Theogony 1: Janissaries (13 page)

 “
I’d like to try these weapons out,
” said Ryan, indicating
the rack of tridents.

 “
Well, they are space weapons, so you really should be
in space to use them; they are probably more powerful than anything that you
want to use on a planet, especially your own,
” warned Steropes.

“
Well what do you suggest then?
” asked Ryan,
obviously annoyed at the answer.

“
Go to the moon and shoot them?
” offered Steropes.

Ryan laughed. “
As easy as that?  Just ‘go to the moon?’
”

Steropes nodded. “
As easy as that. We just shuttle up to
the back side of the moon where the space agencies can’t see us, and you can
use the weapons all you want. It’s actually in the light right now. There are
targets on the
Vella Gulf
we can set up. None of the national
moon-mapping satellites will be overhead for several hours, either.
”

“
OK, Master Chief, you can take the troops up to the moon
to work on weapons familiarization,
” Calvin commed, wondering if that
sounded as bizarre to everyone else as it did to him. “
Unfortunately,
Lieutenant Train and I have a couple of meetings to attend and loads of
paperwork to catch up on, so we can’t join you. Be safe!
”

“
Roger that, sir,
” commed Ryan, happy to have the
officers stay behind. “
At the command of ‘ready, move,
’
troops will
move forward and take the weapons that they’re supposed to have. Ready, move!
”

The troops broke ranks and moved to the weapons racks. After
a great deal of discussion, it had been decided that each of the squads would
be broken down into three fire teams, each with four lasermen. The fire team
leaders carried both a laser and a trident, as did the squad leader. The third
fire team of the ground force was the only one that was different, as it had
the unit’s specialists. In addition to the sniper team of Corporal Steve ‘Tiny’
Johnson and Corporal Mike ‘BTO’ Bachmann, it also had the platoon’s medic,
Sergeant Kawika ‘Hacksaw’ Liu, and its ninja, Sergeant Hattori ‘Yokaze’ Hanzo.
Hanzo was a wild card that didn’t fit into any of the ‘traditional’ positions.
Rather than try to put him into a slot that didn’t fit him, Calvin had decided
to make up a new position that would allow Yokaze to use his skills to the
fullest. Although the ninja took a laser, he had a variety of other weapons
that he favored.

“In national news this evening, NASA has reported that an
asteroid hit the back side of the moon today, confirming video taken by amateur
astronomers,” read KIRO’s anchorwoman, Anna St. Cloud. The camera showed a view
of the moon with a big cloud of dust rising from the opposite side. “None of
the major observatories noticed the asteroid that hit the moon prior to impact;
however, all of them agree that the dust cloud that can be seen on the moon had
to have come from something like an asteroid impact.”

“NASA’s scientist, Dr. Andy Eastwood, said today, ‘Asteroids
hit the surface of the moon all the time, as the moon doesn’t have an
atmosphere like Earth does to burn them up prior to impact. Based on the cloud
of dust, the object that hit the moon was probably about a meter in diameter,
weighing about 300 pounds. The important thing to remember about these types of
impacts is that the asteroids are traveling at velocities that often exceed 15
miles per second. They have a tremendous amount of kinetic energy, which gets explosively
converted to light and heat at impact. This collision probably liberated the
equivalent of about ten tons of TNT exploding.’”

“In other news...”

Calvin looked back at Top and Ryan, standing at attention in
front of his desk as he stopped the online replay of the nightly news. “Let’s
try to remember that this is a
secret
program that we are trying
not
to tell the public about. Making big explosions that focus attention on the
moon is
not
what we want to do. I’ve already gotten phone calls from
NASA and the air force on whether we had something to do with this, and I would
really like it if we didn’t have it happen again.” It was hard for Calvin to
maintain his straight face with Night bouncing up and down behind the enlisted
men, trying hard not to laugh.

“Yes sir!” the men said simultaneously. “Sorry sir,”
continued Ryan, “I thought it was set on microgram, not milligram.” He didn’t
look particularly sorry, Calvin noted.

“OK, I get it that you wanted to see what the grenade
thrower could do, but let’s try and dial it back a little, please. We’ll stop
on the way out, and you can blow up an asteroid of your own if you’d like.”

“Can we really?” asked Top. “That would be cool.”

Calvin sighed. “Yes, we can,” he said as his phone began
ringing. He looked at it and sighed again. “Now get out of here and try to
remember that we’re a
secret
program.”

“Yes sir!” both men said as they saluted and exited. As they
closed the door, Top winced as he heard Calvin take the blame, “Yes Mr.
President, that was us...”

“I see someone coming,”
Top told his squad over the
internal radio.
“Everyone be ready.”
Calvin, as an observer, was able to
hear the radio transmissions of both squads. He was listening to Top’s squad
with his left ear and Master Chief’s with his right. He had learned the trick
as an aviator when he had to listen to two radios while flying.

Half of Top’s squad was lined up in cover along the banks of
a small stream. It was only 4-5 feet deep in most places and about ten feet
across. It was right at the edge of the area that they were defending. Top had
decided to place half of his troops there, because it would be difficult for
anyone to cross the stream without being seen. They ought to be able to stop
the attack before it even started.

While Calvin had been watching, a reed had moved down the
river in front of Top’s squad. No one had noticed it, as it seemed to be
floating with the current. As it reached the end of the squad, it tilted down
until it pointed at Staff Sergeant Jose ‘Boom Boom’ Morales. A dart sped from
it, hitting him in the right cheek as he lay propped up on a fallen tree. His
muscles locked, holding him in that position.

The reed vanished into the water, and Sergeant Park ‘Wraith’
Ji-woo, ROK Army, slithered from out of the stream and up onto the bank. Naked
but for the knife she held in her teeth, she did not make a sound as she
approached Boom Boom’s position. Like a phantom, she flowed around the end of
the tree and placed the knife against Boom Boom’s throat. He was ‘dead.’
“One
down,”
she transmitted. She raised her head just enough to see over his
body and saw that the next in line was Top.

As she began working her way behind him, a bird whistle was
heard from across the stream.
“That’s them moving up,”
announced Top.
“Stay
focused.”
All eyes were focused across the river as Wraith crept up on Top.
Although he never heard her coming, he instinctively felt something as she
moved in for the kill. He turned to look back, just in time for the back of her
knife blade to run across his throat. He lay back down.
“Top’s down,”
she sent.

Drawing in a deep breath, she screamed the most blood
curdling scream that Top had ever heard. All of the eyes of his squad were
involuntarily drawn to where Top lay, and then held there at the sight of a
naked woman laying on top of him. They looked back to see that Ryan, Sergeant
Tagliabue, Sergeant Pesik, and Sergeant Andrews had all risen up from the water
with grenade throwers. Having swum up undetected in their combat suits, they
fired smoke rounds down the line of defense ‘eliminating’ the rest of the
defenders.

Master Chief called the rest of his squad forward, and they
began stripping off their suits. The other members of the squad arrived,
carrying the assault team’s gear and clothes. They dressed quickly and
continued the assault.

“What did you think of that?”
commed Master Chief to
Calvin.

“Much better,”
replied Calvin.
“I’m guessing that
was Wraith’s idea?”

“Yeah,”
answered Ryan,
“it was her idea. I’ve
gotta say, it worked pretty well.”

“It sure did,”
said Calvin.

Ryan shrugged as he jogged by with the squad,
“I still
think she’s crazy, but she’s my kind of crazy.”

It looked like Master Chief’s squad was finally going to win
one.

* * * * *

Calvin arrived early to the newly rechristened ‘Terran Space
Ship’ (TSS)
Vella Gulf
for his first space fighter simulator flight. The
decision had been made to call it a “TSS,” in recognition of the fact that more
than just the United States was involved.

Similarly, someone had made the decision to change the name
of the Zeebat space fighters to ‘Vipers.’ Calvin didn’t know why that was, nor
did he particularly care. He expected that it had something to do with give and
take between the Secretary of the Air Force and the Chief of Naval Operations
(CNO). He had heard the Secretary of the Air Force say one time that he didn’t
think that ‘Zeebat’ sounded ‘cool.’ Calvin idly wondered what the CNO had
received in return.

Realizing that he hadn’t been able to view the moonscape
from the bridge previously, he decided to go up and take a look, as the bridge
should currently be empty. The rest of the
Vella Gulf’s
crew wasn’t due
to start working on it until after the Christmas and New Year’s holidays. As
the doors to the bridge opened, he realized that it wasn’t empty, as he caught Arges
and Brontes holding hands and looking into each other’s eyes.

Feeling uncomfortable and deciding that he didn’t want to
interrupt, he turned to leave, but Brontes caught the motion out of the corner
of her eye. “It is OK,” she said. “You can come in.”

Calvin turned back around. “Sorry to interrupt,” he said. “I
just wanted to take a look at the surface of the moon. It still is hard to
believe sometimes that I’m actually on the moon.” He looked at the two
Psiclopes, who were still holding hands. “Are you two ‘a thing?’”

“Yes,” said Brontes. “We have been together for nearly 4,000
of your years. We just don’t like to make too much of a display around
Steropes, as it is still hard on him.”

“What is hard?” asked Calvin.

“You have heard us say that our outpost here should have
four members,” said Arges. “Correct?”

“Yes,” Calvin answered. “You said one time that your
decision making process was flawed because you only had three people and should
have had four.”

“When we were first assigned here,” Arges continued, “we
came as two couples. I was married to Brontes and Steropes was married to
Brontes’ sister Parvati. She was lost leading the attack on the Drakuls, which
is why Brontes is so affected by telling the story of that time.” Calvin could
see tears in Brontes’ eyes, and as he watched, one brimmed over and ran down
her cheek.

“It has always been the way of our kind to watch over developing
planets as a group of four,” continued Arges. “This is for a couple of reasons.
First, you have to understand our religion. We believe that life is a constant series
of dying and being reborn, until a being ultimately achieves liberation from the
life/death cycle. We believe that someone’s actions, words and deeds have an
effect on their re-creation; if you do good deeds, your soul will be rewarded
in your next life. If you commit evil during your life, that will also be
carried over.

Our society recognizes four paths that can be used to
achieve ultimate enlightenment. Brontes follows the Bhakti, or path of love and
devotion. I follow the Jnana, or path of wisdom. Steropes follows the Raja, or
path of meditation. His wife followed Karma, or path of right action. We do not
know if any of these is better than the others, but we all believe that
following your chosen path closely will lead you to purity in the next life. The
interplay of the four paths is important too, so it is necessary to have a
follower of each of the Ways when making a decision.”

“Wait, that sounds familiar,” said Calvin. “Isn’t that like
the Buddhist or Hindu philosophy on life?”

Arges nodded. “It is very much like the Hindu philosophy,”
he agreed, “and I am afraid that we are somewhat to blame for that. When we
first came to your planet, we found that you had already been invaded by
another alien species near the area of your Himalayan Mountains. We were forced
to interact with some of the local tribesmen in order to eradicate the Rakshasa
infestation; during that period, some of our beliefs were adopted by the
indigenous tribes of the area. These beliefs spread, ultimately becoming what
you refer to as Hinduism. Buddhism, Sikhism, Jainism, and several smaller
religions are all descended from this.”

“So, you’re telling me that you started Hinduism?” asked
Calvin in disbelief.

“No,” said Arges, “we didn’t start anything. Unfortunately,
some of the local tribesman came to understand enough of our ways that they
adopted them as their own. It wasn’t wise to interact with them, but I was
convinced by Parvati at the time that it was the right thing to do. Steropes
and his wife were the two warriors of our group; Brontes and I are quite pacifist
in nature. When dealing with issues of policy, it is traditional that three of
us must agree. That way, our decisions are not swayed to either extreme. When
we lost Parvati, our decision making process became flawed. We are too focused
now on trying to find a peaceful, non-violent approach to matters. We realize
this, but we cannot be other than who we were born to be. Without a fourth, our
decisions are flawed.”