Storm' Fury: The Shenkar War (35 page)

              The female with the dark hair, her name tag read: Birchette, spoke first.

              “Hi, can we join you or is this a private party?” she said, her eyes lingering on Liam.

              Callen looked to Liam before indicating the two open spots next to him. Before moving to the seats the other female pilot looked to Shizta and extended a hand. Without hesitation Shizta took her hand in his and shook.

              “Shizta, right? My name is Leah Aecrin, I hear we will all be working together.”

              Shizta hesitated but then smiled slightly and nodded towards Leah.

              “It is a pleasure to meet you as well, forgive me, but I am unaccustomed to female warriors. The Shenkar federation rarely has any females among our warrior caste. It is not because we forbid it but that the females of my race would rather not fight. Occasionally, some do, but like I said, it is rare. I mean no offense towards female warriors and I am sure you are more than capable warriors.”

              “No offense taken,” Leah smiled, and moved to take one of the seats Callen had indicated.

              “Alyssa Birchette,” stated the dark haired female, although she did not extend her hand in greeting but instead moved to an open seat next to Liam.

              Shizta couldn’t help but notice Alyssa sat as close to Liam as she could without being too obvious. He also noticed her eyes darted to Leah for a moment before turning her attention to Liam and the rest of the group. Looking to Leah, Shizta swore he saw a flicker of fire in her eyes, just for a moment, but he could not be sure. Could there be some sort of competition between the two for the affections of Liam? These humans truly were interesting and Shizta somehow knew he would never fully understand them.

January 20
th
, 2014 8:00pm

EDF
Kraken
, En-route to Shenkar space

              Liam had noticed the exchange between Leah and Alyssa. He was also uncomfortably aware of how close Alyssa was sitting without trying to be too obvious. Somehow he knew he was going to hear about this from Leah later on, even if he didn’t do anything wrong. Putting the thoughts out of his mind he turned to Steve.

              “I have been meaning to ask you, what are you doing in that large storage bay?”

              Steve seemed surprised and yet suspicious at the same time.

              “Why?

              Liam laughed but did not answer, instead giving him a “oh, come on, do I really need to answer that” look.

              Seeming to understand that Liam was only being curious he spoke up.

              “It’s not ready yet but let’s just say it could be a very useful enhancement towards our non-enhanced soldiers.”

              This piqued Liam’s curiosity but he did not push it further.

              The rest of the evening was spent enjoying one another’s company. They joked and Liam couldn’t help but notice how many human features Shizta displayed when he smiled and laughed. This made him wonder exactly how close they were to each other in DNA. Unfortunately, with the disappearance of the Meshtrell, this was something he could not address immediately and would have to be answered another day.

              His attention was shifted away from his thoughts as a pilot Liam did not recognize approached the table. As he came to stand before the table he snapped to attention, saluting Liam. He was roughly 5’6” in height, medium build with black hair and brown eyes. He had a pale complexion with distinct European features.

              “How can I help you?” Liam asked as he returned the salute.

              “I wished to thank you for saving my life,” the young pilot said nervously.

              Liam’s eyebrows rose in surprise at hearing this. When the pilot did not elaborate Liam spoke.

              “And I did that when?” he said in a way that said that the pilot needs too elaborate more.

              “During the battle, I had three Shenkar fighters on my tail, my shields had been nearly brought down when you intervened. Your intervention, and subsequent destruction of the three Shenkar, saved my life.”

              It took a moment to remember the situation the pilot had referred to. It had been just after Evan and the rest of the trainees had entered the battle. He hadn’t given it much thought, only reacted, and moved on.

              “No thanks are needed Lieutenant, I am sure you would do the same for me or any other pilot.”

              The pilot looked uncomfortable, as he looked to Liam before his gaze slid down to look at his feet.

              “I just hope I do not let you and the rest of the EDF down like my brother did. Your exploits are well known and I do not want to disappoint you,” he said quietly.

              Liam was confused for a moment before his eyes fell on the pilots name tag and comprehension dawned upon him. The pilots name tag read “Petiot”.

              “Your brother was Pierre Petiot.” Liam said, more a statement than a question.

              “Yes sir,” the pilot said, his voice holding the hint of sounding ashamed.

              Pierre Petiot had been one of the original pilots that had been present aboard the
Sacrifice
on her mission to slow down the original Shenkar fleet that had attacked Earth. He had been the leader of the French squadron which, due to Pierre’s arrogance, had been completely destroyed when he lead them into an ambush against Liam’s orders. Necro squadron had also suffered their first casualties as a result that day. The squadron would most likely have been completely destroyed if Liam hadn’t sacrificed himself to give the rest of the squadron a chance to get away.

That had been a very dark time for Liam as he had almost died; technically he did die but was revived via his nanites that were infused throughout his body. Instead he had been captured by the Shenkar where they performed tests upon him. While the tests had been painful the Shenkar had inadvertently unlocked something within Liam. The abilities that were unlocked were fascinating yet at the same time frightening. Those very abilities had almost cost Liam his sanity.

              Picking up his datapad he pulled up the pilot’s file. Gavin Petiot had tested very high on the tests, showing exceptional aptitude for combat in both space and the plasma sword. Cycling through the file he found what he was looking for, the most recent combat activity. The recent encounter pilot had proved Gavin did indeed have skill in the cockpit, credited with ten kills. The only negative thing listed within his file was that he lacked confidence.

              Setting the datapad down he looked back up at the pilot who was still staring at his feet.

              “Tell me, Lieutenant Petiot, I see that you are without a squadron. I have an opening on my squadron that I have yet to fill. How would you like it?”

              Gavin looked up in surprise, a grin spread across his face before he managed to suppress it.

              “I would be honored, sir, to fly with the best and I will not let you down.”

              Liam nodded to the Gavin.

              “Welcome to Necro squadron Lieutenant, I suggest you get familiar with your fellow pilots as we will be depending on each other in the upcoming campaign.”

              Gavin nodded and immediately introduced himself to Steve. After a few minutes of exchanged pleasantries Gavin excused himself from the table, bidding everyone a goodnight. Before he left he once again thanked Liam for the opportunity and again stated he would not let him down.

              As he walked away, Steve leaned over and spoke to Liam in a low voice.

              “This should be an interesting addition to our group.”

              “Why do you say that? His qualifications are more than acceptable. He only lacks confidence,” Liam stated.

              “Yeah, but this is the brother to the man that Evan could not stand, not to mention Evan hates the French.”

              Liam rolled his eyes at hearing this.

              “Evan will just have to deal with it, not all French are bad and every country has a few arrogant bad eggs.”

              “I know, I was just saying….should be interesting.

              Over the course of the evening Liam was pleasantly surprised at the number of pilots that stopped by their table to say hello and introduce themselves to Shizta. Liam also noticed that several of the pilots who had given hostile frowns when they first entered the officer’s mess were among them and their attitudes seemed to change once they spoke with Shizta.

              Something occurred to Liam as he watched the interactions between Shizta and the other pilots. Turning to Steve he addressed him in a low voice.

              “Where is Cryta? Did you not invite him to come with you when you left the meeting?”

              Steve shrugged, as he took a sip of his beer, before he answered.

              “I did but he declined saying he was still recovering from his injuries and wished to return to his quarters to rest. Although I don’t think he had resting in mind but more of viewing his entertainment network that was in his quarters.”

              “What makes you think that?” Liam inquired.

              “He asked me if he wanted to search for something specific within the network, how he would do it. I think his conversation with Evan regarding “the holy trilogy” piqued his interest and he wanted to see it. Trust Evan to convert an alien species to becoming fans of what he says is the greatest science fiction trilogy of all time,” Steve said as he laughed.

              This gained a few laughs from the table at hearing this, before Aldis spoke up.

              “I thought there were six movies?”

              Steve laughed again, almost spraying Liam with beer.

              “Not according to Evan, he feels the newer movies are a travesty and they are a whole separate set of movies so therefore they do not count.”

              Shizta’s face showed confusion to the conversation as he clearly did not follow.

              “We are referring to a trilogy of movies that are incredibly popular on Earth. Evan is a huge fan and even though he isn’t acting like it, Steve is just as big a fan,” Liam said, nodding his head Steve’s way on the latter part of the conversation.

              Shizta nodded comprehension but Liam felt he still didn’t fully understood but felt inquiring further would help little.

              “Well, I need to get back to my work so I am off. No time off for evil scientists,” Steve said, the latter part said as he rubbed his hands over one another in a diabolical manner.

              With this said he stood up, bid everyone goodnight and headed off whistling a very familiar movie cantina tune.

              Callen watched him go, his eyebrows furrowed.

              “I really would like to know what he is doing in there.”

              “I am sure he will tell us in his own time.”

              Looking at the time he saw that it had grown late, later than the trainees should be out.

              “Shouldn’t you two be getting back to your quarters? There is heavy training scheduled for tomorrow and I will not go easy on either of you just because you are overtired?” Liam said to Leah and Alyssa.

              Both sighed and nodded their agreement. Standing they both bid everyone goodnight and headed off. Before leaving the mess hall, Alyssa returned and leaned down.

              “I wanted to ask, could I get some additional training in hand to hand combat? I don’t think I am at the level I should be.”

              “Yeah sure, I think we can arrange that.” Liam said as he seemed to think this over, “Although I think you are equal to most within your class.”

              “Thanks, have a good night!” Alyssa said with a smile that hinted at something more.

              As she walked away Callen leaned closer to him,

              “Did you ever notice both of those two look incredibly alike? I mean I know they have separate hair colors and I have to say Leah is prettier but body type? Exactly the same,” Callen said as he eyed Liam.

              Liam didn’t say anything but only watched them leaving.

              “You do know that one has a thing for you, right?”

              “Huh? No she doesn’t, she was just requesting additional training.”

              Callen looked skeptical as he watched Alyssa rejoin Leah who had been waiting near the exit for her. Leah immediately began questioning Alyssa.

              “Uh-huh, you just keep on believing that mate, but I think she has more in mind than just hand to hand,”