Jorz

Slugging Pitchers
~

The eight of us EUSA agents had already tossed back a couple pitchers apiece, at least, and the pain of a long stretch of hunting miscreants slowly started to dull. Take more than what swirled inside a glass pitcher. We patrolled a freaking rough sector of space.

The Kory Mae, the ship we’re based on, wouldn’t be back for a couple days, so we had plenty of time to sleep off the booze, and the physical pain that mingled with the mental, and physical, exhaustion. So none of us slowed down.

The barkeep had already asked us a couple times to shank it down a notch. Wasn’t about to ask us to leave. Might need our help one day. And she wasn’t going to call the local constables to talk to us. Take one look at our EUSA-blue vests, sidearms and armor, the screw-you attitudes we maybe wear, and shrug.

I think she was grateful we had a limit to our obnoxiousness. We needed the release. Instead of ragging on the team, she opened the banquet room for us.

We took advantage of it. The private space allowed us to get as freaking rowdy as we wanted.

The raucous slurs, jokes, insults, and lies, what some people call stories, what each of us had lived through on this tour, continued to come in a flood, as though it might drown the other frustrations and horrors we couldn’t speak of. At times the shouting could have sounded to a stranger as though the shooting was about to begin. But the team is tightknit, have been together for a long time. Handpicked by the colonel. From more elite corps than I knew existed in our space. Shared experiences bond folk. Nothing that couldn’t be said among us. Well. Almost nothing.

Lieutenant GanBwyll glared down her long nose when things got just a little too personal. More often, that was when the stories dealt with the colonel.

GanBwyll had a lower threshold than we younger agents when it came to fun at the commander’s expense. But she giggled like a little girl with the rest of us, as her famous little ditties got repeated.

“Did I tell you the time the colonel and I went down to this stinking mining satellite? Think in the Oneida district. Background investigation. Didn’t expect any trouble. Weren’t even wearing armor. Bloody hell broke out.

“There must have been twenty scumbags shooting at us. Pinned down inside this refining facility the size of Earth’s moon.

“I looked over at the colonel and she wore a smirk, like she’d never had so much fun. We were crammed behind this three-foot-tall wall. Shooters above us on the catwalks. We were flipping goners. I prepared to thank God for nothing. And Toni was smiling.

“I asked her what was so funny. She said, ‘These guys don’t know who they’re dealing with, do they?’

“I started laughing up a gonad, and it gets all quiet, like the scumbags are worried they’re missing something. It gave us the only opportunity we were going to get.

“Toni rose up on a knee and blasted a hole in a chlorine tank that was about seventy-five meters over our head. That place emptied faster than a whorehouse facing a health inspection.

“Toni stands and walks out all calm-like. I still can’t believe we got out of that one.”

There was a joke that maybe the story teller, a sister in blue, sustained a groin injury and didn’t remember what really happened. A round of catcalls circled the table and my story telling buddy stuttered a declaration for our dear friend to perform an impossible act upon himself.

“I was pinned down once with the colonel,” another said. “It didn’t look good for us, either. I hear Toni say quietly, ‘I’m glad Daemon has more friends than Molly did.’” The man looked down into his beer for a moment, and the seven of us reacted to his sudden serious mood.

Molly was Toni’s black Lab, before any of our time with Toni, before Daemon. Had heard they’d been together almost three decades. There are only two photos in the colonel’s cabin. One of Molly, and one of Daemon.

To explain, Toni was cool dying, as long as Daemon was taken care of.

We remained quiet a moment as that sentiment sank in. But we weren’t there to focus on the realities of this crappy sector of space. A few seconds later the more colorful stories began anew.

“I visited a harbor master once with Toni and Daemon. The guy was an absolute prick. Made the mistake of insulting Daemon.” The man chortled. “I’ve never since seen the kind of emotions that came from Toni that day.

“She was ready to close down the port. If she could have stood tall enough to get in his face, she couldn’t have backed him down any faster. She had the master gulping air.

“When we were leaving, Daemon walked over and squated, peed on the man’s foot. Was priceless.”

Between the chuckles another prepared to top that.

“Visited a restaurant with Toni on Earth once. Daemon was with us, of course. Other than staying very attentive for any extra food she needed to help us get rid of, she was an angel, despite her name. Some uppity patron made a scene about a dog in the restaurant.

“The riot didn’t come from Toni. People at the tables around us stood and railed at the woman.

“Later, I learned the snooty diner was the governor of the freaking province. Don’t mess with Daemon in Chicago, let me tell you. She has friends in higher places.”

“I was on a conference with Toni one time,” another agent said. “The president of this colony was giving Toni grief about the heavy-handed tactics she was using to close down a smuggling ring.

“She ranted it was killing the colony’s economy. Kept dropping names of people she was going to call. Gonna get Toni stripped down to traffic duty.

“Toni calmly stated she was going to pull someone else onto the call. Next thing I know the freaking premier is joining the connection. She told Toni, ‘You do whatever the hell you feel is necessary. You know I trust you explicitly.’ Man, did that shut that dirtbag up.”

A couple drowsy eyes popped open a little, impressed Toni could get the immediate attention of the leader of the Earth Union like that.

“I heard Toni’s been offered the director’s job a gazillion times.”

“I’ve never figured out what motivates the colonel,” GanBwyll said. “I know she likes the quiet of space, her ship, and her dog. She barely puts up with the rest of us.” She grinned and took a hearty gulp of her beer.

“For someone who doesn’t like a lot of attention, she knows a lot of important people.”

“And, a lot of people know of her,” another agent offered.

“She’s probably been involved in more high visibility ops than God.”

“I’ll tell you, I love being based on the Kory Mae. Certainly isn’t because of you slugs. What a way to travel. And while you can be a bore and a pain, GanBwyll, I wouldn’t pick another commander than the colonel, if I had a choice. Wouldn’t want to have anyone else in the galaxy watching my back, either.”

“As long as you keep her on ship,” an agent mumbled. “She has a way of drawing fire. I hate covering her six. It’s dangerous.”

There were a bunch of inebriated chuckles, and faces peered into beer mugs, as we remembered our private adventures with Toni.

“How many times has she been shot?” someone asked.

“Every time,” another agent answered, drawing laughs.

“Tremynu and I once went on a hike with her on this world out in the middle of nowhere. She may be two decades older than us, but she walked our asses off in that forest.

“We came to this lazy little river, more a creak than anything. She stripped down to her toes and dove into this small pool.

“I’ll tell ya we were shocked at the scars and dents that tiny woman has all over. Maybe she spent a couple decades in Vice on some outer planet?”

“She always claims she isn’t bashful.” The agent laughed.

“I understand a decade or so ago,” GanBwyll said, “long before she joined the service, she was attacked. Horrendous injuries. Died and brought back a couple times. Hundreds of surgeries—” Her voice tapered away.

Another agent continued for her. “Add up the scars for every time she’s stepped in front of a laser or projectile weapon since.”

Heads shook.

“I’ve seen her in proper, ya know, lady clothes, before. Dresses up right nice. Beautiful woman for being three-foot tall. Hard to understand why she never bothered to have the scars fixed.”

“Not bashful or vain,” GanBwyll mumbled.

“Well, never challenge her at chess if you’re putting money on it. I worked with her on a case where this chess champion offered to spill his guts only if she could beat him and twelve of his buddies in simultaneous games. He thought his challenge was like, when pigs fly.

“But she told him to bring on his buddies. She walked up and down this row of tables taking out some of them in just a few moves. It was so cool to watch—not that I care about the game. Not enough physical contact for my taste. But she beat our witness in something like twelve moves. He still refused to cooperate until she threatened to show up at every match in the future until he was no longer seeded.”

“There’s a twist on her favorite, ‘You won’t be getting rid of me so easily.’”

“Toni can be sweet and brutal. Don’t ever set her up with a date. I ’bout lost a good friend that way. She chewed him up, spit him out.”

“Tried to come across cosmopolitan, huh.”

“He can maybe be a bit of a stuffed shirt.”

We all laughed.

“Probably tried to impress her with his knowledge of politics. Toni knows more about galactic entanglements than God.”

“Or technology.”

“Or just about anything.”

“Gawd, it must be tough for Toni.”

Grins turned the woman’s way.

“Imagine if you were surrounded all day, every day, by people that sounded like idiots to you, how old would that get?”

The door of the banquet room flung open and the eight of us reached for our sidearms, not all as smoothly as we would have preferred, maybe. But no one lost a foot or a kneecap. We lurched away from the table as a man the size of a galaxy class destroyer struggled through the entrance.

He had a pretty face overly made up, hidden inside a round circle of fat. Over-the-top glamour duds. His eyes trailed across each of us, expression turning sad. He teetered toward us, swinging his arms to help propel one-half of his body forward at a time.

Lordy. Why hadn’t the man, think he was a man, taken advantage of medical science to cope with his—challenge with nutrient intake.

A stream of bodyguards followed him in, but they remained relaxed, even with our weapons pointed at them. So maybe fatball wasn’t a local scumlord. I chilled a tad. I think my buds did a bit too.

“I understand you boys and girls are from the Kory Mae. Is the lovely Toni Tegaris on planet?” His voice was high, like a four-year-old child’s. Far from what his exterior suggested.

GanBwyll answered for the team. “No, sir. The colonel’s on a mission about a parsec away.”

“Colonel. Oh, that sounds so impressive. You tell that sprite of a little dear her lovey-dovey Randal has been waiting for her to answer his offer of matrimony, and that I’m still looking for that perfect little world to buy her for our nuptuals.”

None of us spoke. We stared, maybe some of us with gaping jowls.

“You’ll do that for little Randal, won’t you?” he asked.

“Cer—certainly, sir,” GanBwyll said.

“Delightful,” the man answered in his squeal. “I’m sure she’s been terribly busy. I thank you all. Carry on.”

He rotated on his axis and waved, fat little fingers wiggling as he capped it with a tootle loo. He bounced through the door frame.

GanBwyll sat. The eight of us remained quiet. Eyes darted. We still held our freaking sidearms. One by one we holstered them and joined GanBwyll back at the table.

“That must be one hell of a story.”

“Can you imagine—”

GanBwyll interrupted hard, “Don’t even go there. Not even.”

~