Christopher Nuttall - A Learning Experience

“Yep,” Kevin put in. “We wrote a ban on them into the charter.”

Steve rolled his eyes. He’d started the Wolfpac — a band of amateur rocket scientists — as something to do after his retirement, but it had grown into a hobby. Building rockets and firing them into the air was surprisingly fun, even though they had never come close to their dream of building a manned rocket. But then, even if they had, somehow he doubted the government would have allowed them to launch it. It was bad enough when federal agents came sniffing around to determine who was purchasing rocket components and why. They never quite seemed to believe that the club was completely innocent of anything other than trying to have a good time.

“Then we should have barred you,” he said. Kevin was the black sheep of the family; he’d gone into combat intelligence, rather than the fighting infantry. But long experience in Afghanistan had taught him that HUMINT could be just as important as raids and roadblocks when it came to countering an insurgency. “You think too much.”

Kevin made a one-fingered gesture, then poked the fire meaningfully. “You think too little,” he said, as Steve passed him the marshmallows. “These days, thinking men are required to win wars and rebuild societies.”

Vincent snorted, rudely. “We may be doing it in America soon enough,” he said. “Did you read the email from Tony?”

Stuart nodded. Tony, like Steve and the rest of the Wolfpac, had left military service and gone back to the civilian world, but unlike them he’d opened a grocery store in Chicago. And then there’d been a riot — the food stamp system had broken down for several days — and Tony’s store had been robbed. Worse, he’d been threatened with arrest for attempting to defend his property with a shotgun and a bad attitude. It wouldn’t be long, Steve suspected, before Tony abandoned his store and migrated to a state with a more robust attitude towards lawlessness and self-defence.

But it was something that nagged at his mind, whenever he let it. He’d been in Iraq, Afghanistan and several countries it would have surprised American civilians to know their troops had been operating, yet his country sometimes felt more alien to him than any of the foreign nations he’d visited. The old values, the ones he’d imbued along with his mother’s milk, seemed to be fading away. Duty, honour and loyalty were just words, self-reliance a joke…

“Brooding again,” Mongo snapped. “Tony will be fine. He always is.”

Steve shrugged. He had his doubts. Fighting the enemy had been simple, fighting the bureaucracy that was slowly strangling America to death was almost impossible. He’d once planned to open a gun store, but the paperwork had been too much for him.

“Look up in the sky instead,” Kevin suggested. “I think that’s the International Space Station.”

Steve sighed as he watched the speck of light making its way across the darkening sky. He’d once had dreams of being an astronaut, perhaps of being the first man to set foot on Mars or Venus, but his dreams had been blown away by cold hard reality. NASA hadn’t gone back to the Moon, let alone the rest of the Solar System, while the Space Program had become a political football rather than a viable project. There were no dreams any longer for humanity, no Wild West waiting to take the restless and dispossessed. Instead, there was a decaying society. And, in the distance, he could hear the howl of the approaching wolf.

“That’s a satellite,” Vincent said. “I think NSA is peering down at us right now.”

“Probably,” Steve said. “We’re a bunch of males out on a camping trip. Of course we’re a subject of interest.”

He sighed. He’d had enough experience with combat surveillance systems to know that they were terrifyingly good. He would certainly have hated to be on the receiving end. Technology had its limits, he knew, but when the United States cared enough to send the best the results could be remarkable. Plenty of insurgents hadn’t learned how to cover themselves before it was too late.

“Could be worse,” Kevin said. “Did I tell you what we saw in Afghanistan?”

Mongo elbowed his brother. “You mean what you saw while you were sitting in a comfortable armchair, sipping cappuccino, while we were slogging over the mountains?”

Kevin ignored the jibe. “There was a bunch of Afghani men making their way towards the base, walking cross-country in pitch darkness,” he said. “Then they stopped. We thought they were setting up a mortar, so we focused sensors on them and primed the guns on the base to return fire. And then there was an odd heat source on the ground.”

He paused. No one spoke.

“And then there were five more, lying together,” he continued, after a long moment. “There we were, all puzzled, trying to figure out just what the hell they were doing. Were they laying IEDs for us? But we didn’t normally patrol that area. Or did they intend to lure us into a trap of some kind?

“And then we realised what they were doing,” he concluded. “They were having a communal shit !”

Steve laughed, despite himself. “And to think I thought intelligence pukes had exciting lives,” he said. “Wearing black suits, chasing and screwing women, diving out of high buildings…”

“James Bond isn’t real,” Kevin interrupted. “Although there was this time in Bangkok…”

“You banged your cock?” Vincent asked, innocently.

“Oh, shut up,” Kevin said, as the group chuckled. “But I won’t deny that intelligence can get a little hairy at times. There was this village we visited…”

“We’ve been to Afghani villages too,” Mongo pointed out.

“Yes, but you went in full armour and had a whole squad of tough buddies beside you,” Kevin countered. “I was alone, unless you count two more intelligence officers, one of whom was wearing a full veil.”

“And no doubt invited to marry one of the locals,” Vincent said. “Was she?”

“She talked to the local women,” Kevin said. “We told them I was her husband.”

“Poor girl,” Steve and Mongo said together.

“Guys,” Charles said, suddenly.

Steve looked over at him, feeling alarm shivering down his spine. The last time he’d heard Charles use that tone, they’d been under enemy fire seconds later.

“Look,” Charles said, pointing up towards the sky. “What’s that?”

Steve looked up. A glowing light was making its way across the sky, its course erratic. “A satellite?”

“Too large,” Charles said.

“Maybe it’s a UFO,” Mongo said. He snickered. “Do you think they’ve learned everything they can from anal probes?”

“Always knew you were a pervert,” Kevin said. He stuck out his tongue in a remarkably childish manner, then looked back up at the sky. “But it must be a plane, I think.”

“A plane that’s coming closer to us,” Charles said, before Mongo could muster a rejoinder. “Why?”

Steve stared. The glowing light was growing larger, coming down towards the campsite at terrifying speed. Instinctively, he reached for the pistol at his belt — he never went anywhere without it, no matter what the law said — as the light started to take on shape and form. It couldn’t be a helicopter or a plane, part of his mind insisted; there was no noise, not even a faint clattering sound. But he knew there were some helicopters, designed for commando operations, that were almost completely silent. And yet…

Why would such a helicopter come after us ? He asked himself. His imagination could produce a few ideas, but none of them were actually likely. What do they want ?

“It’s not a helicopter,” Charles said. He sounded more than a little alarmed. “ Look at it.”