Before opening the door to her office and stepping out into the tunnels, she donned an oxygen concentrator. A lot of progress had been made in the last fifteen years in making their secret base buried under the ice of Europa more livable, but it still wasn't the same as Earth. Fifteen years ago, General Nordjamin had suspected that the government's order to disband Shield was the first step in imposing an autocratic form of government. Instead of completely disbanding Shield, he had clandestinely built this base and transferred key elements of Shield here so that the core of the organization would survive.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
General Markov was surprised, but not displeased, to see Lieutenant Falleron enter her office. She hoped that she didn't have a serious problem to report. She had been the new Commander of Shield for only five days and was still getting herself oriented. Somehow, spending years helping General Nordjamin do this job wasn't the same as having to do it yourself.
Lieutenant Falleron settled into a chair in front of General Markov's desk and nodded a greeting. "How long have you known that it was your Destiny to be Commander of Shield?" She asked.
General Markov was not a person who could be thrown off balance by an unexpected question. "All my life, I guess. I've been pretty scared all along that I wouldn't have what it took to do it. I could never have done it without your personal support." She lowered her eyes. "I guess that I used you."
Lieutenant Falleron shook her head. "You needed me. There's a difference between needing someone and using them."
General Markov raised her eyes. "I hope so. I did pick an awful time to lead Shield. Our sworn duty is to protect the People. We have to come out of hiding and try to overthrow that disgusting, oppressive thing on Earth that calls itself a government. The trouble is that we can harass them with our cruisers and bombardment satellites, but we'll never be able to topple the government without a ground army." "And," Lieutenant Falleron interrupted, "in the First Mythology, you think that you've found something that was described at that time as a supernatural thing but really does exist and that might be able to help us."
"That's correct. The theme of a 'nether world' is so prevalent and consistent in those stories that I have to believe that there's some truth in them. After all, the spatial dimensions below ours are totally inaccessible to us, but our spatial dimension might be accessible from below. I've been trying for a while to figure out a way of making contact with something down there, but I obviously haven't succeeded."
Lieutenant Falleron settled back into her chair and made a tent with her hands. "There are two things that I can think of. The first is that it wouldn't have been worthwhile for anyone to try to contact you before you became Commander of Shield. The second is that if there is a 'nether world' somewhere, it must be a very strange world ruled by a very strange being. Would we even be able to recognize an attempt at contact by such a being?"
General Markov tapped her fingers on her desktop. "I hadn't thought of either of those things. The second one is scary. I might have already been contacted and I muffed it. If that's what happened, I hope that whatever tried to contact me tries again."
Lieutenant Falleron rose. "I'll continue searching for what you're looking for. Maybe four eyes will see what two didn't."
"Thank you." General Markov answered.
As Lieutenant Falleron left her office, General Markov turned her attention back to her workstation. She was finding that her job had too much busy work. That would have to change and she resolved to have Lieutenant Falleron start finding ways of eliminating the busy work.
A teenage girl wearing fatigues and carrying a briefcase passed Lieutenant Falleron as she walked to the exit from Headquarters. Lieutenant Falleron stopped. The shoulder patch on the girl's fatigues looked like a broken cross. None of their units had such an insignia. The guards had let her through, so Lieutenant Falleron assumed that it must be all right, and continued walking.
General Markov was about to make contact with the strange being who ruled a strange world down in 0-Space that the First Mythology called Hell.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
General Markov scanned the Order of Battle, Weapons Systems Specifications and Heavy-Lift Transport Capacity documents that Didot had handed her. "This looks like what I need. How soon can you deploy your people?" She asked Didot.
"Three weeks after I receive a detailed plan covering what forces are to be deployed and where."
General Markov laid down the documents and folded her hands. "What do you want in return for this service?" She asked, fully expecting to be told that it would be her Soul.
Actually, the last thing that Didot wanted was General Markov's Soul. She felt that she already had more of her race's garbage to baby-sit than she wanted. "I need Machines - Machines that can enter and fight in 30-Space. It's all clearly stated in the contract that you have in front of you."
General Markov read the contract. "I see that if we can't fulfill that obligation within five years, the contract will be considered completed and no further obligations will be expected."
"Right, if you can't do it, you can't do it. That's the chance I'm taking."
"Why do you want these machines."
Didot flipped open her hand. "You have your destiny, I have mine."
General Markov thought for a moment. She felt that she knew what Didot wanted those Machines for. She mentally shrugged her shoulders. "What the heck," she thought "if a bunch of immortals want to play Armageddon in 30-Space, it's no sweat off my back." She signed the contract and handed it back to Didot.
"Thanks. You'll find that I'm a very reasonable person to do business with. My people are all highly disciplined. They won't make any trouble while they're on Earth because every day they can see where I'll put them if they misbehave or don't do their jobs to the best of their ability."
General Markov admitted to herself that what Didot had explained was certainly a very good method of enforcing discipline. She wanted an excuse to talk to Didot to find out more about her. "I have a tray of cookies and a coffee pot on that table behind you. Unless you have to leave now, why don't we sit and chat for a while?" Didot had noticed the tray of cookies when she entered General Markov's office and her tongue had been hanging out for them since then.
After filling Didot's cup, General Markov held the cookie tray in front of her. Didot hadn't been raised in a barn and she knew that the polite thing to do was to take just one cookie at a time and not a handful. She talked and chewed at the same time. "I take it that you still have a problem with my appearance?" She asked.
General Markov rested her elbow on the arm of her chair. "Well, you don't look anything like you've been pictured in those ancient stories."
Didot made a face. "Oh Yuck. Don't look a thing like that. Sorry. Actually, I normally wear my hair longer, but I cut it short before coming here so that I would look more mature and businesslike and make a better first impression on you."
General Markov's face looked puzzled. "You were worried about making a good impression on me?"
Didot pointed at herself with her hands. "Well, look at me will you. I look like somebody's kid sister who should be reading Teen Vogue, not Commander-in-Chief of a large ground army."
General Markov couldn't keep herself from laughing. Didot was certainly a plainspoken individual. Still, in her mind, something was wrong. It seemed to her that either Didot was putting on an act or she wasn't what she claimed to be.
Didot knew what General Markov was thinking. She knew that she would have this problem the moment that she stuck her foot through her door. She just didn't have any credibility. Everyone wanted to know if they could talk to her Mother. In spite of that, she did find that she liked General Markov. They both had put aside something very strong and important in their psyches in order to fulfill their destinies. Neither of them was getting any younger and neither of them had ever done any of the things that a normal woman would have done by this time.
The more that she thought about it, the more she thought that when it came time to kick butt in 30-Space, General Markov would be the ideal person to command her Machines. She would even be willing to bestow on her the same, nearly infinite lifetime that she had. It was lonely down in 0-Space and it would be nice to have the companionship of someone that she liked and admired. There had to be something that she could do to convince General Markov of her credibility.
There was something. They had cost her an arm and a leg to get, but maybe this was the best use that could be made of them. She closed her eyes and concentrated very hard.
An alarm sounded on General Markov's desk console. As she raced to the console, Didot grabbed several cookies from the tray. She could hear most of what was being said by whoever had paged her. "They materialized from nowhere...they have what looks like a broken cross painted on their sides...whoever are manning them are signaling like crazy that they're ours to take and to send out pilots to man them." General Markov looked at the shoulder patch on Didot's fatigues. "Yes, I know where they came from. Send out the pilots and move them into our hangers."
General Markov walked back to Didot and stood over her with her hands on her hips. "Twelve of the meanest looking warships anyone has ever seen have just appeared on our doorstep and are being turned over to us. Your doing, my dear?"
Didot swallowed down the last piece of cookie. "I forgot to tell you, I'm giving out contract signing bonuses this week."
General Markov sat down again in front of Didot and held the cookie tray in front of her. "Have another cookie, I baked them myself, you know."
Their eyes met as Didot took another cookie. "It's going to be Heaven in 0-Space," Didot thought "with someone decent who can keep me company and bake cookies like these." Didot was satisfied that she had a closed a very good deal today.
"I'm a fifty-eight year-old Computer Consultant that doesn't think that everything that we read and write has to be deadly serious. I like to take themes that have been done a zillion times and that everybody is tired of and after reading one sentence says 'I know exactly how this is going to end', and put an unexpected tongue-and-cheek twist spin on the story."
E-mail: DIFROR@TORRINGTON.COM
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