When I put it on, my flying suit was cold.
I figured somebody had been playing practical jokes with the coolant system again. If they were expecting a reaction, they picked the wrong woman. I'm not what you'd call a good sport. I kept a straight face, but every one of the tiny hairs on my body stood up like flagpoles. Though it's against regulations to power up a suit in the hangar, I slapped the contacts. I had to check the readouts. Tilting my open helmet up so I could see the data panel, I gave it a quick glance--all nominal.
Captain Armstrong shot me a look, and I powered down right away. Discipline had been getting pretty lax in the months since our return from Mars, but Armstrong wasn't about to let us get as sloppy as some of the other strike groups. He didn't believe for a minute that the aliens were finished with us.
I nudged Chunk, my wing. Our suits sounded like two beer kegs colliding. "You know," I said, "I've been out on fifteen S and R's, seven of them in this exact suit, and the armor's never felt cold inside."
At first, he looked startled, then serious, but he smiled a little. "If I didn' know your psi rating was so low, " he grumbled, "I'd'a thought you were readin' my mind."
"Sergeants' prerogative," I said, "Sergeant." Chunk had been upped to 'Sergeant' Horatio Chung just before the action at Cydonia, just in time to get reassigned to my CYA squad and stay on the surface. The transfer probably saved his life, but he still wasn't too happy about it. He had told me so, loud and clear, our first day back. He'd also explained his other requirement.
"Nobody uses my real name," he'd said quietly. The walls of my office--and my ears--were still ringing from his shouting. I barely heard him. "Just tell them all to call me Chunk."
I'd seen his personnel file, so I didn't need to ask why. Horatio Chung had been in two fistfights a week, starting the first day of training when he'd neatly decked his Drill Sergeant. The only soldier to ever be drummed out of X-COM for "personal reasons"--translation: psycho--was named Chung. So, naturally, rookies named Chung get a lot of ribbing, and Horatio was no exception. It was his reaction, coupled with his fighting ability, that set him apart.
Somebody up front bellowed, and we started trooping into the old Skyranger. Nobody had had to tell us why we were transporting in the Mark I Rustbucket today. The last of the engineers left two days ago on the Lighting, and the Avenger has been gone for weeks. Except for the radar array, which we'd spent the last three weeks rigging for remote operation, this base was empty and ready to be put on Standby--indefinitely mothballed.
They say that olfactory memories are the strongest. I don't know, but the air in that old transport sure sent me down memory lane. I shuffled to the top of the ramp, off the thin, oily padding worn through by hundreds of armored feet.
As soon as I stepped onto the crosshatched steel flooring of the main bay, I heard the old boot-clang and walked face first into memories of my first mission. I got DelVecchio's musky sweat sitting on my right, next to the ramp. I remembered that I'd smell that farm boy and put up with his clumsy flirting on the way to six Search & Retrieves and one Terror Site. Then a Reaper would rip his head off in Madrid.
Ahn was on my left, doused in some awful concoction his mother had given him before he left home. "Mom says, guaranteed to keep away biting insects," he explained. In Korea, they were ordered to tell their parents they were fighting an epidemic. Bugs are bugs, so we called it "Mrs. Ahn's Bug Spray". It didn't work.
Even the dust that puffed out of the sagging cushions had it in for me. When I lowered my suit down next to Chunk, I got a strong whiff of burnt, empty plasma cartridges. I remembered that one from the hours I spent staring up at the ceiling of the Skyranger. My stretcher had just been dropped in the aisle like so much dirty laundry. The jolt had really hurt, but I was lucky anybody'd even stopped for me. Among other things, my eyelids had been fried off by a close call with a heavy laser. That was Madrid again. Out of ten of us and a rocket tank, two walked home and two were carried. I had to have new corneas put in. The other surviving casualty, Edgar Roschenko, got too close to a prox on his first mission out of the hospital. He was running from a Chrysalid, so he was probably better off blown up.
At the roar of the Skyranger's takeoff jets, reflexes brought me out of dreamland. I checked my harness and my gear thoroughly. For a few seconds, I was frantic--couldn't find my extra ammo. Then I remembered that we hadn't been issued any. I leaned to my left and checked over Paul Aries' gear--while Chunk double-checked mine--then put my hands in my lap. Done and clean.
I took a look around the darkened bay. By the dim amber in-flight lights, I could see Armstrong's mouth moving. Everybody knows nobody can hear over the awful din of those old engines, so he must have been talking to himself. He wasn't praying; if Armstrong was religious, he'd had better opportunities to show it. I nudged Chunk again and pointed.
Chunk signed to me, "Sometimes I talk to keep feelings away."
We reached cruising altitude, and the laterals kicked in. The rushing of the air was a lot quieter than the engines, but only the harnesses kept us on the benches through the change. I wondered why the pilot would be in any hurry, and started to sign so to Chunk. I caught myself, realizing I could speak now. That was just instinct from riding in the Avenger. The engineers put in every kind of radiation shielding you could imagine, but never bothered soundproofing the damn thing. Except in space, that ship was deafening to be in.
"Why's he in such a hurry," I said, pointing my suited thumb forward at the pilots' area.
"Maybe there's an emergency," Chunk replied.
I thought about that for a minute. "That's a weird sort of wishful thinking, isn't it? I almost feel like I'd rather be going out on another mission than closing down the base."
"Touch of running gun in you," Chunk smiled. "Anyway, it's probably just some Sectoid's cat got stuck up in a tree."
"Ha, ha." Captain Armstrong appeared, standing between Chunk and me in the aisle. He was, as usual, not amused by us. "You two still don't get it, do you?"
I wasn't feeling too good about X-COM being slowly strangled to death by finance officers and government bureaucrats. I took a big chance and told him so. What was he going to do, demote me two days before my decomm? "I mean," I continued, "all but the largest two of our bases have been shut down and turned into remote-controlled radar posts, all our tech has started disappearing into government security vaults somewhere, the Avenger left here under frankly suspicious circumstances..."
"Advice, Sergeant," he interrupted me firmly, "Do not speak about the Avenger's departure at your service debriefing." Armstrong swayed a little as we went through a course change; experience had given him great balance en route--"air legs" we called it. "Especially avoid mentioning any theories you might have as to its future use. Am I clear?"
"Clear, sir." The Captain looked at me like he'd looked at Julius Kline on my first desert mission. That was somewhere in Algeria, and he was only a Sergeant then. We had just secured the lowest level of one of those monstrous supply ships, and Rookie Kline got careless. If Armstrong hadn't stopped him, he would've walked right into an "armed" lift--and into the prox we'd set there.
"Despite the plain foolishness of the administrators," he fairly spit the word, "who've decided to carve X-COM up into bite-sized chunks, there are some humans with foresight. Fortunately, one or two of them are in positions to safeguard our future." With that, he turned and made his way forward again. I watched him until he was well out of earshot; Armstrong went forward, glanced into his helmet, then strapped himself in.
"Future?" I whispered to Chunk, "What the hell's he talking about?"
"I've got an idea," he replied, "but I'm not so sure I like it." Chunk peered into his helmet for a moment. I think he was making sure his radio was switched off. "There've been rumors, you know. I don't really believe it. You know how rumors are. Anyway"
"Spit it out."
"I was about to," he looked suspicious. At least he didn't glance over his shoulder. "The scuttlebutt is that two of the Colonels are ignoring the general order to demobilize. They're finding ways to hide weapons and even craft from Command. I heard they got the Avenger, and it's hidden somewhere in the Arctic. Also, fifty or sixty units of elerium are supposed to be missing from General Stores."
"That's ridiculous," I said, a little too loud. Chunk looked scared for a second. I quieted down, "General Stores is so tight they have to have new air delivered every week. Nothing gets out of there without half of Command approving." I sat back against the old ceramic alloy fuselage, "It's all squeak, just soldiers dreaming that it's not all coming apart."
Chunk sat back, too. He sighed a big sigh, "I know how they feel."
One or two of the newer squaddies had unstrapped themselves for the long ride to the Cheyenne Mountain Decommissioning Center--our first scheduled stop and my point of departure. It was a good thing Chunk and I hadn't. I'd guess we were somewhere over Alaska when the Skyranger suddenly heaved at least fifty degrees over to port. Markley and Chandra got dumped, armor and all. I could barely hear their scared screaming over the piercing whine of the engines and the clanging of writhing Power Suits. By instinct, I locked up my helmet and powered the suit. After so many missions, whatever had hit the transport wasn't going to kill me that easily. Chunk's suit was floating a centimeter above his cushion, thumbs up, when I turned to check him out.
As quickly as it had slewed over, the transport righted itself. It still felt shaky, so I kept my suit hot. I bit the radio toggle and started being a sergeant.
"Pipe down, Markely! You're not hurt!" I yelled. Every frequency was a zoo. "Grigory! Power down that suit! Martin! Shut up!" I unstrapped and floated over to the pathetic mass of flailing power armor. Whacking my fist against the back of Chandra's suit I switched frequencies, "Chandra, if you don't stop pretending to be unconscious, I'm throwing you out the airlock! Power up and get back in your seat. Now!" He got up.
Chunk had Markley by both shoulders and was holding him up in the air. As soon as the two of us had gotten into the act, everyone else had stopped squawking over the radios and settled down. War over or not, nobody wanted to get on the wrong side of Jefferson and Chunk.
Just then, the Captain got on the all-band, "Attention. Attention." The old guy wasn't shaken at all, which was typical. "We are having engine trouble. The pilots have found an airstrip and we have obtained permission to attempt an emergency landing. Everyone will secure themselves and remove their suit batteries. I repeat, remove the batteries from your armor. That is all."
I switched off my radio and turned to sign a snide comment to Chunk, but he was facing me with his hands out palms forward--the ancient signal for, "Not now, the boss is watching." I secured myself and made sure the rest of the soldiers were in place. I didn't like it, but I pulled my suit battery, too.
As Chunk placed his in the lockbox under his seat, he signed to me, "This stinks on ice."
Armstrong sat at the end of the aisle watching every soldier. He seemed especially interested in Chunk and I. I carefully signed where he couldn't see, "Batteries won't break on impact. He must know something he's not telling us." We'd never had a reason to distrust the Captain before, but you don't get to be an X-COM veteran unless you've got a big dose of paranoia in your personal makeup. Chrysalid victims always took care of trusting soldiers.
When I leaned down to stow my battery, I twisted slightly to hide my hands from Armstrong's line of vision. As fast as I could, I hit the elbow switch that armed the emergency backup battery, then twisted back. Armstrong knew we all had a backup. If he was up to something, he'd be watching to make sure nobody got a chance to touch their elbows. I figured I only had that one shot. Call it insurance.
The landing went off without a hitch. In fact, the only sign of engine trouble was the jittery flight in. The rear bulkhead dropped; just the sound made my adrenaline start pumping. This was the way every mission started: tingling all over, knowing you could die your first step out of the transport. I had no ammo and only the spare battery for my suit. Suddenly, I was scared. Best cure for that is having the responsibility for other people's lives.
I popped my helmet seal and started yelling, "Strap out! Stand in line! Clear your clips! Fall out!" I ran through the sequence for a return to base. If it didn't calm me down, it might at least have made some of the guys feel better. They trooped out onto the tarmac like good little soldiers. Chunk fed me a tight smile. He thought something was up.
If there was anything going on, it didn't show. Whoever was manning the airfield gave us exactly the wide berth the secrecy of our organization required--they never showed their faces at all. Armstrong led us off the runway and into a corrugated Quonset. The inside resembled nothing more than a military cafeteria--long tables and lots of plastic chairs. On his order, everyone removed their suits completely. Then we just stood there, feeling stupid in our underwear.
"We're going to be here a while, so make yourselves comfortable," he announced. "Colonel Gunkel tells me that no transport will be available to gather us up until tomorrow morning. Harris and Ong will be working on the engines until then." With that, he disappeared into a tiny room at one end of the building. He emerged seconds later with several cases of beer, which he dumped unceremoniously at the end of a table.
"Enjoy," he said. "You've earned it." We all did.
Half an hour later, everyone was feeling a lot better about the forced stopover. Several of the squaddies had already passed out, and even Chunk was wobbly on his feet. Leaning heavily on my shoulder, he confided in me, "Never could freakin' hold much." Then he sat down on the floor and started snoring, very loudly.
A few minutes later, I was the only one on my feet. They dropped where they stood--all over the floor, on the tables, or draped uncomfortably over a chair. "There's gonna be some achy soldiers tomorrow," I said to the sleeping room. That's when the floor opened up.
Right away, I went for my gun, but all I could do was sit down on the floor. It wasn't aliens that came boiling up out of the basement, anyway. Twenty or so white coats climbed up and started loading my soldiers onto stretchers. That seemed like a good idea; they needed to be woken up. I tried to say so.
"Ungh. Brrg. Mmph." I got somebody's attention, but I didn't communicate anything but my location. The guy who picked me up was big and blond with sensitive blue eyes. That's all I remember, except for a whizzing view of the ceiling and the rough sheet under my back. Then I went bye- bye.
I woke up flat on my back with a vicious headache.
There was a bright light shining in my eyes, but I knew I was in a hospital room. It's a smell you never forget. I tried to sit up, but nothing happened.
"Chunk?" I said weakly.
I thought I heard a woman say, "We got another waker!" The voice was really muffled and far away, though. I might have imagined it. I reached for my face, but my hand bumped up against something in the way. There was a hissing sound, very faint, and I started to feel cold again.
"What the hell's going on?" I said. "I have to report to the decomm center." I was woozy and didn't have any strength to struggle. "We're putting the X-COM equipment in storage." Was it really getting cold, or was I imagining it? "I have to go to decomm, dammit." I was starting to get pissed, but something struck me. A lot of things can make you feel cold--anesthesia, for one--but we were putting X-COM in storage...
