WARRIOR

    The first rays of the sun were just peeking over the horizon, but Chuck Desaxe had already worked up a sweat. He ran down the center of the road, to the left of a block of running men and women. On both sides of the road were widely spaced buildings, each a masterpiece of design and construction. Unfortunately, they reflected all the architectural fads of the past century and a half, and no attempt had been made to reconcile any building's style with its neighbors. Such was the campus of Northern Michigan University in the mid-21st century.
     Chuck glanced at his fellow runners. They were all there. Finally, Chuck thought. It took almost the whole year, but it. looks like none of them will wimp out.
     Chuck decided they looked as if they had enough wind left, and sucked in a lung full of air. "Let me tell you a story that is seldom told," he began. Chuck suppressed a grin at the volume they returned it with. He sucked another lung full and continued his chant:
     About an Airborne Ranger and his wings of gold,
     Situation desperate, someone had to pay,
     There were 10,000 Moslems trapped by the Serbian Ar-may.

     In a nearby office, Lieutenant Colonel Poole stood at the window looking out. What he saw both pleased and disgusted him. Part of him the part he rigidly suppressed from others -- delighted at the view. A sleepy college campus being awakened at dawn, by the chants of a formation running in Army gray was enough to make him nostalgic for his own time as a cadet.
     Then he remembered his responsibilities, and the complaints from the student government. No, it isn't something to encourage, he thought. The President says we won't be the world's policemen anymore. So we don't need such a large and visible Army.
     Colonel Poole turned back to his desk. Major Isby, his executive officer, was at the door, coffee mug in hand. Those admin types must have it surgically implanted during Officer Basic Course. I can't recall seeing one without the other.
     "Sir," Major Isby began, "I know what the message from Cadet Command said. But Desaxe is just what the Army needs more of. We've got too many laptop-toting bureaucrats already."
     Colonel Poole grinned. "That's an unusual statement from an admin officer," he said. "But Desaxe is the kind of cadet we don't want. He's loud, brash, over-enthusiastic, and he's always upsetting the student government."
     "And you weren't the same?" Major Isby countered. "I talked with some of your classmates, sir. I especially liked your addition to the Manual of Arms -- Present Bird. Desaxe is just like you were at his age:  a warrior who can't wait for his first battle."
     "That was different," Colonel Poole replied. "We were the world's policemen then, and . . . "
     "And you've become a bureaucrat, sir," Major Isby interrupted. "I might be just an admin puke, but I know a warrior when I see one. And Desaxe is a warrior."
    "And me?" Colonel Poole asked.
    Major Isby walked toward the door. In the doorway, he turned to look at the university's Professor of Military Science. "Sir," he answered, "you stopped being a warrior long before I met you."

     In her dorm, one of the students that the cadets had awakened was checking her appearance in the mirror. She made a minute adjustment to her leotard and did an experimental half-jump. She nodded approval; too much jiggle looked fat, too little didn't attract attention.
     It was a matter of nuances to draw the male eye, and Carol Demir had mastered all of them. She had the oriental appearance still called "true Turk" in her ancestral land, with raven-black hair and skin the shade of bone china. One history professor, after meeting her, understood why Suleyman the Magnificent -- the greatest conquer or in Turkish history -- was dominated by his wife. Carol was majoring in men and minoring in corporate management.
     Carol half-dragged her roommate out the door. They mere discussing their favorite subject -- the men on campus -- by the time they entered the university's gym. Their route took them through the weight room to the early-bird aerobics class.
     Chuck was in the gym, working on a new weight on the bench press.  Chuck paused with the weight halfway up while Chuck decided whether he could make it, when Carol and her roommate passed in front, of him.
     "Carol," the younger girl began, "who's the hunk on the bench?"
     "No one worth meeting," Carol answered. "He's a technodweeb, and a warmonger besides."
     Chuck grunted, thrusting the weight up with a velocity that belied its mass.
     "Technodweeb?" the freshman asked.
     "Yeah," Carol replied. "I hear he's fluent in three languages:  Java, HTML, and C++." Both girls giggled as they passed out of the weight room.
     Chuck sat, up, red-faced from effort. His sweat-drenched T-shirt clung to his chest, revealing more muscle than most men ever develop in their lives.
     "She really doesn't like you, huh?" the cadet spotting the weight asked.
     Chuck decided the spotter hadn't seen the flush in his face and relaxed a little. "She's been in most of my electives," he said. "She thinks the Global Police role was foisted on the US by a group of officers that wanted a guarantee of making general."

     That afternoon, the Cadet Battalion's weekly parade took over the university's football field. Chuck stood proudly at his post as Cadet Battalion Commander. The two diamonds of his rank shone in the afternoon sun more brightly than any cadet before him had ever polished them. To prove a point, he had once used his shoes as shaving mirrors; they were no less shiny today than that morning. His jump wings -- the shiniest variety allowed by regulation -- glittered with a peculiar aura of their own. But the shine he was proudest of was the real gold threads of the Ranger tab on his shoulder.
     Colonel Poole was at a portable podium, making the usual weekly administrative announcements. Chuck half-listened, part of his mind filing important details, while the rest speculated on how hard to push the run the next morning. Then an announcement caught his attention.
     "A you know," Colonel Poole said. "Congress has imposed the requirement to reduce commissioned officer accessions to the armed forces, and the Army is being hardest hit. Due to these cuts, the following cadets will not be commissioned at graduation: Desaxe, Jefferson, Burke. . .
     Chuck's mind whirled at the thought. Rejected! He was rejected! The one selected to lead the Cadet Battalion, one of the few that were sent to Airborne and Ranger schools, and the only one of his class sent to both. The only one who had maxed all his physical training tests. The one who started his college career knowing all the basic soldier skills. The Expert Marksman badge on his chest attested to his skill with both rifle and pistol.
     Why?
     Somehow, Chuck conducted the rest of the parade correctly, or at least close enough that no one criticized him. His mind wasn't in it.  His mind was attacking the problem from all angles he could consider. And he came to the same conclusion every time: he wasn't perfect, but he was the best at the university at everything they had ever been tested on.
     Why me?
     As soon as he could, Chuck went to Colonel Poole's office. He reported as regulation prescribed, rather than his usual, less formal manner. His movements were perfect enough for use in a training video.
     "Why, sir?" Chuck asked. "I followed all your advice. I paid for my pilot's license so the Army won't have to. I went to Airborne and Ranger schools because you told me that too many aviators didn't, understand ground combat  And you thought enough of me to choose me for cadet battalion commander. So why me?"
     "You're what the Army doesn't need now, son," Colonel Poole began.  "You're too loud, always upset the student government, and offending people all the time. . ."

     Chuck left the Military Science Department's office to find a small crowd of fellow cadets gathered. The other ex-cadets were already in civvies; the rest were a mixed group of uniforms and civilian clothes, depending on whether they had followed Chuck directly or changed clothes first.
     "Did he tell you why?" asked Killer, a woman who would be an MP because it was still the closest thing to infantry that the Army would let a woman be.
     "Yeah," Chuck answered. "The Army doesn't want warriors this year.  It wants bureaucrats. Watch your step, Killer. If they learn what you are, you may be out, too."
     "What will you do?" Killer asked, falling in step with Chuck as he walked away.
     "I don't know," Chuck answered.  "Is the Drug Enforcement Agency hiring this year?"

     Meanwhile, in South America, a meeting was in session that would change Chuck's destiny.  Several middle-aged men with the hard look of experienced killers sat around a conference table that could have graced the board room of any major US corporation. These men, and their fathers and grandfathers before them, had supplied North America's demand for chemical stimulation and mood-altering substances for nearly a century.
     One man, much younger and softer looking, was briefing them on recent clashes with the government.
     "How does the government do it?" one man asked. "How do they find our operations so easily?"
     "Nanotechnology," the briefer answered. "The Yanquis give them devices to see in all weather, to intercept our communications, and to sort important information from trivial."
     "So all we need to do is destroy the devices?" another man asked.
     The briefer sighed. How did such as these earn their power? "We tried that last year," he replied. "It is extremely difficult to locate hidden devices as small as they are. Besides, the Yanquis replaced all that we destroyed. What we need to do is acquire our own."
     "How much will that cost us?" asked the man in what -- if this was a corporate boardroom -- would be the chairman's spot. Pancho Escobedo, at least, had the wit to comment only on things he understood.
     "Perhaps not as much as you expect, Jefe." the briefer answered.  He palmed a remote, and the lights dimmed. As the lights went out, a patch of light appeared on the wall. Looks can be deceiving, and the wall was actually a holographic projection screen. The briefer touched a button, and the patch of white was replaced with a video.
     "This is what a man sees with vision enhancments I have in mind," the briefer said. Ethereal images -- like men and trucks, but glowing and dark in odd patterns, with outlines superimposed on the eldritch colors -- moved around, much like a normal business day at a loading dock. "The equipment is installed inside the user's own eyes. This demonstration video was recorded by at midnight in thick fog, from two kilometers away."
     He touched the button again, and the view changed to a surreal insect. "Reconnaisance equipment is much smaller now. A bug, such as this one, can retransmit all the audio, video, or data communications it comes across." The view panned out, until the bug had become a normal-looking mosquito. "Their small size makes it easy to insert hundreds, if not thousands, of these into selected areas." He turned and bowed to one of the more junior men at the table. "I took the liberty of destroying the two dozen similar bugs that Senor Novoa brought to the meeting with him."
    "What!" Escobedo exclaimed. Novoa closed his eyes and crossed himself -- an unusuall gesture from a man who had raped nuns. Three guards moved forward, bringing their guns to bear.
    "No, I do not believe Senor Novoa intended to spy on us. Nor do I believe that he willing helped the government.  He merely lacked the resources to detect the nanobugs."
    Novoa relaxed, and the guards warily retreated to their positions against the walls.
    "Why did you destroy the bugs?" Escobedo asked. "Why not use them yourself?"
    "Jefe, it is a difficult matter to detect and destroy nanobugs. It is harder to make them, and still harder to control bugs another made. I could not be certain of my control, if I attempted to use them."
    "Continue."
     The view shifted again, this time to a man operating a desktop computer. "With the correct software," the briefer continued, "a sufficiently powerful computer can sort all those data streams, building something useful out of partial conversations from a dozen nanobugs."
     "I say again," Escobedo interrupted, "How much money?"
     The briefer touched his button again, and a video of a fiftyish oriental man walking from an office building to a waiting hoverlimo filled the screen. "This is Roger Demir," the briefer said. "He is the Chief Executive Officer and de facto owner of SET Microdevices. They make every device that I mentioned, and many others that would be useful. We tried to buy from his company and they refused to sell to us."
     The screen changed again, and Carol, caught clowning with other students, filled the screen. "This is Carol Demir, his youngest daughter. She is his pride and joy, his favorite among his children. If we threatened to mail her back to him, a cubic centimeter at a time, he would give us all that we desire of his company's products, despite Yanqui military export restrictions."

     A week later, Chuck was reconciled to the need, after graduation, to hunt for a job. His last class of the day was political science, and it was anything but boring. Carol took the class, too.  She used it to engage in one of her hobbies: baiting Chuck. The professor had his head buried under his hands on the desk, and was regretting the statement that had touched off tonight's argument.
     "And it's all a fabrication of the Military-Industrial Complex," Carol declared. "There never was a threat to the West from the Russians, they couldn't even feed themselves."
     "And all those Afghans and Kurds that died breathing mycotoxins are a figment of our imagination?" Chuck retorted. "How do you say these things and sleep at night?"
     The two continued in that tone until the professor noted, with relief, that class time was over. He broke the argument to announce the class was over, gave assignments for the next class, and admonished Chuck and Carol to let other students join in the discussion next time.  He'd been giving that particular admonishment all semester, with the hopes that it would eventually be obeyed.
     Chuck and Carol left the building, still arguing. It was dark out, as this particular class was offered only as a night class. As always, they continued the argument as they walked to Carol's car.
     "Why do you disagree with everything I say?" Carol asked, changing the subject unexpectedly.
     "Because you keep saying such dumb things," Chuck answered. "The bad guys out there don't fight by Walt Disney's rules."
     Carol tossed her books in the back seat of her Audi convertible and turned back toward Chuck, leaning against the car. By their usual pattern, this was the time that both delivered their most powerful arguments; then they would separate, each fuming at the other's bull-headedness. Carol had changed the pattern by changing the subject, and she continued her new attack.
     "Why are you so bitter?" Carol asked. "Your dad decide to skip graduation or something?"
     Chuck tensed, feeling a familiar iciness in his guts. "Something like that. . ." he said, looking away from Carol. Why am I going to tell her? And why, after all these years does it. still hurt so much?
     "Dad was in the Army, in. . . you know it as Delta Force. Crack was the problem drug then, and dad was doing something about it. The druggies captured him, and. . ." Chuck turned completely away, so that all Carol could see was his back, quivering as Chuck struggled to keep his composure.
     "We didn't even know he was missing," Chuck continued, "and I received a special delivery package. It was his head. The note inside said, in broken English, that the rest of his body was being used as fertilizer on a drug farm."
     Chuck was silent for a moment, then turned back to Carol. Her eyes, long trained to read the slightest body language, could hardly miss that his hands were wet, or that his face was streaked with hastily wiped tears. She looked at him, seeing another vulnerable human for the first time.
     "He was a soldier and took a soldier's chance," Chuck said. "And I was going to follow him."
     Chuck turned abruptly to leave, then looked back over his shoulder. "Remember," he said, "most of the world isn't as nice as the executive offices of SET."

     Chuck returned to his dorm room, his mind buzzing with confusion. Too much had happened today. His roommate sprawled on his bed, eyes covered by virtual glasses.  From the noises he made, Chuck guessed that he was accessing a pornosim. Chuck ignored him after a glance and sat at the desk.
     He sighed and looked up at his picture. His sole addition to the room's decor, it was a historical print of an Apache gunship destroying a column of tanks in sub-Saharan Africa. He sighed again and pulled out his Bible.
     His roommate took his glasses off and glared at Chuck. "I don't see why you bother with that ancient stuff," he said. "It has absolutely no relevance to the world today."
     "Wrong answer," Chuck replied. "This tells me the wisest way to live; it just takes a little thinking to figure out how to apply the principles."
     "Are we going to have that argument again?" his roommate asked.
     "Think of it this way, then," Chuck replied, not in the mood for another argument. "It's therapy, and it's cheaper than what you pay your shrink for worse advice. And before you object again, whose advice has you defending in a paternity suit?"

     Carol, meanwhile, was in what she considered her second home. Her father insisted that she live in the dorms, but Carol considered their rules too stifling. So she spent as much time as possible at this particular friend's apartment.
     Tonight was Vixen's Night, when a particularly rowdy group met for girl talk and serious substance abuse.
     Carol's roommate was giving her an accusing glare, not believing a word she had just heard. "This morning he was a dweeb," she said, "too dull to even call a cyberpunk. And tonight he's Prince Charming? What's happening to you?"
     Carol realized she was the only one not drunk, high or stoned in the room. Funny. I used to think it meant I was behind, and had to catch up. Part of me still does, and part doesn't want to lose control tonight.
     "I've made a hobby of dogging him," Carol said. "All of you here have snuck peeks at his class schedule so that I could share at least one elective with him, to torment him."
     "Because he's the only guy you ever met that wouldn't come on to you?" another girl interrupted.
     Maybe that 's it. "This evening," she continued, "I learned where he's coming from. And suddenly I'm the fool."
     "Maybe it's like those old songs," another girl chimed in. "You know, opposites attract and all."
     "Maybe you're right," Carol said. She decided to drink the problem out of her mind for the evening. She picked up a bottle, drained it, and tossed it in the garbage can in the corner. "Whose turn is it to get more booze?"

     Across the street, two men sat inside a van, watching the apartment building Carol had gone in. Notes on Carol's movements for the past five days had been analyzed on a laptop, and the two were studying the result.  The more experienced of the two came to a decision and looked at his superior.
     "I say the best time to snatch her is after the night class as she drives away from campus," he said. Unlike the other, he was the veteran of many kidnappings and murders.
     "I don't like it," replied Carlos Escobedo. "The man looks too strong to risk fighting."
     Jose Curiacos picked up a late-model combat rifle, caressing it as most men would caress a woman. "If he's a problem," Jose said, "It's nothing my love can't fix."

     Chuck's night class only met twice a week. Chuck had managed, by changing his usual habits, to avoid Carol until class time. He was usually early to his classes, but tonight he slipped into his seat just seconds before class began.
     As the class went on, the professor began to smile for the first evening in months. He dropped a few statements that would normally have started his two problem children fighting, but neither took the bait. For the first time this semester, he had day laborers commenting on their experiences and beliefs. This was what he had started night classes for.
     Chuck sat glumly, watching Carol refuse to start their usual fights.  I never should have told her. Now she's pitying me.
     Carol, meanwhile, sat across the room, feeling guilty. He's right, and I've been a fool all along.  Just because everything was easy for me doesn't mean it's like that for others.
     After class, Chuck was the first out of the building and turned toward his dorm. A few students watched in silence, wondering why the class was calm for the first time. Carol glanced down at herself, decided that her clothes needed slight adjustments to send the right signals, but that there wasn't time. Trying to ignore the uncomfortable feeling this gave her, she dashed up behind Chuck.
     "Walk me to my car?" she asked.
     "What?" Chuck asked without turning or slowing his pace. "And set more pity from you? No thanks."
     "I miss our walks after class," Carol said.
     Chuck stopped, surprised. He brought his expression under control and turned to face Carol. "Why?" he asked. "Do you enjoy fighting?"
     "Maybe after four years of fighting," Carol answered, "it's time for us to make up."
     Chuck stood still for a moment, then walked with Carol toward her car.
     "Besides," Carol continued, "I was wrong. And I guess I got carried away about it."
     "What?" Chuck asked. "Do my ears deceive me? A corporate princess apologizing?"
     Carol looked up at Chuck. "Corporate princess?" she asked.
     "Yes," Chuck replied thoughtfully. "Substitute foreign businesses for Vikings, companies for kingdoms, and American attitudes are a lot like 8th century England. And too many major corporations are privately held fiefs."
     Carol grinned mischievously. Perhaps I've found his weak spot. "So," she began, "how about the princess and the pauper?"
     "If that's a pass," Chuck answered, "I'll pass on it."
     Carol pouted in a way that most men found irresistible. As she had already known, Chuck wasn't an average man. "You don't think it'd work?" she asked.
     "The last of your famous one-month-stands'?" Chuck asked. "No thanks."
     Carol tossed her books in the car and glared up at him, hands on hips. "What do you mean by that?" she asked.
     "I try not to listen to gossip," Chuck answered, "but this is too widespread for me to miss. You've had a new affair every month since we were freshmen. My roommate runs a pool on how long each affair will last. The mean is 27.5 days, with a standard deviation of 4.75. Get someone else to complete the data set with."
     Carol jumped into her car, gunned the engine until it whined, powering the lift fans on too much, usually a sign that Chuck's argument had been stronger. Chuck stepped backward as the stabilizer was momentarily overwhelmed and the car edged toward him.
     "Well!" she huffed. "Just when I thought you might not be a total jerk!"
     Chuck stood still, buffeted by a miniature tornado as she sped off.  Yes, that one hit home As Chuck turned to leave, he heard the ear-wracking screech of hovercar skirts dragging on pavement in a panic stop.
     Chuck looked back, and saw a small wheeled van had pulled in front of Carol's car, blocking the road. As he watched, the side door slid open, and a man wearing a ski mask and carrying a combat rifle jumped out.
     Chuck charged as the man dragged Carol from her car and threw her into the van. The van's tires squealed as it took off, leaving Carol's car stopped in the middle of the road.
     Chuck reached Carol's car as the van disappeared around a corner.  He looked down at the car, its lights still on, and saw that the keys were missing. She isn't the type to go back inside just because she forgot her keys.
     Chuck paused a moment, then began feeling into unobtrusive spaces that Carol could easily reach. Under the rear skirting he hit pay dirt: a small metal box with a magnet welded to it.
     Chuck fumbled the box open, almost dropping the keys in his haste.  Then he sat down in the driver's seat of Carol's car and killed the lights.  How well can I drive without lights?
     Chuck drove more recklessly than usual through town, desperately searching for the right van. He had never before realized just how many dark, but not black, old-style wheel-propelled vans moved around Marquette at night.
     Chuck was beginning to wonder why he was searching, instead of having the police do it, when he caught sight of the van leaving a McDonald's drive-in lane. It drove erratically and took a roundabout way out of town.
     Chuck followed the van as closely as he could without risking detection. It took a roundabout route, apparently intended to shake off pursuit, and would have lost Chuck if Carol's car wasn't grossly overpowered.
     Finally the van turned down a one-lane track in a densely wooded area.  Before long, Chuck saw a clearing ahead. The van parked near a helicopter. Chuck was shocked to recognize the helicopter as a late-model assault troop carrier as two men hustled Carol inside.
     Abandoning stealth, Chuck shoved the throttle to full power. The helicopter's main rotor was turning at full speed as he broke out of the forest and streaked toward it. Chuck pulled the tiller up, trying to convert horizontal velocity to vertical as he pushed for enough altitude to intercept the helicopter. To his surprise, he was gaining, and was seriously considering what to do next when there was a loud bang under the hood.  He glanced at the dashboard, and saw that all the warning lights were lit.
     Chuck pulled his legs back, squatting on the seat. He steered desperately, waited until his apogee, and jumped. He caught the barrel of the helicopter's autocannon with one hand and was wrenched backward by air streaming past the aircraft. Chuck reached out for a new handhold as his first grip weakened, and his free hand grasped the helicopter's left front wheel. He swung clumsily as he pulled himself up to sit on the still extended wheel as the helicopter gained speed.
     The stabilizer on Carol's car was working admirably, keeping the car level as inertia in the lift fans kept it from falling too fast. Unfortunately, the car couldn't steer itself, and the centuries-old pine tree it hit was big enough to overpower the stabilizer, rupture the plenum chamber and tear open the fuel line. As it fell behind, Carol's car tumbled end over end downhill, spreading superheated fuel across the hillside.
     Chuck glanced back as flames engulfed the wreckage.  Chuck, what have you got
yourself into?
     He felt into his left pant leg, slightly relieved to find that his boot knife still there. Great. At least two rifles against one toothpick. And the guy with the toothpick has to make a forced entry. Smart money's on the bad guys tonight.
     Chuck leaned forward, the knife in his teeth, as he groped for the front door handle. Chuck wrenched the door open, falling forward and catching the bottom of the door frame with his left hand. The door flapped back, banging against his left elbow, as Chuck pulled the knife out of his teeth. His right arm moved in a rapid arc as the razor-sharp blade cut the seat belt on the copilot's seat. Chuck reached up and grabbed Carlos by the arm. Carlos' startled scream was drowned by the helicopter's engines almost as soon as he was outside.
     As swiftly as he could, Chuck pulled himself inside the helicopter and stood. He saw that the helicopter wasn't on autopilot and wrote the pilot off as a threat for the moment. Aft, Chuck saw Carol, gagged and handcuffed to a seat, and Jose rising and grabbing his rifle.

     Carol revived from her shocked stupor when she heard Carlos' scream. She saw Chuck, looking more like a movie character than the potential love interest of a few hours ago, lunging toward Jose. Meanwhile, Jose was bringing the muzzle of his rifle around to face Chuck.
     Carol saw the events like slow-motion action in a movie, marvelling at how clear and immediate everything suddenly seemed. He's not going to make it. That guy's going to kill Chuck. And it's all my fault.
     The rifle wasn't quite aimed at Chuck when Jose pulled the trigger.  Carol fancied that she saw each bullet fly to its destination before the next one was fired, so clearly did things appear in her terror. The first three bullets tore holes in the floor. Then two bullets hit Chuck's left thigh. Then two more bullets flew past Chuck, noisily chewing their way through the instrument panel.
     The helicopter's nose rose suddenly, helping Chuck's lunge. As irresistible as a tidal wave, he reached Jose, grabbing the rifle's forestock in his left hand. He slashed at Jose with the knife, not seeing where he hit in his rage. He didn't stop until Jose let go of the rifle and fell to the floor.
     Chuck turned toward Carol, still holding the rifle. "Spread your hands apart," he commanded above the engine's whine. Carol complied wordlessly. Chuck put the rifle's muzzle against the handcuffs and broke the chain with a single shot.
     Chuck sat next to Carol, leaning the rifle against the seat. Carol stared at his wounded leg as he cut her gag. "Are you all right?" she asked.
     Chuck probed his thigh gingerly, wincing at the pain. "Feels like muscle took all the damage," he said. "Help me bandage this."
     Within a minute, his leg was bandaged with strips of cloth torn from both their garments. Carol was feeling sick, from both men's wounds. The helicopter's wild pitching only compounded her sickness.  Chuck handed his knife to Carol and Pointed to Jose, still slumped on the floor. "Watch him," Chuck said. "If he moves, stab him. Preferably someplace incapacitating."
     Chuck limped back to the cockpit. The pilot, he saw, was struggling to control the aircraft despite the wreckage the bullets had made of the controls. Chuck sat in the copilot's seat and put the rifle's muzzle near the pilot's chest.
     "Let's set. something straight," Chuck began, watching the pilot's face closely for reactions. "I'm a pilot myself, and I'm curious about how this bird handles. Plus, I've been in a bad mood since your buddy shot me. So, if you don't look like you're trying to make me happy, I'll empty the magazine in your chest and take control myself. Understand?"
     Terrified, the pilot nodded.
     "Good," Chuck said. "Now, the first thing is to turn back toward Marquette. While we're at it, I want a headset that's plugged into the radio."

     Chuck awoke from a drug-induced sleep to find his left thigh encased in the biggest collection of bandages he had ever seen. He felt along it with his hand and decided that it was bandages, not a cast. Good. At least the bone didn't get broken.
     Then Chuck realized that someone was holding his other hand. He turned his head and saw Carol, her expression a look of concern mixed with something else. . . something he couldn't ever remember seeing directed at him.
     Chuck turned his head the other way as he heard a throat cleared.  Chuck was just realizing that this was Mr. Demir when he began speaking. "I can't tell you how grateful I am..." the older man began.
     "No big deal, sir," Chuck replied. "This is what the Army trained me to do."
     "The Army..." Mr. Demir said. "That's right, you're ROTC. Too bad; I was going to offer you a job."
     "I just may take you up on that," Chuck answered.  "Unless last night's activities. . . it was last night, wasn't it?"  When Mr. Demir nodded, he continued.  "Anyway, unless the Army changes its mind, I've been cut."
     "Cut?" Mr. Demir asked. "A man of your caliber?"
     "I don't understand it," Chuck said. "The Army's given me a four-year scholarship, sent me to Airborne and Ranger schools during summer break, and now it's abandoning the investment in my training."
     Mr. Demir reached out his hand to shake Chuck's. "If the Army doesn't want you, I'll give you a job. Come see me when you're ready, and we'll work out the details."
     Chuck looked back toward Carol as exhaustion seized him. He drifted off to sleep trying to decide if the expression on her face was love or hero-worship.
 
This page, and all contents, are Copyright © 1997 by Fred Geisler.
This page hosted by GeoCities (3 KB)
Get your own Free Home Page

Click to see more great pages on Entertainment.