If it had been just the prosthetic right arm, Rose Brass might have been certified fit for duty—but when the docs also concluded her left eye couldn’t be saved, that was that. The army captain found herself down-checked and retired to the permanent disability list. Without any other direction, she moved back to the city where she’d grown up. Now, thanks to the kindness of strangers, she’s washed up at the doors of an organization dedicated to assisting veterans just like her.
Rose visits VSCC some fourteen years before “Rainbow Rocks”—about twelve and a half years before MLPFIM begins.
Hit the “Popular Stories” bar the evening of posting, 29 June 2021, woo!
“Hey, Cap?” The uncertainty in the reedy young shout caught her attention; she turned and started to jog toward the PFC and the barely older junior sergeant beside him. Both of them were peering into the scorched and cratered remains of a compact sedan.
Other two-man teams, also wearing wind-billowed Army Combat Uniform and bulky body armor, worked their own wrecks scattered up and down the narrow asphalt road in the middle of nowhere. The ruined automobiles and trucks, and the hapless civilians inside them, had been caught in a crossfire two days before. Most of the devastation probably could be blamed on the insurgents—who regarded innocent bystanders with the fine contempt of people who believed anyone who wasn’t with them was against them—but not all, oh no.
She honestly believed the ambushed unit had done their best to fight back while minimizing collateral damage; she’d met the CO and he was a stand-up guy. Minimal wasn’t the same as zero, though. The counterattack had gone off like clockwork, the few remaining insurgents were driven off, and after setting out security teams the troops had gone to work as best they could, pulling survivors out of the flaming or guttering wreckage and administering first aid with frantic haste.
The experience had been ugly enough the whole outfit would be rotating back home for rebuilding. Some of those people would have nightmares of guilt and horror for a long time—though some wouldn’t, which arguably was even worse. For the officers, moreover, one of the privileges that came with a commission was being dragged through every terrible moment as the after-action review tried to determine just what happened and who had made it happen, for good or ill.
She shook her head. Right now she had to focus on her job, which was clearing the wreckage and reopening the road. That would have been easier if someone hadn’t lobbed the ball and left the scene completely unattended for most of a day before her company could reach it. Another glance at the team who’d called out showed them cautiously examining the cheap little commuter car, shining flashlights into the black-charred interior and probing it gingerly with extendable wands. “Whattaya got?” she yelled back.
They both looked up at once. At the same moment a faint, hollow thunk echoed from somewhere inside the twisted car body.
Everything except her suddenly racing heartbeat started to move in slow motion. The private never knew what happened. The sergeant managed a single useless jump back. She had a seemingly endless split second to fling up her right arm in an equally futile protective reflex. Then the world vanished in fire and thunder.
“Ms. Brass. Ms. Brass?” The tone switched from quizzical to imperative. “Captain!”
Rose Brass stiffened on her visitor chair. “Present! What? . . . Sorry, Mister, uh, Lectern—what were you saying?” She reached up with both hands to rub her face, then checked the motion when she remembered one of them was now metal and plastic and the other was about to touch a welter of ragged scars and an eyepatch. They lowered again to rest on her BDU-clad thighs. The rugged khaki pants were surplus, not issue, and the black T-shirt above them was a commercial product proudly blazoned with a white fortress on a red rectangle.
From the other side of an old but well-kept steel desk, a sixtyish retiree in rumpled white dress shirt, suspenders, and dark slacks regarded Rose with narrowed leaf-green eyes. “What I was saying isn’t as important as what I’m about to say.” He slid open a drawer and reached in, then leaned forward and held out the business card he’d plucked from it. “I want you to call this office and make an appointment for an evaluation. Don’t worry about the fee; that’ll be taken care of.”
Perforce Rose took it and turned it over to glance at the information, then switched her gaze back with a inquisitive expression.
“He’s one of the best in the business, and he specializes in cases like yours.” A hand gestured. “He even has a security clearance, so you should be able to talk frankly with him. And you’ll be covered by professional confidentiality.”
Another look at the card picked out the word counseling, and Rose snorted softly. So that’s what they called it these days. No rough, tough warfighter wanted to get therapy, after all. And she hadn’t missed how carefully the phrase doctor-patient privilege had been avoided.
To the snort the fellow rejoined, “Yes, I know, but trust me. Ms. Brass—Rose—you really need to talk to him, or someone like him. I want you to promise me you will.”
Rose’s head bounced up again and she scowled one-eyed. “What? Why?”
His round face, the color of old weathered brick and fringed with balding white hair, broke into a kindly smile. “Because you strike me as someone who keeps her promises.”
“Can I help you?” A tone of ineffable boredom put the lie to the ostensibly hospitable words. The dapper business-suited man, within a few years of her own age, didn’t even look up. Snowdrifts of paperwork covered the lavish executive desk, all but hiding the name plate proclaiming its owner to be FILTHY RICH. The Rich clan was fairly well known in the city where she grew up—and to which she just returned. She guessed this particular scion was learning the ropes of the family business by managing one of their properties.
“Yes. Give me your cheapest open unit.” Her voice still seemed strange, rough and clipped. Or was it just her imagination?
Something about it must have sounded odd, because he finally raised his head. Handsome devil, with that aquiline nose, even tan-brown complexion, and dark hair slicked back in a ducktail. When he caught sight of her his blue eyes bugged out a little. She didn’t think she ever would get used to that reaction.
An ostentatious framed lithograph hung on the wall behind him, not much smaller than a garage door. The glazing in its gold-leafed frame reflected the tall haggard apparition looming, like a scarecrow cursed to live, in the doorway of his expensively decorated office. A cheap midnight-blue weather poncho dripped rainwater on the carpet. Its hood framed a face any moviemaker would cast for Death: scarred, hollow-cheeked, hollow-eyed, garnished with a shiny-new eyepatch over a gauze pad.
He cleared his throat. He shuffled some papers. Unable to find any other way to stall, he told her faintly, “Have a seat.”
She strode in and sat on one of the overstuffed visitor chairs without removing the poncho. He made a face. She didn’t care. “You have efficiency flats. I checked the prices on the Web.” She named a figure, the bottom end of the range listed on the Web site.
“Well, yes, we do, but have you considered a—”
“No.” She leaned forward a little. He leaned back a little. “I just need somewhere to sleep out of the rain.”
“I—I see. All right.” His hands fluttered across the papers, twitching a stapled set from a loose stack to one side. “Now, let’s see. . . .”
Once in his element he calmed enough to try again with, “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather—” She stared him down with her claret eye, cold and narrow, and he desisted, switching instead to, “But don’t you want a tour?”
“I saw the floor plan and example photos on the Web site. If they’re accurate, it should be fine.” The razor-thin smile she managed felt unnatural after months of misery. “I know something about architecture, Mister Rich.” Mainly how to demolish it or fortify it, but still, she had an eye for it. Just one, of course.
Over the next several minutes, and not without a lot of hemming and hawing, he conducted her through the process. Eventually they reached the stage when he pointed out, “Of course we’ll need a credit check to see if you qualify.” Judging by his tone, he didn’t expect her to, and would prefer she didn’t.
Her artificial hand appeared from the folds of the poncho, holding a translucent plastic clamshell full of documents. “My Form Delta Two—ah, retirement papers. And pension documentation. And credit information.” If there was anything the academy and the army taught, it was being prepared to the extent possible.
He stared at her prosthesis, but made no move to reach for the folder, so she shrugged fractionally and laid it on the desktop. “Everything should be in order. If your price for an efficiency is correct, the pension will meet requirements.” She expressed her own cynical doubt; bait and switch was a thing, after all. Were his attempts to upsell just reflex, or was he hoping to shut her down when she couldn’t qualify for the higher rent? It had been a real blow when she saw how rents had started to skyrocket in the years she’d been away. “And of course, as a veteran I’m covered by housing law.” She cited the relevant code and section. From his expression, he didn’t like to be reminded of anti-discrimination legislation.
Slowly, as if afraid she would bite his arm off, he pulled the folder closer and opened it to peruse the contents. With each sheet his shoulders slumped a little more. Finally he looked up again. “Yes, these do seem to be in order.” The admission seemed to stick in his throat. “Well, ah, let’s . . . get some papers signed.”
Lectern’s fingers paused on the keyboard. He turned from the CRT monitor that sat diagonally near one corner of his desk and frowned at her over his reading glasses. “According to this, that address is an efficiency apartment.”
“That’s correct. For the moment it’s perfectly adequate.” Rose shrugged. “Besides, anything larger costs enough more I couldn’t be certain of qualifying based on my pension and a credit check.”
The older man leaned back on his swivel chair and laced his hands across his midsection. “You do realize all manner of assistance programs have been set up with the express purpose of alleviating exactly that difficulty, don’t you?”
“Sir, I’d prefer the resources of such programs go to those who truly need them,” she told him earnestly.
He sighed. “Ah. One of those.” This time his frown was more pronounced. “Has it occurred to you, Ms. Brass, you are among those who truly need them?”
Her mouth opened and closed a couple of times, but nothing came out.
“I thought not. Ms. Brass, society has determined people like you are deserving of help, and you are allowed to ask for it. If you need permission to do so, you most certainly have it.” His laced hands came apart and turned palm up. “Why do you think VSCC exists?”
She hunched on the park bench, forearms on thighs, and trembled all over; her peripheral vision wavered in and out. Dark green tank top printed in black with “ARMY” under a five-pointed star, dark sport bra and bicycle shorts, white ankle socks in gray cycling shoes—all were utterly soaked. Occasionally a drop would run down her skin or drip from her nose or elbow. Her buzz-cut platinum-blond hair stuck out in small damp peaks, disarranged by the safety helmet upside down on the bench beside her. A hydration pack on her back had been sucked completely dry. The touring bike itself leaned against the back of the bench.
Months of convalescence had left her catastrophically out of shape. Physical therapy—or as the old joke had it, “PT, physical torture”—just wasn’t the same as a serious work-out; the whole point was to restore function without risking further injury to the muscles and joints being drilled. That was over and done with at last, but trying to build back to where she was before her life ended was rough going. Her body always tended to the lean side, even after she reached her full six-foot adult height. Now it was thin, almost gaunt.
Driving was more or less out of the question these days. Even bicycling was difficult with only one eye, but the shop had cobbled together an ingenious jungle-gym of mirrors that attached to the helmet. At least pedal-power got her around and provided decent exercise. When she could afford to she’d get a set of clip-on baggage so she could—
“Ma’am? Are you okay?”
Startled, she whipped upright, both hands snapping toward the PDW that should be strapped across her abdomen. It wasn’t there, of course, and neither was any other firearm. She blinked the perspiration out of her eye and looked across the footpath at a sturdy boy, maybe a junior-high schooler, clad in T-shirt, shorts, and tennies. Tousled two-tone blue hair capped his snow-white complexion set with guileless sapphire eyes. He stepped back, surprised by her sudden movement. Her fright-mask face and mechanical arm plainly came as a bit of a shock, but he stood his ground, examining her with a youngster’s artless concern.
No words came to mind. She simply stared, her brain vapor-locked, until a masculine adult voice called, “Shiny! That’s enough, honey, come on back.”
He pivoted on a heel and waved a hand at her. “But Dad—”
She turned her head, seeking said father, and spotted a couple probably not much older than she, approaching along the path at the walking pace of a little girl three or four years old. All three were casually dressed for a pleasant day at the waterfront park, popular across the city, though it puzzled her obscurely both adults were out here on a weekday. Identical messenger bags were slung over both adults’ shoulders, splitting the cornucopia of child-oriented items they no doubt carried.
The husband was various shades of blue except the eyes, which weren’t far from her own brass skin tone. The wife was a pale gray with lavender and white hair and light blue eyes. They were a striking pair, really, and their daughter’s lavender and purples stood out just as much. The parents too eyed her sweaty shivering with brow-furrowed unease, and the father spoke up again. “Ma’am, you really do look a little, um . . .”
“Dear, can you take Twily for a second?” The mother handed off the daughter, who blinked owlishly at the stranger, and began to dig in the handy-dandy shoulder bag. A few moments of rummaging produced a tiny spiral-bound notepad and a pen, whereupon their owner promptly began writing furiously. Everyone else waited with varying degrees of perplexity; other folks flowed past in both directions around them, individuals, couples, families, friends, all talking or laughing or simply soaking up the summer warmth. Finally the woman tore off a page and extended it to her. “Here. VSCC do a good job of working with veterans in town. They should be able to help you out.”
She reached her good hand uncertainly to take the slip. “Th-thank you,” she answered rustily. “I’ll give them a call.”
“And don’t keep over-exercising.” The father extracted a pair of juice boxes from the other bag and held them out. “Right now you could start cramping up, and in the long run things don’t get better any faster.”
“Rose Brass, female, age thirty-two. Height one eighty-two, mass sixty-seven with a footnote. Army captain, permanent disability list.” The woman in pastel-blue scrubs skimmed through the information on her brand-new monitor. Rose mused idly that flat-panel displays seemed to be popping up everywhere these days.
Once Rose had been processed in by the fatherly Mister Lectern, she was passed on to the nurse-practitioner for a cursory physical exam to establish a baseline. She hadn’t expected someone quite so young, though—fresh out of school, it seemed. Cool white, pink hair drawn up in a bun, blue eyes, REDHEART printed prominently on the photo badge clipped to breast pocket. Chatty, too. Rose already knew more about the kid than she really wanted to, but at least her one point of curiosity had been satisfied. This Redheart had landed a job with a high-school district, but during summer break sometimes took shifts at VSCC for supplementary income and experience. Rose wondered how long that talkative streak would last.
The current half-mumbled monologue ran down the laundry list of injuries that landed Rose in hospital for much too long. Her upper body had borne the brunt of the IED’s blast. Most of her body armor, including reinforced vest, bevor, and helmet, had been shredded—but it had done its job one last time; other than arm, face, and concussion, her wounds hadn’t been serious. The vambrace on her upraised arm had sheltered the right side of her head. The electronic earplugs she habitually wore in the field had saved her hearing, though like her armor they had been a total loss. There was just enough warning to avoid inhaling any of the superheated gases, which had saved her respiratory system.
The bad news was, that vambrace hadn’t protected the other side of her head, between bevor and helmet, or her hand and elbow. What amounted to a momentary low-grade blowtorch with fragments had swept across her face from just short of her nose to left temple and from hairline to cheek. Nobody had been willing to describe what it had done to her arm.
As too many people already had told her, she was lucky to be alive. She wasn’t so sure of that.
“Okay, getting your records from VA helped a lot. Usually they’re pretty cooperative, though.” Left unsaid was why; try as they might, the official apparatus just couldn’t keep up, which was why so many private and semi-private organizations like VSCC had sprung up to cover the gaps. “Looking at those, and the results from your physical here, you’re mostly healed but still underweight.”
“Tell me something I don’t know,” Rose muttered under her breath.
If Redheart heard the editorial, she ignored it in favor of going on with stock guidance about diet, exercise, sleep, and other lifestyle advice. “I strongly suggest you look into counseling, too. Do you have any questions?”
Rose hesitated, but finally broke down. “Someone I met said I was over-exercising.”
The off-beat comment and its implied query broke through Redheart’s confident front. “Um. Yes, that can happen. Let me see.” A flurry of computer activity apparently found what the nurse sought, and she disgorged a new set of recommendations, leading up to, “One thing that can help is to find a style of exercise that is healthful but low-impact.” A searching glance at the tall, rangy captain followed. “Something that might work for you is tai chi.”
“Huh.” Rose wasn’t sure where else to go with that.
“There are several styles, emphasizing different things. At one end, it can be almost like dance exercises, practically speaking. At the other, it’s pretty much a martial art.” There wasn’t much doubt what Redheart thought would catch Rose’s attention, but being able to calibrate just the right degree of exertion by choosing a particular form also appealed to Rose’s technically oriented soul.
“Sounds interesting. I’ll look into it.” A nod of acceptance closed the subject. “One other thing. Am I healed up enough to start pistol shooting again?”
Redheart’s expression cooled noticeably. “I suppose so, yes,” she admitted with marked reluctance.
Rose couldn’t say that was much of a surprise coming from a civilian medical professional. “You don’t like firearms.” It wasn’t a question.
“No.” The flat tone betrayed a glimmer of self-righteous disapproval. “I don’t.”
“I do.” There was no point trying to explain the zenlike serenity of capturing the sight picture, holding on the aim point, controlling one’s breaths, indexing the trigger just so, sending a round downrange to punch through the target. Even if Redheart believed her—and Rose wouldn’t bet a penny on it—the nurse-practitioner no doubt would offer some well-meaning nonsense like “find another hobby”, as if passions were as interchangeable as parts on an assembly line. Fungible, she thought the money people called it. Well, her interests weren’t fungible. Moreover, her mastery of firearms already had saved her life uncounted times, whether or not this young idealist wanted to acknowledge that inconvenient little fact.
Redheart’s lips thinned, but after a moment she loosened up enough to say, “Just don’t . . . just don’t use one on yourself or, or anyone else, all right? I don’t want to close another file because of that.”
Rose had no other answer than, “Oh. Right.”
How far away was the ceiling? With only one eye she really couldn’t tell. Could be a foot. Could be a mile. It was shrouded in gloom, too, since the only illumination was the indirect morning light leaking past the closed blinds on the single, if decently large, window. She should get up and turn on a lamp. Maybe she would. In a minute.
She lay on the unmade wall bed, in a worn fleecy sweatsuit that served her for pajamas, and stared up into the dimness. Habit had woken her as if reveille still sounded. It didn’t any more, though—not for her. She missed it, even if a lot of civilians might have trouble believing that. She missed a lot of things.
Still, she could be worse off. The board of inquiry could have ruled she was guilty of professional dereliction. Instead of mere retirement to the permanent disability list she would have been discharged entirely, probably not honorably. She had been so hazy with pain, medications, and healing injuries the defense team had to tell her twice the prosecution couldn’t build a preponderance of evidence she had “failed to maintain the standards desired for her grade and branch.” She should be glad, right?
Or she could have been killed in that explosion, like the young sergeant and even younger private. That sure would simplify things. As it was she couldn’t remember anything after the blast front reached her until she woke up in more pain than she imagined was possible, mauled and helpless, on a bed even more bare-bones than the one where she now lay. She hadn’t been in any shape to write the letters for the two families. The battalion XO had been forced to discharge the terrible duty that should have been hers.
. . . What were their names?
She could swear that ceiling was just inches away and getting closer. With an effort she turned her attention to something other than the familiar spiral of thoughts that led nowhere but down. Breakfast. And coffee. She should get up and scramble some eggs or something.
Did she still have eggs? She had the baggage for her bike now, so she should start going to the supermarket instead of spending too much money at the convenience store—the only place close enough for her to walk back, arms laden with grocery bags.
There was a farmer’s market somewhere too. She remembered going to it a few times as a kid in tow. That had been fun. Wait, was it still around? If it was, could she reach it by bicycle? It might have a Web site. Most businesses and organizations did these days. She should look it up. In a minute.
It wasn’t like she needed to be in a hurry. She ate, slept, exercised, and didn’t do a lot else, other than collect her pension. Only so many chores, and they didn’t fill the day, let alone the week. Not much good to anyone any more, not even herself—much less the ghosts of two young men.
Well, there was one thing she had to do. Slowly she pushed herself upright. At least her new arm was reliable, now she’d learned to use it. She turned to stand from the bed, but paused on glancing down for a time check.
On the low-budget bedside table, next to the softly glowing digital clock, lay a slip of paper. A faint frown crossed her face and she twisted to pick up the small sheet with her left hand. Only when she drew it close enough to make out the handwriting did she remember. She should make that phone call. She said she would.
First, though, the latrine. Shower too, now she was thinking about it.
She reached up with her right hand to flip the three-way switch near the bed, flooding the modest room with incandescent light. The ceiling was eight feet from the floor, like always.
Rose slouched on yet another square upholstered modernist chair, numbered ticket in hand for a meeting with an employment counselor. Half the building must be waiting areas, and they seemed to look alike other than a different selection of bright cheery colors on the walls. VSCC must have gotten a bulk discount on the furniture, all straight lines and generous proportions, seating and end tables alike designed to the same modular footprint.
Bland but peppy instrumental music played over a speaker somewhere and traffic noises leaked in from the corridor visible through the broad archway in the middle of one long wall. Otherwise the place was pretty quiet. Most of the other veterans scattered around didn’t seem any more inclined to small talk than she was, which came as absolutely no surprise. Age, gender, and probable grade and service varied; the one thing everybody had in common was an air of weary stoicism. Nobody bothered with the newspapers and magazines helpfully provided to pass the time. Instead they stared off into the distance at something only they could see or sat with lowered heads and their own thoughts.
She’d swept the room with her gaze and was turning back when a half-familiar voice called from her blind side. “Cap’n Brass? ’Zat you, Ma’am?”
She walked the touring bike through the crowds, prosthetic hand wrapped around the gooseneck to steady and steer it. Every bit of baggage she had was mounted, some of it already full. It wasn’t the best shopping cart in the world, but it was what she had. She’d make do.
The farmers’ market didn’t look much like her admittedly hazy childhood memories, but then this was the first time she’d visited it in fifteen or twenty years. A lot could change in that time. For one thing, there was more market and less farmers’ than she remembered. She wondered how the remaining produce sellers felt about that.
Speaking of whom—she craned her neck and spotted the big, distinctive banner famed throughout the city, all reds and greens on a sunny yellow background. Everyone knew about Sweet Apple Acres, the biggest family farm in the area after the closest competitors, the Pear clan, folded their tent and left for greener pastures, so to speak.
Not suprisingly, the booth under an extra-large pavilion canopy was doing a thriving business, so she joined the throng standing a few feet from it and waited patiently. Most people who happened to catch a glimpse of her face or arm looked away again uncomfortably, and her lips tightened briefly. No, she didn’t think she’d “get used to it”, but she drew a breath and schooled her face to a neutral expression.
A good half-hour passed before she was able to step up to the folding tables, covered with paper tablecloths clipped at the corners and laden with baskets and trays. The couple behind them were busy as a one-armed . . . busy as bees. A bluff, handsome fellow shuttled back and forth, bringing up additional merchandise to replace the items that all but flew off the tables; his vibrant yellows and reds went well with a burly, powerful frame clad in flannel shirt and overalls. A lovely, vivacious woman—orange as a pumpkin with pastel face surrounded by waves of bright hair—handled sales, not at all slowed down by the baby carrier strapped to chest and abdomen over a butter-yellow sun dress.
A jumble of emotions filled the ugly-duckling beanpole, scarred and one-eyed, in sloppy athletic wear. Here was a woman who had everything she didn’t and couldn’t: spouse, children, employment, looks, life. She lowered her head, blinked rapidly a few times, and bit her lip.
“What can I get you, Ms.—?”
She twitched and looked up again wide-eyed. That gorgeous orange sun stood before her beaming in welcome, awaiting her response. Only the barest flicker in the other woman’s beautiful turquoise eyes betrayed an awareness of her battered, grotesque face and body. “. . . Brass,” she croaked. “R-Rose Brass.” She let a lung-filling breath in and out before she could steady herself enough to conduct negotiations.
Service was fast and unerring, busy hands never missing their mark as they reached for just the right fruits, or jars, or bundles and bagged everything to be deposited neatly in the bicycle baggage. Apples might be the namesake crop, but it was a diversified farm, offering a variety of produce, and Rose was able to fill most of her needs. How the seller was able to keep up a coherent discussion, complete with recommendations, while wrangling three young children was beyond her.
The eldest, a ruddy orange-haired boy of primary-school age in T-shirt and overalls, was old enough to be genuinely helpful, running empties to the stacks in the middle as his father brought up the refills. The middle child, a tomboyish explosion of white freckles on orange topped with a mop of straw-blonde hair and wearing harder-used T-shirt and shorts, clearly wanted to help, but at three or four probably would end up a net loss. The youngest, a tiny yellow-and-red baby girl in a onesie, lay slack with sleep in the carrier.
At last Rose called a halt. “I still need to hit a couple more places before I head back,” she explained. “So I should leave a little space. How much?”
She was blasted with another blinding smile. “Do you have room for one more thing?”
Rose’s brow knotted. “What thing?”
For answer, a fresh apple pie landed on the table in front of her. “That one’s on the house.”
“I—oh, I couldn’t!” She stared down at it with unfeigned dismay.
“Honey.” Now the voice was dead-level serious. “Take it. You look like you could use a little pampering.”
Rose hadn’t wept even when she was struggling to recover in a hospital ward, knowing her eye and arm were lost forever. Now, as she raised her head, tears tracked down her unscarred cheek.
“Sarge!” Rose sat up and stared in astonishment. “What are you doing here?”
The fellow in his late thirties, working his way around the rows of chairs and ignoring looks from the waiting room’s other occupants, was painfully average-looking; even his colors were subdued earth tones. He wore slacks and a button-down work shirt embroidered with a logo on the left breast pocket—a classic chess-knight–style horsehead over the letters “CCSS” in a bold serif face. He broke into a crooked half-smile at the question as he rounded the last corner and came to an abbreviated brace before her. No salute, of course. “Good to see you too, Ma’am.”
She rolled her eye as she stood and offered her prosthetic hand. “Hello, Sergeant. It is good to see you. But my question stands.”
He shook it without hesitation. “How d’ya mean it, Cap’n?”
After a few seconds’ thought Rose waved the just-released hand. “Any way you can answer it.”
Both of them sat, the sergeant on the edge of the chair facing hers, forearms crossed on thighs. “Well, that’s a story and a half, and no mistake. I did my twenny years and it was time for me to take retirement. We got kids now, and I gotta think o’ my family. I remembered whatcha said about the city, how it was a great place to grow up. Talked it over with the wife, and we decided to move out here.”
“Good for you!” Rose meant it. “Are you all liking it?”
He nodded with genuine enthusiasm. “Yes Ma’am! We bought a house. It’s not big, but it’s gotta yard for the kids to run around in.” He shrugged. “This isn’t the cheapest place to live, but that just shows how much people like it and wanna be here.”
Rose’s brow rose. She hadn’t thought of it that way, but it made sense. “Huh. Fair enough.”
“As for the rest of it—m’wife gotta job almost right away.” That was one proud husband sitting there. “Took me a little longer, but I’m right pleased with what I found.”
“Oh? Construction?” The man was a positive genius when it came to anything that moved on wheels or tracks. Rose was convinced he could write his own ticket running a forklift or bulldozer at any firm he chose to work for.
To her surprise he shook his head. “Nope. I really wanted to do somethin’ different. Don’t get me wrong, Ma’am—we did good stuff over there, buildin’ schools and repairin’ villages. Better’n shootin’ up the joint like everyone else was, them or us.” His expression turned unwontedly pensive. “I guess I just wanted to keep helpin’ people. So I took a job with Social Services, drivin’ folks places. Called ‘paratransit’, see. Kinda like taxi service for people who can’t get around on their own or can’t afford it—in fact, I just dropped off an old squid for an appointment here and was on my way back to the van when I saw you.”
She nodded. “I’ve heard of it. I’ve been tempted to use it myself, since I can’t drive any more.”
“Hey, I’d drive you any time you needed it, Ma’am. Just give us a call.” A muffled buzz sounded, and he plucked a pager from his belt for a glance at the display. “Gotta go. You take care now, Cap’n.” Just like that he was gone, leaving Rose once more alone with her thoughts.
She sat back again on the not overly comfortable chair and frowned a little. The sergeant was right; they had done good work, fixing up or building anew huts and buildings, roads and highways all over the war-torn country, in addition to duties more usual for their specialty. They had helped a lot of people who just wanted to lead peaceful lives, without rude strangers of any stripe rolling through and kicking over anything and everything in the way. But they hadn’t helped—couldn’t help—everyone.
For every face in her memory that beamed happily, there were others blank with shock or twisted with grief. Ruins left untouched because their occupants were . . . gone, fled or worse. Numb children standing alone or in gaggles on dusty packed-earth streets, no parents to stand with them. Parents devastated by sudden gaps, or almost-gaps, in their families. Those almost-gaps, people of any age maimed by all manner of hazards bequeathed by battlefields in which they had no part.
Her own nation’s services and those of allies were hardly innocent, she knew. Military discipline meant any given individual or unit might be less prone to such sins, but the number of personnel deployed guaranteed that lower relative rate still resulted in too large an absolute number of accidents and incidents. Suddenly Rose felt unutterably tired.
An eternity ago, as a teen, she had felt an inchoate desire to—what? Save the world and everyone in it? Something like that. Later, as a cadet, she had burned with the need to serve her country honorably and well. She hadn’t accomplished much of either, had she? The first, she had come to realize, was an impossible task akin to pushing a broom against the tide. The second she no longer was certain she could do, even if she hadn’t been denied the chance. No wonder Sarge had pulled the plug and moved on.
A tone sounded, followed by a pleasant synthetic feminine voice calling a short alphanumeric code. Rose started and glanced down at the slip of thermal paper crumpled in her good hand, then stood.
“MOS Twelve-Bravo.” The employment counselor looked up from another flat-panel monitor. He looked like a well-fed middle-aged accountant in his business suit and tie.
“That’s correct,” replied Rose in the cool, emotionless tone she’d learned at the academy.
“Construction is a growth industry, not just in the city but around the whole region,” the well-meaning fellow began.
Rose shook her head—slowly at first, then more firmly as she considered her gut reaction. “No.”
“But you have an excellent background for it. I’m sure you could take your pick of—”
“I said no.” She drew a breath for patience and thought. “I’m done with it. I’m proud of my work, but I want to change tracks, do something different.”
He frowned. “You realize you’d give up any advantage your education and history give you. You might have to go back to school. That’s neither cheap nor easy, especially these days.”
She shrugged philosophically. “If I do, I do. I can get a VA loan, and where I am now, I can get by on my pension. It’d be tight, but I could manage.”
The patently doubtful expression on his face made her lips twitch. “If you say so. In that case, what do you have in mind?”
“I’m not sure.” She blinked. Her ruminations sparked by the sergeant’s revelations hadn’t gotten that far before her number was called. “I think . . . I want to keep helping people. We did a lot of that, probably the only folks in uniform the locals were happy to see other than the medical and dental units. That felt good. I don’t mean all the smiles and the gratitude. I mean, I liked that too, but just knowing we left someplace better than it was before—well, I’d rather have that than a medal.”
It was his turn for a deep breath. “All right then. Let’s see what we can do for you.”
To be fair, once she’d shaken him of his desire to shove her into a convenient pigeonhole and move on to the next number in the waiting room, he rose to the occasion. The questions he asked were incisive and probing. She spoke about everything that happened to her after the explosion, especially the people she’d met and the things some of them had done for her: physicians and nurses, the family in the park, the couple at the farmers’ market, the sergeant, even the VSCC staff. A few times she struggled to keep talking. He listened closely, occasionally turning back to his keyboard and monitor to make some electronic inquiry. They went far past the nominal time limit on her appointment.
“Social work,” he finally declared, as if putting a paperweight on the pile of discussion. “You’d need at least a bachelor’s for that. I’ll look into where you can study for it and what kind of aid you can get other than a VA loan. You might even be able to take some on-line courses. More universities are starting to offer those nowadays.”
He gave her a penetrating look. “I had my doubts, but you know, I think you could do well as a social worker.” A note of severity leaked into his voice. “But you absolutely will need counseling before you can qualify for employment.”
Rose stood in the still-warm midsummer sunlight of late afternoon slanting across the city and blinked against the glare. Downtown bustled around her, sidewalks and streets busy with traffic. At least the row of bollards disguised as low planters kept most pedestrians from intruding on the narrow apron fronting the century-old four-story brick building that housed VSCC’s offices, giving her a chance to orient without immediately being jostled by throngs of passersby.
Both hands slipped on a pair of glacier glasses, the biggest she’d been able to find. They covered much of her eyepatch, just clearing its shallow conical peak and the bias tape hemming its rim. Expensive but worth every penny, since otherwise she’d have to take off the patch before donning them, and nobody wanted to see that. It was pretty raw and nasty, after all, and there was no point subjecting everyone to it when she didn’t have to.
She straightened again, shoulders back and head up just as she’d been taught in the academy, tall and slim in black T-shirt, khaki BDU pants, and tan tactical boots. No flashbacks had haunted her since reliving the explosion in Mister Lectern’s office. She didn’t fool herself into thinking they wouldn’t visit again, but it was a good sign. A deep breath filled her lungs.
Everyone in that building behind her cared. It really was that simple, and that profound. Even the employment counselor, who doubtless saw far too many people in a day, had gone the extra mile. They had done their competent best to help her. She had a plan, a checklist, and the knowledge she had something resembling back-up.
Now she needed to look ahead, put that plan into action, and start checking off items.
“I assigned everyone I could to perimeter security and split up the rest into two-man teams for checking the wrecks.” Rose, a little more neatly dressed than usual in undecorated olive T-shirt and a brand-new pair of jeans, sat back on the button-tufted wing chair and rubbed her forehead with her good hand.
“Is that usual procedure?” The voice was soft and mild, but steady and at the moment seemed genuinely curious.
“No.” A deep breath followed. “But I didn’t find out until we got there nobody had secured the site in the mean time—it was left unguarded for almost a day. I had to assume the insurgents had taken advantage of the oversight to plant booby traps.” Her unmarred lips twisted. “I was right; they had.”
“Why did you take that particular approach?” The man facing her from a matching chair in the cozy den-like room was only a few years older than she and had the same professional air of competence. All muted gray with aqua eyes and short black hair, he completed a tidy appearance with white dress shirt, blue necktie held in place by a brass wolf’s-head clasp, dark slacks, and dress shoes. His only real quirk was a lab coat instead of a jacket, but she found the gentle humor of it appealing. A yellow legal notepad balanced on a knee; one hand idly twiddled a ballpoint pen. Both found copious use.
“Instead of just using heavy equipment to bulldoze them all, and let the bombs fall where they may?” Rose waved her prosthetic back-handed as if sweeping away an obstacle.
He tilted his head in acknowledgement if not agreement, and she continued. “People have this idea all our gear is a bunch of tanks with ’dozer blades or cranes, but that’s not how it works. The army doesn’t have many of those—they cost a lot of money—and not all of them were in-country. None were assigned to my company, and they were off doing other jobs anyway. What I had was light- and medium-duty stuff, basically civilian machines in camouflage, maybe with a little ballistic protection against fragments and small arms. An IED that size would have demolished anything I brought and killed the operator, not to mention making the job I had even harder by adding to the wreckage instead of removing it.” She shrugged. “But when the army tells you to do something, you find a way to do it.” After a moment’s thought she added, “Or die trying.”
“Let’s talk about that.” Polite and unassuming as the therapist’s suggestion might be, Rose recognized an order when she heard one.
Marching in boots and BDU pants and yet another T-shirt, Rose cut straight across the sunny, breezy quad, eyes . . . eye front. So often she seemed suspended awkwardly between military and civil society, a curiosity for others to gawk at. She couldn’t shake the crawly feeling of being on display, of drawing every gaze in sight, even if it might be all in her head. Nowhere was the sensation more acute than the city college where she’d begun classes a few weeks ago.
Her only previous experience of higher education had been the academy. She wasn’t sure how many civilians really understood the official institution that transformed young high-school graduates into army officers was a university as well as a training establishment. The curriculum was just as diverse, albeit stricter in setting out requirements and course paths. Cadets moved around the academic parts of the campus pretty much the same way any other student body would, apart from the uniforms, salutes, and identically brisk, impersonal clockwork strides. Well, maybe not quite the same way.
Graduates received diplomas at the same time as, but separate from, commissioning as second lieutenants; Rose herself had finished in the top third of the class with a bachelor of science, in the very field of study for which the academy originally was founded just over two centuries ago. As the employment counselor at VSCC had warned, though, the only value of that degree for current purposes was bypassing general-ed requirements, allowing her to skip directly to her declared major and attend the less expensive two-year college that only in recent years had begun offering bachelors as well as associate degrees. Moreover, if she was frugal she didn’t need a job to pay the bills, so other than the ongoing therapy appointments she could devote the whole day, every weekday, to classes. It was a grind, but her former career long since had inured her to doing what needed to be done no matter how tedious it might be.
Midday the quad swarmed with equally casually dressed students—nearly all of them a decade or more younger—sitting around or strolling every which way, singly or in groups. One such herd filtered from one of the concrete walkways onto the quad itself, only a few yards away, and turned in her general direction. She drew in a deep breath through her nose as the half-dozen or so girls, all of them not merely young and healthy but pretty, chattered and gestured seemingly without a care in the world.
One of them glanced up, catching Rose’s eye in passing. The laughing face blanked instantly and the shapely figure in snug jeans and top flinched from head to toe before half-turning away, diving back into the twittering conversation and doing everything possible to ignore the approaching cripple.
Rose tensed all over and gritted her teeth; a dull ache throbbed in the stump of her arm and behind her missing eye. By now she had months of leavening experience with the balks and inconveniences imposed by a physical world not completely accommodating of her prosthetic and impaired vision. As she had worked her way through the enrollment process before this semester, she’d steeled herself against a sense of discomfort, of not quite fitting in, anticipating the age difference and the way civilian students lacked the firm self-discipline inculcated in every plebe.
What she hadn’t expected was the anger simmering, unpleasantly bitter, in the back of her mind. She resented all those intact youthful bodies around her, constant reminders hers just . . . wasn’t, any more. Her breathing quickened and her eye narrowed as the acid within boiled up, heated by the moment of rejection. She fought to cool it down again, to clear her mind of the distraction.
Her good thumb stroked the band of her men’s-style academy class ring, something she almost never wore until, on impulse, she’d put it on her ring finger as a sort of talisman, before her first day here. She never had liked “ring knockers”, officers who flaunted having graduated from the academy rather than OCS or ROTC, often by turning their rings bezel down to rap ostentatiously on desk or table. A simple way to soft-pedal her own graduation was simply to put the ring away somewhere, valued but not something to bring out every day. Now that ring, from the institution where the concept of class rings had been invented, was a soothing connection to the history and traditions she still cherished, even if she had been separated from them—and after all, she wasn’t likely to wear a wedding ring on that finger any time in the future.
Rose didn’t stop, didn’t even slow. She had someplace to be. But she knew what she would be talking about at her next therapy session.
Smiling was beginning to seem less strange. The current expression plastered on her face wasn’t broad, but it was genuine. Her bike clicked and whirred beside her, the mechanical noises barely audible over the talking, shouting, shuffling throngs of weekend shoppers on this brisk overcast morning. A deep breath brought with it the scents of fair-style foods—popcorn and hot dogs prominent among them—that beguiled so many passersby into devouring a few more calories than they really should.
To the cyclewear-clad Rose all of it was simply a backdrop, a stage setting for the pavilion sporting the red and green and yellow banner. Every Saturday she showed up, beelining over to gather what groceries Sweet Apple Acres could provide before stopping off at a few other stalls to complete the trip. The produce indeed was some of the best she had found anywhere, but it wasn’t the only reason these trips had become a highlight of her week.
All the Apples were a simple joy to visit with, even the plump, crusty grandmother who occasionally spelled one of the young couple behind the tables. That couple, in turn, all but outshone the sun, bursting with life and hearty good will. Even the children glowed like embers with the promise of like vigor as they grew. It was as if the family’s mere presence helped to fill Rose with the sunlight that blessed their crops. And they never made her feel anything but welcome.
A cloud passed before the sunny thoughts; her smile faded and her brow knotted. The mob seemed to be thinning rather than congregating as she approached the pavilion’s established location. She didn’t see the banner either. When she broke out into the unaccustomed open space she stopped and looked around in bewilderment, for the tables and canopies were nowhere to be seen.
A few clumps of bystanders stood around chatting, as they tended to do anywhere there were a few unoccupied square feet on the market grounds. Rose dismissed those in favor of a stocky middle-aged woman wearing jeans and a staff T-shirt strolling without clear aim, patrolling the aisles and lanes. Broad, quick strides brought Rose closer to the shorter woman just before she disappeared back into the crowd.
“Excuse me!” Rose called. “I noticed the Sweet Apple Acres stand is—”
The staffer started and pivoted, distress plain on the face that looked to hers. “Oh! Oh no—hadn’t you heard? Oh, it was just terrible. . . .”
The voice rattled on, but after the first few moments Rose didn’t hear any of the words. Her teeth clenched and her eye squeezed shut. She would not cry. Not here, not now. But never again would that brilliant couple light her world or anyone else’s. Those three young children—what would happen to them? Her breaths came short and fast, almost panting.
Rose cut off the maundering that had gone far beyond what she needed or indeed wanted to know. “Th-thank you. I—I have to go now.” Leaving the voluble staff member open-mouthed behind her, she turned and quick-marched off without bothering to watch her path. It didn’t matter; people took one look at her and got out of the way quickly enough.
She went straight back to her little cubbyhole. She would not return to the market for many years.
Bing bong. The mellow electronic tones were familiar from so many other upscale businesses that had installed the same door chimes. Rose stepped in and looked around uncertainly as the old-fashioned double-hung door, no doubt grandfathered, swung shut behind her.
The hush that greeted her was broken only by the murmurs of a few scattered customers and the soft swishes of fabric or metal hangers on metal rods. Piped-in music was conspicuous by its absence. Colors were rich and harmonious, none of them searing or garish. Lighting was subdued but carefully placed—incandescent, she noticed, or LED fixtures, the latter a touch of luxury given how expensive they still tended to be. Not a single plebeian fluorescent tube compromised the atmosphere of quiet good taste.
At the same time a note of whimsy moderated the opulence. The décor evoked an antique merry-go-round without overcommitting to the concept. Even Rose, whose knowledge of architecture was more practical than æsthetic, was impressed . . . and intimidated. Moreover, she had to be a bit underdressed in desert-tan T-shirt, BDU pants, and boots, along with an almost-new bomber jacket against the damp autumn weather outside. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all.
When she called the paratransit office midmorning and requested Sarge as a driver, she had only the vaguest goal in mind. All her adult life she’d relied on her uniforms to answer for any social situation. What little else she had was nothing but casual—fine for school or knocking around town, but not enough for any professional or formal setting—and she had no idea how to build a new wardrobe from scratch. When he arrived at curbside in a shiny new white panel van from the city’s motor pool, she described the problem and asked his advice, exactly as any young officer might request of an experienced NCO before making a decision.
Rather to her surprise his answer was immediate and definite. “Carousel Boutique. M’wife heard about the grand opening a while back and went over to see if it was any good.” He pulled a wry grin. “She loved the place. I didn’t love the bill she brought home with the stuff she bought, but even I could tell it worked really well for her. If there’s anybody who c’n help you with that, it’s Ms. Hemline.”
A youthful voice from her right brought her back to the moment. “Can I help you with anything?”
Rose pivoted abruptly; her prosthetic hand half-rose in a defensive reflex. The rose-complected young woman standing nearby jumped and let out a squeak; burgundy sausage curls, and the brilliant plume rising from a fascinator clipped to them, bounced in response. The rest of the tights-and-skirt ensemble looked just as outlandish to Rose’s eye, and the feeling of being a stranger in a strange land only redoubled.
They stared at each other for a moment, the disfigured captain in bafflement and the floor girl in shock. The latter’s eyes were round as she took in the scars, the eyepatch, the mechanical hand. Wearily Rose let her arm drop. “Uh, sorry about that. I just came in to—”
“To what? Frighten my staff to death?” another voice broke in, this time from Rose’s blind side.
She sure was getting off on the right foot here, wasn’t she? Rose about-faced to see a sharp-featured woman around the sergeant’s age glaring at her from several feet away. Prim Hemline—she couldn’t be anyone else—cut a striking figure. Medium stone gray, page-boy hair close to hot pink, eyes ditto but a bit darker, flamboyant earrings, pantsuit and bolero of cut and colors that wouldn’t look out of place on a certain kind of rock musician.
“No excuse, Ma’am.” The words were crisp, almost brittle, but Rose did succeed in throttling them down from the parade-ground bark they wanted to be. Sheer habit drew her up in a brace, heels together and thumbs on pant seams.
Hemline never moved her gaze from Rose’s face as she dismissed the minion with a backhanded wave and a courteous, if absent, “Thank you, Miss Penny, that will be all.” Her searching look continued in silence until the teen vanished into the underbrush of racks and shelves.
“Veteran?” The question was milder than Hemline’s previous tone.
“Yes Ma’am.” With an effort Rose relaxed her stance, but she wasn’t sure what to do with her hands and feet. Under the weight of the proprietor’s examination she fidgeted, shifting her weight and fiddling with her messenger bag. “Army Captain Rose Brass.” After a beat she added belatedly, “Retired.”
“I imagine so.” The eyes flicked up and down, measuring Rose’s wounds—and not, it seemed clear, just the physical. “Well, Captain Brass, why are you here, if it isn’t to throw a scare into innocent girls?”
With a sigh Rose raised her good hand to rub her forehead and in a few short phrases summed up her dilemma. At least Hemline really appeared to be listening.
“Ah. Let’s see what we can do, then, Ms. Brass. I think, for you, the word to keep in mind is gravitas. Dignified. Balanced—neither too feminine nor too masculine. Follow me.” Hemline turned away and waded into the forest of displays without a backward glance.
The new customer followed with relieved haste and renewed hope.
Rose’s tall sinewy form, dressed out for the day’s exercise in T-shirt, sweat pants, and running shoes, bent and arched with effortless ease as she limbered up. The prosthetic arm braced her against a four-by-four wood post, one of a pair supporting a large sign placed between the unpaved parking lot and the nearby trailhead. The top panel spelled out the park’s name and governing authority in proud bold letters. Under it a lockable glazed notice board displayed a laminated relief map on one side, the balance of the space crowded by a host of brightly colored sheets conveying a variety of announcements and bulletins.
One of the things she liked best about the city was the extensive array of public lands mostly surrounding it. The patchwork of parks—municipal, national, and everything in between—created a broad sweep of wild or mostly wild country in relatively easy reach, a good deal of it crisscrossed by a more or less continuous web of trails historical or constructed. The network extended clear out to Camp Everfree, a fixture since before the parks now bordering it had been chartered, though reaching that sprawling private parcel would take two or three days on foot. All in all, this was a great place and a good day for a nice long trail run, if not as far as the old summer camp.
The morning was pure crystal, clear and chilly and windless. A small dual-calibrated spirit thermometer fastened to her wristwatch strap claimed the temperature was in the mid-fifties or around twelve degrees. Rose drew in the sharp air and its not-quite-scent heralding the changing of the seasons; she remembered her parents describing the sensation as “smelling like winter”. A wisp of steam blew out with her breath.
Right now she was covered in gooseflesh, but she knew from experience that would abate after she literally hit her stride, settling into the distance run she’d learned in high-school track and field. Her core would stay warm just fine, so she was in no real danger of hypothermia, though her skin might remain cool to the touch and she might not break a sweat at all despite the exertion. A thermos bottle of hot chicken broth hung on her web belt, and when Sarge swung by in a couple of hours to drive her home, he could turn up the car heater if she needed it.
On the other hand, the low temperature meant a lack of other traffic, whether hikers, equestrians, or bicyclists, and that was just fine by her. She snorted softly as she finished her calisthenics and straightened. Time to get the show on the road; after all, this might be one of the last weekends she could get out for a run before winter really closed in. She stepped out and swung around to the front of the sign for a good look at the map. Her planned route already was committed to memory, but hard military experience had taught her to double-check both her recall and for any potential surprises such as, in this case, unexpected trail closures.
No, nothing new or unforeseen. As she half-turned toward the trailhead, her absent gaze tracked across the board, then stopped. Oversize bold type did what one more fluorescent paper among the rest couldn’t. She stepped a little closer to read the whole page and muttered, “When did they start doing that?”
The rumble of an engine and the gritty sound of tires on dirt almost drowned out her voice as another arrival pulled onto the lot. The numbered highway from which the little roadster had turned followed a route through the hills that had been in use for centuries, maybe millennia. People from some of the local tribes had traveled it to the place on which the modern city later would grow, reachable from the ocean as well as a variety of other foot-roads, where a trade fair had been held each spring. Hunting and fishing, trade and commerce, feasts and festivals, treaties and vendettas, exchanges of young folk seeking spouses—all the affairs of an intertribal convocation went on for a month or so before everyone dispersed back home.
When settlers began to arrive, they perforce used the same passes and harbors, and they too did business at the fair, among other things selling horses to fellow immigrants and locals alike. New villages and towns sprang up for logging, farming, ranching of horses and other livestock, and when gold was discovered, mining. The importance of horses in the region’s development led to an abundance of equine-related place names, alongside the perennially popular Everfree that reflected an independent streak among both the tribes watching the population of strangers grow seemingly without limit and those self-same pioneers who’d left behind more settled lands in favor of making their own way.
Sometime since Rose had left for the academy, somebody or more likely a swarm of somebodies had decided to commemorate this local history with an annual charity run. Participants would congregate in a small hamlet, still little more than a wide spot in the road, that had been the last overnight stop before new homesteaders reached the nascent city. From there everyone would run, or jog, or walk along the highway to a plaza in town, supposedly on the site of the original long-vanished fairground.
The next run was four months out, according to the notice sheet, which also detailed closures of roads and parks along the way. Rose frowned in thought. Maybe she would sign up for it. She’d made a lot of progress over the last few months, and she should be in shape for it by then.
She started to juggle timetables in her head. Shuffling routine chores and errands shouldn’t be a problem, but the run would be during the spring semester, so she’d have to consider class schedules. Then there was the weekly therapy appointment to think about. And she might have to rearrange her tai chi session or time on the pistol range. . . .
Rose shook her head in bemusement. When had her life gotten so busy? It all happened so gradually, much of it overshadowed by the day-to-day demands of school, she hadn’t considered just how much she was doing these days.
A sudden grin broke over her face. Well, what was one more thing? She wanted to do it. She needed to do it. She could worry about the details later. Face and heart light in the wake of her decision, she pivoted on a heel and ambled toward the break in the fence and the trail that awaited.
A car door thumped closed, catching her attention. From his track suit, the newcomer seemed to be another runner, middle-aged but fit as a fiddle and plainly in good humor as he looked forward to some trail time of his own. Without even thinking about it she raised her artificial arm in a casual wave. There was no hesitation to the fellow’s return wave, a tip of his hand in greeting from one runner to another. Rose laughed in sheer delight as she turned back and scratched off into long, loping strides, straight through the gate onto the trail.
Busy fingers clattered on a rugged mechanical keyboard, then paused as Rose read back the new paragraphs with a slight grimace. She reached over to the mouse to bump up the cursor for a few changes and corrections.
At first she had tried a chording keyboard, thinking to minimize the residual awkwardness of her artificial hand, before discovering it was a steeper learning curve than simply practicing with her bum wing on a standard lay-out. She couldn’t achieve the same words per minute she’d managed before her life changed, but she’d reached an acceptable speed for filling out forms and reports.
She reviewed the alterations and nodded to herself in satisfaction. Another moment with the mouse banished the electronic document to the central repository, after which she pushed back her chair and stood to stretch. Both arms rose ceilingward and her back arched, unhampered by a fine powder-blue business jacket, trim matching slacks, and simple white blouse—though shiny black closed-lace shoes made standing on tiptoe a bit harder.
The dozen or so suits in various pastel colors she’d purchased from Carousel Boutique had cost a fortune, but she didn’t begrudge a penny. Thanks to the meticulous tailoring, not only did they look sharp and professional, they flattered her tall, lean figure and didn’t restrict her movements. She came down from the stretch and turned to nudge the swivel chair again, toward the leg well of the sturdy laminate and steel desk.
The office in which she stood was tiny, a mix of old and new, but it was all hers. The hulking brutalist building around it had to date back at least half a century, and her desk might be even older. On the other hand, the rest of the furniture and the computer hardware, including a flat-panel monitor, had been drawn from the latest institutional order. A trio of newish metal and plastic stacking chairs faced the front of the desk in a slight arc. The computer table from which she had risen stood at right angles to the desk, backing up against one of the room’s two huge windows; the arrangement wasn’t ideal, but after all the architecture pre-dated the advent of desktop computers, so like many other occupants Rose simply left the blinds closed on that window to minimize glare. The corner of the L-shape formed by the two work surfaces was filled in by a low metal supply cabinet, crowned with a store-bought succulent in a clay pot. And she still could smell a whiff of fresh paint and cleaning solutions.
The room boasted only one other prominent item. On the wall behind the desk, at eye level for someone a little shorter than she, hung a sizable picture frame, its double mat cut with a pair of openings. One displayed a diploma, the other a certificate of qualification.
Nothing else competed for the eye—not even the “I love me” wall of memorabilia accumulated by any military officer. Rose simply couldn’t bring herself to unpack the sealed box on the closet floor in her flat. Even her class ring had returned to its velveted box. That chapter of her life had closed, and she was embarking on a new one.
She lowered herself back onto the chair and reached her prosthetic hand for the mug of coffee placed neatly on a saucer. Before she could bring it to her lips, a babel of voices rose somewhere in the hallway outside, riding over the usual low murmur of activity that wafted through the open doorway at the far corner of the wall opposite the windows. Curious, she put the mug back down and glanced up just as a pair of individuals popped through the door, followed by a uniformed policeman who looked to be about her age.
She leaned back to frown at the apparent chaperone, her narrowed eye reading off his nameplate. “What’s this about, Officer . . . Blue?”
The cop waved his hand at the duo standing between him and the stacking chairs. “The folks downstairs thought you’d be the best person to talk some sense into these kids.” He shrugged. “I figured bringing ’em here was better than running ’em in.”
Her brow rose. “Really.” She looked more closely at the boys—young men—in their late teens. Both looked the worse for wear in disheveled but otherwise nondescript clothing. They stared at her scars and eyepatch with trepidation.
One was medium height, if a little stooped, and skinny as a rail. His short soot-black hair streaked with purple stuck out untidily and, she suspected, uncharacteristically. Watery gray eyes were wary behind black-framed spectacles of a style her troops used to call “BC glasses”. His dark-red complexion didn’t show the agitated flush she’d bet was heating his face. One of his hands was clamped on his companion’s upper arm.
Said companion wasn’t much taller or heavier, but he did stand straighter. His equally messy hair was a drab reddish brown, his visible eye a slightly lighter brown. The other sported a magnificent shiner, but she assumed it normally matched. His free hand clutched the remains of another pair of glasses, likely broken by the same blow. The expression on his mist-gray face was defiant; for some reason she was put in mind of a cornered tiger roused to anger from a languid repose.
Rose rocked back and forth on her chair for a long moment, studying the pair, who returned the scrutiny with tight expressions. Then she sat up and swept her prosthetic arm in a crisp arc to point at the chairs. “Sit down, both of you. Officer Blue, thank you; I’ll take it from here.” As the uniform stepped out, closing the door behind him, she turned back. “My name is Rose Brass. Captain Rose Brass. But you can call me Ms. Brass.” She paused a moment as they perched on the edges of their seats, then added briskly, “All right, let’s get started. Who might you two be, and why did Officer Blue think he should bring you to Social Services instead of the city lock-up?”
