An Unwanted Inheritance

3

3

Cas Dragunov’s eyes flickered open and he found himself looking up into a strange face. The face was not strange in the sense of being odd or bizarre, it was strange in the sense of being unfamiliar, and unfamiliar, in his experience, meant dangerous. He reacted instinctively to the danger; his right hand lashed out to close around the throat below the unfamiliar face, to squeeze and choke the life out of the threat. At least that was the intention.

Pain erupted in his shoulder, making him cry out, though that didn’t stop him reaching for the throat of the person standing over him. It was another hand that stopped him, one that caught his in a vice-like grip and then, with surprising gentleness, lowered it.

“Careful, Captain, you don’t want to go hurting the medic before he’s finished patching you up.”

Cas recognised the voice, it was that of his best and most trusted friend, the man who had been with him almost since the beginning of his fourteen-year military career. He turned his head to the left, slowly, because he couldn’t seem to move it quickly, until he brought his friend into view.

“How bad is it?” he asked in a voice that was far calmer than many people’s would have been under similar circumstances. It was a calmness that came from years of dealing with pain and injuries, a calmness that only a military person used to being treated on site for battlefield injuries, and who couldn’t see the extent of his current injuries, might be able to demonstrate.

“You’ve had worse,” Sergeant Max Baker growled in his gruff voice, which didn’t quite conceal his concern. “But you’re going to be out of action for a while. That’s no bad thing, though, you’ve been in the field for six months now, we all have; you’ll get a holiday out of this, and maybe the rest of us will as well.”

Cas scowled at his friend. “You didn’t answer my question, how bad is it?” He fixed Max with a look that told him he wanted no evasive talk. “I felt slugs hit me in the side and leg, punched straight through my armour - I think we can take it as read that the intel reports of the rebs being supplied by the Tar Leksa are accurate, only mil-spec would have gotten through the armour - then it felt as though the world blew up all around me. What happened? And what happened to my shoulder, that feels worse than the last time I took a slug in it.”

“They had the place booby-trapped, somebody must have tripped something,” Max said. “Intel’s fuming, they were hoping to find something that would tell them where the rest of the rebs are hiding out. They apparently know there’s two more camps and three urban cells in this sector, but they’ve got no idea where they are. You got hit by some of the shrapnel from whatever blew; soon as the medic’s finished with you, you’re on the medi-vac topside for surgery, along with the others who made it.”

“Who didn’t make it?” Cas was quick to pick up on the implication of his sergeant’s words; if some of their men had made it, then some had not - bad news at the best of times, but they had already been under strength, something which had been ignored when the local head of intelligence insisted they make the assault on the located, but not very well scouted, camp being used by the Leihdan rebels.

Max hesitated for a moment, reluctant to trouble his friend and superior with the tally of their losses, until he saw that the conversation was distracting Cas from the steps being taken to prepare him for the medi-vac. “Green, Gamber, Ben, Schulti, Zeed...” That was as far as he got for the medic finished what he was doing and stuck a hypo-spray against the side of Cas’ neck; the next thing Max knew, his captain was out of it and being manoeuvred onto a stretcher identical to the one on which he lay. “He’s going to make it alright, isn’t he?” he asked of the medic.

The medic looked from the captain to the sergeant, and then down to the blanket that covered his mangled legs. He had seen bravery many times, and in many different forms, but this was something new; having done the emergency work to stabilise the sergeant, he knew that he was going to be lucky to lose only one of his legs, yet he had given no sign of it as he talked to his superior.

The second time Cas woke following the explosion that tore his company apart he was in a sterile-looking hospital room. He couldn’t be certain, but he guessed that he was on the hospital ship, Selarcon, which had been in orbit around Leihd for months as the battle with the rebels who had taken control of significant portions of the planet raged, with heavy losses among the AFFP forces.

Cas and his company had been on Leihd since the beginning of the rebellion, and this was his second time needing surgery, which was why he was sure of where he was. The medical staff on the Selarcon were first rate, he knew, which meant if it was at all possible he would recover full use of his shoulder. That was a relief to him for any impairment in his shoulder or arm would put him at risk of seeing the end of his military career, his combat career at least - for fourteen years he had been a front-line combat soldier, fighting in one arena or another, and he wasn’t ready for that to end.

If there was a long-term problem with his shoulder or arm, then he might no longer be eligible for front-line duties; that would also mean he couldn’t take the J fighter posting he had trained for and been offered. Without a front-line position his choices would be an admin role or transfer to the exploration arm.

With all of that running through his mind, it was inevitable that he would try and move his arm. Nothing happened, and he felt panic course through him as his brain sent commands to his arm and shoulder, and received no response. He had been a combat soldier for so long that the thought of having to give it up for anything other than age was distressing. Some of his panic subsided when he turned his head, which moved much better than it had the last time he was conscious, and he saw that his shoulder and upper arm were hidden from view by a mass of bandages; the sight was not a pleasant one, but it did explain why he had had no luck in moving his arm, it also gave him hope that the lack of movement was only temporary.

A faint hiss made Cas turn his head. The door was off to his left, and already closing behind the nurse, a stern-looking woman with a strict face that made Cas hope she wasn’t the person in charge of his case; he could only imagine what a dreary recuperation he was likely to have with her in charge.

“Awake now are we, Captain?”

Cas grimaced inwardly, he hated the falsely sweet voices adopted by some nurses. Such voices were bad enough when issuing from the mouths of innocent young nurses, yet to be worn down by their work. When they came from someone who looked as though they had been nursing for longer than he had been alive, as did the nurse now at the side of his bed, it was almost too much to tolerate.

“So it seems,” Cas remarked, a touch of sarcasm in his voice. He couldn’t help it, no matter how much he tried to avoid doing so, he nearly always found himself being either sarcastic or flip when he had to deal with medical personnel. He was usually alright with field medics and surgical personnel, it was the ones he had to deal with during recovery, the ones who acted as though they had played an integral role in saving his life, who made him react as he did.

“That’s good, we like to see people wake up quickly following surgery,” the nurse said, irritating Cas still further with her use of the plural, as though she was not the only nurse in the room. “You’re not suffering any ill effects, are you?”

Cas shook his head. “I’m not even feeling any pain right now,” he said, very much thankful for that.

“Well, if the pain should return, your bed is programmed for pain relief; it will deliver a pre-set dose once every four hours, all you have to do is press the appropriate button. If you find the dose is insufficient, ring for assistance and someone will come. Now, I’ve got some water for you, you need to stay hydrated, and once you’ve had a drink you should get some rest, it’s the best thing for you.”