First Contact

Vuxten came out of it slowly. The beeping. The swish and swoosh. The quiet conversations outside the slightly open door. The dim light of the room reflected off the white tile and white paint. The smell of antiseptic and something bitter. The quiet sound of shoes on tile overlaid with the sound of boots.

It took him twice to open his eyes. His vision was blurred and pixelated until his cyberoptics reboot.

It took three times for them to be crisp and clear.

He jerked slightly when his ear finished booting up and the amount of sound increased.

The first thing he did, even before looking at the diagnostic scanners and observation equipment, was look down and take stock.

His arms and hands were wrapped in quikheal bandages. He realized he couldn't pull the blanket down and took a slow, deep breath.

Yup.

His chest was bandaged.

His legs were hidden and he figured they were probably bandaged to.

Vuxten sighed and waited.

Less than sixty seconds and the door opened fully, a Naverok nurse came in, her neck fronds hidden by a white cloth around her neck.

"Are you awake?" she asked.

Vuxten tried to answer and gagged slightly on the tubes down his throat.

"I'll take that as a yes," she said. She checked the monitors then turned and looked down at him. "You're probably wondering what happened."

Vuxten nodded.

The last thing he clearly remembered was running on the exercise trail. Trying to work off the stress from a nightmare he had suffered but could not remember.

"There was a psychic incident. You were injured by phasic lightning, a phasic bursts, and a large phasic pulse from the stellar mass," the Naverok nurse said. She had a nametag, but Vuxten's cybereye kept trying to translate into gibberish. "You're not the only one knocked out by the phasic pulse, but..."

She shifted his pillow under his head and patted it. "You mainly suffered phasic lightning damage. A doctor will be in soon to talk to you."

Vuxten just nodded, trying not to gag on the tube down his throat.

He laid there, staring at the ceiling. He tried to reboot his cybereyes a few times, but they were on medical lockout.

After a few minutes a russet mantid came in. At the mantid's direction, the tubes were pulled from his nose and mouth.

It always bothered him how long the tubes were and how they were always slicked with thin streaks of blood.

The doctor checked things, using a datapad that only had red text and wireframes on it.

His cybereyes rebooted several times and only made him a little nauseous.

"Well, Major, I'm happy to tell you that you are responding well to the quikheal and nerve reconstruction. You'll be with us for a few days and will have a lot of physical therapy afterwards, but it looks like we got to you before the nerve scorching was too bad," the doctor said while Vuxten was taking his third sip of juice.

"What... what happened?" Vuxten asked. The juice had soothed his throat but it still felt raw.

"Exposure to a phasic pulse, then phasic lightning, then a few phasic bursts," the doctor said. "You have phasic lightning keloid scarring, which the nanites should smooth out. You had some shrapnel in your back but you won't lose either of your kidneys or either of your livers. We repaired the nick in your spinal column. You have some, minor, brain damage. You have roughly 40% nerve mortality across the front surface of your skin," the doctor said. She sharpened her bladearms for a second then stopped. "To be honest, Major, after reviewing the recordings, you shouldn't even be alive."

"No. What happened?" Vuxten asked.

He laid there as he listened. He'd been injured somehow by the first phasic pulse from the stellar mass. Brain damage. Minor, but still brain damage. Then he'd walked into lightning arcing from Casey's Novastar suit, then pulled the Terran out of it when it opened. It had taken three rockets to put Lozen down, and Vuxten had been hit by some shrapnel, mostly from the rocket casing.

The doctor looked everything over.

"Good. Psychologically you aren't despondent or depressed about your injuries."

Vuxten swallowed another tiny sip of juice then looked at the nurse who was holding the cup. The nurse moved back.

"Are my injuries... are they..." he suddenly found he couldn't ask the question.

"Service ending?" the russet mantid asked.

Vuxten nodded. Not very well, but still nodded.

"No. You're responding well. The nanite nerve rebuilds will take some physical therapy. You don't have any cognitive defects and temporary amnesia is normal with phasic injuries," the mantid said. She cleaned her antenna. "I doubt you'll even have to go on the Temporary Disability Listing, Major. Just profiles that we'll scale down until you're done with therapy."

Vuxten felt a flood of relief.

"I'll be back to check on you later," the russet said. She made some adjustments on her datapad. "I'll let you stay awake, but no more than an hour. After an hour, the nanites will put you down so you can sleep and heal."

Vuxten nodded.

He laid there, staring at the ceiling, for a long while.

The door creaked open and he moved his head slightly, the best he could.

Bit.nek slouched in, softcap on backwards, hands on his pockets, his uniform rumpled and his boots unshined.

"Sup, Major?" the other Telkan asked.

"Oh, you know, nothing," Vuxten rasped.

The other Telkan, somehow looking slightly disheveled, gave a quick grin. "Just laying around hardly working, huh?"

Vuxten smiled.

"Image if the Colonel caught you laying around?" Bit.nek asked. He stood up straight and pulled his arms close, bent up at the elbow, his wrists pointing his hands down. "My dear Major, what is this 'injury' you speak of? Why, when I was a grub, they made us march from sunup to sundown and didn't even issue us feet. Without feet, Major. You have feet. I'll expect you at tomorrow's PT run!" the Telkan said in a nasally and stuffy voice.

Vuxten snorted, laughed, then groaned.

"Tough old bastard, though," Bit.nek said. He grabbed a chair and pulled it over. "He sends his regards. He's visiting the lower enlisted that got injured in that damn stellar pulse."

"How?" Vuxten asked.

Bit.nek shrugged. "Dunno. Rumor Control and the Enlisted InfoNet all say it was some kind of Terran MAD super-weapon. Detonated across the entire spur. Knocked most of the Mantids goofy," he said.

"Casey?" Vuxten asked.

Bit.nek got up, moving over next to the window. He pulled a cigarette case out of his pocket, licked it, and stuck it to the glass of the window. There was a slight shimmer and the glass opened like gelatin below the case. The case popped up a lit cigarette that Bit.nek took and took a drag off of.

Vuxten waited, bracing himself for the worst.

"It's bad," Bit.nek said, blowing smoke out the hole. The positive pressure system of the hospital obliged in pushing the smoke out. Bit.nek looked over. "They brought some female Terran named Peel down off the Joint Services Military Intelligence barge. She's been in there," he shook his head. "I got there right as they dropped that suit of armor."

Vuxten frowned.

"Cathy had... you know... a feeling. Big Mike got us a fast transport out there," Bit.nek grinned. "Had a quad launcher full of phasic crackers in the back. Don't ask. Almret about threw me over the side making the corner more than once. Saw your striker go by right when we went overland. Cathy about went ass up out over the sidewall when we mounted the curb," he gave a low chuckle.

Vuxten didn't ask why Bit.nek and his friends would have been racing toward where a Novastar suit was having a meltdown.

He knew.

The enlistedman's expression sobered.

"That armor pulled off all that Casey dude's skin," Bit.nek said. "Ripped the skin and most his fat right off him," he exhaled smoke through the hole. "That's not the worst part," he looked at Vuxten. "Ever heard of armor fusing?"

Vuxten frowned. "Maybe? The Crusade?" he croaked.

Bit.nek nodded. "Yeah. Peel convinced some high up muckity-muck from the Crusade come and look. Apparently Lozen tried to fuse with Casey," he took a drag. "He's all fucked up, sir."

"How... how bad?" Vuxten asked.

"Warsteel fiber intrusion into his muscle and bone. What looks like warsteel but is apparently some kind of nanite fibers into his major organs. I caught a peek of the scans, dude looks like he was attacked by a thread monster or something," Bit.nek said. "The Crusade dude, something like a Thigh Side Ironing Board..."

"Iron Lord," Vuxten said helpfully.

Bit.nek waved. "Yeah, OK. Anyway, they brought down some guys to check him out."

He exhaled slowly, streaming the smoke out the hole.

"They removed his armorjak, removed the cyberwear from his heart," Bit.nek shook his head. "They keep running into problems when they try to clone his organs."

"Melt-down," Vuxten said.

Bit.nek nodded. "Yeah," he gave a grunt. "Spec-Five Mixlee, she's a Telkan that works in Cloning Services I know, said that they tried to print him up some muscle tissue and, she swears it's true, a robot arm reached out of the cloning forge right before it locked up and melted down. She says MI and CID ran in and grabbed the arm while pushing everyone out."

"Lozen," Vuxten said.

Bit.nek shrugged. "Wouldn't know about that, sir."

He tapped the almost done cigarette against the case and it dissolved into vapor. When he tapped the case, the window sealed back up and he pulled the case away, moving back to the chair.

"The Colonel, he said until you're done lollygagging around, drinking Bingo Cola and pinching the nurse's backsides like an enlistedman in a conex brothel, I'm supposed to stay with you," Bit.nek said. He looked around, then hiked up his shirt, showing the butt of a heavy magac pistol in a concealable holster. "The Old Bug handed this to me in the car, told me to keep an eye on you to make sure a suit of armor doesn't try to consume you."

"My armor?" Vuxten asked as Bit.nek pulled his top down.

"Phasic stellar pulse knocked it out. The mechanics have it and your weapons in a Thrifty Thrint Field right now. Try not pulling it to you," Bit.nek said. He glanced down at where the pistol was hidden. "Not sure I can stop that suit if it gets jealous over Madame Director and decides not to share."

Vuxten nodded slightly.

"Your timer's running out, sir," Bit.nek said. He shifted the chair so he could see the windows and the doors easily. "Get some rest, sir."

Vuxten want to nod but everything went black.

-----

The door opened and Peel walked in, ignoring how SP4 Kathreelee "Cathy" was lounging in the chair, apparently with one hand tucked into the waistband of the Hikken's adaptive camouflage pants.

"Hey, Vux," she said softly, moving over to the side of his bed. She touched the bandages. "You're completely bald, aren't you?"

"Yeah," Vuxten said, flushing slightly. His whiskers, almost a half-inch long now, twitched. "How are you?" he asked.

Peel moved her hand to the railing of the bed. "I'm dealing with it," she put her hand on her belly. "There's additional things to think about now."

Vuxten nodded. "When?" he asked, not needing explained what she was talking about.

"Three months ago. When I was running command and control for Pete and Cathal was cleaning up the last holdouts of the androids," she said. She gave a harsh laugh. "Side effects of the Digital Omnimessiah's touch is your birth control implant shorting out."

Vuxten snorted.

They were silent for a moment.

"The hospital's releasing him into the care of the Crusade," Peel said. "Things are pretty confused here. I'm listed as MIA and AWOL at the same time. I applied to go with him. The Crusade gave their consent, but I can't get PERSCOM to release me. They said my skills are needed here," her hands tightened. "Some jackass told me on the com that 'people die in war' and 'even loved ones can be casualties' and told me to report to 21st for reassignment."

"What are you going to do?" Vuxten asked.

Peel thought for a long time. "I'd be throwing away two hundred years of service," she said. "I gave my oaths. I know my duty," she said.

Vuxten thought for a moment then looked at Cathy, who was looking bored and disinterested. "Get me Bit.nek."

She nodded, putting her hand on her implant.

"What's he going to be able to do? Isn't he just a PFC?" Peel asked.

"No. He got busted a week ago. He's a bare necked bare sleeved Private now," Vuxten said. "I'll ask around, see what I can do."

"You don't have to," Peel said.

Vuxten stared at her. "Casey was my friend."

-----

Bit.nek came in, followed by a kobold who looked positively ancient to Vuxten's eyes. Cathy nodded from where she was sitting in the chair and Vuxten watched the two sweep the room. Vuxten noticed that the warsteel pin-on rank on the Kobold's uniform looked worn and his uniform looked somehow older than it should, despite the fact that it was pressed and cuffed, unlike Bit.nek and Cathy.

The Kobold came up, nodding. "Major."

"I'd bow or kneel in your presence, God Father, but alas, I'm confined to the bed," Vuxten said, only half joking.

The Kobold pitched his voice to low and raspy. "You come to me, for a favor, on this day, of all days, the day of my cat's quinceañera?"

Vuxten chuckled and grown as it tugged on the regen-tender nerves across his chest.

The Kobold looked serious. "There may come a day, Warfather, but that day may never come, that I will ask for an equivalent favor in return. Not one that would violate your principles or your oaths. I do not deal with oathbreakers and would not rise above myself to think I could ask one of the Digital Omnimessiah's chosen to violate their principles for me."

Vuxten nodded.

The Kobold took out a data wafer and set it down. "The E-4 Mafia is everywhere, Warfather. We see everything. We know everything. It is our will that makes the Confederate Armed Services function according to the desires and commands of the officers and the Senior NCO's."

Vuxten just nodded.

"At midnight, Peel, a former member of the E-4 Mafia in good standing who has never forgotten the face of her brethren, will be reassigned as a tactical operations advisor to the Dark Crusade of Light," the Kobold said.

"Thank you, System Don," Vuxten said.

"You were once one of us. The Lance Corporal Underground of the Telkan Marines are our brothers. It is good that you remember the faces of those who watched over you," the Kobold said.

Vuxten watched as the Kobold turned to left, Bit.nek opening the door for the Kobold and following him out.

"You used to be enlisted?" Cathy asked.

Vuxten nodded. "Got my Good Conduct gong to prove it," he said. He looked at the Hikken female. "I started as an unranked conscript."

"Huh, good for you," Cathy said. She shifted and blinked several times. Vuxten knew she'd gone back to reading something on her retinal link.

Loyalty is a coin that is difficult to earn and easy to lose, he remembered Lieutenant Bent Spoon's words.

-----

Vuxten woke up.

It was dark in his room.

Bit.nek stood in the shadows, his hands in his pockets, hat on backwards.

Vuxten could smell high pressure hydraulic fluid, carbonized armor plating, and ozone.

"End table," Bit.nek said.

On the end table sat a single golfball.

Pink.