FSTS-317/NATO Site 93
Classified Location
Edge of the 1K Zone
Fulda Gap, Western Germany
17 April, 1986
1300 Hours

I looked at the two female soldiers with me, then back at the rabbit. "Hang on, Aine," I told it, using Hannah/Aine's real name. She went by 'the vulgar Hannah' and had added Lane after the dustup that winter, when she no longer wanted to be what she had been in the dark and cold. Still, I figured that the mortal woman she masqueraded as was probably gone.

I looked up at Gilly and Sawmoth. "Are either of you virgins?" Both shook their heads, although Gilly blushed, "This is deadly serious. I'm not sure what we're going to find, so I need to know some really personal details."

Both women nodded. Gilly looked a bit reluctant.

I blushed this time. "Um, all three holes?" It was invasive, but I'd heard Aine speak about how anal sex was the Gods' gift to women since ancient times.

Both blushed extremely deep, almost purple.

"Either of you religious?" They shook their heads, "Do not reference any Gods, especially the Christian god, do not scream, understand?" Both of them nodded, doubt in their eyes, "Depending on what condition she is, do not allow her to touch your bare skin, kiss you, and above all, do not let her bite you. She is freakishly strong, fast, and tough," I stared at them, "Understand?"

They both nodded.

"What are your first names?" I asked. The rabbit repeated mine.

"Melinda, I go by Mel," Sawmoth said.

"Kassidy, Cass for short," Gilly said.

"No short names with each other, that's important, and call me Jonathon right now," I told them. I looked at Gilly, "Kassidy with a K?" She nodded, and I looked at her blonde hair and freckles. "You're Irish?"

She shrugged.

"All right," I told them, "It's the best we can hope for," I sighed, pulled my helmet off, and scrubbed my crew cut. My hair was sweaty, and when my hand slid down to the back of my neck I could feel the goosebumps when the rabbit said my name again. I clomped the helmet back on my head.

"Let's go, before the Rangers end up getting eaten by something that's been gone from this world for centuries," I said, standing up. "Put your weapons away, move slow, and do not show any fear, fear is for prey, and she's an apex predator."

...the Russian going down on his back, Aine's mouth clamped to the blood spurting wound on his neck, swallowing as she rode the big Soviet troop down and kept stabbing the whole way down...

"Watch for bomblets or shells, walk where I walk," I warned, following the rabbit into the grass. We passed several craters, until we saw her in the brush and scrub between two of the bunkers. The scrub and brush here wasn't scorched or burnt by the fires that the shells had lit, but I could still smell the stench of burnt human flesh. I should have realized that the small mound of blackberry bushes was our destination the minute I saw it.

In the middle of the mound, mostly covered by thorn studded blackberry vines that had large flowers and fat blackberry berries, Aine was curled up in the fetal position. As we moved closer the vines rustled and I heard Gilly's breath hiss. The vines moved off of the diminutive woman, revealing that both pants legs were missing, exposing pale alabaster skin with fine red hair on them.

Aine refused to shave, she said only children were hairless, and that she was a woman.

Her right arm was exposed, the BDU top sleeve missing. The cover on her Kevlar vest was missing for most of her right side, same with the helmet covering. The helmet was torn down to the fiberglass/Kevlar laminate with tufts of fiberglass showing. The Kevlar vest was shredded halfway across her torso, and the BDU top and brown T-shirt was missing, showing alabaster skin, her exposed breast tipped with bright red. Her hair was drawn up in tight rings, protecting her neck. Half of her face was tanned skin, the right side of her face and her ear and neck were all alabaster, with that spray of freckles across her cheekbones and nose.

The bees took off from the flowers, and for a split second I could have sworn they were not bees, but I shook my head sharply and they went back to fat honey-bees. The rabbit stopped between me and her, and then took off into the brush.

When I reached out and brushed my hand on that pale cheek, I noticed again how long her lashes were. She shivered slightly, but the fetal position relaxed a bit. I could see her eyes moving underneath the lids, and wondered what she was dreaming, or even if she was.

"I'm here, Aine, we found you," I said softly, stroking her cheek, "We wouldn't abandon you, you're Actual and Atlas, and we don't leave our people behind," She relaxed further, her hands relaxing.

There were slightly curved thorns extending about a half inch from under her fingernails.

"We're going to have to carry you, Aine, you can't walk," I said, "You've got blast trauma still, so we're going to carry you, sweet."

I looked at my splint and shook my head, then made up my mind.

"Kassidy, you're going to carry her," I sighed, "Dammit, this is risky as hell, and I couldn't carry her even if my chicken wing weren't busted," I stood up, dusted my hands off on my pants.

"Why's that?" Gilly asked, taking a careful step forward. I noticed she was avoiding the blackberry vines. Good girl.

"I'm a boy, she would react differently to me than she will you," I answered, "If I had my way, I'd have you two strip down, paint yourself with war-paint and decorated with holly, before we even touched her.."

"Yeah, she's..." Gilly said slowly, looking down at the diminutive woman. "I think this is outside the normal Army, Jonathon" She knelt down and stroked Aine's leg, then her arm, then caressed her cheek. "It's Kassidy, Aine. You know me, it's Kassidy, and Jonathon wants me to carry you."

"Be careful," Sawmoth said softly as Gilly slid her hands under Aine. Aine made another mewling noise, rolling her head back. The sharp planes of her face were inhuman, her mouth full of teeth better suited to a B-grade movie, and her tongue was bright, blood red and pointed.

"Shush," I said, waving at Sawmoth.

Sawmoth nodded slowly, looking at Aine. Both of them had been at Atlas for two months, both of them had been around her and knew what kind of person she was. Now they were seeing what she was.

Gilly pulled Aine close, the smaller woman's helmet making a clonking noise when it fell off of her head and into the dirt. I grabbed it and passed it to Sawmoth, watching as Aine's hand came up to her face and she started sucking on her thumb. Her other hand reached for Gilly's face, but I stepped forward and tucked it into the strap for Gilly's ruck.

"She weighs like ten pounds," Gilly said, tensing her neck and relaxing. "I've got her."

"Let's go, follow me, we need to get her uprange," I reached up and thumbed the button on the mic next to my chin, "Atlas Bravo, this is Atlas Actual, come in, over," I said, carefully following my boot prints in the ash and dirt.

"This is Atlas Bravo, we read you, Atlas Actual, over," Foster's voice. He sounded stronger.

"We're coming back, we've secured package fruit bat, will need immediately medical support, over," I told him. We hit the road, and I looked to my right and left, making a quick decision.

If I went right, I'd be moving across unchecked ground, and according to my computations, the far corner had a probability of MLRS bomblets at about the 15% range. But that meant 15% per square foot, which meant with each step the probability that I'd step on one grew incrementally until the laws of probability blew my goddamn leg off. If I went left, I'd be following the the way I'd come in, but we'd already marked everything.

Stillwater would go right.

Goddamn it, Ant, you're going to be the death of me.

"Stick with me, step only where I step, your life depends on it. Do not step on any rocks or debris," I told them, "Doubletime it, five meter intervals, Melinda, you take drag, I'm taking point. Melinda, when Kassidy gets tired, you take over." They nodded, Aine shifted in Gilly's arms, and we started out. I picked up the pace, leading the way. If I made a mistake, I'd be the one to pay for it. At five meters the shrapnel from an MLRS bomblet would probably not cause any major damage, but it was all I had.

It was only a half mile to the corner. Gilly said she was fine, and we picked it back up. We passed where Nagle had found Little-Bit, and where Foster's CUC-V had landed. The truck was still there, and I knew that I'd have to get the engineers out here to pull the wreck.

I stopped, raising a closed fist to get them to stop, and then walked over the wreck of CUC-V-2-19-15, which we called either cuck-vee-fifteen or just Gypsy Wagon, and pulled open the door. It took me three tries, and when I did shattered glass rattled inside of it and fell out onto the ground from the floor. There was a broken XM-16E2 (I could tell by the lack of forward assist) in there, but I could also see the keys hanging from the ignition.

"It's not gonna start," Sawmoth told me, hitching up the M-60 on her shoulder. That thing was heavy, I knew, God knows I carried it enough places. Still, even though months had passed, seeing an M-60 always reminded me of King, and the courage he'd shown in the end. The poor brave bastard.

Stripping off the radio and tossing it onto the bench seat I got in behind the wheel. I forgot to unclip the mic from my helmet chinstrap and it about broke my neck before it tore free. Again memories of that desperate fight welled up, but I shook off the memories, and turn the key. The dash lit up and I waited for the glowplugs to warm up on the heavy diesel engine. I closed my eyes, made a wish, pumped the gas three times, and hit the starter.

The Gypsy Wagon fired right up, the engine clunking, but still running.

"Melinda, hold Aine while Kassidy gets in the back, then pass her back and get in with them. I'll drive," I told them.

There was blood all over the floorboards in the passenger side where my Section Sergeant had broken his neck and face.

I helped the two women into the bed of the truck, then got behind the wheel of the GMC Blazer. I threw it in reverse, and to my surprise, it actually backed up. The tranny or the pumpkin were making grinding noises, and it did shudder pretty badly, but it still ran.

I felt like cheering. The Gypsy Wagon had come through again. It had taken a serious beating over the last year, and originally hadn't run when we pulled it off the rail head. Me and Ant had worked on it almost a week before it would even start, and the mechanics had been forced to put a new transaxle in it. It could take beating, it was tough, it was Atlas like us.

The engine clanked and rumbled, but didn't sputter and the RPM needle was steady, so I figured it was the exhaust and probably some of the extra crap rather than any of the important stuff inside of the engine. I drove it carefully uprange, taking my time, dodging the artillery shells and the craters.

"Atlas Actual, this is Atlas Bravo, come in, over," Foster's voice.

"Go ahead, Bravo," I answered, grabbing the mic with one hand while I steered around several craters and hoped that there wasn't an MLRS bomblet in the brush.

"Chief just called, said our Section Sergeant is accompanying some VIP's out here," He told me.

Goddamn it, with Atlas ready to try and kill everyone for probable twenty miles around, the last thing I needed was a bunch of retarded VIP's. Atlas would be coiled like a spring to kill whoever made the slightest mistake, and because we didn't have the safety net of a trained team out here, one of the new people, or the VIPs, would make a mistake.

And Atlas would kill them.

"I've got Aine, coming in with the Gypsy Wagon," I answered. Fuck acknowledging what was quickly going to become a massive cluster fuck.

"It started?" Foster said, even through the static I could hear the disbelief in his voice.

"Yeah, and moves. Think one of the engine mounts might be cracked," I answered.

"Christ, we were airborne and flipped at least once,"

"GMC, like a rock, baby," I laughed.

"That's Chevy, you hick," Forster laughed back.

"We're coming in," I told him. We were coming over the berm, and I had to jink to avoid another crater. If they didn't have a piece of engineer tape, I just crawled the truck through them.

"Roger," and the connection went dead.

I pulled out the pack of Camels I'd stolen out of Ant's ruck and lit one, gritting my teeth as I steered around the craters where Nagle and Cromwell had almost been killed. It took me twice to get my Zippo lit, and I wondered when I'd broken the catch on it and when the emblem had fallen off of it. I'd have to send it back and get a new one.

The truck clunked a few times when I killed the ignition. Stokes' big Amazon ass was out front of The Fort with her medical bag. When I climbed out and went to grab the radio she put her hand on my shoulder.

"Uh-uh, let someone else get it, I don't want you stressing your chest," She told me. I nodded, realizing that I was wheezing.

The drive had been worse on me than walking with a PRC-77 radio on my back.

When I went inside I saw the four males laying on cots. One was rolled over retching into a garbage can, one was mumbling as his hands fluttered above him, and the other two were holding their stomach and moaning. Cromwell was withdrawing a needle from Stillwater's IV, and while I watched she untangled his fingers from her LBE.

"He keeps trying to wake up," She said, standing up and looking down.

"Yeah, that's my boy," I answered, "Foster in the commo room?"

She nodded and I headed over to the commo room, pushing open the heavy door and going inside. Foster was sitting in the chair, checking channels on the radio and making notes. When he saw me, he took off the headphones and leaned back.

"We've got crappy reception on quite few chunks of bandwidth," He sighed, "Worse, we're missing the Corps main commo channel, and about half the bandwidth for the crypto channels are nothing but hash."

"Don't worry about that," I told him. He raised an eyebrow and I continued, "We found McCullen, she's in bad shape. Looks like she got her arm and legs blown off and half her head, and now she's really light, maybe fifty pounds," Foster whistled slow and low and I nodded, "We found her covered in brambles and flowers, and, don't fucking laugh, but she used a rabbit to get me find her."

Foster just nodded, "What do you need me to do?"

"Take CUC-V-38, leave the Gypsy Wagon here. Go into town, where Ant has us buy barbeque meat. Get at least five pounds of beef, venison if they got it, rabbit, at least a liter of blood, two if they have it, at least one beef or venison heart, and a couple bottles of alcohol."

Foster nodded, getting up. He went over to the emergency aid box on the wall and opened it. It was pretty empty, except for a pill bottle labelled Motrin. He pulled it in, then pulled out a roll of 20's that we kept for bribes and the like. He peeled off $200 and put the rest back before he followed me into the main room.

"Anyone see the exchange rate today?" I asked.

"Four and a half Marks on the dollar," Cromwell said, tapping the little portable AM/FM radio on her LBE that she had showed up with.

"Try for five, settle for three and a half," I told him.

Stokes was looking at Aine, who looked alien, laying on her cot. She shook her head and sighed, "Bomber, she knows you, come over here and try to keep her calm, I gotta strip her," She shook her head again, "She should be dead."

"So should Stillwater, Foster, and me," I told her. I moved to the top of the cot, kneeling down, my right knee popping, and put my hands to either side of her face, "It's me, Johnny, Aine,"

Stokes undid Aine's LBE, what was left of it, then her Kevlar vest, then sliced down the front of her BDU top and brown T-shirt. Aine stirred, and I took a risk and kissed her.

Her lips burned like stinging nettles.

Pants were next, revealing that Aine ran commando. I noticed her pubic hair was thick and lush, almost wild looking. There were flower petals inside what was left of her pants and tops, pale pink ones that matched Aine's left nipple. Her right nipple was pale, almost bloodless, and I swore it had looked different when we first found her.

Stokes was examining the tiny woman, checking her pulse, listening closely to her chest, checking bloodflow, and we all stayed silent before she leaned back and shook her head.

"I don't know, Bomber," She told me, "That scar on her arm is missing, this isn't Lane, this is McCullen. I wouldn't know where to start with her."

"Do your best," I told her. Foster left the Fort, promising to be back in half an hour.

"What's your plan?" She asked me.

"Bathe her in blood and whiskey, feed her raw meat and blood, treat her like one of the forest goddess of old," I said, shrugging, "Got a better idea?"

One of the newbies, some chucklehead who's name i hadn't bothered reading off his nametag, snorted from his cot.

"Oh, sure, treat the bitch like some kind of queen," He said.

Stokes walked over, "What did I tell you?"

"I ain't afraid of," he started.

Stokes punched him in the face, dropping him backwards onto the cot. She snatched him up and punched him in the nose again, blood spattering her. "Next time, I break it off your face."

He rolled over on his side, crying, holding onto his face.

"This isn't what you six are used to, this is Atlas, this is Actual," I said. "This isn't Hannah Lane, this is Aine McCullen, and she will cut. Your. Heart. Out."

Cromwell nodded, holding up her hand, "I've seen her do things, she looks human, but she isn't."

"She barely looks human," One of the girl's said, retching. She stood up and wobbled over to squat down next to me. "Look at her ears," She brushed the tiny woman's hair back, and we could all see that Aine's ears came to sharp points. She pulled back Aine's eyelid, and we could see that her pupils were square, more like a goat's pupils. "See."

Aine made a mewling noise, exposing those tiny sharp teeth, and stirred.

"Unless you were with us in the dark and cold, stay back," Stokes said.

The woman next to me stood up, retching, her hands shaking, and rubbed her face. "I'm good, I think." She dug in her pocket, pulling out a pack of Winstons and lighting one. I took it from her, she smiled and lit another, which Stokes took, the woman laughed, lit another, looked at Cromwell, who shook her head, and took a drag before putting the pack and lighter back in her pocket. She walked over to the other woman.

"Ovary up, bitch," she said, shaking the woman's cot. The woman groaned and swung her feet over, retching but keeping her stomach down before standing up.

"You guys survived this?" she asked. We all nodded, "I don't feel like I'm going to die, I feel like I want to die." She leaned against me, resting her head against my shoulder, and I put my arm around her, "You guys got really busted up, didn't you?" She coughed, then retched, and I waited for her to finish before I answered.

"Atlas is a hard mistress, troop, and she'll try to kill you every chance she gets," I told her honestly. I gave her a slight hug when her stomach made a terrible noise. "But we'll do our best to make sure you survive as long as possible."

"Has anyone ever PCS'd?" The other one asked, leaning on Gilly.

I shook my head. "Medical board or the morgue," Was all I said.

Sawmoth chose right then to barge in. "We got a CUC-V coming in, bumper number 62, looks like two of the people from earlier and a driver." She said.

"That would probably be our illustrious squad leader and section sergeant," I said. I sighed and sat down on my bunk, looking over to see Cromwell and Stokes rolling Aine to get a look at her back as well as sliding what was left of her gear out from under her. Pale pink flower petals almost covered her skin, falling off onto the shirt as they pulled it away.

"There's a sedan coming in too, no markings, four men in suits," Sawmoth said.

Crap.

"If you can get up, get up. Cromwell, tag anyone who's still undergoing med-shock," I stood up, felt the world tilt, and realized I was pushing myself too hard. I took a long drag off the cigarette, mentally reciting one of the mantras that Stokes had taught us all during the winter to help steady myself.

One of the M-3 grease guns was hanging from the hooks, and I hung my XM-16E1 from the hook and picked up one of them. I knew I probably looked stupid, but a lot of people didn't know I was ambidextrous. I'd made sure it wasn't in my training file.

Ant had taught me, like he had learned from his father, that the file is never the man, and the man is never the file, so I'd made sure that some things were held back.

When I walked outside the smoke that still hazed the site made my cough, which made my chest hurt for a second before there was a popping feeling and I could breathe again. That tight feeling disappeared, and I shook my head.

The CUC-V was idling while the two NCO's were pointing at places to possibly park.

The sedan was already parked and four men were already out of it. Sawmoth had been wrong. Only three were in suits, the fourth was wearing civilian clothing. Levi's, boots, and an Oktoberfest T-shirt. He looked like everyone's favorite uncle, with rimless glass, jug-ears, a stupid Beatles haircut, and watery eyes. The other three you could file under non-descript.

It was Jugears that I was worried about.

He walked right up to me, holding out his hand. The other three looked around, and I knew they were assessing the area. I could tell by the way they were standing that they had pistol rigs on, and that the guy with the medic alert bracelet was left handed. Still, I reflexively shook Jugears' hand.

"Senior Analyst Timmons, Central Intelligence Agency," he said.

...aw fuck...