Dawn (16 page)

Orphans were raised in the homes of soldiers. A set sum of money for child-rearing expenses was lent to their guardians by the government, and the orphans attended regular schools until fifteen years of age. Then it was up to them to choose their future course; however, if they volunteered for the military and became child soldiers, or enrolled in Officers’ Academy or some technical or other school with military affiliation, repayment of the child support fees would be waived.

For the military, even women were an indispensable human resource in the Rear Service, vital in resupply, accounting, transport, communications, space traffic control, intelligence processing, and facilities management.

“In short, you can think of it like the apprentice system that’s been around since the Middle Ages. More vicious maybe, since it uses money to try and restrict people’s futures.”

Caselnes, who at the time was assigned to Rear Service Headquarters, had explained it to Yang like that, with a healthy dose of sarcasm.

“In any case, people can’t live without being fed. That’s a fact, right? Which means we need a feeder. So come on—you can take in one at least.”

“I don’t even have a family of my own.”

“Exactly, which means you’re not fulfilling your societal obligation to support a wife and child. Look, the government even pays child support—it’d be a shame if we can’t even get you to take on this much. Right, you swinging bachelor, you?”

“Understood. But only one.”

“If you like, you can have two.”

“One is plenty.”

“Really? Well, in that case I’ll have to find you one who eats enough for two.”

Four days after that exchange had passed between them, the boy named Julian had appeared standing in the foyer of Yang’s home.

That very day, Julian had secured for himself his station in the Yang household. Given that the household’s erstwhile sole member was hardly what could be called a capable and industrious manager in the home, things were in a rather horrid state. Although Yang did own a handheld domcom, he always neglected to input the data needed to control his various household appliances; not only had it ended up a useless piece of junk, all his home tech had acquired a layer of dust as well.

For his own sake too, apparently, Julian had made up his mind to get the home’s physical environment into shape. Two days after becoming a resident of the Yang home, its young master had left on a short business trip. When he returned a week later, he found his home under occupation by a federated force of neatness and efficiency.

“I’ve arranged the data on your domcom into six categories,” the twelve-year-old commander of this occupying force had reported to the head of the house, who had stood there frozen with a stunned look on his face. “Let’s see, 1 is home management, 2 is appliance control, 3 is security, 4 is data collection, 5 is home study, and 6 is entertainment. Household accounting and daily menu selection are under 1; air-conditioning, cleaning devices, and the washing machine are under 2; the burglar alarm and fire extinguisher are under 3; and news, weather, and shopping information are under 4 … Please remember these, Captain.”

Yang had been a captain at the time. Wordlessly, he had sat down on the sofa in what doubled as his living room and dining room, wondering what he was going to say to this innocently smiling little invader.

“I went ahead and cleaned that, too. And the bedsheets are also washed. I, ah, think I’ve managed to get things shipshape indoors, but if there’s anything you’re not happy with, please tell me. Is there anything I can do for you?”

“Can you get me a cup of tea?”

Yang had asked this because he was thinking,
I’ll wet my whistle with my favorite tea, and then I’ll start with the griping
, but the boy had hurried off to the kitchen and come back carrying a tea set that was now so clean it looked practically brand-new. Then, before his very eyes, Julian had brewed Shillong-grown tea with a startling dexterity.

Yang had taken one sip of the tea set out before him, and then he had decided to surrender to the young boy. That’s how good the aroma and flavor were. Julian said that his late father had been a lieutenant in the space armada. Being even more of a tea-ceremony aficionado than Yang, he had taught his son all about tea varieties and brewing.

Six months after Yang had accepted Julian-style housekeeping, Caselnes, who had come over for a game of 3-D chess, had looked around the room and thus opined: “This is the first time in recorded history that your place is clean, isn’t it? I guess it’s true what they say, that a child is as mature as his parents are incompetent.”

Yang had made no argument.

Another two years had gone by. Julian had grown more than ten centimeters taller and was starting to look just a little bit like a grown-up. His grades were apparently fine. “Apparently,” because his guardian had always said that as long as he wasn’t failing, he didn’t need to report every little thing, and also because his ward would from time to time come home with awards, medals, and the like. In Caselnes’s words, he was a “student who had surpassed his teacher.”

“Today at school, they asked me what I’d be doing from next year on.”

It was unusual for Julian to say something like that while Yang was eating. Yang’s spoon stopped moving in the midst of scooping up some stew, and he glanced at the boy.

“Graduation’s in June of next year, isn’t it?”

“There’s a system where you can gain credits and graduate six months early.”

“There is?” said his irresponsible guardian, impressed. “So, you plan on becoming a soldier?”

“Yes, I’m a soldier’s child, after all.”

“There isn’t any law saying a child has to continue in his parent’s career. Actually, my dad was a trader.”

“If there’s some other kind of work you want to do, you should do it,” Yang told him. He remembered the ingenuous face of Will, the boy he had met in the spaceport.

“But if I don’t enter the military, you’ll have to pay back all that child support …”

“So I’ll pay it back.”

“You’ll what?”

“Don’t sell your legal guardian short here. I’ve got enough saved to cover that. Now, first of all, there’s no need for you to be graduating early. How about having a little fun instead?”

The young boy’s smooth cheeks flushed with embarrassment. “I couldn’t possibly leave you with such a burden.”

“Don’t talk back to me, kid. The thing about children is this: sponging off adults is how they grow.”

“Thank you very much, but still …”

“But what? You want to be a soldier that badly?”

Julian looked at Yang’s face suspiciously. “Somehow, you sound like you don’t like soldiers.”

“I don’t.”

Yang’s clear, concise reply bewildered the young man. “But, if that’s true, why did you become one?”

“Very simple. I had no talent for anything else.”

Yang finished his stew and wiped his mouth with his napkin. Julian cleared the table and used the domcom to turn on the dishwasher in the kitchen. Then he brought in the tea set and began brewing reddish tea from Shillong leaves.

“Anyway, think it over a little more before you decide. There’s nothing at all to be in a hurry over.”

“Yes, sir. I’ll do that. But, Commodore, they were saying on the news that Count von Lohengramm joined the military when he was fifteen.”

“That’s true, apparently.”

“They showed his face, and he was incredibly handsome. Did you know that?”

Yang had seen the face of Count Reinhard von Lohengramm any number of times—not directly, but in holograms and such. He had even heard rumors that the man was more popular than any officer in the Alliance Armed Forces among the female officers at Rear Service HQ. It seemed likely enough. Yang had never seen a young man with as handsome a face, either.

“But even I can’t be all that bad-looking. Isn’t that right, Julian?”

“Would you like milk with your tea, or would you prefer brandy?”

“Brandy.”

That was when the security system’s lamp began to flash and make a nervous sound. Julian flipped on the monitor. Many human forms were displayed on its infrared-enhanced screen. All of them wore white hoods over their heads, with only their eyes exposed.

“Julian.”

“Yes, sir?”

“Is there some kind of fad these days where clowns like that make home welfare visits en masse?”

“They’re the Patriotic Knight Corps.”

“I don’t know any circus by that name.”

“It’s an extremist group of nationalists. They do all kinds of things to harass people who say or do things against the country or the war. They’re pretty well-known lately … But this makes no sense—why would they come barging in here? You’ve even been praised by them. There’s no reason they should criticize you, is there?”

“How many are there?” asked Yang casually.

Julian read out a number in the corner of the screen. “Forty-two have come onto the premises. Ah, forty-three … and now forty-four.”

“Commodore Yang!” A loud voice blaring from a megaphone caused a wall of reinforced glass to vibrate slightly.

“Yeah, yeah, I heard ya …” Yang mumbled, though there was no way he could have been heard outside.

“We are the Patriotic Knight Corps—a band of people who truly love their country. We condemn you! You have displayed actions both disruptive to the unity of the military’s aims and harmful to its fighting spirit. Perhaps your military accomplishments have made you arrogant. I’m sure you know what we’re talking about.”

Yang could nearly feel the gaze of a surprised Julian landing on his cheek.

“Commodore Yang, you showed contempt for a sacred memorial service. When everyone in attendance answered the defense committee chairman’s passionate speech by vowing to bring down the empire, did not you, and you alone, by remaining seated assume an attitude of ridicule toward the determination of the entire nation? We condemn your arrogance! If you have anything to say for yourself, come out here and say it in front of us. I should mention that calling for security is useless. We have a way of disabling your communication system.”

I see
, Yang acknowledged.
Looks like that enchanting temptress of patriotism, His Excellency Trünicht, is lurking behind these Patriotic Knights or whatever it is they’re called. Both of their speeches are thinner than cheap consommé—and remarkably similar in their exaggerations alone.

“Did you really do that, Commodore?” asked Julian.

“Er, yeah, kinda.”

“Not again! Why do you—! Even if you’re against it in your mind, things like this wouldn’t happen if you’d just let them see you stand and clap! Strangers can only see the surface, you know.”

“You sound like Caselnes, kid.”

“You don’t have to bring Admiral Caselnes into this—even children have that much common sense.”

“What’s the matter?” called the voice from outside. “Not coming out? Still have a little shame left in your heart? But even if you do repent, we can’t acknowledge your sincerity unless you say so definitively in front of us.”

Yang clucked his tongue and was about to stand up when Julian pulled on his sleeve.

“Commodore, no matter how angry you are, you mustn’t use any weapons.”

“Stop jumping to conclusions like that, kid. First of all, what makes you think I don’t intend to have a talk with them?”

“But … you don’t.”

Yang didn’t have an answer for that.

At that moment, the window of reinforced glass cracked with a loud noise. This wasn’t the kind of glass that could be broken by throwing rocks at it. A moment later, a metal ball the size of a person’s head came flying into the room and slammed into a display shelf on the opposite wall, where it shattered several ceramic vessels lined up on it. The ball rolled off the shelf and fell to the floor with a heavy thump.

“Take cover! It’s still dangerous!”

As Yang cried out and Julian leapt lightly behind the sofa with the domcom in his hand, the metal sphere blew apart into shrapnel. Discordant sounds rang out simultaneously from every corner of the room as lighting fixtures, plates, and chairs were shattered.

Yang was left speechless. The Patriotic Knights had used a grenade launcher to fire the sort of powder-free bomb that military engineers used to flatten small-scale buildings when there was a fire hazard.

That there had been as little damage as there was meant it had been set to its lowest level of destructive power. Otherwise, everything in the room would have been reduced to heaps of wreckage. All that aside, what were civilians doing with that kind of military-grade equipment?

An idea occurred to Yang, and he snapped his fingers, though it didn’t make a very good sound.

“Julian, which one is the switch for the sprinkler system?”

“It’s 2-A-4. Are you fighting back?”

“I need to teach them a thing or two about manners.”

“Catch!”

“How about it! Ready to talk to us now? If you don’t answer, we’ll send another—”

The increasingly forceful voice from outside suddenly turned into a shriek. The sprinklers, with their water pressure set to maximum, struck the white-masked men with thick lashes of water. Soaking wet, as though caught in an unexpected downpour, they ran to and fro through the curtains of water in all directions.

“Starting to see now why it’s a scary thing to get a gentleman pissed at you? You’re just relying on numbers, you hoodlums!”

As Yang grumbled to himself, the distinctive siren of the security police grew audible in the distance. Residents in the other officers’ houses had called it in, most likely.

Even so, the fact that the authorities had not mobilized until now might well mean that those self-styled, self-righteous Patriotic Knights were an unexpectedly powerful group. If Trünicht was indeed behind them, it would not be hard to imagine why.

The Patriotic Knights hurriedly dispersed. They probably wouldn’t be in the mood to sing any songs of victory tonight. The police officers, who finally arrived in their blue combination suits, afterward described the Patriotic Knights as a group of people with an ardent love for their country, to which Yang took offense.