Chapter 6 - Grey Man
Kat and Christina waited until they were sure the two men had descended the spiral staircase fully then sprinted back across the roof to the metal fire stairs on the far end of the western wing. Almost throwing themselves down the stair, jumping four or five steps at a time. Speed was more important than silence at this point - they needed to get back across to their abandoned OP and tidy it away properly, then return to their platoon barracks, to their assigned rooms. Hopefully their platoon-mates would provide some excuse as to their absence from morning room inspections such as a visit to the hospital or some additional training for one of the highly competitive inter-platoon sports events.
The sun was higher now, full morning in bloom, and there was no shadow to hide in, they just had to hope nobody was watching the western edge of the parade ground as they rushed across it to the edge of the small forest. They found two of their their section, alpha section, already there, packing up the sleeping bags and sniper netting. Good to their word, Cheryl and Louisa had come to check out their hiding spot when they the deadman's switch Kat had left there hadn't been activated for a period of 10 minutes.
The platoon had naturally been disappointed at the news of Kat lumbering them with Flag Duty. Many had had to change personal and other plans as the natural leaders in the platoon had come up with a watchkeeping schedule for the observation strategy Kat had come up with. But as senior cadets, and the only female platoon, these soldiers, these officer cadets had enough experience to realise that if they didn't come through for one of their own when it was needed, they would carry that reputation with them forever. It was rare for a senior cadet to be punished with Flag Duty, but it was unthinkable for a senior platoon to allow that cadet to fail in that duty.
Nobody knew quite how it worked but you could definitely see some entire platoons ended up with every cadet graduating and commissioning and then going on to the worst most thankless tasks. There were rumours of a shadowy cabal, a kind of "old boys club" that made a lot of these decisions, not that anyone had any proof.
Work in the late 2080s was different but the same as it had ever been. Soldiers work was as it ever was: if you go "sharp end", in reality you will spend 5 years training then 7 minutes in absolutely terror followed by more training. If you joined a technical or support regiment or corps you were still a soldier, but somedays you didn't feel very much like it. These problems had plagued military organisations since the days of Napoleon and the rise of organised standing armies, but there was one new problem, one that soldiers and civilians dreaded the most: the rise of the AML coordinator. These jobs were a soldier's nightmare. These were essential logistical and managerial jobs where doing well or badly hardly made a difference. Putting the fittest most assertive people on the planet in a role where you could barely tell if your personal effort and input noticably changed results was, perhaps, unwise. Since the advent of AML (Advanced Machine Learning), and the implostion of the A.I. myth (it turns out the human mind is not, in fact, analogous to a computer no matter how fast or complicated), humanity had not really managed to remove all of the thankless administrative roles that it thought it would. Instead these were highly automated with AML but required a human decision maker to decide, for example, which data set to re-test, or ignore, or whatever. Important work, perhaps, but not what one joined the Space Force for. Often the banal kind of role one joined up precisely to get away from.
11 Platoon was NOT going to allow itself to go down as one of those AML-platoons. So; they cancelled plans, changed arrangements, did what needed doing in order to make sure Kat Suzuki completed her assigned administrative punishment, and their reputation as team players who adapt and over come and look after each other remained intact.
The four cadets arrived back at the barracks just in time to stow the kit, change into their inspection coveralls and stand outside their rooms. Other cadets had clearly checked each other's rooms and made sure everyone's in good order. What they lacked in privacy they made up for in teamwork. Two cadets from Bravo Section were also missing, they were starting duty at the guardhouse at the front gate at 6 am, and had been tasked to take over Flag Duty after Kat and Christina left their OP. These were good bunch of girls, Kat thought. No. These were a damned good bunch of soldiers.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
--------------------------------------------------------------
It was lunch and the cadets of 10, 11 and 12 Platoon were all coming back from the military shooting range. Many of the cadets found it amusing at first that they had to lumber around these heavy steal rifles and run up and down hills wearing our fashioned low tech camoflague and body armour. Some thought it archaic, but the Space Force took a lot of the traditions, not just the buildings from the former Army Leadership School that had occupied this site. Infantry leadership was still seen as the most efficient way to reveal a person's weaknesses, force stressed people into situations where you must cooperate or die (or so it feels at the time) and so imprint the strange, elusive "military character" upon each person in a time tested manner such that they are simultaneously, and seemingly paradoxically, a completely trusted and reliable teammate, a decisive and calculated leader, and willing to harm others to achieve the goals assigned to them by their superiors.
As usual, even though exhausted, 10 and 11 Platoon mixed a they sat and at in the military canteen, while 12 Platoon kept to themselves.
It was understandable enough: nobody could trust them, so they trusted nobody. The problem was rank and fame. In 12 Platoon there were two cadets from the Royal Family. As such, every other cadet in 12 Platoon was suspected of being either undercover military police posing as cadets while actually being a covert regal protection detail, or intelligence assets who had the ear of God-knows-who. Look the wrong way or say the wrong things to a 12 Platoon cadet and you didn't know whether you'd be added to a list by some local or foreign government intelligence agency, or whether you'd be a "person of interest" to the military police. It wasn't clear which would be worse... perhaps the latter.
"Beans and bacon again" Christina sighed.
"Ah, it is fine, when it all tastes bad, who cares what label you give it." Kat joked back.
"We were lucky to get away unseen this morning, I thought for sure we'd have been noticed." Christina said
Cheryl and Louisa sat down next to Kat and Christina.
"What happened this morning, girls?" Cheryl asked overly innocently "Did you both manage to go sleep walking? That deadman's alarm was a helluva wakeup call."
"Sorry," Kat said "The flag was down."
"WHAT?!!"
"Calm down Cheryl, it is fine we fixed it, nobody noticed. it was 6 hours ago and we haven't heard a word."
Kat was aware that Cheryl, being from a proud military family going back generations, was particularly sensitive to the Platoon keeping its good reputation. For Cheryl, it was gunship pilot or nothing. No Logistics or Battlespace Engineering would keep her ancesters happy, apparently.
"Right, tell me what happened. We earned it!" Cheryl was not grinning and looking around her three friends "It must've been exciting... did you sneak past the front guards and confront the flag-thief red handed? No... too risky... fire escape?"
"Yeah, fire escape" Christina spoke between mouthfuls "sometimes the obvious play is just the best. What's the saying? 'Bags of Smoke and Straight down the middle!'" She chuckled.
Kat responded "Yeah, we got up there and we across the roof and inside in no time. Just put the flag right back up and left again. Really seems like we got away way with it." Kat shot Christina a look as she lied to their friends. They hadn't had time or privacy to speak about the two men, to compare accounts or to even discuss what on earth had really happened.
"Umm, right, yeah" Christina continued "just put it back up and hope for the best."
Kat was thankful that Christina was going along with her ruse but had no idea how she was going to explain if Christina asked about the man in the hooded robe. Perhaps Christina hadn't quite seen as well from her angle. Kat didn't hold out much hope.
"Well, don't do it again, that's all I can say" chimed Louise in her singsong Hebridean accent "We only have 5 days until the final passing out parade, and it will be promotions and free biscuits for all. If we don't mess it up!"
They all laughed, and conversation turned to the usual things - fieldcraft, advanced atmospheric craft design, AML-programming and of course, but in more hushed tones, talk of "home". The military was a great place to make friends, but it was a social world unto itself and talk of home, while not discouraged, was a little bit taboo depending on the mood or the situation.
Kat tried not to look startled when Tom Morrison and his usual three or four 10 Platooner mates entered the canteen. He was just another cadet, not particularly talented, but also not really bad at anything. A bit of a "grey man". Kat wondered it most of her platoonmates even knew his name.
Getting up to return their trays and empty plates to the designated spot, Kat looked over her shoulder as she left the canteen hoping to catch a glimpse of whatever Tom was up to, ever so casually. He was already looking straight at her, not staring but with a mild look on his face.
Without changing his expression, he gave Kat a nod, before returning to his conversation.