The Reaper Plague (12 page)

“
A woman in combat always
has something to prove.”

LeBrun sighed heavily, ground out his current
smoke. “Not ‘A woman,’Repeth.
You
. Last time you were in the
US the Unionists tried to take away your identity. They kicked you
out of the Corps, threw you in prison, told everyone you were a
traitor and mentally ill. Now you’re back, and you won. You’re
vindicated. I figured you’d have to get some of that happy-dance
out of your system but now that you have your platoon in shape, it
seems to me you’re expressing your prejudice against normals.”

Jill breathed deeply for a moment, trying to
push aside her denial, trying to examine herself objectively.
Finally, she said, “All right, sir. Maybe so. But aside from that,
I’m worried…aren’t you worried?”

LeBrun lit another smoke from the burning
butt. The fresh smell assaulted her nostrils. With the first drag
he replied, “I have concerns, but they aren’t much different from
the concerns of a normal unit before Infection Day. I wonder how
soldiers – sorry, joint military troops – will react in a hostile
environment where we have to actively sort friend from foe, where
no one is wearing a uniform except us, where there are a thousand
wrong moves and only a few right ones. Where one wrong move can get
you killed, Eden or not.”

She nodded, casting her eyes down.
I’ve
been so focused on getting Fourth Platoon ready I forgot about the
bigger picture. It’s great not to have an officer looking over my
shoulder but it’s easy to get trapped down in the weeds, lose my
perspective.
“Yes, sir. You’re right. I’ll try to keep what
you’ve said in mind.”

He nodded, gazing steadily at her, as if
waiting for something. Jill wasn’t sure what he wanted but there
was one question that had occurred to her. “Sir…you’re a bit
different from the average captain I’ve worked for before…” She
trailed off, not sure how to ask him “why?”

He chuckled grimly. “I’m not a career
officer. Or I wasn’t, who knows now? I was a permanently-stuck
captain in the Nebraska National Guard and the sole policeman in
the bustling metropolis of Crawville, population one thousand. They
activated me just a few weeks ago. So pardon me if I’m not dyed
green enough yet or I don’t fit your template. I’m a cop, first and
foremost, and you are too. I think you’ve been a commando for just
a little too long.” His gaze sharpened. “I think you need to start
being a cop again.”

Repeth flushed, suddenly ashamed, realizing
he was right. “Aye, sir. Thank you sir.”

“
You’re welcome.” LeBrun
gave her one more searching look. “Dismissed. Oh,” he said,
standing up, “There was someone here earlier looking for you. A
civilian. I told him he could wait in your office.”

She opened her mouth to ask who it was, then
shut it again.

“
Maybe you’d better run
along and see. Go on.” His eyes were amused.

“
Aye aye, sir.” So she ran
along, curious. So curious that she forgot he still hadn't answered
her queries about the Homies’ mission.

A duffel bag and a civilian-style dun-colored
rucksack were thrown untidily on the floor outside her office.
There were no markings on them. Puzzled, she opened the door to
find out who her visitor was.

“
Rick!” She threw herself
into Rick Johnstone’s arms, staggering him. They half-fell against
the wall and reintroduced themselves for a minute or two. When they
came up for air she asked, “What are you doing here?”

“
Coming with.” His smile
was wide.

She scrambled backward to arms’ length, just
now noticing he was in FC-style fatigues. “What? You can’t!” She
felt ashamed as she saw his face fall.
Who am I to tell him he
can’t come along?
“Sorry, I didn’t mean that, you just startled
me. I mean…why? What’s the deal?”

Rick crossed his arms, trying to hide his
hurt. “I’m a Free Communities liaison officer. It was part of the
agreement to provide the weapons and ammo, that the FC would have
some people embedded. To observe, you know.” He looked at her
uncertainly.

Jill was aware of the familiar smell of him,
the deodorant he used, the shampoo, and she bitterly regretted her
first reaction.
Not fair, to surprise me this way,
she cried
inside, but instead forced a smile and said, “Oh, and you just
happened
to be assigned here, to Colonel Muzik’s
battalion.”

He grinned weakly in response. “I admit I
pulled a few strings. Okay, one big string.”

“
A string named Markis, I
bet.” She stepped forward again and put her face up to his,
reaching for his lips. She kissed him tenderly for a moment, then
ferociously as her feelings took over. She buried herself in his
arms. “It’s so good to see you,” she husked.

“
Now that’s the welcome I
expected.” He stroked her pinned-up hair.

She could tell he was still stung, and she
thought of how she might soothe that hurt, in the age-old way of a
woman.
But not yet, not now, and not here in the barracks, where
everyone knows everything about everyone else. And what about my
new commitment to God and Christ? What about all that stuff about
fornication and premarital sex? I wish I’d had more time with
Christine, so she could explain to me how a believer lives in the
real world.

“
So where are you staying?”
she asked. “The BOQ?”

“
No, the Trailers. They
said I got a private one, but I came straight here. You can…” He
trailed off, as if uncertain how to frame an invitation.

The “trailers” were FEMA-type emergency
dwellings, economy single-wides equipped for two or four people.
They’d brought in a bunch of them as Pueblo swelled and boomed with
people serving the new provisional capital of the United
States.

“
That sounds great.” And it
did.
I’ll stay the night with him, even if all we do is snuggle.
She laughed at herself inside. Riiiight. Going to be an interesting
evening.
“Let me grab a bag from my room and talk to my
Assistant Platoon Sergeant. Just stay here, and don’t answer the
door.”

“
Why, you ashamed of me?”
His tone was bantering but he was half serious.

She put her hands on her hips. “Not a chance.
But I’ve worked hard to earn a reputation as an unforgiving iron
maiden and I don’t want to blow it now by seeming human. Just do as
I ask, all right? A leader has to maintain a certain image.”

“
Yeah, okay.” He sat back
on the edge of her desk, picked up one of her souvenir coins to
fiddle with it.

She shoved his bags into her office with her
foot and shut the door on his bemused expression, cursing under her
breath.
A good and welcome surprise but I’m going to pay for it
tomorrow in sleep. Whatever. I’ll catch up next year.
She
hurried down the barracks corridors to her room at the end,
throwing a few things in her gym bag. Then she sat down on her bunk
and called Chaplain Christine Forman.

“
Hello, Jill.” Forman’s
smooth, clench-teethed Brahmin-WASP accent was unmistakable. “What
can I do for you.”

“
Talk?”

“
Of course. What’s on your
mind?”

“
Sex.”

“
Do tell. Let me get
comfortable, and then tell me all about it.”

Fifteen minutes later Jill begged her friend
and counselor to let her hang up. “I think that’s enough for now
and Rick is waiting for me. Thanks for explaining things.”

“
I’m always available for
you, Jill.”

“
Ditto. Take care,
Christine.”

She ended the call, then she looked for
Grusky, spotting him in the dayroom playing cards with the squad
leaders. She signaled to him from the door. He leaped to his feet
and hurried to join her. In a low voice she said, “You handle PT
tomorrow morning, I have another appointment. Make sure they’re
standing tall after breakfast ready for training.”
There, that
buys me some sleep.
She felt a bit guilty but she knew she had
been driving herself harder than anyone up till now
. I deserve a
little me time
. “Reach me on my phone if you have to, but it
better be serious.” She slapped him on the shoulder. “I’m sure you
can handle anything.”

He grinned, genuinely pleased to be put in
charge, a true convert to the Church of Repeth. “No problem, Master
Sergeant.”

Jill nodded and left him to his card-playing.
Remarkable what an attitude adjustment, a good example and some
respect will do to a junior leader. I’m really glad my gamble with
him paid off. It could have turned into a mess.
She walked
quickly back to her office to join Rick.

They scampered out of the building into
starlight and walked the half-mile to the dusty prefab town near
the end of the runway, sharing the load of his gear. Supply trucks
full of water, food, porta-potties, furniture and everything else
the hastily-erected sprawl needed to operate drove past them. They
stayed well off the road and upwind, but they still caught the
stink of engine fumes now and then.

On the way they talked about impersonal
things, operational things, professional things. How the Markises
and the Chairman’s staffers were doing now that they relocated
permanently to South Africa. How the children were safely returned
from the kidnapping. How they’d caught the two nanocommandos and
were holding them as POWs. How the President had decorated and
restored her.

Anything to avoid talking about personal
things in the noise and clouds of dust and diesel smoke.

Threading their way through the dark-bright
maze of trailers and prefabs was a nostalgic, slightly surreal
journey. For Jill it recalled temporary military compounds in
desert lands half a world and more than a decade away. This time,
though, most of the people going about their business under the
glare of the lights were civilians. She hoped none of her people
would be out here to see them.

As Rick fumbled at the lock to his trailer
she felt vaguely guilty and excited at the same time. Ever since
her repentance and spiritual renewal she had struggled as she
anticipated this situation, as with the memories of sins throughout
her life.

Intellectually she knew all her
transgressions were forgiven. In her gut, they all came back to
haunt her: big ones like her role in the missile launch, small ones
like casual, gratuitous fornication.
That’s what I have to keep
calling it in my mind, to remind myself that it’s wrong. It’s
harder to explain to myself, much less him, but I’ll have to
try.

Inside, door locked, she tossed his rucksack
and her gym bag into a corner and looked around at the Spartan
accommodations. Two bare single beds with decent mattresses, two
dressers, two wall lockers, a small refrigerator, a door into a
small bathroom with shower. An air conditioner set in the wall.

“
Not exactly the Hilton,”
Rick remarked.

“
I’ve lived in a lot worse.
You can probably draw linens from some kind of supply
point.”

“
I have a sleeping bag.
We’ll make do.” His face lit up, eager, as he stepped toward
her.

“
Wait a second, Rick. We
have to talk.”

His face fell. “Uh oh. Whenever the girl says
that, something bad always happens.”

Jill laughed. “Oh, you have lots of
experience with girls?”

“
Mostly my mother and my
sister, and whenever they say that, there’s nothing good coming up
next.”

Jill sat down on the bunk, patting the
mattress next to her. He sighed and sat down, woeful and dogfaced.
His eyes were brimming as he asked, “Are you breaking up with
me?”

“
Oh, God, no!” She took his
face in her hands and kissed him. “No way. I love you,
Rick.”

“
I love you too, but please
put me out of my misery and tell me what’s going on.”

“
Well, ah…” She ground to a
halt.

“
Is it about…what we
did?”

She nodded thankfully. “And what we’re going
to do, a lot, I hope.” Her face dimpled in mischievous mirth. “But
not yet. That’s all. Not tonight. Last time I talked you into it,
and I know you were not…well, it wasn’t fair. I wasn’t a believer
back then, but I am now. I’ve repented and asked God for
forgiveness and having sex with you right now as we are would just
be…”

“
Indulgent? Bad timing?
Awkward?” he laughed with relief. “Is that all it is? You were
worried I would be insulted or disappointed?”

She nodded, looking down. “I was all ready
with the big speech about not cheapening intimacy and stuff.”

“
Well, parts of me are very
disappointed. Mostly the parts below the belt. But official
monogamy is God and society’s way of ensuring we’re
responsible.”

“
Make me feel bad now,” she
teased, “because I pushed you into it. You’re such a
goody-two-shoes.”

His expression turned serious. “That’s not it
at all. I just want everything to be right between us. And a good
start is all the more important now that we have a lot longer to be
together. We’ll just have to hit the reset button. On the other
hand,” he grinned, “I’m not going to agonize about it just because
I got to preview our life together.”

He’s so earnest and young. It actually
makes this easier. He wants to please me so much, she thought. All
I have to do is say so and he agrees. Wonder how long that’s going
to last? God, Jill, you’re cynical.
“Aren’t we a couple of
pansy Edens. If my platoon could see me now…”