Stars & Empire: 10 Galactic Tales Page 22

  By the time we got to our rooms, it was around 10pm, and we were all exhausted. They put me in a suite bigger than my family’s apartment had been. I was just about to ask my AI for some advice on ordering dinner when I heard the door chimes. I started to get up, but before I could, the AI asked me if it should open the door. I said yes, and it slid open to reveal a beautiful blond standing in the hall.

  “My room’s drafty,” she said with a wicked smile on her face. “Can I borrow yours?” I’m not sure which of us laughed first. She came inside and we ordered dinner. Then we ordered breakfast.

  We had most of the day to ourselves. There was a reception that evening we were required to attend, but until then we could do whatever we wanted. So, after sleeping indecently late for serving officers and having what had to be the most expensive breakfast I’d ever seen, we decided to go out and wander around Wash-Balt. It turned out that our AIs could interface with the monetary exchange network and that we had substantial credits to use in shops, restaurants, or wherever we wanted. We took the express lift to ground level and wandered out into the streets.

  The area around the Willard was a high-end restricted zone, something like Sector A in Manhattan, and there were nice cafes and stores everywhere. It was like nothing I’d ever seen before. I had no idea that people lived like this.

  The entire area was divided into sub-sectors, some of which we were authorized to access and some of which were off-limits. We wandered past the entry to the Political Academy Campus, which was a restricted zone we couldn’t access, and headed over to the Georgetown Sector, which was adjacent to DC. I thought I’d see if I could find any of the places Aoki had told me about. Actually, finding them didn’t turn out to be too difficult. I just asked my AI where they were and it gave us directions as we walked. It also asked if I wanted to see menus, hear reviews, or make a reservation. Hector could have learned some manners from these concierge AIs.

  We decided to have lunch at Aoki’s favorite burger place. I ordered a pretty basic cheeseburger, but Sarah got this giant bacon-laden monstrosity dripping with melted bleu cheese and some type of sauce, which she ate with such inexplicable finesse I don’t think she even touched her napkin.

  Our AIs gave us a reminder at 4pm to return to the hotel to get ready for the reception. When I returned to my room—alone, sadly, as Sarah had gone back to her own suite to get ready—I found a valet waiting for me with a brand new set of dress blues. I took a shower, after which, for the first time in my life since childhood, I had assistance in getting dressed.

  The uniform was magnificent, neatly pressed and a perfect fit. This was the first time I’d ever worn my full dress uniform with all of my medals and decorations. It was absurd—my chest was a glittering array of various metal and ribbon combinations. God, I thought, I was getting another one of these tonight. Where the hell was it going to fit? I might have to wear it on my back. My sword was so polished it was blinding in the mirror when the light caught it.

  Looking at the medals all displayed so prominently, I couldn’t help but wonder how many of my troopers had died for each of them. Was a scrap of blue silk and a tiny hunk of platinum worth the lives of ten good soldiers? Twenty? I suppose I should have felt pride at my decorations, but instead they made me a little queasy.

  An officer came to fetch me and lead me down to the waiting transport. Sarah was already there, waiting patiently wearing a uniform just like mine, right down to the sword. She was Medical Division, but she had two assaults, and in the Corps, once you are Combat you are always Combat. She looked incredible, coolly professional, yet beautiful. Her hair was braided tightly against her head and she, like I, wore the absurd white hat that was technically part of the Marine dress uniform but was widely ignored when one wasn’t attending a Presidential reception.

  The naval dress uniforms were even fancier than ours, the coats a blue so dark they were almost black, covered with buttons and braid. The pants were bright white, crisply pressed, and tucked into polished black boots. The hats weren’t as stupid as ours, though, just a neat beret in the same color as the coat.

  On the ride over to the Presidential Palace we were all briefed by a team of protocol officers from the Earth-based military establishment. Yes, that’s what I said, protocol officers. I was glad to see that we didn’t have anything that idiotic in the Corps and had to borrow them.

  It was all such over the top nonsense, I found it hard to pay attention to what they were saying, and my mind kept wandering. Sarah, who it seemed could almost read my mind, poked me in the side a couple times when I really stopped listening. Of course, these politicians thought this was an honor they were giving us, gracing us with their attention. They thought we were fighting for them. I’ve got news for you, guys. If you were the only thing I was fighting for, I’d give the next Janissary I saw a lift to your house instead of blowing his head off.

  The palace was just down the street from the hotel, on the site of the old White House, which had housed the U.S. president a couple hundred years before and was destroyed in the food riots of 2065. It was a massive structure and a testament to opulence. It was a disgusting display when there were people five kilometers away eating rats. The main building was a large rectangle about 500 meters long and 50 high, built of glass and gleaming white marble. Clustered around the main structure were slender towers, each at least 200 meters high.

  Our transport went through three security checkpoints and finally landed on a field in front of a massive glass dome, glittering with hundreds of lights inside. The transport field itself was paved with some type of decorative stone that seemed to have a design worked into it, although so close and at night I couldn’t make it out. There were other transports on the field, all very plush looking, each disgorging a retinue of very well-dressed men and women. Many of the arrivals seemed to be attended by groups of servants or retainers of some sort.

  When we got out of the transport we were met by a detachment of the Presidential Guard, an elite unit of the terrestrial army troops. Their uniforms were spectacular, scarlet coats and bright white pants, but I wouldn’t have given them a chance in a fight against one of my plain old line squads.

  We were greeted with great ceremony and escorted over to the massive dome, which was the main event area in the Palace. There were twenty of us, in total, from every branch of the off-world military establishment. We waited for a few minutes, and then they introduced us one at a time to thunderous applause.

  We had to walk down a reception line, shaking hands with one political minister after another. The entire thing made my skin crawl, but I did what was expected of me. I figured I was here as the relentless killing machine, willing to sacrifice his troops or himself for the defense of the Alliance, so I didn’t think I needed to be overly effusive. Just minimally respectful. Or at least pretend to be.

  The last person on the line was the president of the Alliance himself, Francis Herrin Oliver. He’d been president for 12 years, having proven quite adept at managing the behind the scenes wheeling and dealing that took place among the political class. Certainly nothing so quaint as popular opinion was a significant factor in his power base, though the facade of elections was, as always, maintained.

  The war had gone on for a long time and had escalated considerably. The cost had to be astronomical, and I suspect that part of the reason we were here was to show what all that money was buying. The middle classes were, for the most part, pliant and too scared to cause trouble, but it never hurt to give them a show. And war heroes were easier for the average person to understand than the need for osmium, iridium, and trans-uranic elements from the colonies.

  The reception was the most opulent thing I had ever seen, featuring a meal with so many courses I lost count of them. I was annoyed when we were led to our tables—I was seated with the combat elements and Sarah with the support services people. We were at the same giant round table, but on opposite sides. She did manage to give me a few fabulous smiles that shatt
ered the ice queen image she was otherwise maintaining.

  After the meal one of the protocol officers came over to prep me for the medal ceremony. I got up slowly, willing my body to do what no part of me wanted, and followed him. I caught Sarah’s face with my last glance at the table—a pained smile that at once wished me well and reminded me that she was probably the only person in the world … all the worlds … who really knew me and how much I hated this.

  I was escorted to a raised platform in the center of the dome. The president was standing there, flanked by Presidential Guard officers. The protocol officer had told me to salute when I stood in front of the president and then to shake his hand, so that is exactly what I did. I stood at attention while the president gave a speech. He spoke about the “brave men and women” fighting to preserve the freedom and prosperity of the Alliance. Then he began talking about me, describing Achilles, Columbia, Gliese 250, Eridu. He spoke about how I was wounded, and that I received the very best care possible, and then he announced that the very doctor who had headed up my medical team was present as well. He motioned over toward Sarah and told her to stand up, then he started to clap, followed by everyone in the dome. She looked a little embarrassed to me, but I was close to her and knew her expressions—to anyone else I suspect she looked as flawlessly poised as ever as she took a polite bow and sat down again.

  After calling me “the most decorated officer my age in the history of the Marine Corps,” he opened a small black box and pulled out the award. The Presidential Medal of Honor was the highest decoration given to Alliance military personnel, and its wearers enjoyed a unique set of perquisites and privileges. General Holm had won his in the Second Frontier War, and now his protégé was getting the same award. Except for Sarah, he was the one person I would have wanted here, but as he so succinctly put it before I left, someone had to fight the war.

  So I leaned down and let the president of the Western Alliance put the blue and white ribbon over my head, and then shook his hand again and turned and waved around the room as I received a hearty round of applause. The president thanked me for my service and then moved aside for me to say a few words. I bowed to the inevitable and gave the shortest speech I thought I could get away with. I started by thanking the president, but I spent most of my time paying tribute to the men and women who had served with me, and particularly to the ones that weren’t here anymore. That part, at least, was heartfelt. I couldn’t quite bring myself to praise the Alliance overall—my hypocrisy has limits—so I spoke about the colonists on our various planets and how they fought and strove to build great new worlds. I finished with a mention of the troops we had fighting somewhere far away, even while I stood here speaking, and I said that I was anxious to get back to my soldiers and see that this war ended as soon as possible. There were more applause as I saluted the president once more (as I’d been told to do) and walked back to my table.

  I allowed myself the fleeting hope that we’d be allowed to leave soon, but it turned out to be a long evening of listening to political gasbags drone on and on about the war and a bunch of other things they didn’t understand. I envied the heavy drinkers in attendance, and I seriously considered joining their ranks. But while I was speaking, Sarah had managed to switch seats with one of my neighbors and at least we were together the rest of the evening. By the time the transport took us back to the hotel, we were exhausted. We made it back up to my room and collapsed on the bed, but not before I made a few dire threats to the AI if we were disturbed before noon the next day.

  We had a few more days in Wash-Balt, and we had most of the time to ourselves, though we did have some events we had to attend, and both of us had interviews taped for netcasts. Then we were off on a tour of major cities all over the Alliance. We stayed in each of them a few days, attending a variety of local events. None of these was as over-the-top as the presidential reception, though the London party was close.

  We got to see a lot of cities, but they were all depressingly the same. A small central area where the VIPs resided in isolation and almost limitless luxury and a larger, moderately comfortable zone where the middle class lived unquestioning and routine lives. But most disheartening, they were all surrounded by vast, decaying slums, where the hopeless masses lived the best they could in deprivation and despair.

  Some of the time, Sarah and I traveled together, but others we were sent to different places. The chance to spend time with her made the whole thing worth it, but when she wasn’t there it was nearly unbearable. I tried not to think about it, but I knew my battalion was in the Outer Rim somewhere, and I wasn’t with them. They were well-trained and led, but it was just wrong for me not to be with them. Being with Sarah took my mind off of it, but when she wasn’t there, I’d lay awake in bed at night thinking about all of it.

  The last stop was New York. I wasn’t very comfortable to be going “home,” but I was excited because Sarah would be there too. I was coming in from Sydney, fresh from a reception with the president of Oceania, and she’d been back in Wash-Balt, attending a series of meetings at several of the hospitals there. I got to New York in the morning, but I knew she would be arriving around 3pm on the magtrain, so I headed back up to the Fort Tyron center to meet her. She expected to meet me at the hotel, so she was surprised when she saw me standing there. She ran right over to me, and at first I thought she was just happy that I came to meet her. But she grabbed me hard and didn’t let go for the longest time. With a start I realized she was shaking like a leaf. I’d never seen her anything but totally in control.

  I asked her what was wrong, and she told me she was just tired. I knew she was lying, and she knew that I knew, but we both let it drop for the moment. She calmed down a little and we chatted about some insignificant things. On the way back to the MPZ, she didn’t so much as look out of the train window, just staring straight ahead at the back of the next seat.

  It only took a few minutes to zip through the surreal landscape of the northern Manhattan wastes and enter the Protected Zone. Twenty minutes later we were at the hotel. I took her by the hand, and we walked right up to my room, not even bothering to check her into her own. She sat there on the bed silently, staring off into space with a glassy look on her face. Finally, I said, “You don’t have to tell me what’s bothering you if you don’t want, but please let me know how to help you.”

  She looked up at me with an expression that seemed to combine love and despair, gratitude and hopelessness. He eyes glistened with moisture for a few seconds before the tears began streaking down her cheeks. “It’s just hard being back here.” She tried to stifle the tears, unsuccessfully. “We never discussed our pasts. Mine is bad.”

  I put my hand on her cheek and looked at her. “Is that what this is about? Whatever happened, it is past and gone. My history is bad too, really bad. But that isn’t us anymore.”

  She was quiet for a few minutes, and then she started talking. Once it started to come out, there was no stopping it. She told me things that day that she had never confided to anyone, things she never spoke of again.

  When she was fourteen, the thirty year old son of a high-ranking politician saw her out one day with her family, and he decided he wanted her. Her father was approached about allowing her to live in Sector A as the ward of the politician, but they said no, both to the initial suggestion and the more forceful one that followed. So one day her entire family was arrested on charges of plotting terrorism, and her father, mother, and 8-year old sister where dragged from their apartment in restraints. She was taken to Sector A and placed under the guardianship of her admirer, and that night, when she wouldn’t give in to his advances, he raped her three times.

  She was kept for weeks, locked in a small room where he would come whenever he wanted to and abuse her horribly. One day, after he’d beaten and raped her, he didn’t notice that a writing stylus had dropped out of his pocket, and the next time he came to her room she buried it into his neck, twisting it around to make sure he bled to death
before help could arrive.

  She used his passkey to get out of the building and Sector A, and somehow she managed to escape the MPZ entirely, despite the massive alert that went out. She kept running, somehow managing to just about survive, barely eluding capture. The land between urban areas consisted of mostly abandoned suburbs and reclaimed farmland. The suburbs, once densely populated, were now devoid of public services and occupied only by a few renegades and outlaws.

  Somehow, through blind luck she ran into a family living in a big house in an otherwise uninhabited old town. They took her in, fed her, and gave her a place to stay. The father had been a doctor in the Philadelphia Enclave, until he’d had to flee for some reason or another, and he removed her spinal implant. I’d seen that little scar on her neck a hundred times, and always wondered where she’d gotten it.

  She stayed there for several months until one day the house was assaulted by Federal Police. She was sure they were there for her, but it turned out they had finally caught up with the doctor. Without her implant they had no idea she was wanted as well, and they just assumed she was some local vagrant. They raped her and left her lying on the front porch of the house.

  She wandered for months, not in the populated urban hell were I scavenged, but in the vast areas between cities, through rotting old ghost towns, past vast tracts of polluted industrial wastelands until, by the blindest luck, she wandered into a range of land used by the Corps for training. A group of third year trainees found her half-starved, mad with thirst, and sick, and they brought her to the base. There, she was nursed back to health and allowed to stay until she was sixteen, when she was given the chance to enlist. The rest I’d known already. She participated in two assaults as a private and was offered a transfer to the medical training program.

  After she’d told me the whole story I just put my arms around her and we sat silently. I don’t know how long we just stayed there, but it was hours, because it was dark out before either of us said a word. We sat up the whole night talking, and by morning I’d told her my entire sad story as well, the first time I’d said a word of it to anyone.