Solar Courage

Yenna clenched her fists as the Alliance ship approached the drop point. Her carapace like armored skin brushed up against the others as she checked her harnesses one last time. Fusion Grenades, Solar Knives, extra comm set, sidearm, extra solar magazines.

Looking up as her commanding officer moved to his customary place right in front of the drop doors, Yenna felt her stomachs drop. As the rest of the Sunvuenerthian’s head’s dimmed along with hers as the tension seemed to reach a climax. Her rifle’s solar magazine made the only noise she could hear inside the Eclipse Stealth Frigate as it hummed with power.

“Alright brothers and sisters. You all know the plan. You all know the stakes. I won’t bore you with the details again. Just remember this.” Yenna felt her determination redouble as Commander Frex said their time-honored phrase. “Let their blood run into the sand from whence it came! Bring the Sun!”

Commander Frex turned and waited as the pilot spoke over the comm channel, “Bring the Sun my siblings!”

The quiet of the dropship was immediately replaced by a crash of thunder as the electromagnetic storm they had been navigating hit the assault team with a furry. Yenna pounded down the ramp into the storm, glad she didn’t have skin like their Kabrorian neighbors as parts of her carapace began to glow an electric blue from the power surging in their air.

Taking her position to the left of the formation, the other Solar Knights watching her back, Yenna looked through her reticle at the surrounding rock and sand. While other species had always called her home world barren and ugly, Yenna loved the red sand and the storms. Except for on mission days like this, the storm made it nearly impossible to see with conventional weapons.

Flipping the sight from its natural setting to its storm setting, she saw no life signs. “Clear.” She said into her comm as the rest of her team responded similarly.

“Move to phase two.” Commander Frex said, as he gestured for Yenna to take point.

Moving to the front of the formation, Yenna began to move toward their destination. She could barely see it from here, Mostly because of the traitorous Sunvuenerthian troops inside waiting out the storm. Out here her team’s natural glow had disappeared as she felt the cool of the storms electricity.

The trek to the structure was a battle in and of itself, the storm, its debris, and the poor visibility making each step a chore. Yenna put up a hand as they got within 300 lengths of the structure, the traitorous creatures inside clearly visible from the outside.

“Target Confirmation?” Commander Frex inquired.

Bringing her rifle to bare, she sighted in and began scanning the luminous faces with the optical computer tucked safely in the carapace around her right eye. The heads of her people truly were like a lit match with the body covered in intricate black and red carapace. Her scanner began scanning the unique carapace markings on each of the traitors.

“Frex?” Republic Commander Edwards crackled over the comm channel, his calm human voice piercing through. “Your team in position?”

“Affirmative.” Commander Frex responded from behind Yenna as the Scanner paused on a particular creature. “Your squad?”

“As ready as we will ever be, this storm would be playing ping pong with our systems if it wasn’t for your tech. Thanks for that.” Edwards said light heartedly. “Want to just take the shot then move in?”

“That would likely be our best course of action.” Commander Frex said after a pause upon seeing her put up a hand with one finger, indicating she had sighted the mark.

“For terrorists, they sure are dumb.” Edwards said. “Not even considering that someone could attack them in a storm like this.”

“All units prepare for attack in five, four.” Commander Frex began.

Yenna calmly moved her finger to the firing mechanism of her solar rifle, aiming squarely for the chest of the terrorist leader as Frex closed in on the final number of his countdown. As he finished, everything seemed to go silent for a moment as Yenna fired. The leader of the terrorists didn’t even have time to register the pain before his chest blew open.

“Go go go!” Commander Edwards yelled over the comm channel.

Staying where she was, Yenna began picking off the traitors one by one, providing cover for the joint task force of Sunvuenerthian and Human troops. The humans, in their mat black power armor, were first to the building, entering from two sides as they used a breaching charge on one wall before pushing another door open. She could see their rifle muzzles flash as the traitors began to fall, still confused and disoriented.

Yenna didn’t watch her own people enter the squat structure as her attention focused on a group of four traitors beginning to open a hatch in corner of the room.

“Be advised.” Yenna spoke calmly into the comm channel, a habit she had developed over her years as a sniper. “Four targets are opening a hatch in the northeast of the structure.”

Yenna shot one, its head disappearing in a blaze of solar fire, while two humans and one Sunvuenerthian opened fire on the other three. She watched as her three allies moved to the hatch, looked to each other, and then dropped out of her sight. Silently wishing them luck, she moved back to her grizzly task, eliminating threats where she could and calling them out where she couldn’t.

As the joint task force began calling out all clears over the comm channel Yenna saw movement out of the corner of her left eye. Four Sunvuenerthian terrorists had just exited a concealed hatch 400 units away from the facility. Her blood ran cold as she saw them dragging a group of children attached to each other by chains.

“All units be advised!” Yenna roared over the comm channel. “Four targets are exiting a hidden entrance 400 units southwest of your location. They have the kids.”

Yenna swore to herself as the two commanders began yelling orders. These terrorists didn’t care for the children’s lives, some weren’t even Sunvuenerthian, they would die out here in this storm.

It only took Yenna another second to realize the other problem. She was the only unit within weapons range of the targets but she couldn’t shoot for danger of hitting the kids. These bastards would get away with this kids. The task force couldn’t stop them.

But maybe she could.

Leaving her position and pounding toward the terrorists, she slung her rifle and lifted her sidearm. It was a human design, given to her by a member of the Republic squad here. She hoped it worked as well as she had been told, especially in this downpour.

Lightning struck all around her as she vaulted a cleft of rocks and raised the pistol before squeezing the trigger. Her targets were much slower than her, having to drag the kids with them, so she was now in a perfect position with the kids out of her line of fire.

The first terrorist dropped like a ton of stone as her first shot took him right through the head. The other three turned to open fire but she was in a much better position. Finishing them off she moved to the kids, all of which shrank away from her.

“Corporal!” Yenna heard over the comm channel from Commander Frex. “Superstorm incoming! You have to get out of there now!”

Yenna felt as though all of her innards had just dropped through the stones beneath her boots. Her rescue had just become much more dangerous.

Three options presented themselves to her, each coming to her mind in a split second. She could try and bring the kids with her back to the structure but she already knew from the electricity growing in her carapace that she wouldn’t make it. She could hunker down in the rocks and hope they survived the storm. Or she could leave these kids out here to die and make it to the structure just fine.

The decision was simple.

Grabbing the kids, she pushed them into a cleft of rock she had spotted as she took out the terrorists. Facing the frightened children, Yenna put her body in between the storm and the kids. She WOULD NOT let these kids die, even if it cost her life.

She felt the superstorm hit her just as she wedged her feet and hands into hold she hoped would hold. Yenna had seen superstorms on Sunvuenerth, she had grown up here. The aftermath was something every Sunvuenerthian had seen many times.

Being in the storm was a whole different beast. She felt something slam into her back enough force that she felt the carapace on her back, tough enough to stop a blade, crack. The storm roared at Yenna and she roared right back, screaming in defiance as the merciless storm tried to claim these kids.

She didn’t know them, it didn’t matter.

“My name is Yenna Val Tress!” She bellowed into the uncaring storm. “And I will not let you claim these kids!”

Commander Travis Edwards found Yenna first, four hours after the storm had subsided. He breathed in awe as he first caught sight of her. The carapace of her back had been shorn away by the storm, leaving nothing but bloody and broken skin and bone beneath. A length of stone protruded from her right thigh long enough to have gone all the way through his power armor.

Then his breath caught as he saw a small head peek out from around Yenna’s leg. The human girl couldn’t have been more than eight, her body covered in bruises but nothing the storm could have given her.

Not wasting another moment, Edwards called for a med evac and sent a ping of his location. His eyes lingered on Yenna’s limp form, her hands and feet pushed so forcefully into the stone by her own will that it had cracked their carapace.

He found himself saluting the fallen soldier, the fallen hero. Then others joined him. Then all of them stood saluting a woman they had barely known but wished they had.

“Farewell, Yenna.” Commander Frex said beside Edwards. “May you return to the sun.”

“Thank you, Yenna.” Edwards said, only now learning her name. “I wish I had known you, this life did not deserve you, your courage, or your determination. But these kids are alive because of you, and I think that is all you really wanted. Rest easy.”