Scratch Monkey by Charles Stross

Author:Charles Stross [Stross, Charles]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Charles Stross

War Crimes

I'm going downside on Miramor Dubrovnic. It's my first field mission, and I'm tense as a wire. This is no great treat. They weave me into a dropcap with a quick briefing on local mores and taboos and a GP knife for emergencies and the right costume so I'll blend in, only if you think it's a costume they'll click on you're a hostile and burn you before you can say 'flatline'. Repeat, this is normal , this is what you go to work wearing, this is the way you live, this is who you are -- for a while. They're going to drop me right on the outskirts of a town, which would be big trouble except that the army has cordoned off the countryside around it, which is worse. If we do an external insertion I am going to be very dead by the time they get through raping and burning anything that comes their way. So ...

The dropcap is not a nice experience. It bounces about like a dying man on the end of a rope as I drop through the stratopause, shedding bits of molten heatshield and jinking about to break radar lock. I've only ever ridden these in sim before and I'm so shit-scared it's a good thing I've had no food for a day. I lie flat on my back and stare at the colours on the inside of my eyes as the giant fist of deceleration settles down across my body and then there's a THUMP from outside the cap that rattles my teeth in my jaws. Shit if that's a proxfuse they've locked on got range I'm dead -- but no. The status log in my left eye is coiling green, no angry red flare of hostile sensors bouncing off my skin. Well, they said the ratfuckers were primitive --

There's another Thump, and this time I recognise the sound of my aerobrake cutting loose and beginning to burn. That means we're nearly down so I check my display and see the last kilometre unreeling like a broken spring. There's more deceleration, savage this time, and a final BANG as the dropcap grounds. I'm down and so dizzy that I can barely see. I think I bit my tongue, and I can't smell anything ... I scrabble for the release button and then I'm free and the pod exit light is on and I can push at the front of the capsule. It falls away in a wave of silent heat to let the groundside night in. Yes, I've landed.

Welcome to Miramor Dubrovnic.

I'm standing beside the dropcap in a patch of derelict land. It's night. Trees bulk huge and ominous to either side. Rubble, a stink of decaying garbage, something torn that flaps in the wind. I take a step forward, my heavy woollen greatcoat dragging, then turn round: the dropcap is already disintegrating, silently melting into grey cobwebs of self-digesting ceramic. Right. Now is the time to move: that's critical. If

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