C J L MARR

Preview - Hocha

 

Chapter One

    “This is a different kind of mission,” said the man.
    He was a colonel in full dress uniform and looked magnificent.
    “I’ve just come from an audience with Queen Lolai of Strarius.  She is seeking some volunteers.  The mission is entirely voluntary, and will be dangerous.  You will be in the firing line.”
    He turned his back on us, giving the option to anybody who wanted to leave.  There were fourteen of us seated before him.  I knew only three of them to talk to, and only four more by sight.  The remainder were either mercenaries or agents from somewhere other than home base.  None of us moved.
    “Okay then,” he turned to face us again after several seconds, “I’ll offer Her Highness the services of all fourteen of you.”
    I felt more than saw a few swift glances exchanged around me.
    “I’m going to get out of this regalia.  Meet in the briefing room at,” he looked down at his watch, “thirteen hundred hours.”
    He turned and strode from the room.
    “Wow, exciting stuff, eh Suzi?”  Said Schleffer from beside me.  “Cloak and dagger with a royal flavour.”
    Schleffer was one of the three left in the room that I knew to talk to.  I also knew him in a hundred other ways, each more intimate than the previous one.  He had been my lover for almost a year, although with his “contracts” and a few missions of my own, we’d only actually been together for about eight weeks of that time.  However, those weeks had been filled with immense passion.  I kissed his cheek.
    Schleffer was a mercenary with a soft spot for the Agency.  Fortunately, it also had a soft spot for him, and we lived together happily on Hanos, home base of the Universal Security Agency, or U.S.A as it was commonly called.  Schleffer’s “contracts” took him to many worlds I hadn’t even heard of, where he fought for whomever was paying him.  Unlike some of his kind, he had a conscience and would never take a job that he felt was for the “wrong” side.
    On the other hand, I worked for the Agency and therefore did as I was ordered most of the time.  It appeared that this particular mission would be an exception to that rule since I’d already been given the choice of opting out.  I agreed with Schleffer’s ethics of never fighting for the wrong side, but so far the Agency had never asked me to do such a thing.  I didn’t know what would happen if they ever did, and hoped I’d never have to find out.
    We headed out into the corridor.  It was already twelve-twenty so there wouldn’t be time to get home, make love, and return by thirteen hundred.  I would simply have to wait until after the briefing before feeling this man inside me again.
    Schleffer greeted a huge man with a mop of dark hair and an untidy beard and they shook hands in some strange ritualistic manner – I guessed it was a man thing.  I watched Schleffer as he smiled and exchanged tales with the man.  A few tufts of his red-on-blonde hair curled around his ears and at the back of his neck.  His powerful body and large frame made his friend look fat and flabby, and I longed to feel him holding me close.
    “Tiger, this is my partner, Suzi,” said Schleffer, realizing that he had left me out of the conversation.
    “How did this ugly brute end up with a beauty like you?”  Asked Tiger in a gruff voice with an accent I didn’t recognize.
    “Just lucky I guess.”
    Tiger took my hand gently but firmly, and raised it to his lips, where he kissed it in a wonderfully gallant manner.
    “Well, when you’ve tired of his inadequacies, look me up,” smiled Tiger, and it was such a genuine smile that I couldn’t possibly take any offence whatsoever.  
    With such a smile I was sure he had swept many a woman off her feet.
    I glanced at Schleffer as if summing him up.
    “Don’t hold your breath,” I smiled back.
    Schleffer slapped Tiger on the shoulder and the two laughed and turned toward the mess hall.
    “I’ll be right behind you,” I said and watched them go.
    I looked around and spotted an agent named Qwetta.  We had bumped into each other a few times in the gym but had done little more than nod greetings in the past.  I had heard that she had been on a difficult assignment not that long ago.
    “Qwetta, how are you?”  I asked as I approached her.
    “Hi Suzi, I’ll live.”
    The woman was slightly shorter than me and seemed rather slight, but having watched her working out, I’d think two or three times before taking her on in a fight.  Like all of the female agents classed as “intels”, we both had the task of gathering intelligence, and we were trained – and expected – to use any and all means at our disposal.  This included our bodies, either to infiltrate or distract, to buy time or to buy favours.  Some of us were also trained in unarmed combat and were also familiar with an arsenal of weaponry, for those occasions when our bodies simply weren’t enough to get the job done.  It took a certain kind of woman to deliberately place herself naked and vulnerable in with somebody who would kill her as soon as look at her if her cover was blown.  My own background included a period of time in a brothel when I was a teenager.  This had hardened me, as had the murder of my parents and my sister.  After such an abrupt introduction to this filthy universe, I believed that very little could faze me.  I wondered what Qwetta’s background might include.
    “I had the bad luck to bump into somebody who knew me from a previous mission,” she continued.  “But I got out alive.”
    She didn’t smile, and I imagined that it had been a lot harder to escape with her life than her words implied.  The kinds of people we were expected to get information from were not the nicest in the universe and we mainly worked alone although there was usually a support group within a few minutes of us.
    “This one should be a lot easier.”
    Even though it had been emphasised that we would be in the firing line, the simple fact that we wouldn’t have to put our sanity on the line during this mission was a pleasant thought for both of us.  Living amongst the scum of the universe with the constant threat of discovery and death, or worse, tended to raise the stress levels, so simply being the target of an enemy laser gun would be a much more acceptable situation.
    We both smiled.  Mine was more relaxed than hers – was she trying to take on another mission too soon?  I guessed the shrinks must have cleared her for duty.  I decided to keep an eye on her if the circumstances allowed me to.

*****

    “The image you see before you is the Majoll, which some of you may have heard of.”  
    The colonel didn’t linger to find out if any of us had actually heard of it.  
    “The Royal Family of Strarius has been the custodian of the Majoll since the beginning of time.”
    This time he paused.  It was a dramatic statement, but nobody could really argue with its accuracy.  The Majoll was extraordinarily old, as was the Strarian Royal Family, so for all anybody knew, he was absolutely correct.
    Strarius was the first planet with a humanoid population that we came across when we, the early Earth explorers that is, started to spread themselves out into the galaxy.  Apparently Strarians had ventured into space at about the same time that the Roman Empire had been at its peak on Earth, but because they had solved the problems of disease and hunger as well, and had their population growth in check, there was little need to expand.  They had colonized a few of their local planets and had then happily sat back and rested on their laurels.  The result was that they had advanced little since those early days.
    The Majoll was egg-shaped, but larger than any egg I’d ever seen.  It probably was a little larger than Tiger’s head, including its mess of hair.  It was a plain brown-grey in colour with no obvious markings.  Around the middle of the object was a line, which I guessed was a join between the two halves of the egg, suggesting it held something within.
    “The Majoll is the oldest manufactured object in the universe.  It was made before history began, and its significance is colossal.  It is a symbol of civilization, and without it governments would fall.  The loss of the Majoll would not only bring about the end of the Strarian Royal Family, but would signal a shift to anarchy on half-a-dozen other planets.  Now you can see why the Agency has a vested interest in the safety of this object.”
    “What does it do?”  Asked one of the mercenaries from the back of the room.
    The colonel stopped, but didn’t look away from the image of the object lighting up the wall of the briefing room, and didn’t answer.  From what I had heard, nobody was really too sure what the Majoll was supposed to do, and most people didn’t care.  It was the symbolism that surrounded such an ancient artifact that made it the enigma that it was, not its function.  However I took a moment to wonder what might be held inside the shell.
    “You may also have heard about the civil war which has broken out on Strarius,” continued the colonel.  “The rumours you may have heard about it being a particularly bloody and fierce coup are all very true.”
    Now he looked away and glanced around the room.
    “Ladies and gentlemen, the Agency will not get involved in local politics – it is not in our mandate.  However, we have been engaged by the Royal Family of Strarius to move the Majoll to a safe place until the conflict is resolved.  That task is most definitely within our mandate, and that is the task for which you have all volunteered.”
    A shadowy figure who had been sitting in the corner now rose.
    “A plan has been devised to get the Majoll to Hanos.  While it is not foolproof, of all the options available to us, we feel the chosen plan has the best chance of success.  I will now hand you over to Nillando, the Royal Family’s representative, to explain the plan.”
    The colonel moved into the shadows, and Nillando stepped forward into the light of the projector.  Nillando reminded me of an aging boxer – his face was gnarled with age and experience, and his nose had been badly broken at some time in the past.  His hair was grey and thin.  He looked out toward us and the light caught his eyes.  They flashed with a steely blue, and I saw intelligence and compassion in them.  At first I though it was the light he was standing in, but then I realized that his skin was a yellow-green colour and then I remembered reading that Strarian blood was indeed a yellowy-green colour.  Apparently it was something to do with the amount of copper in their bodies, or something like that.
    “Good afternoon,” he began, with a firm voice, then paused for effect.  He was clearly used to facing audiences and to getting their full attention.
    “As Colonel Thom has mentioned, we have looked at a number of ways to ensure the safe removal of the Majoll from Strarius, and there simply is no sure method.  If we approach the task with a substantial show of force, it will attract an equally powerful response.  Our enemies, the Framma, have obtained substantial weaponry and are not afraid to use it.  We would risk losing the Majoll and a great many lives, both military and civilian.”
    Nillando glanced toward the bright image of the Majoll on the wall.
    “Instead, we have opted for a method which gives a much greater chance of success, but which, if it fails …” he paused as if looking for the right words to say, “would result in much less loss of life.”
    The Framma were the race that occupied the smaller continent of Strarius.  They had always been the runners-up in everything to do with progress on the planet and that fact had grown like a giant chip on their collective shoulders.  Despite their differences, the two races had tolerated each other for millennia, even after the agreement that saw the planet join the Galactic Economic Community under the name of Strarius, a title that had never been accepted by the Framma.  Peace had continued to reign until a Strarian health worker had been killed by a mob in the Framma capital city just a few years ago and things had quickly escalated into out and out war.  Both sides had blamed the other for the death and both sides had blamed the other for starting the war as well, but neither side seemed to be in a position to bring hostilities to a close.
    “So what’s the plan?”  Asked a male voice from the back.
    “We have made thirteen facsimiles of the Majoll, and they, plus the real Majoll, will be given to you – one each.  Then each of you will be given a different route out of Strarius.  None of you will know whether you have the real Majoll or a copy.  Even if the Framma learn about the Majoll leaving, they will need to monitor all fourteen of you, and they will need to move very quickly.  We have calculated that they might be able to stop two or possibly three of you, but the rest will get through.  The odds are in our favour that the Majoll will be saved.”
    “And what happens to the two or three of us who get stopped?”  Asked another male voice.
    Nillando paused for a moment as if seeking inspirational words.
    “The Framma rarely take prisoners,” he said finally.
    “So we’re expendable,” said the voice.
    “Might I remind you,” said Colonel Thom from the shadows, “that you all volunteered for this mission.”
    “I volunteered to be part of a team, not to work alone.”
    Thom stood and moved into the light.
    “Anybody who wants out, speak now.  To ensure security, you will be held in confinement here on Hanos until the mission is completed one way or the other.  You will then be released.  Anybody who stays in will give me one hundred percent effort.  I don’t want any half-hearted operators here.  The mission is just too important.  It’s total commitment, or out.”
    Thom moved his thumb toward the door in a flamboyant gesture as he finished his statement.
    There was a little movement and shuffling of feet and clothing, but nobody spoke and nobody left, not even the dissenter.      The fourteen of us were in.

*****

    As was often the case in missions involving the U.S.A, things moved quickly.  It was rare for agents to be able to plan an operation days ahead, and almost unheard of for the luxury of a week to get their affairs in order before setting off.  We were leaving at seventeen hundred, on the same day as the briefing.  The good news was that it would take around 50 hours to reach Strarius, and we were all traveling together, so I would have the chance to say goodbye properly to Schleffer.
    We were each assigned an agent to be with us until departure, to ensure we didn’t discuss the mission with anybody.  Such measures weren’t usually employed, but then mercenaries weren’t usually involved in our missions either.  An agent’s integrity would not have been questioned in such a manner, but because of the mercenary presence, we were all being subjected to extra measures.
    Schleffer and I, along with our two “security” agents, both of whom I knew well, returned to our home, grabbed a few essentials and returned to HQ without any fuss.  The rest of the group was soon with us, some excited by the prospect of another mission, others pensive, and still others withdrawn as they considered the possibility of death.  I had not been on that many missions, but I rarely considered death an option, even when it was staring me in the face.  My will to live was much stronger than my fear of death, and gave me the inner strength to carry on regardless.  However, this time it was not my own death that was on my mind, but the possibility of losing Schleffer.  He was a strong, powerful, intelligent man, and I had never feared for him when he had set off to fight wars, but this was different.  This was not a mission where his talents should keep him safe.  This would be more like “luck of the draw”, and he could die without ever getting the chance to face his enemy and fight them.
    I hid my fears, but I got the feeling that he was also hiding his fears about me.  This was not the best way to start a mission, but there was little either of us could do.  I vowed to myself that I would never take on a mission with him, or anybody I loved, again.  That way, I only had myself to worry about.  Maybe that was selfish, but in this line of work, that was not such a bad trait.
    We boarded the ship on time, and were finally rid of our shadow agents.  With them went one or two of my inner fears, maybe because it didn’t matter any more, there was no backing out now for any of us.
    We were given separate quarters, but after inspecting mine, I went to Schleffer’s and we made love.  It was not as relaxed and satisfying as normal, but we both had other small things on our mind this time.  We slept and were woken about ten hours into the flight.  The others were all in the small galley of the craft and a conversation had already started.
    “Hi guys,” said Tiger as we entered.  “We were just discussing the mission.  Nobody here has ever run into the Framma before.  How about you two?”
    Schleffer glanced at me and then answered for both of us.
    “No, never.”
    He took a seat at the central table while I made him a cup of coffee.      
    “But I have heard one or two stories in the past couple of weeks.”
    Everybody now focused in on Schleffer, hanging on his every word.
    “That guy at the briefing was right, they rarely take prisoners.  If you’re not with them, and not against them, they just ain’t interested in you.  So innocent bystanders don’t usually get mixed up in their stuff,” he paused and sipped the coffee I’d made.      “But if you’re against them, they have no problem killing you.  Conventions and compassion just don’t come into their figuring, so taking prisoners just ain’t on their list of options.  Apparently, they wiped out some Royalist camp a few weeks back, but missed out on a much bigger, juicier target because they failed to interrogate any of their captives, just killed ‘em.  To me, that’s their main weakness.”
    “Doesn’t help us much though, does it?”  Said somebody.
    “It might,” suggested Tiger.  “Bear in mind that bit about bystanders.  If they see black is black and white is white, consider adopting a shade of grey and you might just survive.”
    There were a couple of nods around the table.
    “To know something about the kind of people they are, and their thinking,” continued Schleffer, “consider what they do to their own.  I heard that they don’t kill traitors, they let them live.  They hack off arms, legs, genitals, tits, noses, eyes, ears, whatever they can to cause the most pain and disfigurement without killing.  Then they mark ‘em with tattoos across their faces, dug in with knives.  These people are forced to live the rest of their lives on display, with everybody knowing their crime and treating them like dirt.  Understandably, most take their own lives rather than face that.”
    “Shit!  That’s barbaric,” muttered a woman from the back.
    “Not to them it ain’t.”
    “Even that may be useful,” said Tiger.  “If you come across somebody in that situation, remember that they may be your ally.”
    “The bottom line,” continued the woman, “is to just kill ‘em.  And if you’re back’s against the wall, forget the idea of surrender.  Just take as many of them with you as you can.”
    “Hey, let’s not forget what this mission is all about,” I ventured.  “Don’t get too focused on killing them, or not getting caught yourself.  Remember that the Majoll must be protected at all costs.”
    “To hell with that!”  Rasped the woman.  “My life’s worth more to me than some bloody egg!”
    “You’re missing the point,” interrupted Tiger, who was beginning to grow in stature in my eyes.  “If you’re trapped, remember that it’s not you they’re after, it’s the Majoll.  You’re just in the way – a bystander.  Let them see their real target and they might just be distracted enough.  Or maybe let them think they see their real target.”
    “These guys certainly sound like they can be a little too focused,” said Schleffer, nodding slowly toward Tiger.  “I hadn’t thought of it that way, but you may be right – that may be another big weakness.”
    The conversation continued for some time after that, but little more of interest was actually said.  After a while it turned into a few disconnected gatherings, and finally it just broke up as most of us had run out of things to say.  However none of us had run out of things to think about.