Queen Josephina I

Location: 350 kilometers Southeast of Harper’s Center, Barrowsford, Star Kingdom of Windsor

“That insolent bitch!” Josephina smashed her hand down against the real-glass table in the executive dining car of the maglev train spiriting her away from Harper’s Center at nearly seven hundred kilometers an hour.

The breakable material never stood a chance against her enhanced musculoskeletal structure, but that didn’t stop a flash of pain from traveling up to her elbow, or the small laceration along the meaty part of her palm.

“Your Majesty,” one of her personal armsmen tried to approach, but she shot him a glare that would put Medusa to shame.

She took a napkin and dabbed at the bit of blood that escaped before her ever-present medical nanites went to work on clotting and mending the cut. As she looked at the stained napkin in her hand, she wished the wound wouldn’t close so easy. Nothing in her life was going to be easy ever again.

She’d been a Queen, one of the three members of the new Royal class, one step below the Empress herself, and she’d managed to lose an entire planet in the span of a few days. It wouldn’t matter that the Collies brought a fleet that out massed hers five-to-one. It didn’t matter that some of those ships had the same advanced alien technology that allowed the Windsor fleets to smash to pieces the opposition in their bid to drive the Commonwealth back from Imperial space. It didn’t matter that the royal and imperial troops on the ground were already facing at least an enemy brigade, with another one surely landing as more of the Collies’ ships settled into a parking orbit around Harper’s Junction and her moon. It didn’t matter that she’d bloodied their nose well and good in the process. At this moment, her ships were still dogging half of the Collies’ naval forces as they limped toward the planet. The damage being inflicted was superficial, but it showed her people weren’t giving up.

she squeezed her fist tight, trying to draw more blood from her wound, but it was already clotted, and a thin, protective layer of fresh skin was being spun by the microscopic robots across the gash.

She was rational enough to know that everything that troubled her wasn’t due to the large woman who came barreling through her forcefield and dispatched most of her guard detail, including the good Colonel, with her bare hands and a blade. The woman hadn’t laid a finger on Josephina, and the Queen had taken her arm for her impudence, but that didn’t stop her metal-headed rescuer from threatening to blow up the entire city. The colour sergeant that had saved her had made the right choice in letting them go to save her. As a reward, his mech was folded up in its travel arrangement in the cargo hold of the train, and he would be her personal escort off the planet. However, part of her wished she’d called the enemy’s bluff.

She was sure it was a bluff. She couldn’t see the man’s face, but she’d seen his armor, and the Commonwealth gunnery sergeant stripes on it. From her interrogations and trickery, she’d surmised the team sent by the Collies to infiltrate her planet was no more than a dozen soldiers. She’d captured an officer, senior enlisted, and two lower enlisted. While it was possible they had more than one gunnery sergeant in the team, she doubted it, which meant the man inside the armor wasn’t that high ranking. If one thing was true of all the militaries of humanity, it was that they didn’t give enlisted personnel activation code for anti-matter weapons. That was a chance the colour sergeant couldn’t take, so she bargained their way out, and hoped the troops they’d alerted to the enemy presence could finish the job. They had two of the new anti-armor grenades their alien suppliers had sold them, so at least a couple of the soldiers who’d threatened her life were hopefully lying dead in a ditch somewhere. She’d just have to live with that imagery.

“Coming up on our destination, Your Majesty,” Theodore entered the car as a slight shift in the train’s acceleration announced their impending arrival.

Their destination was Marytown, a medium-sized city about five hundred kilometers from the capitol. It was located at the edge of a large bay, which gave it scenic views, a solid fishery business, and a readily available spaceport to get the goods quickly to market. It was one of the former planet’s masters’ favorite vacation destinations. Many of the wealthy business and political elite owned real estate among the staunchly loyal population, so it was a no brainer to have their private, secret escape train from the seat of governmental and corporate power flee to this safe haven.

The maglev tracks popped onto the surface about thirty kilometers north of the town. Unlike the capitol city, Marytown was not under siege. Its importance made sure it had a shield generator and a PDC, occupied by a royal garrison, but the Collies didn’t get that memo. Railgun rounds and energy blasts from orbit weren’t pounding the shield, and ground troops weren’t pressing toward it from the mountains to west. It was eerily peaceful.

Her train pulled directly into the space port where a defensive perimeter was manned and ready by the company of royal marines. They bowed as she exited, and the captain in charge of the formation led her to her waiting shuttle. It was a luxury craft seized from the former governor and upgraded over the last month with the Windsor’s more modern technology. It looked unarmed, but in fact boasted a powerful bow cannon. However, that was all it boasted, so it wouldn’t win in a stand-up fight against any military vessel. Its advantages were with its shield and speed. That was what was going to get her to safety.

She barely listened to the captain as she sat on a richly-upholstered seat that luxuriously altered itself to perfectly take the pressures of the day off her shoulders and lower back. She poured herself a drink from the full bar and waved the man away. She might not have been paying attention, but she knew the situation. There were two ships waiting to get her back to Windsor. They were running on silent, and trying to be a hole in space as the Collies scoured the areas with sensors and patrols. They’d stayed hidden so far, but it wasn’t going to last much longer. For her to get from the ground to the ships, she needed help.

***

Windsor Planetary Defensive Battery Seven

“Change of mission, “the SGT in control of the battery yelled. “Cannon to position twelve. Fire mission in fifteen minutes, and take every second of that to build our charge. We need more oomph behind this shot.”

Position twelve was the southern-most firing point, which if Ned remembered his training correctly, wouldn’t even give them a line of sight on the advancing Commonwealth forces. He spent a second wondering why they were abandoning a prime shot right into the heart of the Collies infantry for something else, but he quickly pushed that aside. It wasn’t his job to find the targets, it was to shoot the gun.

“Yes, Sergeant, position twelve.” He entered the information into his screens and the cannon moving through the mountain shuddered to the stop and reversed direction.

“And will someone get me that repair team’s status with the door,” the SGT yelled as an afterthought as the power levels on Ned’s gauge slowly began to climb.

***

Mark “Coop” Cooper

Location: Harper’s Junction, Star Kingdom of Windsor

“There we go,” Mike groaned as he and SSG Hightower slowly lowered Coop’s armored mass to the ground.

“I’m good,” Coop feebly protested, but the pain in his leg was intensifying. His armor was reaching that point where it wouldn’t give him anymore drugs to combat the pain without an override. He could ask the GYSGT, SGM, or LT for authorization, but he doubted they’d give it to him. They’d already lost too many people today.

The SGM came up behind them with Sullivan’s limp body in a fireman’s carry and carefully lowered him to the ground. The rest of the team pulled security as they assessed the situation. Instead of looking around, Coop’s eyes went to Eve.

She was pale, but she’d always been pale. It was the pallor of her skin that really worried him. There was a slow drip of blood from the stump of her arm, despite the first aid he’d given her, and she kept passing her hand over where her other hand should be. She gave a start of surprise every time her hand missed her now-missing arm.

“Hey, talk to me,” Coop knew the symptoms of shock, and he might be on his way there very soon.

She gave a bitter laugh and gestured around her. “We kind of fucked this up,” she didn’t’ sugarcoat the situation.

They were in a collection of buildings near the outskirts of the city. The local police hadn’t tried to stop them because they’d taken shelter just like everyone else. When the smoke cleared and a victor emerged, they wanted to be on their new boss’ good side. The Windsor road blocks were few and far between as more troops got pulled to the front.

Through a crack in the windows Coop could see the battle raging in the distance. The sparking of shields, muted artillery fire, and much louder incoming ordinance from space breaking through the atmosphere was all that could be heard as the city ground to halt and took cover.

“I don’t know,” Coop shrugged. “We cleared the way for the cavalry, and we got out in one piece,” he winced at his choice of phrase, “more or less,” he gestured as the lance of duro-steel that had destroyed his leg and imbedded in his armor.

Instead of being pissed, Eve laughed, which was how he knew shock was starting to set in. She waved what was left of her arm and gave his LACS a small tap like they were toasting something with expensive champagne instead of missing body parts.

“This is the infantry,” she stated. “This was always a hazard of the job.”

“Yeah, but they’ll grow you a nice new arm when we get home, and they’ll patch up my leg good as new. Soon we’ll be out dancing and back in the sack like nothing ever happened.”

“Do you ever stop thinking about sex?” She laughed again.

“Nope,” he replied without hesitation. “Especially when it is with you.”

“I don’t know whether to be flattered or offended,” she shot back, but the smile pulling at her lips told Coop is was the former.

It might be the blood loss talking, but Coop was sure he had a very good chance of getting laid pretty soon.

“Lock it up and listen up,” the SGM came over. “We’ve got a medivac on the way, but they’ll have trouble getting close. We need to hump it five klicks out and rendezvous with a RECON team that is providing target data from the fleet on the city’s defenses. They’ll get up back to a Spyder and out of here.”

“Great. Just what a guy with a bum leg wants…more walking,” Coop muttered under his breath.

“You’d rather sit here and wait for the enemy, Sergeant?” the SGM’s eyes bore into Coop from behind his armored helm.

“No, Sergeant Major. I’m up for another stroll,” Coop made sure to keep the string of four-letter words he wanted to say to himself.

“Ok, big guy, let’s go,” Eve didn’t help Coop to his feet, but she was there to motivate him.

They might both be gimps for the near future, but they were gimps together, and he was fine with that.