Hello everyone. I am terribly, terribly, terribly sorry for the very long delay. Life blindsiding me and my computer crashing didn't really help in my writing time. However, I've gotten it done and it's now ready. Enjoy!
It was night time on Magix. Various groups of aircraft, no more than three per group, zoomed by overhead, their engines all but silent in the night. Lines of tanks, artillery, shields, anti-air, and anti-ground turrets darted the areas around the schools and deposit of the Dragon's Fire. Because of the need to defend the civilians and the Fire, the Coalition army was split up to cover the entire area around all the key areas of the planet, due to their proximity, with the exception of the Dragon's fire, which was located several kilometers to the north of Magix City.
For the moment, everyone on Magix was having a fitful sleep. Well, almost everyone. Bloom was tossing and turning in bed, groaning and mumbling incoherently. She was reliving a memory, or more of a nightmare. It was one of her earlier assignments on the mining world of Razor VII. It was a small colony that mined a mineral that was vital to ACU production as it was what the armor was constructed of. The metal had a unique property of not being able to be created with nanolathing technology, making it a very valuable resource to war production. During the Seraphim War, she was tasked with holding the planet at all costs against enemy invasion.
The world was devoid of all life found on one of its size. The only inhabitants were the mining operations crew, the processing center crew, their families, and her unit which consisted of ten commanders, herself included. The Seraphim had invaded, established a beach-head and started to batter against her team's defenses. They had managed to stop them in the end, but it came with a price.
"No!" Bloom shot up in her bed, drenched in sweat. Her breath came in ragged gasps, her heart doing its best to burst from her ribcage, adrenaline coursing through her veins. She rested a shaky hand to her head and let silent tears flow from shut eyes, I'm sorry.
The light turning on broke Bloom out of her crying and her eyes snapped open. Everyone was wide awake, except Stella, who was standing by the switch, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. They all hurried to her bed, worried expressions adorning their faces. While she normally would brush it off as a nightmare or something else, she just didn't have the strength to do it. Bloom just sat there and basked in their comforting auras.
"Bloom," asked a concerned Flora, "what happened? Why are you crying?"
She drew a shaky breath but said nothing. She was still too drained to respond to any of them and the tears were still cascading down her face. It was Musa who took the first step and embraced her in comfortingly. The others added their own and tried to help their red haired friend calm down. She couldn't hold back anymore and she let it all out. For the majority of her service time, she'd kept everything in, except around those she completely trusted and they were very few and never around very often. Now, she just wanted someone talk to, to let them help her. She'd have to face her past sooner or later.
After a few minutes, she'd calmed down enough to speak normally, "Thanks girls. Sorry about that."
"You've got nothing to be sorry about," replied Musa. "Now, what happened? We just woke up to you screaming and crying."
She sighed deeply, unsure of how to begin, "It was… a memory … nightmare … whatever you want to call it."
"What happened," prodded Stella.
"It was my first…," she stopped, taking another shaky breath, "my first assignment in command of soldiers."
"Weren't you in charge of others before," asked Tecna curiously.
"No" the young woman answered. "It was my first true command. No superiors were on planet; just me and my team."
The girls knew they were about to go into dangerous territory. Something happened there and it left her scarred because of it. They knew they had to tread carefully.
"It was a mining world, Razor VII," she continued. "We were tasked to hold it against enemy attack at all costs. It was a planet vital to war production, but our numbers were stretched thin. There were only ten of us, including me, and we were dug in as best as we could be. Besides us, there were the mining operations crew, the factory ops crew and all their families. Altogether, that was 20,000 people."
The others remained silent and waited for her to continue, "Eventually, the Seraphim decided to pay us a visit. We had no warning and our outer defenses were shattered before we could retaliate. By the time we could, they had gained a sizable beach-head and we were forced to dig in even further. The colony managed to get off a distress call, but it would be days before help arrived, as they were tied up in other systems. All we could do was hold-out for as long as possible."
"What happened," questioned Flora.
Bloom's eyes glistened, tears threatening to spill out yet again, "They attacked shortly after. I lost half my team on the first day, two more the second and another the day after. It was just me and a lieutenant named Daniel Fletcher on the third day. That was when the Seraphim broke through our lines and hit the colony's anti-nuclear missile launchers. Then they nuked it and the mines where some of them had fled to. No one survived."
The girls were silenced by what she said. None of them had ever thought she'd see something like it, but continued on hoping to help her by making her talk about it, "And Fletcher," asked Stella.
"He was right next to the colony, maintaining the defenses there. He was caught in the blast. Reinforcements arrived just after the blast."
"You were the only survivor."
Bloom only nodded and she silent tears flow once again, "I saw him screaming over the open channel! I saw him burn to death! I saw it!" Flora was the one to hug the red head this time and Bloom cried even harder than before. It was a sight that none of them ever thought they'd see. Bloom had seemed so confident, unwavering, and fearless each and every day, even when she went to fight. Now, she looked so vulnerable. They all stayed up until her eyes were dry of tears and she went back to sleep. They too followed suit. It wouldn't be until the next morning that they would wake up that they learned that Bloom had made discovery via her dreams.
A little shorter than I expected, but that's all for now. I'll have more ready next time. I hope you liked it and I thank you for reading. I await your reviews. And please, no flamers. Haven't gotten 'em yet, but I know they're there.