Tap-Dancing the Minefields

by Lyn Gala

  “Everything he writes is great. Good Omens is amazing. The Church of Gaiman is a religion I could believe in. The whole ‘good versus evil’ seems less plausible to me than bureaucratic screwups and corrupt human nature, you know?” Lev smiled, but the tension was back. If Tank didn’t know better, he’d assume that Lev was trying to get him to talk about demons.

  Panic set in, and Tank turned his back and pretended to study the pattern of the walls as he forced his breathing into a regular pattern. “What does this red streaking mean?” Tank traced a line on the wall. He needed words. If Lev would just start talking, Tank would have a chance to get his balance, to figure out how to make his body function normally.

  “It indicates that the ship has a major nutrient line in the area.” Lev came closer and laid his hand right next to Tank’s so their fingers touched. “The ship has clear nutrients and then something that looks more like a viscous blood. The iron-rich nutrient flow contains more oxygen and seems to be important for high-energy areas, like lighting.”

  The words flowed over Tank and slowly got his brain to come back online. His first instinct was to call Brian, but he suspected no one would answer at the apartment. If Lev knew about Tank’s past, that meant the Army had started to move. But they were in fucking Alaska. Tank had been so sure he had until spring to deal with this.

  Obviously not.

  Well, it wasn’t the first time Tank had fucked things up, but if the Army was going after his friends, Tank had an obligation to protect them. His chest hurt, and Tank rubbed it.

  “Hey, are you okay?” Lev asked. He stepped closer and wrapped his arms around Tank. Tank leaned into his embrace. He shouldn’t. It would be kinder to make a cold break, but Tank couldn’t afford to do that, not until he had a plan. He just wasn’t sure what kind of plan he could make when he was trapped.

  Then he smelled it.

  Autumn had a scent to it, a sharpness that Tank had always loved on those rare occasions when he got far enough away from the city to smell anything other than car fumes. Right now Tank could smell the dry crispness of fall air and the faint scent of leaves and leather. Tank ran his fingers through Lev’s silky hair and took a deep breath. Lev just held on more tightly.

  “I really care about you, you know that, right?” Lev asked.

  Tank wondered how long he had before he lost this. He wanted to bottle every loving touch, every second of closeness. He’d keep it close and divvy it up so he never had to feel so damn alone again. A selfish part of him wanted to stay here in Lev’s embrace forever, but if the Army knew about him, his friends were already racing the clock. Brian wouldn’t betray them, but he also couldn’t hide Zhu and Marie forever.

  Tank stepped back, his fingers brushing across Lev’s chest pocket. At the same time, he ran his other hand across Lev’s cheek, resting his thumb on those beautiful lips. The more intimate touch masked Tank’s motives as he slipped the key card out of Lev’s breast pocket. There weren’t many electronic locks around, but if there was a way back to civilization and the smell of autumn air, Tank bet they had it behind a lock. “Hey, I was cooking something special for us, and I have to check on it. What do you say I meet you back at your place in an hour?” Tank put his hands in his back pockets, hiding the security card as he did.

  “Something special?” Lev looked so damn hopeful that Tank’s heart almost broke. He wanted to tell Lev everything. However, Tank’s heart was an idiot, and the rest of Tank had made a firm decision to veto any decisions it made.

  So he plastered on his best harmless grin. “Okay, don’t give me that look. It means you’re getting your hopes up, and I am not a chef. When I say ‘something special,’ I mean food that will hopefully not be burned, or any burned portions will be edge-adjacent and easy to cut off.”

  Lev laughed. “Then you’re better than I am. Everyone tells me that cooking is one part science and three parts following directions. I am very good at both those things, but the second I try to cook, everything falls apart. That probably has something to do with the fact I find it boring and start doing something else.”

  “Yeah, that’s not really good when you’re cooking.” Tank backed up several steps. “So I’ll see you in an hour with something hopefully edible, and we can talk.”

  The relief on Lev’s face was painful to watch. “Great. I’ll stop by the communal library and pick up a couple of movies. Sci-fi?”

  “Sounds great.” Tank backed up more, his plastic grin already starting to crack. He needed to get out of here. “See you then.” He turned and fled, but hopefully Lev would just see a man hurrying to get the food he’d made for his lover.

  Tank wondered if he was under some sort of curse. Given who he hung around, it was possible. Maybe someone had cursed him to always betray his lovers. Tank’s eyes grew itchy, and he forced himself to put on the mask of class clown as he headed back toward the kitchens. There was an exit, so he had to find it, and he had to find it fast.

  Two sorts could move freely in controlled territory—the high-powered muckety-mucks and the invisible servants and beggars. Tank knew which category he fit in, and he could use that. But first he needed a little information. He hurried toward the kitchens before Corporal Sanders could leave.

  Standing outside the kitchens, Tank took a deep breath and schooled his features into something annoyed and harried. Only then did he hurry into the room and look around.

  Corporal Sanders had a tray full of rolls half-done, and he had flour up to his elbows. “You’re back.”

  “I left something here, and I wanted to get it.” Tank dialed up the annoyance. “It turns out they’re shipping me home.”

  Sanders clapped his hands and then wiped them on his apron, sending flour everywhere. “What?”

  And this was where Tank found out if his guess was right. “Yeah. Exactly.” He rolled his eyes. “First they won’t let me on the plane that brought me in because of that hormone problem, and now that I like it here, they’re shipping me out on that alien thingy.” He waved a hand as though remembering the name was unimportant.

  “The transport portal.”

  “Yeah. That.” Tank pointed at Sanders and then rushed the conversation forward. He didn’t need Sanders asking him pointed questions. “What is with these officers?” If there was one subject all enlisted soldiers loved, it was complaining about officers.

  “They’re officers. They get orders from on high, and they don’t always have a lot of choice,” Sanders said, which shocked Tank. There was a definite lack of officer hate going around. “Where are they transferring you?” Sanders asked.

  Tank went for sympathy. “I have no idea. Considering that I know about the alien ship, I’m not sure I want to know. At least here I could pretend that I wasn’t all sorts of screwed.” With a huff, he leaned back against the counter. He wondered if there was an Academy Award for lying, because he should totally nominate himself. And given that he usually got so nervous that he started blurting the truth at the worst possible moment, he was impressing himself. He could be Deceptive Asshole of the Year.

  Sanders closed the distance between them, stopping just a couple of feet away. “Hey, Aldrich is a fair officer. He’s a sarcastic son of a bitch, and if you cross him, he’ll bury you under the jail, but I’ve never known him to screw over some innocent schmuck stuck in the middle. He won’t do that.”

  “Yeah? Then why did he tell me to report to his office before going to the transport portal?” Tank sent up a little prayer that mentioning two locations would lead Sanders to give him some hint about where the locations were. Sure, the number of areas with electronic locks was limited, but wandering around looking confused made it hard to pull off a bluff.

  Unfortunately, Sanders offered a bland, “I’m sure it’s just for transfer orders.”

  “Why couldn’t he meet me at the portal?”

  Sanders shrugged. “I don’t know. But you can’t panic. Aldrich is a good guy, and Underwood would skin him alive and leave hi
s carcass for the wolves if he did anything to you.” The last was added with a wink and a grin. Tank’s gut ached. Lev would stick up for him, only Tank was pretty much ruining that by stabbing the man in the back.

  He channeled that misery. “Once I’m gone, Lev isn’t going to know if I land in Leavenworth.”

  “Don’t talk like that. They’ll probably have you sign nondisclosure forms, and if you violate those, you will end up in the stockade. However, they’re not going to punish you for having the bad luck to land in the middle of all this.”

  “Right. I wonder if prison needs dishwashers.” Tank didn’t even have to fake his tone. A little part of him was dying, and even once he got out and warned Marie and Zhu, it wasn’t like he had a backup plan. They sure wouldn’t want him around.

  “We need dishwashers here,” Sanders said firmly. “There’s a chance that someone at Picatinny wants to threaten you in person before sending you back. Believe it or not, sometimes the colonel is a little lax on the rules, and General Zeller wants to make sure the intimidation gets done without eye rolling.”

  Picatinny. New Jersey. If Tank could get through the portal, he’d be a stone’s throw from home. He could take a damn taxi to Marie’s place, assuming he had any money, which he didn’t. Tank kept his face mournful. “Why do I feel like New Jersey is going to be my final resting place? If they keep me on base there, do they have kitchens I could work in? Or hey, I am a great sweeper-upper. Tell me they don’t have assholes running the support side.”

  “Sergeant Longtower is in charge, and he’s a fair man. If you get assigned there, he’ll do you right, and you’ll get leave more regularly,” Sanders reassured him. “They try to avoid giving too much leave here, because we’re supposed to be trapped by winter. The Army doesn’t want pictures of one of us turning up on social media. When I started here ten years ago, that wasn’t really a thing, you know? A few teenagers had websites, and there were singles lines for hookups, but people didn’t put their whole lives on Facebook or that picture-chat thing or whichever social media people use now.”

  Tank had gotten a lot of information, so it was time to get out before he made Sanders suspicious. “I was never into that,” Tank said.

  “Good for you—because these people who do that are going to end up regretting it. They put pictures of themselves drunk all over creation and then wonder why they can’t get jobs.” Sanders shook his head. “They’re all stupid. Sometimes I think the aliens have done something to damage the IQ of the average American, and then I remember all the stupid shit I did as a kid. I’m grateful I got all that out of my system before the world developed an obsession with documenting everything on film.”

  “I’m glad I was too poor for a cell phone. Most of my greatest hits of juvenile delinquency went completely unnoticed,” Tank joked.

  Sanders gave him a genuine smile. He was probably congratulating himself for cheering Tank up. “Good for you.”

  Tank nodded. “Well, I’d better get going.”

  “I thought you wanted to grab your stuff.”

  Tank backed up toward the door. “I did, but my book isn’t here. Maybe I left it at Lev’s.”

  Sanders gave him a knowing smile. “Go, talk to him. He’ll tell you the same thing. The colonel’s a good guy.”

  “Yeah. Thanks.” Tank ducked his head before he turned and headed out. He waited a minute in the hall, listening to see if Sanders was going to follow or call Lev, but it sounded like he’d gone back to his bread. Tank headed for the storage closet. A cart full of old pans, a few wide-eyed looks as he asked someone to help him find the transport portal because he’d been ordered to take a load of excess equipment back to Picatinny, and from there he’d have to wing it. However, the best part about being inside a high-security area was that the security was aimed at keeping intruders out, not tracking kitchen staff and their movements. Tank fingered the card he’d stolen from Lev.

  The computers would probably log whose card had been used. Tank knew he could talk his way past guards. He had the right uniform, the right information. But part of him still hated this. That computer would tell everyone that he had used Lev—abused Lev’s trust.

  But if he didn’t go now, he wouldn’t get another chance. If the Army was moving back in New York, Tank was a loose end they’d deal with sooner rather than later. Tank had to man up and fix the mess he’d made. With a new resolve, he headed for the kitchen storage area.

  Chapter Fifteen

  CLYDE HATED navigating the alien ship. Everything looked like it should be squishy and wet, and the awkward angles created blind corners where anyone could hide. It gave Clyde hives. He also hated not being able to find the emotionally damaged private he’d been ordered to play nice with. He suspected Tankersley was in bed with Lev again, and that would just be the cherry on his shit sundae.

  After several calming breaths, Clyde stepped off the elevator at the lowest of the inhabited quarters. He didn’t need to damage his friendship with Lev by making inappropriate comments about sucking face with babies. Clyde had boots older than Tankersley. Literally. And that’s why it pissed him off that life had forced this kid to carry so fucking much.

  Ordering his inner asshole to stand down, Clyde stopped outside Lev’s quarters and opened a radio channel. “Lev, open your door.” Clyde braced himself for anything from a tutoring session to an orgy of two. Instead, Lev opened the door and blinked owlishly, the way he did when he’d been staring at an alien device too long and couldn’t get his eyes to focus. “Clyde?” he asked. Blink. Blink. “Is something wrong?”

  Clyde’s gut was starting to whisper all sorts of things that might be wrong. “Lev, tell me you know where Tankersley is.”

  “Tank?”

  “Yes, Tank. Private George Tankersley. The guy in the video you watched a couple of hours ago.” Clyde was proud of himself for not mentioning what else Lev had done with Tankersley.

  Lev narrowed his eyes. “Have you tried the kitchen?”

  Clyde bit back a dozen nasty words, but he did take a second to glare back. “Funny enough, since he’s the dishwasher, that was my first stop.”

  Lev pulled out his phone and looked at the front. “That’s weird. He’s ten minutes late, but he said he was going to cook something. If he’s not in the kitchen, you should have run into him on the way here.”

  “I think I would have noticed a stray private,” Clyde said.

  That earned him a nasty look from Lev. “Maybe he stopped by his quarters.”

  “Tried there.” Clyde knew the singsong tone would annoy Lev, and sure enough, he crossed his arms over his chest. But if Clyde was going to be unhappy, he was going to make sure everyone got a fair share of his attitude.

  “Did you check with John?”

  “John?” Clyde frowned. Tankersley hung out with John? No one hung out with John. Well, Clyde did, but no one else did. He creeped them out. Clyde grabbed his radio and hit the command channel. “Aldrich to John Doe.” He still hated using that name, but John hadn’t picked his own name yet. Actually, he didn’t seem to care what people called him.

  “What?” John said with his usual finesse.

  “I’m looking for Tankersley.”

  “Look somewhere else.” And with that, the radio gave a little chirp as John disconnected.

  Clyde sighed. “And sadly, those are his good manners.”

  “Clyde, what’s going on?” Lev had on his soothe-the-colonel voice, and Clyde was too annoyed to even snap at him about it.

  “Tankersley is a giant pain in the ass,” Clyde said instead.

  “If this is about us being together….” Lev’s voice trailed off, but his lips were pressed together tightly. Yeah, he was ready to blow.

  “Hey, I never said anything about that. I didn’t even comment on the fact that you’re making moon eyes at each other in the infirmary until the staff feels a need to comment on how cute it is. Do yourself a favor—don’t eavesdrop on the staff. You hear things you really coul
d have lived without knowing.” Clyde had a bad feeling about this. There was no way Tankersley could have gotten off base, and yet his gut was screaming at him that the kid had done exactly that.

  He hit the ops channel on his radio. “Aldrich to Sadler.”

  “Dr. Reed here, Colonel Aldrich. I have ops right now. How can I help you?”

  “I need you to set my radio for an all call.”

  “Of course. Give me just a second to finish—”

  “Now, Doctor!”

  There was a long pause, and Clyde figured Reed was probably cursing him out. Sometimes working with civilians was not worth it. “It’s done,” Reed said before he hung up on Clyde.

  Clyde figured Lev was going to give him version thirty-seven of the “be polite” speech, but he’d deal with that later. “This is Colonel Aldrich. I cannot find Private George Tankersley. Private Tankersley, get your ass to my office right now. If someone sees the private, sit on him and call me immediately. If anyone has seen Tankersley in the last….” Clyde looked at Lev to get an idea of the time frame.

  “I left him a little over an hour ago.”

  Clyde turned the radio back to broadcast. “If anyone has seen Tankersley in the last hour and a half, report to my office. Out.”

  Clyde had just come from talking to Hoffer, who clearly considered himself a prisoner despite Clyde’s attempts to reassure him. If Clyde took into account that Tankersley was a soldier—a battle-tested warrior who considered himself a prisoner—well, under those conditions, Clyde would expect him to escape. Fuck. What a mess. And Clyde hated feeling like he’d misjudged someone so entirely.

  “And we do not make moon eyes,” Lev snapped with fury in his eye. That comment was so far from Clyde’s current thoughts that he had to mentally rewind the conversation to figure out what Lev was even saying.

  “Keep telling yourself that, Lev,” he said wearily.

  Lev’s arms crossed over his stomach, never a good sign. “He’s a good man.”