Chapter 19A

Eden MPG base

September 3, 2146

The smell in the outside deployment male locker room was horrid, perhaps the worst olfactory sensation Jeff had ever experienced. The thought that he was contributing to it did nothing to ease his disgust. It was the smell of over a thousand combat soldiers who had been outside for eight days, sweating inside of their biosuits, unable to shower or even evaporate the sweat properly. The moment they began to remove the biosuits in the confined space all those layers of perspiration, most of it old, began to permeate the air like a gas.

"I'm gonna fuckin' puke," said Hicks, who was standing next to Jeff and who did indeed appear to a bit green around the gills.

"Go ahead," Jeff told him, peeling the main portion of his suit downward as gingerly as possible. "It can't possibly make it smell worse in here." He disconnected the urine catheter and eased away from the solid waste tube stuck to his anus. His penis was raw and tender from so many days with a piece of latex on it and he winced as the air hit it. He stepped out of the suit, leaving him standing naked except for the MPG T-shirt he'd donned nine days ago after his last shower. It was pretty much beyond salvage at this point. Even if it was washed and sterilized the smell and the sweat stains would probably remain. He took it off and put it in a plastic bag from his locker, intending to simply throw it away.

He had already unloaded his M-24 and removed all of the magazines from the outside pockets on the suit. He now removed his last waste-pack, his food pack, the water tank and the air supply tank and put them all in his locker. He made a last check of all the pockets, finding two loose M-24 rounds, two rocks he didn't remember picking up, and the wrapper from a food pack. He tossed all these onto a back shelf and then removed the combat computer module that controlled the suit. This he set on a different shelf. Satisfied that the suit was now completely empty he turned it inside out — a process that took the better part of five minutes — and then hung it on a hook on the outside of his locker door.

"You got the Spray-clean?" he asked Hicks, who was still going through his own pockets.

"Yeah, right there, top shelf."

Jeff reached into his locker and grabbed the aerosol can. The contents were something that had been developed by a Martian chemist about five years before and it made the process of cleaning one's biosuit a breeze instead of the agonizing, two to three hour ordeal it had once been. All you did was sprayed the entire inside with the concoction, which was a combination of disinfectant and cleaning compounds that would bind to any foreign matter. The active ingredients were mixed in with a sodium bicarbonate base that would absorb most of the odor. He sprayed nearly a quarter of the can, saturating the entire suit. In two hours all he had to do was wipe it all off with a towel and the suit would be ready for action.

"Thanks," Jeff said, putting the can back. "Now its time for a shower, a shave, and some real fuckin' food."

"I heard they got steaks and artichokes out there for us," Hicks said, starting the process of turning his own suit inside out.

"I heard they got us some beer too," Jeff said, his mouth salivating at the very thought.

"If they don't, I'm gonna find me some. Some smokes too. After eight fuckin' days out in the wastelands I wanna drink and smoke until I barf and my lungs get coughed out."

"Well put," Jeff said, grabbing a towel, some soap, and some shampoo.

"You wanna join me?" he asked. "Me and Zen are gonna hit the Troop Club and see what we can score over there. I heard a rumor that they held some of the booze back for the combat soldiers."

"I got something I need to do," Jeff responded.

"You sure, man?" Hicks said. "Xenia might be there. She's pretty much shot me down at this point but you could probably jack your round into her chamber if you play your cards right."

"Xenia and I have an understanding about that," Jeff said.

"What the fuck you mean?"

"Never mind," he said. "I might head over later on, especially if they got booze and smokes over there. But first I gotta go home."

"Home?" Hicks said, raising his eyebrows a bit. "I thought you hated your old lady like the marines hate the Mosquitoes."

"I do," he said. "And its time for me to do something about it. A little promise I made to myself."

"Ahhh," Hicks said knowingly. "You're gonna tell her to take a flying fuck at Phobos?"

"Yep," he confirmed.

"I can respect that," Hicks told him. He considered for a second. "You gonna tear off one last piece first? A farewell fuck?"

To his surprise, Jeff actually found himself seriously considering this suggestion for a few seconds. Sure he hated Belinda now and she had put on more than thirty kilos since they'd been married and sex with her had been nothing but a chore for the last year or so — a chore that had been unsuccessful in its goal of conceiving their one child so they could get that two-bedroom apartment — but the thought of sliding into her body and rutting atop her until release was strangely compelling at this particular moment in time. Wow, he thought, trying to shake the image off before it produced an erection, I'm really fuckin' horny right now. What the hell is up with that?

"No," he told Hicks when the thought was finally banished. "I may need to get my weapon oiled but I don't need it that bad. I'll score me a little something later at the club."

"Not if I score it first," Hicks told him. "I'm horny enough to fuck Drogan and you know how fuckin' ugly she is. It must be all that death and shit we saw that does it, you know what I mean?"

"Yeah," Jeff said as the image of stripping Drogan's manly, yet female body down and slamming into her locked into his consciousness — and not in a bad way either. "I think I know what you mean. I'm gonna go hit the shower. Maybe I'll make it a cold one."

It was quite some time before he actually got to the shower. There were only thirty showerheads in the locker room and there were almost a thousand people wanting to use them at one time. He waited in a long line that stretched all across the back and side walls of the room. The stink of so many naked, disgusting bodies gathered together in close proximity was almost more than he could take at first. Gradually, however, his nose became desensitized to it and he stopped noticing it. Once that happened he was able to engage in conversation with those in line around him. The topics were mostly about the last eight days and what was going on out there now.

"I still can't believe General Jackson called a fuckin' cease-fire on those marines just because they're retreating," said a squad sergeant just behind Jeff in line. "They're just strolling their way back to their LZ right this minute! The Mosquitoes and the special forces teams could be beating the shit out of them!"

"I heard that in Proctor General Azacan almost resigned over that order," said a private in front of Jeff. "He could have gotten his armor in front of the marines and cut them off completely. He could have fuckin' destroyed them, man!" He shook his head. "I'm wondering if Jackson's lost it. Maybe Laura Whiting oughtta replace his ass with Zoloft."

"Amen to that," said the sergeant. "I used to have a lot of respect for Jackson, but now... I'm not so sure."

Jeff listened to the conversations but contributed little to them. He, like most of the troops that had actually put their asses on the line, that had seen friends killed and horribly wounded, that had known that they themselves might die at any moment, had a sincere wish that every WestHem marine on Mars and above it would be killed in some horrible, painful way. He hated the thought that they were just driving at their leisure back to their landing zones where they would launch back into orbit to regroup and then come back down again in overwhelming strength, probably at Eden or New Pittsburgh. The sour taste of their getaway was taking away from what should have been the euphoria of victory. But as for actually replacing Jackson with Zoloft? He wasn't so sure that was a good idea. Nor did many of the others around them.

"Jackson's got us this far," was the common argument among the pro-Jacksonians. "He may have fucked up a wet dream with this cease-fire but he's still the fuckin' man."

"He choked under the pressure," was the common argument among the anti-Jacksonians. "He thinks they're really giving up and he decided not to make them mad."

The entire argument was somewhat of a moot point, of course. General Jackson wasn't offering his resignation, nor was Laura Whiting asking for it. At least that was the story being passed around at the moment. The WestHems in all four theaters were back at their LZs and in the process of loading their equipment back into their ships. Though the main line units were still under deployment, just in case, the ACRs and the support units had been brought back in and given forty-eight hour passes. Another rumor floating about was that many of the soldiers — particularly those in the units that had taken the heaviest losses — weren't planning to come back.

Jeff finally made his way to a showerhead. An MP guarding the entrance to this particular section of the locker room warned him — politely at least — that he only had three minutes to shower and get out.

He made the best of his three minutes, luxuriating under the spray even though it made the abrasions on his penis sting quite badly. He put on a thick layer of soap and scrubbed everywhere with a washcloth, quickly turning it a dingy brown color. He used almost a hundred milliliters of shampoo on his hair and then quickly brushed his teeth before the final rinse-off. When he left the stall for the next soldier in line he felt almost human again — starving, dehydrated, sore, and very tired — but almost human nonetheless.

He walked naked back to his locker and quickly used his laser shaver to take the eight days worth of bristly stubble off his face. He put on some deodorant and combed his hair and then put on a fresh pair of MPG shorts and a fresh MPG T-shirt. He slipped his moccasins on his feet and then headed for the exit and the hopefully fresh air that would be found there.

They were indeed serving steaks and artichokes in the mess hall, along with sautéed mushrooms, garlic baked potatoes, and two bottles of beer for each soldier. The smell alone when he walked into the room was nearly enough to trigger an orgasm. He waited in another line for another twenty minutes before getting his tray. He then went searching for an empty spot at a table. In this endeavor he scored rather well. Not only did he find a place to sit down but it was next to Xenia, who was working on cleaning the rest of the artichoke leaves so she could get to the heart.

"Food has never tasted so fucking good," she told him, her face blissful, her long hair still a little damp from her shower. "It's even better than the shower."

"Where's Zen and Belinda?" he asked, cracking open one of his beers. He took a long, delicious drink of it, savoring the flavor, savoring the warm feeling it put in his empty stomach.

"Zen's grandmother came to town and set up a little apartment for him in the Brophy Towers."

"His grandmother?"

"She's the one who raised him," Xenia said. "His parents were killed in the Jupiter War. A laser strike took out their building while he was visiting her for the day. He's very close to her."

"I didn't know that."

"He sent all the credits he made since he enlisted to her. It's the first time they've had income since she had her medical license taken away. She apparently remembers how to manage money. She used those credits to come here and find him a place to stay. He was very excited about it. It'll be the first place other than public housing he's ever lived in."

"Well that's an ass fuck for him," Jeff said, actually glad he was gone — it was a little less competition for Xenia's affections. "And what about... you know... Belinda?"

The look she gave him was evil. "She went with your friend Drogan."

"Drogan?" he asked, pausing in the act of cutting his first piece of steak. "Where did they go?"

"Back to Drogan's place. She's going to stay with her."

"Stay with her? But... how... I mean, they don't even know each other, do they?"

"They do now," she said. "Drogan came over to the table to talk to me — it seems she has a little crush on me as well — and the next thing you know, they're chatting like they were old friends. Belinda mentioned that she'd been deployed here from NP and didn't have a place to stay..."

"Wait a minute," Jeff interrupted. "I thought she was gonna stay with you."

"She was," Xenia said. "And then I told her about that little emotional blackmail scheme of yours."

"Emotional blackmail scheme?"

"I call things what they are," she said. "That thing about you not fucking me until I say I love you?"

"I wouldn't exactly call it blackmail," he said. "It's just... you know, the way I feel."

"A funny way to feel," she said.

Jeff shrugged, refusing to discuss it any further. "She decided not to move in with you because of that?" he asked. "I would've thought she'd be happier than a marine at full retreat."

She giggled a little. "Good one," she said.

"I just made it up."

"Anyway, I would've thought the same, but Belinda seemed to take it as a challenge to her love for me or some shit like that. She said if you could do it, she could do it too. Now she won't give me no tongue — or anything else — until I tell her I love her."

"No shit?" Jeff asked, unsure how he should feel about this, jealous or relieved.

"No shit," she pouted. "So here I am, all alone and horny while the people who are supposed to love me won't give up the trim."

"Kind of ironic, isn't it?" he asked, utilizing a word he'd just learned a few days before.

"Oh shut the fuck up and eat," she said, though not unkindly.

He shut the fuck up and ate, spending the next ten minutes in an orgy of chewing, chomping, drinking, and swallowing. The steak was easily the best he'd ever had. The artichoke was the first he'd ever had. And the sautéed mushrooms were almost better than sex. Xenia watched him silently as he made a pig of himself, occasionally taking a sip from the remains of her beer or picking at a stray mushroom on her plate.

"So where are you going now?" she asked when he drained the last swallow of his second beer.

"I'm gonna go see the other Belinda in my life," he told her. "And I'm going to tell her she ain't in my life no more."

"Are you doing this just because of me?"

He wanted to lie and tell her he was but he couldn't bring himself to. "No," he said. "Not at all. Belinda was a mistake from the beginning. We've never loved each other — hell, we've hated each other most of our relationship. She was the wife I was programmed to take. It's time to put an end to it."

She nodded. "At least there's no kid to worry about, huh?"

"At least there's that," he said.

"And what are you gonna do after that? You coming to the Troop Club?"

"Wouldn't miss it," he said. "Are you going?"

"Fuckin' aye." Her eyes took on a little shine. "And where are you going after that? I don't imagine your wife will be too keen on you staying with her after you tell her what you have to say."

"Wouldn't want to stay with her anyway," he said. "To tell you the truth, I haven't thought that far ahead. I'll probably go back to the base and crash out there. They have some bachelor quarters available."

"Those are just tents in the exercise yard," she said. "You don't want to sleep there."

"I've been sleeping in a biosuit in a fuckin' trench for the past eight days," he said. "I don't think it will bother me."

"What if you get lucky?" she asked. "I presume you're going to be looking for a little female companionship, right?"

He cast his eyes downward, unsure what to say.

"Oh come on now," she told him. "If you're not gonna fuck me there's no reason why you shouldn't fuck someone else. I certainly have no plans to remain celibate while you and Belinda are having your little hunger strike. I'm gonna find me a guy with a big, hard dick and a girl with a tight, wet pussy and take both of them back to my place and behave like the full-blooded Martian I am."

Jeff felt a minor stab of jealousy at this revelation, but only a mild one. In Martian culture it was not all that unusual to have sex with others for the sheer enjoyment of it, even when in a committed relationship — which he and Xenia certainly were not in. "Yeah," he said. "I guess I wouldn't turn down a little action."

"That's my boy," she said, reaching across the table and caressing his cheek. "So where you gonna take her?"

"Her place?" he asked.

"Or you can take her to my place," she suggested. "I got a spare bedroom you can stay in. No strings attached."

"And you won't try to fuck me?" he asked.

She gave him a saucy smile. "I didn't say that."

"I won't do it," he told her. "I told you how I feel about you. I told you what you have to do to get a piece of me."

"Fine," she pouted. "But the offer is still open."

"I'll think about it," he said.

"You do that. I'll see you at the Troop Club. I'll be the one rubbing my wet pussy over everything in sight."

"Except me," he said.

She stood up and leaned over him, lifting his chin up. She kissed him gently on the mouth, a soft, sensuous kiss that sent chills down his spine. "I didn't promise that either," she said.

She walked away without another word, leaving him with a raging erection.

Jeff found that the MarsTrans system was still operating under emergency operation rules. Although it was back to running on a normal schedule there were armed MPG military police in each car and there was no charge being levied for any passengers. He simply walked past the turnstiles and the empty guard booth and boarded, finding a seat near the rear among many other men and women, most of whom were in MPG shirts and T-shirts like he was.