Armored fanfic

[Aeshdan]

“Karith! Karith!”

Is that Nicol or Maragette?

Captain Karith Marvudi made a tremendous effort of will and pryed open his eyelids.

Huh. It’s both.

Out of his right eye he could see Captain Shepard’s strong profile, with dark brownish skin and short-cut black hair. Out of his left he could see his wife’s pale face, with her blue eyes and silvery-blond hair. With a sort of mental jerk, he refocused on his surroundings. The ceiling above him was the soft green of hospital recovery rooms, bedecked with pictures of flowers, fuzzy animals, and other things designed to suggest peace and love.

“Good to see you…” he croaked, surprised at how rusty his voice sounded. Before he could try to say anything else, Maragette found another use for his lips.

As they separated, he tried again to speak. “How am I still alive? That wound from the boiler should have killed me. Not that I’m complaining or anything, but…”

“My fault,” interjected Nicole with a grin. “Found you bleeding to death in that tin can of yours, put a tourniquet on the leg, and flew you back to the field hospital. Lost the leg, but the tourniquet kept you alive long enough to get you back to the field hospital and on transfusion. We transferred to a medevac ship when the reinforcements arrived and bombarded the boilers to scrap, flew back to here (New Cincinnati in case you’re wondering), and they started healing you. Even sequenced you for a genoplast, which should be ready in a few days. That’s also where we picked up Maragette.”

Karith contemplated that in silence for a few seconds. Involuntarily, his fingers slipped down below the sheets, fingered a bandaged stub where the lower half of his leg used to be. Within living memory, this would have meant permanent disablement, as even the best prosthetics could never replicate the Creator’s handiwork. But with genoplast transplants finally perfected about a decade ago, the wound could be healed within a few weeks.

The basic science behind genoplasts had been widely known since the early twenty-first century. Simply extract a few cells, and it was relatively simple to convince them to revert to stem cells, the undeveloped state they’d been in during the first few weeks of the patient’s life. Then, with the proper hormonal treatments, you could induce the stem cells to turn into almost anything you liked. The problem had simply been in getting the control fine enough that you could grow the desired organ or limb correctly without having to try and destroy twenty other limbs first.

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door opening. There was a brief burst of formless chatter from the hall, then the door closed and the soft stillness of the recovery room returned.

Karith levered himself up to a sitting position, and took a good look at his visitor. For a brief second, he was totally befuddled. Instead of the formfitting crimson of the Mechanized Infantry Corps field uniforms, or even the opulent crimson-and-gold dress uniforms, the visitor wore a simple coat and trousers of black shimmersilk over an equally black shirt in formfitting cotton. A tiny silver pin shaped like a sword glinted from his left lapel, while his right lapel bore a crimson dragon pin. With a jolt, Karith recognized the outfit.

The Order of St George?! What the hell is a trained psionic doing in my hospital room?

“Captain Karith Marvudi, of the Mechanized Infantry Corps, I believe?” inquired the psion in a polite tone.

“Yes, and you are?”

“Brendan Kline, of the Order of St. George. I happened to be stationed here when you arrived, and thus heard of the news almost as soon as the doctors discovered it. Mrs. Marvudi and Captain Shephard have not been informed, by my direction. It seemed better to tell you all at once. Technically, the information is not related to Captain Shephard, but as your partner, it has a direct impact on her.”

“What news? Has he got some sort of disease? What is going on with him that you need to tell us?” Maragette was in a near-panic.

Brendan ignored her and addressed Karith instead. “Captain Marvudi, according to the communications transcript from the Milacria action, you reported feeling a sensation of extreme nervousness, far beyond the norm for your previous missions. Is that correct?”

“Yes, but why is that relevant?”

Brendan resumed. “During the course of the sequencing procedures for your genoplast transplant, the doctors noticed certain genetic anomalies. A closer examination was indicated, especially in conjunction with your unusual sensations during insertion. The exam was performed and confirmed what we already suspected. Captain, you have psionic potential.”

There was a single beat of total silence, then all three of them started talking at once. They all stopped for a second, then Karith started up again.

“How is that possible? I was tested for psionics when I joined the Corps, and the tests came up negative.”

“Psionic potential is undetectable until it quickens,” replied Brendan. “Usually, the quickening occurs at puberty, but occasionally the potential remains inactive through puberty and is instead quickened later in life by some profound mental or physical change, such as the birth of your first child.”

“Kari’s birth gave me psionic powers?”

“Not precisely. The birth of your child, and the corresponding mental changes, unlocked the potential you had already been gifted with. Furthermore, you appear to have an aptitude for precognizance, a very rare and powerful talent.”

“You’re saying my husband is a prophet?!” interjected Maragette unbelievingly.

“No. Contrary to what you may heard, psions, even those gifted with the talent you possess, cannot predict the future with prophetic accuracy. As temporal beings, we remain bound by free will. What precognizance can do is either see which courses of events are probably going to happen…”

He turned to address Karith “Incidentally, this is what happened at Milacria. Your talent discerned that the boilers were about to ambush you, and manifested this knowledge as a feeling of unease. With training, you could have discerned several minutes in advance what was coming, allowing for evasion and possibly saving the MarsFree.”

“Even more usefully, your talent can be used to look just a second or two into the future. On a timespan that short, you can have a near-perfect accuracy of prediction. This is most useful in combat, as with concentration you can learn to fire where your opponent is going to be, or see where your opponent is going to fire and adjust your dodges accordingly. It’s also just as much use against the boilers as against anything else, something that can’t be said for all talents.”

“So what does this mean for Karith? And for me?” asked Maragette.

“For the present, not much. Captain Sheppherd’s abilities are still embryonic, and it is not likely that anything else will happen without training. For the present, he will remain here and recover, and I shall start making the proper arrangements.”

“After he’s released from the hospital, he’ll need to begin training. There’s an Order chapter-house onworld, and it even happens to be within a short commute of your present house. What will happen after he’s completed basic training we’ll see when it happens.”