"Average Joe"

It seemed like average locker room, though average locker rooms usually didn’t have views of shifting stars transmitted onto large, strategically placed wall-sized screens. Bits of black and red gear littered every available surface, and the air held a strong scent of sweat socks and Fritos. The two janitors looked around at the mess with jaded eyes.

“Well, Paul, I see the troops were at it again,” said the shorter man while rubbing a grubby hand over his balding head. What was left of the grey mess lifted into the air, bravely defying the artificial gravity. “Fifth drill in three days.”

The taller man, Paul, nodded and gripped the handle of his mop harder. The outside view being transmitted onscreen from the ship computer were almost too good – the stars flying by were starting to make him nauseous. He looked down at the strange fibers that wiggled at the end of his mop. “Good thing, too, Hal. I still don’t see why they can’t bother to pick their shit up, though.” His marbled grey eyes narrowed slightly in thought. “I mean, isn’t it easier to prepare when things are tidy?”

Hal shrugged and moved further into the room. He poked at a shiny red helmet that lay on the closest bench, turning it so that the wide black eye shields were staring soullessly at him. “They don’t see it that way.”

Paul looked down at the helmet and frowned. “They like living in filth?”

White teeth glimmered in Hal’s returning smile. It was the smile of a shark that was eager to chomp into some poor, innocent bystander. It couldn’t have been on a mouth more unfitting, for the man was basically harmless. “They just don’t think about it. After all, look at ‘em – all prepared to run out in the battle monkey suits with a word from the commander. Life must look pretty temporary to them.”

“After the sewer break in deck 17 last night, life is looking mighty temporary to me, too,” Paul muttered. He hated the fact that those most treated like shit – the new conscripts from the recent drafting on Olingon 3 - were forced to wipe it up. He wiped his nose on the metallic grey of his coverall. “It doesn’t mean that we have to live like slobs. Especially on a starship.”

“It’s a battle station, not a starship,” Hal said smugly. “You could fit fifty-one Telerian cargo cruisers in this baby.”

Paul knew better than to get his buddy started on that subject. It would take hours for him to wind down. That was the way with metal traders. “Either way, it’s still not nice to force everyone to suffer in clutter. Even fifty-one cargo cruisers can be filled eventually.”

Hal snorted. “Yeah, eventually. This place isn’t even close to filled. It’d take years to make it unlivable in here.”

“It’s still new. With people like this,” Paul waved a hand at the lockers, “it’ll probably only last a couple of decades before you can’t even walk down the corridors. Then where would we be?”

“Still employed.”

Both men chortled with dark humor, as they knew it was most likely true. Paul shook his head. “I’d rather have the renegades shut us down. I hear they’re nice to janitors.”

“Anyone else would be nicer to work for,” Hal grumbled, stepping forward to start organizing the random bits of gear scattered around the room. “Though I wouldn’t count on anything. Any base the Allies make is pretty much indestructible nowadays. We’ll be working for our grand high masters for the rest of our life, because the renegades will never win. They just can’t.”

Paul sighed. “That’s a good point. How about we start getting this section fixed up, then? Duty check’s in an hour.”

Hal nodded and aimed a kick at one of the squat clean-bots that just happened to be scuttling frantically across the floor to toss things where they didn’t need to be tossed. As it careened into a set of lockers, beeping in preprogrammed annoyance, both laughed heartily and started their work in earnest.

*******************

Across the planetary system line, Tina groaned as she saw that yet another waste disposal unit was clogged. This time, apparently, with a ball of socks.

“Damn troops!” She growled. She flicked a lock of violet streaked black hair out of her face with a jerk of her head and looked over to the short, lanky man that was her partner. “Why can’t they ever just clean up after themselves, Vern?”

“Why would they have to?” he replied, a sparkle in his dull blue eyes. He continued to lazily push the grimy sponge mop across the rusting steel floor. “They have us.”

“And here I thought that joining this group would be any different.” It only took a quick jiggle of the robotic arm to dislodge the offending pair of socks. “They signed me on as a gunner, you know - never mentioned anything about cleaning bathrooms.”

“They never do.” Vern sighed and pushed the rehydration button on the side of the mop. There was a soft splash and an overly cheerful electronic voice telling him to enjoy his work as soapy water streamed down into the sponge end. It wasn’t enough. “I signed up to be a pilot. It’s funny how the only thing I fly is old Betsy here.” He patted the metal mop, and then pushed the button again with a scowl. “She never works quite right.”

Tina gave a sharp, short laugh. “From what I hear, most of the ships don’t work quite right, either.”

“I’m not surprised.” Vern continued to push the mop across the floor.

A sudden crinkle of static burst out over the intercommunications wave, followed by the harsh sound of someone clearing their throat. The sound echoed throughout the cruiser and caused many a rolled-eye. Tina slipped her hands out of the robotic arms rubbery control module and sat on the nearest bench. All of her muscles ached with that special pain that could only be caused by total exertion. The exhaustion she was suffering was the result of forty hours of hard work. She mentally cursed the day that she ran away from the relative safety of her swampland home to join the renegade force.

“Um, excuse me,” the soft British-accented voice of the commander in charge said, as the cheap first-generation cybernetic crystals running the communications system robbed the statement of most apology and turned what was left of it tinny and hollow. “This is your commander, Robert Lays.”

Despite past orders, Vern cynically continued to work. It wasn’t as though any recent messages passed over the wave were important, anyway. He’d bet sure money that this wasn’t, either –

“We are currently rounding Septimite VI and on course to engage the main Alliance battle station in one hour. This means we are on high alert. Battle stations, everyone.”

"—and would’ve lost," Vern cried out as the heavy metal pole of the mop slipped out of his hands, landing on his right foot.

The battle sirens started their annoying bleating for a moment, before getting cut off. The intercom static returned briefly. “Oh, and please remember to turn all communications to mask 4, frequency 2.1, thank you.” After the snide comment – in which the sarcasm rang loud and clear where softer emotions did not – the sirens continued. Thankfully, they were a lot softer.

“All right!” Tina cried, pumping her fist into the air in excitement. “Finally there’s some action!”

The muffled sound of troops rushing to gear up reverberated through every section of the bathroom. The lower rooms of the cruiser, which were renovated from a planetary pleasure seeking company, became filled to the brim with preparing soldiers that were just itching to go into battle.Tina glanced over at Vern with war-brightened eyes. It was everything she had been waiting for since she had picked up the pen in the recruitment booth: the chance to prove herself.
“Isn’t this great?”

Vern’s habitual scowl deepened as he worked to find the release on his heavy black work boots.

*******************

“Hal, what were you assigned when you were conscripted?” Paul’s question had broken the easy silence the two shared, during which they had managed to clear off the Quadrant A benches only. There was a lot more to do, too; there were four quadrants to every block, and they had been assigned five blocks. All had to be virtually spotless.

Hal shrugged as he tossed a stray shirt into the laundry chute. A garbled thanks came out from the almost invisible speaker above the slot. “Just general janitorial duties. Why?”

“I was assigned to radar in the Command Station.” Paul bitterly ran a cloth over troop number five-four-seven’s bench.

“I’m sorry, buddy, but them’s the breaks,” Hal said softly. “Tons of people got booted from their issued job. It’s what happens when you work for the Allied Empire.”

The cyber-fiber cloth crunched slightly in Paul’s grip. “The entire radar station is staffed by snot-nosed little dumbasses that only got there on their parents’ dollar. They couldn’t find a renegade to save their lives. The bastard could be looking up their barrel, waving, and they still wouldn’t see him.”

“Isn’t the radar station completely cybertronic-enabled?”

“That’s beside the point,” Paul growled angrily. “Even with that type of technological help, it takes a certain skill. You have to know where to look as well as how. I doubt those kids know how to scan more than fifty kilometers away.”

Hal clapped him on the back with a chummy hand, trying to soothe frayed nerves. “Don’t worry, buddy. They might be rich idiots, but they’ve had a couple weeks to train. I’m sure they’ll see anything that’s out there in time.”

It was then that the proximity alarms went off.

*******************

The rubber glove sailed across the room and made an indignant "thwap" against the far wall. Tina growled and paced the three strides it took to cross her living cubical. Vern glanced up at her from the bottom bunk, feeling vindicated. He’d been sure something like this would happen. It was good to be right about something.

“Something wrong?”

Tina glared at him. “We’re stuck in this cubical while the fighting goes on and you’re asking me what’s wrong? Gee, I don’t know, what could possibly be wrong with this picture?” Sarcasm dripped from her words like butter off an ear of corn.

“You’re getting upset at not being able to get yourself killed,” Vern said calmly. He looked back down at the holo-image that graced that month’s issue of Spacer’s Boy-Toy. The women in it jiggled and bounced in their little holographic jungle, their glee completely at odds with the tension mounting in the real world around them. “That’s what’s wrong.”

“Glad to know you care.” The pacing continued.

Vern sighed and closed the magazine. There was a soft sound of programmed protest from the women as the cover shut. “Pilots in the R-Wings only last an average of five runs. That’s not very good odds.”

“It’s better than sitting here!” Tina threw another glove across the compartment with a snarl. “I’m a gunner, not a statue!”

“Us ‘statues’ survive a lot longer,” he said, a dark shadow crossing his face. There was a hint of pain in his eyes, and his voice grew quiet. “Maybe it is better to be a pilot. That fifth run would take care of any guilt.”

The ground moving beneath them interrupted whatever response Tina might have had. She forgot that thought as the lights and carefully regulated gravity flickered. Thoughts were hard to keep a hold of when one is switching rapidly from a comfortable attachment with the floor to floating a few inches above it, and back again. An alarm rang throughout the ship, it’s warning a little too late, as usual.

******************

The soft intermittent trembling of the battle station was barely noticeable to Paul and Hal. There were warnings of hits and airlock breaches, but they were ordered to stay on task. They were told that they would be safest where they were anyway, since the quadrants they were assigned to were well insulated and buried deep within the bowels of the ship. Both knew the real situation, though: after all, one was quite familiar with the layout and placement of escape pods when one was a janitor. They were as far as could be from one.

“Well, ain’t this just great?” Paul grumbled as he continued to scrub a set of lockers.

Hal shrugged nonchalantly, his air of calm completely at odds with the reality around them. “I’m just happy Quadrant Zed gets to deal with the soldiers. Imagine trying to clean around people gearing up.”

“The Quadrant Zed boys get to relax by the nearest pods. They’re practically guaranteed a first jump planet-side if everything goes ape-shit.”

Hal blinked, confused. “What’s an ape?”

“I’ll tell you later.” Paul started laughing. A sudden rush of premonition overtook him, a chill running up his spine as though someone were walking over his grave – not that he’d ever have a true grave. Tears started leaking through the laughter. They weren’t noticed in the resulting dust.

*****************

The announcement that ran through the battered cruiser sent a wave of celebration through all who heard it. “The battle station is destroyed!”

Caught in the rush of the moment, Tina jumped at Vern and pulled him into a hard hug. Her jubilant cry by his ear made him half deaf. “We won! We’re free, completely free from the Allies!”

Vern grunted as he hugged her back with numbed arms. Underneath the joy that ran through the ship, there were the silent screams of hundreds of thousands of lives being snuffed out like a candle.

It was an unexpected sound that he would never forget. “Yeah, free.”

*****************

It was zero-five hours when the small fighter ship left its assigned hanger. It was piloted by someone who would be lauded as a hero in many legends to come. He did the one thing that ultimately mattered in the end, firing a silent shot from a laser cannon that echoed throughout the galaxy and, consequently, proving that a simple farm boy from a backwards desert planet could change history. Many would say he was the most important soldier of the war. Some would say he was the vilest man who ever lived, screaming grief to the stars for those they had lost that day. Those that were left behind on his ship that day would say much different than any other: that he was a man among “Average Joes” forced by circumstance into being a tool of death and nothing more. These people believe that anyone could’ve done it given the chance, from janitors to emperors – that the fact that it had been an orphan from a mining planet was all the proof they needed. The last would be the most accurate – and the least repeated.

"Such is life."

©2008 Danielle Dubey