Savage World

I Sharks-3

One night, while drinking at a bar somewhere on Claremont Boulevard outside Miramar, where Dad was posted, on his way to another post-Dan-Rickman-argument bender, he started talking to a stranger. The guy looked like a junkyard dog, tough and mean with an accent that was part Michael Caine and part Crocodile Dundee. A guy, who could hold his liquor a hell of a lot better than a twenty-year-old college dropout could.

The drunker Derick got, the more he poured out his troubles to the stranger, who listened without comment. When Derick got through telling him about Chris and how his life had been upended by the loss, the man finally spoke.

“So, you're going to piss your life away because your big brother died in the service? f*****g rotten way to remember him, isn't it?”

Derick stared at him.

“Well, no…” Derick stammered a response. He hadn't heard it put that bluntly before. The crux of every argument he had with Dan Rickman was not that he was throwing his life away but of how Derick wasn't Chris and would never measure up to him.

“Look. You can spend your whole life crying about how he's gone but you got to remember one thing: he kicked it doing exactly what he wanted to do. Dying the way he did, with your men about you, in a fight, that's the way soldiers want to go. f**k, that's how I want to go. I didn't ** to die in a comfy bed, mate. I signed up to kick arse for something greater than myself, and I'm betting your brother did the same.”

He was right.

Chris spent his whole life taking care of him, Luke and Lily. Joining the military was simply extending his protective nature to the planet. Yeah, he probably didn't count on dying so early, but Derick could believe it was exactly how Chris would want to go. Dying for something that mattered, protecting the people he cared about. It was a watershed moment, the jolt of clarity he so desperately needed, and he started weeping as it washed over him.

Instead of snorting in disgust at the appalling display, which was also a Dan Rickman special, the stranger patted him on the back and said quietly, “Get it out, mate. Get it out and let him go.”

Sage advice from the man who would someday become his commanding officer and best friend.

* * *

“T- Minus thirty seconds and counting…”

The large passageway just outside a smaller cargo bay was literally crammed full of people. Every square foot was taken up, with barely any shoulder room. Bodies, nerves, and sweat in a stuffy heat the air scrubbers weren't designed to handle. The effect would make anyone claustrophobic. On the other side of the thick doors, crew members were preparing to receive the rations via shuttle and prep them for distribution.

Derick found a small crate in some supply closet and stood on it now, to give himself an elevated view of the crush of people lined up for their rations. With distribution run on a lottery system, chaos was barely threaded out by the presence of the Sharks. People picked up their rations in shifts, by the head of each household and their ID number. Zero's first, then ones, twos, so on and so forth. Each family would get enough rations for a week.

They were lucky one of the agri-haulers survived the jump.

Mostly, folks stayed orderly after a fashion. Derick made sure of it, even it meant being called things like 'Gestapo' and 'Pig'.

“T-minus fifteen seconds…. ten….”

The automated female voice sounded throughout the passageway, briefly silencing the low roar of the crowd. At least, until a voice carried over them, catching Derick's attention. From his viewpoint, he found the source easily. A large man with a slight gut and the sour look of one under duress. “Chu,” Derick said quietly into the throat mike. “On your ri…”

“You're hurting me! Let go!!” Silence spread outward from the man as the crowd shifted and revealed a pretty, dark-haired, and exotic looking woman. The big man's hand was wrapped around her upper arm, nearly engulfing it. “You get your spic a*s to the back of the line. You gotta wait your turn!” The man shoved the woman hard, making her stumble.

“HEY!” Derick shouted, jumping off his crate. He started through the crowd as a path appeared with everyone suddenly finding the space to get out of the big and pissed off Shark's way. “Let her go!”

“And what if I don't!?” Bubba or whatever his name was glowered at Derick sullenly. Easily Derick's height, no easy feat, and thirty pounds heavier, he seemed to be considering taking him on. “You gonna shoot me, you a*s-RINE!?”

A red bead of light appeared on the man's chest and Derick looked up from it with a smirk. He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, towards Ren and her sniper perch. “No. But she will.”

Bubba's chin hit his chest, eyes bulging at the bright red dot on his sternum.

“f*****g pork rind haolie!!” The woman jerked her arm free from the man's grasp. “I'm Hawaiian, not Hispanic!”

“You all look the same!”

Someone behind them shouted. The woman cursed and swung a fist, but Chu grabbed her in time, twisting her away as she protested. Derick grabbed Bubba, preventing him from retaliating and that was all the crowd needed to ignite. They pressed in on Derick and Chu, shouting and yelling, flash boiling to a riot.

“Stand down!!” Jazz yelled, freeing his nightstick when he lost sight of Gunny. “Beta! Crowd control right now!!” he ordered, yanking at the first body in his way to get to their gunnery sergeant.

“QUIIIIIIET!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

The command rolled over the crowd, echoing off the bulkheads and stunning all of them into silence, even the Sharks.

The quiet left behind was like a vacuum, sucking every bit of fight out of the gathered refugees. Derick lunged to his feet, Bubba in hand as he sought the source of the noise. That had sounded like… yep. Derick grinned when he spotted Ren hanging up the intercom receiver near her position, looking at him smugly.

Now that was f*****g effective. 'NICE' he mouthed with a wink before turning back to his charge.

“ID, name and billet,” he ordered as he yanked a chip reader from his harness.

“Name's Jim Dale.” The big guy glowered as he produced his bright green wrist band. “Billet 261.”

Derick scanned it and when the device chirped in positive affirmation, he glanced at the screen to verify the picture. “Mr Dale, once I authorize the delivery to continue, you will be given your rations and escorted off the deck.” Leaning in close, he grabbed the man's shoulder and dug his fingers into the flesh. “You have a problem with someone, you come to me. I catch you starting trouble again and your rations will be cut. Do you understand?” He growled.

Jim's eyes widened. The threat was an effective one. He glanced around, taking in the hostile stares directed at him. He swore under his breath, as if realizing he would have been responsible for things going sideways. Taking a deep breath and letting it out, Jim nodded.

“Good.” The shame on the man's face was enough for Derick to decide that further action wasn't needed. “Anderson!” When the private appeared beside Chu, Derick let go of Dale. “Private Anderson here will make sure you get your fair share and will be your escort.”

Leaving Anderson to handle him, Derick turned to the woman and motioned for her hand. “ID.”

Shoving back lank, dark hair, she held up the bright green band on her wrist. “My name is Lani Kahananui. I'm a teacher…”

Fucking pork rind haolie was a teacher?? Where, a prison? Derick raised an eyebrow as he scanned her ID band.

The noise no one was supposed to be making oozed up again as she continued, raising her voice to be heard. “I'm in charge of the unclaimed kids.” The crowd went silent again, staring at her when they realized exactly who she was. The unclaimed children were the poor kids separated from their families during the chaos of the mass evacuation. Lani had taken charge of them, sorting them out and organizing searches for family members.

Derick scanned her ID band and was rewarded with another satisfactory chirp. “Richards!!” he called out and received a sharp 'Yes, Gunny!' by the red-headed sniper. “You and Mayday are Miss Kahananui's escorts today. Once she gets the rations, please escort her back to her assigned billet.”

Still humming with satisfaction from the smile she received from him earlier, Ren made her way through the sea of human bodies, gesturing at Junior Corporal Maya 'Mayday' Sanjay, a former medic with the British Army, to join her at his call.

“We're on it, Sir,” she quipped, always wearing the slightest hint of a smile for him.

“Right behind you, mate,” Maya echoed.

With the two civilians under trustworthy watch and the crowd under some semblance of control, Derick hopped back onto the crate and hailed Control to continue with the docking just as there was another shout.

Seeking the source out, Derick sighed. It was going to be a long day.