MercSecure Training Facility. Classified Location.
Keva stepped out of the aeros and glanced up at the entrance to the sallyport. She’d spent most of her adult life at this place, honing her ability to wreak havoc, maim indiscriminately, kill with found objects, and to bend the fog of war to one’s advantage – all to better serve her company.
Flashbacks came – her arrival at the facility, the room they kept her in, the food they fed her. The isolation chamber. It wasn’t great at the time, but looking back always had a way of putting things into perspective for MercSecure’s top rep. It was looking forward that proved challenging to her.
The MercSecure Training Facility resembled an ultra-high security prison for the worst of the worst. The airspace above the place was a no-warning air defense zone; the entire establishment was surrounded by triple-layer chain link fences, enormous thickets of razor-wire entanglements, anti-vehicle bollards, dragon’s teeth, minefields, anti-tank ditches, and autonomous gun drones that the FedCorp military had not accepted for service because they were too aggressive and trigger-happy. B-drones appeared and scanned the two reps.
“Memories?” Rinchi asked, behind Keva.
Keva turned to find the Humandroid in a black knit dress that stopped just above her knees. It had taken two days, but she had completely recovered from the episode in Mexico.
“This is where they took me after … after they found me,” she said, recalling the brothel in Damascus. She’d killed everyone there that day – her captors, customers, girls her age and younger. It was her moment of entelechy; the moment when all that was weak and soft and pitying was forever burned from her soul; the moment when the lesser Keva was forged into the entity that she now was.
One of the B-drones stopped directly in front of her face. “We have an appointment,” she growled at the tiny drone.
The personnel blast door buzzed, clanked, and slid open just far enough to admit them one at a time to a featureless concrete box with an armored revolving door at the opposite end.
“Registered visitors,” Keva said instead of hello. “Representative One and Representative Two-One-Zero.”
“Greetings,” came a voice from nowhere. “Please be advised that you are now on sovereign MercSecure Territory; United States law does not apply. Any and all violations or infractions are subject to ExEx Corporate Justice; there is no appeal. Stand-by for biometrics scan, weapons check and identity verification. Please allow at least two meters distance between you; stand with feet shoulder width apart, arms out from your sides, hands open, fingers spread. Please remain in position until the scan is completed.”
A minute or so later the voice from nowhere directed Rinchi to standby until Keva cleared the revolving door, and then instructed the Humandroid to step through.
Two of the facility’s security staff greeted them. “Right this way,” one of them said. He was in a MercSecure field outfit, blue with milspec nanotube matrix body armor. “We’ll need to check for weapons first.”
They were led to a side door with a small viewing aperture of heavily leaded glass. The first escort’s retina scan unlocked the door, Keva and Rinchi stepped in and passed through a backscatter X-ray machine because the decades-old requirement had never been eliminated even when newer and more effective technology came on-line – and because MercSecure’s decades-old no-bid contract with Walliburton required at least one machine per facility, courtesy of the tax-payers.
Keva smiled inwardly; once again the scanner hadn’t picked up her boot knife crafted from the GVH3 glass fiber-filled composite. Always have something her instructors had repeatedly hammered into her; a hired gun is always armed.
The two security staff escorted them through a nondescript steel fire door into a short hallway lined with closely spaced steel security doors.
“Brings back memories,” Keva said under her breath.
Rinchi: What’s with the security doors?
Keva: They used to be isolation chambers. Now they’re just used for storage. The new isolation chambers are underground.
“From this point,” the second escort informed them, “iNet access is blocked.”
“That’s fine,” Keva told him. “Where will we be meeting her?”
He stopped and gave the top rep a serious stare. “You haven’t heard?”
“I’ve heard many things.”
“There was an incident involving Medya and one of the psychologists overseeing her training.”
“When did this incident occur?”
“This morning.” He cocked an eyebrow as Keva took Rinchi’s hand, but made no other comment.
“Is he dead?” Rinchi asked.
“Not quite; he’s in critical condition.”
“He should have been more careful; it’s not like it hasn’t happened before.” Keva recalled how she’d used a pencil to kill a psychologist of her own when she’d been in training.
The two escorts exchanged looks, but very wisely refrained from comment. Keva’s short fuse and unpredictable penchant for ultra-violence was well-known throughout the ranks of MercSecure.
Another non-descript fire door at the end of the hallway led into a lobby area furnished with high-end GSA catalog fixtures and furniture. Two training personnel in MercSecure field outfits were waiting for them. “Thank-you men, we’ll take it from here,” said the older of the two, who moved with an awkward and uncomfortable gait. This one was a recent clean cut and apparently not adapting well to the prostheses. Not everyone did; as a general rule the older you were, the more difficult the transition.
A single elevator door at the rear of the lobby was the only other exit. Keva noticed two gun drones disguised as potted pampas grass. “Those are new,” she remarked.
“And those are just the ones we want you to see,” remarked the first escort. The elevator door slid open, and the escorts gestured for Keva and Rinchi to enter. “Guests first, if you please.”
The elevator was a stainless steel box with no control buttons or floor markers, although easy listening industrial death metal reggae polka muzak was piped in for their ostensible enjoyment. The other escort smiled to himself and hummed along with Nuclear Ganja Rape Camp.
“Where’s she being held?” Keva asked as they began their descent.
“Isolation Six.”
“Number Six…” Her eyes lit up. “I remember that one! It’s one centimeter wider than the others. Luxurious!”
The cyborg gave what she chose to interpret as a funny look.
“Is there a problem?” she asked, baring her teeth. The thought of puncturing his lungs with the blade in her boot came to her. Violence was as much of an addiction as anything – sometimes Keva craved it.
“Not with me, ma’am,” was his bland reply.
Rinchi’s hand wrapped around Keva’s wrist. The tension drained away and Keva laughed. “I spent more time down here than I did up there.”
“Your record remains unbroken, Representative Number One. No other trainee has even come close without incurring execution as an incorrigible,” the cyborg said.
The elevator delivered them six stories underground to the Isolator Unit. It was, cold, sterile, and dimly lit; it was intended that those immured there feel the weight of the earth pressing down above them, that they know that they were truly isolated and abandoned.
“I feel like Odysseus returning home,” Keva said.
“His homecoming was less salubrious than it might have been, as I recall,” said the cyborg with a slight smile. “Do you find yours so as well?”
“Not so far, but it is still early.”
The door to Number Six was a smooth, featureless stainless steel panel. The elevator music enthusiast put his palm against it and the door became transparent. Medya in sat in trainee garb on a concrete bed platform. The smoothly finished concrete floor sloped slightly to a central floor drain; a stainless steel combination sink/toilet was the only other furnishing. He stepped to a retina scanner which confirmed his acce
ss authority, and an announcement in Demotic Arabic sounded in the cell.
“Face in the corner, hands behind your back, do not move until directed to do so.” Rinchi translated.
Keva grinned, “Mine was auf Deutsch.”
The cyborg said, “She claims to have difficulty with Basic English, although the Language Instructors think she’s shamming.”
He stepped to the retina scanner, which apparently liked what it saw as it unlocked the cell door.
“That’s new,” Keva said. “When I was down here, it only took one guy.” She squeezed Rinchi’s hand as the door buzzed and swung in.
“You have ten minutes,” the second man said, moving aside. He took his place next to the door, allowing the two reps to step into the cell. “Ten minutes.”
“Medya?” Keva said. “You can come out of the corner and sit with us.”
The girl remained in the corner. Her shaven head revealed a small indentation in her skull – a forget-me-not from a piece of flying metal, perhaps. The improved diet and exercise regime agreed with her; though still underweight, she no longer looked like a Konzentrationslager inmate.
Rinchi spoke in Arabic, “We are here to visit you, Medya. We are the two who brought you here. As you recall, I’m Rinchi and she’s Keva.”
Medya turned and glared at Rinchi. “I am aware of who you are,” she snapped.
“You don’t like it here?” the Humandroid asked, her eyes dilating as she scanned the thirteen-year-old girl.
“What are they doing to me?”
“They are turning you into a trained killer,” Rinchi said, “they are turning you into one of us, a representative.”
“What’s she saying?” Keva asked.
“She wants to know why she’s here…”
“Tell her this – tell her I went through the same thing, that I … that I was sent here from Damascus after spending most of my youth in a brothel. That I also … ” Keva’s face hardened. “That I also killed a doctor here and that the company forgave me, knowing that my services were what were most important. Tell her isolation is temporary.”
Medya locked eyes with Keva as Rinchi translated the message.
Keva said, “Tell her I know what it’s like; I was in this very same cell, Number Six. That she’ll get through it and when she gets out … ” She dropped in front of the Kurdish girl, face to face now. “You will have your revenge, and more. There will be an end to your journey soon enough. Learn all that they have to teach; become your own instrument of retribution. When you are done here, we will continue your education.”
Rinchi translated then asked, “We?”
“Yes,” she whispered, her passiourn evident. “Tell her we will train her to be more than both of us. She will be our ….”
“ … our daughter,” Rinchi finished.
“Exactly. I know we haven’t discussed this … ” Keva began.
“We haven’t,” said Rinchi, “but I don’t mind.”
“You know how I feel about you.”
“I know.”
“And once Medya has graduated, I will have MercSecure assign her to us. We can – together – steer her in the right direction.”
“The direction of a killer?”
“Call it what you will, but it is a profession. I’d like to pass my legacy on somehow,” Keva said. “Let’s not kid ourselves – I’m already more than clean cut. My life ends in violence and to me, the final fuck you to all of this will be to leave a representative who is better, stronger, faster, more fearsome and relentless than I am; one who will carry on my legacy.”
“I understand,” Rinchi nodded.
“You’ll survive,” Keva told the droid. “Unless they vaporize you, you’re almost immortal. I want to leave you someone ... something to remember me by. This thing, this person, will be Medya.”
“Our daughter.”
“Yes.”
“I understand,” Rinchi turned to the girl and translated Keva’s message, all except the daughter part. It was important for Medya to come to this realization on her own rather than be assigned a role in the future family of three mercenaries.
“This is why you must work hard while you are here,” Rinchi told her, “you must be strong and proud and patient; you must learn focus and control. Truly, your time will come, but that time is not yet. When you are ready, we will come for you, she and I – and then we will hunt.”
Medya sat in silence as she gnawed at her bottom lip.
“Work harder,” Rinchi told the girl. “Be the best. Learn English; learn everything they have to teach you. The risk and the danger is great, but the reward is greater.”
“Two minutes,” the first escort announced.
“Do you have any questions?” Rinchi asked.
Medya nodded, “When will you come back to visit me?”
Keva looked at Rinchi.
“She wants to know when we will come back to visit her.”
“After we get Meta, tell her.”
Rinchi shook her head. “She’s not cleared for that.”
Rinchi turned to Medya, “Keva and I have an assignment. Once we have completed our task, we will visit you then.”
“You and Keva both?”
“Yes.”
“And you are lovers?” Medya asked.
“Yes we are.”
“But you aren’t human.”
“Does it matter?”
“No,” Medya said, her expression softening, “as long as you come back.”
The End
Back of the Book Shit
Book One:
Reader,
Before you fall asleep, or go back to living your amazing life as a physics teacher/killer-for-hire,[1] or leave me a lackluster review due to Book One ending on a cliffhanger – let’s talk about Book One.
Book One was written in November 2011 in one month during a contest called Nanowrimo, in which an author challenges themselves to write a book in a month. I edited a copy and sent a print version to my brother, who hadn’t read any of my other work at the time but for some reason, decided to read this one, mostly due to the fact he liked sci-fi.
“That read like a real book,” was his first comment, which I didn’t know exactly how to take seeing as how I had written three books by this point.
Still, a compliment is a compliment and I took it. Book One was then buried under a pile of other works and other writing interests, including helping pen a failed TV series in Asia (goodbye six months of my life without pay, but I learned what not to do with your creative skills).
More about the book.
Meme’s voice is a combination of several literary styles I enjoy. The “talking to the audience” aspect of his speech is called meta-fiction, something many people frown upon. His hallucinatory passages were inspired by William S. Burroughs and Hunter S. Thompson with a dash of Philip K Dick and a sprinkle of Confederacy of Dunces. He is, for lack of another protagonist, our protagonist, and I wanted him to be funny and at the same time, a caricature of an addict. As you continue on with the series, you’ll see him go through the ups and downs of his problem, evident in the way he speaks.
I say ‘he’ because Meme writes himself. I literally put on some drum and bass music (I only listen to this while writing) and let this character take over. There are pages and pages of Meme rambles that I’ve discarded to form the overall structure of the series, giving some of him, but hopefully not enough to make a person feel insane themselves.
The term ‘Leaks’ used in this book to describe a pair of goggle-like glasses is straight from Kurt Vonnegut’s Breakfast of Champions. I use this term frequently in my series as I like the image it creates in my mind. There are many other borrowed words, the most prominent being ‘aeros’, which was borrowed from one of the first dystopian novels called We, which was published before 1984 and Brave New World.
Pollutes and pollution masks.
The idea for pollutes and pollution masks came from real life.
&n
bsp; In 2011, I moved to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia where I was subjected to the worst pollution in the world (at least during the winter). I wore an actual pollution mask daily, which inspired (or de-inspired?) me to populate my future world with ‘pollution masks’ that resembled plague masks. Looking out the window of my Soviet apartment and seeing pollution thick enough to theoretically box up and mail to your rich aunt greatly enhanced the insanity evident in Book One. Once you start Book Two, you will notice that the manic-ness has been replaced by action. Have no fear – Meme is alive and well throughout the series, my favorite scene being his encounter with a former Cuban rocker-cum government protestor in Book Four. Think: toxic snails and hallucinations.
Winding down.
In December 2012, possibly inspired by the fact the world didn’t end, I began writing Book Two while vacationing in Korea for a week and doing research for a book I’ve since published called Tokyo Stirs. I wrote about 7,000 words (a normal book in the series is 40-45k words), all of which were shit. I put it away to pursue other things, namely the writing and research for a book called Boy versus Self. I gave up again on the Life is a Beautiful Thing Series, yet continued to take notes on technology I could use in the pages as well as sketch out story outlines.
Fast forward two years. My god it is possible.
By the time December 2014 rolled around, I’d finished a number of books, none of which I’d published, and started a publishing company in Asia that exclusively produced ESL works. I was literally sitting on close to a million words worth of unpublished work.
I decided – after an emotional night of thinking ‘my god what am I doing with my life” triggered by seeing my first girlfriend get her doctorate in medicine and realizing I’d done essentially nothing – that I should probably start releasing books, rapidly.
I reread my copy of Life is a Beautiful Thing Book One and came to the conclusion that it needed to see the light of day, and that there needed to be more of it. Thus begun the journey that has led me into your hands.
I am a very fast writer. It is my craft and my obsession. The only thing that slows me down is wrist pain due to poor typing technique (which I’ve since addressed). That being said, this book wouldn’t be half as good if it weren’t for my amazing editor, George C. Hopkins and the best reader a writer could ever ask for, Kay from Scotland, who has an amazing eye for minute details. Thanks for helping me polish this (insert noun here).
Life is a Beautiful Thing (4-Book Box Set) Page 65