Saturday, December 29, 2018

The Fate of the 68th Kinetic (13)


We know that sometime within the first fifty years
on Witness
they gave up on guarding the planet 
against an enemy that wasn't ever going to show up

and simply joined the labor force.



















Thursday, December 27, 2018

The Fate of the 68th Kinetic (11)


Plumber/Pipe Fitter, Third Shift Maintenance at Erbestall Terminal
 
Witness, Kalizch Stars.
 
Sector 2-H, Windlass Cay.
Calendar approximate 004.8, M42.
Voyage of the Belknap, Year One Thirty-Three.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Wednesday, December 26, 2018

The Fate of the 68th Kinetic (10)


Propellant Foreman, Light Gas Refueling Crew
 
Witness, Kalizch Stars.
 
Central Hub, Orbital Dock. St. Pilsner's Gate.
Calendar approximate 005, M42.
Voyage of the Belknap, Year One Thirty-Four.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Monday, December 24, 2018

Saturday, December 22, 2018

The Fate of the 68th Kinetic (7)


At first, when they reached out to us

. . . these descendants

it wasn't clear where the conversation might begin.





















 

Friday, December 21, 2018

The Fate of the 68th Kinetic (6)


Tell me, would you turn from your own because their hearing changed? Or if they became sick in their lungs?

You wouldn't. You'd be compelled to offer assurances.
We find a way to accept.



















 

Wednesday, December 19, 2018

Tuesday, December 18, 2018

The Fate of the 68th Kinetic (3)


Roughly five generations have passed, but perhaps
more importantly

something has transpired.


Low Watt Beam Operator (Second Class); unknown industry (or labor?) battalion. Witness, Kalizch Stars.
Near the suborbital transportation hub at Port Mikkel. 
Calendar approximate 002, M42.

Voyage of the Belknap, Year One Thirty-One.



















 

Monday, December 17, 2018

The Fate of the 68th Kinetic (2)


And then
in the first blush of the New Millennium

the descendants of the 68th were compelled to get in touch
with their families back home on Kalkovac


120 years after the regiment shipped out
for deployment to the Kalizch Stars.



















  

Sunday, December 16, 2018

The Fate of the 68th Kinetic


It wasn't a narrative that we wished to remember
 so we'd forgotten about them

and their misguided deployment.

That's how these things go.


















 

Tuesday, December 4, 2018

Deployed to Witness (ix)


Nobody heard from the garrison
 nothing at all

 
 for a hundred and twenty years.



















 

Monday, December 3, 2018

Deployed to Witness (viii)


So the 68th Kinetic landed on Witness, and went about their duties
 (whatever those were)
 and they were promptly forgotten. Just left there.


They didn't send for resupply or refit
no status reports
or briefings
(maybe they didn't know how)
they just stayed there on that planet and went to work.
The whole regiment.



















Sunday, December 2, 2018

Friday, November 30, 2018

Deployed to Witness (vi)


There was no threat to be had, perceived
or otherwise

for three thousand-thousand light years in any direction.
Three thousand millenia.




We're talking about the Udina Sector here, right?


Kalizch Stars, for Grom's sake.




















Thursday, November 29, 2018

Wednesday, November 28, 2018

Deployed to Witness (iv)


- by reasonable standards a dead-end world, in
a dead-end system

growing genetically modified staplegrains

for no one special.



















Tuesday, November 27, 2018

Deployed to Witness (iii)


It isn't clear why they were assigned career duties

guarding grain storage and cultivators
on Witness




















Sunday, November 25, 2018

Deployed to Witness


But deployment amongst the stars is haphazard,
 random

at least
for the regiments from backwater systems
such as
ours.



















 

Saturday, November 24, 2018

The 68th Kinetic (Witness)


So that by the time
they landed
on Witness
(Udina Sector, Kalizch Stars)

they were three years into their voyage
(somewhere around 874)
 and whatever they envisioned an Intelligence Unit to be

they trained rigorously to become
and had
become.




















Sunday, November 18, 2018

Friday, November 16, 2018

The Unexpected Sailing Of The Belknap (21)


Not the 68th Kinetic. They designated themselves
 an Intelligence Unit.

Other ideas.



















 

Thursday, November 15, 2018

The Unexpected Sailing Of The Belknap (20)


In sixty-eight separate expeditions
over three hundred thirty-two years

the regiment from Kalkovac had always sailed as the
302nd Wasteland Reconnaissance

as it has in the 138 years  and twenty-six
expeditions since



















 

Tuesday, November 13, 2018

The Unexpected Sailing Of The Belknap (18)


They formed on the modified terms of a collective


and named the newly formed,
collective regiment 

the 68th Kinetic Cell




















 

Monday, November 12, 2018

The Unexpected Sailing Of The Belknap (17)


But left to their own
organic

decision-making


they defied the traditional military model-



















 

Sunday, November 11, 2018

The Unexpected Sailing Of The Belknap (16)


All by themselves they worked it out.








Editor's Note: The astute reader will note that this entry is the one thousandth post on Guardsman-A-Day.
Thanks for sticking around and seeing this through with me. 



















 

Thursday, November 8, 2018

The Unexpected Sailing Of The Belknap (13)


So the decision was made
 we would send
sort of
who we could find


with the idea that 
on the long voyage between stars
they would work out what their organization might be

upon deployment.