Peter Prellwitz - Shards Book One

My training continued. Raul Sanchez helped me with my military advancement. I remained stuck at private second class, because of my age, but didn't really mind. He treated me as a person, and one whom he very much liked. Had I been about eight years older-but, no, there was no point and possible harm in that kind of speculation. He was my commanding officer and friend.

He took great pleasure in discussing tactics with me, though I found it to be only mildly interesting. I had been very active during my first military service, and had pride in what I had done for my country, but it was also a part of my life I was glad to emerge from. Sanchez seemed to understand, and after a while kept the conversations limited in length. But I learned a great deal from him.

I continued to make friends with most everyone, but especially with the ladies of Company A. After having said I was glad to emerge from my military service, I also realized that I had missed the camaraderie that came with soldiers who depended on each other for their lives. Although I had not seen any action, I knew they had gone through much to rescue my from my riping, and genuinely appreciated what reciprocation I could offer. I very much looked forward to the times when Company A came back from battle and I could listen to their tales and trade bawdy songs with them in the showers.

Sergeant Thawell provided most of my field training. He scoffed at the idea at first, calling it a waste of time. He kept referring to me as an it, and clearly thought of me as some sort of freak. I think he took me as an affront to his manhood, and thought me weak because I was now female, though there were over a dozen women in Company A whom he treated as equals. We were getting nowhere fast. So one afternoon in the mountains, during combat drill, I took him aside and explained things to him. Wanting to emphasis my points, I broke his arm and three ribs before he started taking me seriously. When he did, I had no chance. He put up a good argument, bloodying my nose and breaking my wrist, but he eventually came around to my point of view, and we got along fine after that.

Physically, Susie drove me to the limits of my small, pliable body. I think she was trying to have me grow into my body, until it was as much me as my mind was me. In that she was very successful. In time, I looked back at how I started out and laughed at how positive I was that I could never be a complete woman. I still had mixed emotions when looking at men, but it was possible now, as I looked at them, to think that I could one day get married. But that was still years of living and growing away.

Mentally, Susie again drove me to my limits. It was here that I think I surprised even myself. I still retained all my memories and reasoning skills. It was in these that I was most centered. They were most probably why I was able to make the adjustment physically, and also most probably why the IHAD

affected me so deeply.

I continued to train in using the computer interface, but it was almost a waste of time. It was so much Chris Young's work that it was like traveling back in time, and using the puterverse became one of my favorite activities. I had six centuries of catching up to do, and it is impossible to know a society without knowing its history. Within a week, I was handling the interface like I had grown up with it. I think it was here that I began to be accepted as something other than a misplaced identity. They still didn't allow me into the Research center. Susie kept telling me it was because of the intensive work that was going on as they continued research on a prospective Cue. That may have been true for the most part, but I was beginning to think that they didn't trust me fully yet. Other than a vague irritation at being put under this restriction, I understood their feelings; I would have done the same thing myself.

Even Jackson helped me out, though with him I'm sure it was completely unintentional. He made my duty hours a living hell. The man had a genius for demeaning and insulting and abusing without stepping over that razor thin line that would result in either his court-martial at Sanchez's hands or death by mine. He didn't want to lose me, because I made his life very enjoyable. Instead of having to do all the work now, he split the time between his? paper work? and his abuse of me. He helped on occasion, when it looked like I couldn't keep up, but he tried to keep it minimal. I will say one thing in Jackson 's weak defense: I don't think it mattered one whit to him whether I was girl or boy. He never harassed me sexually, and while I hated his guts, I did not have the fear of him that I could have had.

Susie guessed at some of what was happening, but kept her anger to herself at my request. I tolerated it because it kept me grounded. As John Wyeth, I'd had a very secure life. I was treated with respect and perhaps a little fear because of my status. In the military, I was called sir and my every order was obeyed because of who and what I was. Then at NATech I had risen quickly to Twenty Year Project Leader and was one of only six people who reported directly to the boss. At my word, two hundred people would drop everything they were doing and shift to a new project.

All that was gone. I commanded no respect beyond the respect given every person. My artificial status as a privileged Cue was fading, as it should, and I became less and less a Cue and more and more a young girl. Jackson kept me in my place. As I said, I tolerated and even appreciated it. Until the day he stepped way over the line.

As I had done for several weeks, I reported to the laundry at 0350. Jackson was there, as always. He started at 0200, but did little while waiting for me to show up. The laundry was dropped off by personnel, then picked up by them. (Noncoms and officers had their laundry picked up and dropped off.

That's how I had mine picked up, because I was Susie's roomy.) They had perfected a process of identification that allowed clothing to be cleaned in a bunch, then sorted automatically by machine. All I had to do was pour the bundles into one of the four massive washing machines, shift the damp, clean clothing to the dryers, then the sorter, then back into the bags. Folding was done by the individual.

Because of this and the invention of such efficient identification and sorting, the laundry detail could be performed by one person, as I'd mentioned earlier.

I stepped in ten minutes early and went straight to work, ignoring Jackson who was busy with his terminal. As always, he shut off all outside access by cutting in the door sight and sound shields.

I'd worked for about an hour when he came over for his first round of daily abuse. Once it became obvious that I wasn't going to report him, he had begun testing how far he could take me. I'd figured out how to keep him on a leash; if he went too far, I simply worked slower, leaving him just that much more to do. He had a double-edged sword: if I didn't report him, he couldn't report me. I wasn't fond of doing less than I was capable of, but it was all I could come up with, short of physical confrontation, which I wanted to avoid. And I didn't have to use the tactic much. In fact, it had been a couple weeks since I'd last purposely left him work. Susie's conditioning had worked wonders with my strength, and while my frame was too small to ever be too strong, my endurance had increased to the point that I could handle my detail.

He leaned against one of the counters and watched me for several minutes. I was, as always, soaked in sweat. I undid another of the endless bundles and poured the clothing into the machine. As I shifted the contents-this bundle was from the women's quarters I remember-I wondered what he was going to do today. Sometimes it was verbal abuse, other times it was physical. He never hit me, but he'd find some imagined breach of my duties and he'd have me do sit-ups or pushups. I preferred the physical, because it left me in a more even temper and gave me a challenge to match his 'discipline'. Again, he couldn't give too much because it cut into my working time. He shifted his weight and crossed his arms.