Danny turned toward the door of the tent. A Marine captain and two of his men had come in.
“I’m Freah.”
“Name’s Petersin. Justin Peterson.” He held out his hand, which Danny shook professionally. “Prisoner?”
“Not exactly,” said Danny. He gestured toward the door and they wen out to talk. The wind was whipping up with a fresh storm; Danny could taste moisture on his lips and his breaths were heavy with the approaching rain.
“I’m in charge of securing the base area,” said Peterson. “I understand you guys have some high-tech gizmos set up.”
“The sensors themselves aren’t that high-tech,” said Danny. “Camera, some IR gear. But what we have controlling them—that’s classified.”
“Oh?” Peterson’s tone was somewhere between a challenge and genuine puzzlement.
“Yeah, I know. It’s a pain in the ass, but I’d like to get some compartmentalization,” said Danny. “I’m thinking my guys work the gear. We feed information to your guys. I don’t know what personnel you’ll have.”
“A company. We can get what we need, though.”
“Company’s fine. I’ll go over the perimeter with you, and you can decide how you want to handle it. We had a similar arrangement with some guys from the 24th MEU (SOC),” added Danny, pronouncing the words as if they were “Mew-sock.” “Seemed to work out. We can get you some of our como gear, but not the helmets we use.”
Danny smiled. “You’d never give ’em back,” he added.
“Okay. I heard a little about you,” said Peterson.
“Me or my unit?”
“Both. You sure you’re not Marines under those black vests?”
Danny knew he was being buttered up—but still, Peterson seemed all right. They’d get along okay.
“So what’s with the prisoner?” asked the Marine.
“Native we found approaching our perimeter,” said Danny. “She’s not really a prisoner. Technically.”
“Don’t think she’s a guerrilla?”
“No,” said Danny quickly. He’d decided he was holding on to her himself until he had things figured out. Giving details of what had happened—such as the fact that she had a gun—would jeopardize that.
He wasn’t just going out on the limb personally here, but potentially endangering the entire mission. Yet he knew that wasn’t the case. She hadn’t been trying to attack them; she was just protecting herself, as he would have done.
Danny was sure he was right. He just needed some time to talk to her, to prove it. Until then, they’d keep an eye on the village. They could take it out quickly enough.
“How can you be sure she’s not a guerrilla?” said Peterson.
Danny shrugged. “There’s a tiny little village in the other side of that hilltop there, down the slope, across a swamp.”
“Going to have to evac it, no?”
“Well, I didn’t want to,” said Danny. “Kinda sucks telling people they have to leave their homes.”
Peterson took of his soft campaign cap, scratching his head. For a Marina, he had relatively long hair—it might measure a full inch. Most of it stood straight up, as if at attention.
“We gotta do what we gotta do,” said Peterson finally.
“Yeah. I know. At the moment, I want to make sure she’s okay, then find out what she’s up to, move off of that.”
“Who we talking about?” said Colonel Bastian.
“Colonel.”
Peterson saluted sharply. Danny introduced him, then told him about the girl—still leaving out the detail about the gun. “She can’t stay here,” said Dog. “What has she seen?”
“She just came to. She hasn’t not gone out of the tent,” said Danny. “I want to see what she was up to.”
“Captain, excuse me a second,” Colonel Bastian said to Peterson.
“Yeah, I have some things to check out,” said the Marine. “Captain Freah, if I could meet you at the Whiplash observation post in an hour maybe? If you can get the radios for us, I’d appreciate it.”
“That’d be good.”
“There more to this than you’re saying?” Colonel Bastian asked after the Marine and his two men left.
“How so, sir?”
“You sound a little protective.”
“No, sir.”
“Why was she unconscious?”
“We had to knock her out to take her into custody,” said Danny.
“You weren’t thinking of setting her free, were you?”
“Absolutely not,” said Danny truthfully. “I’m honestly not sure what to do with her, though. I mean, frankly—she hasn’t done anything except cross an invisible line we set up in the jungle. I’m not sure what I can do. And the local government—from what I heard, it’s best not to get them involved.”
Colonel Bastian had a way of pushing up his cheeks and squinting when he heard something he found difficult to believe. Danny saw that look now.
If this had been Dreamland, Danny would have had the girl in a hood before being transported to the medical area. While she was isolated there, her prints would have been checked against innumerable databases. She’d be in Dreamland-issued clothing. She’d be guarded by two tiers of guards. He’d have a list of legal charges—civilian as well as military—pending against her. All might ultimately be dropped, but they’d be signed and sealed, ready to be used if necessary.