This Is How You Die

by Matthew Bennardo

  Manisha looked around at the mall’s palace-like interior. You could barely hear the commotion outside. Just the faintest hum of the unending symphony of car alarms and police sirens carried over the echoing Muzak. It was like a shrine, specifically designed to help people ignore the world just outside. This was where people came to buy overpriced foreign goods, double their already marked-up price, since they were imported. It was where people came to see the latest Bollywood movies while sitting in leather love seats. Where they tried on dresses that cost more than Manisha’s apartment.

  The machine sat deep inside an otherwise empty storefront. There wasn’t even a sign above the door. This guy knew he wasn’t going to be around for long and just wanted to make as much money off the machine as he could before the rioters forced him to shut it down. A guard sat sleepily on an overturned bucket next to the door leaning on his rifle, blissfully unaware that the guards outside were having a much rougher day than he. A line of about ten people led up to the machine.

  Manisha joined the queue, standing behind a girl who couldn’t have been more than twelve. Slowly but surely, they both inched closer to the machine. A parade of faces passed by, with expressions ranging from sullen to dazed, their eyes leading down to a pair of trembling hands clutching their forbidden fruit, those small white cards that sealed their fate.

  The young girl soon reached the front of the line. She dug into her tiny pocketbook and pulled out the necessary twenty-five hundred rupees. Silently, she placed her finger into the front of the machine. The machine whirred and grinded, then spat out yet another card.

  The girl’s face scrunched up as she read the card a few times to herself. She then read it aloud, to no one in particular.

  “Water.” The girl’s face started to turn red. Tears began to well up. “What does that mean?” she demanded. The attendant tried to shoo her away, but Manisha couldn’t help but feel for the girl. She jumped between the two of them and went right into work mode.

  “I don’t have the numbers on me,” Manisha explained, “but ‘water’ leans heavily toward drowning with a bit of slipping. It’s notoriously hard to predict, though; it does end up being water poisoning and water intoxication sometimes.”

  She looked up at the attendant, who was trying to move the line along. He clearly wanted to get through as many customers as he could while he was still in business. “I work for the company that analyzes these things,” she explained. The attendant didn’t seem to care.

  “I’m supposed to go to Goa with my grandma next week,” the little girl told her.

  “No!” Manisha snapped at the frightened girl as she grabbed her by the shoulders. Manisha stopped in her tracks as the little girl ran away crying.

  Stay away from the beach, she had been about to say. Avoid the lake. Stay out of the rain. Don’t go into the shower alone. The material she was about to cover didn’t come from her training manual. It came from her mother.

  “Next up,” the attendant hollered.

  This is what this knowledge does to people, Manisha thought. I haven’t even taken the test yet, and I’ve already become my mother.

  The impatient attendant demanded she either pay for her turn or step out of line. The guard had found his way off the bucket, slung the rifle over his shoulder, and started to lazily wander over to the front of the line to see what the commotion was. Manisha rustled through her purse and handed over almost everything she had. She put her finger in the slot. The machine did its humming and whirring.

  It was bad enough waiting for her own card. Manisha wondered how much worse this would feel if the life of someone she loved were in the balance. If this is what’s been running through my mother’s head for twenty-two years, it’s no wonder she’s gone crazy.

  She felt the prick of the needle on her skin. It was like a mosquito bite.

  The fear and uncertainty were as real in Manisha’s mind as they surely were in her mother’s. Is hinging your fate on what a piece of card stock tells you really any less silly than trusting a system that’s thousands of years old?

  With its final whir and click, the machine deposited the small white card into the tray.

  It stayed there.

  Manisha closed her eyes. She felt it. Not the mist from her white-water-rafting trip; that was just a memory. She felt what she really wanted to feel. She felt free. She was already living her own life. Not the one her mother had chosen, and not the one this white card was about to present to her.

  “I don’t need to know,” Manisha announced to no one in particular. She walked away from the machine without ever touching the card.

  The sound of the car alarms and sirens came back into focus as she wandered out the door, back into the sunlight, and back into the fray.

  I’m going to go home and get some sleep, Manisha thought. No, sleep can wait. I’m going to have lunch with my mom.

  * * *

  Story by Ryan Estrada

  Illustration by Ben McSweeney

  ZEPHYR

  “COME ON, YOU APES! You wanna live forever?!” yelled Company Sergeant Hurley [HEART ATTACK 28-Apr-2179 04:45.hrs ^.13] above the sudden roar of our navy troop transport dropping into atmo above the enemy’s planet.

  His exuberance was answered with amused silence. Tough to tell through armor, but I think Hurley became a little embarrassed. Choosing to “live forever” or not might have been motivating back in the Invincibles Battalion, but not so much here in the Ephemerals. If he didn’t outrank me, and if there weren’t fifty other soldiers watching, I would have told him to shut his trap.

  The skids of the Rhino hit dirt, and a shudder went through the bulkheads to our seats. Our thick powered armor rattled against one another, our bodies tightly encapsulated, only our organs jostling inside. Sergeant Hurley jumped to his feet and smacked the release pad. The hatch slammed down, and the bay filled with the zips and crackle of incoming fire.

  The Rhino’s top cannon answered with a roar. Hurley pointed at me. “Platoon Sergeant Barrows, get your troops up and follow me!” He sprinted through the hatch and stood tall in the open, returning fire while waving us forward.

  Flipping a switch on my armor’s forearm activated the Platoon Communication link. “By squads, disembark,” I ordered over the PlatCom. “Defensive perimeter up fast!”

  My platoon bundled out quickly and spread out. I was last. The hatch closed behind me and the Rhino lifted off, rumbling along our flank to light up the enemy with its cannons. I headed for a nice thick wall, but halfway there I spotted Sergeant Hurley standing on the edge of a culvert, calmly shooting.

  With a curse, I veered from my wall, waited for an opening, and crossed twenty meters in a terrifying dash, tackling Hurley into the ditch.

  From underneath, Hurley clanged a fist on my shoulderplate. “Get the hell off me,” he barked.

  “Yes, Sergeant.” I rolled over while keeping as low as possible.

  Hurley sat up. “You want to explain your—”

  I slammed him back on the ground as bullets whizzed where his head had been. “Don’t give them a target!”

  Hurley struggled under my arm. “Sergeant Barrows, we’ve got to destroy that anti-spacecraft battery so the cruisers can enter orbit and—”

  I cut him off. “You can’t destroy anything if you’re dead.” I released him when I felt him quit resisting. “You crossed the zero threshold, and now you’re on your curve. You’re not an Invincible anymore.”

  The Vanguard Regiment had just the two battalions. Hurley was a new company sergeant in our Ephemerals, freshly transferred from the Invincibles the day before. It was his first drop mission since his curve start date, and he had to learn that the bravado of an Invincible could—if left unchecked—get us all killed before our predicted times of death. Only Corporal Moeller [GUNFIRE 15-May-2177 16:33.hrs ^.87] was scheduled to die on this mission.

  I’ve developed a knack for reading body language through powered armor, and I could basically see Hurley roll his ey
es. “My time of death is four years from now.”

  “No. A TOD in four years just means that’s when your percentage curve hits a hundred percent.”

  “But it just started. So my odds of dying are tiny—”

  “Your baseline odds are tiny. But you’re in the middle of a firefight. Your chances are spiking high.”

  Now I read exasperation as Hurley sat up again. “Chances of what? The Death Machine said ‘heart attack’ for me, not a bullet. I just had a physical, so—”

  I smacked him back down. “Everyone knows DM predictions are screwy. If the enemy shoots at your chest, wouldn’t that count as an attack on your heart?”

  For a moment, he just stared at me. “Right,” he said gruffly.

  The PlatCom chimed before I could drive home the point further. My squad leaders reported that they were in position. Hurley slowly lifted his head dangerously high out of the culvert to view the battle.

  I couldn’t imagine what he was going through. He’d done four tours in Vanguard Regiment, the navy’s elite and unique special ops unit, and all of it in the First Invincibles Battalion. That’s forty years of going into battle knowing you’d stay alive.

  All humanity could learn how they were going to die, but the navy had secretly developed a way to derive a time frame of sorts, using a powerful quantum computer array. It wasn’t definitive; they could only accurately predict the first moment in someone’s life when the odds of dying were greater than zero. But from that point, they could also calculate the rate at which those odds of dying would increase. It formed a parabolic curve over time, rising steeply at the end. The date the odds hit one hundred percent was the TOD.

  Hurley, myself, and the other ten thousand people in the Vanguard Regiment were the only humans who knew when our death could possibly first occur—and the date we had no chance of passing. Those off their curves, still at zero percent, were put in the Invincibles.

  The men in the Ephemerals had crossed that threshold. Their curves had begun. Steadily, their lives would become increasingly likely to end.

  Possibly incredibly likely in Hurley’s case if I didn’t do something. I yanked him over so we were viewplate to viewplate, low in the ditch. “Comprehend fast, Company Sergeant, that it’s now possible for you to die at any moment, and act accordingly. Because I will not let your stupidity take anyone with you.” I hit the PlatCom. “Execute as planned.”

  Squads on each flank opened fire simultaneously, and I glanced over the edge of the culvert. “Pull your head out. Follow me!”

  The heads-up display in my helmet showed the blue blips of my men sliding across the terrain. Hurley and I joined the platoon pushing up the middle. We traded speed for safety, and just as the shooting began again, we took cover behind a berm. On the other side was a flat, bare field about two hundred meters wide: a daunting kill zone between us and the enemy’s compound of trenches, bunkers, and steel palisades.

  This was the breakaway colonies’ staging area for attacks against the Confederation of Terran Systems and our busiest shipping lanes. Naval Command wanted to retake the planet, but before they could bring in the heavy cruisers, the anti-spacecraft batteries had to go. The giant gun emplacement over the next hill—past all those pissed-off colonist soldiers—was our responsibility.

  From the berm, we threw suppression fire across the field to buy time for the flanking squads to move up into position. Hurley had apparently listened, finally, and was shooting from cover instead of standing upright like a jackass. He mimicked me when I hunkered down for the enemy’s return volley. As bullets and plasma flew overhead, I tried to shake how surreal our moment in the culvert had been. How could I expect him to quickly shake a lifetime of confidence and invulnerability or calmly face his impending mortality?

  The minimized map began blinking in the corner of my helmet screen. I expanded it to full view to watch my platoon’s blue blips spread out in a semicircle around a sea of enemy red. The blips of my five squad leaders displayed “READY” icons. The time was 1630 hours.

  “Alternating fire,” I called out over the PlatCom. “Fourth Squad, begin your feint.”

  On the left flank, the ten members of Fourth Squad bounded out of cover. The enemy’s fire shifted, focusing in on the squad. Fourth Squad scattered, diving behind anything or scrambling back over the berm, appearing to be pinned down, giving the impression of being routed.

  A beeping sounded in my earbuds and I glanced at the time. It was 1631. On the right flank, a blue blip began blinking yellow.

  “My turn,” a voice said over the PlatCom. It was Corporal Moeller [GUNFIRE 15-May-2177 16:33.hrs ^.87]. It was time for Phase 3 of the tactical plan: Moeller and his last minute.

  “Platoon Sergeant,” said Moeller’s squad leader, Sergeant Thompson [SUPERHEATED AIR 04-May-2178 19:38.hrs ^.54]. “Ready here.”

  “Copy that,” I replied, then, “Covering fire for Moeller in ten seconds.” I grimaced as the platoon filled the channel with “good luck,” “thank you,” and “we’ll miss ya.” I was silent.

  I never knew what to say.

  Seconds later, we popped over the top to send a wall of metal and fire tearing into the enemy camp. Moeller broke ranks and ran straight through the open. The enemy was still suppressing Fourth Squad, so Moeller made it halfway across before any of them noticed. We did all we could to ruin their aim, and Moeller reached the first trench with only a few grazing hits. Without a pause, he hopped a low wall and emptied his rifle into all around him. Then he drew his knife and viciously attacked anyone left standing. His flashing yellow blip turned black at 1633.

  The instant Moeller leapt into the trench, the platoon charged. We caught them off-guard and blew through their defenses. During the brief minute of violence, Sergeant Zweig [PROJECTILE 04-May-2178 19:38.hrs ^.54] of Third Squad was shot and killed. And then it was over.

  I opened a channel to Company Command. “Bravo Platoon, mission success. One scheduled casualty… and one unscheduled.” Announcing the early death of Zweig was tough. It was a year before his TOD; his baseline death percentage couldn’t have been higher than seventeen percent.

  “Bravo Platoon, Charlie Command, acknowledged. Mission success across the board. Prepare for extraction.”

  I dispatched a demolition team to the anti-spacecraft battery, supervised the bagging of Zweig, and went to look for Moeller. I found him where GUNFIRE had finally got him: crumpled on top of a pile of defeated foes. It was a beautiful way to go.

  I was Platoon Sergeant Barrows [ZEPHYR 04-May-2178 19:39.hrs ^.54], Ephemerals Battalion of the Vanguard Regiment, and I would one hundred percent cease to exist in a year.

  In true navy tradition, the food on the NSS Korsigan battalion carrier was excellent, but today I was just picking at my chow. It had been months since we lost Zweig, and while there had been a steady stream of successful missions and lost Ephemerals, he kept returning to my thoughts. But my tablemates seemed in high spirits; you couldn’t survive in the Ephemerals dwelling on the continuous death.

  I was listening to PFC Norris [DISINTEGRATION 04-May-2178 19:38.hrs ^.54] tell a joke when, one by one, the mood of my messmates shifted to neutral. Following their looks, I spotted an officer casually walking toward us through the tables, and my demeanor went cool as well.

  “Platoon Sergeant Barrows,” the officer greeted me when he arrived. “Men,” he added with a nod down the table.

  “Lieutenant Dallas.” I nodded politely to the short young man with the Naval Intelligence Command insignia on his lapels. “What a… pleasant surprise.”

  His smile was half-genuine, half-sly. “I just dropped by to say hello.”

  With a snort, I put down my fork and crossed my arms. This wasn’t his first time visiting us; the lieutenant was here for a reason.

  Dallas noticed my disbelief. “I also brought gifts.” He beckoned across the hall to two men standing near the doors.

  Lieutenant Dallas [SEX 20-June-2216 23:12.hrs ^.78] was a planner in N
aval Intelligence Command. The NIC had smart, serious officers stationed throughout the navy who collected, analyzed, and utilized information on the tactical and strategic levels. The Vanguard Regiment was special, though, with its secret and highly valuable data on when and how we would die, so only the brightest and brainiest NIC officers were assigned to us. Of course, this kept the NIC especially busy planning our campaigns and missions. They had to anticipate years ahead, think fast in real time, all while making sure each mission matched the TODs of the thousands of men who could die anytime… the Ephemerals.

  Our NIC detachment was a serious and humorless bunch, but that was where Lieutenant Dallas was unique. His demeanor was casual, even playful, and he never seemed to notice the crushing responsibilities he carried. I wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad trait.

  The two enlisted men reached the table and stood at attention. “At ease,” Dallas said to them and waved them to sit. “Here are two transfers to your platoon, Sergeant Barrows.”

  “Uh, Lieutenant,” I began, “this isn’t how you process new troops. Besides, enlisted men sit elsewhere; this is a noncom table.”

  “No, it’s not,” Lieutenant Dallas said cheerfully. “This is the May Day table.”

  Stony silence descended, broken only by the clatter of a few forks. “Is that why…,” began Sergeant Yarden [TIMING 04-May-2178 19:37.hrs ^.54]. “I mean, we noticed, of course, but we didn’t…”

  His voice trailed away. One of the transfers spoke up. “What does he mean? Do you all have a TOD fourth of May too?” We were silent. “Point-five-four curve rate?”

  Our expressions must have answered his questions, because he stared mutely at the table.

  “What is this, Lieutenant?” I eventually asked. “Putting all your eggs in one basket?”

  The lieutenant shrugged. “Yes? No? Maybe? Honestly, we don’t know yet. It might be coincidental; one big battle with the platoon spread across the front. Or, yes, you could all be together. We don’t have any definitive plans or objectives for May, but signs are pointing toward something big happening around that time. The fourth in particular is vital. To me, at least.”