Book Two: The Tarantula Nebula
Day Three: Anzio, Italy
Sergeant Zebulon Brockway was scared. He and his best friend, Private First Class Rouy, had become separated from the rest of their squad. They’d encountered a German MG-34 and an unknown number of Wehrmacht soldiers out on the left flank, and had ducked back into the intersecting street in just in time to avoid being detected. The rest of their squad had run into the enemy out on the right flank, and had begun assaulting their position before Brockway and Rouy knew about it. Fighting through the position, they’d managed to leave their two friends behind. The error would soon be noticed, but at the moment the rest of their platoon was about to stumble right into the machine gun nest. 2nd squad was approaching at an oblique angle to the church the Germans occupied, and hadn’t seen them yet. Brockway had to warn them.
“Enemy contact, at the church!” Brockway screamed as loud as he could.
Rouy waved his arms to get 2nd squad’s attention. The men in 2nd squad hit the deck immediately. Brockway pointed his Garand rifle at the enemy position around the corner. The 2nd squad leader sent half his men around the left flank of the church, and the remaining men began setting up their .30 caliber machine gun.
“Let’s get in the war, Rouy,” said Brockway. “We have to draw their fire.”
Rouy nodded in agreement. “I’ll do it.”
Stepping back from the wall far enough to swing around his long BAR rifle, Rouy leaned around the corner and fired a five-shot burst at the enemy position. He returned to cover before he could determine any results, but that wasn’t the point. A couple of seconds later the MG-34 began firing at the corner. Brockway and Rouy backed up instinctively even though they were already safe. 2nd squad began throwing grenades towards the near corner of the church.
“They’ve got it now,” said Brockway, “let’s get back to 1st squad.”
Brockway and Rouy ran back to the last place they saw their squad. The street was deserted, but the sound of combat led them in the right direction. Brockway was beginning to get winded. The stress of the fight, his first real engagement, and the added weight of the water and sand that caked his trousers was taking its toll. Rouy seemed similarly tired, although his attitude remained fearless.
Moving down the street, Brockway noticed some of his guys running laterally across the next intersection. He kept his eyes on the rooftops and Rouy did the same with their six. Brockway couldn’t tell what was going on at the intersection, nor could he hear anything from his men. Stray rounds began zipping down the middle of the road.
Arriving at the intersection, Brockway and Rouy were met with a scene of destruction. The large open area, probably a town square, showed the results of naval bombardment. Craters dotted the road and fields, and ugly gashes had been torn in most of the buildings. Fires burned in places, the brisk wind carrying the smoke away and darkening the early morning sunlight. Tracer fire moved towards them, and the two men dove into the nearest crater. They found themselves with two more members of 1st squad.
“Where the hell is the enemy?” asked Brockway.
Private Howard motioned ahead. “Across the square, sergeant. They’ve got us pinned down with two machine guns. The first one is in the first building on the right, second floor. The second one is somewhere on the right, about two o’clock, ground level.”
“Where is the rest of the squad?”
“Over there.”
Private Howard pointed to four bodies lying off of the road ahead.
“Shit!”
One of their dead friends had the radio. Rouy deployed the bipod on his BAR and began firing at the first machine gun position. Tracer fire continued to fill the air, but so far none of it was headed directly at them.
“We’ve got to fix that machine gun,” said Brockway.
“Enemy at twelve o’clock!” yelled Rouy.
Ahead, a squad of Germans began advancing down the main road. Rouy shifted his fire toward them. Brockway took aim with his Garand and slowly pulled the trigger. Private Howard and Corporal Waldron joined in with their Carbines. Two of the Germans fell and the others took cover.
“We need mortar fire!” shouted Rouy.
“We can’t get to the radio,” replied Brockway.
The enemy ahead began firing at them. Brockway scrunched himself down further into the crater and searched for a target. He found one, fired, and the man disappeared from sight. Another squad ran forward and Brockway emptied his rifle at them. The characteristic ping of the clip ejecting was completely lost in the tremendous din.
“Get ready to fall back!” Brockway yelled, reloading.
“Throw some frags out on the line,” said Rouy.
“They’re out of range!” Howard cried.
“Just do it!”
All four men threw one grenade each as far as they could. A few seconds later they detonated, the staccato series of explosions shaking the earth. A large plume of dust began to rise.
“Covering fire!” screamed Brockway.
The men fired randomly through the dust.
“Go, go, go!”
Howard and Waldron ran back towards the street. Brockway continued firing until he was out. Rouy dropped the empty magazine out of his rifle and ran for it. Brockway was fast on his heels. Hopefully, second platoon would be off the beach by now. It would be nice if they identified them before they opened fire.
Something tugged roughly at Brockway’s left arm, spinning him around. He lost his balance and hit the ground. Brockway looked at his arm and was shocked to find everything below the elbow missing.
“I’m hit!” he bellowed.
Rouy reversed course and ran over to Brockway. He dropped his BAR and grabbed Brockway by his remaining arm. Brockway felt pain began to rise from the wound. As he stumbled along with Rouy, the pain rose to unbelievable agony like nothing he’d ever imagined. Brockway began to cry out and collapsed. Rouy dragged him behind an abandoned car.
“John, are you all right?”
“It hurts like hell!”
Rouy could see that Brockway was in real trouble.
“Do you want to end it?”
“Of course I want to end it, Ray! Get us the hell out of here!”
“Seth!” Rouy shouted into the air. “Seth, get us out of here now!”
Bullets smashed into the car, sending debris flying. A piece of glass lacerated Rouy across the face. The pain was terrible.
“Seth! End the damn game!”
The street in Anzio faded away. John and Ray were in a small room. A translucent orb hung suspended in the center of the room, and various pieces of computer equipment lined the walls. John stopped screaming and clutched at his intact arm. Ray felt the side of his face. They were both fine.
“Holy shit, Ray,” said John.
“Well, there’s some incentive to fight like you mean it. That was unbelievable.”
“We’ve got to talk to Seth about the pain level in there.”
“Why? This is combat training, right? I think we should keep the pain where it is. We want to take it seriously. The possibility of feeling pain will keep our behavior realistic.”
“Speak for yourself, you didn’t get your arm shot off.”
“True.”
“I also doubt Christie and Dana are going to be real thrilled with the possibility of unbearable agony, however brief it may be.”
“I suppose we could ask Seth to adjust the pain level for each individual participant. Realism is still essential. Getting shot has to be unpleasant.”
John moved his left arm around. “What about post traumatic stress disorder?”
“I doubt it could get that bad. Nobody is really dying, after all.”
“S
ometimes the subconscious mind has trouble distinguishing reality from fantasy.”
“We’ll have to wait and see, I guess. Come on, let’s get a drink.”
John and Ray exited the orb room and entered the galley. The hum of the stardrive vibrated the deck slightly. John entered the kitchenette section and retrieved a bottle of rum.
“This is only the third day out,” said Ray. “That stuff has to last us indefinitely.”
“That’s why I’m only giving us a shot each.”
John had his own personal supply of alcohol if he wanted to get drunk. He poured the rum and sat down at the dining table with Ray.
“Here’s to our first training mission,” said Ray, holding up his glass.
“May the rest of them be much less painful.”
“That’s wishful thinking.”
“It can’t hurt to get used to a little suffering.”
1. Day Seven
John Scherer sat on the bridge of the Reckless Faith, the first Earth spacecraft to venture beyond the solar system. He was sitting in the pilot’s chair, his feet propped up on the console. The lights were turned down, only the monitors and the stars illuminated the bridge. John was engaging in his favorite recreational activity: watching the universe go by.
They had passed out of the Milky Way galaxy yesterday. Their relative motion had been difficult to perceive while they were in the galaxy, but now their view had been replaced with the motionless panorama of the Large Magellanic Cloud. It would be another four weeks before they reached the outer edge. What was much more interesting to observe was the slow retreat of the Milky Way to the aft, but with no windows facing in that direction such a task required the zero-g room.
The Reckless Faith had a crew of seven, counting a stowaway named Byron. John was not the captain, in fact, there were no ranks aboard. Instead each crewmember had a role, and decisions were made by quorum. John was assigned as primary pilot, although his most useful role was with their on-board artificial intelligence computer, nicknamed Seth. John could communicate telepathically with Seth more efficiently than the others; indeed, Seth favored him for that function. John and the others preferred to communicate with Seth verbally, but some information was more effectively relayed by telepathic link. If Seth was having difficulty expressing a concept verbally, John would link with him and provide an abstract translation.
Seth, the highest level of AI yet created, was not capable of verbal communication alone. He needed an intermediate mind with which to link. Since it was physically exhausting for humans to link with him, and since all six crewmembers found sharing their minds psychologically disturbing, animals were used instead. A cat named Friday and a dog named Tycho took turns providing this link, freeing up the humans to perform other duties. The animals did not seem to be tired out by the task, so they traded twelve-hour shifts on the bridge. At the moment Friday was sitting in John’s lap, purring.
The animals had minds of their own, and when linked with Seth they were capable of verbal communication as well. They were remarkably simplistic, not unlike children, but seemed to be completely unconcerned with learning anything unrelated to their normal existences. They would listen well enough, but would change the subject to food, sleep, or play when asked to participate in the discussion. Friday finally said, “I’m not interested in that,” in response to a mathematics question. Christie Tolliver, the ship’s resident astronomy expert, continued to try to make progress with Tycho. John didn’t care; Christie could spend her personal time however she wished. Unfortunately for the animal behaviorists back on Earth, being able to have a conversation with a favored pet was a luxury limited to this spacecraft. Being able to use animals as an intermediary with the AI was discovered by accident.
Friday was John’s cat, and when she was able to verbally express her affection for his master, John found it both endearing and embarrassing. John had wondered if there was anything compromising he might have said or done in front of Friday over the years, but Friday and Tycho didn’t seem to have any concept of time. Everything was either in the present or the immediate future. Trying to impress upon them anything more had the same results as the mathematics.
The concept of time was not lost on the crew, however. Being aboard the first spacecraft capable of faster-than-light travel was thrilling beyond anything they could possibly desire. Unfortunately, after only a week, even the groundbreaking technology and never before seen interstellar vistas had become commonplace. John couldn’t help but acknowledge the human brain’s curious tendency to become accustomed to practically any circumstance, providing for certain comforts. The uncertainty of their mission also dampened any rampant enthusiasm, since it could very well result in the crew’s hideous demise.
One week into the trip, John was still excited and hopeful. That morning he had awoken in his quarters to the same sense of wonder and positive anticipation he had since the very first days of the space project. During the first few days John often awoke thinking he was still in his Woburn, Massachusetts home, and was elated to remember his actual situation. He toured the ship after breakfast, and loved every square inch of it. For all this amazement, things were nonetheless becoming routine and normal. Boredom began to creep into the daily retinue of emotions. Every day after lunch, the crew would meet for a situation report. The past six days had resulted in very short meetings. Five more weeks of nothing was a prospect that weighed heavily on John’s mind, if only for the sheer frustration of having to wait so long.
Using Seth as a recreational and instructional simulator was also the result of serendipity. When in direct physical contact with the AI unit, members of the crew could participate in whatever scenario they could imagine. Seth could create images perfectly from the minds of the crew, even if their own memory of such things was hazy or worse. For example, John was able to experience his first day of kindergarten again vicariously, despite the fact that he couldn’t have consciously remembered a thing on his own. Revelations from other crewmember’s pasts were either the subject of conversation during mealtimes or never spoken of again.
It was these fantasy worlds that were the most popular form of boredom relief for the crew, with the variable gravity “zero-g” room a distant second. A sheet of paper was taped to the wall inside the orb room for signing out blocks of time for use. Seth didn’t seem to have any problem running simulations for them in addition to performing essential ship functions, except when five or more crewmembers participated simultaneously. Over the past seven days, it seemed that there was always at least one person in there running a sim, even in the middle of the night. Most of the time, the crew would discuss what they’d been up to. Sometimes they did not. John didn’t care to speculate too much about the latter.
Along with Ray Bailey, the ship’s weapons systems specialist, John had continued to try out their World War Two battles. They’d become a lot better over the past few days, but surviving a single scenario still evaded them. John and Ray had both been shot and blown up several times now, each defeat bringing with it more pain and trauma. They’d finally succumbed to the temptation to adjust the pain settings; it was simply too rough on them to have it be completely realistic.
Ari Ferro, the ship’s computer systems expert, refused to do so herself, although this resulted in her participating in the firefight sims much less. She preferred hand-to-hand training, and it was Ari putting the hurt on her imaginary foes more often than the other way around. If she was good before, she was becoming downright scary now. It was probably an excellent outlet for her natural ruthlessness, but John found that it did nothing to temper it elsewhere.
Chance Richter, the ship’s tactical expert, was the only other one who kept the pain level at realistic. He preferred more contemporary combat sims, as it reflected his real-life background as a Marine sniper and CIA operative. John and Ray had participated in some of his scenarios, and had begun learning standard US military doctrine for infantry tactics. It seemed prudent, as did Ari’s unarme
d combat training, but without any idea of their potential enemies it was nothing more than exercise in self-improvement.
Dana Andrews, the ship’s engineer, had practically no interest whatsoever in the combat aspect of the simulations. She all but refused to participate in that sort of training. Christie knew it was most likely a good idea, and tolerated it, but Dana avoided it explicitly. The first time had been the last time for Dana, so far. Getting shot in the head didn’t help.
Only the stowaway Byron had been denied the use of the simulations, for obvious reasons. John was putting off dealing any further with Byron, only because Byron was clearly insane and showed no real willingness to integrate himself into the crew. He’d snuck aboard in an attempt to further a romantic relationship with Christie, at least that was the flatly obvious reason. She’d been an astronomy professor at Suffolk University, and he was one of her students. Byron thought they were meant to be together. He also thought that he was meant to play a significant role in the Faith’s mission. If he’d just cut the crap about destiny, John thought, he might talk his way out of the aft cargo hold. John realized that Byron might just as well be right about his role in the Faith’s mission; after all, John couldn’t tell the future. The prospect only furthered his growing acceptance of Ari’s suggested solution: chuck Byron out of the airlock. He was indeed an unexpected tax of the ship’s resources, even if he was only using 14.3 percent more food, water, and oxygen than expected.
For now, John was glad to leave him to chill out along with the boxes of ammunition, spare plumbing supplies, and medical paraphernalia. If he didn’t smarten up, he deserved the incarceration.
Ray entered the bridge from the main hallway. It was nine o’clock at night, a meaningless designation except to the humans used to such a schedule. Ray was the tallest member of the crew, at six foot one. He was soft spoken and immediately likeable in nature. He and John had been friends since college, putting their relationship at nine years old. Ari fell under the same description, except she had arrived one year later. Between the three of them, their candor often left the other members of the crew feeling left out. It did provide a strong sense of camaraderie that Christie and Dana wished to share.
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