Chains
Part One
I can feel the heat, the bullets ripping by my head, I can see walls being blown apart…I know I’m meant to die. “GET BACK! FALL BACK!” I hear myself scream; my blue and black fatigues are beginning to stick to my body with the blood and sweat, my face is covered in blood and caked with dirt. I stand six feet tall, but I’m taking cover behind a shattered wall, my skin is dull green and the scales that run up and down my brow are a deep shade of forest green “Fall back!” I cried, again, in vain as I watch another of my men brought down in a hail of gun fire. The last thing I remember is seeing one of my brothers fall to the ground, dead, his eyes misting over, blood flecking his lips.
The next thing I know I’m awake, drenched in sweat…in a prison that I could never imagine I’d find myself inside.
The solider sat up, the silken sheets falling off his body. He was the same man who was calling a retreat. He was a Velkin named Edrigh Ta’Dev…but everyone called him ‘Dev’.
Dev stumbled into his bathroom and slumped over his sink, splashing water on his face “What time is it?” He asked no one in particular.
“It is 2900 hours, GST”
“Damn it…I’ve only been asleep for three hours?”
“Yes”
Dev wiped the water from his face with a cloth “Hero of Kedith Gorge” he growled as he stared into a mirror “screw-up” he said, then began to repeat it softly, several times in a row and he almost seemed to cry.
He heard a soft ‘dwing’, the least grating noise in the list of beeps and buzzes that he had been forced to choose from when he moved into these quarters.
“Who is it?” he mumbled as he slowly walked back into the main area.
“Liead sir, I have a priority call from Admiral Kelmer.”
Dev stalked over to the door and hit the button, it door glided open easily, revealing a short yellow woman with a rippled skull, a Norkien.
“What?” Dev growled, Liead’s cheeks turned a light blue.
Ta’Dev glared down at the Norkien “What The Plains did he want?”
Liead was looking to the left, trying to avoid looking at her commander, who was wearing only a pair of tight shorts “H-he didn’t say sir, he demanded to talk to y-you sir.”
Dev frowned and walked back to his bed and sank back down “Tell him I’m asleep.”
Liead didn’t enter behind him “W-we d-did sir, he said it was an emergency…”
Dev sat back up “Why the hell are you stammering?”
Liead flushed even deeper “S-sorry sir, b-but…” her voice trailed off.
Dev suddenly became aware that he was wearing underwear “Oh…sorry,” Dev got out of bed and disappeared into his bathroom and fumbled with something inside, he emerged wearing a pair of blue camo pants and a white tee-shirt.
“I-it’s fine…sir,” Liead said quietly.
Dev walked toward the door and turned right into the corridor “Let’s see what the blowhard wants.”
Liead started out of her daze and called after him “Sir! You should wear your Captain’s uniform!”
Dev stopped “Ya think?”
Liead seemed to considered for a moment whether he was kidding and decided the opposite “Yes sir, you should.”
Dev frowned as he walked back into his room, swearing under his breath.
* * *
Ta’Dev trailed a few steps behind the small Norkien.
He hadn’t been able to memorize the layout of the ship yet and had nearly starved to death yesterday because he couldn’t find the mess hall.
Liead was telling him something, she kept listing off numbers followed by a letter and more numbers “-and the capacitors are all running at a temperature within normal parameters,” she finished happily.
“So everything works?” Edrigh said as he stopped fiddling with the collar of his blue and black uniform and looked down at Liead.
“Yes sir, everything is working within optimal efficiency,” She responded, confused.
“So we won’t blow up?”
“No sir, I-I just said that…I thought,” Liead’s eyes went back to clipboard which had the list she had just recited.
Dev grinned slightly “You probably did, but I tend to tone that kind of thing out.”
Liead looked back at him appalled “Sir! This is your duty!”
Dev just smiled “Well, tell you what, if everything is working just say ‘Its all good’ and if something’s about to blow up say ‘we’re in deep shit’ and then the part…sound ok?”
Liead frowned but nodded “Yes, sir.”
Dev’s grin broadened “Good.”
The door to the command deck slid open as Liead and Dev stepped into the large, oblong, room.
Dev still didn’t know how the hell he had gotten there, but that didn’t really matter he supposed.
“Captain on deck!” an exceptionally tall, light blue Rakin man called. The man was wearing a red and black uniform, showing he was the ship’s defense specialist.
The entire deck stood up and saluted, Dev returned it lazily.
“Hey, you?” he pointed at the Rakin who had called out.
“Officer Rook, sir,” he responded with a hard salute.
“Right, right…don’t do that anymore, ok?”
Rook frowned “Sir, I don’t understand, sir.”
Dev shook his head “Listen Reek, I don’t need you to call me ‘sir’ every two seconds…its redundant…I know I’m sir and you know I’m sir…you don’t have to keep saying it,” Dev fell into his cushy captain’s chair “and none of you have to salute me when I come through a door, it’s annoying, understand?”
There were general nods from the other people on the deck.
Rook’s frown hardened “Sir, my name is Rook…not ‘Reek, sir’. And I will continue to respond to you in the manor decided upon by our commanders, sir.”
Dev shook his head as he turned away from the man, he decided his first impression was right…the stick was way too far up his ass.
“Fine, but if you’re willing to disobey a direct order from your superior than we may have a problem,” Dev responded.
Rook’s face twisted into something reminiscent of both fury and confusion, but faded away as the Rakin came to his conclusion.
“Sir, that order comes from a higher level than you, sir. Therefore I cannot, with good conscious, adhere to your command,” he finished with another salute.
Ta’Dev looked back at his chief of defense and sighed as he turned his head back to the view screen “Fair enough.”
To Be Continued…
