A Change of Career

2000 short story by Jonathan Hicks

Under a year after Episode IV - A New Hope

   “I just want to go home.”

Beyad looked at the superior officer he was addressing with a concerned brow, his eyes reflecting the look the officer had seen throughout most of his company. The dishevelled face, the grime of warfare, the soiled clothing.

The eyes were what held his stare, and he shook his head and looked away, eyes screwed tight as he tried to force the image of their homeworld from his mind.

   “I hear that every revolution, Beyad,” the officer said, fully turning his head away so that his soldier could not see the glaze on his narrowed orbs. For some reason, the distinct look of despair on Beyad’s face had affected him more deeply than any other combatant. He had even looked into the wide eyes of the dead and felt less emotion.

Beyad looked away, both drained of feeling and slightly embarrassed. Most of the company had expressed their wish to return home with forms of jest and humour, but he had just laid it out plainly. They had been fighting for so long they had almost forgotten why they were fighting. Their days were laid out for them; sleep, clean as best you could, shoot at the oncoming Imperials. They had held the starport for two months - two whole months! - and despite frequent calls from their support satellite, assuring them of fresh supplies and regular pickups, they had not had a ship touch down for the last three weeks.

How long were they supposed to last?

Their dead had become so cumbersome the commanding officer had directed a huge hole to be dug in the starport grounds and the deceased deposited into it. It was a horrible thing to do with one’s friends, but the risk of infection and disease was increasing and they were out of options. They had pulled back so far into the starport there was only one place to put them; in the ornamental garden at the forward of a hotel lobby.

The funeral service had been quick and to the point. After the CO had said ‘at least your out of it’ the Imperials had assaulted again and everyone was forced back to the circular wall.

Beyad tightened his grip on his Blaster rifle and breathed deeply, trying to force calm back into his bones.

   “Guess that was a last ditch attempt, eh?” came an inquiring voice. Beyad looked up at Guwoden, his battle partner and academy friend. Guwoden, as ever, looked at Beyad with eyes that betrayed a slight hint of humour.

   “At what?”

   “At getting off this world. Subtle hints and official requests don’t work, so you go for the plain question.”

Beyad relaxed, his back against the wall that protected them from Imperial weapons fire, his rifle laid across his legs. He looked up at the purple sky and deep into the glowing sister planet, it’s rings stretching across one half of his vision. A cold wind blew over the tundra the starport was built on and he drew his knees in close.

   “I guess I can sense something bad about this one, Guwoden,” he said after a few moments of introspection. “The Imperials are getting smart. They’ll give up on direct assault soon.”

   “I don’t think so. The Imperials’ll just keep throwing themselves at us, allowing themselves to get blasted to bits as always. Every day they get fresh troops, every day we bury more of ours.”

   “That’s probably why I need to get out of here. The outcome is inevitable. We’re going to get beaten.”

   “What can the Imperials fight us with, now? Most of their ordnance is out there with their dead, the last two attacks have been nothing but slaughters for them. I shot them as they threw stones at me, for freck’s sake. We may get out of this yet.”

But Beyad wasn’t listening to his friend. He had heard the same thing from most of the other soldiers, small pieces of rhetoric that were meant more for their own self-esteem than for his. Guwoden did not disappoint his expectations; he continued his long list of reasons why they should live through this.

Beyad, like all the others in the company, had been born into war. As a child jumping from world to world to hide from multiple enemies, as a teenager being taught how to fight, and now as a man, forgetting the theory behind warfare and immersing himself in the practicality of it.

No one could tell him who fired the first shot or why. No one could explain why a hundred different species across the galaxy were fighting the Empire. Although a galaxy-wide war was a horrifying prospect, it was even more horrifying being told he was leaving his homeworld to fight a fight halfway across the galaxy. Sure, he had seen the news shots of Imperial warships pummelling Uchata battlespheres with turbolasers, watched impassively as P’ro attack squads killed Imperial Stormtroopers in their hundreds.

But that was on the Holovid. A kind of sardonic entertainment, it was almost happening to someone else. This was real.

When Beyad had seen his first Imperial, he had been filled with such intense emotions he had almost vomited up his personal ration. It was so strange, this white-armoured figure. Almost a ‘droid. It was an Imperial. It was the enemy. Ergo, he had to kill it.

That was what his first contact had been like. Long range patrol, chance encounter with two lone Imperial Biker Scouts, and then a few tense seconds of him and the six others he was with emptying their Blasters into them both. He didn’t even have a chance to properly observe them before splashing them all over what passed for trees on this planet.

That was another thing. This planet... like a nightmare. Why Rebel Command even wanted to set up a starport here he couldn’t imagine. Why they wanted it protected, he didn’t want to know. Surrounded by things he didn’t understand. Sometimes he woke up and didn’t know where he was.

Which, he suddenly thought with a wry smirk, he didn’t.

   “Here they come again!”

He sprang up, weapon in hand, muscles and bones crying out in torment as they were forced into service once again. All along the starport wall weapons were levelled at the misty waste before them. At first glance, the land may have appeared uneven, even dangerously pockmarked, but once eyes adjusted to the gloom it became clear the lumps on the ground were bodies. Hundreds, maybe even thousands, strewn out for over a kilometre, denoting how far Beyad’s company had fallen back. The walls they had recently defended and consequently pulled back from were nothing but rubble now, covered in Imperial dead. Their forms were shapeless, piled on one another or scattered over abandoned war machines.

   “Fire line, ready weapons!” the officer roared, his own Blaster pistol ready in one hand and a plasma grenade in the other. “Wait for my shot!”

Three dozen clicks sounded from the wall as all the remaining troops readied their rifles. They stood or kneeled, depending on how much of their section of wall was left, and waited patiently. There was no ragged gasps for breath, no quick prayers to whatever religion they followed. Just patience and grim expectation. They had done this many times before.

Then the silence reigned. Nothing but the slight murmur of wind as it gently tugged at the mist.

The first Imperial came into sight. Then another. Another. More. They walked in a line, some carrying ordnance, some with crudely made bludgeoning weapons. Some stopped every few steps and picked up weapons of the dead. Beyad grimaced as he saw one toting a rifle of their fallen.

They walked in rhythm, a strange sense of complacency in their movements. Encased in protective armour like beetle shells. Head encased in a helmet with two black emotionless eyepieces.

This was why Beyad found them easy to kill. They were faceless.

There was a shot. The officer fired his Blaster at the lead Stormtrooper, the brightness of the beam leaving a misty line on Beyad’s retina. The Imperial was hit just below the helmet with a shower of sparks and liquefied armour and collapsed apparently lifeless.

With that single shot as a signal, the wall suddenly became a line of fire.

Bolts of energy screamed across the fallen bodies, tearing into the Imperials. Explosions flew in all directions as the barrage ripped them to pieces. Beyad gritted his teeth as he poured on the death. The fire was so rapid and so intense that some of the bolts hit each other before reaching their targets, exploding harmlessly somewhere over the gap between the defenders and the attackers. The Stormtroopers immediately went into action, dodging and weaving, trying to make it to the wall.

The first company casualty screamed and fell back off the wall, his shoulder melted by a Blaster hit. It continued to burn as he lay on his back screaming, and by the time it had died out his arm had come away. Another on his section of the wall jumped down to him, but only took away his ammunition pouch and rejoined the fire line.

Beyad adjusted the scope on his helmet and switched from rapid fire to single shot. He was running low on energy and didn’t want to run out by the time the Imperials had reached the wall. He lined up his sights on the helmets of his enemy and began surgically removing them from the fight.

An explosion lit up the battle as the officer threw his plasma grenade. It spread a sticky flaming substance that expanded in a fireball over the forward line of the approaching wall of Imperials. They became walking torches. But they still came.

Another casualty. A soldier’s chest erupted as a hit tore through him. He toppled forward over the wall and down into the sea of dead.

Then the section of wall just to the left of Beyad erupted, too. It was such a violent explosion it threw him sideways into Guwoden, who heaved him off with one arm as he continued firing with the other. A whole three-meter section of the wall was gone; the burning bodies of the men defending it either lying in disarray or still falling from the sky. The fire from the Imperials intensified.

   “There’s another line behind that one!” Guwoden screamed. “They’re coming up with heavy attack squads! Where the freck did they come from?”

Beyad flicked his weapon back to rapid fire as he grabbed the Blaster pack of a dead soldier.

   “They must’ve been re-enforced!” he shouted back, his ears still ringing from the explosion on the wall. “Let’s get out of here!”

   “Where to? We’re surrounded and there’s nowhere to fall back to!”

More heavy fire arced over the Imperials line in the form of what appeared to be a tiny white light. It connected with its target and another section of wall disappeared in flame and smoke.

The officer was screaming at his communications officer.

   “I don’t care! Send an emergency evacuation signal to the supportsat! Get that damn ship down here on remote, do you hear me?”

The fact that the comm officer was lying on his back with half his head shot away did not stop the officer from berating him. Guwoden leaped down from the wall, pulled the officer off the dead man and pulled a labelled panel off the back of the communication backpack. He hit two buttons in succession and turned to face Beyad who had jumped down also.

   “That’s the signal sent. The shuttle should come down on top of us on remote and haul us out. We should have done this weeks ago.”

Another white light destroyed a small supplies stack to their left.

   “Why weren’t we warned!” Guwoden shouted at the officer, who was shouting at no one, walking back and forth, arms waving wildly, Blaster gripped tightly in one hand. “Surely the supportsat would have seen Imperial ships with re-enforcement's and warned us! Why!”

   “Shut up! Shut up!” the officer roared, his weapon firing into the ground to punctuate each syllable. His eyes were glaring at Guwoden.

Unconcerned, Guwoden stepped forward with a placating hand out.

   “The shuttle’s on its way, sir. We just have to hold for a few more minutes.”

For imparting this information, the officer rewarded Guwoden by shooting him in the face.

   His exploding head sprayed over Beyad, who stood, strangely trying to convince himself that his friend had been shot by stray Imperial weaponsfire. The officer levelled his pistol at him.

   “There’s nothing to go back to, you know! The supportsat staff was recalled a month ago, but they couldn’t spare a ship for us! They left us! So now that satellite is up there, and there’s no-one manning it!” The officer suddenly became calmer, as if he was speaking at a briefing. He was obviously repeating what a senior officer had told him at some point in the past. “Our species is spread so thin across this galaxy that they can’t decide which strategic points are worth holding. Units must be transported to combat sites and helped as much as possible on the understanding that support may be withdrawn at a moment’s notice.”

Men screamed, weapons fired explosions scattered bodies and equipment. The heavy Imperial support was tearing them up.

The officer laughed. He laughed so loud and so hard that Beyad could do nought but watch him, waiting for his blood vessels to burst or his throat to give out. Then he just stopped, saluted Beyad and put the Blaster under his chin.

Beyad made no attempt to stop him as he ended his own life. With one movement of a finger he put an end to the horrors he had seen and the misery he had experienced. He fell down next to Guwoden, one hand lying on Guwoden’s shoulder as if asking for forgiveness.

Looking back, Beyad could not recall the exact details of what followed. More shots as the Imperial Stormtroopers reached the walls to decimate what was left of the defence. The stub-winged, sleek-nosed shuttle touching down behind him as he just stood in the middle of the carnage and stared at the two bodies in front of him. A hand on his shoulder, a voice. Staggering sideways as the hand was removed violently, another hand taking its place. The owner of that hand losing a leg and falling screaming as they began to move to the shuttle. Raising his weapon and white-armoured figures clambering over the wall. Firing. Watching the enemy fall under his onslaught. Heavy Blasters scoring hit after hit on the shuttle. Grabbing the officer's Blaster and firing wildly. Another hand. An explosion. Pain in the shoulder. The hand pushing him through the shuttle’s open portal. The soldier who helped him smiling wildly and saluting, then turning back on the enemy, the officers’ pistol in his hand, now. The same soldier who was the first casualty. The one without the arm.

The portal closing. The shuttle lifting off, shuddering under the onslaught of Imperial fire. Clearing the battle.

Clearing the atmosphere.

Clearing the death.

Beyad sat in the back of the shuttle, alone, staring at three dozen empty seats.

   “And that,” Beyad said, standing up and tucking his flight helmet under his arm, “is why I’m a pilot these days.”

Tyrrah watched him walk for the exit, the tears stinging her eyes.

Histories - A bleak and powerful tale of life in the Alliance's ranks just after the destruction of the Death Star and the Empire's push through the galaxy towards the Outer Rim.  Written by Jonathan Hicks, this story tells of Beyad, later to become a decorated pilot in Squadron Indigo, as he endures the horrors of life in the army.

Cast of Characters

Beyad

Guwoden

Tyrrah