Neon stars twinkled behind a flashing rock.

"'Zat an asteroid or a hemorrhoid?" Counter asked.  "It does look like a...."

"He asks that stupid question every time we come here," Laura moaned.

Though he'd seen it before, just for the hell of it, Caleb casually inspected the sign above the bar.

He followed Laura, Batra, Mr. Hemorrhoid, and Cross into Asteroids, and was quickly enveloped by the sights, sounds, and smells of the place.  Dimly lit, the club was a throng of humanity freshly squeezed from concentrate.  Soldiers from the base nursed drinks at nearly every table, and others gathered in cliques about the bar.  Bottles flashed, liquor flowed, and music videos wailed from speakers and flickered from widescreen projectors.  Wafting in the air was a trace mixture of potpourri, perfume, and cologne.  The talk, Caleb guessed, was either about sex or flying, or, more interestingly, sex while flying.

Cross squinted and went up on her toes to see over the crowd.  "There's a place over there.  Let's take it."

They crossed, seized, and immediately occupied the table.  Counter signaled to the waitress, a cube Lebanese girl who winked at him and, in short order, returned with beers for everybody.

Caleb glanced perfunctorily at the empty stage behind their table, then sipped his beer.

Cross picked at the front of her pants.  "You think I could ever talk the IDF into pleats?"

Counter poured himself a mug of the frosty stuff, then used the rest of his bottle to fill Batra's mug.  "See, if I were runnin' the IDF, I'd give recruits planes on the first day."

Caleb chortled.  "War's good business---but that idea stinks."

"He's right," Cross said, tipping her head towards Caleb.  "The loss of fighters and lives would be enormous---if today's any indication of...."

"Not in defense of Counter," Caleb said, cutting her off.  "But today didn't mean jack.  Actually, without Berkson, we probably would've done just fine."

Laura nodded.  "At least he got his act together on the 2nd run."

"And you've gotta admit," Counter began, then took a sip of his beer, "the bastard's a crack shot."

Caleb rolled his eyes.  "They likely rigged that into his DNA."

"It was 6 on 6 and he got three, one off my tail, one off Batra's----and one off yours, Caleb," Cross reminded him. "Not in defense of him."  

Caleb drew a line in the sweat of his glass.  "I'll concede that he's good.  But a team player?  No way."  He connected the line with the two others forming the Hebrew letter lamed (L) (the first letter of the Hebrew term lahikshl, meaning "fail"):  the tank's grade in the academy.

"I invited him to come with us," Cross confessed.  

Batra set his drink down.  "I told her not to."

"We can get him to play on our team," Cross said, leaning forward as if it was somehow important to her, "if we just try to understand him."

"Why do you give a damn?" Caleb asked. "If he can't handle it, he can't handle it."

"I just think it's a shame that..."

"Well, speaking of hastan (the devil, or Satan)," Laura said, then elbowed Caleb.  

The tank entered the bar, his gaze sweeping over it.  He spotted Caleb but acted like he hadn't.  After one more inspection of the place, Berkson went to the bar and slid into a stool.  He then signaled to the bartender, then shot a look back at Caleb, reacting to the fact that Caleb was still looking at him.  He gave a slight nod of his head, then looked away.

Cross pushed back her seat.  "I'm going to see...."

Caleb pointed an index finger.  "He came her to be by himself."

"How do you know that?"

"Trust me."

"You sound like Jimmy Carter.'

Caleb raised his brow.  "I'm outta here, folks."

Cross pushed her seat under the table.  "All right.  I won't be in the middle of this.  But Caleb, you simply must stop this animosity.  Ther's always going to be one or two rouges in every group.  Get used to it.  There is no need to hate this chap."

She didn't know.   He wanted to, at the moment, lapse into the fact that he had rallied for equal rights for Ao Primes, and those "equal rights" had resulted in a colonial quota system that had blown up in his face.  The woman he loved was light-years away because of equal rights for Ao Primes.  It had been easy to hate Berkson, and then the tank had, by way of his attitude and actions, made it even easier.

But Cross only saw the surface.

A tall figure walked into the bar, backlit by the red neon glow from the sign outside. As he came closer, a face materialized from the shadows:  it was the Shark from the 238th, the one Caleb and Laura had seen from the bus window, the pilot with the stare.

Berkson noticed the pilot's entrance and watched as the Shark found a lone seat away from everyone at the corner of the bar.  The soldier fingercombed his hair, took a pretzel from a plate near him, then munched.  Berkson turned to the Shark, who managed a slight nod in return.  Then both men ignored each other.

"Does he know that guy?" Laura asked.

"Likely not," Caleb said, then looked at his empty beer mug.  "I'm ready for another.  Counter?  Another round?"

"Oh, yeah."

He regarded Laura, who froze as she stared at something out of Caleb's view.  "You wanna chip in for round two?"

"The Sharks...." was all that came out of her mouth.

The elite pilots of the 238th Squadron paraded into the bar as though it were enemy territory they had just conquered.  Arrogant and humorless, the three men and one woman moved to a table of their liking, and, without a word, the recruits drinking there fell over themselves to give up their seats.  One young man even lingered behind to wipe off the table with a napkin."

"Weird," Laura said.

"What, the fact that vets bully cherries?  Been going on since Moses was prince of Egypt."

"No." She looked at the Shark at the bar.  "Why isn't he with them?"

Caleb studied the Shark at the bar.  The pilot didn't even acknowledge his squadron.  He seemed fascinated by the veneer of the countertop.  Then Caleb looked at Berkson.  The tank studied his beer.

Without warning, Laura rose and steered herself towards the Sharks' table.

"Hey, maybe you'd better..." Caleb cut himself off since she was already out of earshot.  He adjusted his seat so that he could watch her.

Arriving before the table, and likely a little short of breath, Caleb said, "Um, excuse me."

They ignored her, the 3 men listening intently as the woman spoke.

"Sorry to interrupt....."

The female Shark broke off and joined her fellow soldiers in fixing their nervous fan with a cold, steely look."

"I just wanted to tell you how much I admire and respect the 238th."

The men looked at each other, smirking.

The woman smiled sardonically.  "Thanks.  Thanks a lot.  We'll have 4 pitchers of draft and two shooters."

The group immediately wounded Laura with their snickers and laughs.  She seemed to grow pale and numb upon realizing that her heroes were creeps.

Caleb slid out of his chair, regarding Counter as he did so.  "Be there. If I need you."

Feeling a nerve thump in his neck, he went to the Sharks' table, crossing in front of Laura.  "She's not a waitress."

"I think we hurt her feelings," the tallest Shark said. "Come and sit in old papa Krantz's lap and tell him all..."

"She's a soldier.  Now....apologize."

The tall Shark rose, knocking over his chair.  He was 6-feet plus, and from Caleb's angle, looked nearly 7.  "Until she graduates.... she's crap.  Now...." he began, spacing his words for effect, "you......apologize.  To me."  He glanced in the woman's direction. "And to Sylvester."

Caleb considered the situation, which boiled down to mathematics.  He was rather deft at the problems they had thrown at him in flight school, physics problems that dealt with aerodynamics, lift, vacuum maneuvering, what have you.  Often, he'd click off his calculator and work out the problem longhand, the way a good pilot might switch off his NAV system or LIDAR and fly by the seat of his pants.  One learned the true nature of the beast that way.

To get the present equation to balance required the addition of two more variables, variables who sat back at his table.  He gave a subtle look to Counter, Batra, and Cross.  They looked worried.  They were not moving.

Laura shifted in front of Caleb as the rest of the Sharks stood.  She was up to something, maybe she had a few words that would defuse the tensions.  "Hey, what's the farthest you guys have flown?"

"5.9 light years," Sylvester said, without having to think about it.

Laura grinned, then her expression soured.  "That's how far you can shove your apology."

The tall guy, Krantz, plowed through the table.   He kicked a chair out of his way, threw Laura aside, then slapped away Caleb's fists in order to bring his beefy hands down on Caleb's shoulders.  Krantz drew back his bereted head, then, gripping Caleb with what had to be all his might, brought his forehead down onto Caleb's.

In a flash, Caleb was gazing at the ceiling, which became a starfield for a moment, then blurred back into wood and rafters.  He rolled away, shot to his feet, and took a defensive stance as a surge of dizziness passed through him.  Laura arrived at his side, her small be formidable fists raised and ready.

Sylvester came at Laura, releasing a high kick that Laura dodged.  Laura's reply was a solid right into Sylvester's stomach, a punch that, astoundingly had no effect.  Sylvester smiled, then backhanded Laura across the face so hard that it sent her flat onto her back.

The other 3 Sharks surrounded Caleb, Krantz assuming a position directly in front of him.  "There's an interesting sound that a nose makes when it breaks," Sylvester said. "Kind of a pop, as if you poked a hot sausage and let out some of the steam."

"YAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!

Caleb looked back and saw that Counter had launched himself from a tabletop and now sailed through the air.  Counter wore the look and sounded the cry of a pissed-off lunatic.  Sergeant Steinberger would have been proud.

Counter collided with Krantz and the soldier standing next to him.  The two Sharks crumpled under the human missile.

Exploiting Counter's move as an avenue for escape, Caleb delivered a roundhouse right to the standing Shark.  The soldier fell back over his chair and hit his head on the leg of a table.

"Caleb!"

He spotted Laura being choked from behind by Krantz.  Running towards the two, readying his fists to do some pounding, he was caught off guard when Krantz shoved Laura aside and sent a knee into his groin.  Doubling over, he spun and fell onto his side.

"C'mon, bitch!  You gonna get some!"

"We're gonna get in a lot of trouble for this."

Caleb didn't have to look up to know that Cross and Batra had joined in what was now an all-out donnybrook. As the fire in his crotch subsided, he stretched out, got on all fours, then finally managed to rise.  He noticed that Berkson was eying him from the bar.  The tank repositioned himself on his bar stool, as if he was considering whether to help or not.  Then Caleb looked to the other end of the bar, at the Shark.  He, too, seemed to be mulling over a decision to join, but just then, the Shark glanced at Berkson, and there was a look that passed between them, one that Caleb read as:  "You help your side, then I'm helping mine."  Once that look was exchanged, neither man made a move.

Then again, as Caleb took in the sights of Laura getting tossed into a table of recruits, Batra taking an uppercut and then a kidney punch, and Cross getting her arm twisted so far behind her back that it looked about to snap off, he reasoned that even with good numbers they were still going to get the shit beaten out of them.

At least they'd go down as a team, a unit.

Seeing that Krantz was open and not looking in his direction, Caleb rushed to the gawk, pulled the guy's jacket up over his head, effectively blinding the soldier, then unleashed a triplet of punches.

Batra staggered away from the Shark who was clobbering him, then summoned what little strength he seemed to have to kidney-punch the Shark holding Cross.

"Ahhhh!"

Free, Cross rubbed her sore nose a moment, but that moment was interrupted as Krantz grabbed the back of Cross's hair and drove her head into a table.

Krantz, jacket down and already recovered from Caleb's beating, seized Batra by his belt, lifted the pleading youngster over his shoulder, then tossed him like a rag doll onto the vacant stage.

Caleb drew back a fist, about to catch an unsuspecting Krantz in the cheek.

An emergency broadcast tone cut off the music videos, and then every wide screen in the bar displayed the bold letters:

Lowering his fist, Caleb regarded the nearest screen.  Everyone around began to do the same.

The seal of the State of Israel flashed on the screen, then the logo dissolved into the image of a thickset man behind a desk.  He blotted sweat from his balding pate with a handkerchief, replaced the garment in the breast pocket of his suit, then leveled his bowtie.  He looked to someone off-stage, nodded, and then faced the camera.  Superimposed on the screen was the name:   

​​​​​​​An eerie, bone-chilling quiet, save for the tone, slowly descended upon the bar.  Nobody moved. The tone stopped.  The bartender lifted a remote and thumbed up the sound on the main tuner above the bar

Laura treaded between Batra and Cross to stand next to Caleb.  "Is that for..."

Caleb put an index finger to his lips.

"Not since the moment of creation has our universe changed so infinitely, so desperately, so quickly.  Tonight---for the first time in the brief history of mankind---we are truly one people.  Last evening, we confirmed that the landing party of the Tammuz colony was massacred, unprovoked, by an alien civilization of tremendous force."

Caleb felt the word crawling out of his throat, but barely heard himself utter it. "No." He gasped. "No." An invisible hand clenched his heart and shook it.  Chills spidered up and down his spine. His ears rang. Then his senses closed down.  The world became windswept ice, and it was hard to remain standing.

"336 are dead," Einhorn added.  "36 are missing."

35.  Could Zara be among them?  He was back in the bar, the glacier behind him.  He took a step towards the screen, and only a laser cannon could have severed his gaze from Einhorn.

"Because of destroyed communications, we have just now learned that the Brashita colony suffered the same fate.  The alien civilization has not responded to any of our attempts at communication.  Of this race we know nothing.  The only clue to their people is the bloodshed they left behind.

"My fellow humans, no matter where you stand on this planet, either beneath the sun's warmth of in the cold of night, storm clouds of war gather over our Mother Earth.  Soon, they may fall in endless thunderbolts.  We must stand together against the deluge, for we cannot possibly retreat."

In the pause, the 238th gathered up their fallen berets and headed for the door.  The lone Shark at the bar fell in step behind them.  Caleb saw Berkson's yawn, then turn apathetically away from the screen and pick up his beer.  

Caleb now rode the loops and rolls of his emotions as if they were a simulator.  One second he was on the enemy's twelve, coming dead-on, target locked, the next he was staring at Zara, who lay in a pool of blood.  Should he go on hoping?  Or would that only make the truth more painful?

WAS SHE DEAD?

He had to know.

When things got tough, as usual, Caleb got running.  He charged towards a hallway that ended at the rear exit of the bar.

"Hey, Caleb...."

Laura's cry faded behind him.  He shot out of the club and into a narrow, moonlit passage between the bar and rear wall of another structure.  Stumbling to the wall, he visualized himself beating his face against it, but he already knew he didn't have the guts for that.  He draped an arm across the stone and rested his forehead on his wrist.  He thought of Zara, how she might have suffered.  He placed her in a scenario after scenario, in life-and-death struggles with the aliens or floating helmetless in the void of space until she was caught by Tammuz's gravitational pull and burned up in its atmosphere.  To someone on the planet, she would be a tiny, falling star.

Caleb pushed away from the wall and drew the photo tags from beneath his shirt. He looked up and spotted the twinkling blue light, center of the system that would have been their future.  Then he stared hard at the tags, not realizing his knuckles were whitening as he held them.  He touched the corner of Zara's tag, and her voice came from a tiny speaker:

"I believe in you."

281Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7hHjunE1KG
281Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5q2BDQuw5V
​​​​​​​281Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhvW8inwFAI
281Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkZyaHTje0G
281Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡz9wCzOyuHM
281Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqkgnSnYYS6

​​​​​​​