Frontline sf-4 Page 6

  “Now we're going to lay flat on our backs. Slowly lower yourself down, stay relaxed and be concious of each movement,” he directed the class by example, everyone watched him throughout the sessions, even through such simple motions.

  When he had everyone on their backs he went on; “now keep breathing from your abdomen, evenly, deeply as you move your arms just out to your sides, palms up and then separate your legs. Rotate your feet inwards, then outwards. Let them fall naturally, don't force them, they know where they want to be.” He waited for everyone to reach the position he was directing them to and peeked at Ashley. While she concentrated on going through his directed movements she stopped breathing. At the conclusion she started to breathe deeply again. “Breathe with your movements,” he instructed generally, trying not to single her out. “Now slowly turn your head from side to side. We're centering our spines and bringing our bodies in line. Once you've finished, lay with your face to the ceiling.”

  She stopped breathing again as she rotated her head. He quietly got up and sat just above and behind her. Her eyes popped open, all her self conciousness rising to the surface.

  “It's all right, just keep breathing. Now relax your neck for me, let me move you.”

  “Okay,” she whispered back.

  He gently took her head in his hands; “now breathe in slowly,” he told her as he turned her head left in a pace that matched her inhale. “Exhale slowly,” he instructed her quietly as he brought her head back to center. “See how natural that feels? Our bodies are more oxygenated, more energized if we breathe with our movements. We are also more self aware, can maintain calm more easily and our thinking is clearer. Try it yourself.”

  She turned her head to the other side, inhaling through a smile and then back to center, exhaling as before. “Better?” she asked.

  “Much better, now through the session try to match your breathing with the movements. No motion has to be perfect, just don't force yourself past your limits and take it slow. Just concentrate on breathing properly for now.”

  “Thank you Chief,” she whispered to him as she watched him stand up and move back to the head of the group.

  The rest of the session went well. Everyone was focused, stretched and relaxed by the end. Most of them were on their way to begin their shift right afterwards. Ashley said goodbye to a few of the crew members she knew before approaching Liam with a big smile. “Thank you for helping me get started. I've never done anything like this before.”

  “That's all right, everyone has to get started somewhere.”

  “Did you learn how to do this on Earth?”

  “I started long before I applied to visit, actually. About fifty years ago during my first time in college.”

  “Wow. At least we have the right teacher.”

  “Well, to be honest I didn't feel ready to teach until I attended on Earth. They have masters there with knowledge that far surpasses anything I've learned, it was a good environment.”

  “Do you miss it?”

  “Sometimes, but like anything; it would be different if I were to return now.”

  She smiled at him and nodded; “I know what that's like.”

  “How are things with you and Finn?” It was what she wanted to speak to him about and his invitation to the topic was a relief to her, he could tell.

  “We're taking it slow,” she shrugged.

  “That's something new to you.”

  “That obvious, huh?”

  “Only a guess,” he smiled.

  “I'm so glad he's okay, but I guess I expected something else.”

  “You used to think about him often when he was in stasis?” Liam stated as he folded his hands into the sleeves of his deep blue robes. They started walking towards the rear hall.

  Ashley nodded. “Maybe too much.”

  “Infatuation is hard to break,” Liam concluded for her.

  “Well, I don't know if I was infatuated,” she paused a moment then nodded. “I mean, okay, a little.”

  “The only way to break infatuation is with reality. You have to look at him for who he is. Watch him, ask him questions about himself, let him speak to you. Get to know him better than the version of him you imagined. Your preconceptions and fear are the cause of the distance you're experiencing.”

  “What if, I mean, if what he says isn't…”

  “What you expected? Or if you don't feel the same way? Well, how do you feel now?”

  Ashley sighed and pulled the tie out of her long black hair, letting it fall loose around her shoulders. “I already don't know what to say to him, we hung out in observation and it's just…” she wrapped the hair tie around her wrist then changed her mind and retied her hair, “awkward. We're supposed to go on leave for a couple days together during a recruiting mission and I don't know what to do.”

  “Be yourself. Don't be afraid to tell him anything, and do your best to invite him to the conversation by asking him questions, even if it's hard. If he's not the person you expected him to be then speak to him honestly. Tell him how you feel. Shared experiences help, do things together away from the ship if you can. He's a friendly person, remember that.”

  They had come to the express lift that would take her to the command deck and he pressed the call button for her.

  She smiled at him; “I'll try. Thanks Chief,” Ashley waited for the express car quietly for a moment and suddenly, playfully punched him in the arm. “You're good at this stuff!” She looked at him, noticed his surprised expression and rubbed his arm where she'd struck him; “oh, sorry, not s'posed to punch priests.”

  “Don't worry, it takes more than that to bruise me,” he chuckled at her. “Besides, I'm a Pilgrim, not a priest. You'd be surprised at what I'm allowed to do,” he winked.

  The doors opened and Ashley stepped inside. “Well, thanks again. I'm on shift in five,” she smiled at him.

  “See you in observation sometime.”

  “Or tomorrow morning!” Ashley called out as the doors closed.

  Liam shook his head as he turned and walked back down the hallway towards the rear express car doors on the other side of the garden. A smile graced his visage as he considered how he had just had almost the exact same conversation with Finn the day before.

  Oz and Jason Go To Pandem Part II

  It took a few minutes for the emergency landing balloons to deflate, and the Silkstream IV settled atop a large, steeply slanted stone slab jutting out from the beach sand. The rear of the ship stuck straight out into the air as the nose slowly dug into the hot, loose white and black sand.

  The rear hatch of the Silkstream flopped open and Jason climbed up high enough to look around. The shoreline was less than a hundred meters behind them. “Missed the water,” he called down into the cabin as Oz hurriedly pushed their packs through the main boarding hatch and over the edge of the jutting stone.

  “Good thing we had the inflatable system for low gravity planets, we'll have to tell Laura how well it worked when you see her.” He looked to the high mountain cliff side opposite the ocean. “Programming it to trigger if the parachutes failed was a bit of genius.” The lower ten stories featured banks of windows, decks, storefronts, various sports courtyards and other fixtures one would expect to see at a high end resort. Above and set behind that section things changed a great deal. There were closed off hangars, indications that the mountain stone disguised large transparesteel windows, transmitter arrays and scanning systems.

  “I'm sure she'll really enjoy hearing about her husband nearly landing so hard he gets liquefied.” Jason commented as he started to take the whole scene in. “The computer must have tried to guide us to Damshir with the gyro system. According to what my visor is telling me it's right in front of us.” Closer to the edge of the water there was a three storey building two hundred meters distant and palm trees lined up in a row between it and the main resort. Outside was a large deck with a bar and seating for many patrons. There were towels, cooling baskets and other odd things
strewn about. At first Jason couldn't see anyone.

  As he swung one leg over the side of the stone's edge his eye caught something that didn't seem right, what it was exactly he didn't know, but there was every indication that something was off. Using the features built into the faceplate of his vacsuit he zoomed in on the shoreline, where there were dozens of reclining sunning chairs lined up. “Oh crap. Something's torn these people to pieces,” he whispered as he looked on the dozens of bathing suit clad corpses. “Looks like they never saw it coming.”

  Oz finished climbing to the top of the ship and straddled the edge of the hull. He had his long coat, rifle and extra pack with him. “I'm seeing scorched earth over here, blast points in the sand that were turned to glass. What's your guess at what happened?”

  Jason looked the situation over for another moment, examining the scene in the distance and then zooming in on the bar on the patio. “There are serving bots there cleaning the place up. Wait, one of them is staring right at me. One eight seven degrees.”

  Oz checked the spot Jason was inspecting and saw it. “I can take him out from here. Your call, Intelligence man.”

  “We should hit the dirt, find solid ground and head towards the nearest entrance to the mountain. There's a high security entrance further down the beach, it's built into the sheer edge. That's a hangar up there, but I haven't seen anything come or go yet.” He pointed to the foot of the mountain, where the grey and white sand ended and the black and brown stone began. The polished, sheer face there with large, closed security doors to the left of the resort facing. “I'd bet there are windows hidden in that rock face. We're probably seeing the tip of an iceberg. Let's go.”

  “That's what I was thinking. Good plan.” Oz said as he swung his other leg over the edge and dropped down.

  Jason did the same, though not quite as gracefully, and drew his sidearm. “I'm setting my pistol to high penetration, sound right?” he asked as he operated the small manual switches on the large handgun. The standard issue Freeground A7 rifle, with its double barrels and hardened stock, was slung over his back with his small bag of supplies.

  “Yup, we don't know what we're up against so we might want to keep the dispersion narrow, save ammo.”

  “My thoughts exactly, Major.”

  A bolt of energy struck Oz in the side and he spun towards the beach. There was a security robot wheeling towards them on small treads, kicking up a cloud of white and grey sand as it went. It fired several more times, missing as Oz rolled out of the way and Jason dove for cover. Behind it were several more automations rising out of the sand between small dunes of blackened glass, scorched stone and broken outbuildings.

  “I'm okay, it didn't get through the vacsuit,” Oz said as he activated his higher powered rifle and came up on one knee facing the bot. His fully automatic particle rifle rattled off bolts of searing energy, turning spots of sand into charred glass and punching holes in the trundling machine. After several hits it stopped and smouldered. “We have a lot more trouble coming,” he stated as he marked two more with his targeting sight.

  “First time I've seen that rifle fired. Nice,” Jason commented as he picked up the emergency supply packs and strapped them to loops on the underside of his backpack.

  “First time I've had a chance to fire it off the range. I like. Let's make a run for it, those serving bots have more balls than brains but I don't know about what's behind them.” Oz said as he nodded towards the resort, where three androids had started running towards them. One had sustained superficial damage to its middle, its split flesh revealed servos and a mass data storage unit in the place of ribs. The other two were fine for the most part, but had a silvered texture to make the fact that they were there to help patrons obvious.

  Oz took several shots at them and scored hits in the nearest ones chest and it fell face down awkwardly, kicking up a small cloud of sand. The other two kept coming, ignoring the failure of their comrade.

  Jason started running with his friend right behind, half turned towards their perusers, firing bursts for cover. His shots missed until they reached solid ground in the shadow of the sheer polished cliff surface. One of the servants took three hits across the thighs and was rendered immobile. Oz dropped to one knee and took aim at the third. At a range of less than twenty meters, a little close for Jason's taste, Oz put two dozen holes in the machine that started at its head and ran all the way down to its knees. It clattered to the stone paved ground and slid to a stop just in front of Oz's feet, completely inert.

  The sounds of high energy weapon strikes hitting the sand surrounded them. One struck Jason and both men swerved to hide behind another large stone jutting out from the sand.

  “You all right?” Oz asked.

  “Fine, my comm kit and extra C and C are done though.” he said as he dropped the smouldering equipment pack off his back and unslung his rifle. “Over a hundred meters left to the doors and no guaranteeing that they'll open for us.”

  Oz picked up a smouldering piece of equipment from the pack Jason had dropped and tossed it in the air. Streaks of light filled the air above their heads, several of them striking the target Oz provided before it landed several meters up the beach. “Damn, those aren't serving bots. They must have hidden under the sand just in case someone decided to come out here. There's cover up there but we have to deal with whatever's got a bead on us first.”

  The sounds of treads and running feet filled the air. Jason and Oz leaned into their stone cover with weapons at the ready. They waited for their pursuers to come to them, they had no other choice.

  Trust and Responsibility

  The first drill of the day was just wrapping up and Frost was watching a tall armoured loader take an awkward backward step right on top of an empty ammunition magazine. The black and grey box was crushed underfoot with a terrible grinding screech. He activated his proximity radio and spoke to the armour's operator. “God dammit Ferrin, crack that machine open an' step out so someone whose ready ta run 'er can get in. You're back to sims.”

  “Just a weak moment Chief.”

  “If that magazine was loaded with high explosive rounds you'd 'ave killed yerself, yer gunner an' at least two mechanics. Prolly woulda disabled two other guns while ye were at it.”

  “What magazine?”

  “Just step outta the armour,” Frost repeated, at the end of his patience.

  “Yes sir.”

  For some reason he glanced behind him just then, and regretted it. Even across a depressurized gunnery deck, even with her blacked out transparesteel faceplate up, he could tell Stephanie was absolutely enraged. Her shoulders were square and her stance was set firmly, as though she were ready for a fight, or spoiling for one.

  “Lildell, take over here, I've got a meeting,” Frost ordered.

  “Aye, sir,” came the reply from his second in command.

  Stephanie wasn't setting foot on the deck and he read that as meaning she didn't want to say whatever she needed to in front of his crew. He strode to the heavy express elevator, large enough for heavy equipment, and stepped inside. As soon as his foot cleared the doors she closed them and sent the car downward, towards the command deck.

  “Thought we weren't visiting each other on shift,” Frost said, trying to bring some levity into the large express car.

  “Not here,” she said flatly over proximity radio as she activated the pressurization systems so they could step out of the lift as soon as it reached a section of the ship with full life support.

  He waited for the car to finish its short trip to the command deck and repressurize before breaking the thick silence. She was out of the express car before the doors were finished opening and continued on right across the hall into one of the smaller briefing rooms. Frost followed right behind her.

  When the door closed behind them she deactivated her headpiece. The faceplate rolled down into her collar and the rest folded down into a small hood between her shoulders. “You don't even know what you did w
rong, do you?” she asked quietly.

  “Burke? He had it comin',” he said simply as he stopped to stand behind the chair at the head of the short black top table. There were eight chairs around it all together, and no windows in the dark blue walled room.

  “Had it coming? This isn't the Samson, Shamus. You don't get to decide who has what coming to them.”

  “Most o' the time, sure, but not for him. Samson, Triton, hell, even on the bloody Queen Mary, I get my sights on 'im and his ass is mine,” Frost said calmly. He was being honest, he wouldn't do anything differently if he had to make the choice all over again. “He alive?”

  “Barely. They had to treat him with nanobots and the first thing the automated medic did was take off most of his fingers and a whole foot. He'll need to have them grown for him and without a doctor aboard, well,” she threw up her hands. “I know Burke burned you, and I got your message about him giving up the Samson for Wheeler, but tell me you understand why you shouldn't have gone around me on this.”

  “You'd have had 'im all cozy in the brig before anyone got anythin' out of him. Bet you wouldn't 'ave gotten anythin' out of him either.”

  “Damn right I would have! Do you think Captain gave me this post as some kind of reward? I've led some of his hardest boarding actions, even when he knew not all of us were coming back! He knows I can handle this and even though he's been running jobs for half as long as either of us, he's a better judge than both of us combined!”