Six decks up from the wrench bunks and ahead of the VTOL hangar lay the Sim Deck, where six upright tank simulators networked together into a sophisticated program that could replicate any battlefield conditions you could dream up.
Naturally, as complicated as the setup is, it’s broken at least half the time. Such was the case when I walked through the doors and found Pug on his back underneath the number-2 cockpit. I tapped his boot with my toe, and he slid himself out. We call him Pug because, well, that’s what he looks like, and no one can pronounce his real name. He’s got a small, flat face, squashed nose, and watery eyes that look in slightly different directions because he’s neurologically blind in one of them.
“Vandal!” he said, extending his hand. I grabbed his wrist and heaved him to his feet, where he dusted himself off and smiled at me. His close thatch of hair seemed to have more gray than it did my last visit, and his Saharan Republic accent was as thick as ever. Pug belonged to a rare handful in the Chevaliers actually born on Earth. “Nice timing. I got an accelerated class on the docket at half-past to start advanced battle drills. The sensory feedback modules on this thing are actin’ up. I could really use a hand before they get here.”
“Happy to help,” I said. And I was. Pug takes good care of us maintainers, something he learned while leading a squad of uprights in the field. Bail him out and you’re likely to find an extra beer ration appear on your meal chit. His sims are also part of the reason I could handle Ardennes well enough to save my own life. In order to fix the simulators, you have to use the simulators, which is how I learned to use a shunt in secret over the years. I got pretty efficient in the cockpit by helping him out. Now I was here to learn for real.
Pug pulled a rag out and cleaned the hydraulic oil off his fingers. “Can’t say as I agree what with Swift’s plan. These kids ain’t going to be ready in two months, let alone two weeks. I’m going to be runnin’ them bloody just to pass on a fighting chance. The next two weeks gonna make indoc training look like a vacation.” He elbowed me in the side. “Need something to do? These things are going to take a thrashing.”
“Pug…” I began, not sure how to continue. “I didn’t come up here to fix the sims. I came to drill.”
The old trainer quirked his head at me, then picked up his data pad and flipped over to his messages. His one good eye scanned back and forth. The eyebrow above it steadily rose with each passing line, and he tapped the screen off, folded the pad under his crossed arms, and licked his lips.
“No kidding,” he said. “You finally ended up in the cockpit after all.”
I nodded. “I don’t exactly agree with the colonel either, you should know.”
“I heard about Ardennes, but I didn’t know it was you behind the sticks. You talked to anyone about it?”
Despite what I had said, I knelt to take a look under the sim. Call it a habit. “I got debriefed at the hospital.”
“Yeah, but have you talked to anyone about it?”
“What do you mean?” I asked. The physical connections all looked fine, so it must have been something underneath. I wriggled underneath on my back and held out my hand. “Light.”
Pug passed me the penlight, and I clamped it between my teeth and separated the cables to find the problem under the sim. The artificial cockpit shifted as Pug leaned back against the outer shell.
“I mean you were thrust into a situation a wrench ain’t ever trained or prepared for. You faced the choice to kill or be killed—since you’re still here, I know which one you picked. Not everyone can handle it. Part of my job is preparing upright cadets to live with that choice.”
“Pad,” I said around the light, and Pug passed it over. I compared the diagrams to the wiring and found a few more issues Pug probably hadn’t even thought to look for. I took the penlight out of my mouth. “I don’t know, man. I’ve seen so much death. Seen it at home in the streets and blaze dens back on Teutonia, and I’ve lost friends in the company. We lost Pacha.”
“Yeah, I heard.”
I adjusted another wire. “But that night? I tried not to think about it too much at the time. Kept telling myself I was shooting at VTOLs and IFVs, not people. But I knew they were crewed. The hardest part is that it felt… I don’t know…”
“…Satisfying.” said Pug. “When you pull the trigger on a shot you just know in your bones is gonna drop a tango off your scope?”
“Yeah.”
“I know it well. In the business we call it the kill-sense. It is a primal feeling. It’s the hunter-gatherer in us feeling the stone leaving the sling and knowing it will hit the antelope. And you feel guilty for enjoying that feeling.”
“Yeah, I guess.” I set the pad down and stared at the tangle of cables, feeling about as mixed up as the nest of wires. Pug gave words to a lot of what I’d spent the last two weeks thinking about. But something still nagged at me. “Knowing what I did… I don’t know if I can do it again.”
“We’ll work on that,” he said, and squeezed my shin. “Bet you didn’t know I moonlight as the Winter’s counselor.”
“Really?” I asked.
“Sure, why not.”
Sarcastic old bastard. I swapped a pair of cables in the sim’s data bus that Pug had reversed, despite the cables only fitting one way. Better therapist than technician, that was for sure.
“Vandal, you good here? I got to make a few changes to the program before the rest of my cadets get here.”
“Yeah, I should have this thing up and running in a few.”
“Thanks. Oh, and don’t dream me going light on you these next two weeks. I would be doing you no favors.”
“Wouldn’t entertain the notion,” I muttered.
Pug got up and meandered back to the control room to find something else to break for me, leaving me alone with my thoughts. That was about the last company I wanted, so I threw myself at the work instead. And for a few brief minutes, I thought of nothing but wires and hydraulics.