Arachnosaur. Richard Jeffries

And what I saw makes me believe that Lieutenant Colonel Goodman’s head exploded from the inside.”

      Chapter 4

      Key really didn’t want to dislike Captain Patrick Logan, but he also really didn’t want to use the wheelchair that Weicholz insisted he have.

      Ultimately, he settled for both as means to an end. Besides, even he had to admit it was worth being ‘incapacitated’ to see the look on Daniels’s face as he went by—being pushed by Second Lieutenant Barbara Strenkofski. It gave him a nice opportunity to appreciate Camp Lemonnier’s facilities, when he wasn’t imagining what the back of Strenkofski looked like pushing him.

      The former, like so many of the military bases in this region, was both impressive and makeshift. Lemonnier was five hundred acres of well-meaning intent; an expansive schematic of what were amusingly called “containerized living units,” plunked down on the southwest side of the Djibouti-Ambouli International Airport—between the runway overflow and a French military munitions storage facility. It had two recreation centers, a wastewater treatment plant, a Navy Exchange Store, a laundry, a fire department, a Disbursing Office, and even an inflated gymnasium.

      Strenkofski wheeled Key into the chapel, a small chamber with six rows of steel pews facing a plain, tan-colored, table before a modest altar. It was empty of people, save for Captain Logan, who sat at the table, seemingly intent on yet another file. Key inwardly smirked at the location and the man.

      “Brought me to confession, did you?” he asked the blonde as she rolled him to the table’s other side. “Do you think I need it?”

      “Do you?”

      The question was probably rhetorical, definitely unanswerable. In his time, Key had shattered many of the Commandments, often in tandem, frequently in multiples.

      There they both waited for Logan to finish reading, acknowledge them in some way, or anything. Key heard Strenkofski’s breathing get shorter and shallower, but he just relaxed, letting Logan’s tightly wired energy roll over him.

      “Do you object to the setting,” Logan finally asked, without looking up.

      “If God doesn’t mind, why should I?”

      “All the other camp facilities are stretched thin trying to sort out the Gate of Tears,” he continued as if he hadn’t heard. Maybe he hadn’t. Or, more likely, he didn’t care to engage in small talk.

      Gate of Tears was the translation of Bab-el-Mandeb, the name of the strait that separated Djibouti and Yemen. But it had come to signify the two-way clusterfuck of refugees fleeing the east’s civil war, and smugglers sailing west to take advantage of the conflict. Key had already witnessed the Kafka-esque pit debaters of the situation fell into after two ward-mates took up the issue.

      Instead of talking, Key took the time to study Logan. His uniform, like the blonde’s, was laser-tailored and the same color as the altar table. That alone gave Key plenty of mental ammo, since it was definitely more than a hundred degrees outside, and here were his friendly neighborhood debriefers in full dress. Although he was given the opportunity to change clothes, Key remained in olive-colored short sleeve, short-pant, hospital scrubs Daniels had found for him.

      “Josiah, no-middle-name, Key,” the shaved-bald Logan continued quietly, as if reading. “Born 1992 in Murrieta, California. Mother a singer, father a marine and then a USMC recruiter.” Logan glanced up to meet Key’s eyes for the first time. “Sounds like an interesting recipe. Mom wants an entertainer, dad wants a warrior.” When Key continued his silence, Logan’s bright, beady, eyes returned to the open file on the table top. “On the basis of your college record, you apparently decided to be both. Wrestling star and drama club president. Managed to excel at both.”

      “You left out the strawberry shaped birthmark on my left buttock and my date for the senior prom,” Key finally said.

      “I’ll make those notations when I give a shit,” Logan replied.

      Key glanced back at Strenkofski, who looked as if she were molded by a paper-thin coating of ice. “It was Destiny Arnold, by the way,” he said pleasantly.

      “Sorry?”

      “My prom date,” Key replied. “Smartest girl I ever met.”

      Strenkofski looked like she wanted to guess why, but hid behind a small, tight grin.

      Key turned back when Logan’s voice cut through his bonhomie. “How’s your health?”

      Key returned the gaze, at half-intensity. “You tell me. You obviously know more than I do, since Doc W wanted me decommissioned, and you, apparently, wouldn’t hear of it.”

      “We have a ‘three conks and you’re out’ rule in the Marines, Corporal.”

      “Don’t I know it,” Key retorted. “I was counting on it. De-comm was doc’s idea, not mine.” He glanced back at Strenkofski again with another pleasantry. “Supposedly that kind of thing is a medico’s prerogative but not today, apparently.”

      “Not today,” Strenkofski echoed then waited.

      Logan waited until Key returned his attention. “Not here, not now,” he agreed. “A supervising commander has full discretion to dictate the service of any active marine.”

      Key perked up at that piece of the puzzle. “You don’t have to quote regs to me, sir. I’m sure you know there’s a reason I’m still a corporal at my age. That aberration notwithstanding, I know the regs by heart.”

      “Yes, I know you do, Corporal Key,” Logan said clearly, trying to establish rank without question. But when all Key did was continue to show him his knowing little smile, he went back to studying the file. “And you know how to bend them just to the point of breaking. No reprimands, no blots, no arrests. I can’t even find an official warning.” He looked back up. “You’re still a corporal because the men who could promote you just didn’t like you.”

      “No, sir, I disagree,” Key pleasantly, but immediately, responded. “I think they liked me. I think you’ll like me too. But I also think that they, like you.” He turned quickly to the blonde. “And you.”

      “Don’t trust you,” Logan interrupted, again trying to regain control.

      Key looked back at him, his smile now dusted with slight resentment. “No, sir, I don’t think it’s that. Ask anyone I’ve served with, or under. They trusted me with their lives, sir, and I did my utmost to deserve that trust. No, the people who could promote me didn’t like the fact that they couldn’t predict what I’d do. And that, in a marine grunt, is not conducive to promotion.”

      Both men looked up when they heard Strenkofski’s quiet realization. “Too smart for a private, too pensive for a sergeant.”

      Key smiled, nodded, and pointed approvingly at her. “Bingo. You may give Destiny Arnold a run for her money after all, ma’am.” Key waited until the blonde reacted to his comment with a hastily-concealed expression of being flattered before turning back to face Logan—who was not even trying to conceal his expression of growing anger for losing control of the debriefing. He resumed flipping through the report.

      “I will attribute this borderline insubordination to post-trauma stress,” Logan said.

      “It isn’t, sir,” Key informed him.

      Logan’s impatience was growing. “Oh? What is it, then?”

      “Impatience,” Key assured him. “We both know why we’re all here.”

      The Captain’s look of amazement turned to one of begrudging admiration. He slapped the file closed, leaned back, and crossed his legs. “All right, I’ll bite,” he announced, clearly deciding that if he couldn’t beat him, he’d join him. “Why are we all here?”

      Key put his hands up. “You told me so, yourself, sir. ‘A supervising commander has full discretion to dictate the service of any active marine.’