Sister Time-ARC

by John Ringo

  "Dude. I ran into somebody I had to deal with. I think I'll still get my paperwork done, but we'll have to rush lunch. See you at the chow hall. Over." He ended the transmission. Yeah, he could probably still get the information they came for, if it was here to be gotten, but getting back out was likely to be anything but clean.

  "Roger that," George answered, grimly.

  This time Sunday was able to get across the main hall and down to the damn hallway terminal without meeting anyone else. Once in, he had to begin the delicate process of convincing the computer that he was surfacing from his deep cover assignment and was authorized to access the files he needed. Getting into the mission files at all proved to be a trick, and then there was an extra level of coding to break to get down to the level of specific planets. After what must have been at least fifteen minutes, with cold sweat beading on his forehead, he pinned down the files he needed and downloaded them to his PDA. He spent more precious minutes covering his tracks within the system as he got back out. Finally, he was able to pull the buckley out of the wall and start back out of the building.

  A couple of men passed him, on their way back in, as he walked back down the hall. Harrison had seen him coming and finished off his conversation with the clerk, disappearing out the door. Sunday tossed the decoy buckley in the return bin at the desk on his way out.

  "Thanks, man. They shouldn't have let you out of here with one of those the first time."

  "You're right. Won't happen again."

  As he left the building, it felt like every one of the few men he passed was looking right at him. They weren't, he knew. It just felt that way, like a rifle was drawing a bead between his shoulder blades. He could pick out Schmidt One going down the hill past Cally and the still captivated guard. She was standing now, flexing her ankle experimentally as she laughed at something he said. She had one hand on his shoulder and his arm around her waist. For support, of course. Tommy's adrenaline was pumping too high to be even mildly amused at how easily she'd reeled the other man in. Once he got out of earshot down the hill he hit transmit again.

  "Lady, as soon as we're clear, disengage and haul ass. Big time." He didn't wait for a reply. It wasn't good communications discipline, if anyone was listening it was obvious as hell, but he didn't want her stalling to cover for Harrison and him any more than she absolutely had to. Maybe they wouldn't find the kid for awhile, but it wasn't the way to bet. Couldn't hurt to be paranoid.

  Down the slope a bit and he was looking for any chance away from enough eyes to make a break for the tree line. By the time he got it he was over a small footbridge and at least a couple hundred meters down from where Cally came in. His sense of direction told him about where the cut through would be at the fence line, and he hurried to get out of sight of the road as quickly and quietly as he could. Fifty meters back out he saw movement off to the northwest. He tensed up until something about the other man's movement identified him as Harrison. The big man whistled softly to catch his teammate's attention, and get him to wait until Tommy could close to within a normal walking interval. They were picking their way northwest as fast as they reasonably could when the klaxons started screaming again.

  "Oh, shit. Time to run for it. Damn, that was fast!" Tommy hit the ground flat on his back as Harrison yanking at the collar of his silks dropped him back with his running legs flying out from under him.

  "Not that way. The second a real Human being, or even an AID, looks at those readouts they're going to localize the hole in that fence faster than we can move—too easy to eyeball, too long to run there. This way." The smaller man led him at a sprint along the bank of the half dried and all frozen stream. Seconds later they were crouched in the stream bed at the fence and Sunday was watching the fixer adhere a downright dinky wire to the fencing with itty bitty alligator clips and bobby pins to hold it up out of the way, at a distance far too close to the ground to accommodate him.

  "I hope you're not expecting me to be able to squeeze under that," he said.

  "Shut up," the other man mumbled around some weird clips in his mouth, as he took an unfolding multi-tool and carefully started clipping wires. Something like a penlight shot out a blue beam that he swept across the ground at the based of a largish circle of the creek that turned to a mix of bubbling, steaming mud and chunks of frozen mud.

  Tommy was starting to get a bad feeling about this. With the sirens still screaming in their ears, he started swearing again as Harrison dug hands and clippers under the mud, clipping and pulling at the section of fence that extended down into the ground. Quicker than Tommy would have believed possible, the other man had pushed back a doggy-door of fencing that moved enough mud with it that the huge man could see getting through it was now a particularly nasty maybe instead of no way in hell.

  "Go," the fixer said. Getting caught wasn't exactly on their list of things to do on this mission. Tommy hit the mud and swore mentally, lips jammed shut, as the mud alternately scalded and froze him as he commando-crawled through the space that was almost big enough. He still probably wouldn't have made it through if Harrison hadn't planted his shoulder against his ass and pushed. On the other side, Sunday was covered with muck, inside and outside his uniform, in a way he hadn't been since the war. The fixer was squirming through the hole backwards, straightening the mud into something that didn't look quite as much like it had been crawled through. It wouldn't have fooled a two year old, but the other man pushed the fencing back as close to closed as he could get it, gave the muck a quick swipe with one arm, and took off running. Tommy hightailed it out behind him. Fuck noise and fuck bunching up, too. He pulled his PDA back out and wiped enough slime off the screen that he could see the first go to hell rendezvous point on the terrain map, maybe about two klicks away. Close enough for now. Distance. They were running in more or less the right direction, anyway. A gust of wind hit him full in the face and he felt the first big snowflakes hit his nose.

  "Hey! Excuse me, Ma'am, this is a restricted area." The guard who challenged her had gray eyes in an angular face. What there was of his hair under his cover was sand-colored and looked like he'd stuck his finger in a light socket. She gave him an apologetic half-smile, letting her eyes linger on his face with the perfect amount of interest to be encouraging but credible. It was blatant false advertising. She ruthlessly squashed the hint of pity.

  "Oh, is it? I'm so sorry, I didn't see the sign. I got a little turned around, anyway. Could you point me back to base housing? My sister-in-law is going to think I'm such a dummy," she said.

  As he kept approaching her, she moved towards him a bit less than halfway, judging the difference between flattery and triggering paranoia to within a hairsbreadth. A quick look back down the road and a helpless look back at him was enough to hook him and get him to follow her about a few meters down the hill. She made sure she had eye contact when she let her foot turn and took her spill.

  "Oooh!" She squealed, arching her back as she turned and grabbed her leg. "It's my ankle. . . ." She rubbed the alleged injury, extending her leg and trying to rotate her foot. She winced prettily.

  The guard squatted beside her, arm instinctively going behind her shoulders to support her.

  "Ow." She looked up into his eyes, arching just a little more.

  His eyes flashed down to her tits, and he released her, standing back abruptly. He looked more nervous than wary. She decided he didn't get out much—more leeway to flirt. Nervous, but trusting. Damn, there was that pity thing again. The team would be in and out without a trace. She wasn't getting him in trouble.

  "If there's swelling, I don't see much yet. Do you want me to call you a medic, Ma'am?"

  "I think I just twisted it a little. Would you mind?" She extended one slim hand for him to give her a hand up. He released it as she stood, so she put it on his shoulder to brace herself as she made a show of testing her weight on that leg.

  In her ear, she heard Tommy's voice. "Dude, I need a beer."

  The wind had pick
ed up and was whipping her silver-blond hair around her face. "Oooh, it's getting cold." She rubbed her hands together, coincidentally pushing her boobs forward with her arms. She felt his eyes drop again and smiled inwardly.

  "Do you think you're going to be able to get back your sister's house on that leg? If you do, you might want to get in out of the weather, Miss . . . ?"

  "Gracie. And it's my sister-in-law," she said, offering her hand to shake. "You've been so sweet, you've got to tell me your name."

  "Abrams, Ma'am—Gracie. Mark Abrams."

  "Well it's very nice to meet you, Mark. What the hell is that?" She slammed her hands against her ears and looked around, eyes wide and fearful, as the sirens went off signaling the start of a drill. "Is something wrong?"

  "Oh, it's just the Posleen alarm."

  "Oh my God!" She threw herself into his arms, clinging like a limpet. "Is there an attack? Are they coming in?"

  "Oh, no, it's just a drill," he said, awkwardly patting her on the back.

  "Are you sure? We're in feral land, aren't we?" She filled the words with terror.

  "Real sure. It's okay. They're just about all hunted out here." As a seven men came out the doors of the archive building, one of them nudged another and winked at PFC Abrams. Predictable. These men hadn't been hit by fellow humans in so long that security was a ritual afterthought.

  She disengaged herself from him, reluctantly. "You must think I'm such a dummy. It's the first time I've been in feral country. It's only my third time out of the Urb."

  Cally made small talk with him for a few more minutes, giving a fictional name for her supposed brother and mentally crossing her fingers. At a training base, people were always coming in and leaving. Since Fleet Strike was trying to give a more family-friendly appearance for PR, even short-term trainees brought their families along. Stupid policy, but it helped her out. She wondered how long she'd have to talk to this guy—Mark Abrams—before Tommy and Harrison got clear of the building. She also wondered whether Mark would get around to asking her out before she had to leave.

  "Dude. I ran into somebody I had to deal with. I think I'll still get my paperwork done, but we'll have to rush lunch. See you at the chow hall. Over," her earbug announced.

  "Roger that." George's answer to Tommy cut off.

  Shit. Shit shit shit. Better shift the conversation to something she could keep going longer. She might have to keep Mark talking for a good little while. She glanced at the treeline and started trying to figure out exactly how far she'd have to get down the road to sneak over and risk making a dash into the woods. She'd probably have to go all the way down to that bend.

  She suppressed nervousness when she started seeing men return from the drill. She sunk herself deeper into her cover role, almost forgetting it was a cover. By now, she had the private almost thinking they were soul mates. They had just discovered a mutual interest in woodworking. She had briefly dated someone who had a passion for it, and that was sustaining her so far, but she was encouraging him to talk as much as possible. There was no way to spare his career from what she was doing to it, which really sucked.

  "Lady, as soon as we're clear, disengage and haul ass. Big time," Tommy said in her ear just after he passed her. Just as if that wasn't pretty fucking obvious.

  "Oh, my God." She looked at her watch and back up at Mark's with dismay. "I told Carrie I'd watch the baby! I've got to go!"

  "Wait! How do I reach you?"

  "I'll call! I'll call tonight!" She lied, remembering to put a limp into her jog as she left the young soldier staring after her.

  "But you don't know my number!" She heard him call it after her, after a pause.

  "Mark Abrams! Got it!" She called over her shoulder, losing the limp as she got out of his line of sight. A quick glance showed nobody in view, she hit it straight into the woods, zipping her windbreaker over the glaringly bright top as she went. She was maybe ten meters inside the tree line when the sirens went off again.

  "Holy fuck!" She poured on the speed, dashing straight for the fence. They'd find the jumpsuit, but to hell with it. It only took about half a minute to reach the fence, but then she had to decide whether she was north or south of the hole. She went north for about two hundred meters before deciding she'd been going the wrong way. Unfortunately, she'd had to slow down to pace the fence line, sirens wailing the whole time so she had to look, not listen. The only benefit was that nobody could hear her moving over them, either.

  She stopped short when she saw the movement and heard the voices. There were two of them, but neither of them was Tommy's size. She faded backwards, trying to think of a plan B, fast.

  Up. Nobody ever thinks to look up. She shinnied up the oak tree nearest the fence. Pine would have provided more cover, if anyone looked, but the bark would have shown her passage. Perched on a solid limb, she examined her windbreaker, ensuring she had full coverage. Black wasn't camo, but at least it wasn't red. This limb extended over the other side of the fence. She looked down and clung to the tree, dizzily. Whatever the hell had possessed her to think climbing this thing was a good idea? She was going to get caught and shoved in another Fleet Strike interrogation room. She shuddered.

  Fuck, fuck, fuck. I am dead whether they catch me up this tree, or on the ground, or I fall and break my damned neck. Move, Cally, move. Besides, this branch must be a good four inches across. Nice, big branch. Yeah. Nice, big branch. She lay down on the limb, clinging to it, and inched her way forward. She shook her head to get the droplets of sweat out of her eyes and tried to ignore the beads dropping on the ground. She hugged the branch for dear life as a hard gust of wind almost knocked her off it, blowing a blast of snowflakes in her face. The wind was the last straw. She scooched forward on the limb as fast as she could go until she got to the other side of the fence, let herself swing down, and dropped to the ground. Her feet slid out from under her and she hit the ground, hard. It was worth it. She was not going to stay that far up in the air in high winds, with snow blowing in her face.

  She opened the buckley and looked at the terrain map. It was damned near useless, and she shoved the PDA back in her windbreaker pocket. The cube from George had been in her jumpsuit. She'd never gotten around to putting it in her cube reader slot. She picked a small hill that looked like it might have some likely cover and hauled ass.

  In the lee of a lichen-encrusted boulder, she shivered as heavy flakes of snow caught on her eyelashes and melted on her sweats. The fall was heavy—she'd be soaked in minutes. Her hands, already red and chafed from standing talking to the guard, shook with cold as she flipped the buckley back open and punched up a transmission. To hell with radio discipline, she needed an extraction.

  She wasn't getting a signal. She tapped the button a couple of times, but nothing. "Buckley, voice access please," she said. Silence. "Buckley?" Oh, goddamn. The fall. One of the falls. She pulled up a menu and selected a self-diagnostic, and put the thing back in her pocket. No telling how much damage there was, but right now it was no good to her.

  She couldn't hear any searchers, and the sirens had stopped. There would probably be a small pause while they got a real search together. Twenty more minutes, at most. She stood up and looked out from behind the boulder. Nothing looked familiar. She climbed on top of the boulder. The snow was heavier now. She wasn't even sure she could pick out the right hill of the base behind her. She was pretty sure, from the boulder and the hill she was on now, which direction was away from the base, but that was about it. She evaluated her situation, which sucked, and came up with a plan. She'd eaten a good breakfast, so her calories were good from some more body heat if she moved around. She needed more distance from the base. She needed shelter, because she sure as hell wasn't going to find her way out of east bumfuck Virginia with a broken buckley in the middle of this mess.

  She cursed the weather again and took off running in the away direction. She'd run for ten minutes and then rig a shelter with the first cover she saw. At least she could s
till see the ground. It wasn't yet totally white. She ran, glancing at her watch a couple of times, until she saw it was time to stop. She was on the flats, but off to the right it looked like there might be something besides trees. As she approached, she realized it was an oddly-shaped hill covered in vines. It had no trees except for a vertical branch of a partly fallen tree, that had clearly fallen over, its roots partly ripped out of the ground. At the base of it, she saw what might be a gap or small overhang, and burrowed into it.

  Under the vines and out of the wind it was still damned cold. It was immediately obvious why the "hill" had looked so odd. The line of the roof was straight, although slanted. She was right up against a tread and at the highest side of the opening. The other side wasn't quite on the ground, but the tread had been so smashed up, and sunken into the ground, that the huge SheVa tank shifted at a sideways slant. The treads on her side had also sunken about halfway into the ground, it appeared.