by Andy Graham
Rick peered into the smoke. Silence. Now. He had to move now. One of the lieutenant’s fingers crunched under Rick’s boot. He shifted his weight, lifting his foot out of the sticky mess congealing around the lieutenant.
A snap sent shudders through the corridor. Something slammed into his shoulder. Spun him round. Shards of stone bit into his flesh. Rick collapsed face first onto the dead man, his cheek pressing into the still-warm slime on Chel’s. His revulsion was lost in a pain that tore through him. His shoulder? His arm? Neck? He wasn’t sure which bit but fuck did it hurt. He pushed. His hands slipped off Chel’s corpse and Rick collapsed as feet thumped towards him. Someone rolled him over and Rick found himself facing a pair of black leather boots that had mud clinging to their soles and smoke twisting through the laces.
His breath came in short gasps. Each one tugged lines of fire into his shoulder. He hadn’t realised until now how much this place stank of blood, urine and shit: the true stench of war. Through the spreading pain, a thought hit him: Maybe Stann was right. Maybe I shouldn’t have taken that job working on the lunar mining project. Blinking the sweat out of his eyes, Rick stared down the muzzle of an old Mennai rifle.
“No pretty speeches for you, Ailan child,” a woman’s voice slurred. “I’m not supposed to waste time gloating, no matter how much I want to savour this. But you owe me. All you Ailan men owe me.”
Above blood-spattered fatigues, her eyes were autumn brown. The same as Thryn’s. The same as Rose’s. Rick had insisted on the name: Rose. He’d joked it was the only decision about his daughter he’d been allowed to make. Like Rose, this woman’s face was smooth and unblemished, curly dark hair pulled back tight around her head. Unlike Rose, she looked haunted, older than she had any right to be.
“Are you scared?” she asked.
No. No, I’m not. The words wouldn’t come. They were there. Somewhere in his head. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t say them.
“You are scared, aren’t you?” She nudged him with her boot. It was too small for a soldier’s boot. “Scared to die.”
To die? No. He wasn’t sure what he felt. A searing pain bordering on numbness. Fear he wouldn’t see his Rose laugh again, that he’d never hold his wife. But scared to die? Even now with the black hole of the woman’s rifle barrel pressing into his nose. No. He wasn’t. He was scared of what death left in its wake.
Her finger tightened on the trigger. “This is for what you did to me, to my mother and my people. And the Mennai People’s Council wish you well in the afterlife.” The woman’s face twisted into a grin, white teeth bright against the blood and camouflage paint. “Oh, I forgot,” she whispered. “You’re not allowed to believe in things like that anymore.”
“What are you talking about?” He must have said it aloud because she answered.
“Your government is going to take your gods from you. I heard it a few days ago. They’re going to take from you what they’ve already taken from us: hope.” She stroked his face with the muzzle of her rifle. “So, there is no afterlife for you. I guess this really is the end. As your brother soldiers said to me: ‘my dear, you are about to get well and truly f—’”
She shuddered. Once, twice, three times.
Her finger convulsed on the trigger. A single bullet grazed Rick’s ear, spilling heat down his neck. The Mennai woman stared at the red streams from her abdomen. She dabbed at them, at the blood dripping off her hands. And as her eyes rolled backwards in her skull, their autumn brown changed to winter white. She collapsed onto the man Rick had stabbed, her face softening into that of a little girl asleep.
“Big problem with war films,” a voice said from the corridor leading to the guard room. “Gives people a sense for melodrama. Doesn’t belong in real war. Do the job, don’t talk about doing the job. Someone should have told her.”
Relief flooded through Rick as Stann dragged himself to the junction.
“Stann! I knew you’d be OK.”
Stann dragged himself over to the fallen woman. He pulled his bayonet free from his weapon. “Wait, what are you doing. Stann? No!” And slammed it through each of her eyes. Her back arched, mouth splitting wide. And with a slow sigh, she sagged back down to the floor. Her fingers went limp on a rifle that looked to be older than her. Stann grabbed his bayonet with both hands. The metal squeaked as he wrenched it free from the socket.
Rick’s tongue felt like a rasp. “You’re alive then.”
“Speak louder, Franklin. My eardrums are shot. Fucking bomb blew them to shit.”
“You’re alive?” Rick shouted.
“Near deaf.” He spat on the floor. “Not a coward, though.”
“What?”
“First you hid. Then you ran. Told myself I’d cover you. I’m not gonna let no one down.”
“Hiding? Running away? Wait. What?”
“Wasn’t sure I was going to make the shot, mind. My aim’s a little off.” Stann held up his left hand. Three fingers were missing, the stumps crudely bandaged with torn-off cloth.
Rick stared, slack jawed. His protests were forgotten as his mind raced through the consequences of what Stann’s ruined hand meant.
“Patched myself up,” Stann said. He was staring at his hand as if incapable of understanding what he was seeing. “Hurt like fuck but it’s amazing what a man can do when high on adrenaline or not running away or cowering under a chair.”
“Your aim’s as good as it always was,” Rick managed to say.
“I was aiming for her head.”
“I didn’t run, Stann. Or hide.”
“Yes you did. Saw you. Guess you’re not going to have any problems beating me in any footraces from now on, either.”
“What are you—” The question died in Rick’s mouth as he saw the trail of blood smeared down the corridor, Stann’s mangled leg. “Oh no . . .”
“Feels like I can even wiggle my toes,” Stann said. “Fucking odd that when I’ve got no foot. Guess I may not be hitting Chester’s new gym tomorrow after all.”
“You’ll be fine.” Rick kept his voice upbeat. From somewhere he found the strength to check his friend’s bandages. “We just need to get you out of here.”
“‘You’ll be fine, Stann,’” the other man mimicked in falsetto tones. “That’s just what you said about those cameras and computers. ‘They’re fine.’ I was there on the battlements. And after you checked the plugs in the monitor room. I watched you filling in the report while we waited to go check out the rumours about Lee.”
“It was a mistake. I was tired.”
“You’re a soldier. You’re supposed to be tired. And I thought the great Frederick Franklin never made mistakes? You always get the girl, get the promotion, always got the right gig going on.” His voice was rising, spittle dripping down his chin.
“You’re in shock, Stann. You’ve lost a lot of blood. You’re high on pain and adrenaline.”
“Blood, yes. Memory, no.” Stann’s lips curled back to reveal red teeth. “This is your fault, Franklin, all of it: the bomb, Chel, my leg and hand. You did this. I saw you hiding under that armchair.”
Rick checked the bullets in his revolver and shoved it back in his holster. Slinging Stann’s rifle over his shoulder, he stooped down to pick up his colleague. Pain be damned, he had to get them out of here. Away from the man he had killed and the corpse that had eyes like his daughter.
“Get your filthy Tear hands off me!” Stann struggled against him.
“I made a mistake but I didn’t set off those bombs, Stann. Didn’t pull the triggers, either. And I would never hide.” Rick hauled his friend over his shoulder. He steadied himself against the wall, fighting the pain and dizziness and nausea that washed over him.
“You might as well have.” Stann’s head dropped onto Rick’s chest.
“Stay angry, Stann. Stay awake. We’ll talk this out later. I’m going to get you home to your family, to Edyth and your boy, Donarth. My little Rose is smitten with him. You never know, when
those two are older they could marry.”
“Never. Never.” Stann’s voice trailed off into a series of indistinct murmurs, each quieter and more bitter than the previous.
5
Tea
The drawbridge rattled down. The clank of the freshly greased chains was lost in the thud of chopper rotors. As the wood hit the ground, dust and leaves swirled in the early-morning mist snaking through the forest.
Standing under the portcullis, silhouetted by powerful search lights, stood a soldier gripping a rifle. Battered but unbowed, he staggered across the planks. A limp body hung over one shoulder. The soldier collapsed onto one knee, pain twisting his face. He forced himself back onto two feet and staggered down towards the waiting line of Ailan soldiers. The image lurched to a halt.
“I still think we should have put the bit where, what’s his name again?” a deep voice asked.
“Franklin, sir,” a woman replied.
“That’s it? Kind of forgettable. Shame. I still think the bit where Franklin stands up should be in slow motion. You know, make it look more dramatic, more lifelike.”
“I think the public would have noticed, sir. This is genuine footage.”
Edward De Lette grabbed his diary and flicked through the dog-eared pages. “Nonsense, the flock have been force-fed so much electronic fodder no one would’ve questioned it. And it’d look better. I agree with you about the dramatic music, though. We’ll save it for the army promo vids.”
Middle age had not treated the president well, Beth thought. The dramatic widow’s peak he’d had in his early thirties was receding into a spectacular example of male pattern baldness. His cut-glass cheekbones were drowning in flesh. It hadn’t been that long ago when he had proudly joked his shirts no longer fitted around his chest and neck. He had attributed his middle-aged spread to a diet of benching, curls and shrugs.
“Why bother doing anything else?” De Lette had asked. “Most of my dealings with the public are done from behind a desk; the cameras never see my legs. And those meet-the-public walkabouts of my predecessor were more hassle than they were worth. Even I found those designated protest zones hypocritical.”
“They were to allow the public the right to free speech, sir,” Beth had pointed out.
“Well, allow them or don’t allow them. Not this stupid pretence at listening, all this attentive ignoring,” he’d said with a dismissive flick of his wrist.
Since then, Beth had been promoted to her current position and De Lette’s middle-aged spread had sunk to his midriff, chased by a collection of chins. The long hours and endless wine-based dinners had taken their toll. His new bespoke suits — made on expenses — helped a little but couldn’t offset the worst of the visual damage.
“I sacrificed my strength for that of the nation,” the president had said early in Beth’s tenure, “my family for everyone else’s. My wife knew what she was marrying and our kids have never known anything else. The losses in my lifestyle are the sacrifice the sheep would never be prepared to pay for power. Everyone knows what’s involved in ruling but they all choose not to see it. Not that it’ll matter for much longer. Soon the people won’t want to wake from the warm embrace of their blissful myopia.”
Beth winced at the memory of those words, delivered one late evening surrounded by too many empty bottles. His eyes had been backlit with a fervour that had made her shiver. She’d not heard anything else on the subject of his sacrifices or the myopia of his flock since that night. She still wasn’t sure if it had been a genuine moment or some kind of play for her.
He clicked his fingers at her. “What time does Franklin arrive? It says three p.m. in the diary of deceit but that was five minutes ago. I thought these soldiers were taught that early is already late?”
“He’s waiting outside, sir,” Beth said, keeping her voice level. “I reminded you but you wanted to watch the footage again.”
De Lette waddled over to a chair in the corner and squeezed himself into it. He had inherited it from a distant relative in Mennai, the country they were unofficially at war with. The chair was ugly and uncomfortable, a sprawling mass of carved wood that would make even a bonfire queasy. “Well, go and get him then. I’m not watching it anymore. Aren’t secretaries supposed to anticipate? You should be where you’re needed to be before you’re needed, precisely so you’re not needed. Your aim is to make yourself redundant.”
Beth’s fingers tightened on her notepad. Is that what happened to your previous permanent secretary? she thought as she bobbed her head and left the room.
De Lette had tried to make her curtsy once, had held it up as an example of good etiquette and manners. She’d refused pointblank. He’d eventually laughed it off, saying he’d rather look at a pretty face that couldn’t curtsy than an ugly sow that could. She’d spat in his tea every day since then.
Up to that point, she’d thought petty vengeance was for losers. She hoped there wouldn’t be too many more principles sacrificed to get where she wanted to be. When she did get there, that chair of De Lette’s was going to be the first thing to go.
The door closed with a click. Odd that such a simple sound, such a mundane act as closing a door, could put her at ease. It changed nothing about the predatory slug who was her president except she didn’t have to see him. Guess we all have an element of ostrich about us, she thought. Question is, what do we bury our heads in to avoid what we don’t like? She shuddered and returned the smile of the soldier sitting bolt upright on the bench. “How are you, Rick?” she asked, conflicting feelings of warmth and guilt washing over her.
“Happy to be free of the wards.” He pushed himself to his feet. “If twelve weeks of hospital food isn’t enough to destroy you, then a dozen weeks of shoulder rehab will. They kept me there for twice as long as normal. Can you believe it?”
Beth’s hand strayed up to the mole on the tip of her nose. “That long? I guess they wanted to make sure you could shoot OK.”
“Wanted to make sure I can salute properly, more like. I never want to see another colour-coded, stretchy rubber band in my life. There must be another way to fix shoulders.”
They stumbled into a handshake that became not quite a hug and an awkward peck on the cheek. Beth smoothed down the front of her jacket, spots of pink in her cheeks. “How is the shoulder?”
“Better than you by the looks of it.” Rick nodded to De Lette’s closed door. “Is he?”
Beth puffed her cheeks out, screwing her forehead into lines by way of answer.
Rick grinned. “You wanted the job, Beth. The VP’s permanent secretary at twenty-two and the president’s at twenty-four. The youngest ever person to hold both positions. It was impressive, even for you.”
“De Lette insisted. I was flattered to be asked but a little put out the VP let me go so easily. Hamilton never did give me a clear answer why,” she added, frowning.
“Simple — a president outranks a VP.”
“It’s never simple in politics.”
“Whatever the reason, I’m still not sure why you put yourself through the hassle you did to get here.”
Beth picked up a heavy china cup from her desk. There were brown stains trickling down the side, covering the presidential seal. She spat into a hanky and polished them clean. “The answer’s hidden in the job title: secretary. The secretary holds the secrets and the secrets hold the power.”
“You know you could have made much more elsewhere?”
Beth sighed and put the cup down. He was right. Rick was right about a lot of things but he was asking the wrong question. She was looking for a different answer. “The money’s nice. I’ve never been able to afford things I wanted before.” She pointed at the white suit she was wearing. It was smart but simple, elegant but understated. She smoothed the material over her hips, emphasising curves that were not quite hidden.
Rick clasped his hands behind his back and glanced at the door to De Lette’s office.
“Relax.” She poked him in the chest. �
��You always were so uptight. I’m not here for the money. It’s a cliche but I have other plans.”
“I remember. ‘Pennies don’t change the world, policy does.’”
“Not my best sound bite. It’s very noble but I got it backwards,” she said. “I’m glad you remember me saying it, though. Back then life didn’t seem so slippery.”
“I’m surprised I remember you saying it, too. I think we were a little drunk at the time.”
“A little? That hangover took days to fade.” Her stomach twisted as a memory of her kneeling in front of a bucket threatened to bring up her breakfast. Rick, red-eyed and green-faced, had sat with her the whole time, holding her hair out of her face as she dry-heaved. Love manifests itself in many ways, she thought. Buying flowers is for amateurs. She swallowed the bitter feeling in the back of her mouth and said, “I thought my twin could drink but you can outdrink a tree. Something to do with all those 100 percent proof baptisms you people in the towns hold?”
“Something like that, yes.”
The intercom on her desk crackled into life. “When you’re done flirting, Laudanum, bring, uhhh, Franklin in, would you? Then make me some tea.”
Beth let out a long sigh and counted down from ten. “You’d better get in there.” She jerked a thumb over her shoulder. “His concentration span isn’t so good; he’ll have forgotten your name again by now. How that genetic throwback managed to get where he is, I have no idea.”
“The usual: rich parents, the right schools and balls dangling between your legs.”
“Your own or someone else’s?” Beth held up a hand to stop his answer. “Whoever’s, it still seems to be the main qualification to progress in this so-called progressive society of ours.” She stepped closer to adjust his tie. “Thryn got herself a good man, Rick, never forget that. And those new stripes suit you.”
He plucked at his sleeve. “They feel too heavy. I get the feeling I’m walking around with a giant neon arrow over my head, too. It’s pointing to the idiot who made a mistake that cost the lives of so many and got rewarded for it. I want to apologise when men twice my age and experience salute me, to let them know I’m an imposter, a fraud. They know what I did.”
