Warzone: Nemesis: A Novel of Mars (31 page)

“Here, let me have those,” Cowboy said, taking the pup’s items and placing the food and water dishes on the kitchenette floor, and the bed and toys in the small living room. He took his t-shirt off and placed it in her bed to help get them acquainted. Cowboy disappeared into his bedroom and grabbed another shirt. Returning, he motioned to the man to let the dog down to wander. The pup walked around, sniffing each item in the small living room. Satisfied by her inspection and soothed by soft music from the stereo, she settled down with one of her rubber chew toys.

Cowboy placed two salads on the table and motioned the captain to have a seat while he checked the oven to see if the baked potatoes were done. Not quite, he decided, and closed the oven door.

“How do you like your steak?”

“Medium rare.”

“Well, then, this one is done. I like mine to stop breathing first,” he chuckled. “Does the pup have a name?”

“I’ve been calling her Blaze.”

“Why?”

“My daddy owns a horse ranch. When there is a streak of white on the head of a horse, it’s called a
blaze
. With her being white all over, it suited her.”

“I see. Then Blaze she shall remain.”

Finally, the last steak was grilled to suit Cowboy. He arranged the steak and potatoes on the two plates, cut the third steak into pieces and placed it in Blaze’s food dish. He brought the bowl into the living room, and held it up for her inspection. She took an immediate interest.

“Come, Blaze.” She followed him to the kitchen, and submitted to being petted and talked to while she ate. Cowboy took it as a good sign, washed his hands in the sink and joined the captain. Dinner was a time of sharing news of both Mars and other posts, and sure enough—Blaze curled up on Cowboy’s shirt and fell asleep.

Captain Ripsnort finally arose to leave and looked evenly into Cowboy’s eyes. “Take care of “my dog”.”

“I certainly will. You are welcome to spend time with her every time you come through.”

“Thank you.” He took one last look at the sleeping bundle and went back to his guest quarters.

MAJOR NORSEMUN

The alarm clock gave its irritating report—its buzzing sound designed to rouse even the most resistant from slumber. Its horrible noise could be used to interrogate victims into revealing state secrets. Cowboy hit the snooze button, rolled over on his left side and buried his face into the pillow. His consciousness was slowing climbing the stairway from deep REM sleep to fully awake. He had purposely set his alarm clock to go off ten minutes earlier than he wished to get up, preferring a slow journey from the world of dreams to the world of reality. The second alarm intruded into his dream world. He hit the snooze again and quickened his pace up the staircase to consciousness. His eyelids opened to survey the clock’s time and gauge how much time sack time he had left. Three more minutes, he told himself, and closed his eyes and rolled over. The sleek and quiet figure climbed up into his bed and crawled to the head beside him. The white wolf-dog pup nuzzled and licked the man’s sleepy face, and he opened his eyes in wide-awake surprise. Recognition dawned upon him. He cradled Blaze into his arms, attempting to keep his wake-up routine. The alarm clock signaled its obnoxious sound for the third and final time.

Cowboy opened his eyes fully, and the pup licked his face again.

“Well good morning, Miss Blaze.” The pup wagged her tail and washed his face some more with her wet, pink tongue. “We definitely have to do something about your morning breath.” He picked her up in his arms, regarding the taste in his mouth, and realized he was the one with “doggy breath.” The man put the dog down, used the head, washed his face and brushed his teeth.
Ah, more like it
, he thought.

The pup followed her new master to the kitchen, where Cowboy was pleased to learn that she had hit the newspaper target he had laid out for her. He was going to have to find a solution for her
necessary breaks
before he ran out of newspapers since he was now a stack shorter than he expected. He made them both a breakfast of leftover fish and soy from his small fridge. A dog wasn’t allowed in the officer’s mess, and he hadn’t quite made arrangements for her yet.

He shaved, put on his uniform and picked the dog up to carry her first to COL SEAL’s office on the way to his own.

The pup was now in a different world, in a different pack, with a different master. She studied the others in the new pack and concluded that she was as special to this new master as she had been to CPT Ripsnort. The others showed deference to her new master. She carefully studied the sights and sounds about her new environment and the body language of every member of her new pack. Not only was this hunting area much larger than the one she had just left, but the pack was much larger.

PFC Gray Eagle rose and greeted the first officer with a salute. “The colonel is in.”

“Thank you, Private, as you were.”

Cowboy shifted his dog under his left arm and knocked on the oak door with his right hand.

“Come on in,” the smooth baritone voice from within called.

“Good morning, Colonel.”

“Good morning.” He smiled. “I see we have a VIP among us. I have never seen you carry anyone around the post before.”

Cowboy grinned ear-to-ear. “Yes, sir—and thank you for the time to get her adjusted.”

“She’s a beautiful pup. I guess now that you have a companion I won’t expect to see you desert us to go home and get married.”

“That was the idea. I am a career officer, and this is my post.”

“Good. She reminds me of one of my dogs back home, Betty.” The colonel looked thoughtful. “Do you remember the orientation film on the shuttle over here?”

“Sure.”

“Do you remember the way this whole secret arms race started?”

“Yes, the alien ship crashed on the Navajo Reservation, some kid found it.” Light dawned in Cowboy’s eyes. “Did you know that kid?”

“I
was
that kid.”

Cowboy straightened up abruptly and Blaze squirmed in his lap, and he tightened his grip. “You?”

“Yes, me. What was not known was that I found one of the aliens still alive and he spoke to me, presumably telepathically, before he died.”

“Incredible! What did he say?”

“Something about failing to do his duty and crying for his dead wife—as a military man, I understand the first part. I’ve had dreams about space ever since that day.”

“Do you find it curious that your journey came full circle and that you joined the service that your discovery helped to start?”

“I find it too coincidental to be by chance. When I was in Vietnam, COL Squid and I were approached by ASDC recruiters. I don’t know if they knew I had prior knowledge of the aliens, and then again, maybe they did. I learned just enough to know it had something to do with that spaceship that I had I found. I was hooked, and talked COL Squid into taking the position.” His face displayed a shadow of sadness and regret as if it were a floating object that he had held under water until he lost his grip on it, causing it to rise to the surface and bob atop the troubled waters tellingly. “I am the one responsible for him being here.”

“We’re warriors. Death could claim us anywhere: in the jungles of Vietnam, the barren Martian landscape, or on the plane back home.”

“You’re right, and his was a good death.”

The colonel’s aide brought the two men a cup of hot tea. Blaze calmed down a bit, and Cowboy was able to manage his cup. The wolf cub studied the body language of the two men. She learned, that though her new master was important, he was the beta wolf of this new pack, not the alpha. Never mind, he was important to the pack, and she was important to him. Though she had no words to articulate these thoughts, she knew and felt them as all animals know their place in the world.

Cowboy carried her to his office, which was between tactical operations and the hangar deck. His role on the post was to be the point man for his commander for all the departments, but especially these two. His usual job when he was not on maneuvers in the field was to be available for the heads of the other departments, do inspections, and keep up detailed reports to submit to his commander.

He arrived at his office and put the pup down beside his desk, so she could explore a bit. COL SEAL had granted Cowboy three days of exemption from patrol duty, to get the pup settled. He could have started as soon as the pup arrived, but he didn’t have the heart to tear her away from CPT Ripsnort. Normally being confined to post was akin to punishment, but this was a very kind gesture on his part. It was something Cowboy hadn’t expected from the colonel, and he appreciated it.

After catching up with all of the routine paperwork, Cowboy put his teapot on to boil for a cup of tea, and took the time to contemplate how he was going to have his dog cared for when he was on maneuvers. The hangar deck and tac ops did have some personnel who worked the night shift. Maybe one of them could care for Blaze in their off-duty time. It wouldn’t be a good permanent solution as off-duty personnel mainly just wanted to sleep. The teapot whistled its invitation to take a break. Setting the cup to steep, he pondered what to do. When his tea had finished steeping, he picked up the cup, inhaling the pleasing aroma of black currant, black pekoe and cinnamon. He sipped the hot liquid, slowly at first while he considered any and all possible answers. Still no good solution came to mind. If he had an aide it would be easy, but no executive officer in the ASDC had one.

It was not yet lunchtime, so he decided to take the pup on rounds with him. He skipped the hangar deck, as it was a loud and noisy place and may spook the pup. Tactical operations was a different story. Geeks liked quiet, and tac ops was geek territory. They were the brainy types that were more comfortable with cerebral endeavors, like literature and music while his pilots were more likely to pursue sports and more physical things in their off-time. He knew it was a generalization. CPT Cipher loved basketball and boxing while Cowboy painted and played the Navajo flute for enjoyment, when he wasn’t playing basketball or one of the other physical pursuits.

Of all of the tactical operations personnel, none fit the geek stereotype quite like MAJ Norsemun. When the major, then known as Erik, was seven years old, his mother told his father that their brilliantly gifted son could not seem to make connections with people. With an IQ over two hundred, his math skills astounded his teachers, even then. His mother pressed his father to buy him a dog, and he complied. The boy immediately fell in love with the border collie pup and named him Pi. He seemed to endure all the social awkwardness of his gift/disorder as long as Pi was waiting at home with his wagging tail. The unfairness of dogs aging seven years to the boy’s one caused him to succumb to old age by the time the Erik was ready for college. His gifts caused him to excel, and he became the youngest cryptanalyst the CIA ever had. But Washington was too busy with people, so when the offer to go to Mars came up, he gladly accepted. His life became ordered around numbers and facts, and he felt safe. His gift and disability was known by the company shrinks as Asperger’s Syndrome. He was the indispensable master of numbers at the post that kept all things statistical and mathematical in order and running smoothly.

Cowboy carried Blaze in his arms to tactical operations. The foot traffic in the corridors on the outside ring of the complex was too heavy to let her down. MAJ Norsemun was debugging a computer program, with his eyes fixed on the monitor. CPT Cipher was checking satellite data from a recent flyby, and two junior technicians were doing routine number crunching on Soviet fleet and arms strength.

MAJ Norsemun looked up and acknowledged the first officer’s presence, businesslike as usual. He and his staff rose and gave the customary salute, and when Cowboy returned the salute with an “as you were,” all but the major went back to what they were doing. The major wasn’t much for socializing. His unusual interests in puzzles and obscure literature and his inability to share the interests of others kept him from connecting with people. In social situations that weren’t work related he often got anxiety attacks. It was not that he lacked the desire to interact with people. He did. He just lacked the ability to “read” people in regards to their needs and perspectives, mostly because his narrow focus did not include being interested in them on a personal level. His inability to connect with people caused him frustration and sometimes anxiety attacks.

But here in tac ops, he was in charge, and in the structured work environment of the TOC, he adapted well and was high-functioning. Being in charge of tac ops, he developed a coping mechanism of being a stickler for process and strict adherence to the smallest detail. His team all knew of his issues, and though they found him a bit odd, the discipline of military life made it easier to keep business and interactions at the major’s comfort level.

The major’s eyes caught sight of the wriggling white bundle under the first officer’s arm. His eyes softened at the sight of her, opening a door to his heart that had been closed since Pi died.