Starfist: Wings of Hell by David Sherman & Dan Cragg Page A

was, promised in marriage to two women. Love is not something you dish out in dribs and drabs; it’s an all-or-nothing proposition and it’s entirely possible to love equally more than one person at a time. And Charlie Bass really did love both Katie and Comfort, two completely different women, maybe not even compatible personalities.
    And to complicate the problem further, he had his own illegitimate child to think about now. He’d already been to Personnel and designated Comfort Brattle the sole beneficiary of his insurance policies. That would take care of her and the boy if anything were to happen to him, and it was likely something would since Thirty-fourth FIST had been alerted only that morning for another deployment.
    Well, Bass thought, if I make it through this one I’ll figure something out. But right now he had to clear his mind, get ready to do his duty.
    Back in his quarters Bass shook off his cold-weather gear, rubbed his hands together vigorously, and opened his tiny liquor cabinet. Time for some bourbon, and he still had some of those Montecristo cigars in his humidor. Might as well relax and enjoy the comforts of home while he could, since soon they’d be off to another deployment.
    Someone knocked on the door. It turned out to be a red-faced yeoman from Mainside. “Ensign Bass, sir?”
    “Yeah, first class, what is it?”
    “Special letter, sir, just came through in this evening’s dispatches.”
    “Little late for mail call, isn’t it?”
    “Sir, the chief told me to deliver it in person. It’s marked ‘High Priority’ and ‘Deliver Upon Receipt.’ Please sign for it here.” He held out a digital clipboard. Bass swiped it with his ID bracelet and accepted the envelope. The yeoman saluted and left.
    The flimsiplast envelope was stamped “Kingdom” and had been mailed ten days earlier. It was from Zechariah Brattle, the patriarch of the Brattle family. Well, here it is, Bass thought. Either I’m a beloved son-in-law or a vile seducer who betrayed Zechariah’s trust. In fact he was a bit surprised Zechariah hadn’t written him much sooner since Comfort’s baby had been born some months ago. Charlie Bass was not the type of man to hesitate facing bad news, if bad news it was, but before he read the letter he was going to be prepared. He poured a generous dollop of Old Snort into a glass, clipped one of his Montecristos, and lit up. He sipped the whiskey, letting it slide slowly down to explode in a fiery ball deep inside his stomach. When there was a tiny white ash on the end of his cigar he felt ready for anything and tore the envelope open.
    He read only as far as the first paragraph and exclaimed aloud, “Holeeee shit!”

    “Dear Charles,” the letter began. Bass shook his head. Zechariah would just never learn to call him Charlie. “Some time ago the boys found a Skink, as you call the creatures that devastated our homes, a baby, evidently left behind when they evacuated Kingdom…” At that point Bass got back into his cold-weather gear and took the letter to Captain Conorado.
    “Holy shit!” Conorado exclaimed, and the pair walked over to Commander van Winkle’s quarters.
    “Holy shit,” Commander van Winkle sighed after he’d read Zechariah’s letter. “Let’s go see the brigadier about this!”
    Brigadier Ted Sturgeon was still at FIST headquarters despite the lateness of the hour. He read the letter in silence. “Get Colonel Ramadan and Sergeant Major Shiro,” he said. They waited in silence until those two notables joined them. He handed Ramadan the flimsiplast. “Read this and pay particular attention to the concluding paragraph.”
    “Buddha’s balls,” Ramadan exclaimed, and passed the letter to Sergeant Major Shiro.
    Sergeant Major Shiro read the last paragraph aloud:
    “We gave Moses up to the two ‘scientists,’ this Joseph Gobels and Pensy Fogel, because at the time we were convinced he would be of use to humankind in its war with the aliens. I am