PRELUDE: Bandro
"Look at this. How could anyone possibly survive this?" The medic says in awed disbelief. The other medics don't say anything but they all agree with him, this time Sigma couldn't have survived. The dead were thrown all over, or at least parts of them were. Some have tears falling but don't even notice. Sigma was gone.
"Sigma is known for pulling miracles out of their hats people, don't give up on them yet. There might yet be survivors and if so they'll likely need medical attention yesterday so get moving." The senior medic snaps but she is upset as well. Her brother and father won't be this far behind lines, not those two.
She turns and heads to where the report of the huge explosion was recorded. If anyone knows how to make those it's her father and her brother. She makes it to the site and stops in awe. A crater two city blocks wide is in her path. This wasn't their work, but she does notice other patches that do look like their work. She knows from reading her father's reports that he likes to take the right and sends his men to the left so she does too.
She walks half a mile before any sign of casualties. Two men one of them lying on top of the other. She refuses to cry, that would be her brothers bloody corpse he always stayed just behind their father. The blast must have thrown him onto their father.
The blast was strong if it did that much damage half a mile away. She doesn't have much hope of finding her father alive but she has to check. She gently eases her brothers corpse off and checks for life signs on her father.
She sighs in relief and the tears she held back come out now. There are life signs. His pulse is weak but it's there. Miraculously he doesn't seem to have any other injuries other than his arm. It's pretty mangled but it might be what kept her father from suffering any worse injuries. She's not sure she'll be able to save it but she'll do her best.
She has both her father and her brothers bodies loaded up ready for transport. But the news that there is a survivor spreads like wildfire and energizes them all to find more.
The doctor returns back to where the main base for Sigma had been. She doesn't hold up much hope for them there but if anybody deserves to live it's Sgt. Jayse. If he hadn't called in for the backup airstrike, an unheard of thing for Sigma to do, she has no doubt her father would be dead like her brother and likely eaten by those bastard shifters.
The command tent or rather where the command tent should be was gone. Oh yeah, Jayse had said that the officers were in a meeting when a lucky direct strike hit the tent. That's why he, a lowly Sgt. directed the fight from almost the beginning. She'd met the officers of Sigma and doubts they would have been willing to call in air support, even if their lives depended on it. Which would have been too late for them, but had been necessary for the people of this colony.
She is brought out of her revery by a sound from the debris behind her. She whirls around and is shocked to see movement. It is small but movement nonetheless. She comes closer and notices a hand moving.
Her eyes open wide. Another survivor? She tries calling out to him but it's possible that he wouldn't be able to hear her after all a shell did land nearby.
She sees his hand move towards his gun. She is astounded that someone so wounded would still try to fight. Then the hand falls slack. She hastily uncovers the body from the debris and checks for wounds.
She calls out for help and starts issuing orders. His body armor is shredded. Shrapnel is embedded all over his torso. So much blood makes it hard to tell how deep some of the wounds are. Her first priority is to stop the bleeding. He's lost too much already.
Even as she frantically works on that another member of her team pulls out plasma and gets it going. Once she is convinced that he's stable enough she sends him to the transport. This is priority one and they are informed to take off and take him directly to the medics for immediate surgery. The medics going with him will be doing what they can to prep him as they go. Including taking xrays and having them ready by the time they get to surgery. She hopes they can get all that out of him, for she believes that to be Sgt Jayse.
"Found another one over here. He's trapped under what is left of his heavy gun. His dead comrades are on top of him so I can't get a fix on how badly injured he is. There's blood everywhere. He's literally soaked with it." The other medic reports, his voice not saying the disgust he feels at the other things covering the poor man. What is covering everything. The medic knows the head doctor won't tolerate anything like that and would likely kick him out of the medic profession if he did.
Soon the doctor was there and helped to lift the melted mass that had been heavy artillery only a few hours before. Once that was off the poor man they set to work. A few broken bones which the doctor worked on immediately and some slight internal damage that didn't need surgery. The doctor thought this man had gotten off light. That is until she looks into his eyes and realizes that his mind had been damaged far more than his body.
She sedates him. "Keep him in an induced coma until we reach Gaia. We don't have the proper facilities to help this poor man." What she doesn't tell the others is that it would have been far kinder if he had died in the attack. She doesn't think the shrinks will be able to bring him back.
"What was his name?" The doctor asks sadly.
"Corporal Rory," The remaining medic by her side replies.
This startles the woman. All three survived so far, to varying degrees. The odds are so against it that she shakes her head in disbelief. But none of the three were out of the woods yet and she seriously doubts that Rory ever will be. And she finds it unfair that those three survived and her brother didn't. But then chides herself on her emotions. Tory wouldn't have wanted to survive if it meant their father died instead. And he definitely would have preferred death to what happened to Rory.
The doctor returns to her sad duty. They found no more survivors and that those three survived will make the rounds as another tribute to Sigma's ability to pull off the impossible. But the doctor realizes even if no one else does that Sigma is dead now. Even if all three survive body and soul (which she doubts in Rory's case) they will be discharged. Sigma is dead.
The doctor returns to the ship in time to fight with the surgeon who is assigned to take care of her father. "Don't just take his arm. This man needs both his hands to do the impossible with his work."
The surgeon tries to reason with her, "His arm is so badly damaged that it will be better for him to go prosthetic than keep it. He'll regain only a small percentage of use if we can save it at all." The surgeon tries desperately to make her understand.
In the end he gives in but does so only under the greatest protest that he can.
Several days later when they are only a few days out from Gaia, "Doctor, we have to remove his arm or he'll die. Even you can see that now can't you?" The surgeon says after he looks in on his patient.
"Very well, but save as much of the arm as you can." The doctor says and appreciates the fact the surgeon doesn't say anything other than to tell them to prep Thompson and the room for surgery.
"I'm sorry father, I tried but I couldn't save your arm." She whispers to herself and wipes the tears away.
"He'd rather have full use of a prosthetic than almost no use of the real." A voice at her side says startling her.
The doctor looks at her other patient, "Ah, yes Sgt. you would know wouldn't you?" She is pleased that Jayse has awakened at last.
"So, Thompson survived that hellish blast did he? And I somehow survived. By any miracles did any others of my family survive?" Jayse asks even as he closes his eyes. The pain meds were good but he hurt and it is hard to breathe.
"I guess that depends on how you define survive Sgt., Corporal Rory took no real physical damage and even now his body has healed. But his mind is another story. We hope that the shrinks can help him." The doctor says reluctantly.
"But you don't think it likely do you doctor?" Jayse says softly when she finishes.
"I think all three of you surviving is pushing luck too far. But aside from that, I've seen cases where the brain shuts down like his has, I think he's trapped in his mind Sgt. And it's hell in there. I think he's repeating the battle over and over and over. Cases like his are a one in a million shot to recover from and I've yet to see the one that recovers. It's possible after all Sigma is known for its miracles, but no, I don't think he'll ever recover. If he ever recovers lucidity enough I think he'll ask for the final grace. And Sgt. it would be a kindness to give it to him." The doctor says not without compassion.
"I see," Jayse says with tears in his eyes. "Tory didn't make it. No one else made it. Does Thompson know about his son yet?"
"His arm's pretty mangled. He's in a great deal of pain so he's been mostly unconscious, and hasn't been told yet." And right then the doctor feels the full weight of her duties.
"I want to be there when he comes out of surgery. I'll tell him. It's my job, my duty as the highest rank..." Jayse swallows as he realizes what he's saying. "Let me tell him doctor. Tory meant the world to him."
Tory was so much like Thompson that it was just natural that when he joined Sigma that he join their group as well. Now there was no more Sigma and no more Tory. Jayse fights to hold the tears back.
"Very well. Rest for now the surgery will take some time. You still aren't up to staying up for long periods of time." The doctor feels cowardly for agreeing to his request, she should have told Thompson long ago about Tory's death and just couldn't. Now she feels relief that she won't have to. She doesn't want to have to face her father with that news, even if he doesn't realize that she is his daughter.
She wonders why her mother made her promise to never tell her father that she's his, but she did. Her mother is long dead and she's unable to ask her now.
She sets all that aside and finishes her rounds and works on her paperwork until the end of her shift.