I Am Automaton: A Military Science Fiction Novel (3 page)

They heard two men yelling commands in Spanish, and she began to lower herself over him. He was limp, but he understood what she was doing.

Two men with carbines surged into the room—Navajas. They yelled at her in Spanish, and she sat up and raised her hands compliantly.

The men looked them up and down and looked at Peter. He obviously was not Mexican. With sudden panic, Peter wondered where his clothes were. If they saw the camouflaged pants…

Shit. The Mini-com Multi-tasker. If they saw it, they would know he was no local. He wasn’t paying attention. Where the hell did she put it?

Everything was happening faster than his concussed mind could understand. And they were staring at him suspiciously, sizing him up.

Peter did not know what to do, so he smiled.

The Navajas saw this pathetic gringo under this whore with his broken smile and an ad for a popular erectile dysfunction pill flashing next to them.

He must’ve looked like a real travesty because they snickered. One man called him names and used the words “carajo” and “mariposa” liberally. Satisfied with their derision, they left.

The girl sighed heavily in apparent relief, and looked down at Peter. She smiled and whispered something in Spanish.

Peter picked his head up slowly. “I don’t know who you are, but thank you.”

She smiled, looking upon him with pity, and whispered, “Mi nombre Lucita.”

That was her name. It was like music to his weary ears. The name of his savior was Lucita.

Then he suddenly felt very tired. The immediate danger had passed, the adrenaline was waning, and Lucita would look after him.

He was too exhausted to think about what had just happened and that his men were all dead. For the
moment, he did not care what was going to happen next, or how he would get back. He succumbed to sweet oblivion, if only for a moment.

Peter was sitting in Molly Apone’s kitchen sipping lemonade.
Her two girls were running around in the back yard playing, undeterred by the unrelenting heat of the summer sun.

Molly was looking towards the back screen door
, lost in some private reverie. “I can’t believe Mya’s going to be starting the fourth grade this year.”

“And Courtney’s starting second?”

Molly nodded.

Peter sipped his lemonade. Molly made the best. It wasn’t overly saccharine like store bought
and man did it kill a good thirst.

He had been to their house on base on many an occasion
, where they had worn out Delroy’s eight-foot, regulation pool table.

“What’re you making?”

There was a savory aroma filling the kitchen. “Oh, I was just making some pecan pie,” Molly said absent-mindedly, “for after dinner.”

Molly’s dinners were the stuff of legend. They were all in for a treat. Delroy…where was…

All of a sudden, the girls’ laughter turned to screams from the backyard. Peter stood up in alarm, but Molly remained seated. She was crying, mascara running down her face. She began to tear at her clothes violently.

“Molly, the girls…”

However, she would not stop. She tore at her dress and then her hair, screaming bloody murder. Peter did not understand.

He crossed the kitchen and flung the screen door open.
A strange man cornered the girls. Peter crossed the yard quickly. “Hey, you! What do you think you’re doing?”

The man did not turn around. He only continued to advance on the girls slowly. They were holding each other and screaming.

Peter descended the old wooden steps and crossed the backyard yelling at the man. “Hey! Get away from those girls!”

But the man never turned around.

Peter put a hand on the man’s shoulder and whirled him around. “Hey…” He was stunned by what he saw. It was Delroy.

However,
it didn’t look like Delroy. The man was practically grey in color, his skin ashen. His eyes were dead, but wild with some kind of feral hunger.

Peter didn’t notice it before, but Delroy’s clothes were disheveled and ragged. He smelled of bile and looked like a hobo.

Recognizing his friend, Peter’s demeanor quickly softened. “Delroy, what are you doing? You’re scaring the girls.”

Only Delroy did not answer. He grabbed Peter by the shoulders and began to pull him close, as if to intimate some kind of secret, something that would explain all of this. His grip was like a vice.

The stench was overwhelming. It was a sweet, sickly, rancid stench, and it was coming off his friend. Peter’s viscera contracted as the aroma of pecan pie was chased out of his nostrils. He wanted to retch.

However,
as Delroy pulled Peter close, his mouth began to open, revealing stained teeth. Peter twisted and pulled away from Delroy and out of his grasp. “Delroy, what happened to you?”

Delroy lurched forward, arms extended, reaching for Peter. His mouth still hung open. Molly was screaming hysterically from the steps outside the kitchen, pulling at her hair. “You let him die, Peter! I trusted you. You promised to take care of him. I trusted you!”

Peter was caught between his friend and his wife. What the hell was going on? The daughters were now taunting Peter. “You let our daddy die. You let daddy our die. Hi-ho the dairy-o, you let our daddy die.”

Peter had been Delroy’s commanding officer for the past five years. In that
time, they had become friends. They had seen some action in Iraq, but they had always looked out for one another.

“I did my best. There was nothing I could do.”

“I trusted you, Peter.”

“Molly, we were taken prisoner. There was nothing I could do.”

“…hi-ho the dairy-o, you let our daddy die!”

“Girls, I didn’t want your daddy to die.”

“Ashes, ashes, NOW YOU FALL DOWN!”

Delroy lunged forward and grabbed Peter, falling on top of him. “Delroy, I’m so sorry.” Delroy opened his mouth.

“As I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep…”

“I’m so sorry, buddy.”

“And if I die before I wake, I pray my dad your brains to take.”

Peter closed his eyes as he felt jagged teeth clamp down on his nose
, sending blood rushing back down into his throat. He gasped for air…

***

Peter woke sitting straight up, his eyes overwhelmed with the whitewash of his surroundings. He heard the blips of monitors nearby. He was in a hospital.

It was just a dream. Where was Lucita? How did he get here? Was he still in Mexico? He knew he was back in the States when he saw a nurse enter the room with Major Lewis.

“How are you, son?”

It was such a big question. His body ached, and he was a bit disoriented. It took a moment to review in his mind all that had happened.

“The whole squad was wiped out.”

His own voice sounded strange to him.

“I know, son.”

“Those bastards knew we were coming. How did they know we were coming?” His question was more of a demand
, and to a Major no less.

Major Lewis was
a forgiving man, given the circumstances, but his tolerance had its limits.

“I don’t know how they knew.”

“Well, now all my men are dead because you don’t know.”

“You’re lucky to be alive.”

Peter was filled with rage, not at anything Major Lewis was saying, but at the notion of being the lone survivor. Why did
he
deserve to live? To carry around the guilt of the loss of his squad? He would’ve given his life for his men.

Mostly
Peter was angry at himself for feeling relieved about being alive. The relief made him feel worse than anything.

“Funny, sir. I don’t feel lucky.”

Did Molly Apone feel relieved? What about the families of the other men? Did they get to feel relieved? He did not feel lucky at all.

Major Lewis paused, choosing his next words carefully. “You should be out in a week. There’ll be some physical therapy afterwards, but nothing you can’t handle.”

And…That was it? Peter was waiting, as it was a pregnant remark. But Major Lewis only stared at him. Was he really going to make him ask?

Peter was so worked up
that he took the bait. “And?”

Major Lewis revealed nothing, all poker face. “And what?”

“And what then? After I finish my physical therapy?”

Major Lewis smiled. “We have something for you, a new assignment.”

“Oh, no. You’re not putting me on some rubber gun squad. I want at those Navajas.”

“I figured as much. This new assignment will be in that vein, but I cannot discuss it at the moment. It’s, frankly, above your pay grade.”

Was this man kidding? Above his pay grade?

“Sir,” Peter was doing his best to restrain his outrage, “with all due respect, you should…no
, you
owe
it to me to keep me in this fight. They need to pay for what they’ve done.”

Major Lewis looked Peter right in the eye. “Work hard on getting better, son. We need a man as tough as you in this program. If you complete your therapy and are up to the challenge, I’ll have to see about promoting you…”

“Sir, I…”

“…to First Lieutenant.”

Peter was speechless. That was certainly another pay grade. He had been hoping to make First Lieutenant, just not this quickly.

Stunned, he did not know what to say. “Thank you, sir. I won’t disappoint you.”

“I’m sure you won’t. Rest up, Sergeant. You’re going to need it.”

Then the Major turned and began to leave the room, but he paused halfway to the doorway. “I’m sure you’ll want to tell some loved ones that you are okay. Remember that our activities in Mexico are classified.”

“Yes, sir. Of course, sir.”

Then
Major Lewis left the room.

He would tell his parents that he was
all right. He would tell them that he was injured in a training exercise at Fort Bliss, so they wouldn’t worry too much.

The world was a crazy place. The United States was spread thin. There was a war on terror in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Egypt, Pakistan, Greece,
and South America. Iran had successfully developed nukes. North Korea was rattling its saber, as it periodically did, near the border.

Then there was the war on drugs. Every American knew there was a war on drugs, but most didn’t know what that meant. Most Americans probably thought it meant patrolling the border, which was a joke, and enforcement within our own borders.

Your average American had no knowledge of the efforts in Mexico itself, with the cooperation of the Mexican government, of course. Drugs needed to be stopped before they crossed our borders.

There were sectors of the Mexican government that were in league with the cartels and gangs. The handful of politicians that wanted them routed out wanted…no, needed the help of the United States. As far as the press knew, Special Forces had gone south of the border to help train the Mexican government’s military to fight the war on drugs on their end.

Of course, when those that were trained defected to the other side, the press went nuts over the story. They spared no ink in tearing the administration a new one for botching the training objective.

They preferred nation building to outright war and occupation, but they never hesitated to criticize when it failed. The only example of truly successful American
nation building was in Japan after World War II.

However,
despite the public’s dissatisfaction with how the government was handling the war on drugs, they would certainly be critical of military operations in Mexico involving hunting down the cartels.

The liberal press would accuse the administration of being
warmongers. The Tea Party and Libertarians would tout a noninterventionist standpoint. The Republicans would only be interested in occupation to profit off Mexico’s natural resources and reconstruction.

So the operations in Mexico were hush-hush. What the citizenry didn’t know wouldn’t hurt it, and that was for its own good.

College kids and yuppies saw the drug problem as a harmless joint on Friday nights or an occasional line of coke in the executive bathroom at work. No one saw all of the death that surrounded the drug trade.

It also involved one of our borders, and therefore was a matter of national security—especially since what had evolved into the Order
for International Liberation (a global terrorist organization) had taken to providing security for the cartels in running the drugs across the border.

Peter wondered about
the new program that Major Lewis was referring to. He thought he knew about all of the operations going on in Mexico. This program must’ve been something brand spanking new, cutting edge even. He was looking forward to getting back in on the action.