A marine with a suit of Tactical Power Amour was just about the deadliest thing in the known universe. Firepower to destroy a mid-sized warship or city. Omni-direction thrusters. A digital engineering battalion, intelligence corps and reconnaissance unit in its oracle software. Proof against any know weapon, at least for long enough to fire back. Wherever a drop pod fell from orbit onto a rebel world, with a single armoured marine packed in impact gel and pumped with drugs .
Armour training worked Shuang's brain far harder than Basic had tested her body, but the Corps had discovered she was worth teaching more than drill and obedience. Instructors went over programming theory as many times as she needed, when they weren't stealing vital parts of her training Armour to ensure she was doing her safety checks. There was a lot of Sense-Sim training. A lot of running around the great plains wearing several tonnes of grey alloy, pounding the tar out of each other with black adamantine knuckle-studs and gel bullets. That could be lots of fun.
There were lots of dropouts. Marines got injured in training. A few fell down on a route march and didn't get up. There were marines, even combat-blooded marines, who couldn't take another failed Sense-Sim run; watching another megaplex burn in nuclear fire because of their choices alone. The endless testing knocked out the rest of the bottom three-quarters that their helpful instructors had orders to eliminate. Eliminating all of them, however strong, would have been as simple as keeping the pressure on for as long as it took.
No one is strong enough. Everyone has a breaking point. Shuang knew that from the first time she'd seen a Tauian refugee girl raped into mangled insensibility in Sense-Sim (She'd blasted the rapists to atoms and barely passed). Any marine who didn't quit could get through Basic, but there was a galaxy of burning horrors, and quiet, cold tortures, without end. A marine and her comrades could face it all with a grin–but an armoured marine faced it alone, in her deadly steel coffin. All of them broke in the end.
If a marine couldn't bear the power they held, or its powerlessness in the face of a dark universe–that was the fault of the horrors, not the hero. Anyone in Armour training that year who disparaged a dropout could prepare to have a wrathful Kung Fu mistress beat them to jelly in the course of the next sparring day.
Still, Fighter swore she wouldn't break. By the end of the year she'd seen more combat and horrors through Sense-Sim than a dozen veterans, and, in the sense that such things were being done to men, women and children all over the galaxy, every minute of it had been true. If she had been Emperor, she might have thrown whole planets into Basic, until there were enough heroes to save everybody. But there was politics, that held the Space Marines back from even the warzones they could've taken. She wasn't a leader. She just had to get her Armour, go out to fight and save as many worlds as she could. She could not break.
After the first year, dropping out was forbidden. The extent of the Space Phase training was a military secret. It was located on an orbital habitat, Shuang presumed, to maintain that secrecy. She only briefly considered that it might have been to keep the marines from getting out as well.
-0-
"Corpsman Lei. After implantation with many millions of credits in cyber and bio augmentation, you passed counter-interrogation training on the first attempt; although of course nobody gets a second one. Then the standard special forces skeletal work, which I can remember hurting like, ah…?"
"…like words aren't enough, sir. It was still better than getting a pain-enhancer tied to my tailbone for four minutes. Shuang Lei. Corpsman. Serial number–"
"Alright, this isn't another interrogation, just a chat. After that, you were drowned a few times and revived. Simulated frost bite and limb loss, some more pain tolerance tests–standard procedure. Then hell week. We showed you your father dead. You hunted his killers across the planet, then let them go when we gave the order. We put you in that fragging ambush on Char. You didn't freeze up. We put you through it again, with a catastrophic Armour failure. You watched all your comrades die, the Bugs peeling off your Armour–and you still fought with your side arm and your teeth, as they picked you apart. You're a fragging good marine, Lei. The best in CQC I've seen, and whatever meditative mumbo you learned, it works. Being beaten and raped by little green men, in some stupid fantasy world, in a fragging stupid simulation, does not change that. Why are you throwing your career down the waste unit by refusing to retake?"
"I will give my life for the Emperor, Sir. You know I've faced being devoured before, and it was an honour. It was an honour to be tortured for the Emperor–I broke in the end, but everyone breaks. But it cannot be an honour to be raped."
"That's pride, Lei–get over it. You must give up on honour, if the Corps demands it. If you are captured, tortured, and raped every day for a year on Star Holovision by Tauian rebels–you must not break. You must continue to kill the Emperor's foes, as a Space Marine, even in total defeat and utter disgrace, because you are a multi-million credit weapon holding the power of a steel god, and you TAKE ORDERS FROM THE MARINES! You will not break, Lei. You will not give up."
"Do the male candidates have to get over being raped, sir?"
"That's classified. You're out of the Corps if you ask a stupid question like that again. I've known Marines who'd gone through raped–good marines. Some got over it, a couple didn't–we did all for them that we could. Are you saying you're better than them, Lei? Are you saying they should all hang themselves, for honour? What the frag do you want me to put on your discharge report?"
"That rape is wrong, Sir. That I joined the Corps to fight such things. That I did my best, and it wasn't nothing."
-0-
At least the Colonel hadn't tried to claim that more Sense-Sim rape would give her empathy with rape survivors. Fighter didn't presume that she could know what anyone felt or suffered, or that anyone else could know who she really was. She hadn't, since the cyber-surgeons had broken all her bones to put the Kevlar lacing in, fitted the big super-adrenal glands in her neck, or doubled her heart's pumping power with synthetic fibres. A big heart–she could almost smile at that.
Fighter gazed from orbital habitat Heinlein's viewing window, at the distant stars. Her new skin was tougher and darker; it almost felt like hers already. Getting another inch in height wasn't so bad. They had finally let her regrow her ponytail. She'd known the glands had addiction problems when she requested them–she hadn't known she might get addicted to the mad rush of courage and fury, one nerve-twitch away. Her broad clear face was at rest now, however. Cold and controlled as Armour.
Martinez had gone crazy during his bonework. She felt sorry for him. She would never hear of him again, or what the Corps did with their multi-million credit weapons when they broke.
Don't break. Don't complain. Don't ask questions. The unwritten Code. The generals had to have kept it very well if could keep on that fragging rape simulation, then talk about the honour of the Space Marines. They might not spot the contradictions for another thousand years, unless one of them did, and spent the rest of his career fighting it. But Fighter knew she would spend the rest of her life on the battlefields among the stars.
She was a Space Marine. She was not afraid or ashamed. She could still feel, she would always fight–and in a hundred lifetimes of Shuang or Susan Lei, she had never felt stronger.
-0-
She stood nearly a half-foot taller again now, counting metal, and half-again as broad. Down the arm of her Beta Shadowclaw Armour, touchplates responded pliantly as her orthoskin. Exoskeleton servos moved the black alloy plates, and her blaster scorched the wall where a Lizard's jaws had gaped. With three more shots, Lieutenant 'Fighter' Lei blasted one alien down. Twenty left.
A green enemy blast struck her shoulderplate; she didn't duck. 5% damage glared in her headset; she sidestepped in the next second, still firing. The marines of her squad ducked for doorways or rubble, snap-shooting red plasma. The fusion plant–the enemy's strongpoint–loomed above them, into the impossibly blue sky of Far Hope.
A frontier world, settlers burdened with the crazy desire to get as far from the Emperor's light as possible. Still, Fighter had grimly faced the mission, after the planet's FTL comms had winked out, of bringing the stray sheep back to the imperial fold, living or butchered. Following one warpjump in the corvette Slipdagger, and one supersonic drop pod ride that had reduced the town hall to a crater when she came down on it, she had been almost relieved to see the Lizards. Hostile aliens from uncharted space had taken Far Hope and its colonists by stealth. Their prisoners would be shipped offworld for the brain soup that stood at the peak of Lizard cuisine, unless the Space Marines had anything to say about it.
Nineteen replaced twenty in the corner of Fighter's vision, as the head got scorched off another marine. She screamed at them to stay down, fired back. The Lizard ducked with superhuman speed–five feet without the stoop, but spike-tailed, piranha-toothed regenerators; tough as leather. Their squawks sounded like mocking laughter.
Rico and Bauer down, before she'd found them holed up in the spaceport and killed all the Lizards there. Park, Kendrick and now McGee down, in the minute she'd taken in failing to make a decision. She could have levelled the power station with her belt-fed shoulder rockets–but that would set a whole colony back to groundbreak; the mission would have failed. The Lizards had every side covered in force; the marines had no real cover from full-powered blasts. Ilsa could have planned an attack, Harry could have inspired one, but she was no leader. That was unchangeable, she had always known…she was a Fighter. She would not retreat, she could not watch her men die.
"FALL BACK, EVERYONE! I'll cover you!"
The marines backed away. Soft humans with no place on this battlefield–no more than the puppy she'd found straying through the empty city, and now passed from her hip compartment to her bewildered NCO. Beta Nightclaw Armour was a light stealth model, not made for frontal assaults–but lightning burst from her super-adrenal gland, and that no longer mattered. Her thrusters flashed blue and she leapt.
Green flashed around her as she arced over the station. Sub-thrusters twisted her into clear air. The Lizard sniper on the station roof–that might have lived and eaten humans for centuries– burst over the concrete under her armoured kick. She swung her fist at the second lizard–fangs and yellow blood shot out, as it crumpled.
Blasts bit through the walls from every side, as she dropped through the roof hatch. Her shoulderpad blown away, her orthoskin feeling the heat, her shoulder thrown back as she landed in a crouched stance; 25% damage. But now the Lizards had to dial back their blaster settings, or risk a stray bolt blowing them all to atoms. Her aural sensors picked out Imperial blasters, her own men still firing, nineteen dropped to eighteen–she shouted again at them to fall back, as she thundered towards the heat-signals blazing on every side.
Not enough heat signals. A Lizard suited in silver, invisible to infra-red, scuttled out lunging at her groin. Sidestep, slap the bio-electric machete into the air, swipe the unholy alien weapon away. Her fist smashed through the monster's bones and flesh; a primal roar escaped her lungs.
There were six in the canteen at the end of the passage. 45% damage, as she broke through the door, firing as she ran, shaking with flooded adrenalin–only two Lizards went down. She dropped hard behind a pillar. Chunks blew off it, off of her–50% damage. She had to keep firing, still as clear water, even as metal burnt on her skin. One more Lizard went down blasted. And another, in a stealth-suit, drove its sword into her back with a venemous hiss. 70% damage. She was too high for pain, but she felt the blood start pooling.
Backhanding the Lizard's head off, with the sword still stuck in her wrenched from its grip, she grabbed and threw a micro-grenade that blew most of the room and two more aliens to bits. The survivor caught her with a burst, as she staggered back to the door. 80%, More Lizards were skittering in behind, yellow eyes flicking toward her.
Another hit of adrenalin–over the limits. She didn't feel the blasts hit her stomach as she charged, or her chest. It took her broken Armour, synthetic skin, Kevlar laced bones and the titanic heart of a hero to keep her up–she could even faintly feel the pain of burns, through chemical frenzy. She felt rage for her dead comrades, and her own death, as she chopped to burst a stomach, swiped the next Lizard into the guns of two more, then spun about in a roundhouse kick that broke all three of them.
She dropped to one knee until her head cleared. Then, without checking her Armour damage, she went to clear the rest of the building.
-0-
When she'd blasted down the several remaining Lizards, they burnt their way through to the huge bunker under the power station. The colonists were curled up in rows of cold-stasis units, the Lizard's Elder/Ayatollah/Commander (The word didn't translate) was raising his claws. And the colony's governor was lying on a table, with bulging legs, a lizard's arm, and scars full of scales.
It came out at blasterpoint that the Lizards had first come as traders, buying genetic material to farm cloned brains–but the quick profits from thousands of pre-grown brains had proved too tempting. The Governor had sold them all the colonists, for a planet's ransom in gold–and Lizard tissue implants that would give him their regenerative powers and near-immortality.
"The brainsss are oursss," The Lizard hissed, "We fairly purchased them from their master. If you sssieze them, or molest me, that will be an act of war."
Some of the 'brains' that Shuang could see behind blue glass had children's faces. Her Oracle wrist computer helpfully informed her that 'leader', 'master' and 'owner' were a single word in the Lizard's language. And a Lizard-human hybrid was their brother; no less qualified to sell off short-lived humans than cows or pigs. Shuang actually agreed that the governor wasn't what she'd ever consider human.
"These people belong to Emperor Gladius Rex. That monster will spend the next century in cold stasis, plugged into Sense-Sim hell. You'll probably spend a few years getting cut up in xenobiology labs before they put you down like a dog, coward."
(Also, all the colonists who had traded with aliens would be sent to a prison world. Unless she vouched for them, and she would)
"When you have lived for over a thousssand yearrsss...you cannot ssssimply die. I have sssseen true interssstellar war–you hairlesss Ape. Planetsss blown apart from within, without defenssse. You will ssseee it too, and every one of you Apesss will die."
Armour torn and body burnt, Shuang stood and looked down on the Lizard like a warrior queen–or simply a woman unafraid, who knew who she was.
"Yeah, I'll see it. They told us we'd see the stars. We'd all be heroes...well, a world like this one needs some. Bring your war. Nothing you can do will defeat us."
-0-
"...Captain Shuang Lei of Far Hope. For outstanding heroics in the Emperor's service, for unyielding devotion to the way of His light...we honour you. "
She stood before the towering chapel windows of Starstation Ajax, as ranks of marines saluted. The Imperial Arbiter, who spoke with the voice of Gladius Rex himself, was saluting her. The crowds of workers and dignitaries applauded behind the marines–the comrades she'd saved–as camera drones flitted like steel angels around her dark and shining head.
It almost felt shameful, when she'd failed six comrades and almost won nothing but her own foolish death. She'd almost failed, at every step...but here she stood. The shame of victory wasn't the lying shame of failure or false degradation; she would do better next time. Save all her friends, wipe out every single foe–some of them might be more than monsters, but it was her duty to protect and kill, above all.
She had done her duty. For her Corps and her people, for her family and her friends. She'd slain a bear and saved a pup–the dog she'd carried from Far Hope was now the regiment's petted mascot and a great new friend. And she had saved thousands of innocents, which was all that had made her charge, drunk on her implants, into the mouth of hell. She was strong. Her father would watch her on holovision, with pride...she had never cried such happy tears.
(The idea that this was all a Sense-Sim, or a dream–that she had failed Basic, failed Armour, died in the Power Station–never even been a citizen of the Imperium, but a brave, smiling adventurer, whose hope, but not her dreams had died in a filthy cave–barely entered her head. She had struggled, fought and staked her life to stand here. This was her, and so much more, and nothing would change that.)
The golden dagger was placed in her hands, the Medal of Honour. And the station's great cannons let off two full broadsides, blotting out the endless stars with white fire–the power and glory of man.
In the assembled ranks, Ilsa applauded calmly as Harry applauded wildly. She needed to speak to them about her mission, as soon as she got a chance. There was the faintest, vanishing sense of loss, thinking she had never had the time or will to be more than his friend. But she'd never had time, they were still friends...and you couldn't have everything in a single run. What was more, she was a hero, and Harry's smile said he would be, someday.
No second chapter to Shuang 'Fighter' Lei's career as a Space Marine was ever written. Perhaps she refused to devastate a planet of rebels or aliens, and the Corps took steps. Perhaps a wary enemy put one blast through her armour, by a freak unhappy chance. Perhaps anything or nothing...but there were a million worlds elsewhere, and so much for a hero to do and see.
A/N: Again, all scenarios are from Steve Cave's digital gamebook Mobile Armoured Marine: Mission to Far Hope. Where you can kill a bear, save a puppy and win the medal of honour...but there was no sequel, hence the ending. Still, Shuang/Susan, Ilsa and Harry will return for more adventures, that will be better than Goblin Slayer and hopefully decent in quality too.