Laila
Captain Laila Storey hated waiting. Unfortunately, in the military, life was either hectic and action-packed, or it was boring beyond belief. Yesterday had fallen into the first category, but today? Firmly in the second.
She was bored out of her mind.
Although it was only yesterday that they had ordered her halfway across the galaxy, it felt like much longer.
She had arrived early for the meeting at Space Force Headquarters. The space station on which it was housed orbited Earth, and resembled a series of donuts built around a central hub. It had started small, expanding over time as Space Force evolved from its beginnings in the early 21st century. From space, Laila thought it resembled a house that was constantly being renovated but never finished.
Humans had finally realized that if they were to survive as a species, they needed to pool their resources and work together, rather than against each other. Unfortunately, that decision had been too little, too late to save Earth from the ravages of a changing climate.
It hadn’t been too late to move forward on the colonization of Mars, and further exploration of the solar system. However, humans still lacked the technology to travel the vast distances beyond.
But that was sure to change after what happened on Mars.
Laila tensed at the memory, still angry at what was being termed the “Mars fiasco”. They had deployed her to the red planet as second-in-command of a unit assigned to protect one of the small colonies. It should have been easy. Who would cause problems on Mars? The worst they had imagined was a colonist getting cabin fever. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, the Xakul had attacked.
The insect-like race had shown no mercy and had slain indiscriminately, feasting on the dead. Their six-legged bodies were huge, their exoskeletons seemingly impenetrable to every weapon the humans had tried. And the Xakul were fast. Unbelievably fast.
Their legs covered the ground so quickly there was no hope of outrunning them on foot, and they were incredibly sensitive to noise. One whisper had their radar-like antennae turning with unerring accuracy to the source of the sound. If they weren’t so horrifying, especially with their many eyes, they would be beautiful. Their exoskeletons were almost black, but shimmered in the light like oil on water.
A technicolor nightmare.
Laila shuddered, pushing the memories aside. During the attack, her commanding officer had refused to retreat, and his decision resulted in the unnecessary deaths of colonists and fighters alike. It was a massacre, and he had gotten himself killed. Space Force brass had questioned Laila for weeks. She had relived every decision leading up to the attack in excruciating detail. Repeatedly she had watched footage from Space Force marines’ helmet cameras. She had read report after report on the carnage caused by what they now knew was one small Xakul reconnaissance team.
And Laila had been horrified at the thought of what an entire army of these aliens could do.
But then she had been told about the Taureans.
First contact with not one alien race, but two? And in the space of days of each other? There was a lot more going on than she knew. Probably more going on than she would ever know, and that made her uneasy.
The Taureans were enemies of the Xakul and had thrown their lot in with Earth. Apparently, they had forged a deal with Earth’s leaders to send human troops to Taurus, and in exchange, the Taureans would teach the people of Earth how to fight the Xakul.
On paper, it made sense. The Taureans had the technology and battle tactics that Earth needed. Earth had an abundance of people. It was a win-win situation, though Laila wasn’t sure how people would react when word got out that they were to be used in a war with an insectoid race that liked to eat their victims.
Either way, here she was, on the other side of the galaxy, about to disembark from a cargo freighter alongside a small group of other humans. Sargent Clodagh Jones, or CJ as she preferred to be called, a medic who had survived the Mars attack by locking herself in a walk-in freezer, was heading to the Taurean Starship Zataras with Laila.
Some of Earth’s larger Space Force military transports could accommodate up to a thousand passengers at a time, traveling between the research stations, military bases and fledgling colonies scattered throughout Earth's solar system, but smaller spaceships with faster than light, or FTL, drives could go much further, faster.
They had thought themselves lucky to catch a ride on a civilian freighter fitted with such technology, otherwise, the trip to the space station that orbited Taurus would have taken much longer. The space station was the Zataras’ home base, and, as Laila had learned, was a major transport and freight hub in the Taurean system.
“Did you ever wonder why the Xakul only destroyed one of the Mars outposts?”
Laila’s ears pricked up at the mention of Mars and the Xakul. The question had come from a man seated in the row opposite Laila. He wasn’t talking to her, she realized, but to CJ, who was sitting on his other side, mostly hidden by his bulky frame. Laila leaned forward, catching sight of the medic with her shock of short, white-blonde hair. Laila snorted, wondering at the intelligence of the man who had sat next to CJ for the entire two-day trip from Earth. Had he not realized she wasn’t a talker?
CJ grunted at the man, disinterested, which he took as permission to continue. Laila leaned back in her seat, shaking her head.
He continued. “I mean, the attack had been really quick, right? In and out so fast. Ever wonder what had scared them off?”
CJ turned to look at the man, her expression carefully blank. “Was it the bogeyman?”
And there it was. He finally realized she would not make idle conversation. The man scowled at CJ and pressed his lips together. CJ chuckled and shot a grin at Laila, who suppressed a chuckle.
The Xakul attack on Mars had been blindingly fast. Laila had been on patrol when they had struck, and it was pure luck that she had not been inside the doomed colony, otherwise she would be dead right now. Like almost everyone else.
The few Space Force marines on patrol that day had survived by hiding in the rocky hills that surrounded the valley where the Martian colony had established itself. She had watched as the Xakul tore apart every living thing they could find.
Laila turned her attention to her tablet, flicking to the file she had read and re-read countless times on the journey from Earth.
