Vanguard Word Update

2k wods

***

With that, he turned and marched off, his gait made odd by his magnetic boots, soon disappearing behind a sloped panel. Cadell’s perception was all wrong, and with no frame of reference it looked as though the Lieutenant had crossed a vast distance in a matter of moments, vanishing over the curve of the hull.

The five of them looked to one another, sharing uncertain glances. Cadell seized the opportunity to take the first plunge – he was squad leader after all, he had to show them all he was willing to take point. Set an example as Kazlu had put it, even if his helmet was permeated with the acrid stench of his own breakfast.

Stepping onto the inside of the torus had been a serene experience, but trudging on the outside of it was like a nightmare. The lack of gravity and his reliance on the magnetic boots to keep him planted was like trying to learn to walk all over again, and no matter where he turned his head, the strange landscape around him was entirely alien. Not entirely smooth, the hull was bumped here and there by white domes, with long barrels poking up from within the housings, Cadell realising they were gun batteries of enormous magnitude. The details of the barrels were so clear Cadell could almost see the serial numbers, as if he was standing right next to it, the barrels lined with coper-coloured rings the size of hoola-hoops. How as anyone supposed to fight in an environment like this, where judging distance was impossible?

There were comms array towers as well, sprouting from the hull at random points like metal trees, their towering bodies casting harsh shadows on the ‘ground’. The shadows were visibly moving as the station continued to rotate through space, the mere thought enough to almost inspire another retch from Cadell.

He looked to the others, seeing how they were faring. Hunter and Samiha were trailing behind him, while Kazlu and Kurtis were starting to gain a lead. The latter of which was moving along at a pace equivalent to a power walk, taking to the unnatural gait that was required like a fish to water.

Cadell didn’t know about the others, but he felt like he was always one misstep away from tumbling into space. They were all secured by the tethers, of course, but Cadell didn’t think he, or his stomach, could handle an experience like that.

He marched up the curve for what felt like ten minutes, somehow the figure of Marek only appearing a short while after that. They were almost halfway done. As long as Cadell didn’t look out to his sides, where this thin landscape ended at abrupt cliffs that overhung total emptiness, and he kept a firm hand on his tether, the second half wouldn’t be as bad as the first.

“How you getting on, yellowbelly?” Marek said as Cadell stomped up the hull towards him. It seemed he’d earned a nickname.

“Good. Better than before, Sir,” Cadell replied, the officer watching him take small, but consistent steps.

“Sounds like you’re getting a little bored over there, Private. Maybe you need some excitement. I have just the thing.”

Without warning, Marek came over and seized his arm, Cadell watching in horror as he reached for his tether, pulling the locking mechanism away with a gloved thumb.

Marek let it float away into freefall, the officer smirking at Cadell’s reaction as the lifeline zipped back the way he’d come, Samiha stepping out of its path as the winding length flailed in her direction.

“You think you’re going to be harnessed every time you’re EVA?” Marek demanded. “Easy part’s over, Private. Time to grow a pair.”

The tug of the tether had been a comforting weight, but now Cadell was back to square one, his legs resisting his efforts to continue the march.

“Same goes for the rest of you,” Marek said, making his way to Kurtis. “You’ve had your training wheels for long enough. Let’s see who crashes first.”

He went through the squad one by one, until all their tethers were gone. The squad gradually began to work up the courage to keep on moving, but Cadell’s nerves were betraying him, no matter how much he kept telling himself this was a controlled environment.

As if to make matters worse, Samiha entered his peripheral, flashing him a pitiless smirk as her three claw-shaped toes curled against the floor. “Taking a breather, squad lead?” she asked. “If this were real, you’d be dead in a second if you stood around like that.”

“This ain’t exactly an environment meant for humans,” Cadell muttered, but speaking under his breath wasn’t exactly discreet on the local channel, Samiha’s beak curling downward. “Yours either, I’d imagine.”

“Our clan has spent most of the last rotation in microgravity,” Samiha replied. “This is not so different from navigating one of our carriers.”

Seeing the alien saunter ahead of him gave Cadell all the fuel his nerves needed, and he hurried after, focusing on nothing but placing one heavy foot before the other. Race or not, he wouldn’t let the overgrown avian beat him this easily.

“Damn it,” Samiha hissed over the channel, Cadell watching as she hunkered, her knees raising above either side of her head as she lowered into a squat, further accentuating the true length of her thighs and legs.

“What’s wrong?” Cadell asked, pausing nearby. She was fiddling with her left boot, which seemed to be skimming along the hull a little bit, but before he could get a better look, Samiha blocked his view with her arm.

“It is nothing,” she said.

Samiha made to walk away, but the foot she’d been fiddling with slid against the hull right as she raised her other, and she toppled backward in a gentle somersault. She cawed out a surprised ‘Kr-awwt!’ through the radio, her arms shooting out to grab the metal, but she was inches out of reach, and gaining more distance as her momentum carried her away. With no medium and no form of propulsion, she was at the mercy of space.

Her arms flailed wildly, and for a second Cadell considered letting her float away. She would have no small walk of shame when someone fished her out of the void, and he knew more than anyone that she deserved it. Still, the very thing he feared about this spacewalk was happening to Samiha right now, and he wasn’t cruel enough to let her suffer that kind of scare.

At the last moment, he reached out, grabbing Samiha by the tip of her wing. The metal sheath shifted as though it was segmented, the feathery appendage unfurling from her elbow at a right angle, extending out to make her limb appear twice as long. That answered the question of whether they branched out or not.

He reached up wit his other glove, grunting as her momentum fought with his magnetic boots, his body jerking toward the flailing alien. His boots kept him glued to the deck, fortunately, and Samiha’s momentum slowly came to a standstill. Cadell pulled her in, the frazzled Balokarid placing her feet back on the metal, taking her breath as they clicked her into place. She glanced between him, and then the place that he was holding her, pulling her arm away from him.

“Don’t touch my wing,” she warned, loosing a shaky sigh.

“Thank you for your help, Cadell. Oh no worries, Samiha, what’re squad mates for?” he grumbled. “The hell happened to you? Didn’t you say you spent a lot of time in microgravity?”

“This reliance on magnets is a human design choice,” she explained. “Our suits never had them until your scientists came along and insisted that they be integrated. And they don’t even work,” she added bitterly. “So much for human technology.”

“Hang on,” he said, squatting down to get a better look at her feet. This time she didn’t pull away, whether that was because she was still collecting herself or some other reason, he couldn’t say. What he found was very interesting. “You idiot,” he said. “the tone is red, that means the magnet is off. You got the colours the other way around, Samiha. So much for Balokarid ingenuity.”

With him hunkered like that, she towered over him, but she was far from imposing, the Balokarid going quiet as she realised her mistake. The puke on the side of his visor put a bad taste on this small victory, but he was glad to have caught her on the back foot for once.

“They are human-made, like I said,” she stammered. “for aliens, by aliens. I wouldn’t have had a problem if my Clan had created them.”

“Well, Kazlu hasn’t had any trouble yet, so your point is kinda moot,” he replied.

“Be silent and keep walking,” she grumbled. “we are falling behind the others.”

Cadell wanted to rub it in a bit more, but he felt like he’d more than enough of that. Besides, she was right, the rest of the squad were pulling ahead. She bent over to fiddle with the settigns of her boot, and with her boots fixed, they set off down the slope.

He walked by Samiha’s side, her giant strides sending vibrations up his leg. He noted that she was keeping within arm’s reach of him, perhaps worried of another incident, Cadell smirking when he was sure she wasn’t looking.

“So you never had mag boots before now?” he asked trying to make conversation as the silence became too much. “How’d you move around on your starships?”

He didn’t think Samiha would answer, but after a brief pause, she did.

“We floated through the hallways, obviously. Our ships didn’t have the capacity to generate artificial gravity, like this ‘Hub’ can, nor was the concept of artificial gravity really pursued by our Clan.”

“Yeah we’re pretty smart,” Cadell answered. “we’ve been using rotational gravity since the first colony ships left Earth. Helps limit muscle atrophy, though we’ve got cybernetics to help with that.”

“You humans pride yourselves on your technological prowess,” Samiha scoffed. “but I know for a fact our Clan possesses one avenue off science that your kind have never been able to refine.”

“Yeah, and what’s that?”

“Perhaps you will see it for yourself,” she answered, keeping a lid on whatever she was talking about. “If we are ever allowed to show our true cabalities in this program.”

“How mysterious. Is that why the Hub allowed you to join the war effort? I don’t know about you, but by definition of an Alliance is that all groups contribute something to the cause. Did you bring anything else to the table? Bad attitude not countin’ of course.”

“The limits of your ignorance are truly boundless,” she sighed. “We have a naval force that is easy to produce and quick to replenish thanks to our skilled artisans, and is it not obvious that we are clearly physically superior to your flightless kind?”

Cadell gave her a once over. She was a tall creature, of course, and she wasn’t without her muscle. Her suit was tight enough that he could pick out her wide thighs anchored to her pinched hips, which were roughly level with his eyes, her suit clinging to a distinctly hourglass figure. Cadell didn’t want to call her impressive, but there was a certain athleticism to her that couldn’t be denied.

“Just cause you can fly don’t make you any better,” Cadell pointed out. “a single shot from a rifle and you’re clipped. Yeah you’re bigger than me, but that makes you a bigger target too, how’s that an advantage?”

“We have ways to circumvent such things,” she said.