Earth Strike: Star Carrier: Book One

There were memories, yes, but they were broken and chaotic. He remembered running through a barren, night-cloaked landscape, remembered the flickering movements at the corners of his eyes, the gathering shadows following his trail.

He remembered sensations of drowning as the shadows covered him, gnawing at his environmental suit, the terror, the rising panic. He remembered peeling them away by the handful, as more attached themselves to him… and more…and more…

“Those…things…”

“Shadow swarmers. The SAR crew said if they’d been ten minutes later, they’d have breached your suit.”

Gray allowed himself a long, shuddering breath. Safe…

“Thank you,” he said.

“Hey, don’t mention it, zorchie.” The man grinned. “You people have been up there saving our sorry asses. It’s the least we could do in return!”

The fact that the man had called him zorchie-Marine slang for a gravfighter pilot- suggested that he was an officer. An enlisted Marine, Gray thought, would never have called a naval officer zorchie to his face.

He heard a subdued click, and his hands and arms were free. Gently, he drifted down until his back was against a firm, foam-padded surface.

“Doing our job…sir,” he said. “I’m Lieutenant Trevor Gray, VFA-44, the Dragonfires.”

“We know,” the man said, as Gray tried to sit up again and, this time, succeeded. “We downloaded your ID when you came in. I’m General Gorman. Welcome aboard.”

And the man was gone. He didn’t leave; his image flickered and winked out, and Gray realized that the base CO had just paid him a visit via holo projection.

“Does your general always holo-down to chitchat with Navy pilots in sick bay?” Gray asked, looking around.

The man at the console turned and grinned at him. “Not usually, sir. But we’ve all been praying so damned hard to the God of Battles to send us some help, maybe the old man just wanted to come down in person-or in holo, anyway-to see if you were for real.”

“Any word on what’s happening up there?”

“You think they tell us anything? Last I heard, the bombardment of the perimeter had stopped, and that’s about all I care about right now.” He extended a hand. “I’m Bob Richards, by the way. HM1.”

Gray touched palms with Richards, and the circuitry imbedded in the other man’s hand lit up Gray’s in-head display. According to the data cascade, HM1 Richards was a Navy hospital corpsman assigned to the FMF, 1^st Marine Expeditionary Force, as part of the attached medical unit. Interesting. He’d been born and raised in the Orlando Arcology, which meant he was from the Periphery back home. As always, Gray waited for the reaction-the faint frown, the loss of interest-as the other person saw his personal data.

For once, there was no visible negative reaction. “So you’re from the Periph!” Richards said, brightening. “Manhattan?”

“What’s left of it. You’re from Orlando, I see.”

“Yup. High above millions of hectares of prime sea-bottom real estate. Your handle, ‘Prim.’ What’s that?”

Gray made a face. “Short for Primitive.”

“Don’t like machines, huh?”

Gray glanced back at the sealed cabinet. “No.”

“You’ll get used to it. That was just Medro.”

“Medro?”

“Medical robot. He doesn’t talk much, but he’s great at taking vitals.”

“So long as he doesn’t indulge in taking vital organs.”

Richards laughed, then got a faraway look in his eyes for a moment. “You’re married? We can let your partner know you’re okay.”

“No,” Gray said. The memory burned, and he turned his head away. “Old, old data.”

“You need to update your ID, then.”

“Yeah. I suppose.”

If he could ever figure out how. He’d received the neural-net implants in his brain while he’d been in officer-recruit training, at the same time they’d grown the circuitry in the palms of his hands. Tam had been alive then, still, when he’d filled out the data that would be stored in his personal RAM, to be exchanged with others with the touching of the circuitry in the palms of their hands. He’d never figured out, though, how to change stored data-something the other men and women on board the America seemed to have known from childhood.

And he was too proud-and angry-to ask.

A chime sounded, and Richards said, “Come!”

Another man in combat utilities entered. The rank pips on his wear-stained jacket identified him as a Marine lieutenant. “How’s the patient?”

“Doing well, sir,” Richards replied.

“Outstanding.” The man offered his hand. Again, data flowed across linked circuitry, appearing in a window within Gray’s mind. Marine Lieutenant Charles Lawrence Ostend…“Ostie”…4^th SAR/Recon Group…1^st Marine Expeditionary Force…

“You’re the guy who pulled me out of…that place,” Gray said, his eyes widening.

“Guilty as charged.”

“Then I think I owe you a drink. Thank you.”

“Damned straight you do.” He grinned at Richards. “You get all the bugs off of this guy? I don’t like bugs….”

“He’s clean.” Richards shrugged. “It’s not like it’s a problem. The local florauna can’t tolerate our atmosphere anyway.”

“‘Florauna’?” Gray asked. He’d not heard the term before.

“Ate a Boot’s native biology. It has characteristics of both flora and fauna, but isn’t either one, really.”

Ostend made a face. “Damned cockroaches, if you ask me.”

“Not cockroaches,” Richards said patiently. “Not insects. Not even animals. Something different. Alien.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Ostend waved aside the distinction. He slapped Gray on the shoulder. “The important thing, zorchie, is that you’re okay. Right?”

“Yeah…”

Gray wasn’t sure he liked the man’s casual familiarity. Within the curious discrepancy among ranks that had evolved out of the long history of Earth’s various military services, a Navy lieutenant outranked a Marine lieutenant. Gray was actually the equivalent of a Marine captain, one grade above a Marine lieutenant. Richards should have been calling him sir.

On the other hand, Gray had never cared much for the stuffy, pseudo-aristocratic demeanor of the fraternity of naval officers-one of the oldest of the old-boy networks. It was that fraternity-and sorority-that had closed ranks against the poor kid from the Manhattan Ruins and made his life hell for the past three years. Officers and gentlemen was the phrase they used, but it included conceited clots like Lieutenant Howie Spaas and arrogant hypocrites like Lieutenant Jen Collins. So far as Gray was concerned, they could all go to hell, with their “sirs” and “ma’ams” and formal military etiquette and protocol.

Ostend’s informality, Gray decided, made him uncomfortable because it was so out of place, so unexpected. It certainly was better than the usual formality.

As unexpected as General Gorman’s holographic visit a few moments before.