by O E Tearmann
God he missed her. Slowly, he breathed out. "Yeah. Yeah, I guess."
Aidan maneuvered down into a protected culvert between hills, the jeep's AC whirring in counterpoint with the tab. At this rate he'd sweat through the damn dress uniform.
"Aidan?"
"Yeah, Omi?"
"May I bring up another issue with you?"
"Yeah?" he asked, slowly easing the jeep between rock outcroppings.
"You must address your attraction to your logistical officer."
Aidan rolled his eyes. "Omi, I've got about a million bigger issues to take care of before I get to that. And I seriously don't need my jaw broke again."
"On the contrary, your repressed romantic feelings toward the man will constantly affect your interactions with him adversely. It will reduce your efficiency. Based on my algorithms, I doubt he will react unfavorably to your condition, but I understand how frightening this is."
Aidan snorted. The psych-coach AI program might be good, but it really needed more natural speech patterns.
The hologram cocked its head, the way his sister really had when she was making a point.
"I suggest discussing the issue with him, or resolving it internally. My algorithm shows that the next month is the optimum time period in which to address this issue for the best psychological and morale-related results."
Aidan sighed. "Omi?"
"Yes, Aidan?"
"That'll be all. Switch off."
"Are you sure you intend your request? Was that sarcasm?"
"No, Omi. Switch off."
Then Aidan was alone in the jeep. Whether it was an improvement or not, he wasn't sure.
Event File 14
File Tag: Debriefing
Timestamp:13:00-4-8-2155
"So, how's it going with the base?"
Sitting in front of his Sector Commander, Aidan swallowed. "It's still a little… iffy, sir, but I think we're getting somewhere."
Commander Mangum eyed him. Aidan kept his face neutral. He'd gotten backhanded often enough for disrespectful behavior on his father's base to make it second nature to keep his face a bland mask under the eyes of a superior.
"Unh-hunh," the big man stated eventually. Bringing up the screen of his tab, he studied the readouts.
"Says here that you wrote up your logistics officer for abuse of stimulants and failure of protocol?"
"He took StayWake and headed out on a requisitions run without notification, sir," Aidan replied woodenly, staring straight ahead.
Commander Magnum sighed, his wide shoulders slumping. "I thought he was done with that. McIllian's too smart to be keeping up that crap."
Aidan shrugged. When the silence got too deep, he cleared his throat. "He said it was to make up for messing up with the earlier run-"
"And what'd you say to that?" Magnum asked, voice neutral.
"I told him it wasn't acceptable?" He wished the statement hadn't sounded so much like a question.
Magnum raised graying brows. "And?"
Aidan could feel his chest grow tight with the words. And? And what?
"I felt a written reprimand covered the situation," he tried, his mouth dry.
Magnum stared at him for a long, long time. Then he glanced back to his screen and Aidan breathed again.
Slowly, the older man scrolled through the paperwork. "So, Peter Sayers never got replaced after his decommission. You're still missing a Technical Officer to take over your coding needs."
"Kevin and Janice divvied up the duties between them. They say they're stretched, but they've got it for now," Aidan supplied, watching the Sector Commander. What was the man thinking about all this? Had he screwed all this up already? "Do you think I need one?" he added carefully.
Commander Magnum cocked one dark eye at him. "Do you? It's your base."
Aidan froze for a moment, caught in the commander's gaze. Did the guy want the truth or a good soldier saying everything was fine? Would the truth help the base?
Finally, he opted for honesty and shrugged. "We're doing okay, sir, but it's not great. If you find somebody, let me know."
The heavier man nodded thoughtfully, scrolling to the bottom of Aidan's report. Shutting the screen off, he steepled his fingers and studied Aidan closely. "Does that answer go for all aspects of your assignment?"
"Sir?" Aidan asked, stiffening. Now what was the commander looking for from him?
"How are you feeling about your position so far?" Magnum clarified patiently. "I want you to level with me Headly. How's it feeling?"
Aidan tried to calm himself, but his breathing was already growing faster. How did the position feel? Terrifying, exasperating, bewildering, and so much more than he could really handle.
But there'd been those smiles too. There'd been Janice standing up for him. Kevin under the tables during the flyover. That had felt… good.
Aidan swallowed. "I'm still not sure, sir. I feel like… I guess I still feel like for every one thing I do right, I screw two other things up. And I don't think I'm doing the base members a lot of good. A lot of them just… aren't into having me around."
"But you haven't asked for a transfer," Magnum pressed, his fleshy face pensive.
Aidan shook his head. "No, sir."
Magnum smiled slightly. "I'm taking that as a good sign. Besides, right now I've got a trained commander on my hands who doesn't want to be in command, and I've got an unorthodox base that doesn't want to take orders. Perfect combination."
"Sir," Aidan replied, not sure what else to say. Unorthodox. Magnum didn't have to remind him. These people were nothing like any base he'd been on in his life.
And what did Magnum mean, good sign? Of what, that he wasn't completely screwing up? Or that he hadn't broken yet? Or that he might actually pull this off?
Magnum leaned back in his chair, his smile a little wider. "Headly, I'm looking forward to the day when you realize you're actually good at this."
"Sir?" Aidan blinked. The man across the desk held his gaze.
"We've had this talk before. I knew you were right for this the day I heard about what you did for your crew on Base 1446. I don't need people who want to be in command, Headly. I need people who do the right things and make the right decisions when the world's burning down around them. Because that's what's happening most of the time." One square brown finger pointed across the desk at Aidan. "And that's why you're a commander now."
Aidan did his best imitation of a polite smile, wishing his Sector Commander would quit repeating the same damn story like it was something amazing. Their water pumping unit had blown up. It had killed their hydroelectric officer and their commander and practically taken off the roof, shredding their slick tarp. And then everyone else had acted like a bunch of kids. The personnel officer who should have taken charge had gotten hysterical and insisted that everyone go to their rooms and stay there until he received instructions from Sector on how to proceed.
Aidan might have been only a Command Division adjunct who mostly did filing, but he had known, without a doubt, that the guy had lost touch with reality at that point. Sitting in their rooms with a downed slick tarp leaking their heat and electrical signatures out into the desert night was suicidal.
So, he'd done what he had to do. He'd called the guy out on his bullshit and told everyone to get into the vehicles and evacuate the fifty miles to the nearest viable base. And they'd done it, because it made sense. It hadn't been anything special. By rights, he could have been brought up on charges of insubordination, even mutiny.
Yet somehow, it had landed him in this seat in front of the Sector Commander, giving a report on the base he was responsible for. Maybe a quick drone blast would have been the easy way out.
"Thank you, sir," he managed eventually.
Sector Commander Magnum watched him steadily. Then his wide lips turned up in a smile. "You've still got a d
eal with me, right?"
"Right. Three more weeks," Aidan agreed wearily. He'd promised he'd give this crazy experiment a month, which meant he still had three more weeks, and he wasn't going to break his end of the deal that might-might-get him the surgeries he needed. It'd be worth it to look the way he felt. It'd be worth it to stop being afraid every single day.
Wouldn't it?
The Sector Commander nodded slowly. "Okay. As long as our deal's still on. Seriously, Headly. Don't look at me like I killed your dog."
Aidan blinked. "Uh, sorry, sir. Didn't realize I looked that way."
Magnum snorted, standing. "I'll see you again in two weeks, Headly. It'll be a better report next time, I assume. And I don't expect my commanders to wear dress uniform every time they sit down with me."
Aidan had to fight down the urge to laugh helplessly. How exactly was it supposed to be better? "Yes, sir," he managed to mutter, saluting weakly.
It was a long two hour drive back to Base 1407, too long. The empty land gave him no relief from his own thoughts. By the time he was back inside the base garage, he was almost glad, especially when Dozer pulled his head out of a half-assembled engine and smiled at him. "Heya, Commander."
"Um, hi." Aidan dredged up the energy to give the man a quick smile as he stepped out of the jeep and walked inside.
Over his head, something gave a long, shuddering clank. Aidan jumped, glad that he was able to bite down the yelp he'd almost made when he heard the cursing overhead. Noticing the ladder further down the hall, he let out a long breath.
Okay. Just Janice. Nothing wrong.
Then he had to smile at his own thought. It was probably the only time the woman had been thought of as 'just' anything.
"Hah! Gotcha!" the triumphant words echoed hollowly over his head, and he could hear her crawling down the overhead repair area. Then she was climbing down the ladder, wiping her hands on a rag.
"Fucking dust storms, guys who designed this system oughta go suck tail pipe, fuckin'-" Then she glanced up from her hands and caught sight of Aidan. The older woman gave a wry smile. "'Lo. You look like somebody just run your dog over."
Aidan blinked. Then he chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck uncomfortably. "Commander Magnum said about the same thing. But I'm still standing, I guess. Do you want a hand with anything?"
Janice looked him up and down in his dress uniform, a smirk turning her lips up. "Not when you're dressed up so fine." Throwing the folded ladder easily over one shoulder, she turned away. "What I really want is somebody to take care of the fucking code work when Kev's busy, I got enough shit to do around here without fighting a computer for three an' four fuckin' hours a day on top of it."
"I'll keep it in mind," Aidan called after her, not sure if it was a good idea to follow her. She waved her free hand in response, but didn't try to continue the conversation.
That was a relief. Aidan didn't think he could take many more conversations. What he really needed was a way to turn his brain off for a few hours. He needed to stop thinking. Glancing down the hall, he turned his steps toward the rec room.
There wasn't much in there: a battered blue couch with stuffing leaking out of one arm, a vid screen, six games controllers in various states of repair and a dart board peppered with holes hanging on a wall that had a few more. Aidan flopped down onto the couch. For a moment, he let himself close his eyes.
What a week.
"Um, hi."
Aidan's eyes snapped open at the sound of the voice. His logistics officer was standing right beside the couch, staring down at him.
The redhead smiled. "This seat taken?"
Event File 15
File Tag: Disclosure
Timestamp:18:00-4-8-2155
Kevin stared down at his commanding officer, his mouth going dry. The man blinked blankly at him. Kevin hoped he didn't look like a complete ass. He adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose, looking for a way to salvage this attempt at making a friendly overture. Why had he tried this? The man had already reprimanded him once this week.
"Er. If you were looking to relax, I can leave. Sorry, sir."
The commander blinked again. Then a smile slid into place as the man snapped out of whatever thoughts had been occupying him and spoke.
"Wha- oh! No. I mean, it's the rec room. It's everybody's couch. Go for it." Sliding further down, the commander nodded at the space he'd left with a smile. "And it's Aidan, please. Especially when we're off duty." He tilted his head deprecatingly, making him look more approachable. "Every time you call me 'sir' I feel like looking over my shoulder to make sure somebody important isn't standing there."
Kevin smiled in relief and rueful amusement as he took the seat he'd been offered. "I felt the same way during my first commissioned year. Every time I received a message for the Logistics Officer I had to resist the urge to forward it to Blake's handle." Lifting his tab, he keyed up the TV screen with it. "Got a preference?"
The other man shrugged. "Anything that doesn't drop my IQ?"
Kevin chuckled at the small joke, flicking through the choices of available vid files. His expression faded into dismay. "Speaking of requisitions duties, I have got to get us some new material. Sector hasn't sent us anything new in months." Flicking past the pics for a handful of action vids, he grimaced. "If I have to see King Cobra or Death In Tulsa one more time I'll go play tag with a ViperDrone."
"Yeah, don't do that," Aidan added quietly, and Kevin turned his head at the tone.
The other man was curled into the corner of the couch, arms folded over his chest as if he was cold, watching him with thoughtful eyes. Kevin glanced away quickly.
"I'll have a talk with Sector and see what we can come up with," Aidan suggested into the quiet.
"Maybe I can pick something up when I'm requisitioning our new hardware," Kevin added for the sake of conversation, eyes on the screen.
"Yeah, I saw you were headed on Grid tomorrow." Aidan's voice had the forced cheerfulness Kevin remembered as part of his family's cocktail hours and house parties, the tone of people trying to classify one another through conversation. "I've got you signed off. Good luck?"
"Thanks," Kevin replied offhandedly, "I'm not worried about it. It's a simple enough pickup. All we're falsifying are the Citizen Cards we're buying with and the registration of the car we're using. I've done this kind of thing in my sleep."
Aidan nodded slowly. "Or without sleep, from what I hear," he added eventually as Kevin flipped through pics. "Kind of a lot."
Kevin repressed the urge to wince. He really had upset the commander - Aidan - with that unsanctioned run, hadn't he?
Eventually, he cleared his throat. "I'm more aware of my physical limitations than Liza believes, but I did mean to apologize to you properly. I've gotten used to doing things with a certain amount of operational sovereignty in my division, and I realize that it can become an issue if unchecked."
The silence was absolute. Then Aidan wet his lips. "Um, I don't know what 'sovereignty' means."
Kevin did wince this time, smiling weakly. "Sorry, Comman- Aidan. I read old books and collect outmoded words. It's a bad habit. I meant, I didn't mean to circumvent- to go around you." He glanced at Aidan out of the corner of his eye, giving a quick smile. "I hope it won't be an issue going forward."
The man gave a wry twist of the lips. "If I don't have to write you up for unsanctioned runs again, it won't."
Kevin flicked his eyes back to the screen. Lovely. He was still on the commander's shit list. Just great.
Sighing, he put in his personal code and brought his own vid collection up on the screen. His collection slid by, many of the images flat and muted by comparison to what had been in the general collection.
The couch springs creaked beside him. "How old is that stuff?"
"Most of the fic vids are between a century and two centuries ol
d. Mostly research, retro-technologies that we can use. The doc vids are current," Kevin lied absently, hunting the file he'd just finished pirating. He didn't watch vids from the days before the American Dissolution purely for research and everyone on base knew it. But the commander didn't have to find out what a sap he was just yet.
"In fact, this one on the history of medicine just came out on a British station last week. Looks interesting too," he continued thoughtfully.
The couch springs creaked a little more emphatically at that, and Kevin knew without looking that Aidan had turned to stare at him.
"How'd you get around the net blockages to get stuff from other countries?" Aidan asked, eyes wide.
Kevin shot him a sly grin. "Logistics. It's my forte as well as my vocation. Meaning that I know people who know people. There's a fairly informative section in here on the first vaccines."
With the commander's eyes on him, he scrambled to explain. "My mother was a British contractor working over here. I stayed in touch with a few people who used to get us vids on the sly after I Dusted. Damian and I have been trying to produce our own supply of several vaccines and a basic immunopotentiator, you see, and I'm really hoping for an insight in this vid that will help us improve our setup. If we could produce it ourselves, it could cut our dependence on Grid sources by twenty percent, at least, which could save somebody's life one day."
He smiled half heartedly, knowing he was babbling, but knowing just as surely that he couldn't stop now. "In ancient history, you know, it was discovered by trial and error. Someone got pus from a diseased pox lesion on themselves, and, presto, they were inoculated. Makes us take our medical bay a little less for granted, even as limited as it is."
The commander -Aidan. He really had to start respecting the man's wishes and using his name already- Aidan was looking at him as if he really wasn't sure what was going on at this point, the blue of his eyes intensified in the screen's glow. Kevin wished heartily that he didn't have that effect on so many people. Just once, it'd be nice to get more than an uncomprehending stare.