The Handmaid's Fail

The Handmaiden Guard. Before the Emperor's rise to power they'd kept the kings and queens of his homeworld safe for untold generations. Now though they serve only him, the noble daughters of a hundred systems drawn like moths to a flame and twisted to his desires.

His latest desire is my planet, for both my people and its rare minerals. We successfully held his troops off, sallying forth from the same mines the Emperor coveted, until he had no choice but to personally intervene. The Handmaiden Guard came with him, assuming command of his armies, and then we started to lose, mine after mine overrun.

That was why I found myself lying atop a ruined building, a passenger's waiting room at the planetary spaceport. The control tower had been occupied since the initial invasion and was now the residence of Primadonna Liana Orci, leader of the Handmaiden Guard's 1st Battalion. Two of her soldiers, each standing out in the virgin-white tunic and knee-high black boots that their uniform consisted of, flanked the tower's entrance and after a minute of watching them softly chatting I took action.

There was a quiet cough, a splash of scarlet liquid on the wall, and one soldier was slowly crumpling, ending up as a heap on the ground. The second was instantly searching though, rifle butt pressed tight against her shoulder, and we both fired at the same side. Her shot, the noise shattering the night silence, bounced off the brickwork near my head but mine found its target, the soldier joining her sister-trooper in death.

I still cursed her though for alerting the spaceport to my presence, scrambling down from my perch and dashing across to the tower. I moved between the two dead Handmaidens, noticing how youthful they both looked up close, and collected their rifles before entering the control tower. Doors were opening and closing above me, there was the clattering of boots, and the first Handmaiden to reach the ground floor had bonelessly tumbled down the stairs, my snapshot having punched a neat hole between her eyes.

With the tower swarming with roving Handmaidens I couldn't take the risk of heading straight for the primadonna. I checked every room I passed, counted the number of make-shift beds in each. A lone soldier was waiting in one, so well-trained that she'd gone for rifle rather than uniform, and the sight of her nakedness made me pause. It was the staring down the barrel of her gun though that snapped me back into movement and, after I'd pulled the trigger first to send bullets into her gut, the Handmaiden was doubling over in agony.

On the third floor the Handmaidens were trying to establish a barricade but I was able to jump it, standing amid a half-circle of women determined to stop me. The gunfire started a moment later, although I was already among them, and Handmaidens started dropping, their tunics now adorned with crimson poppies.

The top of the staircase was littered with bodies by the time I left, only a few of them actually killed by me. Due to the hazards of a gunfight some now wore ruined clothes, the torn-off rags used as bandaging upon my person or in one case padding, but if not for all the carnage they would surely look like they were just sleeping.

The fourth was where I was stopped. The sacrifice on the third floor landing had given those above time to set up multiple firing lines, none of which could affect the others. Primadonna Orci was behind the central group, a cold smile on her aristocratic features, and I aimed a rifle at her.
"You can't win here. In any sense of the word." She spread her hands to encompass the other Handmaidens. "Kill us and the Emperor will just find more. You'll still be dead and your world will still fall."
I looked from face to determined face, from pristine tunic to unhidden flesh and back, at the rows of gun barrels all pointing at me.

The tension was rapidly building. I could see nervous tics, fingers shifting or tongues flicking out to wet lips. The primadonna was still smiling but a smugness was now present and my eyes flicked from one Handmaiden to another, gauging their visible state of mind. With a deep breath, noticing the primadonna twitch in anticipation, I fired off a quick shot and charged back down the stairs, out of the corner of my eye seeing Primadonna Orci clasping hopelessly at the new hole in her neck.

A hail of bullets chased my footsteps as the Handmaidens opened fire but the loss of their commander had shaken them, only a handful of shots coming close. I leapt over the corpses on the third floor, slamming into the wall and clutching at the stair-rail to keep my balance, before resuming my flight.

A squad had taken up position on the ground floor when I returned, drawn by the many gunshots, and I vaulted over the rail to avoid the fate of the girl at the base of the stairs. I managed to shoot three before landing and barreled out through the door rather than deal with the rest, the sounds of Handmaidens descending from the higher floors clearly audible.

My sniper's perch was still undiscovered, the muzzle flash had been how my position had been given away, and I wasted no time in taking shelter there to catch my breath, confident of outwitting any search and making good my escape.