Plague Wars 06: Comes the Destroyer (17 page)

Girls like this didn’t fit.

“Oh, mah, it looks like I have a lot of work to do,” Stevie went on with a dramatic sigh.

“Yes, we all do,” Vango responded, deliberately acting as if he misunderstood. Maybe if he was lucky they would be nowhere near each other as they trained, at least until their schedules filled with work. After that, perhaps she wouldn’t have time to bother him.

Both wore uniforms: hers the crimson and navy blue of the EarthFleet Marines, his the khakis of a working Fleet naval officer. Because of this they avoided holding hands or any other obvious public display. To complete the inadvertent illusion that they were not together, Jill carried most of their gear: four tightly-packed duffels, as if she were his enlisted aide. Rick toted only two carry bags.

What onlookers did not know was that, while Rick had a full suite of chips in his head for his CyberComm duties, Jill’s body brimmed with the latest cyborg upgrades, lacking only things that might show. Some Marines opted for ferrocrystal outer skin or obvious mods such as metal teeth and claws, but with her part-time duties as a covert operative, everything on the outside looked standard human.

Of course, with her enhanced musculature and bones the baggage seemed more awkward than heavy, even in the half gravity provided by the gravplates, but she was far more physically capable than he. Human culture still tended to ascribe overt strength to the male, though, and they drew a few odd looks.

“Couldn’t we just have checked all of those bags through to the new base?” Rick asked as they walked the short distance to their quarters, threading their way among other arriving personnel.

“Airlines ever lose your luggage?” she asked. “No one’s going to bring it over later in space, and there are no malls or mail-order companies out here. Trust a Marine. The best thing we can do is keep our gear close.”

“Right. Well, here’s our stateroom.” As a married couple they rated a tiny private space the size of a closet, with bunked beds taking up half of the space. Drawers below the bottom one and netting above the top provided some stowage, but they barely had room to turn around with both standing. “Looks like restrooms are communal,” Rick went on.

“Head, Rick. It’s called the head. Dress you up like a sailor but you’ll still be a civilian at heart.”

“Hey, I didn’t ask for this uniform,” he retorted. “I got drafted.”

“You got presidentially appointed is what you did, and then you joined EarthFleet.”

“Only because you did.” He sighed. “Out of the frying pan…”

“I thought we talked about this?” Jill said.

“We did. I’m just whining, in private, to you. Is that okay?”

“Of course,” she said, kissing him. “I’m sure things will be much better at Grissom Base. I hear they have plenty of living space.”

Rick nodded. “At least I hear the food is decent.”

“Welcome to forward garrison. Besides, you’ll be going back to
Orion
before the attack starts. For you, this is a working vacation. For me, it’s my job.” She leaped lightly to the top bunk. “I’m for some shuteye.”

“Okay. Sweet dreams. I’m going to look around the ship.”

“Have fun. One ship is pretty much like another.”

“After being stationed on
Orion
for the last four years, any change is a good change.”

“At least you got to come down to Earth once a quarter and see me.” Jill pumped her eyebrows comically up and down.

“And you got to come up several times. It’s your fault. I’ve gotten used to the military.”

“You’re just a techie at heart. You want to look at the gizmos.”

“Good thing you’ve got so much machinery inside you, huh?” Rick waved as he shut the cabin door.

Your first scenario is simple takeoff and landing practice, set here on Callisto. During this first day, your ship will be locked in beginner mode, and you won’t be able to get hurt. Later, you will be able to crash the simulated ship, which will cause you some mild pain feedback and also will be recorded for your debriefings. Good luck, and follow the tutorial.

This method of instruction was quite different from what he was used to, but all the students were fully trained jet pilots, and he’d heard they had been experimenting with a more organic, heuristic approach. Besides, they didn’t have enough qualified Aardvark fliers yet for the usual one-on-one methods.

A tutorial screen opened automatically, and he followed its prompts to start up the ship from power-down all the way to takeoff-ready status.
LAUNCH
. The word flashed gently in front of him.

Vango looked down at his virtual hands on the virtual controls and remembered what he’d been taught.
You don’t actually need the physical illusion, but it helps a lot
, the brain-teachers had said.
Eventually you’ll find yourself losing track of your virtual avatar and just flying the ship as if it was your body.

Placing those hands deliberately on his virtual lap, he decided to use his newbie grace period to try doing without them. With his mind alone, he willed the craft to take off.

Nothing happened.

Vexed, he reviewed his checklist, and ran a snippet of the brain-teacher’s class on a virtual video screen projected before his mind’s eye.
If you really want to fly the Avenger the right way
– the instructors always called the A-24 by its official name, even though everyone else called them Aardvarks –
you have to inhabit it. You have to imagine that its sensors are your eyes and ears, its weapons your arms, its thrusters your feet and your muscles.

Deliberately, Vango sank into the illusion, trying to feel those things the teacher had talked about. He replicated some of the exercises he’d performed back then, on simpler brain-training scenarios after he’d had the additional link chips implanted. In those, he’d inhabited the virtual bodies of animals, cars, airplanes, even heavy construction equipment, but those simulations had been simple, designed to help the new pilots take baby steps.

Now he was expected to really run and play.

His first success was his vision. Instead of the illusion of the inside of a cockpit, he followed the sensor feeds through the skin of the ship and suddenly looked out upon the 3D surroundings without being anchored in place. After that it was easier to hear the radio comms all around him, and feel the idling fusion engine, like a beating heart oddly connected to his feet.

Around and above him he watched dozens of ships flying in simple takeoff and landing patterns, presumably his compatriots who had seized the physical controls and launched. He had no doubt that if communication with them had been allowed, they would be razzing him for just sitting there on the virtual ramp, not moving.

That’s all right. I’ll show them
, he thought.
I always do things by the book, but the instructions did not say I had to follow the taxiway to the runway and go zooming down it, airplane style, the way everyone assumes. The simulation should replicate everything about Callisto, including its low gravity, so…

With a deep breath that he felt as a ramping up power, he imagined himself crouching in place, then gently rising up on his fingers and toes.

His Aardvark lifted off the ground, wobbling a bit but under positive control, and he continued to rise, until he imagined himself standing. This brought his ship to a vertical orientation, nose up and twin engines pointed at the ground, like an old-fashioned rocket.

Then he leaped.

Blasting upward, he shot through the middle of the formation of ships in their counterclockwise traffic pattern, higher and higher until the limits of the beginner’s VR space stopped him from climbing. Even so, he now hovered far above the rest. More and more, he felt as if he was flying his body rather than sitting in a cockpit.

ENTER PATTERN, CIRCLE AND LAND
said the tutorial. The words had been pulsing there for some time, but he’d ignored them as he had climbed. Now, though, they constituted an order and his natural sense of responsibility kicked in. He was happy to push the boundaries of instruction, but wasn’t going to blow his chances by acting like some rebel on his first day.

Swooping down, he selected a gap and dropped into it from above, and then followed the left turns on the pattern legs named
upwind
,
crosswind
,
downwind
,
base
and
final
, regardless that there was no actual wind on this moon.

He hurried through the tutorial as fast as he could, earning several hours at the end to just play in the no-crash mode. Instead of hanging around the virtual spaceport, he flew out over the representation of the moon’s surface, racing above the plains and zooming through mountain passes, just…having fun.

As he was working his way back, he was startled to see a ship pop up from a canyon behind him and paint him with a targeting laser. “Bam! First kill for me, flyboy,” he heard a female voice say.

“Can’t kill me today, Stevie,” Vango replied. “We’re in beginner mode.”

“Sounds like quibbling,” she replied as she pulled up alongside.

“How’d you find me?” he asked, curious.

“From above. Got tired of flying around in circles when I saw you shoot off thisaway. Figured if we was gonna get put on report, we might as well do it together.”

“We’re not going to get put on report,” he replied. “They are watching us. They want to see who is going to think outside the box.”

“Well nobody ever accused me of doin’ too much thinkin’,” she said.

“That’s a crock and you know it, Stevie. You’re as smart as anyone. Why do you try to cover it up with that hick act?”

Her accent became an aristocratic drawl. “Wah Vango…a gentleman never asks such a question of a lady. Pahaps ah just want to be appreciated for mah body and not the brilliant mind you boys can’t keep your frontal lobes off of.”

Vango couldn’t help but laugh. “Anyone ever tell you you’ve got a funny way of looking at the world?”

She didn’t answer for a moment, and then she said in a pensive tone, “Not often enough, Vee. Not often enough.”

Outside the simulator pod Vango jumped, startled by a slap on his butt as he stood adjusting to reality. He turned to find Stevie there, with that turned-up nose and short blonde bob that barely came up to his chin. “Hey,” he said.

“Come on, flyboy. Let’s go get some chow. I’m starving.”

“Sure,” he replied, and let her lead the way toward the busy dining facility – or so he thought. At some point he realized she was taking him off the expected track, down unfamiliar corridors of the vast training base. “Where are we going?”

“Getting dinner. Real food.”

“What?” He had no idea what she was talking about. “Where else but the chow hall or the Officers’ Club is there?”

Stevie tsk-tsked. “You gotta live a little, Vee. Get out more. You been here for two weeks and I bet you never been anywhere but your cabin, the gym, the chow hall and class.”

“I went to the O Club last Friday,” he said defensively. “Had a beer and everything.”

“Ooh, a beer. Wild man.”

They rounded a corner to enter a sudden whirlwind of humanity, and not a bunch of uniforms, either. People of all shapes, sizes and colors of dress and outfitting mixed on what Vango first thought was a city street full of shops. After a moment, he realized that the high ceiling had been decorated with stars and a moon, augmented by some kind of fiber optic lighting to resemble a night sky, at least at first glance.

The buildings that lined the street were facades in a New Orleans style and neon signs flashed in windows, advertising food, drink, tattoos and other…services. LIQUOR IN THE FRONT, POKER IN THE REAR proclaimed one garish marquee, and other similar ones competed.

Vango lifted a hand to wave at a couple of classmates as they walked by. EarthFleet personnel were in some evidence, along with many civilians. Some of those also seemed to be patrons, but most looked like they were working here.

“My god,” he breathed. “Where did this come from?”

“Oh, come on. Every base has some kind of sleazy district to soak up the excess cash,” Stevie replied. “They call this the Earth Quarter, or just the Quarter.”

“Like the French Quarter in New Orleans. How did you find it?” he asked.

Stevie just laughed and clutched his arm. “Come on. Let’s get some real food.” She pulled him toward a restaurant at the main intersection corner and with a twenty-FleetCred bill soon secured them a table on the balcony. This allowed them an excellent view of the milling humanity enjoying the ambience.

“I had no idea anything like this was here. Isn’t this a military base?” Vango asked.

“Not this part. This is owned by General Services. You know, multinational contractors that build, maintain, provide services...”

“But…where do all these people come from?”

Stevie stared at him as if he had three heads. “What, your mama never told you how babies are made?” Then she relented. “Some are official, some are family of the civilians, some are people whose contracts ended but they decided to stay on. Some declared allegiance to EarthFleet and now don’t have countries to go back to. A few probably came out here specifically for this kind of…opportunity. Earth is a bit over-regulated nowadays for some folks’ tastes, what with the command economy and all. Did you know a lot of places back home now prohibit any businesses that don’t contribute to the war effort?”