The Darkness You Bring

Even so, I couldn't imagine anything of interest being left in the combine, and assumed the squad would simply press forward. I was dismayed, therefore, when Reyalis ordered a search of the dorms. I pleaded with her to reconsider, but she refused--clinging to the idea like a rabid dog with a bone. I only prayed the structures weren't rigged with traps.

Precious minutes ticked away while the troops fanned out, and then: "Commander!" It was Shiyava's voice. "I found something!"

What she'd found, in fact, was a pair of someones, holed up in a smoke-damaged living-pod. I haven't a clue why they were there--whether they had chosen to stay, or been abandoned by their fellows. Perhaps they'd put out the fire, which would be a mark in their favor. But they were also unclad, which weighed toward the likelihood that they were part of Kirz's bizarre leader-cult.

From the way they huddled together under the muzzle of the troopers' guns, I supposed they were a couple. They were both of middling age, but not perfectly matched. The man was older, balding, slumping a little. The woman was still rather fresh-faced, with a curvy, feminine figure and earthy thatch of pubic hair that I found agreeable. I'd once had a prostitute very like her while on business in Vissita, and the memory was a fond one.

Reyalis strode near to the hapless pair, towering over them with blood in her eyes, feet set apart, hands on hips. "You know something," she hissed. "You dug those pits, didn't you?"

"No--no!" the man replied. "Others did it. The Teacher told them to."

The lieutenant launched into a barrage of follow-up questions. "Where are the rest of the pits located? ... Who dug them? ... Where are your comrades? ... Who gives you orders? ... Where is Kirz? ..." The man tried to satisfy her, but his responses were vague and contradictory. Within a minute or two, I'd concluded he didn't really know anything. Oh, it was possible that he had picked up a shovel. But even supposing it was true, his intel still didn't reach any further than the bottom of a couple holes.

Reyalis, however, couldn't accept this--couldn't let it go. I don't believe she was really looking for information at all anymore. Just someone to blame... someone to punish. "You're going to talk. You're going to tell me what you know. Because if you don't, then every man in the unit will take a turn with your girl here."

The woman blanched and shrank away, and the man put a protective arm around her shoulders. "No, no! We will tell you!"

It was a pitiable performance; and I thought the grunts, at least, might see the futility in going on like this. But from the stony looks on their faces, it appeared they were of much the same mind as their officer. Six of their number had fallen. Someone had to pay.

After another round of unsatisfactory answers, the shockers shifted to making good on Reyalis's threat. Without even needing to be told, Amaya and Shiyava dragged the local woman to her feet, and bent her over a table. Then, while they held her arms, two of the other troops used their belts to strap her ankles to the table-legs. Jeffer, meanwhile, had whipped out his cock, and was firming up fast.

"Last chance," Reyalis snarled. "Talk now, or we fuck her!"

The man was close to tears. "Please! If you let her go, I will show you where the Teacher is. If you let her go I will tell you everything."

Jeffer took a step closer to the table, glancing at the lieutenant for the go-ahead. But she stayed him with an upraised hand, and cocked an inquiring brow at me instead. "First crack, commissioner? Privilege of rank?"

I won't insult you with a lie--I was very much tempted to accept her offer. Eyeing the woman there, pinned down by two soldiers and utterly at my mercy, I felt a crude surge of arousal in my loins, that was somehow all the sweeter for her helplessness.

Indeed, she was a tasty little thing, very pleasant to look at. The plump swell of her tits had caused them to bulge out fetchingly at the sides when she was pressed down on the tabletop. The arc of her back was smooth and delicate. The rich, round curves of her ass beckoned me to grab them with greedy fingers. And the ruddy, silken softness of her gash... mmh, it would indeed be a joy to sink my organ into that. To batter down her feeble resistance, and soak her with my essence...

After all, at a most basic level (however much we might dress it up), wasn't this exactly what men of my station did--foist ourselves on females of her station? Usually not forcibly, of course, and rarely in front of their life-mates. But it fit the general pattern well enough.

And added to this, there was another factor as well. The truth was that I fully understood the sentiments of the shockers, and in large measure shared them. These locals were the enemy. They might not know anything, or be in much of a position to hurt us. But they belonged to Kirz, and it was Kirz's people who had killed my comrades and very nearly killed me. It seemed only fair to wrest what I could from them in return.

Yet, in spite of all that, this moment was also colored with a sickly, pallid tinge--a tinge that disturbed me, and swayed me not to give in to my lustful urges.

On the one hand, it was a moment of far too much insanity. If Reyalis hadn't been deranged before, then I felt sure she was now. Nothing she was doing made sense, and it was going to get more people hurt. I wanted no part of such brainlessness; and it seemed I should do whatever I could to reject it.

And on the other hand, it was also a moment of too much crystal clarity. I felt I was seeing the empire, and how it operated, with an uncanny, ugly lucidity. A scene like the one laid out before me simply did too fine a job of exposing the raw, functional mechanics of our society, and the seamy underbelly of 'how things are done.' It left me wanting nothing, except to crawl back into the gauzy self-deceptions of my old bureaucratic life.

The entire room watched me, silent and expectant, as these gears turned in my head. Then I reached a decision. Turning on my heel, I strode from the room.

Outside, I sat down against an exterior wall in a patch of shade and waited. An hour or so passed, and then the squad finally straggled back into the light. Silently, we grabbed our packs and returned to the Heartline.

"Did you learn anything?" I asked, after the agcombine had passed from view.

"No." Reyalis said expressionlessly.

I'd never heard the chatter of the autoguns, but wagered there was no one left at the settlement now.

Two more days, I thought when we trudged out of camp the next morning. At least, if my reckoning was correct. And we maintained a steady pace.

Well, that latter hope was quickly dashed. Not an hour into our hike, we came up short before a churning torrent of murky, plum-purple water. The flow emerged from the jungle on one side, sliced a channel perhaps 20-meters wide across the track, then disappeared again into the vegetation on the other side.

We stood there, scratching our heads. If we'd had the floaters, we would have glided right over it without paying much heed. But for a squad on foot, it was a substantial barrier.

Reyalis, in particular, seemed unable to reconcile herself with what her senses told her. "This... it... wasn't on any of our charts..."

"Shanlu river?" I mused. "The old waterway probably ran through here, before it was diverted. Big terraproject, seventy or eighty years back--channeled the entire river to run south of E'ban. They use it to drive the big sluices there, and irrigate the mangga plantations. Well, not anymore. Kirz must have found a way to crack the levees."

The team was waiting for orders, but the lieutenant showed little of her usual decisiveness. "We... um... Davinn, come up with some way to cross that."

The soldiers put their heads together. The river wasn't terribly wide, but its rushing, eddying swiftness hinted at depth and power. Finally, one of the larger squad-members--Davinn, presumably--approached and saluted. "If we're smart about it, I should be able to carry a line over. Then the rest of us can use it to cross safely."

I think Reyalis was relieved that someone had an idea. I can only assume this sort of thing would normally be child's-play to a trained officer like her. But between the stifling heat, the strangeness of Barnards, and the dismal series of defeats we'd suffered at the hands of Kirz's pathetic band, she was plainly rattled, and badly off her game. "Good. Get to it."

They tied a stout irocore rope to one of the larger trees at the edge of the road. Then, as a couple of other troopers belayed the line, Davinn waded into the water. The bank was steep, and after just a few paces he was in up to his chest. The clutching fingers of the current tore at him; but steadied by the tether, he took one stubborn step forward, and then another, and another.

It was just then that we heard a dull, steady, powerful thump begin to sound--audible even over the roar of the water. Like some heavy metallic drumbeat, it echoed from the jungle upstream, not far off. The cadence was ominous, each crump sending a throb of nervous anxiety through our hearts. The shockers raised their weapons, scanning the underbrush, expecting a horde of Kirz's naked savages to rush us at any moment. But if his minions were there, crouched in the shadows watching us, then we couldn't detect it.

Davinn had reached mid-channel, and I was beginning to think he'd make it, when we heard a bone-rending crack. Almost at once, a massive frond-trunk swept down the waterway.

He never had a chance. The thing barreled straight into Davinn--parting the cord and flinging him head over heels, like a ragdoll. Then he was gone... alive or dead we couldn't say, but carried off to parts unknown.

The fighters blasted the forest upriver indiscriminately, plastering it with slugs, showering it with plasgrenades. We had no sign that we'd hit Kirz's bushmen, but it was cathartic.

This latest attack did at least infuse Reyalis with new life--pumping her full of a fresh dose of fury. "Fuck this," she growled. Fixing two new ropes in place of the ruined line, she waded straight out into the water. Perhaps she was simply seeing red; but whether by instinct or reason, I believed she had the right idea. With the enhanced strength and protection of her mechsuit, not to mention knowing what was coming, the lieutenant would likely shrug off the kind of blow that had felled Davinn.

As the opaque, slimy waters rose around her, she held the ropes high, guarding against the likelihood that the next log would sever them. The rest of us could only wait--soldiers stroking their triggers with a light, seductive touch, while I held my bated breath...

But, the next log never came. Maybe we'd killed the axmen responsible. Maybe they knew it was impossible to take out a suited officer that way. Or perhaps this had been their plan all along, and they'd simply melted back into the wilderness.

Reyalis secured both ropes well above the waterline--vertically separated from each other by about a meter. This arrangement allowed the rest of us to edge across in relative safety. I've rarely felt as naked as I did then, suspended out over the middle of the river, wondering what eyes might be playing over me from the depths of the jungle. But the troops were vigilant against renewed attack, and in the end we made it across without further incident.

When we assembled on the far side, Reyalis's anger still seethed, raw and indiscriminate. "We'll show these fuckers what they're dealing with. We'll incinerate the next ten goddamn klicks of Heartline. And then go right on doing it, all the way to E'ban. Dial up your rockets."

I tried to deflect her. We were in the middle of economically-viable territory now. If the district was rendered sterile, it'd set the development of Barnards back a quarter-century. And I knew who the prefect would blame. "Yes, ah-... but you see, my orders..."

It really didn't matter what I said, though. One of the soldiers--Balaan it was--talked right over me like I wasn't there. "No lieutenant, we aren't firing any more nukes. That previous blast-zone was only four or five klicks, and it cost us nearly half a day. Deal out much more of that and we're goners. Anyway, we need E'ban in one piece if we're gonna hold out long enough to be rescued."

Reyalis fumed with an unquenchable rage. Face beet-red, eyes showing the implacable glare of a mad bull, she brandished her pulser at Balaan. "Insubordination is a Reg-Ten offense. You know this can pierce right through your kevvron... However, under the circumstances, I'm willing to forego field-execution. The courts martial on Celestria may let you live. Disarm, soldier!"

He didn't disarm. Instead, Reyalis stiffened to feel an autogun muzzle press up against the back of her helmetless head. "Lieutenant, you've shown yourself unfit for this mission," Amaya said in a voice of unnatural calm. "I'm relieving you of duty. Take off the suit."

My eyes ranged over them, wondering how it would play out. And I could see the cogs turning in Reyalis's mind as well: assessing the options, weighing the percentages...

With just a nerve impulse, her pulser could cut Balaan in two. But then Amaya would surely pull the trigger. So... with her enhanced strength and speed, the officer could duck, wheel, and sweep Amaya's legs in bone-breaking fashion. But Amaya's finger need only move a couple of millimeters in that amount of time. The odds were not terribly encouraging... And even if she bested Amaya, there were still a half-dozen other troopers left. What would they do? Would she need to take them all out? Would one of them land a head-shot before she did...?

Reyalis raised her arms in surrender.

With a single, well-directed thought, she activated the suit-removal protocols. A faint whirring was audible, invisible seams opened, joints disengaged, and then the individual components--a complex assortment of arm, leg, and torso panels--pivoted apart for removal.

Soon, the mechsuit was piled at her feet like so much refuse. Just one more bit of debris added to the carcasses of floaters and broken bodies of soldiers we'd left scattered along the trail...

Something I learned that day was that shocker officers have not a stitch on beneath their armor--not even the underwear or form-fitting body stocking I might have imagined. Perhaps skin-to-suit contact was necessary in order for man and machine to bond so seamlessly.

At any rate, it was the first time I'd witnessed Reyalis appear nude before her troops. I very much doubted she'd ever done so before in her life, in fact. Even when intimate with me, she'd kept her top on. And absurdly, when the delectable teardrop heft of those perfectly-symmetrical tits came wobbling into view, some vestigial male part of me couldn't help salivating. Her areolae were generous and pink and slightly puffy, and I wondered if that was how the emperor himself preferred his women in the seraglio.

The soldiers perused her unclad form in a leisurely manner, expressions betraying a complex mix of curiosity, envy, malice, and lust. She was better at hiding her feelings than they, but you could see the tension and adrenalin their crude inspection roused in her. What gave it away was the clenching of her hands, the rise and fall of her breasts, the slight tremor around her eyes. Even so, she held her head up, jaw set defiantly. Reft of nearly everything that mattered to her--clear-headedness, authority, tools of power, and dignity of rank--she still clutched on to her pride. Let them kill her. She'd go out as she'd come: a true Celestrian elite.

The ringleaders conferred, while the others kept their weapons trained on Reyalis. Stripped of her suit she was a mere mortal--genetically endowed with strength, speed and agility far beyond the norm, perhaps, but just as vulnerable to their slugs as anyone. Yet even knowing this, the guards still shifted nervously in their boots. She'd spent years cultivating that aura of menace, and it wasn't so easy to dispel.

As for me, it appeared no one there considered my presence relevant anymore. Reyalis did not look to me to intercede, and nor did her fighters consult with me (let alone defer to me) on their course of action.

At length, a decision was reached. Amaya stepped forward. "We judge you guilty of gross negligence, leading to the death of your fellow shock-troopers. It is a Reg-Ten offense. However, we have no wish to kill a sister. Instead, you will be punished under Reg-Nine."

Reyalis gulped visibly, her teeth clenched. Whatever 'Reg-Nine' was, she obviously wasn't pleased with the verdict. I half-fancy she might have preferred to meet the firing squad and be done with it.

All was still for a time. Sweat beaded on Reyalis's forehead, and we could hear the drip-drip of condensation among the fronds. That silence was suffocating; and as it stretched out, longer and longer, it began to weigh heavy on our backs--heavier, even, than the dank, cloying atmosphere of the jungle.

At last, the officer stirred herself. With much the same ritualized manner as I'd seen her soldiers adopt when bracing for punishment, she sank slowly to her knees. Next, planting her arms on the ground, she lowered her face into the squishy, verdant grime of the Heartline. Finally, spreading thighs wide, she reached her hands back behind her ass... wedged fingertips in-between labia... and pried both pussy and buttocks clean open.

After that, well, she simply waited there in that pose, exhibiting her most private parts to us in about the most humiliating fashion possible. It was poignant to see her debase herself like that. To see her render that soft, sensitive, rosy-red gash of hers so profoundly vulnerable. To see her invite those hard-nosed grunts to enter her, and plunder her bodily treasures.

Another moment passed. Then, with a matching air of formality, the surviving males (five, leaving me aside) removed their trousers, formed in a line, and began coaxing and massaging their cocks up to full erection.

Balaan was at the front of the column, and he paced over to his former commander with military precision. Pressing one broad, calloused hand against the side of her face, he thrust her head more firmly into the muck. Then, reaching the other hand behind her ass, he drove three blunt fingers deep into Reyalis's cunt.

The woman cringed and yelped at the incursion. Frankly, I was a bit shocked to see her react like that. In the short time I'd known her, I'd never seen her mask of stoic self-assurance waver in the slightest. Still, it was a toothless protest--she was in no position to do anything more than bleat. A cold smirk appeared on Balaan's lips at the sound of her squeals, and he leaned over to speak in her ear. "When a soldier gets her brothers and sisters killed, she puts herself below all of 'em. So now you're going to lie under us, like the maggot you are. And we're gonna take what we want from you." He spat on her face.

Removing his hands and shifting to crouch behind her, he nestled the springy tip of his penis against her opening (an opening which, even now, her trembling fingers still held apart for his convenience). Then at last, in plain sight of us all, he began cramming that massive, golden-tan battering-ram of his straight down her pipe.

This initial plunge was slow and labored. Instinctively, her flesh rebelled against such a violation of her autonomy--battling frantically to keep him out. For an imperial elite like her to be taken, penetrated, raped by a creature as far below her as a line-soldier? It went against all her programming, both social and genetic. She had no choice but to try and resist it.