Chapter 6: Pynchon - 3752 C.E.

The small craft of which Colonel Vashti was the pilot weaved in and out of the relentless barrage of hostile laser fire that streamed towards her from the approaching fighter jets. The moment she failed to avoid being hit would be the moment when her craft would be no more and her mission terminated. Although her firepower was outmatched by the weaponry set against it, she made sure that each one of the laser-propelled missiles she launched hit its target. All around and ahead was the wreckage of enemy jets.

It was then then that colonel became aware of Brigadier Svenssen's silent presence. Her impressive talent for eliminating hostile forces quite suddenly faltered and she was hit by a laser beam that crippled her craft and sent it spinning and spiralling out of control through the debris of enemy fighter jets.

"Well done, colonel," said the brigadier. "Very impressive."

Colonel Vashti stepped out from the Virtual Reality pod where she'd been immersed for the last hour or so.

"I was just practicing, sir," she said.

"Well, I certainly hope you won't need those skills on your mission, colonel," said the brigadier with a good-humoured smile. "We don't anticipate any hostile activity out there in the Oort Cloud. I dare say though that you have more practical experience of warfare than most of the soldiers who're being trained for this mission. You have a very impressive record of service in the National Army of the Mariner Federation. You've been awarded a dazzling array of medals and commendations."

"Thank you, sir," said the colonel. "And you'll be pleased to know that there are several other soldiers from the Mariner Federation on board."

"And many from the Polar Federation as well, of course," said the brigadier whose own home was the colony of Psamathe in the Neptune Federation. That was a part of the Solar System that never had to engage its military forces in any conflict fewer than a million kilometres from the home planet. The brigadier envied Colonel Vashti's more extensive experience of combat and the associated opportunities to be awarded medals for conspicuous bravery and the like. "You must think this a very dull mission, colonel."

"Not at all, sir," said Colonel Vashti. "This is the mission I was always meant to serve."

"Well, there's no guarantee that you'll return of course," said the brigadier. "Do you have any theory what this Anomaly is, colonel?"

"None whatsoever, sir," said the colonel. "Do you have any, sir?"

"Sadly, no," said the brigadier. "Like most observers I've speculated that it might be some kind of extraterrestrial intelligence, but if so it's chosen a very odd way of manifesting itself. Anyhow, colonel, I didn't come to see you to discuss the Anomaly or even to congratulate you on your excellent game-play. Are you coming to the wrestling match this evening?"

"The fuck fighting, sir?" asked Colonel Vashti who knew exactly what Brigadier Svenssen was alluding to.

"I like a good fight, soldier," said the brigadier, "but I like a good fuck just as much."

"I do as well, sir," said the colonel who placed her hand on the brigadier's crotch where she could feel the swell of his genitals. Quite clearly the prospect of watching some sweaty energetic fucking had already stimulated him.

"Not now, colonel," said the brigadier sternly but reluctantly. "I have other duties to attend to."

"Of course, sir," said Vashti, removing her hand. "I shall see you at the wrestling match at Twenty Hundred Hours Universal Time."

She saluted her commanding officer who acknowledged her in kind and strode off.

Colonel Vashti had been training at the Pynchon military colony in Earth orbit for several months now and there weren't many more months left yet until she and the other soldiers would set off for the Space Ship Intrepid on its voyage to the very limits of the Sun's gravitational sphere. The space colony was one of many administered and owned by the Interplanetary Union that was dedicated to the armed services. It was unthinkable that the militia should be under the direct control of just one of the many nations, planets and colonies that composed the Union's special forces This was particularly imperative given that some member states, such as Colonel Vashti's Mariner Federation, were at war with some of the others.

The training camp where Colonel Vashti and the other soldiers were based was at quite a distance from the other military bases. This wasn't especially unusual, but more out of the ordinary was the fact that no one in the training camp was permitted to discuss the mission for which they were training with soldiers based elsewhere. To make sure of this, only the most senior officers, such as Colonel Vashti and Brigadier Svenssen, were allowed any freedom of movement within the confines of the colony.

The Pynchon was specifically designed to accommodate military exercises, so the greatest proportion of the colony's habitable area was a wasteland where soldiers could fire live ammunition and practice military exercises with real lethal hardware. This made the colony one of the least cultivated of the Solar System. The plants that struggled to grow in the messy aftermath of staged conflicts and the animals not slaughtered in the artillery cross-fire were entirely abandoned to their own devices.

There wasn't much that the soldiers under the colonel's command knew about the mission. She'd been ordered to keep it as much a secret as possible. All the soldiers knew was that they would be travelling into deep space and that there was an unspecified and even mysterious risk that might require a military response. There was nothing more. Nevertheless, most of the soldiers guessed that their destination was the Anomaly. Everybody knew that there was something quite extraordinary out there in deep space and few believed the official line that it was a natural phenomenon best left to scientific research. Few believed that, whatever it might be, the Anomaly would turn out to be just like the other strange phenomena in human history for which there had always been a perfectly reasonable and quite boring explanation. It was an alien unknown presence that might even be associated with the weird and often preposterous Apparitions that so excited conspiracy theorists.

The soldiers had the same access to international media as everyone else in the Solar System so they could easily study holographs of these mysterious Apparitions. There was the huge Viking ship that sailed for several seconds across the Asteroid Belt. There was the massive banana that spiralled round and around for nearly a minute somewhere between Uranus and Saturn. There was the fierce burning fire on the freezing surface of Pluto. And then there was the Anomaly itself. It was almost as old as space travel and getting steadily bigger and ever more peculiar.

The soldiers were required to undergo an exhaustive course of training and instruction for the mission. There was the standard preparation for military action both inside an enclosed space such as a space colony or a very large space ship, but also in deep space where even the slightest compromise to a space suit's defences would lead to sudden and painful death. The soldiers relied heavily on the readiness and quality of their equipment to survive. A battle-ready soldier had to make very thorough technical checks before setting out into the deadly vacuum of space.

Colonel Vashti was more fully briefed than the soldiers under her command. The more she found out the more she appreciated what a risk her fellow soldiers were taking. Most frightening of all was the fact that nobody was sure that there would even be a return trip from the Anomaly. None of the robotic probes that had entered the Anomaly had returned. They broadcast no meaningful information once they were inside. Every observation of the Anomaly at any proximity from outside was exactly as unhelpful as the high resolution analyses made from several light months distant. Although there was no actual evidence that the Anomaly might harbour hostile intentions, it couldn't be assumed that it would necessarily be friendly.

The soldiers also needed to be entertained while they were stationed on Pynchon. This was taken very seriously by the military colony's administrators, even to the extent of passing a blind eye on activities that were legal in some colonies in the Solar System but not so in most of the others. Controversially, this included prostitution, gambling and drug abuse. The entertainment on-hand had to be of a nature that would appeal to soldiers and this was unlikely to be compatible with a celibate, contemplative and quiet life. Amongst the available diversions, the one that most appealed to Brigadier Svenssen was male homosexual fuck fighting or Extreme Hard Core Wrestling as it was sometimes known.

Colonel Vashti totally understood Brigadier Svenssen's enthusiasm for fuck fighting. What could be more entertaining than to watch two or more male soldiers stripped to the skin wrestle together with the intention of gripping one another's testicles and erect penis? What greater reward was there for the victor than for him to fuck his defeated opponent? What greater treat could there be for the audience than to watch two oiled and ripped wrestlers thrust their erect penises deep inside the other's anus and fuck with exactly the same animal intensity that they'd exhibited in their fighting?

Even so, Colonel Vashti was conscious that such a treat didn't appeal to everyone. There were very few women in the audience, even if the colonel could count herself as one. There was a high representation of shaven headed men from Saturn in the audience and many had ambitions to be active participants in this form of physical recreation. The brigadier was on edge throughout the wrestling. He would always place a bet on the wrestler he wanted to see win, but Vashti could see that the wager wasn't on the man who was really the better fighter. Brigadier Svenssen paid scant attention to the wrestler's form even though this was the best indicator of likely success. The brigadier generally backed the wrestler who was most muscled, the most oiled and the one with the largest cock.

This was Brigadier Svenssen's ideal masculine form and one on which he'd modelled himself. He was well ripped. When not executing his military duties, the brigadier was most often to be found pumping iron or doing press-ups or lifting weights. He enjoyed doing these exercises in the nude so that he could show off his taut, muscled frame and, naturally, his own quite splendid genitals. What he liked to do most was to shove his cock up a man's arse and have his balls rhythmically pound against a man's buttock crack. What could possibly be more fun than that?

The brigadier had once again put his money where he would like his cock to be. And once again he lost his bet. Colonel Vashti also liked to gamble but she was far more successful with her wagers. It was always a matter of satisfaction to assess a wrestler's form and predict who would win. It was even more of a challenge to guess the actual final score, but even there the colonel's predictions were remarkably accurate. The colonel often knew the wrestler's form rather more intimately than anyone, but she didn't really want the brigadier to be too aware of this. She preferred the brigadier to continue to believe that there was something special in their relationship. And not, of course, just in terms of who was the commanding officer.