Lieutenant Ivar Bandle daily regretted the contract that lured Dawson's Bunch to the planet of Darson. Now his platoon finally had a mission to be something other than a glorified security guards. However, all is not as it seems and soon he, his men and a sylph named Sascha are on the run. All that is left for them is to march or die.

Note: Story has not changed since it was posted during the Stardust Anniversary Science Fiction Contest.

The Shootist
by Arcie Emm

Ivar Bandle shared one thought with the men amongst whom he walked, that being a mutual distrust bordering upon outright hate. They saw him as an outsider here to destroy their way of life, while he saw their way of life as something worth destroying. It made his patrol rife with danger, for he knew they were a pack of macho shit heads. You never knew when one of them was going to try and prove the size of his stones.

It may not happen this patrol or the next, but it would happen. And when it did Lieutenant Ivar Bandle and his platoon would once more prove, that they too were macho shit heads and that their stones were bigger than any puke who wanted a compare. After all the mercenary’s superior fire power would do the measuring. But today bloodshed seemed unlikely. The men out and about today were older, past the uncontrolled fire of youth. And they looked prosperous, at least what passed for prosperous in the capital, Taling. These were not hard eyed rustics from rural Darson, no they were locals who may hate, but who would still tolerate.

His assumption proved correct and the platoon safely returned to Camp Royal, so named by King Nicholai after it had been established by the first holders of the security contract held by Ivar’s company. After three months Ivar could see why the contract officers could negotiate such a premium deal for Dawson’s Bunch and why none of the previous companies had rebid. Darson was a pit, sadly one that had to be experienced to be understood, so the credits had resulted in a majority ‘yes’ vote, though now none of the mercenaries would admit to having so voted.

The next morning found Ivar in the company office working on paperwork when a clerk informed him that Colonel Dawson wished to see him. Soonest and in formals. During the quick dash to his quarters and then towards the regiment’s headquarters he wondered what task the colonel would have for him and his platoon. Hopefully it would be one that would diminish the general malaise upon them.

Ivar stopped outside for a few moments to regain his breath. During that short pause he noticed, in front of the HQ, one of the large, armoured, tracked cars used by members of the royal family to stop assassination attempts by their beloved subjects. His excitement about the task diminished when he guessed that the royals were involved, a slimy batch who held onto power through treachery. It made him sick that the Bunch were in their pay, but as a professional soldier it came with the job. Therefore, before he entered the building, Ivar schooled his face to hide his thoughts about his employers.

A wise move; there were four large men waiting in the lobby, watching over all who entered. They would be of the Gamdi clan, headed by King Nicholai. And if these four men fit the mold of the other Gamdi whom Ivar had met they would be quick to anger, almost seeking to be insulted. They stared hard at him, but he kept his face impassive, letting them see nothing as he approached the desk to inform the colonel’s clerk of his arrival.

At the clerk’s direction he took a seat and forced himself not to fidget under the beady gazes of the Gamdi. Following orders, secretly published by the psych officer, Ivar did not look any of them in the eye. The psych team’s report had compared these body guards to dogs, saying they would be less likely to attack if one did not look them in the eyes.

Soon after his arrival, the clerk let him know he could enter, upon which he found a full room, leaving himself, the regimental sergeant major, the executive officer, and his own captain standing. Only the colonel and two recognizable figures from Darson were seated. The first, Minister Tor Aldieno, a cousin to the King, served as the main liaison with the Bunch. Beside him sat a younger, though not young, man whom Ivar had never met but whom he knew much about, the psych report had contained an entire chapter on the third son of the king who often acted as the family enforcer. The report had raised serious questions about Prince Fallan’s sanity, believing him to be at a minimum a delusional paranoid sadist. The two were accompanied by four more of the uglies, each looking ready to chew furniture.

After the colonel’s welcome, Ivar surmised one of the reasons behind their anger. Colonel Dawson was fully in charge of the meeting and they would feel this did not show proper deference. But Ivar guessed the very fact that the meeting was taking place here, rather than in one of the palaces, was a sign that they were in trouble and needed quiet help. Thus Bandle was prepared for something big to be going on, but the colonel’s next words still shocked him.

“Lieutenant, last night in Bitrel Province the village of Denj was raided by a large contingent of rebel troops. They killed a number of men; furthermore, they breached the Denj enclave and took all of its tenants hostage.”

’Oh my,’ thought Ivar. Further reasoning behind the goons’ anger zoomed into focus. Bitrel Province was one claimed by the Gamdi clan and though he had never heard of Denj, it must be important if it held an enclave.

The Darsonian enclave resulted from one of the largest, cultural, planetary idiocies that the lieutenant had ever observed. Darson held a populace patriarchal in the extreme, a society where sons meant everything and daughters were a burden. This combined with gene splicing had led to multiple generations where boys significantly outnumbered girls. It came to a head about eighty years before Dawson’s Bunch arrived, when a rare period of peace allowed the realization that there just were not enough women to go around.

Instead of leading to a cultural change, a much more logical approach, the thoughts and prejudices were reinforced. Women did become more precious, but as a commodity not as individuals. They were rounded up by their clans and locked away in enclaves. There they birthed heirs to wealthy families and daughters to follow in their footsteps. Only men considered lucky or privileged visited enclaves, most had to settle for an incubator generated son, using eggs purchased off planet.

Some men, with a broader world view, saw this as a good approach to increase the female population. However, the powerful who had already created enclaves proved unwilling to lose control over the women. Their harsh reprisals birthed the first rebels, at least the most current incarnation of rebels on this planet of idiots.

Having an enclave successfully breached would be interpreted as a major sign of weakness. The Gamdi needed to act fast to re-gather their women, but more importantly they had to capture the rebels and deal with them. Otherwise they may be toppled from the pinnacle. Even allied clans, those helping to keep them at the top of the food chain, would consider switching sides, or chasing the throne for themselves.

“Currently the news of the attack has been kept quiet, contained within the Gamdi who are currently equipping a force to give chase to punish the rebels. However, they have asked for some assistance and that is where you and your men come in.”

Three hours later, Ivar waited impatiently at the shuttle port for the arrival of Prince Fallan, who would escort his platoon and a squad from the heavy weapons company to Denj. After meeting the man he felt little surprise at the wait, the prince had seemed to go out of his way to be unpleasant. He had swung back and forth between bitching about the rebels to vehement and graphic descriptions of what he would do once they were caught. No, Ivar did not look forward to this mission, nor did his mood improve when he saw that the prince was accompanied by the nymph-like figure of his pleasure slave .

Ivar knew the prince would put on a show of great outrage to hear the word slave, he would say Darson did not condone slavery and that his sylph acted as a valued and cherished member of his household. Not that Lieutenant Ivar Bandle would use the term in the presence of his employer, despite his disgust at the practice. Nor was he alone in this belief, the League of Planetary Systems had judged the Darsonians guilty of slavery when denying their membership.

Yet it wasn’t only the subjugation that bothered Ivar. No, the very presence of the pleasure slaves made Ivar uncomfortable. He found it disturbing to see men serve other men as women, even when that service was forced.

For not only in the fathering of heirs did the idiotic Darsonian policy towards women cause problems. A more simplistic issue existed in the unavailability of women to meet man’s basic pleasures. On a planet brimming with men it resulted in a population hornier than a herd of bulls, making it hardly surprising that they spent so much time trying to kill each other. Yet man is, if nothing else, adaptable and thus there were those such as the prince’s companion, those who were called, often mockingly, sylphs.

Still everyone, even the mockers, made use of the sylphs, creating a thriving industry in the procurement and development of boys and young men to fulfill the role. The trade skirted, often drifting across, the borders of legality. Many stories of kidnapping existed and fathers went to extremes to protect their sons. At a minimum, son’s were taught to display no signs of femininity, such that only the most masculine of hobbies were known. Nearly as common was body shaping, rarely did one see a slender male. Instead, everyone tended to be either muscle-bound or overweight. And amongst the poor, facial scarification became common.

Even with these protective measures, thousands of boys went missing every year. Rarely did a conviction occur, and more rarely still did a father accept the return of a son so taken. Not that Prince’s sylph would have been some kidnap victim, no, he would be a completely different type of victim. The wealthiest did not wait to find a sylph who met their fancy, instead they would have one made. From gene splicing to physical development and growth, nothing would be left to chance in the fulfillment of the client’s vision, no matter how exotic.

Before Ivar could judge this sylph’s level of exoticism, Prince Fallan marched in front of him, closer than needed, asking, “Lieutenant Bandle, are your men ready to head to Denj?”

“Yes, your Highness,” Ivar replied, ignoring the hour-long wait for this rude man standing in his space.

“That is good. We are in a hurry; therefore, you will ride with me so that we can confirm your role in this operation.”

Ivar would have preferred to travel with his men while holding the conversation over comlink, but he could not find a polite way to refuse and soon found himself trailing the prince and followers onto the royal launch sitting beside the larger and blockier shuttles favoured by the mercenaries. Once aboard he found the inside richly appointed, throne-room-like in appearance, with the prince sitting at the front centre beside a low, cushioned bench where the sylph arranged himself. In turn, Prince Fallan’s men sat in rows of seats facing him, though they left the seat directly across from the prince for Bandle.

Once in his seat, they left Ivar alone during take-off, time he used to inform his second, First Sergeant Alphonse Dasi, of the change in travel plans. During his quiet conversation, Prince Fallan watched him with a lizard’s gaze while absentmindedly stroking the hair on the bowed head of of his companion. Once Ivar finished, the prince asked, “Is everything okay, Lieutenant?”

Somehow the man turned this casual question into an insult, one impossible to meet in kind. Instead, Ivar took sanctuary in the mannerisms of all underlings dealing with asshole superiors, he said as little as possible. “Yes, your Highness, my second has everything under control.”

“Ahh, that is good, Lieutenant.” Once more the prince lapsed into a lengthy silence, later broken by another question. “I suppose that Colonel Dawson informed you of your role in this action?”

“Yes, your Highness. Once you determine the direction in which the rebels are running we are to use our sleds to get in front of them and act as a blocking force.”

“Exactly, it is good to see that we are on the same page,” Prince Fallan murmured before resuming his silence.

The entire encounter put Ivar on edge. He had left camp with cautions from Captain Dagnyer the C-2 that there were irregularities in the Denj story, now he had to endure this simple, apparently meaningless interview. He felt caught in something beyond his pay grade. Therefore, he mentally hunkered down, preparing to deal with anything thrown his way while wishing that the prince had not separated him from his men.

Trying not to fidget under the stare of the prince, Ivar settled back into his seat and closed his eyes, pretending to go to sleep. The appearance had almost become reality when he heard the prince order, “Sascha, why don’t you get everybody a beverage and a snack.”

Opening his eyes to see the prince’s companion rise from his bench, Ivar obtained his first good look, though quick so as not to insult his touchy hosts, at Sascha. Ivar could not believe the boy’s tiny size, easily three decimetres shorter than the average female on Ivar’s home planet of Unity. Nor would he think the boy weighed much more than the kit carried by a trooper in Dawson’s company. Yet despite this, the tight silk of the dress displayed ample curves. Hips and backside likely appeared larger because of a minuscule waist, but no such illusionary affect was required for breasts larger than symmetry allowed.

Ivar’s surmise, based upon brief glimpses, was that Sascha’s face was as beautiful as the body that it topped. But he could not get a good look with it mostly obscured by an amazingly thick fall of obsidian-black hair hanging almost to his knees.

Yet, despite looking so much like a woman, Ivar doubted the presented picture, it felt artificial. The boy’s movements and gestures were elegant in a exaggerated and tutored manner, lacking the natural grace possessed by the women he mimicked. This was not surprising, for Ivar guessed that Sascha had never met a real woman and the images and methods used for training would have misled him. No, it was unfair to expect more and yet it added to the unfavourable judgment Ivar had originally formed, one he recognized as irrational and unfair.

The initial crack in his judgment came when he realized that they too had judged him, as shown by his being served last. Then when Sascha did approach and he finally saw the boy’s face what he saw made him almost completely cast it aside.

Not because the face was lovely, with a petite nose over luscious lips bracketed by high cheeks and perfect chin all covered in a creamy skin. He had expected nothing less; this launch, the guards, and even their clothing showed that the prince expected the very best. But Ivar had not expected Sascha’s eyes, not because of any emotion they displayed, just the eyes themselves. The lashes matched Sascha’s hair being thick and long, but the eyes were enormous, impossibly large is such a small face and so deeply coloured. Crystal emerald green irises twice the size of normal and almost obscuring the white glistened at him. So very unnatural, yet the eyes enhanced the face making it both beautiful and haunted. So great an impact did the eyes possess that Ivar could not stop a gasp of surprise.

Hearing this, Prince Fallan chuckled and asked, “Isn’t my Sascha amazing?”

Put on the spot, Ivar’s mind scrambled trying to decide how to answer, in the end he settled on truth, “She is very beautiful, your Highness.”

The chuckle turned to a full laugh before the prince questioningly stated, “She? No lieutenant, despite all appearances, Sascha is definitely a he. Otherwise he would be locked away in a enclave and I would be denied the pleasure of his company, which would make me sad. No, when my enemies forced me to take Sascha before the Board of Judgment they found that he was born male, just as you and I. Which bothers you, does it not?”

It did, but Ivar would never make that admission to this man toying with him as a cat with a mouse; therefore, with total conviction he told a bald faced lie. “No, your Highness, not at all.”

“No? Many off-worlders are disturbed by our sylphs,” Prince Fallan stated while continuing to study Ivar. Seeing nothing on the lieutenant’s face, he chased down another path, “Though you are correct that he is very beautiful, which is only fair based upon how much his shapers charged me. Yet his appearance was my idea, my vision. Do you know upon what that vision is based, Lieutenant?”

Quickly glancing at his fellow mouse Ivar saw that Sascha stood straight no longer with head downcast, despite being treated as a possession. Unbowed he stared back at Ivar almost demanding that the lieutenant not look away and Ivar did not, instead he studied the young man trying to answer the prince’s warped question. Sascha’s appearance made the boy one of the most feminine looking sylphs he had seen. In fact, few women he had met were physically as attractive. Features, skin tone and hair all pointed towards an Asiatic influence, which may explain the size for Ivar had heard that Asian women were at one time small. Yet that did not explain the eyes. With much less confidence than he had managed for his prior lie, Ivar asked, “A doll, your Highness?”

“A good guess, Lieutenant, but not quite. No, my vision for him came to me soon after I reached manhood, while searching my uncle Ander’s home for treasonous information. Imagine my surprise that his secret room actually contained the largest collection of historical pornography from Earth that you have ever seen. Poor Uncle Ander, his secrecy over such a silly hobby ended up being the death of him.

“Amongst those works were a number of the most curious picture books. Each of those books had a heroine fighting against all sorts of villains and monsters, except when those same villains and monsters were having their way with her. But at the end she would always win as a result of her extraordinary powers or skills at fighting. A different power or skill for each heroine, yet each of them had a consistent look. Always tiny, yet curvaceous, dressed in the smallest costumes and invariably having long hair in a rainbow of colours. They also had the biggest and brightest eyes you could imagine. Actually you don’t need to imagine, you just need to look at my Sascha.

“I devoured those picture books and by day’s break I knew what I wanted my sylph to look like. It took years, during which time I had to settle for second or third best, but the results were worth it. I monopolized a coterie of splicers until they fully understood what I wanted. The eyes worried us the most; therefore, we were not surprised that only four of ten babies from the incubator successfully took the mutation without ending up blind. Those four grew up under constant training and competition, in most things they equaled each other, but in one area Sascha stood out.

“I wanted my little boys to be fighters like those little girls in the picture book. Of course mystical powers were not an option, nor sadly were the martial arts due to their inability to develop any strength while keeping my desired bodyshape. Therefore, we taught them the use of hand guns and where Sascha thrived in the simulators while other three shrunk away. So despite my wishes for blue eyes, my adventurous little Sascha became my choice to undergo the last sculpting and training. During that time we ran into a problem with his hair. The length came naturally, but I wanted all the colours from those books and hair dyes were just not acceptable. But we found an answer.”

Temporarily turning from Ivar the prince spoke to his companion, “I think a dark indigo, Sascha.”

Ivar’s gaze in turn went to Sascha to see him reach into the bag he had carried aboard to remove a metallic comb. After a moment of fiddling, the young man began to comb his long hair and everywhere he brushed, the hair changed from its lustrous black to a deep, dark, purplish blue. Strangely fascinated by the sight, Ivar did not immediately turn back to the prince as the latter continued his speech.

“My shapers found a chromaticist by the name of Dr. Werner Eveline. He works with micro-organisms that change colour when agitated by energy waves. The doctor appreciated my funding and modified his research to solve my problem. First he had to stop them from being such carnivorous little devils; therefore, he made human flesh poisonous to them while nourishing them upon the natural chemicals found in the oils in human hair. Once that issue was solved he had to find a way to bind them to hair. Luckily, Sascha’s brothers were able to help in the experimentation so that Dr. Eveline could perfect his methods without damaging my prize. He also found a way to use the organisms upon nails. Show him, Sascha.”

Though his hair still shone mostly black Sascha held up a hand, so that the long sleeve fell down to show a narrow hand with long, clear nails. Then touching the end of comb to each nail they changed to a pale purple. Switching hands, he quickly finished the rest of his fingers, then with an embarrassed face, wiggled his fingers at Ivar before returning to his hair.

Though the whole performance seemed rather mortifying, Ivar decided to once more speak, to play the active audience. “Very impressive, your Highness, I would think you would find quite a market for such an invention.”

“Oh, most definitely, Lieutenant. I have opened a number of franchises both on Darson and off planet; however, it is not perfect. Only small variations of colour are possible, nor can you immediately make another change. You must rest the hair between each treatment or the organisms will die, so it takes a number of days to make drastic changes, such as; black to a pink. But why explain when you can see the full transformation, for I plan to leave my Sascha with you while I am out in the field, as the locals I will be travelling with look down upon sylphs like him.”

“Your Highness!” Ivar exclaimed, finally shocked out his shell.

“Yes, it is lucky that you don’t have such a problem.”

Two mornings later, a grumpy Ivar Bandle pretended to work in his Denj inn room, where he had banished himself so his mood did not affect the men. He felt nervous, an emotion constantly growing with the lack of information from both the prince and headquarters. And because of the kid, his, or maybe her --- it was getting harder to differentiate --- presence seemed dangerous, like a trap waiting to be sprung.

The kid, following Fallan’s orders, would soon arrive for his regular visit to show Ivar the next stage in the hair colour transformation. Awkward visits, but Sascha understood the only way out of his room involved visits to the lieutenant and since the kid was bored spitless he continued to come to Ivar’s room. But Sascha needed someone other than Ivar to play nursemaid, for the lieutenant had the empathy of a stone. Ivar knew he could not be the person to help the emotionally scarred teenager.

Noticing the time, he felt no surprise to hear from outside his door the first sergeant complementing Sascha on his appearance. Dasi and most of his troops did not have Ivar’s difficulty with Sascha, they just seemed happy to finally have some top-notch eye-candy around.

He tried to delay the meeting for a few more minutes, but a spate of giggles, combined with remembered tales of Dasi’s furloughs, made him rethink that wisdom. “Dasi, please send in Sascha.”

The sight of Sascha made him roll his eyes. No longer did candy provide the right description, the boy had become a confectionery treat from a fetishist’s bakery. Hair that on the last visit was a light purple now was a pale pink, matching the colour of the clothing the kid now wore. From hair ribbons to shoes and with lacy, short dress in between, Sascha personified pink fluff.

Despite appearances and unlike Ivar, Sascha was full of empathy. A mechanism surely developed to survive being owned by a homicidal maniac. So he guessed Ivar’s opinion, resulting in a pink pout and a high-pitched question, “Lieutenant Bandle, what did I do wrong?”

Cursing to himself, Ivar tried to dismiss the question, “Nothing is wrong, Sascha, you look...ummm...nice.”

“You think I look silly.”

“No, not at all, I just didn’t expect you to be all in pink.”

“You don’t need to lie, I know how I look, like a little boy. I wish you hadn’t wanted my hair to turn pink, I much prefer it black when I don’t have to wear these silly dresses,” Sascha accused.

“I didn’t want to see it,” Ivar retorted.

“Why didn’t you stop me? You could’ve.”

Ivar actually felt pleased to hear fierceness where he expected a whine, yet he would not take any blame, “How was I to know? Besides you appeared to be enjoying it.”

“Well, it did give me something to do,” Sascha admitted. “After all I don’t have my books or entertainments.”

“Then you should have packed something other than clothes,” Ivar bluntly replied.

“But I didn’t!”

“Didn’t what?”

“I didn’t pack anything, someone else did. It surprised me to see the shuttle carried so many of my things when we arrived.”

“So you usually travel with less?” Ivar asked, almost feeling comfortable with Sascha who apparently had a back bone.

“I don’t know, this is the first time that Prince Fallan has ever taken me out of the palace.”

The statement slammed into Ivar, making his fears rise up like bile. That sense of wrongness, lurking since the outset of the mission, could no longer be denied and in a quiet voice he asked, “Sascha, don’t you find that strange?”

“No, why wouldn’t I have my clothes? I never know what Prince Fallan wants me to wear; therefore, I need everything in order to be able to please him.”

“Not just the clothes, Sascha, that he took you out of the palace, that he left you here with us?”

“It’s an adventure. I always wanted to go on one, like in my books, but it’s turned out more boring than I expected. Is something the matter, Lieutenant Bandle?”

“I think so, Sascha, but I don’t know what.”

“Oh,” Sascha replied before joining his thoughtful silence. Then innocently stated, “Maybe something I overheard between the village elders and Prince Fallan may help. They mentioned that no evidence would be found at the enclave or of the attackers around town. Maybe you can find something they missed.”

Mentally Ivar kicked himself for not having checked already. From moment one, he had distrusted the prince, yet had still taken him at face value. How much had the prince played him for a fool? Rising to his feet, he almost reached the door before remembering his guest, turning to the figure in pink he said, “Sascha, stay here please, I may have some more questions.”

“Ok, Lieutenant Bandle, and can you think of a new hair colour for me? Not black though, Prince Fallan will expect something different.”

“Ok, Sascha, if I get the time.”

He did not get the time, instead Ivar spent the next hour dispatching men around the village and on the horn with Captain Dagnyer back in Taling. His men’s reports solidified his hunch, as he learned the only recent tracks led away from the village and that the enclave damage resulted from demolition, not combat. Confirmation came when the C-2 informed him the satellites showed no unexplainable recent traffic in Bitrel towards Denj.

“What’s going on, Captain? I have to tell you I feel like we are sitting here in the pincers.”

“I am not sure, Lieutenant. I have heard rumblings of a rebel plot called Ascension, we have no idea what it is about, so this may have something to with it.”

“Ascension?” a little voice in the corner of Ivar’s office asked. “The prince has been mumbling that in his sleep recently.”

Captain Dagnyer reacted first, “Lieutenant, time for you to pull out, get your boys kitted up and ready to leave.”

Ivar did not have time to reply before the captain signed off, instead he focused on Sascha wondering if the kid understood what was going on. Slowly he saw a look of fear settle over the pretty face, soon followed by a murmured, “I guess my hair colour doesn’t matter.”

Ivar directed his first real smile at Sascha. After all, he had always preferred bitter to sweet, so gallows humour touched him where candy failed. Still though his appreciation for the kid had grown, Ivar did not think Sascha’s dress would be good for a potentially bloody trip to the shuttles. “Sascha, do you have something else to wear?”

“Lots of things. Most of my closet.”

“Anything more appropriate for this situation?”

“I don’t understand, Lieutenant Bandle?” A confused Sascha said.

“You know, something less delicate than what you have on. Maybe something in which you can run.”

Hearing Ivar’s qualifiers, Sascha’s face began to light up, “I know, my adventuring outfit. The prince doesn’t like it, ’cause it doesn’t show as much, but he had it made for me to use when playing in the simulator against his men.”

“Ok, Sascha, why don’t you go change into your adventuring outfit,” the lieutenant replied. Then, watching the boy scamper out, he passed the word for everybody to kit up.

Not surprisingly, Sascha was ready last and before Ivar headed down to join his men he knocked on the boy’s room door to hurry him up. Hearing a muffled reply he entered to see clothes scattered all over and the most amazing behind staring back at him. Taken aback it took a moment to realize that Sascha was bent over a hair styling machine braiding his long, pink hair.

“Please, just a moment Lieutenant. I am just about ready, except for my stupid hair,” Sascha apologized.

Ivar’s waited and studied Sascha’s impressive adventuring outfit. A grayish, blue jumpsuit made from a rubber metal alloy that would stop the spray of most energy guns, the preferred weapon on Darson. It would also provide some stopping power against the rarer projectile weapons, like the mercenary’s needle guns. He guessed it was made of a better quality alloy than in the under-armour worn by Dawson’s Bunch, though their carbon hard shells made up the difference, specially against projectiles.

Nor did the Bunch wear their body suits skin-tight or with high-heeled boots. A good thing in Ivar’s mind, none of them had the curves showing on the tight little body in front of him. The view from the back and even more so from the front, shown after Sascha finished his braid and turned towards him, cast serious doubt on the the boy’s claim to maledom. Though in this Ivar believed Prince Fallan did not lie, nor had he been wrong in calling Sascha adventurous, for the boys face gleamed with excitement. Seeing Ivar, Sascha smiled, performed a showy pirouette, posed and challenged, “Is this more appropriate, Lieutenant?”

Stuttering over the first few words, Ivar replied, “Much better, Sascha, but don’t you have lower boots? You’ll end up stumbling all over the place in those.”

Waving dismissively, Sascha said, “They match my outfit and the heels are really strong, they won’t break. Besides Prince Fallan did something so it’s easy for me to walk in them.”

Then putting truth into words, Sascha glided over to a table. Ivar found it more natural than the elegant lady he had first seen or the girlish flounce brought about by the changing hair colour. For the first time it made Sascha appear truly feminine. Distracted the lieutenant barely took notice of the two silver objects Sascha attached to what he had previously thought were decorative straps around the thighs of the body suit.

“Woah, woah, woah! What are those?”

“They’re my needle guns. You’re not going to take them away from me? I need them for the adventure.”

“Are they live? Where did they come from?”

Sascha appeared insulted by the questions, “Of course they’re live. It wouldn’t make any sense to use my practice guns. And they were in my bag. You’re not going to take them away?”

“Well...”

“I do know what I’m doing with them, I practice in a Havoc Simulator all the time.”

This made Ivar pause. A Havoc Simulator was the military-grade, combat trainer that every member of the Bunch used for training and in which Ivar spent a significant amount of his time. “What level?”

“Well I have been to thirty-two, but I mostly practice at twenty-six.”

Ivar did not believe that, twenty-six was high and thirty-two was amazing. The Bunch only expected a trooper to be competent at eighteen. Looking at the kid he tried to decide how best to take the the guns away, but seeing the tears building in the big green eyes he growled, “Ok, you can keep them. Do you need anything else? We have to get our ass in gear.”

Triumphantly, Sascha held up a backpack and said, “I have my emergency pack, just like all my books recommend.”

Guessing he had been played, Ivar never-the-less opened the door and gestured towards it. The guess became proven when a passing Sascha giggled and in a horrible, high-pitched mimic of his growl said, “Let’s go kick some ass.”

Once outside, Ivar found the platoon spread about the yard in a defensive posture and First Sergeant Dasi gesturing for him. Rushing to his sergeant’s side and crouching down Ivar asked, “What’s up, Al?”

“I’m not sure, Sir, but the streets started emptying just before you came out. Makes me think someone learned about our evac, I wonder if they are going to do anything to stop it.”

“Shit! I hate being out in the boonies, they are crazy enough to try and stop us. Are we ready to move out?”

“Aye, ready when you say which route to take.”

Looking around he spotted 3rd squad towards the West, near a street that they and he had scouted the day before. It was wide and headed away from the village’s housing, towards a district of granaries and warehouses. Those buildings had fewer windows and doors from which to stage an ambush. And the route met the approval of Lance Corporal Deagle, the platoon’s regular point man. “We’ll be heading West, Deagle knows the path. Marching order on the left is 3rd squad, Me, Sascha, 2nd gun and 1st squad. Right side is 2nd squad, 1st gun, you and 4th squad.”

“We sledding or hoofin’ it Sir?”

“Best to hoof it, we’re too vulnerable to ambush on the sleds, easier to react on foot.”

“Yes, Sir.”

While the sergeant passed on the marching orders Ivar updated Sascha, while wishing they had a spare helmet so the boy could listen in on the general channel. Then, with Sacha in tow, he activated the sync to his sled so it glided over to follow a metre behind him. Each of his men had a sled or, in the case of the heavy weapons’ squad, cannon platforms. They were the standard mode of transport for light infantry units like Dawson’s Bunch, acting as both personnel and gear transport. They were rugged, could travel up to 80 klicks an hour and handled terrain impossible for wheeled or tracked vehicles.

In moments, everybody looked ready, so when Corporal Deagle saw Ivar’s signal he carefully moved out into the street. The rest of the platoon followed immediately behind in two columns at five metre intervals, all with weapons at the ready. Forty-two men and one sylph moved out into the unknown.

They were able to make quick progress for the first couple blocks and Ivar felt happy with their intervals and watchfulness. It allowed him to spend a few moments with his attention distracted while communicating with the lead shuttle pilot, confirming how long before the shuttle could perform a pickup. Another couple of blocks found them between two large warehouses where Deagle stopped them and broadcast, “Be ready for visitors, I hear vehicles.”

As everybody crouched down with weapons either pointing to fore or background Ivar ordered, “Ok, all, we aren’t going to dick around with these treacherous bastards. If any even look sidewise at us, put him in the ground.”

Soon after, he heard from the rear guard that they too heard trucks from behind. He briefly considered pushing forward to try to get out of the trap between the two groups, but decide the current location with the factory walls on either side provided the best protection they would find. “Gunners, be ready to take out any vehicle that gets within range.”

“Yes, Sir,” he heard from the two corporals, each in charge of a cannon.

Checking Sascha, he saw the kid had the sense to mimic the mercenaries, crouching down and darting eyes in multiple directions. A hand on a pistol made Ivar nervous, but no more than anything else about the mess.

It did not take long before he too began to hear the trucks and then from across the street the sound of 1st Gun firing backwards down the street. He turned in time to see a Gamdi militia truck, which had turned onto the street a block away go up in a ball of flame when hit by a fifteen centimetre shell of liquefied metal. So quick and violent was the explosion that not a single man in the truck had time to scream. Nor did the following truck have better fortune. The drivers of the third and fourth trucks were smart enough to not turn onto the street; however, the passengers were not nearly as smart and in a display of stupidity disguised as bravery they charged en masse around the corner to be mowed down by the calmly waiting mercenaries.

It was not much of a fight. The militia in their cloth uniforms and with their energy guns were no contest for the heavily armoured and armed mercenaries. Nor did the second attack from the front prove any more difficult to manage. In a few brief moments the population of Denj shrunk significantly.

While 1st and 2nd squads checked the wreckage in front and behind, Ivar got on the horn with HQ during which there came another attack, this time well coordinated and from an unexpected quarter. Explosions on either side of the street blasted holes through the walls of each warehouse and caught four of the mercenaries in the blast. Before the dust settled men showed in the holes, this time they were equipped similar to the Bunch and wore markings showing they were Prince Fallan’s personal troops.

Yet though similarly equipped, they were not as well trained. Nor could they feed enough men through to quickly overrun Ivar’s platoon. The attack started more successfully than the first two, but quick reactions by the defenders minimized its impact. On the right side of the street, the hole served as an easy target for multiple grenades, which blunted the guard’s attack so they were quickly overwhelmed by the mercenaries’ counter attack.

On the left, where the explosion had knocked down three men, Ivar watched in shock as Sascha flowed to his feet with a pistol appearing in each hand. Then, as calmly as someone at practice, fired towards the hole. Every shot, from either hand, targeted the weakest point in the enemies’ armour, the visor of their helmets. Proving the manufacturer’s warnings correct, Sascha fired well-placed 1.2 second bursts that were guaranteed to shatter a mask. A shot not recommended in training, since few could consistently make it. Apparently Sascha numbered amongst those few, for as man after man moved into the sunlight they were met by such a burst.

After seeing the first five of his colleagues collapse to the ground immediately upon exiting the warehouse, the next guard paused, during which time #2 gun began blasting shells through the hole, obliterating him, those behind him, and lighting fires within the warehouse.

Sascha’s actions removed Ivar’s doubts about the Havoc Simulator claims. What he had seen could only result from a natural gift combined with thousands of hours of practice. But when Sascha rushed to follow 3rd squad into the building Ivar grabbed the boy by an arm. When Sascha turned to him questioningly, Ivar stated, “I want your eyes and gun outside watching over the injured.”

It was one of those intuitive, quick decisions that good combat officers made. In that brief ten plus seconds, while Ivar watched Sascha in action, the boy had moved from the compartment in his mind labelled fluff into one labelled ’The Shootist’. And where a lieutenant of a platoon in danger had no need for fluff, he could always find room for a shootist. Sascha, with his ability to read people, saw this respect in Ivar’s eye and so his protest at the order died and he nodded like a good little soldier.

It took over ten minutes for the mercenaries to mop up the guards and see to their casualties. During which time Ivar learned that two of the four troopers, those closest to the breaches in the walls, had been killed by the blasts. A third man ended up unconscious with serious injuries, while the last had broken a leg and arm. Beyond these four, injuries were minor cuts and bruises.

While the medics strapped the two wounded men to their sleds, Ivar moved over to the men doing the same with the dead to ask, “Are either of their helmets still working?”

They looked questioningly at the lieutenant who answered by gesturing over his shoulder towards Sascha. The troopers looked at the boy with a broader appreciation than they would have earlier in the day and one nodding his head turned to the the bodies to gently remove the helmet from his dead friend before walking over to Sascha and saying, “Here you go, Miss, you can put it to better use than poor ole Guiarmo.”

The boy looked somewhat nauseously at the helmet before darting a quick glance at Ivar whose nod caused him to take the helmet with a whispered, “Thank you.”

Soon after they were once more on the move, both Ivar and Dasi warning the men to stick with the same purposeful pace they had used before the attacks. Their pace soon brought them to the outskirts of the village where they settled into a watchful stop while the lieutenant performed a final coordination with the shuttle pilots. After deciding upon an open field two klicks West of town, Ivar switched to a private channel to ask the Corporal in charge of 2nd gun, “Jenkins, do you have room for Sascha on your platform?”

“Well, it will be a tight fit, we might have to have her sit on somebody’s lap...”

“Corporal,” Ivar warned.

“Sorry, Sir, there will be no funny business. And yes, we can fit a tiny thing like her aboard.”

With that problem solved Ivar opened the general channel to let everybody know their destination, then with a growled ’mount up’, he and his men left their cover and zoomed out of the village. Some shots were fired from a nearby building, but the sleds travelled quickly and the shooter lacked the skill or luck needed to hit the moving targets. However, he was smart enough to stop when a shell from #1 gun blasted into his building. In minutes they reached the field and established a perimeter to wait for the arrival of the shuttles.

Relief at the sight of the first shuttle proved short lived for, as it slowed down to land, multiple missiles came streaking out of the village and smashed into the cockpit and front of the craft. As it plummeted to the ground, Ivar heard the pilot of the second shuttle on the open channel muttering ’Shit! Shit! Shit!’ as he fired his burners and rocketed back into the sky.

Once the man felt he had reached safety, he calmed down on channel and stated, “Sorry Lieutenant, they have Minknov Missiles, they can’t hit me when I am in the air, but my ship is incredibly vulnerable during landing or taking off. I’m not going to be able to evac you at this location.”

Ivar silently offered a prayer of thanks that the enemy had been too eager and had shot down the shuttle before he and his men were aboard, then followed it with a curse that they could not get out of this clusterfuck. “What’s the range on the missiles Ensign?”

“About seventy klicks Lieutenant, but they are only deadly within five.”

A third voice, recognizable as the XO, Major Radulsky, broke in on the conversation, “I can guess where you are headed, Lieutenant, but the missiles will be truck mounted, so you will not easily get out of range. You are going to have to keep on the move for now, while we prepare a force to get you out of there. For now, head Northwest. There is little in that direction, few people and the roads are terrible.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Ensign Fong, I want you to act as a scout for the Lieutenant’s platoon, keep them out of trouble.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Ok, get to it. I will have an update for both of you soonest.”

With his new orders, he keyed Dasi to ask, “Were you listening in?”

“Partially, Sir, I also made contact with Corporal Mubai who checked out the shuttle.”

“And?”

“Both the pilot and co-pilot are dead, Sir.”

“Shit can’t say I am surprised with that hit on the cockpit. Ok, have Mubai prep the corpses, strip the craft of anything we can use and prepare a surprise for any snooping pukes. I want us on our way in five minutes.”

“Yes, Sir.”

It took longer than that, but they were soon on their way, with the shuttle high overhead scouting their path. About fifteen minutes into their escape, a loud explosion from behind proved someone had tripped the booby traps in the shuttle. This final act of violence temporarily ended any pursuit from Denj, allowing the platoon to gain some distance. Though even with this their body count grew by one when the seriously injured trooper expired from his wounds.

Ivar also learned of developments in the capital. Apparently King Nicholai had known nothing of the situation in Bitrel until Colonel Dawson had contacted him to lodge a protest about Prince Fallan’s actions. The king had reacted at his paranoid best. Minister Tor Aldieno had been arrested and put to questioning, which had soon led to an entire plot being uncovered. Apparently the prince had become tired of being the family goon, thinking that he did all the work while his brothers and father benefited; therefore, he had approached the rebels and dissatisfied members of the Gamdi clan. With these two groups he had struck a deal to help them overthrow the king and place him on the throne. In turn the rebels got the women from the Denj enclave plus pardons and the traitors were to prove themselves by sacrificing a platoon of the arrogant off worlders. Poor Sascha had been included because Fallan had grown bored with his sylph.

However, with the plot exposed, the king suspected all his allies to one degree or another. He had demanded that Dawson’s Bunch assume control of his personal security, then had begun confirming the loyalty of his own troops. As each grouped passed his tests they were sent after those who had been ratted out by Minister Aldieno. It placed the Bunch in a position that did not allow them to mount a rescue of their comrades.

Instead, for three days the platoon were kept on the run, being able to avoid contact they did not initiate. Contact occurred when they sprung ambushes to slow down their chasers, which cost three more dead and left five men with incapacitating injuries. Exhaustion had just about gotten the better of them when they passed into the Badlands and seemed to gain additional separation from their pursuers. With intelligence postulating that contact had been broken off, Ivar decided on a full night of rest and headed towards a defensible bluff one of the ever present shuttles had spotted.

After keeping the men on their feet long enough to improve the defensibility of the camp, Ivar assigned one squad to take watch while the others got some sleep. He also made Dasi, who should be awake while he slept but had joined the ranks of the walking wounded, take the first sleep. Fighting sleep of his own, Ivar moved between the members of the squad on watch, ensuring they stayed awake and gauging their mood. Like him and despite the chase and losses, they all were in good spirits. Honestly, they were adrenaline junkies at heart and days like the last three made them feel alive, it explained why they decided to become mercenaries.

The assessment made Ivar wonder how the lone member of their band, who had not made the choice, felt. He saw that Sascha no longer seemed as enthralled with adventure as he had been when they had left the inn. Though the boy had proven, in multiple ambushes, his marvelous skills with guns, the march had been extremely hard on him. For Sascha had lived a physically soft life and inhabited a body without the strength or reserves demanded for soldiering.

And as he had eaten away at his reserves, Sascha had grown paler and seemingly smaller. Nor did he smile as quickly since learning that the prince wanted him dead. Not that the kid was broken, he still acted cold and deadly when necessary, it just seemed that his vulnerability had increased, a vulnerability recognized even by the normally insensitive Ivar Bandle. Therefore, his next move was to make sure the boy could sleep. Pinpointing Sascha’s position on the bluff, he headed in that direction, realizing as he went that, despite his earlier dismissal of the idea, he had become the boy’s nursemaid.

He almost turned away when he realized the movements and sounds coming from beneath the blanket resulted from crying. Yet he did not, could not. No longer was Sascha an annoying burden nor a pretty toy, now he was one of Ivar’s men. Admittedly unique and special, but most definitely one of the team and Ivar looked after his team. Still he felt nervous as he that knelt down and posed the question, “What’s the matter, Sascha?”

At the sound of his voice the crying came to a stop, followed by quiet, “Nothin’.”

“Now that can’t be true, otherwise you wouldn’t be here crying. You can tell me what’s the matter, I won’t promise I can help, but I will try. Besides, this may be your only opportunity to see me acting sensitive.”

After some hesitation the blanket pulled back and a teary eyed Sascha looked at him like some beautiful waif then gestured towards the sleds holding the seven bodies saying, “It’s all of this.”

Taking a guess at what Sascha meant, Ivar stated, “Yes, it is all rather horrible.”

“It is. You must have thought I was such a fool for babbling about adventure the way I did?”

“Well...”

“That’s ok, you don’t need to lie. I know you like me better now than you did when we first met.”

Steering clear of this, Ivar focused on the question, “Most people are fools when it comes to adventure, be they those like you who dream of it or those like me who need it. I take it you are not one of the second?”

With a shake of his head, Sascha answered, “No. I would rather be almost anywhere else than here, where I could be clean, warm and in a nice, soft bed. And yet that is why it can’t end.”

“I’m sorry, Sascha, maybe it’s because I am tired, but that doesn’t make any sense.”

“It does Lieutenant, it does. ’Cause even though I don’t like it, here I have a place. I am part of your group. I have never been a part of a group before, well, maybe with my brothers, but even then we were just Prince Fallan’s possessions. Now though, Prince Fallan doesn’t want me. Where am I going to go? Who is going to look after me?”

“You don’t need anybody to look after you, Sascha,” Ivar tried to calm him.

“But I do, I don’t know anything that’s any good. I can please a man in bed and I can shoot a gun. But I have no money and I don’t know how to get it. Someone has always looked after me, providing me food and clothes and a place to live. I don’t think I could survive on my own. And there is the way I look.”

“There is nothing wrong with the way you look,” Ivar blurted trying to stem the tide of self-doubt.

“Course there is,” Sascha scornfully replied. “Nobody looks like me, has my stupid eyes or hair. And I look like a girl, but am a boy. That means that I have to belong to somebody or I will end up in some horrible place. Blah, I will end up in some horrible place anyways. Likely with Prince Rudo, I know he wants me, but he is ugly and smells.”

“We will just have to get you off planet.”

“Off planet?” Sascha questioned in awe. “I never thought about going off planet. What would I do out there? And how would I survive?”

“Well, Dawson’s Bunch has contacts and we would help you get on your feet.”

“Oh, thank you, Lieutenant, maybe with help I could do it.”

“Sure you can, Sascha, you’re tougher than you think.”

“Off world where there are real women and girls? Will they be mad at me for looking like I do, think I am a fake? You know it isn’t my fault that I look like I do? Don’t you?”

“Well, Sascha, most won’t have a problem, though you may still run into some judgmental people or those jealous of the way you look. But most people won’t care. Heck, looking as you do, most won’t know. But if you want, maybe there is a way to turn you back into a boy.”

“Oh no, no! I don’t want to do that, I wouldn’t know how to be a boy. Besides if I was changed I wouldn’t be me and I like me.”

“Yeah, I like you too, Sascha.”

This caused Sascha to break out in a huge smile, “I like you too, Lieutenant Bandle. Oh, maybe I could stay with you or one of the others, I would do whatever you want.”

Stunned both by the question and his temptation, Ivar shook his head and said, “No, Sascha, you deserve more. You need to decide who you are, not have somebody make you into what he wants.”

“Oh no, I wouldn’t mind. I really like you.”

Blushing at the emphasis on ’really’, Ivar reasoned, “Well, we can keep it as an option, but let’s try my idea first. Now do you think you can get some sleep? I need to make my rounds.”

“I’ll try, Lieutenant. Thank you for helping.”

As he walked away he thought he might have heard a whispered, ’But I’m still scared.’ This time he kept walking, because he did not need that perceptive kid to read his face. Sascha had every right to be scared, nothing would come easily for him after their escape, even if they could get him off world..

Their eventual escape proved anti-climatic for Ivar and his platoon. The next morning HQ ordered Ivar to maintain camp, as the chase had broken off. Apparently the King had finalized his purge in Taling and now had time to focus his vengeance upon Fallan and his traitors, which vengeance would be delivered by eight regiments of the King’s Guard that had moved into Bitrel and the surrounding provinces during the night. No longer could the prince worry about the rag-tag platoon, now it was he outnumbered and on the run.

During the lull they had their wounded and dead lifted out. However, since HQ still felt unwilling to risk another costly shuttle it was done by copters, meaning the rest of the platoon were left waiting, their role complete. During the wait, Ivar contacted HQ about Sascha. After failures in bureaucracy, involving three attempts to fill in Form 1101-0234 (Indigenous Ally Assistance Program), he finally got something set up. Both Ivar and Sascha were assured that the boy would disappear off planet before the locals even thought to look.

Ivar then sat back to wait for the end, which came during the afternoon. Fallan, having been the family enforcer, knew that there would be no mercy and he decided to go down swinging. Therefore, he made his last stand in a canyon rigged with explosives whose detonation hurled tonnes of rock down upon the King’s Guard, killing two-plus regiments of men.

The rebellion was over. But the damage done would make it difficult for the king to keep his throne and Ivar wondered if Dawson’s Bunch could extract themselves before that blow-up occurred. For now, he would just be happy getting back to the camp.

Yet, like everything else about the mission, it turned out to be more complicated than necessary. HQ ordered them to Baldon, a mining town over four hundred klicks away, serviced by an interplanetary trade shuttle-port with missile defenses. Ivar, deciding that everybody wanted to just get the mission over, decided not to delay and once more had everybody mount up to begin their final trek.

The next day, when he could finally get out of his gear and head to the showers, Ivar spared a moment of thought for Sascha. He had last seen the boy at Baldon sitting alone, looking tiny and scared, as he waited for a lift to an ore freighter orbiting the planet. Ivar knew that the boy was unprepared for what he would face and easy to once more victimize. He hoped that would not be the case, but decided that he would have to check up on Sascha.

Assuming he survived Darson.

     

Thank you to Hope Eternal Reigns and PuddinTane for the proofing work on this story