take the hint. I went to sleep praying they would pair me with Vok and woke up to discover they’d assigned Rauder. I’ve become convinced CC does that kind of thing either for laughs or to be deliberately annoying.
Rauder had been even less pleased, but apparently decided to make the most of it, and the morning had passed without any conflict. Rauder hardly spoke as Adriassi led us through the maze of carts, identifying the multicolored foods, medicines, and ornamental crafts as I took samples and conducted material studies. The eyes of the shoppers and merchants followed us, some fearfully, others with curiosity. Rauder’s free hand often strayed to the priest’s hood she wore at her belt, or her “soulbag” as she’d taken to calling it. When Adriassi excused himself to haggle with a merchant, I asked her, “Think someone’s going to steal that off you?”
“What? This?” Rauder asked, again covering the bag with her hand. “No.”
“I notice you keep touching it. Feel a little self-conscious maybe? Carrying a hateful reminder like that around a peaceful place like this?” I asked, motioning to the shoppers. “Mixing with the locals isn’t so bad, is it?”
“Kiernan—” she started to say, her voice hard, when our WDSs went off in unison, a faint but unmistakable high-pitched whine, alerting us to the presence of hostiles in close proximity. My faceplate hissed closed as Rauder reported. “We’ve got fifty—no sixty—seditionists closing fast from all sides.
“Is there a problem?” Adriassi’s stood beside me, his face gaunt and frightened inside his helmet. The seditionists were closing faster than any of their ambushes in the fields, and I tried to think of a way to get Adriassi to safety when it hit me: We were in the center of a sprawling market. Over the com, Marsten and Finnel reported that they would reach our position in under five minutes, but Fireteam Alpha was on the far side of the city. The seditionists would be on us in seconds.
“Would they attack us in this market?” I asked, but Adriassi’s face was blank, uncomprehending. I remembered he couldn’t hear over our communications system and would have no idea what I was talking about. “Would the seditionists attack here, with all these people around?”
Adriassi’s mouth fell open. Rauder had her rifle ready and screamed, “Get to cover!” as the first green plasma bolt shot through the crowd, skipping off the top of her helmet. Then the air was filled with weapons fire from all sides and chaos erupted. Shoppers rebounded off our armored frames, running like crazed animals, trampling the fallen in their attempts to escape the barrage. Stray bolts passed through their limp bodies, which offered no resistance.
Rauder tipped over two carts, forming a bunker, then called to me. Shots careened off my chest and back, each hitting with concussive force, driving the wind from my lungs. Adriassi cried out as a shot tore through his thigh, and on instinct I grabbed him by the collar and flung him to safety behind Rauder’s barricade.
A bolt struck my ankle-joint and I screamed at the instant, searing pain even as more shots ricocheted off my forearm and shoulder. Our barrier was disintegrating under the hail of fire as Adriassi crouched between us, whimpering. Rauder poked her head out to squeeze off a shot and was rewarded with a half-dozen blows, one glancing off her helmet and blasting the earth beside the petrified Adriassi.
“Fireteam Bravo,” Rauder shouted into her headset. “Deploy firebombs when you reach our location.”
“You can’t!” I shouted over Adriassi’s head. “There are still civilians in the area, and Adriassi’s armor can’t handle a firestorm. He’ll be burned alive.”
“Launch!” Rauder shouted over the com as a chunk of the barricade exploded and peppered our faceplates.
My eyes fell on the brown bag hanging at Rauder’s side, and without thinking, my hand darted out and grabbed it. “What are you doing?” she shouted as I rose, reaching out and extending the bag out over the edge of our blasted and blackened barrier.
Plasma bolts struck my fist, as I began waving the bag, knocking it down, but I hoisted it high again. A few seconds passed and then the bombardment slowed, and then stopped. Rauder mounted her firebomb on the end of her barrel and hissed, “Are you crazy? Get down.”
I stood up slowly, the bag held aloft over my head. Around me, the market stood in ruins, blackened and smoking, the colorful wares spilled onto the dirt streets amidst the bloody bodies of the fallen. In every direction I saw seditionists, their rifles trained on me, their expressions invisible behind their black faceplates. I opened my hand, showing I held no weapon. Then I exaggerated my motions as I opened the bag and again waved it, pushing my hand through the bottom, turning it inside out. I waved it again then let the breeze carry it from my hand. I amplified a single word—“Free”—and the scorched air fell silent.
The first shot struck the joint at my raised elbow and I shrieked as I my arm hyperextended. A split-second later, a second shot struck the back of my knee and I toppled, as hundreds of other bolts buffeted my head, back, and chest. I collapsed onto the ground holding my arm in agonizing pain.
“Deploying!” I heard Marsten shout as a bolt struck the side of my head, blurring my vision. Rauder launched her firebomb into the sky even as I cried for her to stop. A chest-thumping thud reverberated in the air, and with the last of my strength, I pulled Adriassi flat and smothered his body with my own as we heard the second and third firebombs detonating.
The dust swirled in miniature tornadoes as the bombs sucked the oxygen from the air, then a white-hot bath of flame poured over us. Before the fog of pain enveloped me, I remember the flame finding the seared holes in my armor and scorching my flesh, and my voice joining with Adriassi’s, screaming.
I write this from an orbital infirmary, far away from planet ES-248QRT4T. The armor saved my life, but the firestorm branded me with third-degree burns: thick ropy scars down my arm and leg that will be with me forever. Had the plasma bolts opened a gap at my neck, I would be dead. Rauder’s armor was never breached and she walked away from the assault with only some severe bruising from the force of so many direct hits. They tell me Adriassi survived, albeit as a quadruple amputee. My body covered his head and vital organs but his exposed arms and legs were incinerated in the firestorm. Of course, there’s no way for me to contact him to apologize, to tell him how I wished things hadn’t turned out this way.
During Vok’s visit, she said some trade agreements on the far side of the galaxy had broken down and, as a result, the Confed has decided against using the planet as a refueling hub. The squad was being redeployed to some other far-off rock somewhere else, and Vok assured me that the replacement Xeno temporarily assigned to my squad is even more annoying than me.
All that remains, however, is the issue of my naming the planet. I have spent a considerable amount of my time laid up in bed researching options and have finally come to a decision. I’ve checked and the name hasn’t yet been registered for any other planet, so applying for naming rights is a formality. Besides, only a few people will ever remember this planet anyway.
Like many words, the one I have chosen has ancient roots, and it has spawned many other words during its continuous, circuitous evolution. Originally it meant the hearth, or the place of the fire; a few thousand years and dozens of permutations later, changing spelling and meaning, it signifies a black mark on the skin, a sign of damage by burning. I have decided that this insignificant place—a nothing rock in the corner of nowhere—deserves a name designating both fire and scars.
It will be named
THE ONE WITH THE INTERSTELLAR GROUP CONSCIOUSNESSES JAMES ALAN GARDNER
