Uncommon Loyalty Page 28

  His wrist link vibrated softly and a single beep issued from the device, alerting Dean that it was his turn to head down to the entrance of the intake facility. He lifted the heavy pack that contained his clothes and toiletries. The pack didn't seem as heavy to him as it had when he arrived. His clothes were all neatly folded and tucked away in the pack. There were discrete pockets for his toiletries. He slung the drab-looking pack across his shoulder and left the dorm he'd called home for two weeks.

  He passed the mess hall, the admin offices, and the training facility. He felt a pang of regret, although he couldn't imagine why he would miss the place where he had been worked to near exhaustion and given hardly any time to rest. Yet there was something about what he'd accomplished in his first two weeks with EsDef, he was proud of how he'd fared in the first phase of his training. He couldn't have imagined anything as hard as the two-week intake process, and that made him fear what the EsDef instructors had planned for him in the future, but he felt he had proven something, not only to the officers and his staff sergeant, but to himself as well.

  At the entrance of the facility, were he'd spent plenty of nights standing watch in shifts, never with the same person twice, he found a transport waiting for him. It was an all-electric glider, a short-range, minimalistic vehicle that was little more than a few seats on a repulsor engine. The man sitting in the driver seat was none other than Sergeant Dillon himself.

  "Hurry up, Blaze, we haven't got all day," he complained.

  Dean pulled his pack off his shoulder, sat in the passenger seat, and held the large duffel bag on his lap. The staff sergeant immediately pressed down on the accelerator and the vehicle hummed as it glided away from the intake facility on a cushion of air.

  "May I ask where we're going, sir?" Dean said, afraid of the answer.

  "You're going to the EsDef OTA."

  "Are the others already there?"

  "The others aren't going there," the sergeant said. "They've all been assigned to their various divisions. You're the only ensign in this group of recruits."

  "An ensign?" Dean asked.

  "That's right, Blaze, you're going to be an officer. If you pass the academy, at any rate. But don't think for a second that means you won't be working for a living. Recon lieutenants lead squads into the pits of hell. Work your ass off and you might have a chance of surviving and, better still, getting your troops out of harm’s way. Remember that, Blaze. No matter what else they teach you in the academy, know that every soldier wants their LT to get them home again. You do that, and I'll buy you a beer when you're back on good ole planet Earth."

  "Staff sergeant," Dean said. "Were you in combat off world?"

  The big man stared into the distance as he steered the glider between large hills. They were moving deeper into the mountains and Dean guessed he was about to be taken to the fabled underground base that was the home of EsDef, but his mind was buzzing with the realization that he wasn't going to simply be a soldier in the Recon Division, he was going to be an officer. His fear had risen dramatically at the very thought of being responsible for the lives of other soldiers.

  "Four years off world," the sergeant said. "Six combat missions. One fire fight and two bug hunts. Most of it's boring shit, but occasionally you do some good. The humans out there need us. The galaxy is a dangerous place."

  Dean wanted to point out that Staff Sergeant Dillon had survived. He had returned home and was safe enough, but there was a haunted look in the big man's eyes and Dean thought it best to stay silent.

  They rounded a bend past a thick grove of aspen trees and came to what looked like a giant hole in the side of a towering hill. There were dozens of vehicles inside, as if the hill were a gigantic garage. Staff Sergeant Dillon steered the glider over to a sleek-looking aircraft and brought the vehicle to a stop.

  "Good luck, Blaze," Sergeant Dillon said.

  Dean nodded and climbed off the glider. It hummed a little as it flew away and Dean looked in awe at the ship before him. It was a small, two-man craft, little more than a rocket with wings. There were boosters along the wings, smaller rockets that would get the ship up into the stratosphere, where the main engine would kick in to take them up into space.

  "I hope you don't get airsick," said a rugged-looking man in a thick jacket of brown leather. "I'm Captain Atwood, I'll be taking you up."

  "Up where?" Dean asked.

  "To the Academy," the pilot said with a lopsided grin. "That's where the action is."

  Dean tried to hide his nervousness as he donned a flight suit and climbed up into the cockpit. His mind was overwhelmed at the wide array of dials, gauges, and screens. Most of the switches were analog, which seemed odd to Dean since he was so used to touch screens and motion controls.

  It took them an hour before the ship was taxied out of the cavernous hangar and lifted into position on a launcher that would hurl the ship several hundred feet into the air.

  "Don't worry," the pilot said with a grin. "It's a little like being shot out of a cannon, but it's over before you know it."

  Dean was silent. His head was covered with a sturdy helmet that had large round lenses covering most of his face. An oxygen regulator was secured over his mouth and nose before being fastened to the helmet. When the pilot spoke again, his voice crackled through the comm system in the helmet.

  "Just stay relaxed," he said. "The G-forces are intense, but it only lasts a few seconds. You may see spots and find it hard to breathe, but you'll be fine. It'll be over before you know it."

  Dean could feel sweat trickling down his chest and back. He tried not to tense up, but the fear made it difficult. Everything seemed to be happening too quickly. He wanted more information and more time to process what was going on. He hadn't asked to be an officer. He didn't want to go to space, not yet at any rate. He wasn't ready, and the fear was raging like a warning klaxon in his mind.

  Readouts began to appear on the inside of the view lens of the helmet. Most of it seemed like gibberish to Dean, but he could make out their trajectory. He had studied trigonometry in school, but he couldn't remember any of it at that moment. He knew he needed to pee, and that he wanted to hold onto something, but there was nothing in the cockpit but gauges and buttons. He didn't dare take hold of the throttle, so he folded his hands in his lap.

  Dean's heart thundered in his chest as the air controller gave a countdown to their launch. It reminded Dean of being on a roller coaster that was clicking and clacking toward the top of the first big drop-off – only they weren't going down, they were going up.

  Instead of “zero” the controller said "contact." The small rocket shot down the runway and then angled steeply upward into the sky. Dean felt like an elephant had dropped suddenly onto his chest. He couldn't move, and he certainly couldn't breathe, but a puff of air in his oxygen regulator seemed to make the pressure ease a bit and the craft leveled off of its steep climb.

  "This is Onyx Seven Niner," the pilot said in a clear voice. "Engaging boosters."

  Dean couldn't see anything but blue sky, but he knew the ground was far below them. Gravity had just begun to pull at the aircraft when the pilot flipped a switch that ignited the booster rockets, causing the ship to sail forward again. The pressure was back, but not quite as bad as before, only this time it seemed like they were riding on a bottle rocket, racing toward the sky where they would explode in a burst of sparks.

  After a few minutes the pressure eased again, although the roar of the rockets could still be heard and felt in the aircraft. Dean opened and closed his hands, lifting them off his lap a little as he felt gravity ease its grip on them.

  "Boosters spent," the pilot announced.

  Dean was a little giddy as he felt the aircraft arc once again. He had gone from being crushed by the weight of the world to suddenly floating freely.

  "Ejecting rockets Alpha and Bravo."

  There was a thud that shook the aircraft, then it was drifting again.

  "Wanna say goodbye to Terr
a?" the pilot asked.

  Dean didn't respond but the pilot flipped the aircraft over and suddenly the earth filled Dean's vision. Only instead of looking down, he was looking up, through the clouds, toward the ground which was mostly ocean, but he could see the edge of a continent below them. He was just beginning to feel the pull of the world below when the pilot engaged the main engine. Earth shot away as the aircraft spun and suddenly there were stars everywhere, millions of them. Some were bright, others seemed to flicker and glimmer in the distance. There were satellites too, hundreds of them moving in unison, like a vast robot army marching in parade formation.

  "Are we…?" Dean asked.

  "Yep," the pilot said. "Welcome to space."