Galactic Frontiers: A Collection of Space Opera and Military Science Fiction Stories Read online

  “What?” The word just blurted out. I hadn’t been sure what he was going to say, but that was certainly not what I was expecting.

  “You heard me, Darius.” There was a smile on his face – he was enjoying this, the SOB. “I’d like to make a Marine out of you.”

  “Why would you want me?” About half a dozen responses came to my mind, but that’s the one that came out. I couldn’t imagine why they’d be after me. The entire thing seemed ridiculous.

  He let out a short breath. “Darius, the Corps is unlike any other military organization. We are looking for a certain type of recruit.” He stopped for a few seconds as he put together what he wanted to say. “Most of us have pasts like yours…” He looked me right in the eye. “…or worse.” He emphasized that last part and let it sink in before he continued. “Some a lot worse. I’m from the LA Metroplex myself. The Valley.”

  The Valley was one of the most notorious slums in the U.S. I didn’t know much about other places, but I’d heard of the Valley. If this guy grew up there it was no joke. “So you guys need a thief? What, did your budgets get cut and you’re looking for new income?”

  He smiled and snorted slightly, not quite a laugh. “No, Darius, we need independent thinkers. We need doers. Not easy to find.”

  I laughed. “And you think that’s me? What makes you think I’m what you’re looking for?”

  “Well, for one, you obviously cut out your own implant, which suggests that you have the toughness you will need to make it through our program. A sloppy surgeon to be sure, but it takes a certain grit to do what you did.”

  “Big deal, you want tough you should head up to Louisville and hit up some of the Gangers there.”

  He held in a small laugh. “I said tough, not crazy. We aren’t looking for psychopaths, Darius. Look at you…you are very measured in how you do things. You haven’t been terribly forthcoming with me, but you haven’t been overtly hostile either. Measured.”

  “So the fact that I didn’t tell you to fuck off makes me Marine material?” The whole thing still seemed crazy to me.

  “It’s more than what you say or don’t say. Look at how you ran your little gang. You robbed us three times – we were watching you after the first, by the way – and didn’t kill or seriously injure anyone. You did what you needed to do to survive, but you didn’t escalate the situation past what was required. It is very clear you are deliberative, brave but cautious. Just what we want.”

  Still on my mind: “You were watching us?” I hadn’t had a clue. “Why didn’t you stop us sooner?”

  “Why do you think? He had an annoying smirk on his face. He clearly enjoyed these head games.

  “My God, you’re fucking kidding me.” This was getting more and more bizarre. “You were watching to see if you wanted to recruit us?”

  “Very good.” He leaned forward over the back of the chair. “You are starting to understand. It was pretty clear from your first robbery that you knew what you were doing. You even watched the convoys, and you hit the specific cargo that was easiest for you to move.” He paused slightly. “Unless that was a coincidence.”

  “It was no coincidence.” I felt a little naked; they had us completely figured out. “I wasn’t looking for the kind of attention stealing weapons or high tech stuff would bring.”

  “Look, Darius, trust me.” His voice changed slightly, less casual, more serious. “You are the kind of recruit we’re looking for. You’re clearly intelligent, despite your lack of education.” He smiled again. “And your robberies displayed some first rate small unit tactics.”

  He let me think for a minute. Why would I want to be a Marine anyway? Just because they invited me? “Look, I appreciate the offer, but why would I want to join up anyway? So I can go get my ass shot off…what? In space?” He nodded. “You figure I’ll join up so you don’t turn me in. Because it’s better to take your deal than end up getting sent to the lunar mines for stealing?”

  “Or sentenced to gas by the megafarm magistrate back home?” He had a self-satisfied smile on his face. “Of course we know who you are, Darius. We’re not imbeciles.” He paused, clearly enjoying my dumbstruck silence. “But to answer your question, no, if you say no to us we won’t turn you in. Not for your robberies and certainly not to the megacorp that runs that farm.”

  “You’ll just let me go?” I looked at him quizzically. “Just walk out the door?”

  “Yes. With a stern warning never to steal from us again.” He looked at me and his eyes were deadly serious. “A very stern warning.”

  I was quiet for maybe half a minute, trying to process everything he said. Free to go? I could just walk out? “So if that’s true, why would I ever agree to sign up? If you’re not blackmailing me with prosecution why shouldn’t I just leave now?”

  He let out a deep breath. “Well, Darius, the first part of that answer is the fact that you’re asking the question at all. I just told you that you could leave any time you want to. Why are you asking me questions at all?” He paused for an instant, but continued before I could answer. “It depends on what you really want, Darius. You’re smart enough to get by as a thief for a while, at least until you step on someone else’s toes and you end up mining meteor fragments on the moon. Or more likely dead.”

  He rolled up his sleeve. “You see this arm?” I looked at him, confused. “I got this blown off as a private. My first battle.”

  I thought to myself, this guy needs work on his sales pitch if that is his idea of an inducement. But I kept listening anyway. I was curious where he was going with this.

  “This is a new one. A perfect regeneration. You’d have to be a member of the political class here for that kind of medical priority. But in the Corps all you have to be is a Marine. What was your medical priority rating before you ran? Zero?”

  I frowned. “So you’re saying if you get my arm shot off you’ll grow me a new one? You’re a lousy salesman.”

  “No.” He looked at me with the first hint of impatience I’d seen from him. “I’m saying that the Corps is someplace that respects all of its members. We don’t prioritize our people and throw most of them away because it’s expedient. An injured Marine gets the care he needs, whatever that is. Private, general…it doesn’t matter. A Marine in trouble gets the support he needs.” He stared right at me, his eyes boring into mine. “Haven’t you ever wanted to belong somewhere? To be part of a team where everyone has your back?”

  “So it’s that simple? I say yes, and you make me part of this team you’re talking about?” I had to admit to myself, the prospect of not feeling totally on my own every second was appealing. I also thought it had to be bullshit.

  He laughed. “Far from. If you say yes, I will give you a chance to make it. If you sign on you will do six years of training.” He paused, smiling wickedly at the blank expression on my face. “Yes, that’s right. Six years. You’ll get the education you never got before, and you’ll learn how to really use that reasonably effective brain I think you have. You’ll also work like a dog; like nothing you have ever experienced. You think they worked people hard on that farm?” The wicked grin widened, becoming downright maniacal. “You’ll end up face down in the mud puking your guts up from physical training you can’t imagine now. Our program is serious.” He paused, and the grin slowly vanished. “It’s dangerous too. People die in training. You may die in training.”

  “So you sell the Corps hard and then try to scare me away?” My head was spinning. I didn’t know what to think. “So if I make it through your training, then what happens?”

  “Then you graduate as a private.” His voice was serious now. All the earlier informality was gone. “And when you make your first drop you’re one of us.” Long pause. “For the rest of your life.”

  “After my first drop?”

  “Graduating from training gives you the right to drop with a Marine unit. Completing the drop makes you a Marine. We’re combat veterans, every one of us. You may end up being a mecha
nic or a computer tech in the Corps, but the first time out you’re a private and a combat soldier. Even our medical staff starts out fighting.”

  “Everybody starts as a private?” I was intrigued. This was very different from the society I’d seen my whole life, where birth and connections were everything. It amused me to think of a Senator starting out as a field hand on the farm.

  “Everybody. You may be a general someday, but until then you’ll always know that whoever ordered you into battle has been there himself.” He was exaggerating to make a point, but it turns out he was right…I would become a general one day, and I would never ever forget what it felt like to climb into that first lander.

  “So fine, the Corps takes care of its own. That’s all great, but it still sounds like going out there and getting all shot up for the politicians who sit behind desks and tell everyone else what to do. The Marines may have a different attitude, but they still fight for the system that worked my father to death on that farm.”

  “I knew you were smart.” His grin was back. “Most recruits aren’t this much of a pain in the ass.” He hesitated, as if he was trying to decide how to discuss delicate matters. “Darius, the system is what it is. I’m not here to defend it or even worry about it. But if you become one of us you will see a whole universe you can’t imagine now. The colony worlds are nothing like Earth. I’m posted here, but this isn’t my home any more. When I retire it will be to Atlantia or Arcadia or one of the other frontier planets. Earth is dying, choking to death on corruption and repression, but not mankind. The future isn’t here; it’s out there.” He pointed upwards.

  He got up and spun the chair around facing the right way. “We’re not offering you a job, Darius. We’re offering you a home. One you need to prove yourself worthy for. When you hit the dirt on that first drop you are reborn; your sins are washed away. It’s in the Marine Charter…a full legal pardon. If you want, you can come back to Earth when your ten years are up. You can walk right onto that farm and tell the administrator you killed one of his supervisors a few years back. You can tell him to eat shit if you want. They can’t arrest you, and if they tried they’d have a Marine strike force showing up to get you out.”

  He sat back in the chair, sitting closer, looking right at me. “When you muster out, if you want to settle on a colony world, you’ll get a land grant or resource allotment. We take care of our own, and once you’re one of us, you’re always one of us.” He slapped me on the knee and got up again. “Think about it, Darius. I’ll have some dinner sent in here. Then sleep on it. We’ll talk in the morning.” He turned and walked out without another word, and the door slid shut behind him.

  I sat for a long while just thinking about everything he had said. My first reaction was to tell him to forget about it. I was only sixteen – six years of training seemed like an eternity. And leave Earth? Fight on other worlds? It was just too much.

  But then a lot of what he said came back to me, and I started to think about it. I had grown up on the lowest rung of the system. My parents were penniless Cogs with no prospects to improve their lives or mine. I got only a rudimentary education, little or no access to medical care, and barely enough food to survive. At the time, that just seemed to be the way of things. A Cog’s life is ruled by necessity, by the daily struggle to get by. There wasn’t time to think about anything else or to contemplate the inequities of the system or the failings of the government. The utter powerlessness and vulnerability made all that seem very far away. A Cog worries about getting food today, not a better life tomorrow.

  When I ran from the farm, I started to become someone else, but only to a limited extent. My horizons had expanded, but not all that much. I stole because I didn’t have what I needed to survive, and later because I got better at it and could live a more tolerable life, albeit at the expense of my victims. I had my crew, but we were drawn together by necessity and opportunity, not by any great commitment to each other.

  I tried to imagine what it would be like to be part of a group like he’d described, but it was just too much to deal with. I put it out of my mind and drifted off to sleep determined to turn Captain Jackson down, to go back to my hideout and lay low and be more careful about picking my targets. For some reason, I believed him when he said they would let us go. But I thrashed around all night, my decision made consciously but still conflicted somewhere deeper inside myself. Something he said got to me on a level I couldn’t entirely understand or control. When he came back the next morning I tried to say no, but all that came out of my mouth was, “Yes, I’m in.” I was on my way.

  Chapter 5

  2253 AD

  Firebase Delta-4

  South of the Kelven Ridge

  Delta Trianguli I

  By the time I got to Tombstone, I was a different person. Marine training is long, longer than anything I’ve ever heard of for any military organization. Part of that is because our wars are complex. No uneducated conscript can survive on a 23rd century battlefield. The suite of weapons and equipment we utilize is extensive, and it takes considerable effort to master. But the Marine program is as much about evolving the individual as teaching him to shoot and walk around in armor, and that is what really takes time.

  I adapted well and really excelled at training. I’d never felt a part of anything meaningful, and when I had the opportunity to join a team that truly worked together, I jumped at it. Some of the others in my trainee class took longer. Many of them had even worse backgrounds, and they’d sunk deeper into depravity than I had. Bitterness and hatred hadn’t entirely consumed me as it had with some of them. I was an outlaw, yes, but never a bloodthirsty one. I stole to survive, and later to live comfortably, but my crew didn’t murder the people we robbed. I’d killed the supervisor, but he had abused me for some time, and I was sure he had been responsible for my father’s death. Some of the others in my class at Camp Puller were real hardcases, broken people who had been driven to do some truly horrible things to survive and to lash back at the world. It took time to repair that kind of psychic damage, and that’s part of the reason Marine training is six years.

  Now I’d made my first drop, and I’d fought my first action. I’d fought several, in fact – I was a full-fledged Marine. My crimes were gone, pardoned away in exchange for my service. I could go back to Earth when I mustered out if I wanted to, and I would be free from any consequences of my past. But even then, Earth was already starting to seem like something far away and long ago. I didn’t realize it at the time, but the concept of home was changing for me.

  We’d been on one mission that particularly made an impression on me. Three of our troopers were out on patrol, and they ended up cut off by superior enemy forces. The lieutenant didn’t hesitate – he mustered the whole platoon and we scrambled out to try to link up and get them back home. The Captain was in on it too, sending a group of snipers and a heavy weapons team from base Delta-3 to assist us. We fought for four hours, the lieutenant pushing us relentlessly the entire time. In the end we broke through, but too late to save them. They were all lost.

  The mood was somber when we got back to base. We were in a profession where people got killed – there was no way around that. Yet we mourned every one of them, and every trooper in the platoon wondered how he’d failed, what he could have done differently. I felt the loss too, and the futility of our fruitless, costly fight to save them. But then I realized it wasn’t fruitless. Mathematically it was, of course. Had we abandoned them we would have had three casualties instead of the eight we ended up with. But combat isn’t decided solely by numbers or equations; it is a test of morale, of the willingness of men and women to fight, sometimes under impossible conditions. Those three Marines died on that plateau, but they were never abandoned by their comrades. They knew to the last that their brothers and sisters were fighting to reach them…and the troops struggling to break through saw how the Corps treats its own. If it was them next time, trapped and cut off, they knew at least that they would no
t be cut loose, that no officer was going to make a cold blooded decision that they were expendable. The Corps stood by its own…wherever, whenever, whatever the cost.

  I’d been on-planet for five months, and I wasn’t one of the new guys anymore. Combat on Tombstone wasn’t cheap, and we’d lost eighteen of our fifty since we’d landed. Half of them were wounded, all thanks to the armor’s impressive repair and trauma control mechanisms. Our suits were a hell of a lot better than the Caliphate’s in that regard – their nanotech was way behind ours. In a place like this, a wound was pretty much a death sentence for one of them.

  We evac’d the wounded on the transport that brought us replacements. We had eighteen fresh new faces wandering around the base, and I was in the unfamiliar territory of mentoring the new people. Somewhere in five months of serving in hell I’d become not quite a veteran, but at least seasoned. I knew my way around this miserable planet and how to survive its many hazards, and I was determined that none of these 18 newbs would go out and get themselves killed doing something stupid. Others had done that for me, and some of those people were now dead or shipping out to the hospital on Armstrong. It was my turn, my debt to start repaying.

  We’d just celebrated the new year…the new Earth year, of course. A year on Tombstone was only 61 Terran days, and just over 20 of the 73 hour local days. I’d never celebrated the new year before I’d become a Marine, but we had a nice little party in base Delta-4 and welcomed the new additions to the platoon. Six of them were experienced and were transferring from other units or the hospital. The rest were fresh from Camp Puller, the class that was half a year behind mine.

  There was a lull in the action as the new Earth year began. Both sides were building up and replacing losses, and while we did frequent patrols there was little action. There was one interesting thing, though. We managed to intercept and decode a Caliphate message that gave the exact arrival date of their next convoy. I’d been with the patrol that caught the transmission, and we were pretty excited for a while. Taking out a couple hundred of their troops while they were still in the launch bays would save us a lot of trouble down here. But in the end nothing came of it. Alliance Gov considered engaging enemy forces in space to be an unacceptable escalation. Neither side had attacked the other’s naval forces, and they weren’t looking to start now. Everyone knew that full-scale war was coming, but nobody was ready for it yet. It was frustrating fighting a war that you weren’t allowed to win, but there was nothing we could do about that.