The Legacy of Earth (Mandate Book 2) (2 page)

“Come this way, please.”

So this isn’t the guy who will be interviewing me?

I am led down a long hall, through a heavy steel door, to a white chair. It’s a big office with a bare desk and a gruff-looking man behind it. He gestures to the single chair in front of the desk, so I take the seat.

Even enlistment chairs are comfortable. Damn the world. It’s enough to drive a man crazy. Except, you don’t dare let it be known even if you smell the engine belt burning. Don’t want to get flagged for a psychological evaluation.

“Morning, Mr. Garner.”

“Morning, dude,” I say, trying to sound more experienced than my twenty-two years, but feeling like a sixteen-year-old kid.

Damn, he’s a big, mean, muscular sumbitch. I don’t dare piss him off. I am suddenly curious about military laws regarding assault and how hard it would be for him to hide my body.

He held out a gadget with an imprint for a fingertip. I put my finger into the slot and it pricked me. The
Sarge
—or whatever he’s called, as I don’t recognize the rank insignia—stared at the gadget for a minute, then nodded and put it away.

“I’m Commander Juan Ortega, UNSC Navy.”

So, he’s a
commander
. Just like Mom. Shit.

“But I might just as well have been
Mister
Juan Ortega, Vice President of Marketing, A-OK Corporation. Get it?”

“Uh . . . sorry, what, man?”

“Is that a question, son?”

“It sounded like a question to me, dude. Uh, commander.”

Shit, I almost winced when I said that, and he almost noticed.

He looked me over for a minute. I’m surprised he isn’t playing faux intimidation games, trying to see if I’ll run off before I’ve had a chance to get killed in the line of duty. Everything is so
faux
these days. Wonder if they use faux rifles? Faux bullets. No, I can imagine troopers must use DEWs on a spaceship. I’ve always loved that acronym. I want a
DEW
. I know a few assholes I’d like to use it on.

“It means,” he said, after an impressive eyes-closed ten-count, “that the UN is just a name. Multinationals call the shots today.
They
decided the
personhood
of a corporation is more reliable than people or sovereign nations. And the AI gave them the directive, I’m sure.”

I swallowed hard. Suddenly not feeling so brazen.

“Son, I assume you know how the world works today, behind the scenes?”

“You mean how the AI is running things?”

“Yes, quite, and I’m glad to hear you’re up to speed. Makes my job easier. Today, we have no way of knowing how many decisions are made by people or whether our leaders are even calling the shots. No one can complain. It’s impossible to move against the AI because it moves too fast.
Thinks
too fast. We’re done making our own decisions. As a species, we are now confined to an elderly home.”

Changing the subject suddenly, Ortega asked, “Do you know how many babies were born every day on Earth before the invasion?”

What the hell?
That sure caught me by surprise. “No, man, can’t say that I do.”

My phone was vibrating and my watch was rolling a pattern on my skin that meant a
phone call
. I ignored it . . . for now.

“Try a third of a million!”

“Third of a . . . holy shit!” I blurted. It was the blood pressure talking. I don’t like being laughed at.

“Yes, indeed!”

Whatever his angle was, it wasn’t intimation. That I could handle—I’d even expected it. But the passive-aggressive jarhead got his power trip by other means.

He smiled, got up out of his chair, came around the desk and sat on the corner near me. Then, he pretended to be disseminating top secret information with the tone of his whisper. “Do you know how many people are born every day
today
?”

This question bothered me. What was he getting at anyway? “No, man,” I said. “Can’t say that I give a shit, either.”

“Less than twenty-five percent of the pre-war numbers. Mostly in rural areas worldwide. It’s impossible to keep newborns a secret when every phone and computer is essentially wiretapped. When the AI finds out, that town is sprayed.”

“What?” I said. “No . . . uh, sir. You must be mistaken. There were kids when I was still in high school, few years back. And what about China, India—”

“How old?” he said.

“Uh—”

“What was the youngest child you remember seeing?” he said.

“Oh, I never drove by the elementary school, but there were middle school kids . . . fifth graders. I had some cousins.”

“Ah-ha! Fifth grade, you say. That being about eight years ago when you started high school?”

“Look, man, what are you getting at?” I said, getting pissed over the whole damn conversation.

He snapped his fingers and walked back to his chair, and at this point, I wondered how he had the energy to put on this show for every Joe like me who came into his office. Am I a special case? Sure I am! And so is every guy who sits in this damn recruitment chair. I’m ready to leave now.

“We were
gassed
. Old-school chemical warfare of the worst kind imaginable, because it didn’t kill us—it
changed
us. Made us malleable, passive,
emotionally sterile.
”

He paused to let that sink in, and it damned well did, because I felt myself getting angry. I’d heard the rumors. Everyone knew but few could prove it aside from the lack of baby strollers and car safety seats you used to see in the old days. Now I was hearing it from someone in the government.

“That pisses me off, man!”

“Yes, indeed! If you’re human, a survivor of a heinous attack on our sovereignty—on our ability to
choose
our own future—then you should be outraged!”

“I am, dude—uh,
commander
,” I said, while thinking this commander was too good at hiding his emotional state from the scanners or he would have been sent to a padded room a long time ago. I need to learn his trick!

“Son, the reason I’m telling you this is
not
because I’ve lost my marbles. Abortion is illegal. Did you know that?”

“What the hell? That’s ridiculous, man. And, what’s the point of this conversation, man?”

I’m definitely getting pissed now.

“Why is that ridiculous?” he said.

I stared at him suspiciously. “Because,
sir
, it’s been legal for like a century.”

“New executive order overruled Roe v Wade. It was kept quiet. If your girl goes into a clinic, she’ll be taken care of—quietly and until she delivers. They’ll say she has cancer or something. She loses her personal rights until the child is born.”

“Bullshit!” I said, full of suspicion. “What game are you playing, man? Trying to get me to confess some illegal belief that gets me drummed out? Playing the old game, ‘
By the way, do you like naked women?’—
don’t ask, don’t tell. This is something like that, isn’t it?”

Ortega leaned back in his chair, mentally counting to ten or something. Finally, he met my eyes again. “Nothing like that, son. You have my word, I’m not playing games with you. Babies are now a matter of national security. In fact—”

He ruffled through some forms in a drawer—suspiciously
not
on his padd—and pulled out a legal form, held it out for me to inspect. He would not let go of it, but held it while I read.

“Pregnancy bonus?” I said, dumbfounded. My phone was about to shake itself apart with so many back-to-back calls. I shook my wrist—a gesture that told my watch to shut-the-fuck-up and go into silent mode.

Ortega ignored me. “That’s right, and this is
off the record
, son. If you consent by signing this contract, your dearly beloved will be granted
ex post facto
benefits from the first day of her pregnancy.”

“I see. So, when I sign up, I get my girl to sign up too—in a different way. Or she will just
disappear
into some damned federal concentration camp for those afflicted with the condition known as
having a fucking baby
!”

“Y—yes, in a matter of speaking,” Ortega said, grimacing. “
If
you can get her pregnant, that is. That’s the part we don’t fully know yet. And, by
we
, I mean, the doctors, scientists.
We
don’t know if the airborne attack affected just the libido or the reproduction system as well because other things were changed.”

I was visibly angry and he knew it. “Tell me something, Commander.”

“Yes?”

“When did this country become a fascist regime?”

“Why, Mr. Garner! Outside of this building, it
is
the United States of America. In God they trust. Land of the free, home of the brave. Nothing has changed in that regard.”

“Oh, spare me the speech, man! I don’t go for that hooyah bullshit. Why else do you think I’m at the UN enlistment office?”

“Mr. Garner . . . the United States as we know it no longer exists. The executive order began as a Security Council directive made privately—by courier—to the top twenty nations. Those that don’t heed the warning will implode in a single generation. Remember, the world loses a third of a million people
per day
. Age, cancer, disease, accidents, murder—any number of usual and unusual causes. That is devastating to smaller nations.”

I mulled his words over for a moment. “So, the Defense Force is—”

“—looking after the unborn. The next generation is a paramount emergency. We were
attacked
, son! As a species! I’m supposed to encourage you to go
home
, find yourself a nice girl—or a bad girl, whatever works for you—get married if that suits you. And try to knock her up. The population is dropping rapidly. We have a few more years before it affects the economy, but it’s already a problem. There will be a huge generation gap if we fail to counter it. If it weren’t for the religious extremists—”

“Wait, how did you know?” I said, my position feeling tenuous. “About me being . . . you know?”

“I’m a trained interrogator, Mr. Garner. I can tell just from the expressions on your face. You don’t need to say a word. There are a few like you. About one in ten thousand. Most young people have all of their native behaviors except the desire to . . . reproduce. Have you noticed?”

“Yeah, who hasn’t? What’s the government doing?”

“The best we can, son. We are fighting this the only way we know how. By going to the Moon, going to Mars, back to growing our own food, back to making
real
babies
again. Not relying on the damned AI to feed and clothe us, despite all of those social services already in place. Despite its authoritarian control of the world.”

I nodded. I didn’t disagree with him but found it difficult to acknowledge that to him.

“I know who you are, Mr. Garner. I know who your
mother
is. So, your name carries some weight over random recruits. You’ll get a good assignment, assuming you don’t fuck up your training.”

I stared at the desk for long seconds, surprised by the sudden change of subject. Finally, I looked up at him, said, “I might just do that.
Some
day. But as of now, I need to get away from here, get this
place
out of my head for a while. I need to get
out!
And, there’s the problem of my
condition
getting noticed
.
”

“Your condition, son, is why I’m suggesting you go home and settle down with a woman. You will be protected. Not with the social services set up by our enemy, but by the UNSC and the US government.”

I sat there quietly for what felt like ten minutes; it was probably only a few seconds outside of my head. I looked at him firmly, my mind already made up. “Okay, I get it,” I said, relaxing my tensed shoulders.

“Glad to hear it. Still want to sign up?”

“Yes,” I said without hesitation.

He sighed, which felt like a victory to me. He said, “Fine. And, it goes without saying, of course, but I must say it anyway: If you serve your country and the world by impregnating a willing and eager partner—then any fraud, any
gaming
the system, will result in loss of all benefits and a dishonorable discharge.”

I grimaced while signing the contract. Ortega stamped his own notary, signed it, and then slipped the paper into a folder with my name on it. Seemed a strange contrast to the digital way of things. Usually, only a thumbprint was required.

“This will remain in the secure section of your service record, by presidential order. It will never be digitally transmitted or duplicated, because technically—”