Chapter Eight
Angh
The cadets swarmedthe grounds below like an army of insects. I stood next to the Academy training commander and watched the activity from an observation deck. On the rocky terrain below was a mock battlefield eerily similar to the ground I’d fought for on Latiri 4, before we lost it to the Hive. Before I lost everything to the Hive.
Battlegroup Karter had been forced to retreat from the planet, and its twin, Latiri 7, when the strange new Hive weapon had been deployed. With Commander Phan, we’d managed to save the battlegroup, and I’d read reports that my old shipmates were steadily gaining ground in the sector once again. Most of that gain was due to the skills and talents of Commander Phan from Earth, and the strange Hive implant in her head.
We’d been the only two who could hear them. The enemy. And although we’d managed to dismantle their offensive net of explosives, her implant was put in place by the Intelligence Core. Mine was pure Hive. Just like the implants in my arms and back, my muscles.
I was contaminated. Commander Phan was not. And so she fought on with the Battlegroup while I’d been sent to The Colony to hope and pray to the gods for a mate, for some kind of decent life.
But even that would be denied me and I’d given up hope. Yet now—
“You have to tell her the truth. Tell her what will happen to you if she does not accept your claim.” Denzel stood on my right, shoulder to shoulder, as we watched the battle scenario unfold below. Somewhere down there was my mate, directing her cadets in a mock battle that looked all too real. It set me on edge, my beast pacing, even though I knew it wasn’t real. I’d seen real and didn’t want to go back.
“Tell her the truth? I will not,” I told him. “She has made her choice.” I watched her move with a small strike team in a flanking maneuver. They hadn’t been seen by their enemy combatants yet, and soon it would be too late for them to recover. In a short time, my mate would be upon them with her team and the game would be over.
Kira moved like a shadow, carried her weapon as if it were an extension of her arm. I only had eyes for her. Could pick her easily from a large crowd, or a mock battle. For others, she was obvious in her instructor’s uniform, the others with her in the uniform of the cadet. she was easy to see. When she aimed her rifle, she did not miss, no matter the distance. The other instructors on the ground were skilled. Patient. But they didn’t move as she did, like she was nothing more than a ghost passing through the darkness to destroy her enemies. It was obvious why she was an instructor. It was obvious she’d spent time in battle. She had stories I did not know, but I wanted to learn them all.
An unexpected sense of pride filled me as I watched her. She was a sight to behold. Beautiful and deadly. Fearless. She ducked an ion blast and didn’t even pause in her step before returning fire and striking her ‘enemy’ down.
I knew the ion blasts were fake flashes of light, that the fallen were not truly dead, but the sights and sounds of battle were real, not forged. The screams of pain real as well, for the specialty training gear simulated the sting of taking an actual ion blast in armor if a cadet was hit. They had to be ready for anything, and being conditioned to deal with the jolt of an ion blast in a real battle could prove to be the difference between life and death.
Or worse. Turning into the likes of me.
I’d been through these simulations, this training. I’d been on that exact training field. There were no Atlans out there today, mostly the smaller races, those from Earth, Trion and Everis. I knew the Atlans and Prillon warriors trained for different types of missions, would use the field in different scenarios and practiced at a different time.
Below me, a pincer move-and-ambush on an enemy base camp was underway, led by my mate. The other three Academy commanders were pitted against her, their teams moving to protect the base flag that represented their stronghold.
Kira and her team were on high ground, moving to a flanking position as the rest of her team feigned a full-frontal assault. They struck hard and fast, then pulled back into a narrow ravine, taking up sniper positions to keep their enemies pinned down and engaged on their front line.
The Atlans were usually up front in a full ground assault, charging through the middle, tearing bodies in half as we went. The Prillons usually combined ground and air assault tactics, their pilots uncannily skilled at hitting targets on the ground with little to no margin for error.
But the stealth I witnessed here was astonishing.
“Damn, she’s good.” Denzel was watching as well, his arms crossed. He whistled when she moved directly behind the defending team’s commander and took aim with her rifle. “She can’t hit that shot. She’s five hundred yards from the target.”
The Academy observer snorted in disgust. He was a huge Prillon warrior, young, but strong. “Captain Dahl does not miss. Not from that short distance. I have seen her strike a Hive Scout through the heart from a mile away.”
I grunted, but said nothing. A Hive Scout? What the fuck was my mate doing attacking a Hive Scout? But as the defender fell—from that substantial a shot—his body armor forcing him to remain unmoving on the ground, I watched Kira silently signal her team to move in on the flag target.
One by one her opponents fell. She struck in the rear, taking out the nearest defender until the opponents’ entire team was focused forward and no one remained to defend their flank.
As she walked forward and lifted the flag from its base with no resistance, I realized that I had no idea what my mate was capable of. I knew little to nothing about her or her life. Her history. Her training. Her job here. I wanted her. Needed her. My beast howled for only her, yet there was much to learn. She was my very soul, yet a complete enigma.
I turned to the Prillon, who was grinning as the alarm bell rang, signaling a victor. “Hive Scout? Do the instructors here frequently go into enemy territory?” I had never head of such a thing, but I had to admit I did not know anything about the Coalition Academy or how it was operated. I had trained on Atlan, in a different facility before being voted in as commander of my unit. The election was a huge honor and I had served proudly up until the day I was captured by the Hive.
The Prillon cleared his throat, then turned to me with one eyebrow raised. “Apologies Warlord, did you ask me a question?”
I frowned. He’d heard me. We both knew it. “I asked, Prillon, if the instructors here normally go on strike missions against Hive positions? Do they go into active combat?”
He grinned. “Not normally. No. But Captain Dahl isn’t exactly normal, is she?”
“Do all of your instructors hold the rank of Captain?”
“No. Of course not.” Shaking his head like I was a fool, he turned from us and made his way down to the field. Victors and those who had been defeated now stood shoulder to shoulder on the ground as the Prillon recounted what he’d seen from his vantage point in the tower. Strengths. Weaknesses. Mistakes.
Through it all, my mate stood with the victory flag in one hand and her rifle in the other. She had removed her helmet and used the flag arm to hold it on her hip. Her hair was a wild, sweaty tangle and her eyes intense and focused with the challenge and victory, but not surprise. I saw no arrogance or excitement. Around her, chests heaved with exertion. Cadets threw up or dug at their uniforms, fighting the heat or resonant pain of the ion blasts they’d taken.