The Red: First Light

by Linda Nagata

Rule one: Don’t kill off your taxpayers. War is what you inflict on other people.”

“So we Americans... we don’t jump in right away. We have another war to wind up first, so we promise to intervene when humanitarian issues demand it—but we don’t discuss what side to come in on because it doesn’t fucking matter. Everyone knows we don’t understand the local politics and we don’t give a shit anyway. There’s nothing in this region we want. The only reason we’re jumping in is so that our defense contractors can keep their shareholders happy. The American taxpayers will listen to their hoo-rah propaganda media outlets and pony up the money, blaming the libruls for the bad economy, while brain-draining the underclass into the army because hey, it’s a job, and even the DCs can’t convince Congress to spend ten-million dollars each on a combat robot when you can get a fully qualified flesh-and-blood high-IQ soldier for two hundred and fifty thousand.”

Sometimes the dead just keep walking, right through my dreams.

The army likes to brag that every LCS soldier is an elite soldier, meeting strict physical and intellectual requirements, with a demonstrated ability to adapt to new systems and circumstances. Translated, this means we’re chronically shorthanded, and no one gets a night off.

Subtlety is not our talent. We’re rigged to hit fast and hard.

I can’t feel it directly, but I know my skullcap is working, stimulating my brain to produce a soothing little cocktail, a mix of all-natural brain chemicals that puts an emotional distance between me and what just happened.

I try to feel guilt, remorse, regret... but nothing’s there. Guidance makes sure of that. If robots were cheaper, we wouldn’t have to be here.

The informality of my LCS tends to confuse the fresh meat. We may not click heels and salute here, but if it matters, we do it and we do it right. “I only win this game if we all get out alive,” I remind her.

I patrol the catwalk, but there’s nothing to see in any direction, and there’s no sound except the rustling of leaves, the bleating of goats, and the buzz of insects. I wipe away the sweat on my face. My T-shirt is wet with sweat. And my anxiety is getting worse. I don’t want to be here, inside these walls. I don’t want my soldiers to be here. I want to get out. But that’s crazy. We’re safe here. What the fuck is wrong with me?

I’m barely in the door when a sense of urgency slams through my brain. It’s now, God whispers. Whatever’s happening, it’s happening now. I know I’ve lost it. I know I’ve cracked, but I don’t care. I start screaming. “Everybody, up! Now! Something’s coming. I can feel it. A slam’s coming. Get on your armor and bones. Now!” Ransom pops out of the TOC, wild-eyed. “King David?” “Do it! Armor and bones!” “Yes sir!” He launches himself down the hall to the bunkroom. “Dubey, up!” he shouts. “Yafiah! King David says armor and bones!”

“Thank you for your service, Lieutenant Shelley,” she says, in much the same tone a staff sergeant might use to say Sit down and shut up.

I might find myself pushed into panic when only a reasoned calm could save my life and the lives of the people around me. Then I’m not David anymore, I’m Saul—rejected by God and dead with my soldiers on the battlefield.

I’m contemplating what it will take to blow the door to the control room off its hinges without bringing the ceiling down when a large gray rat falls from overhead, landing with a plop in the blood. I look up, to see neat ductwork and piping suspended from concrete. Then I nudge the rat with the toe-end of my footplate. A camera button is stuck on its narrow forehead. A whip-wire antenna sticks out of the back of its skull, lying flat against its spine. The mystery of how Intelligence knew exactly what was going on down here is solved. Ransom leans over to look. “God-damn,” he says in a voice muffled by his facemask. “Is that a robo-rat?”