Free Starbound by Dave Bara

hat plus the pay rai se wasn’t enough in my book, but it woul d have to do.
    The more difficult part would be the debriefing. Maclintock would want answers as to what had happened to his marines. But before I could tell him, Dobrina got to me first. She buzzed into my stateroom com as I was changing out of my EVA suit and back into my uniform just prior to the debriefing. “Come in, XO,” I said over the com. She opened the door and came through the threshold, then shut it behind her and stood across the room, staring at me. “Yes?” I prompted her as I continued dressing.
    â€œYou could have been killed out there,” she said.
    â€œI’m well aware of that. More than you know.” I thought about Private Jensen, cut clean in half.
    â€œYou’ve got to stop taking so many chances, Peter,” she said, then put her hands behind her back in a very formal gesture.
    â€œIs that my XO speaking, or my lover?” I responded as I bent down to slide on my shoes. I wasn’t in the mood for a lecture. I’d lost thirty-three men and women under my command.
    Now she looked cross at me. “I’m speaking for us both,” she replied. “You don’t understand how much risk you take sometimes. You can be brilliant, like with that damnable hybrid drive. But other times your intuition has a price. This time it was too high a price.”
    I stopped. “I’m well aware of that, Commander,” I said. “We left enough dead bodies on that station to remind me every day for the rest of my life.” I sat there on the edge of my bed, hunched over. I put my hands to my head and rubbed my face, holding back tears. I couldn’t get visions of Rosler being beheaded, of Horlock taking a deadly blow to the chest, or of Aydra Jensen out of my head. I took in a deep breath. The next thing I knew Dobrina was standing over me, her hands rubbing my shoulders and neck, trying to comfort me.
    â€œYour intuition told you that the mystery power source was above you. You wanted answers, so you convinced Maclintock and you went. But your intuition can’t tell you if that decision is good or bad, only that you’re correct in your assumption. This time it cost us many lives. Most of all, it almost cost us
you
,” she said quietly.
    I rubbed the tears out of my eyes. She pulled me close to her, my head resting against her body while I sobbed quietly.
    â€œMy heart aches at how many we’ve lost, here and on
Impulse
,” she said quietly. “But it would break if I ever lost you.”
    We stayed like that for a few minutes more. Then I stood and started buttoning up my uniform jacket. “The captain is waiting for me. He’ll want answers,” I said.
    â€œHe will,” she replied, looking up at me.
    â€œThen let’s go give them to him,” I said.

    â€œSo you were completely overwhelmed by a superior force of automated . . . robots?” Maclintock said, incredulous. He, Dobrina, Serosian, and myself were the only ones in on the debriefing, held in the command deck staff room. Marker, Babayan, and Verhunce had been sent down to console the remaining marine PFCs on the loss of so many of their comrades, more than half our full complement of sixty. I thought about that.
    Thirty-three marines.
    â€œYes, sir,” I replied, stating it as a matter of fact. “In my opinion, that base should be destroyed as our first course of action.”
    â€œThat’s to be determined,” snapped Maclintock. “Describe these . . . robots.” It was almost as if he couldn’t bring himself to say the word.
    â€œGold in color, bipedal, similar to humans in shape, but large, two and a half meters tall I’d say. And they carried a type of coil rifle that emitted a green energy beam that was incredibly destructive. I saw marines dismembered, cut in half right through their armor and shielding, and a combined