by Isaac Stone
He was much older than I was and had to be in his later 50’s. What was he doing in this infernal heat at his age. Why hadn’t he gone back when he had the chance? Surely, someone of his age and rank could pull a better post.
“I’m sorry, sir,” I told him. “The heat, you know. It takes getting used to.”
My eyes scanned the office and I saw the reason why he chose to stay in this remote part of the British Empire. There was a small photograph of his wife and children behind him. She wore a sari and had the look of a local woman. The children, all five of them, favored both parents and were dressed in proper English school attire. The major had married her in his twilight years and started a family in this humid place. He had every reason to stay here. I couldn’t help but admire that little touch which added some backstory into the game.
“You’ll have to get used to it because it won’t improve,” he told me. “At least the rains bring some relief from the heat, but now you will have to learn to bear the waterfalls from the sky. At least it’s not as bad here as it was a hundred years ago. I once heard that in those days the average lifespan of a westerner was two monsoons.”
I blinked and tried to remember what Heath told me about this scenario. I was in a country somewhere on the other side of the current border of India. What minute. The country of India didn’t exist as a separate entity until the British pulled out after World War 2, at which time they divided up the former region into Pakistan and India. So was this a real country that had a historical basis, or was it somewhere invented by the geniuses at Ruby to create a pulp adventure world for the game? The end result wouldn’t make a lot of difference since I was inside a computer simulation anyway. They could call this country “Bob” and I would still have to buy into it if I wanted to find that box and win the game.
It appeared they’d sent me into the initial interview with my commanding officer. This was a lot different from the last time where I was dropped on the mountain with my supplies and expected to locate the team I needed to help me. So long as I played along with the game, I would do just fine. I did wish the game designers had done something about the heat. Realism was fine, but a tropical environment was full of all kinds of unpleasantness if they wanted to take it to extremes. And right now, it appeared this is what they wanted to do.
“I knew your father, captain,” the major said to me. “He was a good man. Terrible thing that happened to him out on the Transvaal. I wouldn’t wish that end on any man.” Of course, I nodded my head with understanding, although it made no sense to me what he said. Beta-tester note, give your player character some insight as to his own background before dropping him into the game!
“It’s one of the reasons I brought you here,” he told me. “I knew you needed a change of scenery after that business with the lion. Don’t worry, we have no lions in Baharaj, but there are some large jungle cats you do need to worry about. You will soon learn of them, let us pray to God you never encounter one without less than a full clip.”
“How was your trip?” he asked. I heard a sound and a small man in a white uniform poured the officer a drink. He gave one to me as well and retired to a corner in the room. Rank did have its privileges at this point in time. However, it would have its responsibilities as well, which the British would find out when if the Japanese Army invaded Singapore.
“About as best as expected,” I told him. “At least they had a decent place for me. I assume the roads will be dirt covered from here on out?”
“Except for the rail lines,” he told me. “The train runs all the way up to the Maharajah’s station in Dunwoody. It cost us a lot to put it up there, but it was a small price to pay to keep him on our side.”
I looked down and saw the pistol holstered to my side. Good, this would be the one I needed to use when I had to communicate with the VR team. I wanted to pull it out and activate the communicator in the handle, but doing so would break character and compromise the game. Next to my foot was a briefcase, which carried the logbook that would help me as the game progressed. The logbook should also carry the location of the next plot cache I would need to progress in the game.
“Now I need to talk to you about the nature of your mission,” the major said as he tossed his drink back. He sat it down and the white-uniformed orderly picked it up before the glass touched the table.
I followed suite and finished my drink too. I could taste the bitter flavor of something in it and suspected quinine flavoring. Malaria was a constant threat in this part of the world and the British came up with vermouth to hide the bad taste of the natural remedy. Likewise, the orderly, who appeared to be a local man, took my glass. He avoided my eyes, but that would all change in less than ten years if history followed the time line in my reality.
He walked over to the wall and pointed to a location on a huge map that covered it. “Here is where you will be headed,” he explained to me. His hand swept down lower and he indicated another place. “This is the end of the rail line at the Maharajah’s station. As you can see, there is quite a bit of distance to be covered. But it can’t be helped. I need you to recover a courier box, which carries documents crucial to His Majesty’s Empire. If those documents are not recovered, or fall into the hands of a hostile power, the consequences would be terrible to consider. I don’t have to remind you who is on the march. If the Japanese or Germans get that box, it would cost us the alliance of several Asian powers. We can’t afford to lose their support with war brewing.” I nodded in understanding.
“Are you at liberty to say what is in this box?” I asked him.
“No. You are one of five people who even know it exists. It is small, five by six inches and bears the seal of the empire on the cover. Whatever you do, do not open that box. If you find the seal broken, we will assume the other side knows about the contents, but I still need it returned to me just the same.”
“But if the seal is broken,” I told him, deciding to push the game's logic engine just a bit, “Why not destroy the contents, providing any are left inside?”
“Leave these matters to me and my counter-intelligence team. All I want is the intact box returned to this office.”
I nodded to show I understood what he meant, even though I didn’t. It was, at least a solid stock answer on the part of the game's AI.
“And now I need to talk to you about the man who disappeared with the courier box,” the colonel continued. “It’s part of the story of how the box came to be missing and might have some bearing on finding it."
I leaned closer to listen. Out of the corner of my eye, I notice the orderly’s expression change. The colonel wanted to ignore him, but I noted a sudden interest. The colonel’s loyal man Friday passed information on to someone else. I suspected the cause was financial, but he might be tied into one of the many revolutionary movements that plagued the British Empire during its long slide into history.
I turned and looked into a mirror mounted on the wall. It was there for the colonel to use when he dressed every day, I was sure, but I was able to get a good view of the body they’d given me for this trip in the VR world. Gone was the hunky Jeff Chandler body. It was replaced by a tall, gaunt man with an abundance of black hair that was slicked into place. This one resembled Carry Grant. Not bad all things considered.
“Major Farnsworth Buttersnipe was a fascinating man,” he told me, as the colonel starred out the window, which was good because I had to stifle a laugh. That name was going to take some getting used to. “The empire produced very few men like him. He spoke all the local dialects and new more about the history of this part of the world than people who’ve lived here all their lives. The army brought him in to help build the rail line to the maharajah’s palace, but he spent most of his time sketching temples and copying over books he would find written on palm leaves. Most of his books were published when he got back to England, but some never saw print.”
The colonel turned away and looked out the window. “One of his tomes on the tantric cul
ts of the Upper Ganges was very shocking,” he told me. “It almost cost him his rank. My dear wife is from these parts, you may have noticed, and even she couldn’t believe the things he talked about.”
The colonel turned and starred at me directly in the face. “You need to know that there are many things in this strange land which your local priest would find disgusting. I tell you this as both a warning and advice to go easy with the locals. The may seem meek and simple, but they are heirs to a great deal of knowledge that England never discovered.” Thus, he explained all the children in the photograph, a bit unusual for a man of his age at this time. I was willing to bet Mrs. Colonel was waiting for him at home so they could get started on the next one.
“He was truly an astounding man, Major Buttersnipe,” the colonel went on, “but he was supposed to take that box somewhere else. However, he heard talk of a lost city of Virkya in the jungles and decided to make a stop before he continued on his journey. We lost track of him three months ago. The last anyone heard came from one of his drivers who claimed the entire party was attacked by tribes. The driver made his way back to the nearest imperial outpost and told the representative what happened.”
“And this is where you come in,” he told me. “You have to find that box, or at least prove it was destroyed. So long as there is a chance that box survived the attack, the empire will not be able to rest easy.”
“I understand the difficulty involved, sir,” I told him. “You can depend on me to find it, should the box still exist.” Of course, it existed, if it didn’t, there would be no game to find it, but hey, you roll with it.
“But the dangerous jungles near the mountains aren’t the only thing you have to fear,” he added. “We have reports the Germans have sent their people on the trail to find it. We know they wanted to locate the same lost city that Buttersnipe tried to find for their own reasons.”
“We fought them in the European war,” I told him as I used the popular term for World War 1. “We beat them then, we’ll beat them again. Besides, this is the jungle, what experience to the Jerries’ have with jungle warfare?”
“Are you serious, captain?” The colonel said to me, as his mood changed. “I thought you were a graduate of Sandhurst! The Germans have colonies in Africa. They were busy in the southern tip and tried to expand into Mozambique! Didn’t you ever encounter them in the years you spent around the Boer?”
Oh, now I’d done it. I was very close to ending the game. If the colonel’s character decided I was some kind of spy, he might end it all right now. The game would terminate and I would need to start over. Easy enough to do, but time consuming and it could cost me any extra bonus I wanted to achieve. Beta-tester extra big time note to brief the player on their background if its going to be so integral. This is basic stuff, but I suppose that's why you hire testers.
“Of course,” I told him as I attempted to extract myself from the flub. “I was thinking of continental Germans, not their Namibian cousins.”
“I see. Just the same, Hitler and his bullyboys have trained all manner of commandos to carry out his will in the world. We knew months ago that he’d dispatched a team of his personal SS guard to find the lost city. These are the worst of the lot, fantastically dedicated to the man and determined to prove them. The courier box would be a major prize for them to take back to Berlin. I want you to know what you’re up against today. They’ll stop at nothing to achieve their mission. I’ve heard they graduate their academy by killing puppies, if you can believe that. Disgusting.” He shook his head.
I’d heard plenty of gruesome things about the SS over the years and I doubted anything he could tell me would top it. Just the same, it was something else to watch out for in this game. A machine gun could be just as deadly as a spear in the jungle and several times worse if used at close range. The SS weren’t known to be very nice people. They were Hitler’s personal guard and became the Nazi death squads in the next world war where they went around and exterminated anyone felt to be an “undesirable”.
“However, I am sending you out with two of my best men,” the colonel went on. “I’ve had them waiting outside too long.” He turned to the orderly. “Jagdesh, go tell the gentlemen that they can come in. Also, make sure you fill the pitcher back up. This afternoon has given me a beastly thirst and I’m sure the captain would like something to drink as well.”
“Yes, sah,” the small man in the white uniform said to him and vanished out the door. Why did I have the feeling he would next appear as the head of some powerful political party?
The door opened and two men entered the room. I could tell by their uniforms that one was a sergeant and the other a private. The waltzed into the office of the colonel and saluted. I had to admit, the game did its best to stick to the forms of the British Empire and all that it entailed.
“Sargent Grom reporting, sir!” the first man announced and held his salute. He appeared to be forty years of age and had a scar on one cheek. This man was one who’d seen a fair share of action over the years.
“Private Tommy Adelson!” the next man announced and held his salute too. He was much younger, no more than twenty. Here was a young man who took his position seriously and planned to go far in life if he played correct.
“At ease, men,” the colonel announced and both dropped their salutes. I’d remembered to stand up when they entered.
“You may be seated,” the colonel told them and both took their place on a bench on the other side of the room.
“Sargent Grom went through the entire Willogy Campaign back in ’25 and didn’t get so much as a scratch,” the colonel told me. “The scar wasn’t even the result of combat, am I correct, Sargent?”
“Yes, sir,” he answered. “She told me her husband was dead, sir!”
“Enough information there, sergeant. Private Tommy, I understand you showed rare initiative at the Beluga Bridge skirmish last month, is that correct?”
‘It’s not hard to make nitroglycerin if you have the right materials, sir,” he responded. He smiled, a little too pleased with himself.
“Yes, too bad for the Pashtuns that time, or what remained of their division. Very good gentlemen, I want you to meet the man you will be serving over the next few weeks, or at least until the mission is completed. This is Captain Vincent Richards, the son of one of my colleges from the East Indies days.” They stood up and saluted again.
“That will be all, men,” He informed them. They marched out of the room as the door slammed behind their forms.
“I don’t have to worry so long as those two are behind you,” he told me. “Both good men. Just keep Grom away from the local women, you understand. He’s left a trail of broken hearts from here to Hudson Bay and a number of angry fathers in search of him. As for Tommy, he’ll advance to Sargent himself someday, but only if he doesn’t blow himself up. Likes to play with things that go boom too much, that one.”
“Another thing you need to understand is that you’ll be headed into wild territory where the rule of law does not prevail much beyond the fort near the maharajah’s palace. He never had much authority inside the jungles and plenty of those people have their own ways of settling disputes. Look at an elder’s daughter the wrong way and you head could end up on a stake.”
“I’ll keep it in mind, sir,” I told him. It felt hot again and I wondered where the orderly with the tray had gone.
“But what you really need to fear are the isolated groups of nuns who live in that jungle,” he informed me. This caught my attention.
“Nuns, sir?”
“It’s the only word I can find that fits them. They are called ‘yogini’s’ and live in small groups around the river. We don’t know a lot about them, but the local people feel they’re holy women and can work miracles. You stay away from them, because they have a lot of influence among the tribes.”
Now I was curious. “How will I recognize them, sir?”
“They wear this mark on their head in red sandalwood pas
te,” he told me. The colonel sketched out a distinct pattern on a pad and held it up for me to see.
“I only know about this because my dear wife is from that region,” he told me. The colonel paused and looked at the picture of her and the children on the desk.
“They taught her…many things,” he said to me, almost lost in thought. “She doesn’t want to leave this country, so here I stay, no matter what happens next in the world. So far the command has left me intact hear because no one wants to be transferred to this location. I need to get home to her in a few hours. The youngest child has learned to walk.”
I could only imagine what those female ascetics had taught his wife. She’d learned enough to snare a British Colonel, that was certain. If one woman could control the British Empire in this part of the world, imagine what an entire colony of them could accomplish.
“You mentioned the tribal people are not to be trifled with,” I said to him. I wanted to hear more. Even in 21st century India, the people who lived in Northwest India were fiercely independent and didn’t bow down to the government in New Delhi.
“Most live deep in the jungle,” he told me. “We don’t have a lot of contact with them. Until my wife came to the city, they had almost no presence in the larger towns and cities. She came here as a representative from her father, who is prince among a tribal federation in another part of the jungle. However, even his group has no influence over the tribes where you’ll be headed.”
Interesting. The colonel married a princess. How convenient. I bet her titles stretched onto two pages. It sounded as if her father planned to marry her into the most powerful tribe in the world, which at this time was the British. I wondered if she had any other siblings offered to other foreign dynasties. It sounded like her father was a shrewd politician and tribal leader. Too bad, I’d never get the opportunity to meet the rest of the colonel’s extended family. I’m sure the sergeant and private would have plenty of stories, if the game's writers had gotten around to that.
