Masoul (Harmony War Series Book 2) (12 page)

              And so the next few months passed. Nerva talked about every facility with a familiarity that made the troopers think he had been in the system before.

              He talked about a fleet of massive freighters and shuttles moving the people of Masoul out to the rest of the system. Other than Masoul Actual people, there were the asteroid and atmosphere collection, and refining centers. Masoul G, which gained the nickname Gas planet before the end of lecture, had asteroids lowered into the atmosphere with massive collectors that grabbed the planet’s atmosphere. It was pulled into refiners that were stored and passed off to freighters. More asteroids were converted for holding and resting places for the workers. The CEO station rested above them, which was again made from an asteroid. It was identical to the stations over Masoul. Outside, they looked like spherical objects. The older a station, the smoother it looked. Inside they were a mass of artificial gardens, open areas of armored glass and synthetic metal - nothing at all like the dirty and dark conditions that the people of Masoul actual lived in.

              More stations rested in the asteroid belt that was just within the gravitational pull of Gas planet. A CEO asteroid held position just off of the asteroid belt, close to the refiners and finished materials holding stations. Hundreds of shuttles and freighters moved from the mining projects happening on multiple asteroids, brought back raw materials, and dumped them into the refiners. Crews that did their few months of labour were given rest in asteroid stations nearby, or shipped back to Masoul.

             
Strike
Station rested around Masoul E, with three other stations. The only other installations in the system were the progressing stations in the asteroid belt, or around Gas Planet. The last and biggest was Shipping Station.

              The station was massive, with a twenty-kilometer radius. Super Freighters were built with the purpose of moving the sphere’s materials to Masoul’s Shipping Station. Even they were half the size of the station. The station could be filled within seven years of the system’s output. The freighters dropped off their loads from the other planets in the Sphere. That turned into four months. Super freighters, or their smaller brethren, constantly poured into the system. Refined materials and technology - the products that the Sphere poured out - were the lifeblood of the EHC. It was why
Strike
Station was in Masoul. All of that fuel and those resources kept the EHC moving. Without them, there would be some serious issues.

              As they learned about the system they were going to, they ran through countless simulations on the various decks. It helped more than most would have assumed to knowing what pipes meant what, and the standardized layouts of the stations.

              The best of it all was the time off.

              ***

              Jerome slumped into the booth with Holm, Mark, Tyler and Alexis.

              “Just a week to go until we’re in the coffins and put to sleep till we come up on
Fearless
,” Jerome said, as he nursed a beer in his hand.

              “Yeah, then
more
training and we’ll be off to Masoul,” Alexis replied, with tiredness seeped into her voice from all the training.

              The complaints reached the higher ups, and it was why they had the next week off before they filed into the stacks of cryo pods, to be lost to time. They would be waiting there until they were awoken to war.

              “The joys of the EMF,” Tyler said, as he raised his beer in a faux toast. He got a snort from his girlfriend.

              “I don’t like this Harmony group one bit,” Jerome said as he leaned forward. His eyes were dark.

              “You talking about the freighters they seized?” Mark asked. It was a few weeks old, but it still unsettled a few. Harmony spread their influence across Masoul, to the gas planet. The asteroids were still unclaimed, but they took as much refined materials from Shipping Station and the storage stations around Gas planet as possible.

              Harmony wasn’t as quick to get to shipping station. When they got there, there was little left. The Gas planet storage still had most of their resources. They stayed at the shipping station, and people thought that was it. A freighter came in, and people tried to warn it off but it kept coming. The followers of Harmony waited. There were no reports of fighting, but a few hours later, inner-system freighters headed for Masoual actual and Gas planet.

              There was some fighting on Gas planet, as Harmony asserted control. Gas planet still had their cryo-bunkers. Those that didn’t want any part already climbed aboard them, hit the auto-pilot, and waited at a certain point outside the system for retrieval.

              Once Gas planet was under Harmony’s control, communications stopped coming from it - as with Masoul. Freighters and shuttles moved across the systems, and there was a regular hive of activity between Masoul actual, the Shipping Station, and Gas planet’s stations.

              Another freighter came in, and it too didn’t move from its place at shipping station. It was a damned mess.

              “Yeah, either they’re pretty good and capable of stopping people from communicating with the freighters, or those freighters are being sent as aid,” Jerome said, as he looked up into the silence.

              “Come on, that’s pretty damned elaborate. Maybe two systems could work together. Those freighters are from two different systems. There aren’t many crew on those things - just twenty people at a time and their families, maybe four hundred people tops. The Harmony bastards probably got a couple of thousand loyal followers on there. And those freighter workers aren’t going to put their family in Danger,” Tyler argued.

              “Maybe, but Nerva tells us to look at all the possibilities,” Jerome said, as he sat back and drank his beer.

              “Well, you’re a ray of sunshine today,” Holm said, as he shot Jerome a look and a grin before he took a swig.

              Someone tapped Jerome on the shoulder. He turned and found a rather pretty athletic-looking woman.

              She was smiling at him for some reason.

              “Hello, can I help you?” he said, as his eyes fell to her nametape. He definitely wasn’t taking in the way her smart clothes gripped what lay underneath that nametape.

             
What? I’m a guy, ogling is my first function. Garcia - that name’s familiar. Why am I thinking of baseball?

              “Hello Sergeant Jerome. Mind if I buy my savior a beer?” she said, as she enjoyed his confusion.

              “Savior?” he asked. He looked at her in alarm, and his eyes twitched to the others in the booth to see if they knew what in the hell she was talking about.

              “You don’t remember?” she said. She was clearly teasing him.

              “Nope,” he said, as he shook his head. She laughed, and it was a rich. It made Jerome want to hear it again.

              “The last time you saw me, I got hit in the side with the boulder and was freaking out. I believe you told me to ‘Calm down you twat.’” The smile was still on her lips.

              “Oh,” Jerome said. The memory came back to him, and he wasn’t sure what to say to that little remark. He remembered how he raced around to get ammunition to people, and checked on his section when someone got bowled over with a boulder.

              “So, what about that beer?” she asked, as her eyes danced.

              “See you around,” Jerome told the others, and chugged the rest of his drink.

              “Nice to meet you all,” Garcia said. She smiled to everyone and let Jerome out of the booth. She led the way to the bar, and the smart clothes helped him see all that was hidden under her armor.

              They rested on the bar, and looked at one another.

              “Sorry about back on Sacremon. I thought you were a guy,” Jerome said. He hoped that was the right thing to say.

              “And now?” she said, as she flicked those deep brown eyes up to his.

              “Most definitely not,” he grinned.

              “Good answer,” she said, and let out a chuckle.

              “What can I get you?” the bartender asked.

              “Two beers, please,” Garcia said, as she passed her hand over the scanner and deposited the required credits.

              “Coming right up,” the bartender said. He grabbed the squeeze bottles that every liquid was stored in, and put them to the taps. A bubbly brown liquid showed through their clear packaging.

              Garcia made small chat.

              “So, what unit you with?” she asked.

              “Alpha Company, Second platoon, third section. You?”

              “Bravo, First, First,” she said, as the bartender came back with their beers.

              “Thanks,” Jerome said. He held it up and toasted her.  

              “Gotta thank my savior somehow.” Her smile was back in full force as she took a long drag off the beer.

              “You were a squirmer,” Jerome chuckled.

              “You said I had a broken arm!” she said, as she hit him lightly.

              “You wouldn’t shut up, or stop moving,” Jerome shrugged. He hid his grin behind his bottle as he took a drink, and moved a bit closer as he brought it down.

              “Took two days for them to sort me out up here,” she countered.

              Jerome took another drink.

              “And you got a nice vacation, look at that,” he said.

              “I’m not going to win this argument, am I?” she asked, as she bit her lip.

              “Nope I don…” Jerome’s words were stopped with Garcia’s lips. He stood there in shock for a moment before he melted around her. His hands moved around her back, and he pulled her to him. He had the pent-up need of a trooper to feel alive with another person, and it raged inside of him. They parted, and he felt the same hunger in her eyes. There was little time for niceties in the EMF.

              “Library?” he asked.

              “Look at you, such a gentleman,” she quipped, and bit her lip and smiled.

              “Well I did save your life,” Jerome said, with his face split in a smile.

              “I guess I should repay you,” she answered. Her lips came up to his quickly, and her hand snaked into his as she pulled him away from the bar.

              They got to the door, and both of them downed their drinks. They weren’t allowed outside of the mess.

             
Girl after my own heart,
Jerome thought. He thanked whatever luck that got him a night with this wonder of the opposite sex.

              She let out a belch. Jerome, not about to be outdone, let one rip that made others look his way.

              “Gross,” she said with a laugh.

              “Hey, you did it first.”

              She bit her lip, kept walking, and shook her head. They got to the elevator and he pressed her up against the wall. He pushed his body against hers. The smart cloth was a thin barrier between their hungered bodies.

              Someone made a noise, and got on the elevator. Jerome and Garcia separated. They were a bit embarrassed, but not too much. The elevator got close to the library, and they jumped off.

              “Have fun!” the other rider said after them. They laughed as the doors shut, and they sped off.

              “Oh I think I will,” Jerome said, and got a look from Garcia. Then they were in the library, and headed for the darkest nook they could find.

Chapter 13

             
EMFC Reclaimer

             
In transit from Sol System to Masoul System

             
9/3206-1/3237

              “See you on the other side,” Alexis said with a grin.

              “You bet,” Tyler said, and kissed her before they went their separate ways. He fell in with the rest of his platoon, and headed down the spine of
Reclaimer
. Everyone found their pod and climbed in. They slapped the adhesive skin-contact leads, and hooked on their harnesses while the sedative took effect.

              Tyler looked out through drowsy eyes, as the pod’s door shut. Then they opened.

              Tyler checked his implants. It had been thirty-one years and four months since he went to sleep.

              He stepped out of the pod, and his body felt like it was half asleep. It was hard to think that so much time went by. It felt like he had just closed his eyes.

              His implants pinged, and he used the implants in his eyes to pull up the message. Instead of heading to the platoon’s barracks, he headed towards the armories. The rest of the Platoon did the same thing. Most of them wobbled, and looked more like zombies from old-fashioned movies than humans.