Chapter 8: Horsing Around

Waking up hung over is no fun. I had been there before—a stinger hangover. Stingers have an unfortunate side effect on me—amnesia. I forget the immediate past prior to being zapped. I've timed it because I'm that sort of guy—I forget both being zapped and between 20 and 45 minutes prior to being hit with the stinger's ray. The aftermath, however, is pure misery—and yes I did time that too—with medical tube intervention I'm only miserable for about 90 minutes. Those are LONG minutes.

Thinking back to my last accessible memories I came up with Thursday at zero eight hundred hours and breakfast. Waffles with sausage—turkey, I think. My empty stomach rumbled at the memory. I opened my eyes and there she was.

Tess.

"How long?" I croaked.

"What?" Tess asked.

"How long have I been out?" I asked after clearing my throat.

"What was your last memory?"

"Thursday's breakfast," I said—and my stomach rumbled again.

"That was three days ago," Tess said.

"Oh," I said. "Well, at least I'm clean and this will pass in ninety minutes."

"Clean?"

"Yes, Tess," I sat up, endured the room spinning. "Medical tubes leave us cleaner than a long soak in a hot tub. If it only took a minute I'd be using the medical tube instead of taking a shower."

"Oh," Tess sounded down. "Let me help you out. Lean on me until you get your balance back. They want to see you right now, just the way you are."

"Who is they?"

"Colonel Dorman is the Central Command liaison," Tess told me as she stiffened upon contact with my naked body. For the record, Tess was in her modified Civil Service uniform—modified with a full head scarf. If I hadn't known her to be Catholic, I might have mistaken her for Muslim.

"Tess, I've been thinking," I said as we moved from Medical to Conference Room Four. "You don't have to change. Lesbian is your identity. You could do artificial insemination."

"No," Tess said. "That's not permitted."

She didn't explain who determined 'permitted' or not. I didn't press.

"Thank you for letting me make love to you," I said.

"No wonder the animals like you," Tess muttered, wiping her face. "You accept us for what we are and you make us feel good about ourselves."

Don't ask me to understand. Yes, my analytical personality means that I'm constantly evaluating my environment and the people in it, both human and four-footed. I just set my prejudices aside as best I can and see what's there. Soon we were at Conference Room Four and confronted by a large red-headed man in a Marine uniform. I disengaged myself and snapped to attention, rendering a hand salute as was US Army custom.

"Why the fucking hell are you naked!" The Marine's high-pitched voice reminded me of surviving recordings of General Patton from World War Two.

"You demanded that he be brought in front of you immediately," Mary wore a Navy uniform and I finally got to see that she was also a colonel. I didn't even know Mary's last name. "Didn't you learn already that Lieutenant Lawrence will obey orders to the letter?"

"Lieutenant Lawrence reporting, sir," I wobbled, holding my salute.

"What's with that saluting shit?" the colonel thundered. "You aren't under arms! You're not even in uniform."

"That is his uniform, Colonel Dorman," Mary patiently explained. "As you were told in the horse exercise area, the animals prefer naked humans. Lieutenant Lawrence is going to Canada to recruit special auxiliary ground forces."

"I still call bull shit!" Colonel Dorman growled.

"Just like you did before my lieutenant decked your Marines?" Mary asked. "Oh, don't worry. Lieutenant Lawrence has no memory of that. The AI verified that he doesn't remember. Tom, tell us your most recent memory before waking up in the medical tube?"

"Zero eight hundred on Thursday," I repeated. "Breakfast was waffles."

My stomach protested being empty again.

"At ease, goddammit!" Colonel Dorman snarled. "So you're telling me that he doesn't remember hand-to-hand combat practice?"

"That's right," Mary replied. "You laid on the stinger even after he was unconscious, Colonel. If anybody should be up on charges it's you."

"He clobbered four of my Marines!"

"In a demonstration, as you ordered, Colonel Dorman," Tess butted in. "Don't try pulling rank—we're not in your chain of command. You got angry because you were wrong."

"What happened to the Marines?" I asked.

"You decked them with cheap shots!" Colonel Dorman thundered.

"Colonel," Mary warned, "if you're trying to intimidate the Lieutenant, he's a combat veteran. He's not some scared recruit in boot camp. Besides, if you attack him, I'll order him to defend himself. He will be leaving on his mission to Canada in two hours."

"Punching out grizzly bears?"

The conversation was making no sense to me—stinger hangover, I guess. I closed my eyes for a moment and was laying on the floor looking up at three concerned faces. The red-headed Marine's freckles stood out when he blanched.

"How the hell did you knock out four Marines in two seconds?"

"You said something about punching out grizzly bears," I said. "That's a two-step process. First is getting positioned to target the bear's knock out spots. Second is applying the requisite amount of impact force on those knock out spots. Didn't you read Miyamoto Musashi?"

"Who?" Mary asked.

"Book of Five Rings?" I asked. Three shaking heads—or my vision was doing the shaking. "No wonder Confed Marines re-invented the short sword. Musashi was a 17th Century swordsman—Japan's premier swordsman. He preached the formless form. Getting inside the others' minds and acting before they do. John Boyd reinvented that in the 20th Century--"

"Is he always like this?" Colonel Dorman asked.

"No," Mary smirked. "Right now he's operating at half speed. Stingers really mess him up. Tom's professor act is worse when he's on his feet."

"You should take his small unit tactics course," Tess said. "Just ask the AI to up-load it into your sleep learner."

"I command a regiment of Marines," Colonel Dorman spoke low in his squeaky voice. "Why do I need squad tactics."

"Small units are company size and below, Colonel," I sat up and weathered another bout of vertigo. "That's funny. I should be feeling better now. How long ago was I zapped?"

"Three hour ago," Mary replied. "Well, almost three hours."

"I don't remember feeling this wretched," I said. "I usually only lose about a half hour. I lost three days of the past. The time I lost 45 minutes was when I had Mary and Tess hit me with two stinger blasts at one time. Wait a minute—usually I only need about five minutes in the medical tube."

"There were," Mary hesitated, looked at Dorman, "there were complicating factors."

Colonel Dorman's face turned red. What wasn't I being told? I decided to be stoic about it. I was under the weather but being released from the medical tube meant that I was physically okay. I'd get over the hangover. As for the rest, it was in the past—and no longer mattered.

"What did you need to see me for, Colonel?" I asked. "I'll need help standing up."

"You are still sending him out?" Dorman squeaked. "He can barely stand!"

"I am a woman of faith," Tess said. "I have faith that Tom will complete his mission—as long as you don't interfere again."

"Of course, if you want a rematch between your Marines and Lieutenant Lawrence, they should be out of the medical tubes in a few minutes," Mary Popov offered. "He can still clean their clocks—though it might take more than two seconds and Lieutenant Lawrence might really hurt them this time."

"I'd like some breakfast before I leave," I said. "I don't want to scare the recruits."

Mary laughed.

"What's so funny," Dorman asked.

"You obviously didn't pay attention to your briefing," Tess quipped. "You didn't pay attention to the demonstration either. Are you going to foul up your end of this mission, too?"

I felt sorry for Colonel Dorman.

"I know my job," Dorman said softly. "I'll be there at the appointed time."

Unfortunately I had forgotten my own briefing for the mission. I lost my own briefing somewhere in those three missing days. Food helped. I had the AI project the mission parameters again, the terrain models (why settle for maps and photos when I can get 3D models?), and the name of the wild man—John. I finished off caffeinated orange beverage and toasted bread—have you ever been both nauseated and bear-hungry? I was feeling better when I stepped through the portal and onto the Canadian plains east of Calgary, near the foothills of the Rockies. Fresh air and sunshine helped. Okay, the temperature was around ten—Centigrade. For all you still on the English system, that's fifty toasty degrees. Yes, I was nude—but my metabolism had been adjusted so that as long as the temperature was above the freezing mark, I'd be comfortable. I would have to eat more than usual. Everything has a price.