You Know, Where Fairies and Gnomes Live.

     Bourbon, he indeed had. Marie found Zed intensely staring at his terminal, a map of the battle plan they had last reviewed on the Righteous before the present hostilities, lay across the screen.  Now, however, the map was alive with color.  She could see their present position highlighted just behind a thick blue line that lay intimately south of an equally thick red one.  Numbered blocks designated the units on the Conglomeration side, while some more hesitant marks hinted as the presumed strength of the enemy.

     It wasn’t the lines that Zed’s eyes were drawn to, but a scatter plot of blotches that drew an irregular trajectory up to and including the Antarian capital.  A clock wound up in the corner of the image and as it did, the irregular blots winked out one after another until there were none and the clock cycled back to zero and the dots resurrected. Along with the counting clock there was a buzz.  It was not electronic.  She could hear it coming from inside Jedediah’s head.  It didn’t seem like the bourbon.  It was like an idea, or a conclusion.  The solution to a puzzle lying right outside his grasp like an aggressive fly that can land on your eye lid, but just somehow manage to stay out of swatting distance.  

     “What’s shaking Zed?”  He hadn’t noticed her standing in the entry, but he paused his playback and gave her a grin and a gander.  

     “Sup shorty, late night.  You looking for a drink?”  She was damned if he wasn’t a better mind reader than she was, but who knew.  Such talk wasn’t for polite company.

     “Don’t call me that Zed, I’m not some sheltered 18 year old you can impress, just pour the Whisky.”  She sat down with him at his desk and he pulled out a spare glass.  “Just came from Marcus’ tent.  He’s as strung out as I’ve ever seen him.  Could probably use one too, but considering he lost his fight with the bottle awhile back, I figured it best not to tell him so.”

     “Well, you ain’t wrong, on either count.  But none of us much better off.  I haven’t had a lick of sleep since D-day and I need to.  This communications problem is bugging the crap out of me.  I feel like if I just went to bed, all the pieces would congeal right here.”  He tapped his forehead square in the middle and took a sip from his tumbler.  “But I gotta have it pegged and I gotta be ready by the morning.  Sleep just going to wreck me for as little as I’d get right now.”  Marie dragged her chair across the dirt floor to get a better look at the monitor.  She took a slow sip herself and exhaled the airy vapors that remained.

     “What’s the problem, If you don’t mind my asking?  Supposing its not operationally classified anyway.”  Zed put a finger on the scatter plot that extended past their lines.  

     “This, this is the problem.”  He paused until the clock began to make the dots disappear.  “You see that?  Those dots represent the clusters of Orbital Infantry that managed to land anywhere near their drop zones after Righteous went down.  They show up when we pick up their broadcasts here.  Then, as you see, one by one, after they pop up, they bloop right back off.”  A large group of dots all disappeared at the same time, right after that the display began the cycle all over again.  “That last wipe is when we sent an order out for broadcast silence.  No EM communication, whatsoever.  Just in case thats how they were being hunted.  Now of course, that means we have no idea if they’e still there or not.  Not until the balloon goes back up tomorrow”.

     “Tunnels?” She offered.  “What about the tunnels?  Last time we were here, this place was rotten with surface tunnels from the old mines.  Things the CEC forgot about over years of digging.  Place is crawling with them, remember?”

     “Can’t be.”  He replied. “Shut them all down.  All the derelict mine shafts were mapped, collapsed, or other wise filled during the last occupation.  I was here.  We didn’t plan on letting the locals use them against us ever again.  Just, something is up.  I just wish we had some good intel.  Without Righteous in orbit, or the Lunar outpost, we have no up to date orbital data, no access to the satellite network, and no drones.  All we have are the Z’s that made it planetside and those are on rationed fuel until we break out, so our up to date intel is limited to their range.  I’m not used to working like this.”

     “On so little?” Marie asked.  “The bane of a technologically dependent existence I guess?  We forget how we used to do it.  Oh, Balloons!  I just got it! We used to use Balloons!  How did I not get that expression before?”  Zed smiled.

     “Shit, thats it?  I didn’t know that either.  Are you sure?  I gotta read more.  Anyway, there is one more thing, can you guess, ms. making connections at 4am?”  Marie canted her head to one side, gave a squint.

     “Where…are they…going?  The O.I.s I mean?”  Zed made the finger on nose point gesture, with all she speed and grace his fatigue could muster.

     “Yup”. He said with a nod.  “These are heavily armed and impenetrably armored soldiers.  As far as we know, the Antarian’s don’t have shit that can take down one.  You saw how much lead I took yesterday, didn’t scratch.  What the hell is out there?  Or am I just worrying myself into insomnia?”  Marie drained her Whisky and stood up.

     “I don’t know.  But I’m tired.  I guess I’ll go have some quick nightmares about all that and get back to you there, I guess.”  She left the tent and Zed waived goodnight to her back.  The dots set themselves back up on the screen and slowly knocked themselves back off.

We're in a Dell.

“So let us do real fighting, boring in and gouging, biting.

Let's take a chance now that we have the ball.

Let's forget those fine firm bases in the dreary shell raked spaces,

Let's shoot the works and win! Yes, win it all!”

                                                                   -Gen. George S. Patton

     “As the valiant Conglomeration Marines rally the encircled CEC Security Forces, the formerly tenuous and desperate situation here has evolved from one of rout and pocket, to push and progress.  The Orbital Infantry under Command of Captain Marcus Compton the Third have cleared the peninsula of all rebel forces and, despite the loss of the U.C.S. Righteous to treachery and treason, are poised for a breakout from their beachhead and an almost ordained victory.  I have been Marie Montgomery of the Conglomeration Press Corps.  Goodnight, and God bless the Conglomeration.”  As the segment came to an end, Marcus looked up at her from across his desk.

     “It was a good report Marie.  Factual, exciting, patriotic, just like the last three.  So, do you want to delete this one, or shall I?”  She sighed.  It chapped her ass that she had come all this way for nothing.  She hadn’t written so many useless presentations since the academy, but since she wasn’t a line soldier, she really didn’t have shit else to do. 

     “Go ahead.  No point in letting it linger.  Frees up space for the next batch anyway.”  Marie watched as Marcus hit the delete and “Are you sure” buttons on his display.  Just like that, an entire evenings worth of work vanished.  They were sitting in his field tent approximately twenty miles behind the front line.  Technically they were still in range of any guns the local insurgents might possess, but they had been reluctant to use anything beyond some light mortars when in direct contact.  Despite the lack of big guns on the table, Marcus was sticking to Conglomeration protocol.  The tent was as dark as all others were on the forward operating base.  Only a few red or blue tinted lights allowed the men to read their tablets, going over the plans for the next day.  Marcus tried to give Marie a cheerful smile, the lighting just made his bony face look a little necrotic.

     “I really am sorry about this Marie.  It really is good work.  Considering how bad things started off, you’re making us, and by us I mean me, look competent and almost heroic.  You were definitely the right person for this job.  Unfortunately, until we know what the official line is, we can’t tow it.”  Marie nodded.  She knew that song.  She heard it a lot being a state journalist.

     “Complete blackout.  I know.  I knew there would be some kind of oversight on this one with Antaria in full rebellion, but with half the Righteous slowly burning away in the upper atmosphere and the other half working on settling into its new position as Antaria’s second moon, Fuck all, amirite?”  Marcus summoned a polite chuckle.

     “You, are not wrong.”  He drifted back to his monitor.  They let a silence form and congeal.  She saw his eyes glaze over as he began to fidget.  He had shut down.  Even though they hadn’t been close since their senior year, she still remembered that look.  She didn’t need her base telepathy to know what it meant.  He only ever used to be quiet when he wanted to say something was bothering him.  He never would. 

      “I spent the first six months of our sophomore year breaking you, don’t wall up, people are dying.” He didn’t look up.  She kept staring at him.  “Is it the Righteous?  Is it Antaria?  Focus your mouth hole.”  He started to open his mouth, closed it, opened it again.

     “It’s not Antaria.”  He took a pregnant pause, continued.  “These people, I know they’re traitors.  I know what to expect.  What happened to the ship, its personal, it hurts.  It feels almost like when Karl stole you away from me, when you cheated…”

     “It’s nothing like that you asshole, people are dead.” She blurted. She felt a tinge of guilt that she had deviated from her mission, but he took the tangent first.  “What is happening and keep the broken heart in a separate basket from the bodies”.  

     “Sorry, he said.  “Just, a similar feeling, never mind.  Why do you care?”  He made eye contact.  She had him.

     “Because left to your own devices, you might over think this.  Something went horribly wrong and we need to get it right.  Besides, I can’t do my job right now, so I may as well play shrink.”  She did her best to say “So get on with it” with just her face.  

     “Betrayal is the point.  Think about all the things that would have been required to invert the polarity of the main magnetic drive so that in would push against itself when it was switched to shield mode.  An entire crew would have been required to bypass all the safety measures so that no one, including the main computer would notice.  It would have had to operate normally until such time as the override was needed.  Finally, it would have required either the craftsmanship to remain hidden from inspection, or the high level authorization to keep a blind eye turned.”  He waited to see if she could fit the next part of the story together.

     “You’re thinking the chief Engineer then?” She asked.  He nodded. “Who was he?”

     “Xavier Cawdor.  Nothing too exceptional.  Nothing to raise any immediate red flags.”  He punched a few keys on his monitor, brought up an image on the monitor of a small, ginger haired man of questionable grooming with a slightly charming snaggletoothed grin.  “Born on New Pittsburg, son of the CEO of General Defense Contracting.  Just another child of the gentry sent off to academy to kill time until they get their turn at the family company. Just like you and me and all our friends.  He was on Antaria with us the last go around is the only thing that I figure connects it.  Engineering Corps, spent time preparing infrastructure during the occupation.  Thats it.”

     “Maybe thats it?  If he spent a lot of time with the locals, maybe he became sympathetic? Saw too much, something snapped?”  She shrugged.  She might be able to read a few minds, but it didn’t make her a shrink.

     “I’m not sure.” Marcus continued.  “It still doesn’t seem right.  Something is missing.  The assignment, the timing?  Its too much to do alone.  He still would have had to coordinate with someone on the ground here, and someone else far out in the ether to have the codes and access to know about this mission and what was coming.  There is an intense amount of coordination here.  I just, feel something is still off.  Something that will bite us in the ass if we don’t find it.”

     “Has he been accounted for?” Marie asked.

     “Nope, as much as I’m love to interrogate the bastard.  But seeing as more than half the crew is in the same predicament, I don’t expect he will be.  Marcus stopped and rubbed his eyes.  The clock read 0427, D+4.  They had done a lot of work since they hit the ground.  She hadn’t seen Marcus sleep since they’d landed, but she had been busy too.  They could use some sack time.  But the fires kept popping up.

     “Ugh.”  He bemoaned.  “That tears it, I’m rack bound.  Fuck off for awhile will you?  I’m going to get back up in a couple hours to get ready for the push tomorrow afternoon.  If you want, you can bug Zed, I’m sure he’s up.  You two can brief we when I’m up on everything up the road, k?”  She nodded, pulled stingy out of her back pocket and turned to leave.

     “You run this Cawdor thing by Zed yet?”  She asked?

     “Not yet, its just been zipping around my head.  Put it in his ear.  Maybe he’ll think of something I missed.  Goodnight.  He shut off his terminal and headed to his bunk.  She stepped out, plopped the old green hat on her head and started toward Zed’s tent.  She could see a faint light under his flap.  She put on a fresh smile.  Zed usually had bourbon.