Mark “Coop” Cooper

Location: Harper’s Junction, Star Kingdom of Windsor

“Let’s go people, let’s go!”

A shiver went down Coop’s spine as memories of Basic reared their ugly head from the depths of his subconscious. GYSGT Cunningham was marching around the resistance HQ like she’d marched around their barracks. Only this time she was wearing a LACS, and he could swear the barrel of her Buss was still smoking.

The multi-strike raids had been a success….mostly. One team had been caught out in the open by orbital bombardment, but there was no use worrying about them. One moment they’d been alive, and the next they’d been scattered across a dozen kilometers. They hadn’t felt anything as the kinetic force of the railgun round ripping through the atmosphere pulverized them.

Coop chuckled as he imagined the racket the round cutting through the atmosphere sounded like.

“What’s so funny, Cooper? You want to end up as a smear stain on some Windsor mech’s boot, because that’s what is going to happen if you don’t move your ass!” The GYSGT descended on his momentarily good humor like a plague.

Like in Basic, it was unwise to respond. Instead, he just put his head down and kept picking things up and putting them down. As the strongest human outside a LACS – even injured – the bulk of the loading fell to him.

A steady stream of trucks was pulling into this section of the tunnel system that had this former mining command center. Into those trucks the rebels, with the SRRT team significant assistance, were piling all of their crap. They all needed to get the hell out of dodge.

The smoke had barely cleared from the orbital strike and the Windsor’s and their loyalist lackeys were on the move. While the hardcopy and electronic data in the planet’s achieves was gone, there were still people out there who knew their way around the mines. Some were helping because they liked the new management, and others were doing it out of fear. Coop didn’t really care which one was their motivator. They were all traitors.

Kill teams of Windsor troops were spreading out through the intricate network of tunnels that infested the bedrock of the entire continent. Running into them at this point was like finding a needle in a haystack, but teams on other missions had found that needle, and it had fucked them up. Now, everyone was scurrying to reposition and blowing shit up to stop the enemy’s progress.

“There is an old forge here,” Masha was pointing to a spot on a hardcopy map that Coop couldn’t see.

It irked him to no end that Masha was a high up in this rebellion. The guy was literally a student…an art student. The first time he’d fired a weapon in anger had been the ambush, and Coop knew for a fact he hadn’t hit shit. On top of that, he’d nearly gotten shot. Coop had found him on the withdrawal shaking in the back of the vehicle he’d stolen, but now Masha was giving relocation orders like he knew what he was doing.

Coop concluded, and continued hauling stuff into the waiting truck.

“Did I say you could take a water break!” The GYSGT barked as she listed an entire computer server and walked it across the base to carefully put it in the back of the Coop’s stolen vehicle.

It irked him that his ill-gotten gains had immediately been seized in the name of the resistance. Now, a man in a flimsy-reinforced, clothe vest was manning the weapon on top, and like an idiot, had it pointed in the wrong direction. The idiot was watching them pack, not the tunnel that was the only avenue of approach into the HQ.

“Do you want to stop pointing the shit and me and all your buddies. One nervous twitch and you’re going to blow everyone away.” Coop plopped the served he was carrying next to the GYSGT’s.

“It’s on safe,” the guy shrugged.

Coop closed his eyes, gritted his teeth, clutched his fists and counted to ten so he didn’t pull the guy out of the turret and knock his teeth out.

“Cooper, stop just standing there!” The GYSGT was back, but Coop didn’t care.

He held up one finger in the universal “wait a minute” gesture, which was a lot better than the one-finger gesture he felt like giving everyone. Surprisingly the GYSGT didn’t bite his head off. He felt a cold, metal hand on his shoulder.

“Take five out there,” she pointed back into the depths of the HQ.

“Thanks,” he muttered as he continued those deep, soothing breaths.

He marched into an empty corridor and rubbed his eyes as sudden exhaustion spread over him. The only time he’d gotten any shuteye since landing on this planet was being passed out from injury or in surgery. Those didn’t exactly lend themselves to a good night’s sleep, so he was starting to feel it. Plus, he’d fought – more than fought – he’d single handedly dominated his battle only to come back to HQ to have to rush to retreat. Then, he was surrounded by such incompetence he’d rather grab a bunch of FNGs fresh from Basic. It was all so…

“Frustrated?” The SGM walked through the door in his LACS. His head barely avoided brushing the ceiling.

“Among other things,” Coop answered honestly.

On top of the sleep deprivation, and being forced to work with starving artists turned wannabe soldiers, he had been too busy until now to think about Eve. Killing some Windsor’s had been cathartic, but now he couldn’t help but imagine what they were doing to her.

“Don’t worry, we’ll make it right.” Coop wasn’t sure if the SGM was talking about the lack of basic warfighting skill in the rebels, or their missing team members, but either way it helped to know the NCOIC was thinking the same as he was.

Coop opened his mouth to respond but a boom rumbled nearby and the whole facility shook. At that moment, he didn’t need to be reminded to get back to work. He shot to his feet and sprinted back into the makeshift loading dock.

“What the fuck are you standing around for? Remove your thumbs from your assholes and move, people! We’ve got less time than we thought!” Coop roared and the rabble of men and women were shocked back into action.

The SGM walked back over to the GYSGT who was standing in the middle of the madness.

{Cooper,} their voices appeared in his mind as they activated their IORs. {We can’t stick around with these guys any longer. They’re going to be on the run for weeks trying to avoid the Windsor’s. Chances are that they are going to be caught and killed. Masha doesn’t know this, but we’ve convinced him to take us into the city to get our people back while the rest of his people run.} It was the best news Coop had heard all day. {Once we get our people, we’ll make contact with the rebellion and complete our mission with them if we need to, but I don’t need more info for my report back to the brass.}

Coop would bet half a months pay that the report said the populace was willing to fight for their independence, but their tactical prowess or strategic importance was minimal at best. Like with the Windsor loyalists, their best use was going to be diving down into these holes and leading Commonwealth troops on a subterranean hunt for any remaining Windsor’s.

{Get your kit and meet at Masha’s vehicle.} The SGM broke off and left Coop to gather him ramshackle, oversized, jerry-rigged Dragonscale armor.

He thought as he jumped into the back of the truck.

Everyone but the SGM joined him in the back, but they remained silent behind their faceplates. Everyone had something on their mind, and if they were thinking the same thing as Coop, then they wanted to get their people back fast.

Coop hadn’t been through SERE school, but he knew the generalities of what his girlfriend was probably putting up with.

Eve Berg

Location: Harper’s Junction, Star Kingdom of Windsor

even Eve’s mental thoughts were groans at this point.

She was naked and tied up in this Windsor hellhole. After she’d dislocated her shoulder trying to kick her interrogator, the bastards had stripped her naked and tied her up like she was the star in some kinky bondage film. Thankfully, it hadn’t gone farther than that, but there were plenty of other ways to torture her.

She had no idea how much time had passed, or how many times they cut her. Death by a thousand cuts seemed to be the recipe of the day for her current tormentor. The lithe man took a simple razor and sliced her flesh open at periodic intervals. The cuts varied in size and depth, but they all hurt, and each one of them drew more blood and strength from her enhanced body.

“Again,” the man stood in front of her with his silver instrument of pain dripping with her blood. “How many soldiers came with you? What is your mission? How did you get here?”

This time Eve opened her mouth, which she’d stubbornly kept closed up until this point. The man visibly perked up.

“Didn’t they teach you anything in Interrogation 101? One question at a time.” Her lips broke into a vicious grin as she hacked a loogie right onto his face.

The man closed his eyes and sighed deeply, like he was dealing with an unruly child. He wiped the spit off and flung it onto the floor just before he slashed out with the razor.

she noted before stinging pain lanced through her forehead.

Blood quickly trickled through her eyebrow and into her eye. She grimaced as more stinging enveloped her face, and she tried to shake away the blood. That only succeeded in terrible agony emanating from her shoulders.

“Sometimes it’s the little things,” her tormentor smiled once she stopped screaming. “A little blood in the eye from a little nick on the head. It’s just so troublesome.” He brought his face very close to hers.

Normally, she would have broken the fucker’s nose, but she couldn’t bear to move her body a centimeter.

“That’s a good girl. Give in to the pain.” He gently pressed his lips to her forehead.

It felt like much more of an invasion than it should have considering what they could do to her in her current state, but she instinctually reacted. She lashed out, but he was already dancing away. Pain wracked her whole body until finally darkness took her.

“We’ll start this up again later, my precious.” Her tormentor placed the razor on his table of deadly instruments and took a seat to watched her hang their unconsciously.

A moment later the door opened.

“Your Majesty,” the torturer bowed deeply as Josephina stepped into the room.

She gave Eve a good once over and nodded to the torturer. “How close?” was her only question.

“Closer every minute,” the man smiled. He had a system, and it was known for its effectiveness.

“Good. Get me when you have something actionable. We’re going to crush this rebellion now, and make sure everyone knows what happens when you bite the benevolent hand that rules you.”

“Of course, Your Majesty,” he bowed low again as the Queen left, before turning his watchful eyes back on Eve.

He settled in to wait.