Episode 3 | Chapter 19 - Two, Maybe Three

Episode 3 - Plowshares

Chapter 19 - Two, Maybe Three

Blake’s immense Bison lowers its shoulders and glows a faint sage green along its zig-zagging markings as it leans against the weight of the armored vehicle it is harnessed into, pulling it up the ramp onto the freight car at the back of the train. Blake circles the operation, watching closely the edges of the ramp where the width of the huge offroad wheels just barely fit.

The rest of the briefing after Pooka’s outburst continued into the evening, and we spent another few hours reviewing the map and plans for the extraction, including going through photography of key members of the C-suite we were escorting. Although it was professional, an iciness lingered in the air, and a sharp feeling remained in my heart that I was growing to recognize as a blooming recognition of my own mortality.

The Bison’s nostrils flare, snuffling white sparks into the air, and it rolls forward a few more steps, pulling the APC up the last feet of the ramp and centering it on the flatcar. It whips its thin tail back and forth and tosses its head, short silvery horns gleaming under the flood lights illuminating the early morning dark for us.

Shion, no, Aster now, waves one hand over his head in a ‘wrap it up’ motion, and Blake begins to pull the ramp away from the car. This morning we are all dressed in matching black Aquila uniform, the black shirt and padded pants, our body armor and gear safely stored already in matching duffle bags in the train car we’ll share on the ride to Borough.

Aster takes a draft of his vape-stick, blowing the white breath of his exhale above his head and directly into the air. “Let’s circle up, I’ll call operational commencement.” I’ve finally spotted his symbiont this morning, a Hymenopus. Its pale jointed body is lined with vibrant splashes of bright pink and pastel greens, its praying forearms held tightly before it. On his smooth bald head, it shifts back and forth in a constant stuttering dance, as if bobbing in the wind.

The four of us gather off the side of the platform by the train, the passenger cars are further up, towards the public areas of the station. Aster locks both thumbs into the armpits of his body armor and gives a quick nod to everyone. “Right-o then. Commence Material Obligation, lock in and sound off.”

The Vespas on all three necks draw back their pulsing abdomens and then plunge their barbed tails into each, all three men unable to prevent themselves a grimace or grunt from the pain. My own Vespa grips my ear, I can feel all six of its pointed little legs touching me, and hear the fanning buzz of its wings. But there is no plunge, no unifying shock of pain. A cold weight settles in my gut.

Adrian speaks first into my ear, “Operation is go. Vespa congregation now separating for unit operations. Rishi you have tactical command, confirm?”

“Rishi, confirming lock in. I have tactical command,” replies Rishi in my ear.

“Confirmed. Aster, you have field command. Confirm?” continues Adrian.

“Aster, confirming lock in. I have field command.” Aster’s mouth does not move as he speaks through the Vespa.

“Confirmed. Team sound off and confirm lock in?”

“Everett, confirming lock in.”

“Blake, confirming lock in.”

Neither of their mouths move, the only sound between us the mechanical groan as the train shifts slightly.

“Adrian on behalf of Conrada, confirm you can hear us?” says Rishi.

I open my mouth, a sudden rush of nervous adrenaline sending my heart fluttering. “Confirming I can hear.”

Adrian’s voice repeats my words into the connected Vespa, “Confirming she can hear,” then he adds to me, “I’ll be listening, say my name if you need me and I’ll repeat anything that comes after.”

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Piece of fucking junk. No wonder they call him Junk.

I flick the antenna unit of one of the primary symbiont sensors with my index finger, it half spins then the weight of the small dish at its end jams the poorly lubricated mechanism and it grinds to a halt. Another flick loosens it, spinning another two times before jamming again.

We’re sitting in a sealed boxcar of the train, crates of supplies and equipment packed around us. No luxury cabin today, I guess because Regina isn’t here. With ten hours of free time, and no windows to look out, most of our team of four has spread out in the space, building ourselves fleeting privacy between the crates and trunks. At the lack of anything else to do I’ve been tinkering with the sensors so I don’t look like a complete waste of space when we get there.

I have some pride. I was good at these things. I am good.

Pooka lays at my side, his chin resting on his paws while he watches me with one fiery eye, his ear and the ridge of his back twitching occasionally. With a harrumph of annoyance he lifts his hind foot and scratches at his side, but the twitching spot is too far up his back at the base of his spine to reach. He sits motionless a moment, then gives a whine of frustration and bends his head over his back to nibble at the spot instead, his lips wrinkling as he digs at the skin with his pointed incisors.

I could do it for you? I can scratch myself. Suit yourself.

Somewhere else in the carriage, Blake loudly snores. I pull a knife out of a pocket on my tactical belt and flip it open with a press of my thumb to the lock. I cut the head off the data cable the sensor came with, where the rubber strain relief is starting to crumble, and start prying back the plastic to take a look at the pins of the connector. I have a blanket spread in front of me with the parts all scattered about. The blanket is meant to be for the ‘targets' when we pick them up. Listen to me already dehumanizing them, part of the new system already.

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“You want something to drink?”

I look up at Everett, leaning on the pile of crates I’m using as a privacy wall. He’s holding a khaki green insulated flask and a pair of plastic mugs. I eye him suspiciously, and he looks at me back with bland nonchalance, then I turn my attention back to tug a wire across the edge of my blade cutting it shorter.

“What is it?”

“Tea.”

I pause. “What kind?”

He looks at the flask, then twists the lid open with a squeak and gives it a sniff. “Oolong maybe?”

Huh. “Sure.”

He sits cross legged across from me, putting the cups on the ground in front of him and pours from the flask, wisps of steam rising from the pale golden liquid. I glance at the handgun strapped to the side of his thigh and keep on working. He pushes one cup towards me, and takes the other, leaning back against a crate to blow on it. He looks indifferent, but I catch the occasional flash of his eyes as he watches my hands. Another loud snore from Blake almost shakes the walls of the box car. Pooka flicks his ear in annoyance.

“It mostly go like this? A whole lot of nothing,” I ask, not looking away from my work.

“Hmm?” he sips his tea. “Yeah. And a small amount of explosive everything all at once.”

I sniff. “You sitting here for a reason then?”

He draws a leg up to his chest and balances his cup on his knee. “You don’t really do small talk,” he remarks.

“Not with people who threaten to kill me, no.”

He holds two fingers out and tenses a muscle in his jaw. “It was the second time too.”

“What?”

“I threatened to kill you twice, maybe three times, depending. But definitely two.”

I'd forgotten about the knife. Somehow that felt different, might as well have been another life it feels so far away already. I hold the new wires I’ve prepared against the pins of the connector and tug fresh heat shrink tubing into place. Can you heat this? Pooka twitches his ear. You don’t have to ask, just do. I am you, as you am I. Asking seems more polite. The air grows hot in my fingers and the tubing shrivels tight until everything is snug. I toss the cable back down in front of me with a sigh.

“You actually kill people before?”

Everett picks up his cup from his knee and takes a sip. “You don’t seriously think I’m answering that?” he replies gruffly. I glance up at his face, he's staring into his cup with a mask of indifference across his features. Pell’s eight eyes glimmer from his shoulder, one of her legs sticking up into the air for no reason. I wonder if she would be soft if I touched her, or are the hairs covering her body rough and itchy?

I don’t reply, and pick up the sensor again to blow into the port, then I grab another cable and connect it to my tablet then the power supply, watching as it boots and begins to run through its start up sequence and calibration. The antenna begins to rotate and I put it back down to watch for any stiffness in the mechanism. I finally pick up the cup of tea and give it a careful sip, it has a deeply complex herbal flavor with hints of smoke. I imagine this is what expensive tea might taste like, not the bulk green tea you could get everywhere at Murasaki, and certainly not what I would expect for field rations.

“How’d you learn this stuff?” asks Everett suddenly.

“None of the basement labs had much budget. Technicians from the manufacturers were expensive. We learnt to repair our own shit, and I was good at it. Helped Dad out,” I reply simply. “Gave me an excuse to be there doing what I really wanted to do.”

“And what was that?”

I glance at him, he’s balancing his cup on his knee again with the tips of his fingers, hands draped down either side of his leg.

“Drawing.”

“Drawing what?”

The diagnostics complete and my tablet flips to the sensor's active mode, displaying a flashing radar of proximity around us as the antenna’s motor revs and it begins to constantly spin. On the screen there are two symbionts marked; Pell and Aster’s. I put my cup down and adjust the field of view outwards till it picks up Blake’s Bison on the car behind us, and a few others towards the front of the train where other passengers are. It can’t see Pooka?

“Uh,” I give the device a flick and no change. “Symbionts, I guess.”

“How?”

I grab a second sensor from the hard-shell case and begin to plug it into my tablet as well, half distracted from the conversation. “Descriptive protocols. We have a bunch of reference cards, with all sorts of body parts drawn on them, you go round interviewing people about what they see and then interpret it into a drawing. They get published with papers describing all the symbiont species.”

“Hmm.”

An edge enters my voice, “My dad did it cause he loved it, and its useful for the applied research teams. The jockeys like it for knowing what they are buying at manifestation.”

He pours himself another cup of tea and doesn’t respond to my barb. The diagnostics of the second sensor complete, and additional information pops into the screen, but still no Pooka. “Except for you, how did they sense you?” I mutter aloud. The network of sensors they mount around the manifestation platforms and in that holding cell we shared must be more powerful than these portable ones.

Everett raises an eyebrow, the line of his mouth shifting with something close to amusement at my tinkering. “My Dad’s a bit of a cracked cog as well.”

“Is he the ‘Aquila’ then? Your Dad?”

“No, that’s Mum’s boyfriend, Owen. Or ex-boyfriend, or whatever they think they are, I don’t keep up with it.”

I blink, and pick up my pliers. “He’s not here? At Aquila I mean?”

“He’d never leave what he loves, he runs his own company out of All-Markets,” he replies.

A whole family of free-men then, and with enough money between them to be running independent corps. Aster’s nicknames for them all make perfect sense. “Sure it's not cause Regina’s a drunk?” I sneer as I grab another cable.

His shoulders stiffen. I thought it was a bad joke. I lower my voice, “Sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I can be kinda mank.”

He rolls his jaw. “Yeah, that’s one way of putting it…” he then sighs and his voice drops to a rumble, “Not like I’m much better.” He leans forward and rolls to his feet, clearing his throat and returning to his ‘business’ manner, “Aster will call when it’s lunch. Get some sleep, there won’t be much tonight.”