled as he drew nearer.  The silence hanging over the village had not lifted.  Before, he could always hear the merchants hawking their wares, the loud sound of haggling, the sounds of kids playing, or of goats and sheep passing through the village on their way to market, or to another sparse pasture.  If nothing else, he should already be seeing women hanging their laundry to out to dry in the sun on clotheslines draped across adobe roofs.  Yet there was nothing.  The stillness was only disturbed by a slight breeze coming from the north, and a dust devil that crashed into one of the adobe houses on the edge of the village and dissipated.

As he continued, Dareem saw well ahead of him
another body lying in the middle of the road leading into the village.  His breath caught in his throat as his sense of dread deepened.  He approached cautiously, and knelt beside the body.  It was one of the women of the village who had been carrying her wet laundry from the nearby river where the women typically washed their clothing.   The basket, which normally would have been balanced on her head as she walked from the river to her home to hang them out to dry, had been dumped, its top lying where it had fallen.  Some of the clothing had tumbled out, and the woman lay on the ground, her hands grasping her throat as if she had been suddenly robbed of the ability to breathe.  Like Jawdah before her, her lips were blue and eyes wide in desperation.

Afraid of what he might find, Dareem left her there and
entered a nearby abode only to find a family of four sprawled out on the floor in their dining room.  Like the others before, they showed signs of suddenly being unable to breathe.  It looked as if, in his desperation, the father had attempted to slam himself on the table, believing that perhaps he was choking on his food.  The two children, both beautiful little girls, were both dead as well.  One little girl had slumped forward, her face firmly planted in her plate.  Aasif was always fond of the slightly older girl, Sarai.  Gently, Dareem lifted the girl’s head from her plate and rested it on the table, off to the side.  The Mother, he noticed, was laying on her side, on the floor, her hand outstretched towards her husband.

Dareem staggered from the home
in a daze.  He was so overwhelmed with emotion, he did not know whether to scream or weep.  Instead, he walked down the village street, looking at the faces of the dead, though they barely registered in his mind because he was looking for two very specific faces.  He knew, with a dread certainty he would find them, though he hoped against hope that he would not.  As he rounded the final bend in the road, a sharp curve really, he came upon the marketplace where many of the villagers were sprawled out on the ground.  Some were sprawled out behind market stands, but all were dead.  Then he found them, and the daze his mind had been in shattered, along with his life.  A long, forlorn scream escaped him as tears flooded his eyes.  Running forward, he knelt beside the bodies of Isir and Aasif, gathering them into his arms.  Isir was holding Aasif, in their last moments.  Now he held them both.