The View From The Lorica: Chapter 1.

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say.

I can see his scream.

We detect it in the greens and reds of his heat pattern. My imagination and memory add the soundtrack.

I stand on the command deck of my ship, The Lorica, and watch him drown.

My lover, my heart. Arú, the man who went to war and didn’t let me talk.

The massacre has ended, and he is alone. He slowly revolves in the sea of stars as we watch. He is the only life-form amongst a calamity of destroyed warships and dispersed organic matter. I wonder how he got the suit on in time, or whether he was outside when his cruiser was destroyed. The only light we can see through the viewport is the blue wash from the ancient local star, Ygdrai II, as she continues her slow death. This is an awful place to be alone.

I watch, trying not to implode with grief. He was so beautiful and bright once. He hated me doing this, joining the Observation Corps. Just watching, reporting, and witnessing.

“It’s so fucking passive” he said.

“This is so fucking stupid.” I said, smiling the words to his lips before trying to kiss his mouth shut.

I thought I was being smart by saying that. Those tattooed shoulders I loved to kiss and press my face into just climbed higher. He was terrified. He was intractable.

“They’ve taken everything from us, Tira.”

He returned home to the Makteera and their war. I stayed with the Obs Corps and completed my training. In the years since, there have been others, of course, but I can still feel his heartbeat on my lips, and the touch of his hands on my skin.

We capture the scream on the thermal scanners. There are no molecules in space to shake up and create noise, but heat can be detected. Space is cold, so any warmth is something our Nav officer needs to see.

We can hear the way Arú is screaming because of the shifts in temperature on the faceplate of his helmet. The Lorica’s computer can render these as a sound. It must be sickening to listen to, but that is a job for my flight officers. I can see he is panicking though, gasping. His body temperature is rising, and he is urinating in his suit.

“Skip, he was your fella, right?”

Damadan, my XO, is watching me. He has the sort of face that the girls love to sympathise with. He’s never done it for me, but I’d be lying if I said he’s not hot when he’s angry. He is the angry sort. When we went to report on the child-genocide on Kalledra, I had to arrest him for killing one of the gerontocrats. He never got his step. He will be a Lieutenant-Commander until he dies.

He is a decent sort though, filled with that honour that men wear like a bracelet. He would have made a great soldier, for all of six seconds.

“He was, Pavil. I lost him when he went to fight.”

“Do you need a moment ma’am?”

“No time for a moment. I just…”

“Let’s be with him when he goes.”

“We can’t get involved.”

Arú is speaking now, we can see his lips move on the thermal imaging. Lt. Barda, the comms officer, is trying not to cry as she pieces together the pattern in her headset.

“What’s he saying, Lieutenant?”

Barda jerks her face at Freelish, the Nav officer, who is listening in too. They share a dark look. Freelish looks like he wants to cry. The huge man has gone bone white.

“I think that he’s praying, ma’am.”

Arú has no religion. It doesn’t make sense. The tribes only have each other, their families.

“Praying? What do you mean? Who is he praying to?”

There is the slight throat-clear of awkwardness and a shudder in Barda’s face.

“He’s chanting to his Princess Tira. To you, skip.”

**

We were supposed to have a full leave-rotation once we got back to Dureaa, of course. After that clusterfuck of an assignment to the Timban Ore Moons.

The Mining Syndicate installations had been captured by an anarchist group with the ridiculous name of the ‘The Children of the Thumbless’ and we were ordered to observe and report. They had been sending out hourly data squirts with footage of the executions of the administrator’s entourage; his wife, his mistress, his catamite, his cook, with a threat to kill the fat bastard himself if their demands were not met. It wasn’t particularly engrossing footage, with the victims capturing the usual, wide-eyed ‘Dash it, this isn’t jolly-well fair’ look as their heads exploded. Central command wanted us to capture the Syndicate’s response, with a brief note from Culture & Lifestyle to find out how the average ‘Son of the Thumbless’ held a pulse rifle without thumbs.

Four of our frigates went out and only two of us returned, scorched, battered, and exhausted. The thumbless fucks had salted the space lanes around the two moons with Kenzic nanoparticles, then waited for the Syndicate to arrive. Sure enough, the Syndicate’s Honest Profit arrived with a dozen friends, right into the trap.

I was acting commodore, with the three igCannu brothers as captains under me. Hey, I get to pick my team. Better have folks I know from the old neighbourhood, eh? Their father and my father were old friends, or cousins, or both. I’ve known them since I was a girl, and they always looked out for me. They were the best in the fleet.

I told the torpid Soontree to scan and record wide shots from the flank of the attack, with Timbana in the background. I ordered the jolly Gantree to invert beneath the fleet, then capture running-shots of the buzz-craft and heavy ordinance. I commanded the Goltree to focus on the misery, doing her usual sad job of showing the reality of these little sub-million skirmishes.

In my artistic mind, symphonic music would have played over the footage as the Soontree showed the ponderous, balletic manoeuvres of the Syndicate flotilla, silhouetted against the orange marble of Timbana. Then with the pizzicato mischief and rising drama of the orchestra, we would see the elegance marred as the clouds of buzz-craft fighters poured from the hangars of the flotilla, and the heavy cannons started to warm up and fire on the installations on the moons. The Gantree would follow the fighting as the fighters engaged with the small insurgent naval forces and the music would relay the breathless action and break-neck turbulence of fighter-to-fighter combat. The brass and percussion would be making the viewer almost hard where they sat. Let’s fucking go! But then, the genius of my creative command: the Goltree’s impassive eye would scan over the devastation of battle, showing the erstwhile-horny viewer the carnage of twisted, glowing metal. Their genitals would shrink and dry as they saw the static mists of human remains hovering in vacuum, or the snapshot stasis of ultra-slow mushrooming from the nuclear explosions on the moons.

That was the plan anyway.

What actually happened was that the Thumbless waited until the Syndicate flotilla had manoeuvred to attack position and then fired a single pulse beam. Kenzic particles are used in mining, able to detonate and demolish with huge amounts of force in vacuum. It’s ideal on a lump of barren space rock. It contains its own blast wave and doesn’t send building-sized lumps of ore rocketing off. If you were to use it on a much larger scale, say in a wide tract of inter-planetary space, the effect is rather more interesting. None of the brigs or frigates, and certainly not their flagship, bothered to put up a shield to deflect the stringy little pulse beam. It wasn’t even on target to hit anything, for fuck’s sake.

On The Lorica, I was busy checking the input feeds from the other captains, directing them to adjust course or to follow a particular subject. Suddenly two of the feeds cut out. Gantree just vanished, and looking from the command deck, I saw Soontree disintegrate, like a sandcastle being gently destroyed by a sea-wave. Tursha, the eldest brother, gave a surprised yelp through the comms as the Soontree scattered into nothingness and that was it. Barda and Freelish, both hooked into the Lorica’s scanners, were nearly thrown back from their sensor banks by the shock of information overload.

“Captain? What are your orders?”

The stars vanished as the chain reaction inexorably grew from the point of the pulse beam. A wall of green-flamed destruction sweeping away the Syndicate flotilla.

“Shields up.” yelled Damadan.

I couldn’t move, let alone issue commands. Despite the implant, my body was hacking itself. Somewhere between the amygdala and the hypothalamus, my automatic nervous system was given shitty information. Instead of the adrenaline-cortisol cocktail that would trigger flight-or-fight, I froze.

“Evasive action. Power-down ship.”

When the wave hit, we were tumbled around like stones in a tin can. We had a good deal of leeway, thank the stars, so we weren’t likely to crash into anything large, like a large orange planet, but the damage was extensive. By steering us off-course, Damadan ensured that the shockwave only hit us a glancing blow. By powering down, he ensured that our circuitry and telemetry weren’t immediately fucking fried. He had done well. I had ballsed everything up.

**

We limped back to Dureaa, The Lorica and Goltree, with our shields on the brink of failure, our engines spluttering, and our morale destroyed. In all, I had lost over eight-hundred souls from the destruction of two of the ships under my temporary command. Twenty-seven of the Loricas had died too, including the marine captain, with ninety-six seriously wounded in the med-bay.

I immediately ordered a full refit of the two ships and, once I was certain that I was the last person aboard, I wobbled down the gangway. I felt so ashamed, so stupid. And what the fuck had gone wrong with my implant? It would need replacing or upgrading. My line of work doesn’t need a bleeding heart, just a cool head. Sure, I can feel the usual joys and sadnesses, the worry-abouts and frets, but abject terror is not something I want in my head when I am in the Shit. Emotions are fine, but that sort of chemical imbalance can get someone killed.

Or eight-hundred and forty-two someones.

Sitting in the cargo-bay doors of the Goltree was Gruma, the middle igCannu brother. The only igCannu brother now. His ship looked like it had been used for target practice, with cracked polycrete and smouldering pools of scorched armour dripping to the deck. He was huddled up, crying around a bottle. It was not a stagey grief for the cameras, but rather the shuddering sobs of a captain whose soul was in worse condition than the hull of his battered ship.

“Captain igCannu?” I said. And damn-the-stars if I didn’t feel my own tears begin. The implant was fucked. “Gruma, honey, are you okay?”

Gruma looked up at me, his face swollen and distraught. He had the good looks of his family, but unlike his brothers, he was unpolished, rough-looking. Between the wild hair and the beard, I had never really noticed how bright his eyes were. They were flashing with a terrible, angry sadness now, but softened when he recognised me.

“Tira, they’re gone.”

“It’s my fault, Gruma, I’m so terribly sorry, I led us into the trap.”

He shook his head in pain, as he took a slug from the bottle then gave a nauseous belch. “No no, no-one’s fault. Just fate.” Then he was sobbing again. “My beautiful brothers.”

I held him for a while, as he cursed the Thumbless and the Syndicate and War and Humanity and Fate and his own survival. I finally got my shoulder under his arm and half-carried him away, staggering.

**

“It’s a shame about the igCannus of course, but that is the nature of combat correspondence, I’m sad to say.”

Mornya, the Admiral-commanding of the Observation Corps, spoke with their usual drawl. Their space-black hair had a few strands of starlight now, but they still were as intoxicating, and powerful as the day I was commissioned as an ensign. Their beautiful, flint-cut face was stretched into a hopelessly sympathetic expression as I gave my report.

“Such a shame, and from the same family too.”

“Yes, Admiral.”

I had a fucking brutal hangover. In the sixteen hours between disembarkation and reporting for duty, I had taken Gruma on a bender that might be called heroic if it wasn’t so sad. I should have taken a few hours in a coma-coffin really, just switching off and allowing my body and mind to rest, but I was so worried about him. We waked Gruma’s brothers, moving like a tsunami through the seedier bars and taverns in Dureaa, then got into a fistfight with some RullyaB’llya traders. After we were ejected from the third place, we went back to my chambers, where I stopped Gruma from giving his blaster a blowjob and bundled him into the coma-coffin. He was sobbing and giggling in embarrassment and at one point we might have kissed. It was all very emotional and messy. Now I sat in my dress-uniform and watched the Admiral with a gimlet eye as they put on the soap-opera act.

“In spite of the tragedy, Captain, I must say that you performed an exceptional service.”

“Admiral?”

“The footage and data from the battle is some of the best I have ever seen.” They tapped through the footage. “This is award-winning stuff.”

Behind the Admiral, the motto of the Corps was craved in formal serif font on the wall:

Full Information, Freely Given.

That was our mission statement. Find the truth, collect it, and report it. I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t trust myself neither to scream nor vomit. The Admiral continued, their eyes full of a sly, bargaining glint.

“I think this may very well put you in line for a promotion. Your time with frigates is very nearly up, isn’t it, and you’ve been an acting commodore for the last few assignments anyway, so what do you say?”

I paused to think, and to swallow my gorge, before responding.

“I really entered the corps to report on combat, Admiral. Would that still be an option?”

The Admiral gave what they thought of as a tinkling laugh. To me it sounded like a raven in a metal toilet. “We don’t get to choose our assignments, Captain. Do you think I reached my rank by being choosy? We go where we’re sent.” Their eyes widened. “But before that old anger-problem comes out, why don’t you consider this: once you get to a sufficiently high rank you get your choice of reporting duties. You just have to play the game, dear.”

And there it was, the peak of my ambitions. Taking a ship to the lesser-reported trouble zones in space and letting the galaxies know why Sentients fought each other. If that meant I had to spend a year or two doing the shitty tabloid jobs, then so be it.

“May I think on it please, Admiral?”

“Yes, do. But take a friend’s advice.” I nearly laughed. The mad snake thought we were friends, “Offers like these don’t come along every day, Captain igGyra.”

I smiled my most beatific smile and rose to salute. “Thank you for the advice, Admiral.”

**

In my chambers, I sipped brandy and watched the city beneath me. I’m an off-worlder, not a Dureaan, so have never felt truly at home in the city-planet. My planet is green and blue and wild, a far remove from the white stone and steel of the big city. Still, it has always fascinated me to watch the bustle of life from my windows. Each of the little moving dots was a person, and they all had their own lives. I sat in a robe with my hair down and the bottle open watching the movement of life; the strolling Sentients, the speeders and the transports, the huge freighters taking off from the civilian spaceports.

The burn-mark by my temple stung something shocking. That’s how I justified the brandy. I reported for my after-action medical and the Doctor had immediately condemned the neural implant.

“What the hell did you do to cause this?” he asked, like a fucking idiot, after the sizzling crackle and the feeling of my brain being pulled out through my nose. I had writhed on the floor for a bit, doing a little jig, then staggered upright to curse at him as fluently as I could.

“Wank…bastard…bad…prick…fucker.” The room smelled delicious, roast 'me', and I giggled a bit, then vomited down his tabard. A victory of sorts, if a bit pyrrhic.

Later, after I had recovered some sense of myself, and could walk, he gave me the bad news.

“We’ll need to reconfigure your implant from the bottom up.” He gave me a rather creepy leer and his eyes raked my body. I was wearing the medical compression suit. Not much to the imagination. My tits seemed to have something very important to tell him.

“So?”

“So, uh, you’ll have to do without until we can build you another.” He must have caught my displeasure at this. “But don’t worry. We’ll put one together for you in a few days. You just go and rest up, and we’ll let you know when the new one can be fitted. You might feel a bit, uh, emotional for a day or two though, so take it easy.”

So, I followed advice and relaxed. I sat in a bathrobe and listened to music and watched the traffic and tried not to cry. The emotions began as a gentle pulse through my system, quite normal, but they started to peak and trough as time wore on. Soon I alternated between wild flights of energy and morbid depression. I danced around my chambers, whirling the bottle in the air like a harvest dancer, then crumpled in heap like poor Gruma. Every strong emotion that I had previously banished came back to pay their respects. I was horny and romantic; terrified and furious. It was fucking horrible.

After a few hours of emotional reunification, I received a buzz on my wrist comm. It had been interesting to revisit the old emotions, but I was eager to get back to match fitness. Stars-bless that creepy doctor. I threw the message onto the comm screen. The Admiral’s aide, a weasel-like youth, filled the screen.

“Captain Tira igGyra, you are requested to attend a meeting of tactical command at 26:00 hours. A speeder has been dispatched to collect you.”

“Fuck.” I said to the brandy bottle.

**

The tactical command headquarters are located in a secure bunker beneath the Observation Corps headquarters. Instead of the clean-cut lines of the Admiral’s office or the Debating Chambers, the Command is built along the lines of a battleship, all grey metal, smelling of lubricants. I arrived and surveyed the other officers as we waited. I saw some commanders, a few captains I knew well, a commodore or two and a clutch of fat vice-admirals. Gruma sat with an empty chair on either side of him. He gave me a watery smile when I sat across from him. He looked like shit.

“People, we have a breaking development on the conflict in the Tarngirra System. This is a priority one story.”

The Admiral had entered with their usual stride and threw the images from their data-pad into the central holo-screen. There was a murmur of talk amongst the officers. The Tarngirran War had lasted for almost thirty years now. Of all the damned times to have my implant taken out, this was not it. I looked across at Gruma and his eyes had taken on a haunted, feral look. I knew what he was thinking.

“It appears that the Tarngirran Alliance and the Xobichi are ready to talk. We have to cover it.”

“I hate the damn Xobichi.” Muttered on the of vice-admirals.

The holo-screen changed to a dark-purple planet with a sprawling asteroid belt.

“The Xobichi Timocracy declared their new emperor in the last solar rotation, having undergone their usual honour-combat rituals. Apparently, the new leader killed most of the previous administration in the process, and now wishes to focus on a course of honourable cooperation with his valiant enemies.”

The holo-screen now showed a cluster of little blue and green planets. There was Tarngirra, Terhuin, Maghmell, Dr’iocht and tiny little Ablach. The holo was fuzzy, but they looked so beautiful to me as I stared at them.

My Home. My birth right.

“The main Tarngirran forces have all agreed to a cessation of… “

“The Makteera won’t agree to a truce.” said Gruma. “No way.” He swayed ever so slightly, and his voice sounded like a rasp dragging over ironwood. Oh shit.

The Admiral looked up from their notes, straight at Gruma, “Both the Makteera and Conyeen tribal councils have given consent to a cease-fire, Captain igCannu, it turns out some things can change. Envoy fleets from both sides will meet at the ancient battleground of Ygdrai II to negotiate a peace settlement.”

“Could it be a trap, Admiral?” said one of the commanders.

“It’s likely, but not guaranteed. The Xobichi are not known to use ruse de guerre in any form. Either way, we need to be there.”

“I can go.” said Gruma. “I know that area of space well and have useful informants.”

He glanced over at me, and I knew he would never come back if he went. Poor gloomy Gruma. At least he might get to see his brothers again.

The Admiral smiled sweetly. “I appreciate your local knowledge Captain igCannu, but your ship will not be space worthy until it has had a complete refit, you took too much damage on the Ore Moons.” The Admiral’s voice hardened as they glanced back down at the data pad. “Besides, Gruma, you’re not impartial here. You’re compromised.”

“igGyra, you’re from that part of space, aren’t you?” said one of the vice-admirals.

“Yes sir, but I left when I was very young.”

“Perfect, no conflict of interest.”

“Well, sir, I -”

“Captain igGyra, fleet maintenance reports that your ship will be ready to depart in two days,” said the Admiral “As the senior available captain, I want you to go to Ygdrai II ahead of the talks to capture the arrival of the two fleets. Set up a command hub to assist later teams who arrive to report. You will act as head of station there.”

“But I…yes Admiral.”

After the briefing, I was left alone with the Admiral. Gruma strode out without so much as saluting. He would keep the secret though. The igCannu family always did protect us. The Admiral gave me the information pack on the conflict, as if I needed it, and then the secret signals codes. After the Ore Moons, all combat correspondent vessels were now to go with a full combat complement.

“Ma’am, there is one thing that concerns me. My neural implant is currently being rebuilt. I won’t have it if I’m to leave at once.”

“We’ll have to rely on your training and professionalism then, captain, won’t we?” The Admiral gave me a rather nasty smile. “Let’s hope you don’t have to go to battle stations this time.”

“But Ma’am, at the Ore Moons, I froze up.”

“Which reminds me,” said the Admiral, ignoring me, “you lost your marine captain on your last assignment, didn’t you?”

“Yes, Admiral. Captain Dhostri was crushed against a bulkhead when the wave hit us.”

The Admiral gave a little tut of regret and pressed her data pad. The doors to the command centre opened and a large man walked in. An ogre.

“It’s usual for a commodore to have a higher-ranking marine officer, so I thought that we could give you Major G’Bolga until your promotion comes through. Say hello to your new commanding officer, Chaktara, this is Captain igGyra.”

G’Bolga had a face like a battlefield. His remaining natural eye had been partnered with a prosthetic that glowed a poisonous green, and his face was a storm of scars and old wounds. His service dress jacket strained against huge shoulders and his massive hands looked like they could each crush a skull for fun. He gave an elegant bow, then took my trembling hand in his. They were soft and gentle. He smiled at me; it was a beautiful thing to behold after the shock of his physicality.

“An honour to serve under you ma’am.”

“Likewise.” I said without thinking. Fuck it, he knew what I meant.

“Good luck, igGyra. Do us proud.” said the Admiral.

I felt an icy drop in my bowels.

**

We arrived at Ygdrai II just in time to see the destruction of the two fleets. The Xobichi had arrived in elegance, with their consular pahis escorted by a small fleet of junks, xebecs, and sloops. The Tarngirran Alliance had arrived with the usual mixed fleet. Dreadnoughts cruised alongside Frigates and old Freighters. The Tarngirran Navy was not renowned for its sophistication.

Both fleets were taking incredible damage. As we slipped into temporal reality, we could see the thousands of explosions that briefly flared amongst the shipping.

The vessels of both sides lay as if at anchor, facing each other across the vast empty space. A platform station had been erected between them, for the negotiations I assumed. It burned now with stabbing pink flames. None of the ships were manoeuvring, and from what I could see, none of them were firing at all. They just lay there, being chewed apart.

“What the fuck.” I muttered, then raised my voice in command. “Comms, find out what the chatter says. Lookout?” the crackling voice of Lieutenant Sulla in Obs affirmed that he was listening, “what can we see? Who’s doing the shooting.”

“I’m tracking movement ma’am. It’s faint but definitely there. I can’t identify it as belonging to either Xobichi or Tarngirran vessels. They’re almost like shadows on our sensors. Visuals are showing some attacking force though.”

“Lorica, magnify visuals to command deck view port.” The ship gave two beeps, and we could see the two fleets as they were destroyed. Whisps of shadow seemed to flow over the ships where they lay. Stealth ships perhaps?

“Lorica, go dark.” Beep-beep. We were plunged into the soft gloom as the fractal engines powered down.

“You think they might track us, ma’am?”

“I don’t know who they are.”

**

I watch as the life-support system on Arú’s suit begins to cool. He will be dead soon, maybe half an hour. He could have lasted much longer if he had stayed calm and sent out the rescue beacon, but the attackers have jammed all comms.

We have recorded the massacre of both fleets and must away before too long. If the phantom force that destroyed the warships spot us, there is very little I can do to save the ship. How do you defend against an enemy that you cannot detect? Freelish and Barda are both in tears now, Freelish crying into Barda’s shoulder, and soaking her dark hair.

Arú had dark hair too. It fell around his face, like spilled ink. Sometimes, when I watched him at practice, I could see it dance around his smile. He had been so beautiful. I hadn’t quite believed it when I first met him, a fellow-exile on Dureaa. The Makteera rarely sent anyone off-world, and this young nobleman had sought me out.

I had fallen quickly for him, if truth be told, and he had been my first lover. He was older, already tested in combat and inducted into the tribal ways, but he was still a boy to me. The lithe contours of his muscles gleamed with the argentum tattoos of his clan, and yet I always felt like the older one of us. I always had the burden of maturity, while he could be reckless and wild.

When he left, I had the neural implant fitted. I had never felt so much pain, such sorrow. I never wanted it again. And yet here it was again, eating away at my heart and nicking at my throat like a sharp blade. I wanted to hold him, to be with him. To die in the cold vacuum with him and dance amongst the stars in a frozen waltz for all time.

“Beegah lom, m’gragill forfa. Beegah lom m’Tira gyall. M’banfrinza gyall. M’gra’Tira. Beegah lom.” The words are automated, a computer-assisted attempt at what Arú is saying.

I understand the words.

“Ma’am, we have options.” Damadan is by my side, choosing not to see the tears. “Send G’Bolga to get him, we still have time. Or we can kill him now, to end his suffering. We can’t just sit and watch.”

“Our duty is to not interfere, commander.” I don’t believe what I am saying.

“Fuck duty, Tira. Make the call. You know it’s the right thing to do.” His grip is painful on my arm.

I look out into the sea of stars and try to think. We do not interfere. But I cannot leave him like this.

“Ma’am, squirt from Dureaa.” Barda sounds like she has a cold. “Hostile forces are attacking the planet’s defences. Immediate order to return.”

“Captain, please. What is your decision?”

I watch as Arú spins, praying for me in the cold darkness.

I try not to freeze.