Nano Bytes - A Collection of Short SciFi Stories

Shore Leave, by J B Durbin

"Hot damn. We get to go back to Prime." Max flipped his visor up to reveal his face, its left side looking like molten wax. He'd been scarred by a Slythian flame weapon ten days prior. Scratching the puckered skin, he smiled crookedly. "I'll bet the ladies will want to hear about how I got this."

"It makes you look better, you ugly bastard." Chase laughed as he ran toward the approaching aircraft. "Last one there buys the first ten rounds."

*****

"Some weird shit is happening. We went in with ten thousand soldiers. I know our squad is down to you and me. We started with seven. If everyone else was in the same firefights we were, you'd think they'd suffer the same casualties." Max looked around the cabin of the small transport. "Can't be more than five hundred in a transport of this size."

"You're right. Most of these guys got to be REMFs. Soft as baby shit." Chase spat on the deck. "You know not everybody has the balls to be a front-line soldier."

"Notice something else?" Max leaned in. "We're the only old-timers on the ship. It's full of young guys. It's the vets that are missing. You think maybe they sent them home and forgot to include us?"

"That has to be the answer." Chase looked around the transport and shook his head.

"What else could it be?" Max leaned back into the webbed seat and began snoring almost immediately.

"Man, I wish I could get to sleep that fast." Muttering to himself, Chase thought about the missing soldiers. "I need to find out where the other guys are." He closed his eyes. "I'll do it after our leave is up." Chase was asleep in twenty seconds.

*****

"Prime world is just like I remember it." Chase licked juicy fat from his fingers and threw the rib bone onto the pile with the others. "Barbeque smoked just right. I wonder where they get the mesquite? Have it brought in from Earth or did they transplant some trees here?"

"It don't make no difference to me. I'm more of a wingman myself." Max cleaned every bit of chicken off the bones and placed them carefully on the pile he'd built. It looked like he was performing a voodoo ritual. "At least we both like the same beer." He sloshed amber liquid into Chase's mug, getting half of it on the table.

Chase leaned forward, licking the beer off the wood surface. "Man, that's alcohol abuse. Next time, try your one shot, one kill routine."

"Speaking of shots, I think the waitress is bringing ours now."

A female Quatranian approached the feasting men. She practically flowed across the floor, a shot glass of brown liquor in each of her four hands. "You gentlemen going to need anything else?"

Staring at her chest, Chase almost choked as she set down the booze and spread her robe wide so they could both get a glimpse of her more than ample breasts. He grabbed a glass, tossing it back. Reaching out, he pointed at one of her nipples. "How about some of that?"

"I'm not sure you can handle it, but I get off in five minutes if you want to come home with me." Her upper right arm snaked around Chase's head and pulled him to her bosom. She held him there long enough for him to be drenched in her pheromones, then let him go. "Just follow your nose, if you get the urge."

She sidled off to another table, her body swaying in a way only a four-legged woman could.

"I bet you get off in less than five minutes, Chasie boy." Max slapped his friend on the shoulder. "Me, I tend to go more conventional." He held up a thousand credit chip. "Who wants to spend the night with me? Earthlike only, please. But if you're interesting, you can always try to change my mind."