The Navy Proving Grounds at Caltor Prime 0630 Hours Intergalactic Time:
In the early morning sunrise, the hills of the rolling grasslands sprawled across the foggy low mountains. Beams of light poked through the fog as it swirled over the hills like smoke. Brinus and Simmie brewed morning coffee with their morning cigarettes, while around them, the sergeant major and his men did the same. The air was crisp with morning mist and had a particular bite in the frosty air. Everyone could see their breath as Brinus looked through his binoculars to gauge the situation.
He threw his cigarette butt into the campfire. “Hey Simmie, are you ready for the attack?”
Simmie flicked some ash into the grass, tilting his head back and taking a draw, blowing smoke into the air. He then looked at Brinus with a Stern Look. “We’re in the field and I am an acting lieutenant for this exercise. Technically I am your commanding officer.”
Brinus jumped on top of Simmie and rolled in the tall grass with him until Simmie pushed him off. “Brinus! Behave! We can do whatever you want after the mission!” he growled, nipping at his ear.
Brinus smirked and leaned down to kiss him, “Sure love.”
They both laughed maniacally.
The Sergeant Major approached the two young men, one brow cocked. “Are you two done? We have to attack the enemy base at 0700 hours!”
“I’ll get ready.” Brinus giggled like a schoolgirl.
The troops retreated to their tents to don their armour: white dura-plastic breast, leg, arm, and joint plates, a matching helmet with built-in comms, black gloves, and pristine white boots. All carried standard-issue flash pistols at their sides.
The men set out, marching uphill, until Brinus could see two police droids protecting a Federation flag on a hill around four-hundred meters ahead. Nearby, two more police droids with dummy guns guarded a fortress nestled in a valley near the river. Security droids manned the perimeter guns placed on top of sandbags.
Stimmie came to stand shoulder to shoulder with Brinus. Reaching up, he took his binoculars and looked toward the fortress before giving them back and pointing toward a concrete bunker. “See that scope flash? There is a sniper in the hills.”
Brinus brought the binoculars back to his eyes and turned to where Simmie pointed. Sure enough, there he was. Dressed in a bad gilly suit with a spotter sitting nearby in fingerless gloves, and a camo shirt and pants. “Yeah, I see them. I don’t think they’re ours.” Brinus looked through his binoculars a second time and saw the sniper in infrared view.
“You want me to take them out?”
Brinus growled and grabbed Simmie’s leg. “Those snipers are not with us nor are they part of this here exercise. Let command deal with them.” He snarled.
Brinus knew he would have to call in the unauthorized snipers, and then a professional strike team would take them out. At this point, the exercise was over.
Simmie stood and said, “I will take them out now.” His priority was Brinus’s safety and not the mission. As soon as the snipers appeared, any desire to finish the exercise went out the window.
Brinus attempted to knock Simmie down. He yelled, “Simmie! No! Please! You’ll be killed if you go out there!” Brinus grabbed Simmie, but he was too late. He didn’t care about the mission; he only cared about Simmie.
Simmie ran forward with Brinus hot on his heels. At this moment, the months of military training, the months of discipline, and the months of basic training went out of the window. He only cared about Simmie.
From Simmie’s point of view, his priority was to protect Brinus. Despite almost two years of military training and discipline, he prioritized Brinus. At this moment, he only cared about Brinus and not the mission.
The other men were shocked into silence as Brinus ran after Simmie, screaming at him to get down. Then, a sniper shot rang. Despite the blaster bolt moving at the speed of light, Brinus could see the bolt approach Simmie. On pure adrenaline, he ran into the bolt and took a chest full of plasma. The impact was a fifty-caliber blast, so it obliterated his armor and incinerated his thermal underwear shirt. It left a large cut on his chest from the breast plate exploding but no burns or major injuries. His arm had a piece of armor sticking out of his left forearm.
He then jumped on Simmie and covered him from a second sniper shot. The sniper threw a grenade and ran, but it failed to explode. A blue plasma shield appeared around Brinus as he wrapped himself around Simmie to protect him. The other men watched the two boys in the field.
Brinus yelled, “I fucking told you not to run out into the field!” He Smoothered Simmie in kisses and hugs.
The sergeant major snorted and turned to the sergeant of the company. “This is why couples shouldn’t be in combat together, sir.”
The company sergeant took off his helmet and sighed. “I agree. Do you wanna call this in or should I?”
“I will, sir.”
One hour later, on
“Yes, sir. I give my statement for the official record.”
Finally, the captain spoke after ten seconds of awkward silence. “Were you aware you had magic before joining the Navy?”
Brinus decided to go with the truth. “No, sir. The magi were interested in me but nothin’ came of it. Although…”
“What, Stinkball?”
Brinus shifted his feet and then looked down and then up. “I remember about two months before I was incarcerated for arson, I woke up in the hospital with mustard gas burns, glass in my shoes, and bruises like I had been beaten with 24-hours of my memory erased.”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
Commander Theodore asked, tilting his head and crossing his arms, “Why didn’t you tell anyone? Clearly, something happened. You should have notified the ship’s librarian of this upon recruitment.”
“Obviously,” Brinus snapped as he pinched the bridge of his nose.
Captain Plato held up his hand to silence the entire room. “Brinus is down to 68 cigarettes a day last time I checked. Isn’t it possible that cutting back caused his abilities to surface?”
The commandant shuffled some papers and then used a search engine to look it up on his TriQuarter. He looked it up. “It looks like heavy smoking of more than 70 Tarken Tea cigarettes a day does suppress magic. After 75 cigs a day magic becomes impossible to detect. It’s because of an additive in the cigarette. They don’t know which one it is or it would be removed.” The Commandant rolled his eyes and snapped, “Were you aware of the risk of uncontrollable magic use during the live fire simulation?”
“No, sir. I as stated previously. I was aware the magi were interested in me and I had that weird memory gap. But no. I was not aware I had magic.”
Captain Plato looked over at Brinus’s medical file, “It says you’re down to 68 cigarettes a day because you get terrible withdrawals if you go any lower. I will ask again, is it possible that reducing your smoking is what made your magic surface? Yes or No?”
Brinus sighed and rolled his eyes, “I don’t know much about magic, sir, but I guess it’s possible.”
The Commandant leaned back into his chair and cussed, “I’m issuing standing orders that you and Simmie are to go together on future battle or live fire sims. You two will only be allowed in psychiatric exams. I am also going to ask the magi’s permission for use of their fire temple; the sooner we can start training you in magic, the better. Furthermore, I am putting you and Simmie on academic probation for the next semester for insubordination. You both endangered your own lives as well as the lives of your men and women.”
Commander Theodore spoke. “Is there anything you wish to add to the after-action report? You have permission to speak freely.”
“Simmie is my first serious relationship since Harper, sir. I want to marry him someday and I love him. I think it would be best if we didn’t go into combat together in the future because he would be a distraction.”
The three officers looked at each other, nodded in agreement, and then Captain Plato spoke. “Agreed, you and Simmie will no longer be on battle simulations while you are at the academy. Dismissed Midshipman Helios.”
“Sirs.” Brinus saluted and left.
Thirty minutes after the meeting, Brinus was at his quarters in a pair of black boxers and shirtless.
After he crawled into bed, Simmie stirred and took a sharp inhale through his nose and exclaimed, “Hey love!”
“It looks like we’re being separated.”
Simmie handed Brinus a note and mumbled. “A courier came by thirty minutes ago and dropped this off.”
Brinus opened the envelope, which said,
Brinus took his cigarette lighter and burned the letter. No, the matter was not settled. They tried to kill him for leaving the syndicate and his second boyfriend, just like they killed Harper. One day, he would get even with the syndicate. He was a now duke and would be learning magic. He had power, both magical and political.
Simmie put an arm around Brinus’s chest and kissed his ear as he laid down, snuggling next to him. “Can’t we worry about this tomorrow? Let’s just cuddle.”
Brinus wrapped his legs and arms around Simmie. “Good night, love.”
Simmie was back asleep as Brinus turned out the lights.
The Orin Syndicate in Klatax
A lone sniper in combat boots and a grey trenchcoat walked down the urine-soaked streets of Klatax, which was a Federation world on the border. A homeless man pushed a cart filled with trash, another woman begged on the street for money with her toddler. The shops were boarded up with half of them closed, with graffiti on the windows. After coming up to an abandoned shop with a broken window and bars on the door, he opened it. The sniper from the proving ground stood before Captain Long Ho.
The Hideout was a rundown housing area with a layer of dust over everything. The furniture was worn and very cheap with a modern style to it.
“I failed the boy conjured a shield and then, when I threw a grenade, it didn’t explode.”
“You’re talking nonsense.” Snapped Captain Long Ho with his arms crossed and a scowl on his face. “All magic is controlled by the magi. There is no way Brinus would have magic. If you lie again, I’ll string you up by your thumbs.”
The sniper shook his head. “I’m not lying. My spotter can back my statements. Target 1-1-5 conjured a shield of blue plasma and took a fifty-cal shot to the chest and back. I think he ran faster than light speed, but I can’t be sure. Oh, and I believe he disabled my grenade but again I can’t be sure.”
Long Ho looked stunned. He regained composure after a few minutes. “Okay, whatever.” Long Ho looked at the sniper and then stated smugly, “Exactly. If we can’t kill Brinus, then I’ll kill his boyfriend and make an example.”
Several men and women laughed. The idea of killing the boyfriend of a dark fire mage was comical at best and suicidal at worst.
Long Ho looked around the room and then said, “What?”
The sniper crossed his arms and laughed. “You really feel that way about your only son?”
“He is not my son after he left the syndicate.”
The sniper rolled his eyes and snapped his fingers. “You drove him away and into the hands of the navy. It was you who insisted the syndicate kill Harper. The syndicate was willing to tolerate Brinus’s sexuality even if they didn’t like it.”
“I never killed Harper.”
The sniper laughed, “Then where is he, asshole?”
Long Ho laughed and then crossed his arms. “Is Management blaming me for the Brinus problem?”
The sniper rolled his eyes and made a hand motion to shut Long Ho up. “I think we have had enough of this discussion. Management made it clear what would happen if you continued down this route. Good luck finding someone willing to hurt a fire mage like that. No one will do that for you. Oh, management told me to tell you something.”
The sniper pulled out his pistol and shot Long Ho between the eyes. Hemoaned and started shaking, so the sniper shot him again in the chest.
He then leaned over the body and said. “You’re fired.” He shot him again over his heart.
The Sniper looked at Long Ho’s crew. “Who is the first mate? A petite woman answered, “Me.”
“Management wants to see you to set up your new command. I have been told the matter with Brinus is closed since he is a dark fire mage and is .”
He walked out of the safehouse and into a bar.
The sniper sat in a bar at Klatax three days later. Every table had an ashtray with cigarette butts in it, and the bar was smokey with tarken tea smoke—stools and tables all throughout the barroom with at most 20 people in the bar. Every one of them was smoking. The bar was mostly empty and quiet as it was noon on this planet. The sniper had a cigarette in his mouth and read a news pad.
A Federation intelligence officer sat across from the sniper. They put a bag of coins on the table. “Did you do it?”
The sniper shrugged. “The two officer cadets you wanted targeted are still alive. Turns out the target has magic.”
“Doesn’t matter. We disrupted another live fire exercise. That is what is important.”
The sniper took a drag from his cigarette and blew smoke into the officer’s face. “Give me my payment.”
The agent pushed the coinsack towards the sniper. “That money is in Confederate credits.”
“Seems pointless to disrupt training. Killing cadets, I can understand.”
The officer shrugged. “We stopped a training exercise.”
The sniper took another drag from his cigarette and then blew more smoke into the officer’s face. He said, “And then what? How did it impact the war?”
The officer leaned back and crossed his ankles under the table. “It isn’t about impact overall. It was about disruption despite the failure of this operation. Since we started, we have killed over six hundred midshipmen and four thousand cadets. Take your money and be thankful.”
The sniper took another drag from his cigarette and blew more smoke from the Federation officers. He grabbed the coin purse and left. The officer looked shocked that someone would ask questions. However, they did wonder what the overall goal was of these disruption operations. After all, the sniper was proper. What was achieved? The two love birds would likely be separated. The proving ground would probably have security improved. They would likely notice the pattern.
The Federation intelligence officer called his boss, Commander Pattaban.
Pattaban sneered. “Did you pay the sniper?”
“Yes, sir. Sir, Permission to speak freely.”
He nodded.
“Why are we targeting cadets and midshipmen? It doesn’t seem to be doing anything.”
He slammed his hands down offscreen and yelled, “Don’t question orders!!! Do as you’re told!!!”
“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.”
The intelligence officer hung up his TirQuarter. Pattaban was looking at a report saying that a group of Confederate cadets had just refused a lawful order to go to a training drill. Ten cadets were kicked out of the Enemy Navy, and the others were disciplined. Moral was beginning to fall, so it was working.
