The Requiem of Steel

by David Adams

  “Blue falcon?” She coughed. “Sir, it’s a euphemism for when officers are about. Means a Bravo-Foxtrot. BF. Buddy-fucker, sir.”

  “Right.” He gestured to the nurse to make the snap. “Well, I’d say that’s pretty accurate.”

  He waited, and then a nurse bought the image to him. There was inflammation of the appendix—and no sign of foreign bodies. Not that their machines could detect anyway. Although, to the Toralii, Human equipment would be laughably primitive.

  His doctor’s mind tugged at him. This could be something else. Some Toralii interference. Some twist. The Toralii had shot prisoners in front of their very eyes to prove a point. What interference could they do to her?

  “Prep her for surgery. We’re going to have to perform an appendectomy, and quickly, before it bursts and we lose her. There’s no time to do anything more.”

  He had to put his trust in Allah.

  Commander Iraj’s Office

  Later

  Commander Iraj did paperwork as he waited. Come war, flame and death, the military demanded its paperwork be done. Truth be told, it was a procrastination. A deliberate waiting.

  He was good at waiting. Many people were not, but he was. The time ticked away and he let it pass, signing reports and making himself busy. Waiting was all he could do for Sanders.

  Surgery was a difficult, risky business, but Saeed was the best doctor in the fleet. If anyone could do it, he could. With the hand of Allah guiding him, all things were possible.

  The chime to his small office sounded, and he put down his pen. An interruption would be welcome. “Come in.”

  A trio of marines in United States uniforms escorted a man he not only recognised, but desperately wanted to talk to. A despondent man. A broken, crushed man. A man who had let his short, neatly trimmed beard grow out to a scraggly mess. Commander Wolfe.

  “Good evening, Commander.” Iraj beckoned him in and politely put aside the meaningless reports.

  “Is it?” Wolfe waved his hand over his shoulder. “Dismissed, Marines.”

  When they were alone, Wolfe took a deep breath, seemingly struggling with some internal worry. He could guess what it was.

  “Commander Iraj, I would like to speak to you about matters of continuation. The Washington is, as per our agreement, being run by a skeleton crew while we continue the investigation. Lockwood is filling in for Cole, and—”

  “And you want to resign.” Iraj knew where the conversation was going. “And I’m here to tell you that it’s stupid and that you can’t. That the command staff of the Washington can’t lose two Captains in three months. That fleet resources are stretched to breaking point as it is, and that you coming to me like this is going to make you feel better but at the expense of the fleet, and all of humanity, so allow me to cut to the chase: no. Your application is rejected. Go back to work.”

  There was a brief pause, a moment where he thought Wolfe might fight him on this, then his shoulders straightened slightly. “Of course,” Wolfe said. “I understand.”

  “Good. Is there anything else?”

  “Yes,” said Wolfe. “There’s… the arrangements for the funeral of those lost at Qadeem. I was hoping that, in the spirit of things, it would be a multi-denominational service. Some Christian prayers, some readings from the book of Mormon, some secular words. And I selected a nasheed to play, too.” A nasheed. An Islamic a capella prayer. “I was hoping you could approve it.”

  That seemed reasonable. Wolfe, as a Mormon, would have little knowledge of what might be appropriate. “Okay,” he said.

  Wolfe fiddled with an old, scratched MP3 player for a moment, then Iraj heard a familiar noise through the tiny speakers. The sounds set the hairs on the back of his neck on end. Those words. Its distinctive opening. Saleelul sawarim nasheedul ubah…

  “No.” Iraj grimaced, wishing he could close his ears. “Switch it off. And hell, delete it, too.”

  Surprised, Wolfe did so. “Did I do something wrong? This was from the Beijing’s databanks.”

  It was difficult to explain. “I am particularly fond of nasheeds, but… not this one. This is ‘The Clashing of Swords.’ It is infamous for its use by Jihadists. Violent rapist warlords who, Insha’Allah, are now all dead.”

  Uncomfortable silence filled the room.

  “It’s catchy as hell, though.”

  “The words of the devil always are.” Iraj smiled. “The devil is not a horrible little red man with horns and a tail. He is beautiful. Because Lucifer is a fallen angel and he used to be God’s favourite. Why would his words be anything less than divine?”

  “I never really thought about it that way,” Wolfe said. “But I’m glad we agree that ISIS put the idiot into ideology.”

  “Of course, but it’s… at once more complicated and simpler than that.”

  Wolfe shuffled uncomfortably. “How so?”

  Iraj put down his pen. “I grew up in Iran. You grew up in Utah, yes? I’m guessing your exposure to Islam was little. Mostly through the media or your studies.”

  “That’s right.”

  “You look at the Islamic people and see only the beauty in them. I see both sides; I see the joys, the common people trying to make a living, doing all they can according to their beliefs their book, their sense of righteousness, but I also see the darkness, too. Extremism. Nationalism. Tribalism. The forces that pit Muslim against Muslim.”

  Wolfe inclined his head. “Europe has seen plenty of war.”

  “Of course. Europe was united by two World Wars… Europeans saw total war, carpet bombing and gas and all of the majesty and terror of it shook them. We never had that. For the Middle East, every day was war, but always low-key. Always tribal, regional, sectarian. Sunni versus Shia, Shia versus Sunni, squabbling over and over, with no clear winner. Until the Toralii scoured the whole region when they burned Earth.”

  “You sound like you’re almost glad they did.”

  How could he explain it? Iraj folded his hands in front of him. “May I tell you a story, Commander?”

  “Of course.”

  “There was a man. I will not speak his name, because he was an evil man. A real person, flesh and bone. This man was born in Birmingham, England. A British citizen all his life. He was white, raised in wealth and peace in a rich, western nation. He grew up with computers, the Internet, playing in the street… his own mother said, as a child, he was a shy, gentle boy. A good boy.

  “But that shy, gentle boy read the Koran, changed his name, left that world of peace and prosperity and went to Africa in 2011, to join al-Shabaab in Somalia. He torched schools and beheaded Christians. The people there, his victims, called him the White Beast because of his viciousness and ruthlessness on the battlefield… battlefields like a Westgate shopping centre, where he helped kill sixty innocent people, hacking them to pieces with a machete. At some point, he married a thirteen-year-old girl, whom he bartered from her family in exchange for a cow.

  “Naturally, as one lives by the sword, one dies by the sword. The evil man was killed in a failed, pre-dawn raid on a Kenyan army base. He was second in command and the cameraman for his unit. Al-Shabab filmed most of their assaults for propaganda purposes, and it was his turn. His death was recorded.

  “The camera, which was strapped to his body, shows him firing his rifle in the dark, sparks from the dirty, old ammunition flying everywhere, he and his men screaming the takbir, the call to faith. Allah akbar! Allah akbar! Over and over they said it, with such passion and enthusiasm.

  “Then the White Beast caught a round in the chest. The camera kept rolling as he fell to the dirt. He prayed, weeping, writhing in agony, and calling for Allah to save him. I heard the choking, the low groaning as his lungs filled with his own blood. Whining. Gasping. He lay there as the sun rose and colour came into the world, his camera still running, dutifully recording his misery. Finally, an APC drove over his head, and it burst. Bits of his skull and brain went everywhere; chunks of the pink flesh fell in the dust.
Then the APC backed over him again. The camera kept rolling. The sun came up. Flies descended on the chunks of meat, still in full view of the camera, his rifle on the edge of the frame. The Kenyan militia casually walked around, shooting the dying survivors. The sun climbed high, and another day came, and that man’s body was left to rot and bloat in the Kenyan heat. Eventually, his camera ran out of power.

  “I remember seeing a picture of the White Beast, in his early twenties, before he left. He was a clean young man, handsome, smiling an awkward, but happy, smile. He wore jeans. A T-shirt. On his lap, he had a kitten. A cute little cat, tortoiseshell and adorable, pawing at his chest, and he was patting it. And oh, his smile!

  “This could have been any normal young man. There was no palpable aura of evil about him. No darkness clinging to the edges of the picture. Just an ordinary person with a cute cat, just like any one of the millions on the Internet.

  “What poison was pumped into his head? This was no marginalised, uneducated youth from a backwater shithole. This was a white British man who was given every opportunity in life, the chance to be educated and employed, to do any kind of good he wanted. Instead, he chose to live a life of darkness and sin.

  “When she heard the news, his own mother was happy her son was dead and that he was certainly burning in hell. Can you imagine being that woman? Being relieved and devastated all at the same time. Your child was dead, but his death meant he could no longer harm innocents. No longer terrorise, rape, and enslave. The strangest thing about it, however, was seeing an interview conducted with his wife, his child bride, traded for a cow when she was thirteen.

  “She said she was happy her husband died a martyr fighting for what he believed in.” Iraj, in the quiet of his office, kept his voice barely above a whisper. “Glad. Glad her rapist ‘husband’ was dead, I could imagine. Glad she was free—of a sort—I could understand. But glad that this terrible person had gone to a higher power as just reward for his butchery? Such things are beyond me.”

  Wolfe, after a moment’s pause, shook his head. “And I, as well. Honestly, I can’t see it. But… why are you telling me this?”

  “Because,” Iraj said, “Islam has a darkness to it. I say this with no more bitterness than a Christian acknowledging the sins of the church against gays, or an Atheist speaking of Stalin’s murders. I am not trying to say: not all Muslims are like that. Because everyone knows that. Instead, I am trying to say I cannot imagine you had anything to do with Anderson’s actions. Simply because you are both American, that does not make you guilty. A nation, a religion, a race are not a bloc to be labelled. We must move forward.”

  “How can we do that, after what has happened?”

  “We continue to be Christians, Jews, Muslims, Mormons, and Atheists, and we work together, even when we don’t want to. But the blade of tolerance cuts both ways. We must acknowledge the darkness in our own groups, our own identities, with the aim of moving forward and away from it, into the light. Many in the West struggle with this: they want to divide the world into easy black-and-white categories. White men are evil; black women are good. Muslims are oppressed. Christians are not. Reality resists such clumsy oversimplifications. We must judge individuals by their character, not by what they are but who they are.” Iraj shrugged. “Or we will not survive.”

  “On that point,” Wolfe said, “we totally agree. It’s time everyone in the fleet took on that attitude.”

  It was difficult to be anything other than cloudy and grim in the light of their previous discussion. He wanted to smile. He really did. But the realities of their situation weighed on him. Iraj prayed five times a day in the direction of Mecca, though its direction was a difficult thing to assess on another world in another solar system, but Mecca itself was a smoking crater. Nothing remained. The Koran, Al-Baqarah, 2:149 commanded Muslims to Turn then thy face towards the Sacred Mosque: wherever ye are, turn your faces towards it…

  How could he do that when the mosque itself kept moving?

  It was not a problem without precedent. The qibla, the direction in which Muslims were commanded to pray, was a contentious issue that essentially boiled down to the following question: pray in the compass direction to Mecca or the shortest route? Should a Muslim in Alaska pray towards the west or almost directly north?

  The answer was: it didn’t matter. Prayer was not intended to be a gymnastic or mathematical exercise, but a mark of respect. Muslims were expected to focus on the prayers themselves, not their technicalities.

  “Maybe it's time,” Saeed said, almost to himself, “to leave Earthly religions on Earth.”

  Squinting, Wolfe leaned forward. “Pardon, Commander? I missed that.”

  Saeed smiled. “Nothing. Make the funeral arrangements. As for the nasheed, I suggest Dust is My Bed. An appropriate funeral song, especially given the climate of Qadeem.”

  “Right, I’ll let you know if I have any further questions.”

  “Of course,” Saeed said, then he let Wolfe go.

  When he was alone, he checked his messages. Sanders was out of surgery. Iraj touched the radio on his breast. “Dr. Saeed, how’s our patient?”

  “Doing well. She’s resting now.”

  Welcome news. “What did you find?”

  “Nothing,” Dr. Saeed said. “My medical staff found nothing. No bombs, no poisons, no spying implements. We X-rayed and examined and scanned Warrant Officer Sanders with every sensor at our disposal, but the only thing they had found was exactly what I had predicted: an inflamed appendix, which we removed before it could kill its owner.”

  Although it should have been a relief, Saeed found it difficult to believe that the Toralii Alliance had returned Sanders for entirely charitable reasons, but he accepted that, perhaps, there was more to it than he knew, more than he could knew. Allah’s eyes had been upon them, and Iraj had acted as the hand of Allah’s will. It felt good to trust his instincts and to save a life.

  “Good to hear,” Iraj said. “I’ll expect your full debrief within the day. Iraj out.”

  One prisoner returned. Thirty-something to go. It was something.

  His radio crackled. “Commander Iraj, it’s Jiang.” Something in her voice stole that little scrap of relief.

  “I’m here. Report, Commander.”

  “The Knight has returned,” Jiang said, her tone grave. “They are requesting docking and medical assistance.”

  “Did they—”

  “One Broadsword escaped. Colonel Decker-Sheng was with them, along with a dozen or so of the prisoners. Unfortunately, they…report that the second Broadsword, Warsong, was heavily damaged before they jumped out. Possibly destroyed. It has not returned. Captain Liao was aboard.”

  Pedarsag.

  “Ask Sabeen to come aboard and give me a full debrief,” he said, gently putting the cap back on his pen. “I’ll see her immediately.”

  “Aye aye,” Jiang said then closed the channel.

  Infirmary

  Meanwhile

  Dr. Saeed entered the engineering bays, which had always been Summer Rowe’s haunts; she was possessive about them, insisting on controlling their contents, as though they were her little playground built into the hull of the ship. Especially Bay Four. That one, for reasons that were unclear to him, was her favourite. Rowe’s hovel, as he called it, had seemingly become a lot more crowded since the previous day.

  A faint blue light bathed the room in strange hues and harsh shadows. The floor was covered in networking cables, the thin threads a spiderweb stretched out along the floor, the centre of the mess a huge hexagonal prism. Power outlets in the walls ran sporadic, untied power lines to the device at the centre, and the faint hum of high-voltage power reverberated in his ears. His nose tingled at the lingering smell of sweat and decay. At the middle of this mess was the woman herself, her hair spilling down her shoulders, unbrushed and unwashed. Her clothes were the same ones she’d been wearing the last time he’d seen her, days ago.

  “How are you doing, Summe
r?” Saeed cast a critical eye around the room, at the empty plastic bottles and discarded MRE packets. “Taking care of yourself?”

  “’Course,” Rowe said, hunched over a laptop, eyes focused on it intently. “Doing great. Pretty busy. Working on a thing. Whatcha want?”

  “I’m just checking in on you.” He gingerly stepped over a massive nest of cables, tip-toeing towards nearer towards her, until he found a bare spot where he could stand. “Like I said I would.”

  “Like you insisted.” Her fingers flew over the keyboard in a blur. “Like you demanded. Like a tyrant. A big ol’, mean ol’ tyrant.”

  “You’re still healing,” Saeed said. “The brain is just another part of the body. Yours was damaged. It’s recovering, yes, but you can’t push yourself too hard. Not yet. Your healing isn’t yet complete.” He kept his voice quiet, soft, to drive home his point. “You need time.”

  “I feel fine.” Rowe slapped closed the laptop lid and finally turned to face him properly. “I haven’t gone to sleep—I mean, passed out—in ages. Not like I used to. Not for like, a month.” She clicked her tongue in a manner he found entirely unconvincing. “Like I said, I’m fine now. You gotta relax.”

  “That remains to be seen.” Saeed paused, trying not to think about what the truth might well be. “How long has it been since you slept?”

  Rowe grunted, her eyes flicking away from his. “What time is it?”

  “Half past ten. In the morning.”

  “So about, oh, about fifteen hours.”

  Oh, Summer. Saeed grimaced. “I lied. It’s four a.m.”

  Rowe waved her arms around wildly. “Then I lied, too!”

  He put his hands on his hips. “Mmm. Shouting and waving your arms like a lunatic is definitely the best way to convince me that you’re not overstressing your brain.”

  With visible effort, she calmed herself, taking two deep breaths as he had trained her to do. “I’m fine.”

  Saeed affixed a firm stare on her then, with a sigh, shook his head. “What are you working on?”