25
Apr
For the first time in a long while, I’ve written another entry in the Jenny serial. With luck, I shall finally get around to finishing the story this time.
It hurt. Badly. But JNY-35197 was still alive. He tried to move. Couldn’t. The console had fallen on his legs, crushed them. Suit had numbed him. Waist down was probably gone. Jenny shrugged. Hope his owner hadn’t wanted a sex change.
Propped on his elbows, he surveyed the room. Stirring forms there and there. Three humans up and at the door. He shouted at them, a quick question. Hmm. Six made it, four dead in the crash. And no fire coming through the hole in the blast door. Jenny’d been in worse spots before. Unless the ship blew. He’d never died before, not for real.
A repeater spat through the opening. The humans answered. Jenny dumped covering fire through, not able to see what he was shooting at. Better not. Save the ammo for someone who can fight. Might make it last.
Command better remember which dropship was which. Course, they didn’t care about the organ replacements inside. He didn’t want to die yet though, so Jenny tried raising them on the radio. Static. Damn hull. Jenny sighed and passed out. He needed the rest.
He woke to more fighting. Four humans firing, and another carcass on the ground. Aliens still fighting for the cockpit. Meant they thought the dropship could still fly. A curse, then only three organ replacements firing. Jenny tossed his repeater towards the sound. Ammo was almost out, then.
No grenades. Odd. Guess the alien battlesuits didn’t want to damage the consoles. A glance towards the hole. Three firing again. A soldier dead or out of bolts. The end wouldn’t be far off, then.
Static on the radio. New static. Jenny shouted at the others to get down, but they were already diving for cover. Superheated plasma blew through the hole, melting everything it touched. JNY-35197’s armour started to glow. Infiltrator suits could dissipate an awful lot of heat, but this was ungodly.
Then it stopped, and the radio crackled. No, cackled. And cackled. Well shit. The other infiltrators pulled the console off of Jenny, one of them throwing him over their shoulder. So only four of them had made it.
Ducking through the hole they found a Devastator. Of course. This one had plasma jets where the criminal had once had arms. It hissed and chittered. Then it pointed. There was a tunnel straight through the hull of the ship. The Devastator had melted his way through everything. Guess they were going out.
Daylight. Then Command called. The four organ replacements were going to get promoted. Whatever the hell that meant.
7
Apr
A fly buzzed when I died. It wasn’t a noble death, or a valiant one, just a death. I was standing patrol in some godforsaken jungle on a planet I couldn’t even name, and a sniper shot me. Kinetic kill, right through the heart. So that’s it for me, lying bleeding out on the ground. I had always wondered what death would feel like, and I can tell you, it doesn’t. There’s nothing, no feeling, just a sort of growing blankness, like bits of your body are turning off. I guess that’s accurate to what’s happening – bits of my body are turning off, no more oxygen to feed the little guys.
Base sent out a rescue wagon, but all it’s going to pick up is my cold dead corpse. At least they got the bastard, counter-sniper with a rocket. I’d say goodbye to my wife and kids and family, but I don’t have any. I was grown in a vat, originally going to be used for organ replacement for some rich old bugger. Then the war started, and the government realized it had all of these healthy young men laying around collecting dust. Few months of high-speed training, and suddenly I’m standing patrol out in Hell 101, or whatever this planet’s called. Better than lying around knowing I was going to get chopped into spare parts one day.
I know, I’m taking a long time to actually die if I can record all this, but that damn fly buzzing around my head is keeping me awake so I can talk. Don’t know how, but it is. Maybe it sprinkled pixie dust on my face when I closed my eyes. Or if I tap my heels three times, I go home. Yeah, right.
Sorry, blacked out there for a moment. The fly isn’t working as well as it used to. Blood loss, I suppose. Where was I? Nowhere, really, just nattering away into a mic while lying on the ground. I don’t even have a name, just a code number. JNY-35197, that’s me. Has such a nice ring to it that people call me Jenny. Can’t read or write, don’t have any rights. Why would they give either to a bag of organs?
That blankness is most of the way up my chest, and it’s getting a bit hard to breathe. Probably only have about a minute or so more at this rate, so I should wrap things up. I know my comrades and I are just bags of organs, and that we got the bum jobs: foot patrol, grunt work, the dangerous stuff, but we’re still human, still have emotions and think and feel like the rest of you. We’re not cyborgs or androids or whatever you call them these days. So, when the war is over and we go home, treat us clones right, would you? Think of the old empires – if you fought for them, at the end of the war you became a citizen. Give that to me and mine, please. It’s my dying wish, and all it takes is thinking with your heart, and not your head. I know you’ll do it, and thank you. Goodbye.