The first thing for today was to issue an OPORD to—
“Sir,” Hillson said in his earplant, “coming up.”
It was the first time that the master sergeant had announced entry instead of asking permission. Jason braced himself.
Hillson’s face had the rigid, impassive expression that meant he was furious. “Sir, we’ve had an incident. A hunting unit left at dawn, ten troops led by Lieutenant Sullivan. They just returned. Two of them are dead.”
“New America?”
“No. They were shot by Private Kandiss.”
Jason blinked. Mason Kandiss, the soldier off the Return that Jason had assigned to J Squad, had performed so well that Jason had had the luxury of forgetting about him. “Tell me as much as you know, and how you know it.”
“Kandiss told me himself. I have him in custody in the stockade. I also talked to the seven other members of the hunting unit and to the prisoner-at-large.”
Tommy Mills, of New America? What the fuck did he have to do with this? Jason waited. Hillson would produce the story in his own way, each word weighed and measured before being released.
“The hunting unit divided into two squads. They preserved, as far as I can tell, proper communication and support distance. Kandiss was assigned to lead one squad; Sullivan had the other. When the two had reached maximum permitted distance apart and were out of line of sight, the four other members of Kandiss’s squad turned their weapons on him. They told him he was a traitor, bringing the virophage to the base, part of a conspiracy to kill everyone. They—”
“Was this ‘conspiracy’ supposed to be created by World or by New America?”
“They didn’t say. Sir—you knew that in some quarters there’s a lot of anger and fear about the aliens, and about the v-comas, and about bringing the Settlers here, and about… everything.”
Of course Jason knew. Anger and fear were to be expected after ten years of claustrophobia, of boredom broken by rare bouts of combat, of crowding now made worse by the Settlers, of a war that seemed to go nowhere. There had been incidents before, but no one had died. He said, “Go on.”
“Kandiss told me that the four others said he deserved to die, along with all traitors, and they were going to take him out. They didn’t. He killed two of them. A third is in the OR now with a knife wound in the belly. The fourth threw down his weapon and raised his hands. The other squad heard the commotion and came running. Kandiss surrendered.”
“He took down three of his attackers? Who were the four?” Not J Squad, surely.
“Privates Landry, Guerra, and Madden. Landry and Madden are dead. Madden was a new recruit who grew up on base. Landry was always a troublemaker and Guerra a broke dick, always whining. Private Drucker surrendered. Lieutenant Sullivan shouldn’t have put them together in a squad.”
“But they were all armed and in full gear—how did Kandiss take them down?”
“Sir, you may have forgotten—Corporal Kandiss was an Army Ranger. The only one we have.”
Jason heard the respect in Hillson’s voice. He said, “Is Kandiss injured?”
“Minor bruises.”
“How extensive are these sort of conspiracy theories?”
“As far as I can tell, not very. But there is resentment about the aliens and the v-comas. Some about the Settlers, too, although as long as we have enough food, that seems pretty low level. Especially since some of the Settler women don’t believe in monogamy and they’ve made it their business to try to convert soldiers to their Mother Nature ideas, which they’re doing in a sort of free cathouse combined with ideological lectures.”
Jason tried to picture this enterprise, and failed. “Why did you talk to the prisoner-at-large, Tommy Mills?”
“He’s been assaulted a couple of times—war enemy and all that. Mills says that Kandiss started to protect him. Which made Kandiss even more suspect to a lot of our people with bad attitudes about the aliens.”
It was the third time he’d used the word. Jason said, “Hillson, they aren’t ‘alien.’ The aliens are the ones who took them from Earth a hundred and forty thousand years ago, the same ones who left them the spaceships and domes. Worlders are as human as you and me.”
“If you say so, sir. I’m just saying that a lot of soldiers don’t see it that way. We could have more assaults.”
Jason tried to think. He needed more sleep. Hadn’t he learned once that Rangers were trained to function on a few hours of sleep for a week or more? Probably Jason, who had been competent but not outstanding at physical training during basic, could not have qualified for Ranger School.
“Kandiss is housed with J Squad? Any trouble there?”
“No, sir, never in J Squad.”
Good—Jason needed to trust his elite unit. “Quarter the prisoner-at-large with J Squad. Put Drucker—and Guerra, too, as soon as Major Holbrook gives permission—in the stockade to await court-martial. Keep me informed of any further conspiracy theories or other problems you hear of.” Hillson must have a hell of an informant system, and Jason was grateful for it.
“I may not hear of anything in time to stop it.”
“I know. Pick men you trust for twenty-four-hour guards on Dr. Ka^graa and the other three Worlders, including the two in v-comas. Don’t use anyone from J Squad—I’m going to need them.”
“Yes, sir.” Hillson didn’t ask what Jason planned for J Squad.
“And send Kandiss to me.”
“Yes, sir.”
Colin’s words ran through his mind: You think violence is an instrument you can control. You can’t.
Colin had no idea how much more violent things were going to get. But then, before Jason could put his plans in motion, New America attacked.
CHAPTER 15
Blatt… blatt… blatt blatt blatt…. Sirens in both domes sounded an attack. Zack hardly noticed. Deep in lab work, protected by the invulnerable domes, he didn’t need to react. Alerted by the signal station, the patrols would get everyone inside in time. A few more missiles would shatter themselves against one or both domes. If the signal station was hit, Jenner would erect a new one, as he had before. And nothing mattered as much as this lab work.
Susan had fallen into a v-coma as she sat by Caitlin’s bedside. Four more people had also gone down. Then had come a caesura, in which everybody had hoped the virophage had run its course, having infected everyone susceptible. All eighteen victims shared only one unique allele. Uninfected people had been tested, including the other four children who had played with Caitlin and Devon, as well as the research scientists. Zack did not possess the mutation, which by now they referred to simply as “the allele.”
Neither did Colonel Jenner.
“I think the epidemic is over,” a lab tech had said.
“Shut the fuck up,” Toni had snapped. “It’s not over until we bring them out of v-comas.”
To what? Zack wondered. But he only glared at Toni, before taking precious time away from work to pacify the lab tech. Still, Toni was right, even though having no further victims was a blessing.
Then there were more victims.
In the three weeks since Susan had fallen into a coma, so had three of the Settlers. They had arrived last at the base, which meant that they’d been easily infected, without long exposure. The evidence was at least predictive: If you had “the allele,” you fell into a coma. If you didn’t have it, you were infected with the virophage—probably they all were, by now—but you didn’t get your brain rewired by a microbe from antiquity.