Part 1 (1/2)
Machines of Eden.
a green military techno-thriller by.
Shad Callister.
1.
The discharge clerk looked up, tired and sweaty. The soldier standing before her looked like all the others, and the lines still stretched across the dusty staging ground behind him. The clerk wondered how bad it would be if she just didn't show up the next day. Certainly no one would go after her. Would any of her remaining superiors care enough to record it somewhere that might bite her later?
The soldier cleared his throat politely. ”Here for my two-fourteen, private.”
”You and the other six thousand,” she yawned. The man's uniform said he was a staff sergeant, but the clerk didn't care much anymore. n.o.body did. ”Card, please.”
The soldier handed over the small datacard that hung around his neck, and the clerk touched it to her terminal. Data popped up on the display and she eyeballed it wearily, poking at the controls to start processing him. When she saw the name at the top of the screen, however, she stiffened.
She raised her eyes, awe lighting them up. ”Staff Sergeant John Fletcher? You fought at Buenos Aires?”
The soldier nodded.
”I heard about you. You shut down the entire Green bot advance in the middle of an EMP blackout! Saved your whole battalion, right?”
The sergeant shrugged.
The clerk made a half-movement, as if to rise and offer a handshake, then thought better of it. She turned to her terminal and began spinning it through a hundred rapid-fire functions, fingertips dancing.
It was an effort, John knew, to impress him. He wasn't impressed by the show of efficiency, but he was grateful. It was nice to have a fifteen-minute outprocessing done in five.
The clerk finished and held out the card. ”A real privilege to meet you, sir. If anybody around here deserves an Honorable, it's you. Good luck, sir.”
”Not a sir, honey,” John said, nodding his thanks. He plucked the card from her hand. ”Especially not now.” He moved away from the stares and murmurs collecting behind him. He enjoyed his notoriety, but wasn't in the mood to regale them all with war stories just now. Not today.
Newly discharged soldiers flooded the tarmac, some loading into troop carriers, others migrating toward the rail terminal where rumor had it a train would arrive sometime later that afternoon, city-bound. John wanted no part of that. He'd had enough of cities.
A corporal wandered past, pay voucher crumpled in one fist. A warm breeze gusted past and s.n.a.t.c.hed the paper out of his hand, but he didn't look back, just kept walking. John watched the paper, at least two years worth of pay, skip and flutter across the asphalt until it disappeared in the weeds on the far edge.
That's what it was worth. Nowhere left to spend Green money, outside of the now empty commissary.
He spotted a warmed-up troop transport a few meters away and ambled over, duffel over one shoulder. The woman in the driver's seat was big and mohawked, chewing gum. She gave him a wary glance as he approached.
”Help you, Sergeant?”
He shook his head. ”No more 'sergeant'. Where you headed?”
”Portland.” She cackled. ”What's left of it. Word is, Restoration isn't even close.”
Cities. He shook his head. ”Thanks anyway.”
It was the same story with the other vehicles. Most were headed north, up the coast. A few were going inland; Vegas, Denver. The three-hour-late train, he learned from a crowd of young ex-tankers, was Mexico-bound.
More cities.
He moved on.
The air s.h.i.+mmered at the far end of the tarmac as John approached the hangars. This was one of the few operational airfields left on the West Coast, and security was tight. Several anti-aircraft batteries were placed to cover the hangars and runway, and a checkpoint was the only way through the fence surrounding the control tower. The top of the tower still bristled with heavy guns, this long after the cease-fire.
The duty sergeant looked up from his datapad as John walked over. His eyes were calm, but his hand rested lightly on his sidearm. ”What can I do for you, Sergeant?
John nodded in the direction of the hangars. ”Any transport flights?”
The sergeant shook his head. ”Last one left yesterday.”
”Anything else flying? Anywhere?”
”Let's see.” The duty sergeant consulted his datapad. ”Got a cargo plane going west to the islands. Refuels in Hawaii, then on to the Philippines. But I doubt he'll take a pa.s.senger. Our remaining freight jocks don't like live baggage.”
”I'll give it a try, anyway. Thanks, Sergeant.”
In the nearest hangar he found the cargo plane. It was an older model, still using liquid fuel. The fuselage was battered and scarred from more than a few close calls, and John noticed a fifty-caliber bullet hole in the rear tail section. He approached slowly, sizing it up. If it was going to carry him over the open ocean, he wanted to be sure of its st.u.r.diness.
An Asian man, mid-forties, walked out of the rear cargo door and down the ramp, putting away a pocket comm unit. When he saw John, he shook his head.
”No pa.s.sengers.”
”I'm pretty quiet,” John said. ”Won't be any trouble.”
”Sorry.” The man looked him up and down. ”There's not a square inch in there for you, and I'd be summarily shot for allowing it. Nothing personal.”
John drew a long, slow breath, reached into his breast pocket, and drew out his pay voucher. His showed over three years of officer pay piled up, but he had no use for it. Not where he wanted to go. A pilot might, though, with connections at Green bases all over the world. He held it out.
The pilot looked it over, glanced around, then rolled it up and stuffed it in his coveralls.
”Leaving in ten. This all your gear?” he asked, nodding at the duffel.
”Not much for five years, is it?”
”52nd, huh?” the pilot grunted, eyeing John's shoulder patch. ”What unit?”
”Hackers.”
The pilot eyed him dubiously. ”Heard the 52nd got chewed up bad.”
John nodded. ”We sure did.”
”What did you say your name was?”