The Impossible Future: Complete set by Frank Kennedy (mini ebook reader .txt) 📕

They may even kill one of us. I’ve never lost a soldier, and I’ll be cudfrucked if it’s going to happen now. We kill them all while we have the advantage. Say you?”

Six hands rose, Michael’s included. His resolute commitment surprised Nilsson, who became Michael’s commanding officer fifty-three standard days earlier.

“No hesitation, Cooper? No moral qualms?”

The first non-Chancellor in the history of the Unification Guard squelched any reservation about a wholesale slaughter.

“Personally, sir, mass murder ain’t really my thing. But this base is too important. If we don’t finish what we started here, we’ll never make it to Hiebimini.”

He wanted to add, “Or to Samantha,” but personal goals were neither relevant nor appreciated by the chain of command. Michael learned that painful lesson early in his spec-ops training. The Guard serves the Chancellory. The Chancellory protects the Collectorate. Preserve the natural order.

Michael knew his allies on Earth – those who stood at his side in the fight for Solomon equity – would not understand his choices. To wear their body armor. To fight with their weapons. To transform his physique using their synthetics. And for the love of one woman?

“You surprise me on a daily basis, Cooper.” Nilsson nodded, setting off grunts of approval from the others. “Good man.”

Unfortunately, neither Capt. Forsythe nor his special advisor, Col. Joseph Doltrice, supported the proposal. Forsythe insisted the Praxis crew not expose its military capability unless boxed into a corner. Praxis was, officially, a science vessel, and its crew independent researchers engaged in a continuing study of the Void. The spec-ops team was private security hired for protection only.

“May I remind you,” Capt. Forsythe said via holowindow, “we are here under the direct authorization of Supreme Admiral Poussard. She does not wish to antagonize the Chinese Convocations or their Senate. If they decide we are a military mission in defiance of this so-called realignment, they won’t hesitate to deploy an army with substantial air power. Or, they’ll simply call in Bouchet’s terrorists. You will be annihilated. You are to maintain defensive operations.”

This did not sit well with Nilsson.

“So, we engage in morning target practice until these indigos decide they’ve had enough, or they can’t climb over the corpses.”

“Correct. As long as the major clans don’t consider us a threat, they’ll have nothing to do with the Void.”

Michael went through a back channel to convince Joseph Doltrice to support the team. Joseph saved Michael’s life in the last battle of the Solomon uprising while working as a mercenary for Samantha. The two bonded after her kidnapping and during the journey to Tamarind. Michael thought, incorrectly, he had Joseph’s ear.

“With apologies, Michael,” Joseph said. “I cannot put my respect and devotion to you and Sam ahead of this mission. Our predicament is more fragile than you realize.”

“I’m sorry, Joseph. I think my voice should count more than most. My Presidium paid for twenty percent of this mission.”

“Samantha’s Presidium. I understand your point. Nonetheless, it’s a military decision. Financial outlays are not relevant.”

Michael fumed. “I just thought after everything that happened on Earth, you’d have my back.”

“I do. Always. But you and I are soldiers. This is what you wanted, Michael. I gained you access to spec-ops. You survived their training and proved yourself worthy of the uniform. Your job is to protect the mission and kill the enemy. This is our path to Hiebimini.”

Michael nodded. “Killing, I don’t mind. Not anymore. But when I was on Earth, I assassinated Chancellors who posed a genuine threat to the Solomons. I knew their names and their faces. But these Mongols? They got no shot against us, and they believe we are a genuine threat. And they will not stop coming. Instead of these massacres at dawn, all we need to do is drop three energy slews on their village. It’s what the Guard used to do from the Ark Carriers. I’ve read the history.”

“True.” Joseph sighed. “I must admit, hearing you so casually advocate for the annihilation of an entire village is … unsettling.”

“Or maybe I’ve learned from all the Chancellors I been hanging out with it the past few years. Sometimes, murder is practical.”

“As is patience. Do your job, Michael. Kill the enemy.”

They had not spoken to each other since. Thirty-one days. Twelve more incursions. Six hundred twenty dead Mongols. And for the spec-ops team? Two broken bones, a few bruises, and a holographic scoreboard documenting kills. The latter was 1st Lt. Percy Muldoon’s idea. He figured a little competition would liven the proceedings. Maj. Nilsson did not object.

*

Michael ranked third going into this morning’s fifteenth conflict, mostly because he was ordered to take point in the early attacks. Nilsson, influenced by hardliner Col. Rachel Broadman, threw Michael into the first line of fire to show his true mettle or die trying. Michael succeeded to the tune of a high body-count, a feat not everyone in spec-ops appreciated.

“In any other context,” Rachel told Michael over a round of drinks two weeks earlier, “you’d be an indigo. A proto-African rat like the ones I killed on Zwahili Kingdom and Boer.”

She bared her teeth at Michael, a predator closing in for the fatal strike. But he didn’t flinch. Instead, he pulled on his pipe and filled his lungs with poltash weed.

“Want a toke?” He offered his pipe. “G’hladi weed. Best around.”

“So they say.”

She accepted his offer and pulled on the pipe, her eyes laser-driven on Michael’s all the while. She nearly tore him from limb to limb during spec-ops training, broke his ribs, and savaged his ego daily. Kick by kick. Punch by punch. And each day he returned, often with little sleep and/or straight from the medpod. She tried to break him, even as he fought with vigor, adapted to peacekeeper combat techniques, and became more powerful with infusions of Guard proprietary synthetics. Now, Michael saw