The Crystal Variation (6 page)

What they did not wear were masks—thus baring the all-too-silly tattoos that were becoming the rage—and making each as identifiable in the long run as if they’d shouted out name, rank, birth creche, and gene units . . .

For in fact, every one of the new keepers were of the accelerated, the vat-born, the selected, the so-called “X Strain”—able to work harder and longer on less food than even the efficient Ms. Too, they had for the most part had similar training, similar instructors, similar lives. They spoke amongst themselves a truncated and canted artificial dialect, and appeared to lump any soldier but those of the latest vat runs into a social class of lesser outsiders.

Despite the disdain, and the tendency to seek only the company of their own kind, what had so far eluded the designers of soldiers was the sought-after interchangeability that would have made them—the Y Strains and the X—in the image of some committee-envisioned super-fighter: Physically perfect, identical, and above all amenable to command. It was the downfall of the M Series, so he had heard it said—they were too independent, too individual, much too prone to use their own judgement. And much too often, Jela might have added—right.

So, he found himself in the care of the proud yet still-flawed X Strains, and he’d been annoyed in the night to wake as some one of the guardians attempted to enter the room without disturbing him: They were all of the blood, dammit! Would he have assumed them so lax . . . well, yes. He might have.

“You of Versten’s Flight have no regard for the sleep of your brethren, eh?” He called out in the assumed dark of the infirmary’s night. His reward was a not unexpected flash of light as the woman with a red lance crossing a blue blade tattooed on her right cheek reacted, alas, predictably.

“Wingleader,” she gasped.

He’d
startled
her—and if he’d been of a mind he might just as easily have killed her—been though the transparent enclosure and had his hands around her throat before she’d known he was awake.

“Wingleader,” she said again, recovering her voice, if not her dignity. “The monitors must be checked manually from time to time, and the calibrations . . .”

“The calibrations may be made just as conveniently from a remote station,” he said, allowing his voice to display an edge. “It would be well if these things were done during ship’s day, for who knows what one who has been abandoned on a near lifeless world might do in the midst of being startled awake?”

“Wingleader, I . . .”

“Enough. Calibrate. I will sleep again tonight, and some of tomorrow day as well . . .”

Which was unlikely, so he owned to himself, but minor, as he was no longer entirely on ship schedule.

This was an oddity he considered too minor to concern med techs of any ilk, though interesting to himself. It seemed he was keeping two clocks now. One was the ordinary ship-clock any space traveler became accustomed to. The other . . . the other was the daily cycle of the planet he’d been stranded on, though he’d kept planet-time for so few days he might still be expected to be in transition-timing.

The X Strain tech finished a half-hearted tour of the sensors, used her light to peer inside his cubicle and satisfy herself that he was not green and leafy, and that the tree was. She left then, without a word to him, leaving him wakeful.

And that, too, might have been her purpose.

Jela crossed his arms over his head, his thoughts on the planet of the trees, its sea, and other things he could not possibly remember from the place. No doubt he’d been very close to total exhaustion and on the verge of dementia when he’d been picked up. Perhaps the techs were right to be concerned, after all.

Because he was a pilot, and an M, with all that Series’ dislike of being idle, he began to calculate. He checked his new sense of time against the trip back to the mother-ship, knowing that the breeze would about right
now
have been shifting to come at his face if he stood on the hill over the empty sea.

That established, he calculated the entirety of his journey to his best recall—brief time outbound, to taking on the enemy vessel, to near automatic charting of course to the nearby planet, to the landing . . . likely he spiked this or that spy-sensor as he recalled the grueling and pitiless flight through that eventually life-saving atmosphere—and then the walk. He recalled the walk vividly, recalled the valleys, treasured the long trip the trees had undertaken from the side of a mountain to the ocean so far away . . .

And that thought he put quickly away, tagging it mentally as a mention-to-none, a category that by now seemed to include half of his thoughts in any case.

Jela consulted the other clock in his head, saw that it would soon be time for his breakfast, and rose to do stretching exercises. When the techs entered, en masse as they did at the beginning of each of his days, he’d be good for a full schedule of work, sleepless half-night or not.

The combat warning came before breakfast, and the transition warning overlaid it almost instantly. Neither his bunk nor his chair were attached to the deck within his isolation unit—nor was the tree secured. His orders were clear—he was to observe the tree until released to general duties.

Jela yanked his bunk against the wall of the wider room, ignoring the ripples in the flex-glass, and pushed the tree, still within its own cocoon and attached to its various umbilicals, into the corner thus made. Flinging himself against the bunk he hugged the tree’s base through the flexible walls, internal clock counting the beats until—

“Go, dammit! Go!”

His voice rippled the flex-glass walls, and that was all the effect it had. The ship shuddered with the familiar shrug of launching fighters . . . but no stand down from the transition warning followed. He did the calcs out of habit, assuming a nearby threat in the line of travel—why else launch now?

There was another kind of shudder in the ship now—this one less familiar. Perhaps a jettisoning of mines, or an unusual application of control jets?

Maneuvering
was
starting. The direction of
up
shifted slightly, and then again, and as if it hadn’t already sounded, the transition buzzer went off again.

He ought to be with his wing! His duty—

He took a breath, and another, and did what he could to relax. Around him, the ship went absolutely still as it slipped into transition. He wondered, then, and with an effort, how long breakfast would be delayed, and how many pilots they’d left behind so that breakfast was an issue.

BREAKFAST FAILED TO arrive
, and it was nearing time for lunch. Jela remained close to the tree, concerned that any moment might bring them into normal space with unwanted, deadly, motion. He was
still
sitting beside the tree when the commander arrived, four hurried helpers in tow.

“Take your samples, quickly,” she ordered. She half-bowed, half-saluted Jela, who rose as quickly as he could.

“Wingleader, the medical department has been advised that they are no longer concerned with the possibility that you have become infected by contact with your tree. As they assure me you show no signs of physical abnormalities, other than those any M grade soldier might show at this point in his career, we shall shortly have an opportunity to discuss the matter I spoke of earlier. Please, Wingleader, prepare your computer for removal as well.”

Jela went to the desk and snapped the unit together, watching with some relief as the technicians inserted a hosed connection to the outer lock of his chamber. In a few moments, the structure sagged around him and the outer flex-glass rippled as the technicians peeled apart the seal. A moment later and the inner seal sighed open and two technicians strode in, heading toward the tree. Only one was face-marked.

“The tree? I may take that with me?” he asked the nearest tech—the unmarked one—but was rewarded only with a half-formed shrug. He risked annoying the officer, whose attention was focused on a medical reader connected to the room’s telemetry.

“Commander? The tree—I will take the tree with me as well, I assume?”

She didn’t look up from her study of the reader, her answer heavy with irony. “Yes—the tree, the computer, your boots—whatever will make you comfortable, Wingleader!”

He nearly laughed; then wondered if he’d really put up that much of a fuss when they’d told him to leave his boots outside the isolation area. Yet, as a soldier and a pilot, he deserved certain politeness, and he was as aware as they that his treatment had misused his station.

The commander was quick.

“You, Corporal. You will carry this computer, and walk with us to the Officer’s Mess. You, Wingleader, may help the other tech as you will, or carry the tree if you prefer, and we shall together retire to the mess so that you may be fed.”

In the end, Jela carried the tree, while one of the techs carried his boots and his computer; they made a strange procession through a ship unnaturally quiet, and it had taken a moment or two of confusion to see everything placed when they arrived at the mess. At last, the techs were sent on their way, and the Commander preceded him through the lunch line—open early, apparently for their convenience.

“So, Wingleader Jela, we have arrived at a place I’d hoped not to arrive at.”

He looked up from his meal, startled, and she smiled a mirthless smile.

“No, it is not that I dislike the food onboard ship, as rumor might imply! Rather it is that our hand is forced—
my
hand is forced—and all of this ripples things set in motion long before either of us took our first breath.”

Jela thought for a moment, waited until he was sure an answer was required.

“This is always the case with soldiers,” he said carefully. “From the colors of our flags and uniforms to the names of our units to the choice of worlds we must defend, none of it is beyond the influence of what went before us. It is a matter of soldierlore that we often die for the mistakes made generations before.”

She was eating as if she, too, had been denied breakfast, but Jela saw that his remark had sparked something, for she put her fruit down and took a sip of her water, while raising a hand to emphasize . . .

“Which is the problem I deal with,” she said, moving her hand almost as if she wanted to break into hand-talk; Jela followed her fingers for a moment, but she resisted or else failed to find the appropriate signs.

“You will not quote me to any on board this ship, Wingleader, but we have only a few days to prepare you. First, I must ask if you have made any plans for your retirement?”

He nearly choked, hastily swallowed bread in mid-chew.

“Commander, no, I have not,” he admitted, stealing a hurried sip of juice. “I’ve always thought I would die on duty, else on penalty of some infraction . . .”

“Indeed? Then you have paid no attention to the information from the bursar’s office about time due and funds due, of the rewards of taking up a farm?”

He looked at her straight on, and then allowed his eyes to roll.

“Commander, there’s not much retirement allotted for an M. True, true, some of us have retired—I’ve heard of three, I think, but it’s not something I admire. I just spent several days too many watching a star set on a desert world—a sight I’m assured is restful and worth seeking!—and found it far from restful. I fret when I’m not busy. You’ve seen my record! When I’m idle I am as much an enemy of the corps as any . . .”

“No, Wingleader, I will not permit that statement. The truth is that you are what you say. You know you are an M; you would rather march in circles for days in payment for having had your fun than sit staring at a wall doing absolutely nothing, and often you are better informed than your commanders, for you sleep very little and begrudge it besides.”

She paused, sipped her water, went on.

“Still, there is in your record the information that you’ve taken your leaves on quite a few worlds, you’ve managed to survive in situations that killed your creche mates, and you’re a very quick study. More, when you have been in command situations, you’ve done well until faced with dealing with the—let us call it
the weight
—of decisions made above your head.”

Jela permitted himself a hand signal of acknowledgment, to go along with a sigh.

“I have very much been a soldier, Commander. Alas, some ‘above my head’ have been raised to different rules and understandings about soldiers, duty, and necessity.”

“A soldier’s truth, plainly put.” This time her hand did signal agreement; it was as he had supposed—whatever other training or duties she’d had, the commander was a pilot.

She paused, pushed her plate away from her as if it were a distraction, and leaned toward him, speaking quietly.

“Wingleader, I have for you some choices. There
are
times in a soldier’s life when choice is available, there
are
times when it is preferable. So here, listen up, are some choices. Alas—you have no time but the time we sit at this table to make up your mind. I will not say that I do not
care
which choice you make, but I expect you will know.”

Jela listened, swore he could hear the sound of a leaf, rattling in the breeze. Indeed, there was a breeze now—the ventilators were running at some speed, having come up unnoticed during their conversation.

“First, you may remain Wingleader of your small squadron. It is likely to be reassigned, given that the duties of this vessel are soon to change, but it is a respectable position, in which you would do well, to the benefit of the troop.”

His hand-signaled acknowledgment—
information received in clear form
.

“Next, rather than remain as Wingleader, you may accept assignment to another squadron as a pilot. This choice I suggest in case you expect the duties of Wingleader might wear on you over time. You would be placed in the available pilot pool and we would have no way to know what or where you might be assigned, but you would have no responsibilities but those of a pilot, which are known to you and, I think, not overwhelming.”

“Finally, you may take a long-term temporary assignment delivering a very nearly surplus vessel to a long-term storage area, with appropriate adjustment of rank. You would oversee the delivery crew and be responsible for seeing the vessel properly shut down in case it must be redeployed. You would also assist in assessing local unit response readiness, from a pilot’s viewpoint, in areas you travel through, to and from. In order to facilitate this, you would undergo a short, specialized, dangerous, and highly confidential training. It will not be an easy assignment.”