Conscription Day: The Johnson Chronicles Read online

  “Everyone, listen up! The pilot just told me we are on our approach. We will enter the atmosphere in a second, and head for our objective as quickly as possible. The defensive fire is heavy, and it could get uncomfortable. We will be deploying momentarily. Now, let me tell you what our target is. This damn defensive fire is making our job harder. The bastards have already shot down a lot of units. The enemy has managed to set up a force field around their defensive systems, and we haven’t been able to penetrate it. There are a hundred and two gun emplacements, scattered across the entire surface of the planet. We have located them all. We will launch a simultaneous assault at every location. We’re going to go down, sabotage the system and shut off the force fields. The rest is up to our battleships in orbit. This whole invasion is therefore just a diversion. We will set down undetected and fly toward our target.”

  It was very silent in the combat boat. Everyone looked at me in disbelief, unable to believe what they had just heard.

  Master Gunnery Sergeant Zuchkowski was the first to break the silence. “Okay, you heard the captain! We’re going in, we’ll tear a few lizards a new asshole, sabotage the system and bug out. Like taking candy from a baby. So get ready.”

  The combat boat entered the atmosphere of the planet with the other units as planned. There was nothing to see through the small windows. The friction of entering the atmosphere surrounded the ship in a sea of flames. The pilot changed course as planned and headed for the target coordinates. Suddenly the combat boat started shaking badly.

  “Captain Johnson!” my ICS squawked. The pilot was having trouble staying calm. “Something is wrong! We are taking heavy incoming fire. I’m doing one evasive maneuver after another. This doesn’t feel like a covert operation to me. The enemy is concentrating fire on us and … Wait, I’m being contacted by the other units. They are getting the same pounding we are. All our special units are taking heavy fire. Units twelve and thirty-six have already been shot down. I don’t know how long I can keep evading this fire. It’s just luck we haven’t taken a direct hit yet. What are your orders, captain?”

  My mind was in chaos. How was this possible? How could the enemy have found out about our plans? Was there a traitor in our ranks? This thought was so absurd and unimaginable that I immediately discarded. The ship started shaking brutally again, a lot worse than before. Smoke started coming from a panel at the side. The interior filled with the acrid stink of burning plastic and cables. The combat boat was hit again. This time, the screaming of tearing metal could be heard and the squad started yelling. A recruit suddenly flew right by me before slamming into the cockpit door. The dull thud of the impact was clearly audible and the unnatural angle of the man’s head, which was pulled too far back, showed everyone that there was no point trying to help him. He was dead.

  “Turn us round, right now!” I screamed at the pilot. “Get us out of here. Fly back to the invasion fleet and find cover at the center. We will all go down together and try to reach the target by flying low. When we get down to the surface, the defensive emplacements won’t be able to target us. These are planetary defensive systems, and they aren’t designed to attack targets that are already on the surface. Send that message to the other special units. Now!”

  I could only hope that my plan would work. Now we had to get ourselves to safety, if there was such thing as safety during an invasion.

  “Captain. Message sent. The other units are trying to rejoin the main fleet. But it was too late for ten units. They have already been shot down. We have a … Oh shit! Watch out, here it comes …!” The pilot broke off, mid sentence. The fragments that I had managed to catch gave me a bad feeling. Something slammed into the combat boat and it was swatted from its course. The ship was spinning and tumbled over and over. The next thing, my stomach fell into my combat boots, a sure sign we were in free fall. It was only then that I noticed that the drives had fallen silent. All I could hear was an extremely high-pitched whistle, and it kept increasing in pitch.

  Everyone who had survived this far was probably kissing their ass goodbye. I was thinking something similar. Why the hell did I have to bite the big one here on this shitty planet? But one planet was just as good as any other, it didn’t make much difference in the end where it happened. On the law of averages, I had survived this war too long already. It was unlikely anyone was going to put me back together again like they had always done before. Being shot down from this altitude would mean no survivors. It would be amazing if there was enough left of me or my men to be buried.

  The gravity pulled at my body. The whistling had risen so high in pitch that it could now hardly be heard by human ears. There was nothing left to hear except a very soft whistling. It could also be that my implants were damping the noise. I was expecting to crash at any moment and thought for a moment about my family: about the promise I made to my mother; about my dead father who had gone on a secret mission and never returned; about my brother, who had died on board the Typhus. The Typhus had been ambushed when it was patrolling. The enemy had completely destroyed it. There had been no survivors.

  A deafening roar tore me from my thoughts. The interior lighting failed then, and I was thrown from my feet. The gravity increased perceptibly and pressed the air from my lungs. I started having extreme trouble breathing. There was no point talking to the pilot, he wouldn’t hear a word over all the noise. Besides, it sounded like he had managed to get the drives started again and was now wrestling for control. I could hear the scream of tearing metal again. This time it was so loud that it even drowned out the unnaturally loud roar of the engines.

  I looked up, at least in the direction that seemed to me to be up, and saw a gash in the ship’s hull that was several yards long. It wouldn’t be long before the combat boat came apart. I gave up any hope of a landing as soon as I saw it. But maybe the pilot might be able to do a crash landing. There wouldn’t be much chance of surviving it, but any chance was better than none. A few moments later, the noises faded almost completely away, the flight stabilized and we were actually decelerating.

  Suddenly the drives cut out again and the combat boat suddenly dropped, then slammed into the surface a few heartbeats later.

  Somewhere inside a fire broke out. I saw the smoke and the glow of a fire out of the corner of my eye. “Out of the way!” Zuchkowski yelled. It took me a moment to work out that he was talking to me, too. I scrambled to my feet and had hardly taken a few steps toward the stern before the Bull came charging past me. He was holding a fire extinguisher in his hands. Good man, I thought and was eternally grateful that Zuchkowski had survived. Not just that, he seemed to have the situation in hand just seconds after the landing. It was only then that I became aware of the blaring of an alarm. And I could hear the groans of soldiers between the notes of the alarm. That at least meant that there were more survivors. That was a start. Not much of one, but a start. I used my ICS to connect directly to the pilot. “Lieutenant Hoi? Can you hear me?”

  “Loud and clear, captain,” came the pilot’s weak voice over the ICS.

  “Can you give me a preliminary status report?”

  “I don’t know how reliable the data is, captain. I’ll need another minute or two before I can give you more detail. But one thing I can say is that we are down. But you probably noticed that. Lieutenant Abbe is dead, sir. The boat seems to still be in one piece. But like I said, I’ve got the computer running a check right now. I’ll get back to you when it’s done.”

  “Okay, Lieutenant Hoi. Can you turn off that alarm, I don’t think we need that anymore.” I paused for a second. “And thanks!”

  “Thanks? What for?”

  “For getting us down okay.”

  “Right, I’ll tell you how okay we are in a minute. Besides, I was just doing my job. But,” Hoi paused for a moment, “you’re welcome.”

  I could almost see the very young pilot’s grin. We hadn’t ever met up to that point
. I had just glanced at his file. Junior Lieutenant Samui Hoi, born on Grandos, a barren planet in an unimportant system at the edge of the empire. It had been settled against the advice of the science council. The gravity was too high, too much desert, too little water, huge sandstorms that lasted for weeks, and there wasn’t even much in the way of useful raw materials. The first settlers must have been very stubborn. But not without friends and supporters in high places, because the settlement was approved despite the recommendation against it. The settlers had rolled their sleeves up, gotten to work and managed to survive over generations almost self-sufficiently. The people of Grandos were said to be tough, hard-working and inventive bastards. Lieutenant Hoi had proved himself many times in his short service, and had received several commendations. He had the reputation of being a hotshot. He had seemed the best choice to me, especially because of his planet of origin. My decision had proved to be right on the money. He had probably just saved all our lives.

  The damage report was still being put together and I needed a moment before I would know what state my men and their equipment were in. Then we would have to work out our position. I had to know if we could still carry out our mission, or if we would even be able to survive behind enemy lines. There was total chaos in the passenger compartment. Wall panels had been ripped off, cables and hoses were hanging from several damaged ares, and sparks flew as the wires kept short circuiting. Bodies were lying everywhere. Some were moving, others weren’t. Fortunately, I saw that some of my soldiers were still standing, even though some of them were hanging limp from their straps. “Master Gunnery Sergeant Zuchkowski!” I yelled into the chaos.

  “Here, captain! I’m coming,” he answered.

  I couldn’t see him. He was hidden among the smoke, discarded equipment, cables, hoses, and other scrap. Seconds dragged by, and I started to wonder if I should seal the helmet of my battle armor. I would be able to see Bull easier using the systems in the helmet. Just as I was about to, the Master Gunnery Sergeant appeared out of a cloud of smoke, the extinguisher still in his hands, even through it was now spent.

  “Sorry, captain, that took a while. I had to get the fire under control. We don’t want any more damage, who knows we might need this bird again.”

  Involuntarily, I looked at the ceiling, and the huge rip in the hull that stretched almost the whole width of the combat boat. Zuchkowski followed my gaze and he only then seemed to notice how close we had come to being ripped in two. All he said was, “Oh,” before a grin spread over his face. Escaping death had a way of lifting your spirits. I was about to say something when Lieutenant Hartmann came up to me. He had a gash from his right forehead to above his left eye. He was bleeding heavily and holding a dressing to the wound with his left hand. I nodded to him.

  “Are you okay, lieutenant? That looks bad. But we’ll fix it. We’ve been through worse. Sit down there at the front,” I pointed at a free seat behind me, “on the floor, and you can lean against the wall. As soon as we find a medic I’ll have them patch you up.”

  “Thank you, sir, I’m okay. It looks a lot worse than it really is! And no, sir, I haven’t been through anything worse than this.”

  “Your first crash?”

  “Yes, sir! That was a hellish ride! When I get my hands on that pilot …”

  “You’ll shake his hand and thank him for saving your life! That was amazing flying from the kid,” I interrupted him.

  “Sorry, sir! That’s not what I meant. I was just trying to be funny. I think I’m just a bit shook up.”

  “Okay, lieutenant, we’re all a little shook up. You’re probably in shock. Now sit down. No objections! I still need you. So sit down and wait for the paramedic.” I turned back to Zuchkowski. “Okay, no problem, Bull. I’m glad you reacted so quickly. But will this thing ever fly again? I have my doubts. But who knows, miracles do happen. We have seen a few ourselves. Bull, I need my officers. Find out who survived and bring them to me. Then find some paramedics, I need a list: how many survived, how many are injured, and who is still capable of fighting. The paramedics should tend to the officers first, if they are seriously injured. Like Hartmann. I need all of them.”

  The decision was abhorrent to me but I had to make it anyway. I definitely needed a couple of capable people. There had to be a couple I could temporarily promote and who would be able to lead a squad. This was where my photographic memory really came into its own. But was the life of one more important than the life of another? Ethically, the decision had to be immoral and it made me sick but it was logical and important for the survival of others. Without good leaders the individual combat troops would be lost and as good as dead. There were always difficult decisions to be made. This wasn’t my first and it certainly wouldn’t be my last. Seconds could make the difference between life and death. The last thing I needed when things got hot was soldiers arguing about their plans for dealing with the situation.

  “Understood, captain,” Bull saluted smartly and disappeared again and I heard him yelling the officers’ names.

  This was all taking too long for me, even if the landing was only a couple of minutes ago. I was about to radio the pilot but he called me first. “Captain Johnson? Lieutenant Hoi.”

  “Go ahead, lieutenant!”

  “The system analysis is complete. I have some good news and bad news. What do you want to hear first?”

  “Start with the bad!”

  “We took a real pounding. A lot of systems are down, including the drive controls. The hull has several areas of structural damage and breaches. The hyper communicator and long-range communicator are both damaged. We can’t send a distress signal. The impact embedded us in the surface and we’re stuck. We’re also about as far away from our target as we could be! We’ve landed in the ass of this world, in the middle of a jungle.”

  Shit! I thought, and I must have yelled it out loud, too, because lieutenant Hoi answered me. “Yes, sir. You can say that again.”

  “You said that was the bad news. What is the good news? Although I can hardly imagine what good news there could be.”

  “Okay, sir. I don’t want to get your hopes up. But I think we can get this heap back in the air. It shouldn’t take long to fix the drive controls. We’ll have to improvise reinforcement for the hull, of course. We can separate the hold, cut the steel walls and weld them on to the worst areas. That shouldn’t take too long, either. And somebody has to clear the crash site and dig us out a little. We won’t have a high top speed, and we won’t be able to do any daredevil maneuvers, but we will be mobile. We won’t be able to leave the planet in this crate, that’s obvious.”

  “That sounds promising,” I said, as a spark of hope kindled in my heart. Maybe we could find another unit. Marching gig after gig through the jungle was too much like suicide. “How long do you think it will take to get airborne again?”

  “Well, captain, that depends how many people I can put to work. Thirty men could do it in about two hours. I doubt you’re going to leave thirty men here, though.”

  “What do you mean, leave? Where else are we going to go? In fact I don’t even know if even that many survived or are still capable of fighting.”

  “I said we have landed in the ass of the world, but there is a defensive emplacement not two gigs from here. We couldn’t get to ours so I tried at least to bring it down near another. Our short-range communicator is still operational but I’m not getting any reply from any other unit. I have to assume that nobody else has managed to penetrate to this base.”

  “Dammit, Hoi, why didn’t you say! That changes everything! Okay, I’ll be back in touch in a second, as soon as I have a handle on our situation. In the meantime, work out a repair plan and work out how many men you will need.”

  “Aye, aye, sir.”

  I had just ended the call with Samui Hoi when Bull was coming back toward me. I had no chance to think about our situation. “Jay-J
ay,” he said, softly enough for nobody else to hear. “I think we have had another stroke of luck. It could have been a lot worse. Sergeant Hopper and Kaval seem to have survived the crash uninjured. A flesh wound or two, cuts, and bruises. Nothing serious. But Sergeant Schuster isn’t going to make it. Even if we get him to a paramedic, his injuries are just too bad. Doc Maison has stabilized him, but he says it doesn’t look good. Anyone with any medical training is tending to the wounded, and there are plenty of them.” Bull paused a moment, searching for the right words. “We’ve also lost several people, mostly from the new guys.”

  Bull ended his report, and as he paused for several seconds, looking me deep in the eye, I started to assume the worst. I returned his gaze and prepared myself for catastrophic news. “How many?”

  “Honestly, John? I have no idea. I haven’t had time to get an exact number,” Bull began to falter. “At least twenty or thirty. I’m including the badly wounded who aren’t going to live through the next few hours.”

  “Twenty or thirty men?” It felt like a hand grasped my heart and slowly squeezed. We had all just been standing on the hanger deck, and now a large number were dead or badly wounded, and there was no way to get them to a medical center any time soon. This was a bitter blow because most of the wounded could have been saved if we could somehow have managed that. “Okay, Bull. Let’s make the best of it. I need the exact numbers. Take care of it. We have to reorganize the men. I’ll give a mission briefing in ten minutes. There is still a mission.”

  “A mission? What the hell are you talking about? Take a look around. Our craft is a pile of scrap, full of dead and wounded, and who the hell even knows where we are? Jay-Jay, forget the mission, we have to work out a way to get out of here!”

  “I know.”

  “What do you know?”

  “I know where we crash landed. All the rest is my problem. We’ll speak about all that when I have precise numbers.”

  “You’re the captain,” was his only reply.