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“Let me add that to my list of quals,” Landon smirked. “Doc, condom dispenser, baby sitter, psychiatrist. I think I need a pay raise.”
“You and me both, brother.” Sgt. Sierra laughed. “Can you believe they are doing this though? How hard is it to navigate back to the states without equipment? It’s a straight shot east. Big land mass. Can’t miss it.”
“I know.” Landon shook his head as he adjusted his ring back into place. “Hey, I’ll catch up with you later. I’ve got to send an email.”
This is the worst time to tell you this… Landon pressed delete until the screen was blank. He sighed, running his hand over his freshly trimmed hair. Hey beautiful. I’m sure you know by now about the quick delay. I know this is hard, but I love you more than you can imagine. I’m sorry I didn’t reply earlier, things have been a little messy around here. But I know we need to talk about what you said. Let’s do something together, just me and you, when I get home.
He read through the email twice, wishing he was better with words and wanting to wipe the whole message away. He just needed to hold her in his arms again. Her fiery red hair getting tangled in the stubble on his chin, the feel of her shoulders relaxing as she melted against him. Her pouty lips pressed against his as her hazel eyes looked up, imploring. Landon hit send and took a steadying breath. They’d get through this. They always did.
The message failed to send.
Cursing his luck, he copied the text and pasted it into a new message, that also failed to send. That’s just great. He shoved the keyboard across the desk and then pulled it back, trying a final time before exiting out of the browser. But he wasn’t fast enough to not see the message failure error screen. Frustrated, he made his way to the gym.
Rock notes blared through his earbuds drowning out the metallic whir of the treadmill under his feet. He closed his eyes as he ran and focused on the lyrics, blowing out measured breaths to help him keep the pace. When his heart was about to explode, he hit stop and moved to the empty weight bench. Whoever was there last didn’t rerack the weights. 100lbs sat on the bar. Landon added 80lbs more and pressed until his muscles screamed. The playlist turned to a haunting melody, songs that reminded him of late nights and drinking beer around the firepit.
He blew sweat from his lips as he set the bar and hoisted himself up. The song was too much. He killed the music and wiped his face with the moisture wicking towel, breathing heavily until his heart rate returned to normal. The silence of the gym was foreign, but a welcome escape from the demands of his job that never seemed to end. He sat there a moment longer, enjoying it. Then he put away all the weights and wiped down the equipment.
The shower’s hot spray streamed down his back and eased the tension from his muscles. He forced his mind to stay blank, tried not to worry about anything. There was nothing he could do to fix things at home now and he’d learned a long time ago not to focus on what could make you go crazy. This wasn’t the first time his job had messed with his marriage. Tessa would understand. Wouldn’t she? Landon pressed his forehead against the cool steel of the shower stall.
“Hey Doc.” The metal rings slid across the bar as the plastic shower curtain was pulled to the side behind him. He turned the water off, glaring over his shoulder. Sgt. Sierra tossed him his towel. “Have you been up topside today?”
“I haven’t even had a chance to shower in two days.” Landon wrapped the towel around his waist.
“I was wondering what stunk.” Sgt. Sierra smirked, but there was something uneasy about his smile. “Get your clothes on and come check this out.”
The heavens stretched across the entire world when you stood on the flight deck of the ship and they only touched down at the distant horizon where the sky met the sea. But this… This wasn’t normal. Landon’s eyes widened, reflecting the ghostly trail of red and orange light streaking through the black sky as if the night itself was on fire and reaching down to swallow the ship. He’d seen the aurora borealis growing up in Idaho, the greens and pale yellows that twisted like smoke through the atmosphere, so he knew what he was looking at.
Except this wasn’t anything like it at all. The sky was so bright it illuminated the crystal-clear tropical waters beneath the ship making them shine with a bloodied reflection of the galaxy. It was too bright to be the dead of night, and the northern lights shouldn’t be at this latitude. Up ahead, the shadowed dark green mountains of Hawaii were lit up by the hellish glow of red clouds dancing around the dormant volcanic peaks and the harbor was littered with thousands of stranded boats, bobbing on the gentle waves and going nowhere.
“Do you have service?” a sailor whispered to someone else, too awestruck to speak out loud. But his words set off a frenzy as everyone pulled out their phones and held them in the air. Landon yanked his own phone from his pocket. If they were this close to land, he might be able to get in touch with Tessa.
He swiped past the lock screen photo of the four of them posed at the dock on a lake and punched in his passcode. There were three dots where bars should be and no Wi-Fi service. He powered his phone off and restarted it, glancing around at the frantic faces that were all trying to do the same. Hey beautiful. Back in Hawaii. I’ll give you a call when I can. The message lit up with a red exclamation mark as it failed to send.
Landon looked up at the sky again, shielding his eyes from the intensity with his hand and watching the brilliant celestial display as a sick feeling of dread snaked its way down his throat and buried itself in his gut. He knew before the 1MC cackled to life that this was really, really bad.
“General Quarters, General Quarters,” the commanding officer barked into the microphone. “All hands below deck now. This is not a drill.”
“Doc? Am I covered in radiation or something?” Cpl. Hemming tore at his blouse, his fingers shaking as he fumbled with the buttons. Landon looked to the others, assessing for the first signs of radiation sickness. Boils, burns, vomiting… All he saw was terrified Marines gathered around him in the hanger bay. Whispered words of “terrorist attack” and “EMP” ran through the crowd. The silent ones with five o’clock shadows on their faces shifted anxiously, waiting to be sent out to fight but not yet knowing what was happening or how they were supposed to fix the bloodthirsty looking sky.
“Keep your uniform on, Corporal,” Gunnery Sergeant Fuimaono barked out the order in his heavy accent. The man stood a foot taller than anyone in the room and directed his stern gaze to Hemming as he marched through the crowd. “No one wants to see your hairless chest. Not even Doc.” Nervous laughter echoed through the hanger bay as GySgt. Fuimaono made his way to the front of the group.
“It seems we have a problem here, Marines. Looks like the sun has thrown a fit and spit some fireballs at us or whatever the scientists are calling it— ask those rich boys what the technical term is. Best we can tell, it’s causing some serious damage. But we’ve seen worse than this in our lives.” GySgt. Fuimaono tensed his muscles, his broad shoulders and heavy biceps stretching the seams of his cammies. It had the intended effect. The Marines all widened their stances, preparing for the moto speech to follow, but Landon had seen this kind of bravado too many times and was tired of these speeches.
“Comms and NAV are down right now, but our Navy boys will get them working soon.” GySgt. Fuimaono glanced over to Landon like he had any clue about how a ship should work and hadn’t been greenside his entire career. “We’re not heading back out. There’s nothing for you to fight unless you want to join the Space Force and shoot some plasma back at the sun. The CO is going to make an announcement soon, but I know how trigger happy you all get. Go back to your berthing and sit tight. We’ll be home in a few days and you can push Jody out of your bed then.”
The “ooh-rah, Gunnys” were tainted with good natured laughter as GySgt. Fuimaono made his way back through the crowd. They formed a respectful path for the legend to pass them by. Technically, he wasn’t a god. But the Samoan warrior who towered over any normal man and crushed skulls with his fists came pretty close to one. Everyone had heard the rumors. Smoke pit fairy tales made you infamous. If Gunny said that everything was okay, then it was good enough.
“HM2 Ward.” GySgt. Fuimaono paused in front of Landon. His looked down at him from the corner of his eye. “Senior Chief Miller wants all the line corpsman in main medical now.”
“Aye Gunny.” Landon turned on his heel to leave.
Trepidation slithered down his spine as he made his way back through the corridors and passageways. His thumb brushed against the silicone band for reassurance. Solar storms couldn’t do that much damage, could they? The ship speakers blasted static throughout the steel walls, stopping Landon in his tracks.
“Attention all hands, stand by for words from the commanding officer.” There was a brief pause where it seemed the ship itself held its breath.
“Good evening sailors and Marines. I know everyone is confused as to why we are back in Hawaii. From the intelligence we can piece together via morse code from the surrounding ships, at 0900 this morning solar activity caused a breakdown in communications that seems to stretch over the Pacific. Our ships are hardened for an event like this, but all satellite and radio communications are offline at this point. IT is working to solve a few more glitches to our systems and then we’ll be on our way home. I understand this is hard to hear, but we have a job to do and let’s not forget it. Mission first.”
The echo of his words hung in the stale air long after the 1MC turned off. Landon shook his head. Gunny’s speech was better.
