Part 2: A Conversation About War
Vincent felt many things, but victory saturated his mind and dulled the aches and pains of his brave charge. The meadow was his only world and reality. But then it began to seem like a dream and each moment stretched into the next. His hands held a chemical-laize rifle, controlled the helm of a deep space fighter, and clutched the damp soil of the meadow. Was the meadow a state of mind, a particular planet, or another dimension? In one moment he was charging through the meadow, and in another he was using a fallen comrade’s body as a shield while firing at the enemy. Then he was in space and in the relative safety of his deep space fighter. He watched numbers record the distance from a nearby star and could remember each iteration. Looking through the battle-scarred canopy, the hazy visage of a throttled bomber sagged ahead, limping towards the thick nebula.
A vicious laser fired several hours past caught up and scourged his wing, sending metal smoldering in a blue glow dancing against the fuselage. The debris’ inertia carried it on a collision-course with the canopy, and then sent it off into the depths of space.
His mind was hard of clearing and he tried to concentrate on his cockpit displays. Without concentrating, he found memories and visions of the meadow bleeding into his peripheral vision. The smell of blood and the hallucination of enticing fields began to mesmerize him. Vincent forced himself to concentrate on the display in an effort to ward away the meadow. Many of the readouts appeared to be nonsense; he switched the processing from his brain to the ship computer. Immediately, warning lights erupted in muted, tactical flashes. It was the first time he looked at the tactical information of the war and understood it without interference from the psychological shield. More than fifty-thousand deep space fighters had been sent to a distant star with one intent: genocide. From the little information the computer provided, he could only surmise that the mission was partially successful, but not complete. A fission bomb capable of destroying a star had not been detonated, leaving five percent of the primary target intact.
Vincent looked up at the limping ship and could see the vague outlines of the required armament. He must have pulled the bomber out of the battle. He did not know what happened to the other fighters, but the computer indicated that they were destroyed. Particular attention was paid to presenting Vincent with the information. Not missing or disengaged. Destroyed. One fission bomb was required to complete the mission, and of the entire army that had fought, two ships were all that remained. One armed with the required weapon.
As the navigation computer guided both ships into the nebula, clarity overtook him and he pushed his face into his palms and wept. The behavioral conditioning was supposed to protect his subconscious from guilt and regret. But in order to complete the mission, the conditioning was removed. He was left alone with so many dead that he felt like he would drown in a tangible stink of sin. “My God! What have I done,” he asked in a hoarse whisper.
Vincent beat his fists against either side of the cockpit. “What did I do? What did I do?” He screamed the question until he had no voice, crying until he had no more tears to shed. But the words ached to be shouted and a billion lifetimes of tears tormented his eyes.
He knew there was no absolution for what he had done, and he feared the decision that weighed down on his shoulders.
For the next several minutes, Vincent concentrated on making sure that nothing followed either ship into the nebula. The War was like a drug. It caused him grief, depression, and altered his perception of reality. And the only thing that he felt would keep him sane was to think about the War.
The environmental readout from the bomber indicated the pilot was alive, so he didn’t attempt communications right away. It was difficult to work around his grogginess, and the place he sought for fortification only returned further clarification on his dismal position. The bomber was critically hit and would barely survive the nebula. His ship was only in slightly better condition.
He verified the communications were still encrypted and then tried hailing the bomber. It took several minutes before he could even raise static. As the nebula approached, he started to worry that the pilot was either dead or unaware of the condition of the bomber. The engine would have to be jettisoned once the nebula was reached, or it could explode and take the fission torpedo and his fighter with it.
When the computer failed to post a reply to his transmission, he switched to vocal.
“Panthera Class Bomber, this is Panthera Class Fighter at your six. You copy?” He waited impatiently.
The cabin of the ship began to feel cool and he increased the thermostat. His skin crawled and felt clammy in his suit, and a sharp headache began to pulse in his temples and at the base of his neck. From the corners of his sight he could see the brilliant colors of the meadow beckoning him to return. The thought of going through a withdrawal or becoming immersed in a hallucination heightened his concern and he switched on the cabin light, only to be taken back in utter disgust. Vincent had to do everything his will would allow to keep from retching.
His ship suit was covered with dried blood. Cauterized slash and puncture wounds covered his legs, arms and torso. He couldn’t tell if he was still bleeding, but he could clearly see that some of the blood was not his. Dried, deep blue blood was splashed across his chest and was smeared across his legs. He wanted to scream, but could only muster a soft-spoken cuss.
“...ing radio,” his headset crackled.
Vincent immediately knew it was the emergency radio. He focused his attention on the primary display until the translucent vision of the meadow receded again and his nausea subsided.
“You alive over there?” Vincent asked, now overcome with a wave of vertigo.
“Barely,” the male voice replied. “You?”
“If you want to call this living,” was all he could think to say.
“If you haven’t turned on your overhead light yet, don’t.”
“Too late,” Vincent muttered, then swallowed back a thick swell of nausea. He stared at the primary display for a moment and tried to regain control of himself by concentrating on the warning indicators and status reports. “You need to jettison your engine once you hit the nebula.”
“You have tact?”
“Is your computer up? I’ll send it over.” Vincent tried again to establish a communication link with the computer on the bomber, but the delay told him it would most likely fail.
“No. Computer’s gone. I’ve got life support and a fission warhead. Damn, man, this whole thing is screwed. What’s the tact?”
Vincent swallowed. “It looks like the light. If you haven’t seen it yet, don’t.”
“We had an armada large enough to sack this galaxy three times over with just its reserve. How bad is it?”
“Wait one,” Vincent replied and accessed the General Combat Log. The sheer size of it caused him to sway into another rich bout of nausea. He scouted for main engagements and events, then output those into a summary. “Well, the short version is, by our intelligence, we started out with an armada able to erase all known sapient life from this galaxy. Presently, one or two ships of an unknown class remain, defending four primitive colonies around the farthest star. They comprise about five percent of the entire target. Our assets include one beat to hell bomber that can’t fly, one beat to hell fighter that can, and one fission torpedo capable of obliterating the star and all surrounding planets. There are some codes that must be the date, but I don’t know what they mean. I don’t know how long we’ve been awake.”
“No one else made it, then?” The voice came back, the tone much more hurt than before.
“If they did, they hacked my ship computer to say they didn’t. But I think we’re all that’s left.” Vincent pushed his hands to his eyes and wanted to wail like a frightened child. Somewhere in the intense withdrawal of the drugs and adrenaline, he managed to stay afloat, but knew an emotional breakdown was
not far away. “I don’t know about you, but I think my heart is about to break.”
“I envy you,” came a distant, whispered reply.
“Why?” Vincent asked.
“I think my computer didn’t finish cleaning those drugs from my blood. I’m still seeing burned trees and animal corpses. I’ve been conscious for about two hours now, and there have been times I’ve wanted to cry like Niagra falls, and times I’ve wanted to go kill somebody. But I’d give anything to get this shit out of my blood right now. Hey,” he said then paused, “what’s your name?”
“Vincent,” came the muted response. “And I don’t think it’s any kind of drug that caused that meadow. It must have been whatever they did with our heads under the label of behavior adjustment.”
“Possibly,” he said. “My name’s Daren. So, Vincent, what are our options here?”
“I’d say lets just get the hell out of here, but I don’t think it’s that easy. The star charts are only for this region. I haven’t seen anything that shows us where Earth is located.”
“Why am I getting this sick feeling that the information is there, but is only available when the mission is completed?” Daren asked.
“Yeah,” was all Vincent cared to offer as a response. “Whatever we decide to do, we’re going to have to transfer