When the Devil Dances lota-3

by John Ringo

  “Why not Elgars?” Mosovich asked, thinking that Mansfield was really gonna owe him big time.

  “Memories mostly,” Richards said, putting her glasses back on and scrabbling through her notes. “Anne Elgars has memories that she really shouldn’t have.” The doctor finally seemed to find the notes she was looking for and frowned. “Ever seen the movie Top Gun?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” Mosovich admitted. “A few times.”

  “You’re a rejuv though, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did you see it when it first came out?” Richards asked.

  “I think so,” Mosovich said with a shrug. “Probably. That was, what? ’82? ’84? I think I was at Bad Tölz then. If I saw it, I saw it on post.”

  “The movie came out in 1986,” Richards said, glancing at her notes. “Elgars has distinct memories of seeing it for the first time in a movie theater then going over to a friend’s house, driving herself to a friend’s house to, as she put it, ‘jump his bones.’ ”

  “So?” Muller asked.

  “Anne Elgars was two years old in 1986,” Richards said, looking up and taking off her glasses again. “Even the most open-minded of parent is going to question her two-year-old driving. At the least. And she has another memory of watching it for the first time on TV in a living room.”

  “Oh,” Mueller said. “What about… what’s it called… ‘implanted memory syndrome’?”

  “Up, got me there,” Mosovich said. “Whassat?”

  “We considered classical implanted memory,” Richards said, leaning back again. “Implanted memory used to be called ‘regression analysis.’ It turned out that the process for regression analysis implants a memory that is absolutely true to the person with the memory. I could run you through a little scenario right now and you’d end up with a memory of having been a giraffe. Or a woman. Or that you were sexually abused as a child. Guaranteed. And none of them would be real.

  “It caused huge problems for a while with child molestation cases; I was still dealing with the repercussions when I got moved down here. Still am for that matter. Women that have a distinct memory of having been molested by a parent or a family friend and it’s very unlikely that it ever happened. The only way to get them to even consider that the memory is false is to go through the same process with one that is clearly impossible. And then they end up with this really impossible memory. Which has its own problems.”

  She shrugged and put her glasses back on. “What can I say? I’ve dealt with dozens of implanted memories in my time. This one doesn’t show any of the classic signs. She recalls small details that are not germane to the memory. That’s one sign of a ‘true’ memory versus implanted. Then there’s the EEG.” She picked up the alpha rhythm sheet and pointed to the transition. “We think that weird transition is where she is hunting for the right… call it ‘soul’… to manage the action. It only happens the first time she engages a skill, so new examples are getting harder and harder to find. But it’s consistent. And she goes alpha when she shouldn’t. When she’s writing, for example. That’s not a normal alpha moment, except when typing.”

  “So what’s going on here?” Mosovich asked in exasperation.

  “Like I said, we’re not experts,” Richards answered. “We can only speculate. You want our speculation?”

  “Yes,” Mueller said. “Please.”

  “Okay,” Richards said, taking off the glasses and setting them on the table. “Anne Elgars sustained a massive head wound in the battle of Washington. The damage was extensive and large portions of her brain showed no normal function. She was in a coma, effectively a permanent one, for nearly five years.

  “The Tch… Tchfe…” she paused.

  “We usually just say Crabs, doc,” Mosovich said. “Although the best pronouncement a human can get along with is Tch-fet.” He smiled. “I’m one of the few people I know who has ever had to try to speak Crab. And even I don’t try when I don’t have to.”

  “Very well, the… the Crabs approached the therapy team, us that is, with an offer to try to heal her. They noted that she might die in the process, but that if it worked it would permit various others who had sustained damage to be recovered as well.

  “We had… authorization to do whatever we liked, except cut off her lifeline, so we acquiesced. She disappeared with the… Crabs and reappeared… as she is. In less than a week, with significant muscular improvement. ‘Miraculous’ was the most minor word we used.”

  Richards paused and shrugged. “From there on out, it’s speculation.” She frowned and shook her head. “Crazy speculation if you don’t mind my using the word.

  “Say you have a computer that is broken. You pull out the broken parts, clear out the memory and load on new software. We think that’s what the Crabs did… All of it.”

  “Shit,” Mueller whispered. “You mean they…”

  “They probably had to cut portions of the brain away,” Richards said. “Or something just as radical. The damage was extensive and not just a result of bruising; she had some comintuated fractures in her tissue. Repairing that would require cutting and regeneration in, say, your liver. At least for us humans. But whatever the Crabs did, it was just as extensive. And when you finish that, you still have a ‘dead’ computer. So we think they took a… personality, a person if you will, that they had… hanging around, and loaded it in Elgars. And the memory stuff that we’re seeing is the result of the sort of little fragments of code you just have… hanging around. You rarely can get rid of all of it in a computer, much less a human.”

  “So, Anne Elgars the person is dead,” Mosovich said. “This is a different person entirely.”

  “Sort of,” Richards said with another sigh. “Don’t ask me about souls. Who or what a person is is a religious debate as much as a psychological one. For one thing, nature does have some influence on it; that’s been repeatedly proven. People seem to tend to… fill a mold that is somewhat prepared. They’re not locked in deterministically, but it is unlikely that the person Anne Elgars eventually becomes is either Anne Elgars or the person that the Crabs apparently ‘loaded into her.’ ”

  “What about the thing with the alpha waves?” Mueller asked.

  “Ah, that’s different,” she answered. “Anne not only seems to have been loaded with a person, but also, separately, loaded with skills. And we think that some of them are ‘integral’ to the base personality, or even the original Elgars, and others are separate. So when she runs across a new situation, she has to ‘hunt’ for the right file so to speak. It’s quite unconscious on her part; she has no idea what she is doing. But that’s the reason for the odd transition.”

  “Well, I don’t know who she is,” Mosovich said. “But the question is, can she do her job? Right now we need every rifle we can get. Can she soldier or not?”

  “She can do a job,” Richards answered. “Quite easily. She’s programmed to be a soldier, arguably a ‘supersoldier.’ She has skills ranging from advanced marksmanship to field expedient demolitions. She can certainly soldier. The question is, what else is she programmed for?”

  * * *

  Wendy opened the door at the buzz, tucked a squirming Amber under one arm and frowned at the figure in camouflage filling the door. “We gave at the office.”

  Mueller frowned. “I’d think this was your office.”

  “It is, but we already contributed,” Wendy answered. “In other words, what are you here for?”

  “Ah, we were told we could find Captain Anne Elgars here,” Mueller said. “From the picture, you are not Captain Elgars. However, it is nice to make your acquaintance Miz… ?”

  “Cummings,” Wendy said, wincing at the anticipated joke. She had lived with her name her whole life. “Wendy Cummings.”

  “Master Sergeant Mueller,” Mueller said. “Charmed. And is Captain Elgars available?” he continued as the baby let out a howl like a fire engine.

  “Sure, I’ll get her,” Wendy said. “Come on in.”r />
  She stepped around Kelly, who had chosen the middle of the floor as the obvious place to do a life-sized Tigger puzzle, and walked towards the back.

  Mueller looked over his shoulder at Mosovich and shrugged, then stepped through the door. The room was filled with the sort of happy bedlam you get with any group of children, but the noise was dying as the kids noticed the visitors. Before too long Mosovich and Mueller found themselves in a semicircle of kids.

  “Are you a real soldier?” one of the little girls asked. Her eyes were brown and just about as big around as saucers.

  Mueller squatted down to where he wasn’t much over their height and nodded his head. “Yep. Are you a real little girl?”

  The girl giggled as one of the boys leaned forward. “Is that a real gun?”

  “Yes,” Mosovich said with a growl. “And if you touch it you’ll get a swat.”

  “Guns aren’t toys, son,” Mueller added. “What’s your name?”

  “Nathan,” the kid said. “I’m gonna be a soldier when I grow up and kill Posleen.”

  “And that’s a fine thing to want to do,” Mueller opined. “But you don’t start off with a big gun. You learn on little guns first. And someday, if you eat your vegetables, you’ll be big like me. And you can kill Posleen all day long.”

  “Without getting tired?” one of the girls asked.

  “Well…” Mueller said, flipping a surreptitious finger at Mosovich for laughing, “you do get tired.”

  “Okay, let’s start getting ready for lunch, children,” Shari said, coming out of the back with Elgars and Wendy. “Leave these gentlemen alone. Wash hands then sit down for grace.”

  “I’m Elgars,” said the captain, ignoring the children. She had white powder on her hands and a cheek.

  “Captain, I’m Sergeant Major Mosovich with Fleet Recon and this is my senior NCO Master Sergeant Mueller.” He paused and then nodded as if he’d done some sort of a mental checklist. “Your commander, Colonel Cutprice, sent a message to one of my troops asking him to come down here and find out if you needed rescuing from the shrinks. I don’t know if you remember Nichols, but you two went through sniper school together. He got banged up on our last op and is still down in the body-and-fender so I came down here with Mueller instead. Anyway, here I am.”

  “Okay,” Elgars said, with a nod. “So am I being rescued from the shrinks?”

  “Is there someplace we can talk, ma’am?” Mosovich temporized. “Someplace quieter?” he added as the children trooped back from the bathroom.

  “Not really,” Elgars said, raising her voice slightly over the children. “The kitchen isn’t much better. We’d have to go to my quarters and I can’t really afford the time for that.”

  “Is this where… Do you work here, ma’am?” Mosovich asked.

  “Sort of,” she answered. “I help out. I’m following Wendy around, getting my bearings again.”

  “Well,” Mosovich frowned. “Okay, the question, ma’am, is, how do you feel about going back on active duty?”

  “I feel okay about it,” Elgars said. “Can I ask a question?”

  “Of course, ma’am.”

  “Are you here to evaluate me?”

  It was this question that had made Mosovich pause early in the discussion. The question was whether to answer honestly or do the two-step. He finally decided that honesty was the right policy even if it wasn’t the best.

  “I guess you could say that, ma’am,” the sergeant major admitted. “I got told to come down here and check you out then report back to your commander in writing as to your perceived fitness. You don’t normally use a sergeant major to report on an officer and I’m not a psychologist. But I’ve been beating around this war for quite a while and I guess the powers that be trust my judgement.”

  “Okay,” Elgars said. “In that case I’ll be honest too. I don’t know what the hell a captain does. I can shoot, I know that. I can do other stuff. But I keep finding holes. And I have no idea what the job of a captain even is. So being a captain would be tough.”

  Mueller tapped Mosovich on the shoulder and whispered in his ear. Mosovich turned and looked at him with a quizzical expression and held a finger up to Elgars. “Captain, could you excuse me for just a moment.”

  He and Mueller went over into a corner of the daycare center and spoke for a moment. Elgars could see Mosovich shaking his head and Mueller gesturing. After a moment, Wendy came over to ask Elgars what was going on.

  “I dunno,” the captain replied. “But I don’t think I’m gonna like it.”

  Mosovich came back over and looked at both of them. He opened his mouth for a moment, stopped, glanced over his shoulder at Mueller. Looked at Wendy for a second then looked at Elgars.

  “Captain,” he said over the shrilling of the children in the background. “I don’t think we can get a good read on how you really feel about your abilities in this environment.”

  Elgars looked at him for second, looked at Wendy then looked back. “So, what would you suggest?”

  “Mueller suggests that the four of us go take a turn up on the surface. Maybe go to dinner, go to a range, see how you feel about being in an environment other than…” at which point Shakeela started with one of her patented howls ”… a daycare center.”

  “Sergeant Major Mosovich,” Wendy asked with a raised eyebrow, “are you suggesting a double date?”

  “No,” Mosovich said. “Just a chance to talk somewhere other than in here.”

  “Uh, huh,” Wendy said, glancing at Mueller, who returned a look that said butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth. “Well, Shari can’t take care of the children alone. I think that Captain Elgars is capable of taking care of herself, however, so why don’t the three of you go?”

  “Okay,” Mosovich said with a shrug. “Works for me.”

  “Hold it,” Elgars said. “Wendy, how long has it been since you’ve been to the surface?”

  “November?” Wendy asked with a frown.

  “Uh, huh,” Elgars said. “What year?”

  “Uh…” Wendy shook her head. “2007?”

  “And how long has it been since Shari had anything resembling a break?” Elgars asked.

  “Taking the kids to the surface wouldn’t be a break,” Wendy noted. “But… I don’t think she’s been out of the Urb since we came here from Fredericksburg. And the last time I was up there was… was to give testimony,” she continued with a stony face.

  “Well, I think we should all take a trip up to the surface,” Elgars said.

  “With the kids?” Mosovich asked incredulously.

  “Sure,” Mueller said. “With the kids. Stress testing for the captain.”

  “Christ, okay, whatever,” Mosovich said, raising his hands. “Stress testing for me. We’ll all go up top and have dinner someplace in Franklin. See how Elgars handles being out and about. I’ll include that in my report and we’ll see what Colonel Cutprice says.”

  “I could use some help,” Shari said, walking over.

  “Well, that clarifies that,” Wendy said with a laugh.

  “Clarifies what?”

  “The sergeant major needs to spend some time around Captain Elgars,” Mueller noted. “I recommended going to the surface, along with Wendy so that the captain wouldn’t be completely alone. Wendy pointed out that you needed too much help with the kids for her to leave. So it came down to inviting all of you to the surface.”

  “Where, on the surface?” Shari asked nervously.

  “There’s at least one decent place in Franklin, I think,” Mosovich noted. “It’s an R R area for the corps. There’s got to be someplace.”

  “I dunno,” said Shari, reluctantly. “Franklin? It…”

  “It doesn’t have a very good reputation down here,” Wendy noted with a grim chuckle.

  “We don’t go there much either,” Mueller said. “But, trust me, the food’s better than down here.”

  “I’m not sure…” Shari said.

  “Well
, I am,” Wendy argued. “How long have we been down here? Five years? How long since you’ve seen the sun?”

  “Long time,” Shari whispered with a nod. “Except for Billy, I don’t think any of the kids remember what it looks like.”

  “There will be three trained soldiers with us,” Wendy noted. “It will be safe. It will be a chance for the kids to look at the surface. How bad can it be?”

  “There’s basically no Posleen activity at the moment,” Mosovich pointed out. “There’s a globe around Clarkesville acting funny, but they haven’t done anything either. Except chase us around the hills.”

  “Okay,” Shari said after a moment’s thought. “Let’s do it. Like you said, Wendy, how bad can it be?”

  * * *

  “You’ve completely outgrown this, Billy,” Shari said, adjusting Billy’s windbreaker as Wendy negotiated for her personal weapon.

  “This is… unbelievable,” she said looking at the weapon. It was an Advanced Infantry Weapon, the standard issue weapon for the Ground Forces, a 7.62 semi-automatic rifle with a 20mm grenade launcher on the underside. This one had been personalized with a laser sight on the top.

  Had.

  “Where’s my laser sight?” she asked angrily, turning the rusted weapon over and over. “I turned this in with a Leupold four power scope that was laser mounted. There does not appear to be a Leupold scope on this weapon. There also were three more magazines. And you made me turn in my two hundred rounds of ammo that weren’t in the mags. So where is all that?”

  “The inventory just lists the weapon,” the guard said, looking at his screen. “No ammo, no scope, no magazines.”

  “Well, bugger that,” Wendy said, leaning forward to shove a faded receipt against the greenish glass. “You want to read this motherfucking receipt, asshole? What the fuck am I supposed to do with a weapon and no goddamned rounds?”

  “Wendy,” Mosovich said, pulling at her arm. “Give it up. There’s no scope. There’s no rounds. These assholes shot them off long ago. And the scope is probably on this dickhead’s personal weapon. That he hasn’t shot in a year.”