by Ginger Booth
Ava snatched Fox’s notebook and read her outline. Her themes revolved around rage and power. And her dad served in Afghanistan. “One of these things doesn’t belong,” Ava muttered, and put an X by the dad item. “Unless you’re mad about him, too.”
“Never liked him much. Always behind on child support.”
Ava gazed dolefully at her material. “Selfless giving. Effing doormat. What a crock.”
“It’ll write itself,” Fox promised.
And oddly, Fox was right. The essay formed easily under Ava’s pen, flowing from one form of generosity to the next. She re-read it in bemused distaste. This isn’t me. I’m queen bitch. And proud of it, fuck you very much.
But she had to admit, the ghastly thing did read smoothly. The essay was repulsively coherent. And freshly reminded of arcane comma theory, she thought even those were in the right places. She handed in a clean draft, and headed back to her unit for afternoon running.
The birthday cake at supper was pretty good. The kitchens used sweetened cornbread, canned dark cherries, and whipped cream for frosting. They had two empty chairs now, with Lotus and Dima gone, so Ava invited Fox to join them for dessert. Everybody sang happy birthday. Ava even got a slim little birthday-cake candle to make a wish.
“Um.” She laughed out loud.
“Forgot to come up with a birthday wish,” Marquis teased.
Puño suggested, “I wish this cake made me a hundred pounds, overnight.”
Ava pointed at him. “That one’s good.”
Yoda said, “Everyone at this table makes it into Basic.”
“Selfless wish,” Fox observed. She and Ava both laughed.
“Hot sex over solstice break,” Fang offered.
“Great movie title,” Doc said. “Hot sex over solstice.”
“A good marriage,” Fakhir suggested.
“Can’t beat hot sex over solstice,” Sauce voted.
Ava privately decided to go with majority opinion. Not that she really believed it could happen, but… She blew out the candle, and served out the cake.
Fox wandered away after eating, and Ava squatted down to talk at the table corner between Puño and Fakhir. “You know Soho Jihad? Gang near Hudson and Clarkson.”
“Don’t know Soho streets,” Puño said. “So-so Jihad, pretty insular.”
“ ‘Insular?’ ” Fakhir echoed. “Need a dictionary around this dude.”
“Stick to themselves,” Doc clarified. “Jihad’s pretty bad-ass. No match for us, but not soft. Why you asking?”
“Dima’s gang,” Ava said. “I crossed them once. Rabbit run, and they shot at me. Jerks. Need backup to talk to them again.”
Fakhir looked sad. “I’m in. For Dima.”
“Why?” Puño echoed, more stridently. “You going, I got your back. I’m not with you, you don’t go, chiquita. But why a dust-up? You think they were her friends? I don’t think so.”
Doc was more practical. “You hear back from your ville? How’s Dima?”
“She’s in the asylum,” Ava said. “When people, you know.” When they couldn’t function at all, couldn’t work. Ava had never met any graduates of the asylum. When people went there, they didn’t come back. “Guzman didn’t say more than that.”
“We should get together, visit her in the asylum,” Doc said affably. “Maybe not Fakhir.”
Puño nodded judiciously. “We should get together. You should visit Chelsea Free, see what we’ve done with the place.” Ava looked down and nodded in resignation. Puño poked her. “Nothing to find at So-So Jihad. Except a fight. No point in that. Dima left them. Best day of her life.”
“They were not kind to her,” Fakhir agreed.
“I just need to, you know, do something,” Ava said. “About Dima.”
“Don’t trust that instinct,” Doc advised. The others nodded – good advice.
“I didn’t do it,” Fakhir beseeched her. “I know it looks bad, but –”
Ava stood abruptly. “I know.”
Puño called out to the table in general. “Listen up. Get together over solstice. I want to show off Chelsea Free. Who’s in? Which day?”
Ava tried to let it go, about Dima. In mesh texts over the next day or so, Guzman asked her a lot of pointed questions, about what kind of medical attention and psych resources the recruits were receiving.
They weren’t receiving any.
She told Guzman their sergeants were nice. And they seemed to be trying new things since MacLaren visited. But they were drill instructors, not doctors or shrinks. Ava was learning more about other platoons, now that she was in class with them. Her platoon seemed to be treated better than most. So far as she could tell, her sergeants did their hand-holding on overtime. With Dima, they’d lost a dozen recruits, but some platoons had already lost twice that. The MFT just encouraged the instructors to kick students out faster.
15
Interesting fact: Greater New York City was not the only area ‘culled’ during the early Calm Act. The goal of that stage was to bring the U.S. population to under 200 million, starting from roughly 325 million. Because of interventions like Project Reunion, the death toll came up short, at only about 100 million.
Still trying to catch her breath, Ava rapped on Sergeant Clarke’s office door. She’d just run across campus from the martial arts gym in her gi, then ran up to their platoon’s fifth floor in Pershing Barracks. The Jersey squad recruit who found her only said to run, not what the summons was about.
“Come!”
She opened the door to an office chock-full of all her platoon sergeants, plus several of the Jersey recruits. Sitting at Clarke’s desk was not Clarke, but Lt. Colonel Emmett MacLaren, lead Resco of North Jersey these days. Her eyes widened, and she stood frozen to the spot.
MacLaren leaned forward on the desk, and raised his hand half-way to salute, as a hint. Instantly Ava stood ramrod straight and saluted. Emmett completed his return salute with a smile.
“My next interview, guys,” MacLaren said to the Jersey ‘guys,’ two male and one female. “Thank you. Dismissed.” With a finger, Clarke bid the Jersey squad sergeants to decamp as well.
Ava flattened herself against the door jamb as they filed past, then haltingly took a vacated seat in front of the great man. She started to say, “I admired your speech this afternoon, sir!” But she remembered in time not to speak until spoken to. Technically that was true with sergeants, as well.
“At ease, recruit,” the colonel instructed, in a southern drawl. “No ‘sir’ stuff. I’m a Resco, not on your chain of command. Call me Emmett. You prefer Panic, right?”
Ava glanced uneasily at Calderon from the corner of her eye, and nodded curtly.
“Guzman told me about you, Panic.”
Ava startled at that.
“Good things,” Emmett clarified. “Said you could translate gang rat to grown-up.” He paused, but Ava didn’t respond. He pointed to her gi. “Said you were a fighter. Which art?”
“Karate, black belt, two dan, s–,” Ava replied. “But I was just kick-boxing for fun. I already did my workout today.” She shot a guilty glance at Calderon, then cast her eyes down.
“Is Panic not allowed to kick-box?” Emmett inquired.
Calderon sighed. “She’s having trouble gaining weight, sir. It’s the extra exercise I’m concerned about.”
“I see. Could you take off the jacket a moment, Panic?” She stood and did so. “Pants, too.” She kicked those off and stood at attention, trying not to be embarrassed. She wore sports bra and form-fitting black short shorts, the same exercise clothes she wore in front of her unit all the time.
“Thank you. As you were. Well, you’re just tiny, aren’t you? Ripped with muscle, though. I was pretty scrawny when I got here, too. They were always shoving food at me. Like I could turn into a proper linebacker if only I tried harder.”
Ava tried to smile politely and gave it up. She tied her gi and sat again, trying for good posture. His comment did make her noti
ce his physique, though. With his dress uniform jacket slung on the back of a chair, she could see he had a lean and wiry build. Taller, of course.
Emmett sat back lazily, then shot his arm toward her and snapped his fingers. Ava found herself in horse stance, heart thudding, ready to fight beside the chair. She gulped.
“They’re a little high strung, sir,” Clarke offered.
“Relax, Panic.” Emmett pointed back to the chair. “Are you this tense all the time? Ignore the sergeants. They can leave if necessary. But I’d rather they listen in. And not talk.”
Clarke nodded acknowledgment of the order.
“You’ve been here, what, two weeks now? What’s gone right and wrong, you think?”
“Our sergeants are excellent,” Ava said cautiously.
“How so?”
She thought for a moment. Emmett leaned back and gave her the time. “I’m not sure why Calderon understands us so well, but somehow he does. More than the adults back in the ville. Almost like he’s been through apple trauma, and knows the ropes. But he’s on our side. Like Guzman back home, but not most grown-ups. Clarke took Thanksgiving weekend to get to know us before the other sergeants came. Awalo is just really decent. Nice to us at night. You know, with night terrors, people go into crisis at night. Um, you know that stuff from the Apple Core, right?”
Emmett nodded slightly, with a slow smile. “My housekeeper pulled a meat cleaver on Colonel Margolis last month. Pretty funny. Gladys is convinced Margolis wants to steal our brownstone. Probably true. Nice house.”
Ava grinned in spite of herself. “You know, then. Another example, the MFT nearly destroyed us the first day. I was spitting mad. But Calderon made me see that pushing myself only hurt me, not the MFT. I mean, I still want to gut the bastard.”
“Sure.”
“I guess I expected medical supervision,” Ava continued. “Like, they want us to put on weight. Two weeks, I’ve gained three pounds. I know I shouldn’t exercise so much if I want to get fat.” She scowled. “I don’t want to get fat. None of us do.”
“No.”
“But I need to burn off the energy, or I can’t sleep at night. The MFT wrecked my hamstrings the first day –”
“Panic, no one can wreck your hamstrings but you,” Calderon corrected.
“Sergeant,” MacLaren murmured.
“Sorry, sir. Reflex.”
Emmett nodded once, and went back to ignoring him. “Hamstrings?”
“Yeah, I could barely walk for a few days. I was in the night terrors room every night. Sat around effing coloring all day. Arts and crafts. It was awful.”
“Uh-huh,” Emmett agreed, eyes alight. “Sitting still isn’t my thing.”
“Yeah, right? I think Calderon made a mistake, though,” Ava said. “Still not sure. He ordered us not to watch out for each other. That was his job. I can kinda see that.” She lay her head almost to one shoulder, then flopped it to the other shoulder. “But I think he’s wrong.”
“How?”
“Well there’s this ‘unit cohesion’ army thing. We don’t need to learn that. And there’s this ‘obey’ thing. Been there, done that, too. But there’s the ‘trust’ thing. We don’t do that. I mean, if I were willing to trust somebody, it might be Calderon.”
“But you’re not willing.”
“No. That’s gonna get ugly. We have too much time on our hands.”
“What kind of ugly?”
She shrugged. She couldn’t think of how to comment without making clear to Calderon who was doing what, and jeopardizing someone’s chances at boot camp. “You know, it would help if we thought we all had a chance at boot camp.”
Emmett pursed his lips. “You do.”
“Not what the MFT says. Says we’re all garbage. He’d be surprised if ten percent of us made it.”
“Where do you think you are in the pack? Like a percentile, zero to a hundred. You understand percentiles, right?”
“Maybe twentieth percentile,” Ava returned sadly. “And that’s the thing, you know? If my chances at succeeding suck, screw their game. Play my own.”
“Sergeant Calderon,” Emmett said. “Do you agree that Panic is only around the twentieth percentile?”
“Sir, I’d say sixty or so. Higher for talent and spirit. She is small, though.”
“That’s a large perception gap, sergeant. Panic, you saw my Jersey recruits who just left. Where would you guess they rank themselves?”
“Under ten. Not a chance.”
“Panic, you’re a smart woman. Only half can be below average. By definition. And most people below average, will succeed. So where is this coming from?”
“The MFT. And the LI recruits. He compares us to them all the time. They’re bigger and stronger. Us gang rats are below average, compared to the gavis.”
“Gavis?”
“Las gaviotas, seagulls. Long Island for gang rat.”
“Got it. So you think you have too much free time, huh?”
Ava shrugged. “Can’t work out all the time. They’re saving up the Army lessons til boot camp. I had one suggestion…”
“Shoot.”
“We want training. I mean, I get that ‘society,’” Ava supplied air quotes, “mostly wants us ‘disciplined.’ Like we’re lazy slugs who need to be slapped into behaving.”
MacLaren laughed.
“But I want a high school diploma. Or even experience doing inventory, or kitchen work or something. Something real. Something to do. Not just ‘discipline.’ I bet the others would kill for that, too. I mean, we’re all voters. Most gang rats couldn’t care less. But we’re the ones who studied for that voter test and passed it. We’re not just criminal idiots. We want something we can show to prove that..”
“Very helpful,” Emmett said thoughtfully. “Thank you. If you have more ideas, Panic, I want you to tell me. And Yafuel Guzman wants to hear from you, too, alright? Could you mesh him at least once a week?” He checked something on his phone and started tapping.
“No mesh access,” Ava said. “Back to the city. We got codes. But we’re afraid to use an instructor’s account.”
Meshnet access was free, and so was Internet. But there was a charge for Internet-to-mesh traffic, to jump the phone-to-phone meshnet break between West Point and the cities. Otherwise the tiny bandwidth of the meshnet would be swamped by thoughtless data dumps from the broader-band Internet. Yoda managed to swipe Clarke and Calderon’s access codes, but it amounted to stealing direct from their pay. They liked the sergeants, and weren’t willing to screw them over. Yoda was still working to crack the MFT’s bank account. They’d eagerly steal his last dime.
Emmett grinned crookedly. “I’m sure the instructors appreciate your restraint. Hang on a sec.” He put phone to mouth. “Darlin’? I’ve got Guzman’s account for Panic, but I don’t want him charged for… Way ahead of me, as usual… Outstanding Christmas present, thank you… Will do.”
Emmett completed a few more scrolls and taps on the phone. “Alright. My wife just set you up with a new camp meshnet. She’s populating the free images – no charge to send those. There’s a huge charge for sending custom photos and data. So recruits can only use the postcards.”
Emmett turned his phone to show them the photo album his wife Dee Baker was developing. Ava grinned at the ‘Hello from Hogwarts!’ emblazoned across a photo from lunch. She scrolled through to see campus views, the pewter-gleaming Hudson River, the stupid landmark guy on a horse, the jagged ruin of the Cadet Chapel. Photos detailing barracks bedrooms, gyms and uniforms and recruits doing calisthenics. Several luscious food close-ups. Each image had a cool caption from the recruit perspective. Dee must have enlisted students to provide those.
“Your wife is awesome!” Ava said.
“I think so,” Emmett agreed. “So I’m sending you two meshnet accounts. Guzman pays for one, just for you. You can send custom photos and data, if you need to. But it’s coming off Guzman’s salary, yeah? Be nice. The other one is my Ch
ristmas present from Dee. Every recruit on base can use that, but it’s limited to text and postcards.”
Ava grinned from ear to ear. “Alright!”
“Now gather your platoon and run to Arvin gym. Dee’s shooting a music video. There won’t be a postcard of every recruit. But you can mesh people what time slice you appear in the video. Ham it up.”
“Thank you!” Ava leapt out of her chair and out the door.
“Dismissed,” Emmett said with a smile, to a girl already gone. Calderon rose uncertainly, but Emmett waved him down.
“We’ll keep it short,” he promised. “Dee and I are attending the Governor’s Christmas party tonight.” He started tapping notes into his phone. “I think my main action item is to put the MFT on notice. No medical attention?”
“No medical, no psych, sir,” Clarke confirmed. “We keep begging. MFT says he won’t waste army resources on rejects. And what she was saying, about the percentiles? The brigade leadership is all about insult-the-grunts. The standard army line, kill their egos and rebuild from the ground up.”
Emmett nodded. “But these aren’t children, they’re adults. Their egos are already rock bottom. And this isn’t Basic.”
“Sir?” Clarke asked. “Some are under eighteen.”
“Age is deceptive, sergeant. They survived on their own for years. Under worse conditions than I’ve ever faced. They’re adults. Trust me. Their egos need to be built up, on solid accomplishment, like any other recruit. But tearing the old ego down first? No. They need every shred of dignity they’ve got left. Try to strip them of their self-respect, and they’ll despise you. Like the MFT. They’ve written him off. Permanently. If they saw a chance to kill him, they’d grab it. I’m not sure that’s an exaggeration.”
Clarke nodded thoughtfully. “But what Panic said about the percentiles, sir? She’s dead on. MFT claims no more than twenty percent of this class is worth their feed. And that twenty is all from LI. Guess we didn’t shield the troops as well as we hoped.”
“And what do you think?”
