Mike’s awaking hadn’t gone unnoticed.
“So,” barked the cabal commander, “this is how my first sergeant handles problems? He bathes in booze and dives into his bunk?”
“No, sir!” Wait… he had. “Yes, sir!” That came out wrong.
“No, sir!”
The sun’s bright morning light filled the room and painted yellow squares onto the carpet. Sunlight? He jackknifed into a sitting position. Shit, what time is it?
The chronometer beside the bed reported unpleasant information. He’d slept through this morning’s reveille, as well as yesterday’s and Saturday’s as well. He hadn’t programmed in two days of hibernation!
He was in for a serious ass kicking.
“No, I retroactively cleared you for two days of R&R.”
The arrival of this other voice, alerted Mike to the fact there was a witness to his humiliation. Two, in fact. The Envoy and Doctor David stood on the far side of the bed. It had been David who spoke.
“Uh…” Mike’s mind stalled over the unusual situation. The doctor had overridden his programmed hibernation session and put him to sleep for two days? “Thanks?”
Cabal Commander frowned harder. Mike bit the inside of his cheek and focused on the pain instead of his embarrassment.
Hoping to deflect a threatening blush, he bent down and searched for his boots. He found only one on the right side of the bed. He tipped over and glanced beneath the bed for the other one.
Not there.
“The unplanned R&R was authorized at my request.” The Envoy spoke into the room’s silence. “Our volunteers are not the only personnel experiencing a paradigm shift. David reminded me that our Urilqii are also bound to suffer adjustment concerns. You especially.”
Mike’s snapped his attention from beneath the bed to the Envoy so fast his back gave a twinge of protest. “Me?”
The Envoy squatted. When he again rose to his feet, he held the missing boot in his hand, which he offered with a stoic expression.
“Yes, you,” Doctor David answered the question. “After all, you are Patient Zero of our control group.”
Shit-fuck-damn. He was legendary, both on and off the battlefield, and now especially as a fuck-up. Space-shit, it was just a kiss.
“Apparently it was much more than that,” said the Envoy with a smile. “As I said in conversations earlier, it’s—”
“Don’t say it.” Mike snapped the useless demand. The grinding of his back molars had to be audible to everyone in the room.
“A beautiful blend,” the Envoy finished.
Since he couldn’t come up with anything to say that wouldn’t get his ass stuck in the brig for an evening, he locked his jaw shut and rolled out of the bed to straighten to his full height. When he caught sight of the sad state of his clothing, the dirty and winkled trousers and the fact he was missing his shirt, he couldn’t help but wince.
Out of regs and in front of the commander. What else could go wrong with his morning?
::Get cleaned up and get to your post.::
::Yes, sir.::
The three left Mike to do as ordered, which he did. He stripped as he lunged for the bathroom and the shower, fast and cold, followed by the decontamination gel that made him itch. Dammit!
Dressed and polished as much as was required for a day driving a desk, Mike opened the throttle of his single-unit transport and blasted his way across base to his office.
Arrival. Greetings. Ignore the chuckles and winks. Dive into the job. A summary of the changes he’d missed while on his ass in bed was more shit onto an already crappy morning.
Steve had accompanied the deployment of the selected liquid team personnel to assist the cabal already embedded onto Kiribati.
That entire nation teetered on the edge of destruction due to Earth’s climate change. If the Targolt had their way, it wouldn’t be the last. But why had his pod-kin accompanied the selected teams?
Orders, it seemed, and he found the information after a brief search of his electronic messages. Steve was there to “facilitate the adjustment.” Another one of the Envoy’s manipulations? Even if it was, there wasn’t anything Mike could do about it.
Steve was scheduled to return by the end of this week to resume control of what remained of the liquid team in the Portland area. Until then, Mike was a master sergeant down and someone had to step into the vacated position to ensure continued cohesion.
He, Mike, was expected to watch over the man placed into that position. “Make it a training opportunity” was the suggestion.
Oh, and Liam had been released from medical and was cleared for duty. The expected day to report for duty with the tanker teams was Tuesday morning.
* * *
The daily report crossed Mike’s desk late Tuesday afternoon.
Steve and his team were engaged in conducting experiments alongside the other cabal. Of immediate concern was the water creep and the expanding dead zone.
Targolt molts, described by the natives in the area as “by the wind sailors” had been located washed up on beaches. They followed the path of documented oceanic currents, so nothing unexpected there, other than the unwelcome arrival of the “sailors.”
He considered the local’s name for the molts while examining the images saved onto the global information reserve. It was an attractive, somewhat poetic moniker for the little bits of organic flotsam that littered their shores.
Liam had reported for duty, as expected. His presence delivered an instant change to the paradigm, as well as immediate changes to the equipment. According to the report, Liam had stipulated “minimal” damage to the terrain as well as “reparations” behind the vehicle as it moved through the soil. At top of those expectations, Liam demanded a “critter alarm,” which would precede the tanks. Why? “They live on this planet, too. They deserve a chance to get clear and to come back home after we leave.”
Mike smiled when he read that. That sounded like Liam, and he had a point. What was the use of leaving devastation in the wake of their efforts to ensure a viable ecosystem for all
