Loading Souls Read online

Loading Souls

  By Dalen Buchanan

  © 2012 Dalen Buchanan

  Revised 2013

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1: Prologue

  Chapter 2: Self-Guided Tour

  Chapter 3: Exodus

  Chapter 4: Down the Rabbit Hole

  Chapter 5: Welcome Wagon

  Chapter 6: Meeting the Neighbors

  Chapter 7: Guerrilla Tactics

  Chapter 8: Spraying off the Deck

  Chapter 9: Trouble at Home

  Chapter 10: Pornography Filters

  Chapter 11: Mission Brujo

  Chapter 12: The state of Texas

  Chapter 13: Barksdale Boys

  Chapter 14: Bustin up the VIP

  Chapter 15: Players & Cribs

  Chapter 16: Rolling Stones

  Chapter 17: Boats Drinks & Piracy

  Chapter 18: Not on the List

  Chapter 19: Epilogue

  Terminology

  Read an excerpt of the Sequel

  About the Author

  ****

  Chapter 1: Prologue

  Pontifical Academy for Life

  Vatican Gardens, Roma

  2313 Anno Domini

  "Our speaker for today's luncheon is Father Charles Luke, a scholastic brother of life sciences from the Academy for Sciences." Encouraging applause followed in the form of silverware striking bowls. The Academy clergy were calling for lunch. Father Luke rose to the podium and clasped hands with the Academy Secretary, "Thank you for your kind encouragement. Brothers in Christ, I bring today research from the Academy for Sciences related to bioethics questions that have troubled both our houses." A large screen focused on a graduation still of a young Latino in a Garda dress uniform. Viewing the uniform, many diners began murmuring to each other. "This is Jesus Navarro, a Templar Marshal now in our service. I will advise that this study relates classified information and should not be discussed or disseminated to the Laity." The screen changed to show two more Latinos. They wore the Templar tabards. "These are also Marshal Navarro. He came to our service from the Garda after his initial loss of life. I ask that you view the compressed mission log and see this guardian's life through his eyes. I warn that this contains violence and irreverent observations, even under medium filters. Be also aware that Marshal Navarro is an informed Catholic but a lapsed Church member."

  Replay of subject Navarro, J

  Excerpt of mission debrief DT-312-3

  Narrative feed with medium paraphrasing

  Another bright morning in the desert. The weather man promised a dry, hot afternoon. I already wished I had stolen a cab with air, or gone to a different cart for that sausage sandwich. My cab was parked in the back of the pickup lane of the Intercity bus terminal. A couple of Militsiya, looking testy in their big hats and slung sub guns, were watching me slowly eat this awful sandwich with my service light off. I had turned away a fare already. They were beginning to question my work ethic; soon they might run me out of the lane. It could be a problem. I set up a frag order to my two compadres and readied to send. One of them would have to come relieve me if the big hats came over.

  Back in Urban Tactical School, I learned you can hack public transport for an insertion, but you better have your own ride out. So we came in mostly public. Three teams entered on buses from outside the city. Cabs with their toys were parked ahead by we few who knew how to roll an armory. The original drivers were locked in a garage for the duration. It was very low profile.

  That was a problem with low income recruiting. Most of these boys had never driven in their lives. But they had the drugs and heard the word. You can speed learn almost anything in virtual on the right Cocktail. The hardest parts were sorting the aggressive from the merely hungry and training them into soldiers. Father Luke is uncanny for these kinds of crews; runs them like a Masonic temple on steroids. But the Father can get a little squeamish with the ethics. He’s not always Need to Know.

  The terminal doors slid aside and people getting off the buses began to stream out. My boys came out together, turning quickly toward the cab. I wiped the text and sent the call sign out instead. My Sergeants would be here within a minute.

  Rafe and Etienne had my back. When I became the first Templar Marshal from North Mexico, they assigned these two Alsatian sergeants to me as a detached operations unit. Rafe was the older, a snake's disposition with small dark eyes and a large nose. Etienne was fair and the youngest of us all. They had only gotten me killed once so far and seemed sincerely apologetic. I appreciated the sentiments, and going in with a new body would be good cover.

  Our recruits were very cosmopolitan about the new face in the plan. That was mostly due to a reliable effect of the right Cocktails. Good biochem can make or break an Operation and Saint Peter could fab up anything we needed in a few hours. He is Need to Know at all times. Even now he rode with us, through the Battlenet link.

  My team loaded onboard while two more cabs lined up behind us for their own crews. The boys averaged about twenty-four, but seemed much older with the face hair and dark digital glasses. The look was reminiscent of some Krymchak Jews from Ukraine that visited Jerusalem. Disguising the face lines and aging up was my idea to make the video useless. All public areas would be submitting surveillance to the State apparatus within hours of any trouble. And we were delivering trouble.

  As I wheeled my fare, they reached under seats and pried back panels to get to the tools. Etienne had put their body armor in the doors as a precaution. The boys slid on their combat loads with practiced moves and curious faces. We had appropriated local weapons straight from the army for them, trading more noise for coloration. We three Musketeers relied more on Combat Skins, but a breaching shotgun is pretty handy for this kind of B and E. Mine rode in a locking briefcase surrounded by foam and electronics. The leather matched my tasseled loafers.

  The Refugee center was south of town over a river. The Christians here had been rounded up for their protection and made completely dependent on the jailors. Seems the criminal element and the street crazies really enjoyed having some turn-the-cheek Samaritans moving in next door. Their Pastor became a martyr in the first attacks. This Mission was mostly Bible belt Lutherans. Slow to violence, but a little overzealous when roused. The thoroughly corrupt regime had mixed responses to this, being as they made a bit of profit from the situation. When enough of the Christians got themselves killed resisting, the rest were labeled a cult and rounded up. After Mother Church read the mission reports and began receiving invoices for their upkeep from the regime, they sent us.

  Father Luke had come for us in Jerusalem. The Templars were one of many specialized security units in and around the city. Some of the residents called us Hospitallers, but we were really there for the people, not the city. Most of it was just a re-creation of the original shrines anyway. It could be rebuilt again.

  All of security was part of the Garda, but religious cultural protections required specially trained members. Our Rules Of Engagement were by committee. It was a judgment assignment that could burn career paths. They said you needed faith just to sign up for these teams. That was true, in as much as you needed to understand the culture to uphold its legal protections. Agreement with the philosophy was not strictly required. If you had an epiphany or experienced a conversion through interaction with the Christians or just hit your head really good one day, you could get transferred permanently to Templar service. But the Church had to see the sincerity.

  Many Templar’s did convert, which showed an appeal in the culture. I grew up among Catholics and found them mostly civil and friendly in an innocent way. But always at the top, the same hard eyed pragmatists, although much older in appearance than the norm. They formed a layer of insulation that let
the flock live without seeing the Devil at every turn. And they were the ones that aimed us like arrows at their attackers.

  The camp came into view shortly after the river, a big sprawl of concrete and barbed wire, just as I remembered it. There was a cloud of dust drifting over from the parking lot. Sunday morning visiting hours. After a few weeks behind the wire, the Christians were allowed to have visits from local Samaritans and lawyers. The Samaritans reduced upkeep costs, the lawyers were all for the prosecution. The Regime really wanted to nail down this cult charge thing before the church could send more attorneys.

  I was dressed as a lawyer, but the suit was an incredibly bad fit. It made me look local. It also concealed about fifty kilos of custom combat exoskeleton. My four boys wore these ill made suits to complete their look, although their body armor was conventional homespun. We would only seem like a lawyer and his bully boys for a little while. Up close we would just be scary.

  Subject Navarro, J

  Mission debrief DT-312-3, Bookmark

  Query; Subjective History

  Father Luke was our Jesuit scholar. The Jesuits were the liaisons for direction of the Templars. They had supple minds that could deal with the Instrumental Pragmatism in vogue with the rest of the world. There was a historical precedent in the church that made the arrangement seem divinely inspired. From my point of view, it was better to deal with realists to preserve professionalism.

  They had rules that showed concern for my individual well-being. That was a great benefit of Templar duty; the thought that they would always try to bring me back, not just because of the investment in training, but because I had an intrinsic value as a warrior for their Lord. Even if they also believed I had no soul. This job is full of paradox like that.

  There was comfort few had anymore. Most toiled for any patron who would hire them until judged unfit for duty. Then you went on the Dole and sank into inconsequence, or emigrated offworld for adventure. If generating enough revenue for good credit you could get a Transference, a continued life in a new body. The debt would be paid off in a few decades and then you could find a new future with new patrons, if desired. There was a long waiting list. Anyone who could do the math saw that every year, about six percent of the population died. We had facilities to Transfer less than two percent. Several plausible explanations for the disparity had been offered. But it all came down to you took what was given and paid what was asked. If you had some private income, you could live as an upload while waiting. For those trapped on the Dole, we had the Lotto. A few million fortunate were awarded Transference every year. It is necessary to have hope, to promote domestic tranquility.

  In the Garda, we could receive a body on a Medical Writ if killed or maimed in action. Approval was based on availability and your record. The special units had first draw on this zombie pool. We were an all-volunteer army and recruitment was not a problem.

  However, Transference was a sore point with the Christians. It was the position of the church that when the body died, the soul went to Judgment. Translating a quantum model into a new body created a being they called a Zimboe. It would act in every way just like the original mind but was missing the bit of consciousness that constituted the immortal soul. They called the practice “False Resurrection.” The concept was currently unprovable, the implications subtle. Christians were one of the few cultures that held this belief. When Christians died, they did so utterly. The right was available under the Protected Cultures Act.

  The Jesuits had made peace with this idea when dealing with the secular world. They treated the Transferred as anyone else. Their only quirk was that they would not grant the sacraments of the church. We had no souls to save. Father Luke was considered scandalous by many of the other Jesuits for his practice of offering a blessing on us before perilous operations. He felt that we Transferred could be blessed as inanimate tools of the Lord’s will; like a plow. The premise was insulting, but to receive a blessing before battle was a small comfort. It is an odd feeling to know that people will be praying for you while at risk. I think of it sometimes when working and retune my resolve.

  For those Transferred Templars that were curious or found relations with Christians, the Church would welcome them to Mass, but the sacraments were for the spouse and children only. We were shadows in the pews, earning only smiles. On my last trip to Mass I was stared at by three small, whispering boys. It made me wonder what they heard. I had read the story of the original Templars, killed by their priests on Friday the thirteenth. Most times things change in small ways before the big change arrives.

  But then again, Christian motivations were mostly pacifistic. The Garda manual called the form a non-profit Hagiocracy. Their God was non-corporeal and debatably uncommunicative. Priests would guide the converted to perform good works until his return. They did this with donations and a Protected Culture annuity awarded by the Union Senate. That award came only with a trip to the negotiating tables for a religious Cultural Charter. All the flavors of Christianity were to negotiate as a bloc. Some skeptics say the Charter was a muzzle to get more control over religious feuds. Others noticed the Vatican’s centralized bureaucracy and large membership served them well in many of the negotiations. At the time, half of the Earth’s population would claim religious status. A third of them were Christian, half of those were Catholic.

  It became a Charter violation for any church official to incite harm to any group or person. This included libelous or economic harm. Christians may proselytize through mass mediums but may not proselytize individuals without permission. Christians could not be forced by an employer to violate their expanded ethics. Christians could get a Do Not Transfer order in place. There were a whole lot of other minutiae about digital harassment, large gatherings, economic plans and preferred correctional systems.

  The one that concerned the Templar detached teams was, "Missions legally accepted in other cultures are extensions of the Church and enjoy the same protections." The inherent flaw in that provision was that Christians do not usually send missions to nice places. As a Protected Culture, the Garda had to assign security assets with the authority and training to enforce Charter provisions, wherever Christians might make a home.

  The Garda ran the new section parameters against the cultural model. The Knights Templar were the obvious precedent. I was told that the Templars were old enough to be vague on details, but had good iconic recognition. It was still necessary to reassure religious scholars that we were just resurrecting the brand name. Most of them were co-opted into study or oversight groups, the better to appease their historical fears.

  The section, once named and tasked, grew exponentially. As a cultural bloc, Christians now had rights to a percentage of all Transferral bodies produced annually. Since they did not use them, the rights were sold to the Garda. This provided costs for several real-time prisons and defrayed transportation overhead. The Church named the Jesuits to directorship of their use. The 280th Pope sent a Papal Brief in a crystal frame to make it official. Our Grand Master has it on his office wall.

  A culture needed to seek protections during those times of change. The transition from nations was not a smooth process. It took a scourge of wars lasting too long to bring the exhausted combatants to arbitration. The arbitration grew to a movement for reform. Our economies and ecologies were too interwoven. It was too easy for small groups to cause worldwide suffering. We would recognize our differences, but protect all from harm. Our defenses would enjoy economies of scale while our economies could scale back on defense.

  It happened gradually over generations. At first, nations joined in East-West blocs. This led to an economic Cold War of preferred trade networks. But the West had finally overcome their lack of a long view. Many leaders were now among the Transferred. They learned to leverage on their strengths, fewer mouths and more resources was too much advantage. One day, the East just defaulted. It was handled so well, most did not notice the change in leadership.

  In anothe
r hundred years, nations became less relevant. Culture and belief were the commonalities for collective bargaining. Defense and economies were already globalized. Borders were porous. Management had become a world bureaucracy as millions of the dissatisfied were encouraged to vote with their feet to sponsored offworld colonies or alternative cultures.

  We got a system that was hard to break, lots of safety valves and succession hierarchies. The colonies got their own mix of cultures and time to grow a market, using whichever socio-political model they could sustain. Find a niche and we’ll check in on you, once in a while.

  Subject Navarro, J

  Restart mission debrief DT-312-3

  Narrative feed with medium paraphrasing

  We were at the first step to a long journey. Operations were always to the dark corners of nowhere. Places where all hope was for the future, because the present was really bad. This colony had been a dumping ground for criminal vory and zeks that the balkanized Soviet could do without. To keep them manageable, Mother Russia also sent generals with unpopular nationalist leanings. As soon as they arrived, the Generals raised old fashioned armies and began expanding. Lately, they were becoming a bit feudal in their dealings.

  A Note of Understanding made with a troubled regime for acceptance of a Church Mission was now worthless. It seems the brother-in-law, who was high in the army, staged a coup d’etat and declared that the previous administration’s contracts were criminal malfeasance. They were debt free for about two years and then found they had no credit. They also had no real exports. The economy turned inward and began devouring resources in zero-sum trade. It was an engine for conflict. Peter must be robbed before Paul sees a dime. I find it depressing how many colonies fall into these historical dead ends. It’s like they forgot how to read.

  Parameters would have been very different for a Mission to that type of setting. Missionaries were positioned badly and overtaken by events. Out of the five thousand souls in country, estimates believed three thousand might still be viable. It was believed also that more losses would occur until the situation was stabilized. Saint Peter would work up a new mission plan and adjust on arrival.

  We were assigned an eighty year old Ferengi class trade ship. They were common, although the class name had a strange history. It came with a shuttle, since the design could never enter an atmosphere. At five thousand tons, the starship was small, in need of a polishing and decidedly non-military. But it was relatively cheap to operate. The computer was upgraded with a Splinter of Saint Peter and a Fabricator filled the forward cargo bay. Six zombies were placed into cold sleep as misadventure insurance.

  My first visit to the camp had been alone. Armed with a briefcase full of legal papers and my favorite Seville suit, I had attempted an assault of reason and vague consequences. The Minister of Defense agreed to meet me on the force of Church bona fides. Possibly, he thought I had the money. When he found that money would not be involved, I was handed over to a Deputy Minister and his aides for resolution to my problem. They offered an impromptu inspection of the camp which I could not refuse.

  Once there, I was accused of a number of detentionable offenses including being a Christian provocateur. They must have heard something about the Church before I got there. I found myself a prisoner and very unpopular with the guards. While they beat me in shifts, I related the camp layout and schedules to Saint Peter. When they thought I was good and tenderized, they allowed me a teleconference with Father Luke. I used the uplink to plead for money and mercy from Mother Church. If I had really been a lawyer for the Vatican there may have been a chance of ransom. But Templars were never ransomed. It was a very old rule. So, after a month of talking to Father Luke, they set up a media camera and put me against a wall with a cigarette. I didn’t smoke anymore, but the incongruity of being offered a mercy by these bastards momentarily stunned me. It tasted better than I remembered.

  When the rifles spoke, Saint Peter brought me home.

  Transfer of subject Navarro, J

  Excerpt of mission debrief DT-312-3

  Anthropometry – HC-Garda I

  There is a trick in quantum physics called entanglement. It means that paired systems can transmit data over long distances without a visible connection. Some call it Quantum teleportation, but that term always makes people think about fantasy shows. It doesn’t work with energy or matter. You just get an image of the other system’s state in a superposition file. If you are within ten thousand klicks of a quantum computer that is entangled with another quantum device, then they can do this until they run out of paired particles. We’re working on the range.

  Now, human brains are not quantum devices. They operate on different principals. The invention of Transference translation allowed the brain to be described to a quantum system. The depth of detail was amazing. What you are reduced to is called a superposition file. That can be stored or transmitted like any other data. It is a record frozen in time.

  What this expensive technology gave to me was a superposition file waiting in backup. There were six stored zombies to receive that imprint if something should happen. I had a few implants that let me speak with Saint Peter over distance, as long as I still had paired particles to swap. None of it could stop them from killing me, but it wasn’t a permanent condition.

  They shipped my perforated corpse back to Father Luke. To show they still had some appreciation for legalities, I guess. That was unlikely, but allowed them to deliver a message. It was depressingly simple, "Take your provocateurs and your sanctimonious arguments back to the Vatican and pay us what you owe." It had that uncompromising, single-minded clarity that always makes me think of wars.

  We didn’t actually leave. They had nothing working that could reach us in orbit. We just lifted consumables and my body into the shuttle one last time and orbited overhead like a baleful eye. The quantum model was imprinted to a zombie and I seamlessly found myself in a new body. For just a second, I tasted tobacco.

  "Is anyone home?" I opened my eyes and saw Rafe looking down at me with a quizzical expression. Blurred specks moved across my sight, synchronizing vision to new eyes. Soon, he was in focus.

  "It’s a boy!" said Etienne, passing an imaginary cigar to Rafe. Rafe absently mimed taking the cigar but kept looking at me. I tried to say hello, but broke into a phlegmy coughing jag instead.

  "Get some water. Raise the bed up." Rafe said. Etienne put a plastic cup to my lips, spilling most down my chest. My new lips were slow to remember drinking skills. "We had to intubate the body for Transfer. This little bay doesn't have a proper aerator."

  "Saint Peter said he would fab one for the next time." Rafe offered, too little, too late. If I managed to get killed twice on this trip I would count myself unlucky.

  "It's OK," I croaked. Etienne patted my shoulder and gave me a concerned look, "Sorry about getting you killed." Saint Peter and the Father had actually come up with the plan, but my compadres signed off and felt guilty about the trouble.

  "We snuck a Field Translator inside to back you up before the firing squad."

  "These commissars would strangle a kitten for a couple rubles," Rafe said.

  I made the right noises and reassured them we were brothers. Some of the memories were not pleasant, but you need to keep your friends close.

  Rafe had a Christian woman that he would have to start over with if he got himself killed. The Jesuits would put his new body into the Templar line-up, but for his rank and file Christian neighbors, he would have to court his own widow. It was one of those funny "Don’t ask, don’t tell" arrangements the Church churned out when faced with paradox. So whenever the volunteering part of first contact comes up, Etienne and I split the duty. I had just lost the toss.

  Later, after our reunion, Saint Peter smuggled us down to night side in the mountains and then went back to his usual supply airdrops. The shuttle was very stealthy compared to the sensors available in the Regime. But it was fragile and one of a kind right now. We would try to keep
the hours below the required overhaul rating.

  The team had been busy the month of my incarceration. Seeing the nature of the beast allowed Saint Peter to compile the War Chest. Everything known about the application of violence became a plan option. The ROE’s and logistics would reduce these options, but it was still a lot of very scary activities that no sane person would ever want to be the target of. Unfortunately, the current regime would never be considered a sane opponent. This would be about levels of damage and political extortion. Well, that and overhead. The church was a non-profit and the Garda never had enough operating budget.

  Saint Peter tapped their satellites, the ones still working. From that connection, no outdated cryptography could keep him out of their systems. Anything found on the network was sorted, classified and relegated to subprograms. A political flowchart sorted out the regime players. Photogrammetry created the terrain models. Cultural and societal analysis found the soft spots.

  A regime this bad always has enemies. Their short time dealing with us showed they weren’t even very circumspect about creating new ones. That spoke of a feeling of control. Their enemies weren’t enough of a threat yet. Odds were low that we could put someone else in power and make it stick.

  There was Terror, an ugly choice that would cause collateral suffering and probably endanger the Christians being held. Ugly would beget ugly until a side broke. We rarely ran with terror.

  There was also no way Attrition was going to get our people back in any reasonable time period. Trying to involve the Navy in our dispute would take even more time. Instead the team agreed that the Sword of Damocles appeared the best plan. We could get enough zircon ore for almost nothing and refine the hafnium for an emission. The forging of the sword would be up to Saint Peter. Father Luke would be the salesman. He could be very persuasive.

  That left three thousand souls who needed a new home, somewhere far from the hustle and bustle of a sick society in the thrall of gunmen. Their Mission would now be a safety valve for the dispossessed. They would be a coalescing point for a new society to emerge. Assuming we could get them out of the camp.

  The Christians had been busy too, prior to their incarceration, gathering a flock of converts. Some of these people had been rounded up with the Missionaries and then driven out to a raw mountain range and left. One was shot to demonstrate the seriousness of their exile. They were told that they could live here, in the most godless wasteland available and that perhaps their faith would bring God back to this place. They should send word if they woke up one day in a green paradise. This was considered a grand joke by the guards, who laughed while removing selected personal belongings that had been overlooked in the first sweep.

  In time their families who had escaped the sweeps found out what had happened and relocated with them. They brought all the wealth they could still carry off, not that it amounted to much. It was a bounty to the exiles, who were living off birds traps and evaporating plants in plastic bags for water. They became as the old Kurds, a crucible of wretched conditions and unnecessary death. There were only six hundred of them.

  Father Luke made fast friends with a small application of care. We had brought settler kit for use by our Christians on relocation. Here in these hills he found Christians, so they received supplies routed to them through the smuggler roads they had all learned so well. That these supplies were found in the middle of nowhere and attached to parachutes drew little comment. Crates of old style weapons delivered by Rafe and Etienne served to introduce them to our martial arm. They could see we were serious about putting the fix in.

  Father Luke supervised the growing of a Holding. Construction Nano shaped a network of caves out of the rock, leaving piles of separated ore. Power kernels turned loads of scrap into utilities. Food and equipment found its way over the hills to disappear under the ground. It was a low signature growth plan that tripled the living standard and fully employed the entire exile population. Within my month of captivity, the team had made a beachhead. We Templars had recruits.

  Here is a trick Father Luke taught us that should find its way into the Field Wiki. We found a lot of kids from sixteen to twenty five who had no practical experience with violence, except as targets. Then there were a few men twenty six and older who had seen some action in one army or another. They had been using old house guns to drive away bandits and rogue army shakedowns. It didn’t always work out so well for them, but the survivors learned and adjusted. They would make fine NCOs, if we could get them to maturity. These men had held the top rank in this little society until the Church came along. Meekly relinquishing control of their family’s future was not going to happen. They would break quickly from losses and jockey for advantage. They carried grudges. So the Father would pick a few of the boys for speed learning in the morning. Just as a demonstration. Jack them up on Cocktail number 6 and strap them into the few Simulators we brought. He liked to slip a maimed boy into the mix on the sly. Little villages under attack always had a selection of these. He found a boy blinded by an explosion and took him away for a "medical evaluation." The family was only too happy to have us feed and take care of him for a while.

  Just after supper time, when the villagers had had their fill of our good food and the Father had said a blessing, we brought them out. The first thing you would notice was that these boys had a different bearing. They looked serious and proud. There was a hint of nervousness, because many had had their position in this society beaten into them by the elders in the audience. But they had a peek at a future where they could do or be anything. They knew they would surprise the elders with what they could do. Father Luke’s pep talks and the effects of Cocktail number 6 also played a big part in their transformation.

  We would start the show slow. First they sang an acappella version of "Onward Christian Soldiers." It was an unfamiliar hymn for the villagers, but the translation gave them the words and the words were uplifting to any Christian militia. There were gasps as their sons performed solo bits and graceful harmonies. It was a choir of angels to the gentle of heart. But the fighting elders were not very gentle of heart. They saw no practicality to singing, missing the lesson of rapid coordination, and so we moved on.

  A few of the healthier boys performed Kata and broke boards. A pair squared off in a Capoeira dance that was obviously martial combat training. This was most impressive to the fighting elders. They would have to think twice about beating these boys again. All of them wanted to know this new art. But the use of hands is not a thing easily done in a gunfight, so we moved on.

  The last two boys were the most impressive to these hardened hill men. Father Luke led out the youngest boy selected and also guided the blind boy to seated positions on a blanket. The surprise at these two selections for a finale caused murmurs among the crowd. Rafe gently laid automatic rifles beside each boy. Father Luke made a show of consulting a stopwatch and softly said, "Begin." The boys broke the rifles down in a handful of seconds, performing jam clearing actions as they went. They reassembled the rifles in quick time, pausing at the last to chamber a round. The two of them grounded the butt of their rifles and fired one round straight into the air. It all happened in less than twelve seconds. The blind boy was actually the first to accomplish the task, due to his clever hands. But there was not a full second between their shots.

  Neither boy had ever handled a gun in their short lives.

  The villagers let out a raw animal sound. Many fell to prayer and shouts. The boys were returned to their families, still high on accomplishment and number 6. Father Luke brushed off the press of elders who wanted details and promises. We had set the hook, they would come by in the morning and hand us the keys to the village.

  We fed them guerilla training and Cocktail number 7. They grew more serious than normal. The authority recognition portion of their brains had been dialed up a bit. It was a subtle effect. But it gave you steady men who would obey the command chain. Those who outperformed were shunted off into NCO and specia
l teams. They got Cocktail number 9 and the advanced tactical schooling. It made them a little dreamy, blurring the line between training and off duty. They learned very fast this way, but most of the Elders in the NCO group found themselves abdicating their roles as village strongmen. They were sublimating the new rules, fed to them in the Code of Conduct and the Field Wiki. Their subconscious had hijacked most of their creative thought processing to do this. The Father assured them we would care for their families, while they became Christian soldiers, and all was well.

  Sun Tzu favored provisioning from your enemies stores. That was the first written application of an accounting trick to reduce overhead in war. Saint Peter is very big on these economies. The regime’s antique military network made it easy to divert materiel from one place to another. We sent supplies and the transport to carry them from other posts to a certain post nearer to our strength. Small bite shipments with layers of paperwork were stockpiled in a mobile artillery bunker next to a growing motor pool.

  The supply sergeant on the receiving end of this bounty was approached by one of our new warriors who used to be a smuggler. "Would there be a convenient time we could drop by and pick up, say, a few cases of ammunition? Money would change hands and we could do further business." The sergeant was a known quantity from past exchanges with the smugglers. He welcomed the opportunity.

  It was a bit of routine and a bit of terror for our newly educated recruits. The routine was the supply sergeant, arranging schedules with a staff sergeant to cherry pick the graveyard shift. He wanted just enough men for a watch, but not enough to dilute profits. The rest were sent on leave or to far corners, out of the way of business. The terror was rolling into that den of pirates armed with a pack of lies and some weaponized mosquitoes.

  From the front gate to the bunker entrance, large clouds of the insects were released from a tray between the rear wheels, concealed in the line of tire dust. As insect predators went, they had an affinity for mammals. Heat and light attracted them, exhaled CO2 zeroed them in. They brought their own hypodermics. We had access to a lot of them around the villager’s septic fields. Best of all, you just had to trap them, breed for girls and dip their beaks in the right mixture to weaponize them. We probably had a million of the little vampires, anesthetized in loose bricks. They wake up hungry.

  The fight progressed across the post in suddenly appearing clouds of insects. Men with guns would swat and stumble away from lighted areas. Mosquitoes were not usually a problem here, so the window screens were a little too porous. The shacks and Quonsets were open doors to the insects.

  Our weapons mixture was nanotech that sought the reticular activating section of the brain and began churning out neurochemicals. The bitten would become sleepy and lay down in a very natural way. They would find their will uncoupled from their motor control a bit before that. Saint Peter said it was a variant of surgical anesthesia. Testing showed no one lasting more that fifteen minutes from bite to sleep and the only evidence would disappear with their morning pee. The mosquitos that failed to find targets after a few hours would die when the nano cooked off. For our parameters; complete access without drawing an immediate military response, it was perfect.

  Our Trojan truck rolled up by the bunker, dropping to an idle at the entrance. The driver was looking at the passenger who was having an animated phone conversation with some unknown third party. The passenger held up his hand to implore patience as a small cloud of stinging mosquitoes swept in behind the truck and scattered around the bay full of men. This was an annoyance to the Supply Sergeant and his guard. They swatted but stood to their guns.

  Our smuggler agent concluded his conversation and jumped down from the truck, swatting a few mosquitoes himself and probably happy he had the antidote so no chemical factory was going to set up in his brain. “Dobriy vyecher,” He told the Sergeant, a formal good evening to go with business. “My caller was telling me about a border guard unit crossing our trail out in the dark. Friends of yours?”

  “No one I know tonight,” said the Sergeant. “Just bad luck. I can schedule another time, but it will cost more.”

  “No no, let's wait a bit and let my man call me back. We’ll sit in the truck until he says the way is clear and then we’ll conclude our business with the Army.”

  The Sergeant did not like this delay, but saw no percentage in sending us back out for arrest. He also did not want his supplies in our possession if it should all go wrong somehow. So, he let the Smuggler go back to his truck then he found a chair and a bottle to nip while thinking about robbing this little bit of money and finding some other smugglers. Occasionally, he would swat a mosquito. "Damned hillbillies" I heard him say, through the canvas of the truck.

  The driver was Etienne. Rafe and I sat in the back like caravan guards. Only our smuggler, who we called Lieutenant Fokin and the two troopers in the back with us were Christian militia. They were nervous, not sure where the training would take them. When the Gate guards had flipped the canvas for a quick look in back, Rafe and I gave them relaxed, confident poses. Our two troopers tried to look like young laborers in over their heads. It was believable because it was mostly true. To the gate guards, we looked exactly as expected and were passed through. We sat and listened to the hum of insects over the short drive to the bunker. Although covered in repellent, there were still a lot of mosquitoes busying around the back with us. Everybody got stung regularly for a few minutes. We wouldn’t be going to sleep, but it was a part of the plan we could have done without.

  When the first army guard slumped over, the other soldiers did not react. They seemed paralyzed, but it was a case of lights on, nobody home. Their open eyes focused on nothing. Soon the bay was full of slumbering soldiers. Fokin made another call on his phone. Our observer squad out at the fence line could see no movement on infra red. There were a dozen soldiers sleeping on the grounds. The men in barracks were undisturbed. It should stay that way for at least several hours. Our mosquito air force would continue hunting around here for that long.

  We waited ten more minutes and got off the truck, swirling around the bunker bay with silenced automatics. No one challenged us. The Supply Sergeant had passed out next to a small radio. Fokin picked it up and asked for a status check. He had the slumbering Sergeant’s accent down pretty well. No one answered. I told Fokin to call in the observer squad while we swept the perimeter. Etienne and I took one of the militia boys on a walk around the bunkers. Rafe took the other one over to the barracks for a quick reconnoiter. Other than picking a few soldiers up out of the roadway we saw no one moving until the first of our militia began streaming in from the gate.

  A big limitation on this op was the shortage of drivers. We Templars and a couple of the militia could handle big trucks offroad in the dark. Virtual driving programs would deliver the basics to more, but without access to the trucks, we could see some bad decision loops leading to a wreck. Our one smuggler’s truck was a smaller civilian model that handled very differently and was too valuable to risk on training. The compromise was that each of the qualified drivers would take a truck and lead another truck out into the free market collection of smuggler’s trails. If they followed slowly behind us and stuck to our tire tracks, we could expect to get them home. Fokin would drive his smuggler truck back out, leaving no trace behind.

  We taped up the lights and disabled the friend or foe transponders on eight trucks. They were loaded with our pick of supplies and lined up on the exit road within ninety minutes. The convoy slowly rolled out the gate and eventually split off in three different directions. We drove into the hills, exploiting surveillance blind spots to cache the bounty. Before dawn, it was all underground.

  ****

  Chapter 2: Self-Guided Tour