The Ondellus Determination
By Tim Williams
Chapter 1
Calling it “home” would have been a misappropriation of the term. It was simply where I slept when I was out of orbit. As I stepped inside, the message display panel illuminated to alert me to a video message from my mother. I was in no particular mood to deal with her at that moment, so I touched the blinking 'IGNORE' icon and the panel reverted to showing a mirror image of the front room.
I examined my face in the mirror image. My age was beginning to show in the lines on my forehead and around my eyes. I pulled off my identification amulet and ran my thumb over the inscription: Lokewa, Son of Krexel The Pathfinder. My father's contribution to our people had earned his name a place in our history. I could only hope to do the same someday.
Hitting the release buttons on my boot retention straps, I stepped out of them and crossed the room, setting into my reading chair. I picked up the tablet from the end table and found where I had left off previously.
My right arm was throbbing, and I pulled back the sleeve of my uniform to examine the swollen, irritated spot where the proton bolt had hit me during the training exercise. The medics had told me that the irritation would fade throughout the evening, and my arm would be good as new by the following morning. I counted myself lucky to have been conscious to learn from the experience. Had it been a headshot, I likely wouldn't even have woken up yet.
Realism was the most important aspect of our training. The proton bolts we fired in training exercises were calibrated to inflict massive temporary discomfort, without actually causing any damage. In my youth, I had spent several unconscious nights in the training center infirmary due to training injuries.
The training center was located just offworld, between the upper atmosphere and Kiola, the nearest of our six natural satellites. Every training exercise was a nine-day ordeal. I had the following day to catch up with any issues that may have arisen in my absence, then I was due back at my unit the day after.
I was a Commander in the Orbital Defense Force, which kept our territory clear of any unwelcome visitors. Our planet, Meron Prime, had become a hotbed of illegal activity since our ancestors developed faster-than-light travel countless generations ago. Other galactic travellers had picked up the trail our magnetic plasma engines left and traced them back to us. We had colonized all of our satellites long ago, and the outlying colonies began to come under attack from pirates; merchants trying to expand their profit margins by stealing from us along their trade routes.
Not all galactic travellers were hostile, and it was my job to be able to recognize the ones we welcomed. Our entire culture had benefitted greatly from the commerce our allies have brought, so closing our space territory was not an option.
We patrolled the spaces between the orbits of the satellites. Seniority on the force determined the orbit to which we were assigned, with the rookies getting the first orbit, between Kiola and Biso. The next orbit beyond that was considered to be shared by Janen and Tohem, which circled Meron Prime perpendicular to each other, although Tohem was slightly further out. I was assigned to the Third Orbit, between Janen-Tohem and Envola. Past Envola orbited our smallest satellite, Yuchek.
I was training for the possibility of an assignment upgrade and promotion to the Envola-Yuchek Fourth Orbit, which would only leave me one step from the deep-space assignment. Every Orbital Defense Force member wanted the deep-space orbit, because it was the first line of defense against the pirates.
Because Yuchek orbited the furthest from Meron Prime, it was the colony of choice for the citizens who valued their privacy, mostly because they were the wealthiest. Due to its mass, the force of gravity on Yuchek was less than one-tenth of the gravity on Meron Prime, making it an attractive option also for older Meronians who had trouble getting around. The other satellites averaged somewhere around half of the gravity of the planet itself.
I had chosen not to permanently relocate to a colony. I maintained my residence on Meron Prime, in the hub city of Khur. A hub city was any city that had an Orbital Velocity Spire, which was a tower that used linear accelerators to propel a craft out of the atmosphere. There were eighteen hub cities on the planet. Each hub city appointed a representative to the Ruling Council. The six largest cities without a Spire each appointed a representative to serve as an alternate on the Ruling Council, should a member become incapacitated. The Chancellor served as the tiebreaker when necessary.
I had team members who lived in one of the Biso colonies, and they claimed to enjoy it. I always felt more at ease in the full-scale gravity of the main planet. Those who were assigned to the Deep Space patrol were required to live on Meron Prime, as the Orbital Velocity Spire could be set to reach the outer orbit faster than conventional travel from any of the other satellites.
I turned my attention to the tablet and resumed reading. It was a combat manual written by Tarsk of Soxus, founder of The Meron Prime Orbital Defense Force. Tarsk of Soxus was a famous General in the Terrestrial Army and hero of the Battle for Janen, which was fought when I was very young to liberate the colonies from the self-imposed rule of Parsag the Mercenary King from the Banu System. Parsag's mercenaries had dug in for a long fight, but General Tarsk commandeered a mining tunnel digger and excavated the ground beneath their main position. He sent a single fusion bomb down the tunnel and detonated it, blowing pieces of the mercenary emplacement into space. There were unconfirmed reports of mercenary bodies landing on Envola, which was aligned with Janen at the moment of detonation. After the battle, General Tarsk proposed the establishment of the Orbital Defense Force to prevent any future aggressors from gaining a foothold in our system. Throughout the manual, General Tarsk advocated for using brute force to deal with hired thugs, to provide them with the chance to die by the same sword by which they claimed to live.
