Broken Angels Read Online Free PDF Page B

then the commandant sagged back in his seat.
    â€œSergeant,” he bellowed hoarsely.
    The door opened.
    â€œSergeant, get Wardani out of ’fab eighteen and take her to the lieutenant’s shuttle.”
    The sergeant saluted and left, relief at the decision being taken out of his hands washing over his face like the effect of a drug.
    â€œThank you, Commandant.” I added my own salute, collected the authorization hardcopy from the desk, and turned to leave. I was almost at the door when he spoke again.
    â€œPopular woman,” he said.
    I looked back. “What?”
    â€œWardani.” He was watching me with a glitter in his eye. “You’re not the first.”
    â€œNot the first what?”
    â€œLess than three months ago.” As he spoke, he was turning up the current in his left arm and his face twitched spasmodically. “We had a little raid. Kempists. They beat the perimeter machines and got inside, very high tech considering the state they’re in, in these parts.” His head tipped languidly back over the top of the seat and a long sigh eased out of him. “Very high tech. Considering. They came for. Her.”
    I waited for him to continue, but his head only rolled sideways slightly. I hesitated. Down below in the compound, two of the militia looked curiously up at me. I crossed back to the commandant’s desk and cradled his face in both hands. The human eye showed white, pupil floating up against the upper lid like a balloon bumping the roof of a room where the party has long since burned itself out.
    â€œLieutenant?”
    The call came from the stairway outside. I stared down at the drowned face a moment longer. He was breathing slackly through half-open lips, and there seemed to be the crease of a smile in the corner of his mouth. On the periphery of my vision, the ruby light winked on and off.
    â€œLieutenant?”
    â€œComing.” I let the head roll free and walked out into the heat, closing the door gently behind me.
    Schneider was seated on one of the forward landing pods when I got back, amusing a crowd of ragged children with conjuring tricks. A couple of uniforms watched him at a distance from the shade of the nearest bubblefab. He glanced up as I approached.
    â€œProblem?”
    â€œNo. Get rid of these kids.”
    Schneider raised an eyebrow at me and finished his trick with no great hurry. As a finale, he plucked small plastic memory-form toys from behind each child’s ear. They looked on in disbelieving silence while Schneider demonstrated how the little figures worked. Crush them flat and then whistle sharply and watch them work their way, amoebalike, back to their original shape. Some corporate gene lab ought to come up with soldiers like that. The children watched openmouthed. It was another trick in itself. Personally, something that indestructible would have given me nightmares as a child, but then, grim though my own childhood had been, it was a three-day arcade outing compared with this place.
    â€œYou’re not doing them any favors, making them think men in uniform aren’t all bad,” I said quietly.
    Schneider cut me a curious glance and clapped his hands loudly. “That’s it, guys. Get out of here. Come on, show’s over.”
    The children sloped off, reluctant to leave their little oasis of fun and free gifts. Schneider folded his arms and watched them go, face unreadable.
    â€œWhere’d you get those things?”
    â€œFound them in the hold. Couple of aid packages for refugees. I guess the hospital we lifted this boat from didn’t have much use for them.”
    â€œNo, they’ve already shot all the refugees down there.” I nodded at the departing children, now chattering excitedly over their new acquisitions. “The camp militia’ll probably confiscate the lot once we’re gone.”
    Schneider shrugged. “I know. But I’d already given out the