The officer was greying around his temples, his green eyes flickered from left to right and back on his tablet.
He had the dark grey standard space non-combat attire, that is to say it was the light combat rig with no armour attached with a side arm and Light-VAC mask enclosed in the collar.
He had no rank on his uniform, but he had the cross denoting he was a medical officer and he was standing like a ropert.
I studied his face and the few scars crossing on his forehead and cheek, scars told you a lot about a man. Medical creams could hide them and smooth over the skin but a man then kept them was proud or didn't care. From the way the scars were around his forehead, cheeks and nose told me they were from a shattered heavy VAC suits face screen.
A small grunt and a node was all the warning i got before he addressed me
“Soldier 7732, No name listed but from your service record I imagine you are from earth?” He asked, with a tone that implied i was a puzzle. It was common for soldiers to for go names when on operations, made it easy to shift blame.
“No, Was told that the project would change me so i figured that a history was pointless.” I crocked with more hostility than I intended, Damn the medical screening did a doozy on me. If he took offence to my statement i could not tell.
He raised his eyebrow at that, a flicker of his eyes to the pad and a slight smirk.
“From the south pacific? Australian from the sound of your voice, Yes?”
I rolled my eyes, this guy must imagine he is Sherlock Holmes.
“Quite right Mr Holmes.”
A nod and a word was all i got in return.
“Indeed” he turned and produced a standard contract pad with a blood pin for a DNA sample from the table in the small gray room.
He, the table with an assortment of medical devices, probes, Paperwork and me sitting in a large medical chair that was currently in the standing configuration was all that was in the room.
“You have read? And you know that once you sign you will no longer hold the citizenship your earned my your term of service, that you will be owned by the SUN Defence Force? I say this as an testamony do you concer?”
The script was known to me obviously, the first 30 pages of the contract was basically that 10 second sentence.
“Yes i have read, Yes i acknowledge, yes i understand and yes I concur.” i said almost reverently, the last time i said that line was when i signed up to be a SUN Marine on our swearing in day. Full circle..
The contract pad Beeped and a robotic female voice chimed.
“ Voice sequence recorded, Voice pattern matched Soldier 7732…. DNA Sample requested…”
The doctor taped a few things into the tablet and the restraints for my left arm disengaged with a hiss. The contract pad was handed over so i had to reach to grasp the bottom edge.
As i looked down to the A4 size screen the red words ‘DNA Sample requested’ flashed in the centre.
Bringing the screen up to within 10cm of my face i could just make out my reflection, my hair was gone, that went before i woke up from the trip, and i looked pale and haggard.
With a slow resigned breath i spoke the final words for a binding contract.
“ I Soldier 7732 freely give a sample”
My breath left a film of my sample on the screen before the mist was absorbed back into it.
“DNA Sample accepted.. Voice Pattern match… Sample temperature within acceptable parameters.. DNA Match to REDACTED…” a beep sounded then words that every convict love and hates at the same time.
Stolen story; please report.
“Amnesty contract accepted, term of contract…. life, Thank you for your compliance.” the uncaring voice finished.
The Contract-tab was taken and the from me and whisked to a woman that i did not see enter, she looked at me with pity in her eyes before walking from the room the hiss of an airlock bulkhead behind her.
The M.O taped a few more times and my hand was restrained again by the polymer cable steel around my wrists.
“Now we are not being recorded and you won't remember this anyways, I would like to say that i don't like how it all turned out for you, your chain of command have all be tried and executed from the failed coup while your were in stasis” he said with the same pity the woman had.
I grunted in acknowledgment, i had read in the old books that crimes in the past were solved with the suspects running around, that would have been a fucking nightmare. Now days they just round up all parties and freeze them and a third party finds the answers and you wake up and it's on trial if you're important enough or if you're like me at your execution.
“You however have a high tolerance for implants and modification, but you have not had any in the past?” he stated fact and then asked a question this guy was definitely an intellectual type but his build, posture and scars say otherwise. He must have noticed my frown because he looked on the tablet a few more times the flipped it around for me to see.
“You have an almost 99.99% compatibility rate with implants and genetic grafting” he said almost sounding excited.
The screen just had a line along the top of the screen with a Y axis running from 0 to 100 and a X axis with a load of numbers and code only a few out of the 100 or so i recognised as combat implants.
“Never saw the need, and if you look at my early service log i did HUMINT during the southern cross revolution, you think the average aussie wasn't smart enough to scan for implants at every chance they got, The chinese loved them bugs and i sure as hell didn't want one of my own shooting me coz they thought a SUN bug was a chinese one?” the last part came out like venom, something about the chinese occupation of australia made any true blue aussie mad after the SUN did not intervene and left the Ozzies on our own to avoid an escalation and WW3, that effectively cut Australia in half making from Mackay north New South China, True the invasion happened before i was born but the tension was no different to the ancient conflict in Germany after the 2nd last World War.
“Fair point, but after? After the Chinese bankrupt and the recession? Australia was the wild west, all CCF states where” he pressed almost like he needed to know.
I squinted at him before answering.
“Just didn't need it, I was in combat for so long that it was too much of a liability, the Reds had a lot of ECM and it was always a catch up game, so no i didn't get any work done.”
“So no failed procedures at all?” he was relentless and i had a feeling that i knew why.
“I was offered many times even leading up to the liberation..”
“Coup” he cut in.
I pursed my lips at that and he looked like he was going to say more but stopped and made a few more tapes on his tablet.
“Ill let you know that what you and the 92nd Space assault brigade did worked, and that the SUN is thankful, you took out the last strong hold that held the Chinese Communist Federation together, But you broke so many treaties peace accords and committed war crimes that even the supply crews on the Moon that saw the ships leave have been given jail time, One loose word and the SUN could have stopped it, But you pulled it off and now the last few Communist states have folded to democracy and are part of us now.”
It was me hanging of his words now, every last one and i didn't even care. I just needed to know.
And he fucking know it.
He smirked at me, He had me the sly dog.
“So did you have any failed implants modifications or grafting?” He asked with the shit eating grin never leaving his face.
I resigned myself to being at the end of his leash and gave him what he wanted to here.
“No, No modification or alterations and no implants, Im a… i m a..a purist, If the body can't adapt and evolve what hope do we have?” I said searching for any sympathy, anything to use to get out of these chains and find freedom.
There was none, he nodded knowingly and looked at me.
“The South CCF State was unable to be govern after the capital was struck by the ION Cannon on Zuse, Millions lost their lives and the systematic sweeps took out any leadership not in the country, The Former NCA has been absorbed into the ANZC and the Chinese nationals have been deported back to other former Chinese Communist Federation states.”
It was all worth it, Australia was Australian again, the likes it had not seen for 100 years. We won.
“The actions of you and your co-conspirators destroyed the last fracture of peace this planet had, Earth is now governed by the SUN and to some you are Hero’s, Was it worth it, sacrificing yourself, never to see your loved ones and family ever again, would you do it again?”
His tone had changed from one of sad pity to fire and power, He was all fired up for some reason and i hated that my mind cept drifting back to his questions on implants, Was a blank canvas to him? But i know the answer i have always know it.
“Yes, even if we failed i would have still done it over” i said looking him straight in the eyes.
“Good, and for whats its worth the united people of earth thank you” he said with a few more taps on his tablet.
A prick on the back of my neck let me know that i was being sedated, the way i was losing consciousness told me it wasn't just a knockout druk and the itchy feeling on my spine let me know i was being prepped for stasis.
“Relax soldier, Your work is done, sleep now and you will wake up a new man….”
His voice drifted off slowly like he was talking underwater and my sight and mind grew fuzzy,
Light from the bulkhead streamed in but it was to blurry to make out
A feminine voice chimed in “ Stasis commence date time. 120200Z October 2166…..”
2...1..66 my mind tried to grasp an intense meaning that i knew something was wrong…
2166, 2166
2166 the year 2166 it was 2141 when we dropped on the reds….
With my last though my mind latched onto that though, I was asleep for 25 years already…
And with that came nothing.