Deathstalker 04 - Deathstalker Honor

doesn’t kill them immediately, yank on their ankles till their necks break.”
    “Marion! Do you want to give this lecture?”
    “Of course not, dear. You do it so well.”
    This had the sound of a conversation that could go on for some time, so Owen left them to it. He moved on through the compound, seeing what there was to see, listening to scraps of conversation that mostly evolved around everyday things. It was as though the colonists wanted to savor their few happy memories while they still could, before everything was lost in the fighting. No one seemed particularly
    optimistic about the final outcome. Owen found Colonel William Hand and Otto sitting together on a bench outside their hut, polishing their swords and quietly singing an old marine marching song. The Colonel still wore his old uniform, ragged and tattered but still scrupulously clean. His chest bore an impressive display of medal ribbons, carefully maintained. He didn’t bother with the usual cloak and hood. He had leprosy and didn’t care who knew it. His gray skin was dotted with dark patches of dead matter, and half his nose was eaten away. He might have been handsome once. It was hard to tell. He looked to be in his late fifties, a large and muscular man running now to fat. His long, dark hair was greasy and stringy, held back out of his face with a plain leather headband. His companion Otto was a hunchbacked dwarf, barely four feet tall. His overlarge head was touched with decay here and there, and most of his hair had fallen out. He too wore a marine uniform, but it was filthy dirty and he looked like he hadn’t bathed in weeks. For a hunchbacked dwarf with leprosy, he seemed cheerful enough.
    The Colonel looked up at Owen and fixed him with a cold, flat gaze. “You must be new, boy, or you wouldn’t be hanging around us. Even lepers have their pariahs. Got time to sit and talk for a while?”
    “Of course,” said Owen. He sat down on the bench next to the Colonel. “May I ask what makes you a pariah here?”
    The Colonel snorted. “Because I don’t think the sun shines out of Saint Bea’s ass. I don’t have any time for her peace and love nonsense. I’m a killer, boy. Bloody good at it too. Joined the marines as soon as I was able and never looked back. Never wanted anything else.”
    “You seem to have had an impressive career, Colonel,” said Owen, indicating the medal ribbons.
    “Bet your ass, boy. I fought in every campaign of note for the past thirty years. Killed men and aliens on a hundred worlds, first to advance and last to retreat, and loved every minute of it. No regrets, no bad dreams, no stirrings of conscience in the wee hours. Mother Bea never could understand that, and for a Saint she’s remarkably unforgiving to anyone who won’t toe the party line. She wants me to make confession, say I’m sorry and make my peace with God. Well, I’m not sorry, and I won’t say I was, and when I finally get to stand before God, I’ll look him right in the eye and say, You made me a killer. I just did what you made me to do. Now, where’s the next enemy?” He laughed shortly, rooting around in the ruined half of his nose with a fingertip. “I was one of the best, but they still sent me here the moment I was diagnosed. I’m not bitter. Not really. But it came hard at the time, to give up my career for this shithole. Ironic, really. All the battles I fought, all the odds I beat, and in the end it wasn’t a sword or an energy blast that got me, just a stupid mindless disease, killing me by inches. Not at all how I expected to die.”
    “You never expected to die,” said Otto. “You thought you were so special you’d live forever.”
    “Maybe,” said the Colonel. He looked at Owen. “Don’t suppose you brought any cigars with you? No, of course not. Just as well, filthy habit anyway. But it’s one of the few things I do miss… I missed the rebellion, you know. Biggest bloody war in the history of the Empire, and I never got to fight in it. Shame.
    I would have liked to test myself against the Deathstalker and his crew. They would have been worthy adversaries. Still, Empress or Parliament, it makes no difference in the end. Neither one is going to let us off this planet.” “No one cares about us,” said Otto. “They’re ashamed of us. We have no place in their bright new shining Empire.” He sniffed wetly and rubbed his nose with the back of his hand. “I was gengineered like this, in case you were