Insignia

by S. J. Kincaid

  Tom and Beamer entered a thirteenth floor training room. It resembled the one Marsh and Olivia had showed him on his tour: vast and dim, with a series of cots in a circle, EKG monitors at the ends.

  “Do we need to put on electrodes or something?” Tom asked Beamer, pointing to the EKGs.

  “No. There’s a neural wire under the cot, and it goes in your brain stem neural access port.”

  Tom’s hand flew back to his neck, to the round port he’d felt earlier.

  “It’s how you hook into the simulations and get downloads, too,” Beamer added. “Just stick the wire in, and the neural processor will do the rest.”

  They settled on empty beds. Tom spotted Wyatt Enslow already perched on one of them, her long legs curled up in front of her.

  Tom said, “Hey.”

  She replied, “Shh.”

  Nice to see you, too, Tom thought.

  Plebes continued to shuffle in, and then Elliot Ramirez came and slid onto the edge of the last empty cot. The EKG monitor bathed his black hair in a faint green glow. “Good to see you’re all on time.” He beamed at Tom. “Now, let’s give a warm welcome to our newest member, Tom.”

  Awkward clapping followed. Tom felt for a strange moment like he’d accidentally wandered into a support group.

  “You see, Tom,” Elliot went on, “I don’t like to throw my plebes into a simulation like a lot of other instructors do. It’s important we all have a chance to chat first, get out some of our emotions, decompress from the tensions of the day. I like to get my group thinking about self-empowering topics. Today, we’re going to discuss something very important. And that thing is perhaps the most important concept of all: self-actualization.”

  Elliot was silent a moment to let the lofty words sink in. Then he launched into a tedious description of something called Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. He related those needs to anecdotes from his own life, and other moving tales of triumph over adversity he’d read in letters from his many adoring fans. Then he veered into a discussion about the triumph of the human spirit.

  Tom grew so restless with the talk about self-empowerment that he almost shifted his weight right off the cot. He knew—just knew—that Heather and even that Genghis Division guy, Karl Marsters, had been running their own groups through fantastic simulations for over a half hour while Elliot perched in that preschooler circle with them, delighting himself with the sound of his own voice.

  After what seemed like an eternity, Elliot gave a start. “Wow. Has it been thirty minutes? Time sure zipped by, didn’t it?”

  Tom laughed. He muffled it behind his hand and pretended it was a cough. Elliot flicked him a glance but bought it. Wyatt shot him a ferocious scowl, and Beamer gave a not-so-subtle conspiratorial grin.

  “Let’s get started with the simulation, everyone,” Elliot called. “Hook yourselves in.”

  A shuffling sound filled the chamber as the plebes around him leaned down to grab neural wires from beneath the cots, then they connected them to their brain stem ports and stretched out on their cots. Tom heard clicks throughout the room, and he reached down to grab his own wire. He was so excited suddenly that his hands shook as he unwound it.

  “Hold on there, Hot to Trot.”

  It took Elliot’s grip on his shoulder to make Tom realize he was the one being addressed.

  Elliot raised a finger. He seated himself at the foot of Tom’s cot, waiting out the others. Within moments, they were as good as alone. The rest of the plebes had lapsed into silence and utter stillness. The EKG monitors registered the steady electric lines of their heartbeats.

  “Is something wrong?” Tom blurted.

  “Tom, I realize we’re not military regulars, but I’m your superior, and you need to address me as sir.”

  “Right.”

  Elliot waited.

  “Right, sir.”

  Elliot removed the coil of wire from Tom’s grasp and began unwinding it with a graceful, fluid twirl of his hands. “Now, Tom, do you know much about Applied Simulations?”

  “I know enough,” Tom said. “We enter a group simulation, we work as a team, we carry out some objective. It’s all in the brain, like Calisthenics without the workout.”

  “Not quite, Tom. You see, in Calisthenics, you’re presented with false images, but you’re still aware of your own body. In Applied Sims, you are literally receiving sensory info directly from your neural processor according to the simulation’s parameters. Applied Sims is designed to mimic the way we use neural processors to interface with machines in combat. Hooking in feels like being inside a new body. You may not remember yourself; you may only know what your character knows, depending on the parameters of the program. Some people find it frightening the first few times because it’s a total immersion experience. The emphasis is on teamwork.”

  “Sounds great.”

  “You say that, but I bet you’re nervous.”

  “I’m really not.”

  “Oh, sure you’re not.” Elliot gave him a knowing look Tom did not appreciate at all. “Now, Tom, the first time hooking in can be scary. I like to take my plebes through it personally.”

  “I’ll be okay. Sir.”

  But Elliot strode around to the other side of the cot. “Lean forward.”

  Tom braced his hands on the edge of the mattress and dipped his head. A hand clasped his shoulder to anchor him in place. Tom clenched his jaw. Elliot was so close that he could feel hot breath on his neck.

  “You can let me know if you get frightened or uncomfortable. It’s pretty common—”

  “I’ll be fine,” Tom cut in. Then, “Sir.”

  The wire clicked into his brain stem and the world tunneled into blackness. All sensation seeped from his limbs with a horrifying abruptness.

  “That happened faster than I . . .” Tom’s voice blurred away mid-sentence.

  The last glimpse he had through his own eyes was of the world flying downward as he keeled over.

  AND THEN TOM was not Tom.

  Blinding whiteness on all sides of him. An icy tundra crushed beneath a thick gray sky. Chill wind stung at his eyes, his skin, yet it felt perfect to him, bracing.

  A strange feeling pulsed through him, his muscles, his tendons. Blood, vitality, life. He bounded forward, his paws treading over the cold, hard snow, and the scents tearing at his nostrils overwhelmed him. His vision became a dim afterthought and all he could do was stand there, experiencing the tastes on the wind.

  The earthy scent of friends.

  A hot, rich taste of prey.

  That distracted him. He thrust his muzzle up into the wind and inhaled it, the teasing, taunting scent calling to him. But there was something else.

  Danger.

  He thrust his muzzle against the icy ground and checked on it. An image in his head: the stale white fur of a predator, blood-crusted paws, a low roar.

  Danger gone for some time now. A massive predator. Stalking across the snow. Gone now.

  He followed more scents, entranced. Ice . . . metal . . . dirt . . . man . . .

  Howling.

  The call of his friends split the air. He hurled himself toward them without deciding to, tearing across the snowy plain, driven by an insatiable need to add to that sound. The scent of family grew stronger and richer in his nostrils and then he was among the other wolves of his pack and throwing back his head, the sound rising from deep in his throat. The wail seemed to pierce the sky above them and spread over the valley, a sense of union like he’d never known before welling inside him.

  The largest and the strongest wolf charged into their midst. The tails of the other wolves flopped down submissively. Ferocious barking from the alpha, and then the alpha whipped around and charged toward that scent on the wind, toward the sweetness of prey with its fresh, pulsing blood and tender flesh. The pack became a gray surge tearing over the plains, tails straight and tense, following their leader.

  The warm, rich scent of prey mounted on the air, its gathering power the sin
gle measure of time. They stayed with the winds, icy blasts of it carrying the scent toward them while concealing their approach from the target.

  Then they were upon their prey. The moose raised its massive head. It knew they were closing in on it. It bounded forward and tried to run, but the alpha snarled and cut off its retreat. The prey knew it could not outrun them. As the alpha tore toward the beast, it turned and ducked its massive horns, ready to impale him. The alpha leaped clear by instinct.

  The rest of the pack enveloped the creature, leaping forward, nipping, gnashing at it with teeth. Barks and growls filled the air along with the bellows of the massive creature. Hooves swiped down and the bloody scent of the first wolf killed—Beamer—roused something human in Tom.

  Two more went down, victims to those massive horns, yet the alpha wolf kept circling, leaving tiny, gashing injuries on the magnificent creature too powerful to be toppled by such a pitiful attack.

  So Tom hung back.

  Tom ignored the call of instinct, demanding he join the fruitless attack, the subroutines trying to force him in line with the alpha’s plan. He instead watched, like Tom the boy in the VR parlors used to, and he saw his opening. He didn’t hesitate. He sprang into the fray, flying right over the heads of the others, and faster than any human could ever move, lashed forward to clamp his teeth around the moose’s throat. In one smooth movement, he tore at cartilage and flesh while propelling himself away. Hot blood spurted over him, and he was out of reach before the lethal hooves could dash his brains out.

  It was finished. The creature staggered, dark blood gushing from its gaping neck wound. It sagged to its knees, then heaved up, but now other wolves tore at its tendons; its hindquarters; its soft, vulnerable abdomen. Tom licked at the fresh blood on his lips, feeling so alive and dangerous in that instant he never wanted the simulation to end.

  Then he heard a low rumble. Danger swelled on the icy air.

  Tom grew aware of Elliot stalking toward him, legs ramrod stiff, tail curled forward, ears slanted, jagged teeth on full display. Responding to his defiance. A warning note of instinct thrilled through Tom and he knew what Elliot was trying to do with those narrowed eyes fixed on him, with that fur bristling. Tom did not move. A ferocious bark tore from Elliot’s throat.

  Tom understood the order. The instinct and parameters in his brain urged him to obey the alpha, but the blood was sweet on his lips, and to the depths of his being he rebelled against the very notion of rolling over and baring his belly, his throat, accepting a position of subservience to this one even if he was torn apart for it. Power and a sense of possibility ripped through him. He could defeat the alpha, he was sure of it. Claim the pack, make it his. He felt a prickling as fur bristled up all over his body, and his lips curled back to bare his own teeth, the growl mounting in his throat.

  The other wolf rose to its hind legs and lifted a paw above its head in a completely human gesture. And in that way, Elliot ended the simulation.

  TOM OPENED HIS eyes and gazed up at the slashing green line of the EKG, blazing through a standard rhythm. He grew aware of a hollow ache inside him as the sense of union, of belonging, faded away into nothing. He sat up fast enough to make his vision darken for an instant. Around him, everyone else was rousing as well.

  Except for the dead ones. Beamer was already up, his elbows perched on his knees. He shrugged. “Death by moose.”

  Inside Tom’s head, the neural processor registered that more than two hours had passed. Time held a very different meaning as a wolf.

  “Wow,” Tom whispered, his mind blown.

  Elliot sat up, tucked his wire back beneath his cot, and told them all to sit again for post-conference. He sighed loudly, focused his attention on Tom, and folded his arms over his chest. “So tell me, what did you do wrong, Tom?”

  “What?”

  “Tell me what you did wrong.”

  Tom glanced at the faces around him, carefully neutral, and back at Elliot. “I did something wrong?”

  “The point of Applied Sims,” Elliot said, pointing toward the back of his own neck, “is not just getting you used to the idea of mentally detaching from your body and interfacing with another form using the neural processor. The point is to practice teamwork.”

  “I know that. You said so earlier.”

  “Clearly, no, you don’t know that. The scenario was about emotional attunement: a pack of wolves working as one to take down a moose. You should’ve helped the pack kill the prey. Instead, you broke with the team and worked all by yourself. And then you tried to challenge my leadership of the pack. That indicates to me, Tom, that you don’t feel like being a team player. You didn’t feel like going with the team strategy. That concerns me.”

  “But the team strategy sucked. Three of us were already dead.”

  “Tell me, then, Tom—what do you call a lone wolf that doesn’t work with others?”

  Tom thought about that, a bit puzzled. There was a trick question in here, right? “Er, you call it a lone wolf.”

  Elliot’s mouth bobbed noiselessly open and closed—like he was caught off guard because he hadn’t even thought of that—and then he shook his head. “No, Tom. It’s called a coyote.”

  Silence filled the room.

  Wyatt raised her hand and waited for Elliot to acknowledge her, as if they were all sitting together in a classroom. When he waved graciously for her to speak, she blurted exactly what Tom was thinking: “Coyotes aren’t a type of wolf. Coyotes and wolves are two entirely different species.”

  But if Elliot caught the implication that he’d just said something astoundingly stupid, he didn’t show it. Instead, he nodded, like Wyatt had made his point for him. “Exactly, Wyatt. Exactly.” He turned back to Tom. “Think about what she said, Tom. Wolves and coyotes are entirely different species. Think about that long and hard.”

  UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

  HarperCollins Publishers

  .....................................................................

  Chapter Seven

  THE NEXT DAY, Tom opened his eyes, wide-awake, when the neural processor informed him, Consciousness initiated. The time is now 0630.

  Vik sat up at the same time and mumbled that he was going to go check and see whether Beamer was “capable of ambulating today,” or whether he’d binge downloaded all his homework after yet another long night with his girlfriend.

  Tom tossed off the covers and stretched. Sore muscles and tendons objected all over his body. He wasn’t used to exercise.

  He also wasn’t used to growing 0.86 of an inch in the course of a night.

  Tom registered the height change with a shock. But the neural processor informed him of it. He leaped to his feet, and found that his eyes were definitely looking down from a greater height than on the day before.

  Vik hadn’t been kidding at breakfast when he’d told him about the nutrient bar. Tom was having a serious growth spurt.

  He loved being pseudomachine.

  PROGRAMMING CLASS ALSO met in the Lafayette Room, only this time there were plebes, Middles, Uppers, and CamCos there. It was the only class they shared with all levels of the Spire. Vik told him it was because Programming was the hardest class, and most everyone sucked at it equally.

  Tom settled with Vik, Yuri, and Beamer on the same bench they’d grabbed the day before during civilian classes. “So Programming’s that bad, huh?”

  “That’s one way of putting it.” Vik slung his boots up on the back of the bench in front of him. “We’re not allowed to use the neural processor to do the work for us. The processor will do some stuff, sure, like memorize the rules of syntax and semantics for you, but you actually have to sit down and piece it all together. You have to use your brain and write the code yourself. It’s tedious and awful.”

  “Speak for yourself, Viktor. I am happy to use my—” Yuri grew limp and keeled over onto Tom’s side.

  Vik flicked Tom an amused glance as he struggled to dislodge the de
ad weight. “The Zorten II computer language is Indo-American neural processor-specific, so it’s classified, so Yuri’s neural processor sends him into shutdown mode.”

  Between Tom and Beamer, they were able to prop Yuri up on the bench in a way that stopped him from crushing either of them.

  “What does he remember happening during Programming?” Tom asked Vik.

  “I asked him once what he thought of this class, and he started rambling about ‘munchkins’ and ‘fractals.’ I think he just gets so scrambled, he doesn’t even realize he’s scrambled later.”

  The door to the lecture hall slid open, and chattering voices died away. Tom looked up, and saw an imposing man with close-cropped brown hair and a hawkish face stride up to assume the podium. His profile said he was:

  NAME: James Blackburn

  RANK: Lieutenant

  Grade: 0-3, USAF, Active Duty

  IP: 2053:db7:lj71::008:ll3:6e8

  SECURITY STATUS: Top Secret LANDLOCK-10

  He greeted them with, “Well, folks, I had a big laugh after your class prank.”

  Then a ping in Tom’s brain: Morning classes have now commenced.

  “I had to look over your firewall programs twice just to be sure.” Blackburn leaned his elbows on the podium, his broad shoulders stretching his fatigues. “At first, I honest to god thought those were the real programs. But then I realized—no, these are the best and the brightest young people in the USA even without neural processors. They couldn’t possibly be serious about such laughable, poorly written code. So, well done—you had me, trainees. Now where are the real programs? Feel free to submit them now.”