Chapter One

Strom

 

Strom sat calmly in the barracks, watching his company spar in the early morning heat.  He noticed that they were being sloppy with their maneuvers. Slamming his chair back, he strode quickly toward the duo that the entire company was idly watching.  He noticed yet another sloppy move, displaying weakness in their forms.  As Strom approaches, the ranks move to let him through, giving him access to the pair.  He closed the gap between the edge of the circle and the combatants.  Planting his feet, Strom watches for the next opening, seeing the opening that he was waiting for, he twisted his hips and struck one hapless combatant square in the gut. 

“You left yourself open,” he snarled, doubling the man over.  Hearing gravel crunch next to him, he instinctively twisted, catching the other man’s arm, pulling him off balance, but keeping himself centered and throwing his victim at the other, sprawling them both on the dust.

With the two gasping from their exertions, Strom turns to the group and states, “You have to watch your form. Don’t face your enemy square; you have to make yourself as small a target as possible. I don’t want you exchanging blows.  I want you to be efficient. Your enemy is a lot bigger, stronger and faster than you.  We don’t have time to dance around. Put your opponent down and find another.”

One of the observers spoke up, “But you came at them from the side and out of view.”

Shaking his head, “Which is exactly why we tell you to be aware of your surroundings.  On the battlefield, you aren’t facing just one opponent.” 

The observer spoke yet again, “There is no way that we can be aware of every person on the field.”

“You’re right, you can’t be aware of everyone, but you can’t get tunnel vision either,” He retorted, “Expand you attention to take in your immediate surroundings, focus on your opponent, but be ready to react to a new threat.  We are going to simulate a battlefield situation.  Find a partner, when you defeat your partner by throwing them on the ground, move on to another target.  Your goal is to defeat your opponent, but more importantly, try to keep an eye on your immediate surroundings.  Someone may come at you from the side.  Get to it.”

 

Diz

 

Diz looked out the window, watching the men drill as he straightened out yet another bent weapon. ‘How do they keep bending them like this?’ Diz thought to himself as he bent the gun back into its original form.  He continued diligently working in his small shop.  Wondering how he could challenge himself, he grinned and pulled out a stopwatch. Beginning the time, he tried to fix as many weapons as he could before the timer went off.

He was at 47 seconds in when an auto launcher let off a live round tearing into the shop. Sparks flew as the round bounced around spinning and grinding into all the equipment.

“S**t, S**t , S**t SHEEEEEETTTTT” he exclaimed as he chased the live round around his shop trying to catch it before it escaped.  Too little too late did he realize that it was heading toward his comrades. 

As he ran after the round, Diz calculated the trajectory and managed to catch it just before it swooped over the sparring area. 

“Everybody stay calm I caught it.” He said as he looked at his hand, unfortunately the round wasn’t there.

“Oh well nevermind,” he shrugged as the men stared at him in shock. Lieutenant Strom had a look on his face that could only be described as resigned.
“Crap!” Strom said.

“Don’t worry Lieutenant, it’s around here somewhere,” Diz replied.

“That’s the problem.”

“If you could just tell your men to not move, we could get this resolved without any loss of limb,” Diz said, as he searched frantically for the round, “I would really give the order now, the round is motion sensitive. You have about twenty seconds”

Strom takes a deep breath, and with tremendous bellow, “Halt!”

As Diz hears this, he notices the round conveniently behind the lieutenant’s feet.  “Lieutentant, don’t move.”

Without looking down, Strom said, “Mhmmm, about where I expected this to go.”

Diz creeped slowly, wrapping his fingers gently around the shell, and in one smooth motion tossed it in the air.  The detonation thundered throughout the canyon, with a near simultaneous explosion that bloomed bright flames into the sky. 

All the men ducked as Diz spoke, “Whew, I’m glad that’s over. Wouldn’t want to embarrass ourselves in front of the new CO. Good morning Captain.”  The lieutenant glowered at the combat engineer as he walked off whistling a tune. 

 

Ifri

 

Ifri paced angrily the inside of her room. “How can they do this to me? I don’t understand it Nyx.”

“There is nothing you can do about it now,” Nyx said from her spot on Ifri’s bed, “You need to calm down.  You need to stop worrying about it.”

Growling at her sister Ifri said, “That is not the point.  What am I supposed to do with this group? The other captains call them the bane of the army.”

“You are going to teach them,” Nyx said standing up and grabbing her sister’s shoulders, forcing her to face her, “Do what you do best, mold them into the best of the best.  They all have the potential to be great.  If they didn’t they would have been sent to the fields or into the trades.” 

“I see your point,” Ifri said, slipping on her boots, “I need to head out. Thanks sis.”

Hugging her sister, Ifri left the quarters for the last time for what would be quite a while.  As she left the building, she said her good byes to the one fellow captain that she didn’t hate.  Walking swiftly toward the 82^nd company, she made it just in time to see their engineer trying to blow up one of the men. 

“Good morning Captain.” 

 

Strom

 

Looking down at the newcomer, Strom grunted unhappily, and turned his back to her.  Walking past clumps of his men, shouting, “GRUB’S UP!”  The men cheered and started dispersing towards the mess hall. 

Standing still, the Captain stared after the retreating group, her natural eye twitching violently.

Storming into the mess hall most of the men marched directly to the makeshift bar, laughing and chatting amiably amongst themselves, including Strom.  Because the military hierarchy neglected the 82^nd, not an inspector was to be been seen near their posts.  As a result, the men of the 82^nd decided they needed a bar.  The soldier behind the bar was cleaning a glass and looked up and smiled as the mass of people approached.

Gathering around the tray line and tables, the men soon created a cacophony that filled the open room with their chatter.

Slipping quietly into the hall, the woman walked around slowly attempting to gather as much information about the company as she could before she made her announcement.  When she was satisfied that she knew what she was in for, at least for the night, she grabbed one of the men’s trays and threw it into the middle of the biggest table.  The men looked over at her as she stood.

“Listen up.  If you didn’t know already, I’m your commanding officer.  The 82^nd has fallen from the standards-” Ifri began, before she was rudely interrupted by someone in the crowd shouting.  “Who the hell did you piss off to be stuck with us?!”

Glaring into the crowd, she said, “That doesn’t matter at this moment.  What matters is that I have been assigned to bring you up to par with the current military standards.”   The crowd erupted in hysterics.  Many falling off their chairs, more than a few literally rolling around on the floor, consumed by guffaws.

 “You have to be kidding me,” Ifri whispered to herself as the crowd restored a measure of calm, before addressing them once again, “The Council hopes to assign this troop to special tasks, and that means you have to become more disciplined.  How do you expect to be allowed into the fray if you can’t even listen to me without interrupting in some form?”

Many started getting up, shaking their heads and heading for the door.  Strom rose from the bar and started walking towards her in time to hear someone say loudly, “Translation, we are going on more suicide missions.”

Anticipating the retort, Ifri was scanning the crowd.  Smirking as she found the speaker, she walked over to him and in one swift motion, she planted her foot behind his, grabbed his head and threw him heavily on a table, smashing his face into the table, denting the metal.  Everyone froze, as the noise echoed.  Staring at her, then the still approaching Strom, then significant looks back to her.  Someone else nearby muttered quietly, “Oh, s**t.”

The captain walked straight toward the Ironfist.  Without warning, she slammed a knee into his crotch, bending him slightly.  “Teach them respect,” she growled.  Then punched him in the nose, her reinforced gauntlet breaking his nose.  She turned and left, pausing at the door, “Drinks on me.”

Strom looked after her as everyone looked at him.  He straightened.  “I like her.”  Another pause, as he wiped blood from his face.  “I really like her.”  He smiled with blood stained teeth.

 

Diz

Diz examined the square in front of him, he didn’t quite know what it did all he knew was that it could be dangerous.  He really needed to stop working in his sleep.  The lines that warped around it glowed and pulsed like a radio electric heartbeat all flowing to a shiny button.

“To Press or not to Press,” he mused.

“Goddammit.”  Strom mumbled, walking in on Diz and observing the alarming device.  “Is this going to blow up as well?”

“You know lieutenant I’m not really sure, I made it last night and I don’t remember what for,” Diz continued to contemplate the button press.  Eye, once again, twitching violently, Strom sighed and took a step back.

“I put a pulsing button on it and I kinda want to press it but I’m not entirely sure that it’s safe,” Diz said, “But anyway, what can I do ya for?”

Again, Strom stepped back speaking slowly, “So, what do you know of this new CO?”

“Her name is Ifri and we used to live in south hovel together a long time, real stone face type, but smart.” Diz  floated his finger around the button.  Stroms’ voice rose a few octaves, “Now we don’t need to do that just yet!” Another step back, putting a heavy desk between himself and the device.

Diz put the device down on the table and walked toward the lieutenant and moving his hand to Strom’s busted nose, and snapped it back in place.  For a brief moment, Strom stared at Diz as he fought his instinct to crush what cause him pain.  That infuriating smile nearly drove him into a rage.  As he reasserted control, Strom growled at him, “Thanks.  I think.”

“You’re welcome.  I assume that was her handy work? That’s a fight you won’t win I’m afraid .”

“Maybe not, but she’s got quite an arm on her.”  Then he added ruefully, “And a knee.”  He rubbed his crotch.

Diz let out a laugh for the ages “I do wonder what she is doing here?  She is way too high profile for us.”

“Heh.  Yeah.  The rejects.”

“I think I can better answer that if you care to ask me.”

Diz peeked behind him toward the voice.  Ifri leaned against the frame of the door with her arms folded and a slight smirk on her face.  Strom looked at her with a placid expression, “Rejects.”

“They put me here to try to teach me a lesson,” Ifri said, “I don’t think that’s going to work the way they want it to.”

“Rejects,” Strom repeated.

Full out smiling now, Ifri spoke, “They want me to be their little puppet.  Someone that they can give an order to and not have to explain themselves.  I believe that if a leader wants to be followed, that they must be open to questions.  They must be able to bend and not break when things don’t go as planned.  And now the Council wants me dead.”

Strom chuckled, “Join the club.  They want us all dead.  As far as those a******s are concerned, we are little more than cannon fodder.  ‘Course, we are-”

“Not to me you aren’t.  They expect you to roll over and take it lying down. They expect that of all of us, but I didn’t get to where I am in the ranks to just roll over and I didn’t think you were the rolling over type either Ironfist.”

Stroms’ expression remained placid, “-more than anyone can-”

“Well I think your both a little bit too concerned with image, instead we should be concerned with what we can do,” Diz pushed the button.

“-handle.”  Strom finished quietly as he rubbed his eyes. The cube then begin to play a nice chiptune of happy birthday.

“Oh yes I remember now this is Private Miller’s birthday gift,”

“Wait for it,” Strom held up several fingers, counting down. When the cube stopped playing the tune it opened and confetti burst free of the small container and showered the three of them. A little beer token for the bar appeared at the bottom. 

Ifri glowered at Diz, “I hate confetti.”

“Huh.”  Strom stared at the cube.  “I guess I was wrong.”

“Well I didn’t tell all of you to come waltzing into my lab. Now if you’ll both excuse me I have a cube to stuff” Diz began picking up the confetti off the floor. 

Out of nowhere, the cube began to spark like a small firework, shedding embers all over the miscellaneous explosives in the room.

“Or not,” Strom muttered.

“We should probably get out of here,” Ifri said, and turned away as one of Diz’s creations caught a stray ember. 

Strom grunted his assent an turned to leave, calling back, “Try not to kill yourself!”  Then added under his breath, “Or the rest of us.”

“Sure thing Lieutenant,” Diz keeping his focus on the confetti. 

Ifri and Strom walked back to where the men were all gathered talking and cleaning their weapons when they heard an explosion.  They looked back to see Diz standing where his lab once was.  He smiled.

Reviews

[Stars and Whales]

Short but good chapter. I like the way you started off; you have a lot of talent. Keep writing, and keep going; I see you have plenty of talent to use in your writing. Good job with this!

[wagonburner]

We really need to work on the tense. That first section was a little hard to read. As for the rest, I may have started to automatically correct it in my head, but I don't think it was as bad.

[Lady of the Ring]

we will start proof-reading better once we get a little further into the story.