Soul of a Gambler

Part VI - "Partners"

The first day was the hardest. Two days without food (Jax didn't really count the single bite Arna snuck him) and three without a cigarette had Jax on edge. Compounding this, was the fact that he was now living out his days at the mercy of his greatest enemies.

These days began at what they referred to as 0400. Four-in-the-goddamn-morning, Earth time.  How strange it was that a dynasty of off-world Humans who had to take over their ancestral home had based their days off of Earth's. He didn't get time for a shower, the attitude expressed by the crew was that you did that on your time, whenever 'your time' truly was. Thankfully enough, there was coffee in the chow hall. This Jax drank of deeply. The exceedingly thick and bitter brew caused all of his conscious nerves to cry out to recoil and spit, but his stomach's demand for something, for anything, overrode this higher-level instruction.

Two cups, three cups, four cups went by as Arna looked on in stunned horror, still nursing her first one. "You're going to end up stroking out, Jax."

"Gonna' take a lot more than yesterday's mud to kill me." He winked to her as he buried his battered nose in the white ceramic of the cup.

Commander Cross and a masked soldier entered the chow hall and snapped everyone inside to attention, except Jax, who was preparing cup number five with the dregs of the pot. Cross came over to him slowly, and Jax couldn't help but smile, wanting to see how far he could push Cross.

Still got that iron. Not for long, buddy. He could almost see his reflection in the mirror-chrome of the thigh-length weapon lashed--not quite holstered--to Cross' leg.

Cross pinched the cup from his hand with two fingers and put it to his lips. He tried to take a sip but even the hardened veteran couldn't stomach it. His face tightened into a cringe and he spit the lukewarm coffee back into the cup and forced it back into Jax' hands.

Jax knew better than to let his laughter rise to the surface, he couldn't imagine his nose could take another punch.

"God-damn! You got a gut of iron!" Cross looked Jax over in disgust. "For that, you get assigned last. Everyone else, I got your first jobs for ya!"

The Commander went about assigning all twenty conscripts a job. The poor foreigners who couldn't speak English, the accepted primary language of the Blackwatch, were struck with palms, gauntlets, or in one occasion a closed fist until they agreed.

Such aggression on Cross' part backfired when he attempted to assign Rocky to clean the high-bore guns on the outer hull considering he probably didn't need to breathe. What Cross didn't know, or didn't care to know, was that Rocky also couldn't speak. When he lashed out to beat Rocky into submission, his fist struck solid stone and he pulled his injured hand slowly back, face flushed with pain and bottled-up embarrassment.

Arna was assigned the engine room, maintenance would see to it that she's instructed further, and Jax was assigned the corridors.

"You'll be working with our mechanics welding plate onto the frame. Don't get any ideas with that torch."

Jax rolled his eyes, "Or I will be shot?"

Cross pulled from the thin bindings the utterly astounding weapon he carried, the J-Frame gleamed in the hard white light. "You know full well what this badass-motha' can do. Don't make me acquaint anyone else, Davis."