“What about this one?” Ellen pointed to the blue dot.
“The blue dot is the location of the C2ID2 monitor. The green ones are surveillance bots set up around camp. You want to make sure you and the monitor are well out of range before setting off one of the charges.” He sent Ellen off with the monitor and Rosette and Barbara off with additional simulated satchel charges.
Deborah sat down on the ground beside Hiram. She handed him a protein bar◦– this one labeled blackened tuna. He cringed, recalling the last time he’d tasted the so-called tuna, but accepted the snack. “They are learning well?”
“And quick. I thought the technology would be a problem. Most have taken to it easily.” He took a bite of the protein bar. “Emma and Justine’s ability to pick up the maintenance procedures on the combat robots surprised me.”
“They both worked as forced laborers in a Vichy munitions factory before being sent to Camp Joffre,” Deborah said. “Those places are dangerous. The foremen probably made them fix the machines themselves rather than risk Gentile lives to a random spark.”
“Well they both know how to turn a wrench, which could come in handy down the road.”
“Do you think we’ll be ready when the time comes?”
“I am amazed at how far they’ve come already.”
“What did you expect? You’ve given us a reason to fight. If not for our lives, then for those of our loved ones. Now we have the means as well. We certainly don’t feel helpless.” She leaned over and kissed Hiram on the cheek. Then she was up again, moving, distributing high protein, high carbohydrate snack packs to her fellow soldiers.
He touched his cheek. Hiram had been at war too long - even before this time travel incident. How long had he been fighting? How many years had he been at it? He remembered a girl back home, the one he’d seen blown to bits by civil unrest. She had been the one to suggest he join the damned service in the first place. She had once kissed him like that.
Soon, these women would be reunited with their families and Hiram could focus on what to do about his situation. Maybe he could take a chance at a normal life here in 1942. He laughed to himself. He was a soldier. He didn’t have time for such things◦– not now.
1930 hours, Friday, July 10, 1942, Pyrénées-Orientales Department, Vichy France
Hiram’s CDID2 chimed. He pulled up the infrared view. One of the drones detected an intruder four hundred meters north of the campsite. An armed man headed straight towards their campsite, moving with purpose.
Hiram switched to the daylight camera. The man carried a primitive shotgun and he appeared to be tracking something. A hunter!
His soldiers provided an audience. They had heard the chime, knew what it meant. Deborah joined him, translating for the group.
“A wolf?” Rosette said.
“No. We’ve got company. Turn down the lights.”
Frieda made it to the small control unit at the center of the camp and turned down all the surrounding glow lights. Hiram watched the display. The hunter paused when the lights went out, then continued at an even quicker pace.
“Kak,” Hiram said. Shit.
Deborah said, “What do we do?”
“We don’t take any chances.” On Hiram’s signal, the women assumed their preplanned defensive positions around the perimeter of the campsite as they had during the previous day’s exercise. Hiram found a spot along the hunter’s presumed path and waited with his Taser in one hand, pistol in the other. He hoped to take the man alive and decide what to do with him later.
As the hunter passed Hiram’s location, the unmistakable zip-zip of an M22 rail gun cut through the air. The hunter spun around on impact, blood blossoming from his chest. Further along the path, almost hidden from his line of sight, Barbara knelt under a low hanging branch.
“He would betray us,” she said, her weapon now lax in her arms. “We must save our families.”
1935 hours, Wednesday, July 15, 1942, Pyrénées-Orientales Department, Vichy France
Barbara sat close to the heater. Three other women, Danette among them, sat nearby as well. They spoke to one another quietly. Hiram made out a few of the words, though the topic of their discussion eluded him.
After the incident with the hunter, Hiram doubted his judgment in training all of the women with weaponry. The look in Barbara’s eyes after she had taken the shot concerned him. He told himself fear forced her to pull the trigger.
They had buried the French hunter four days ago in a subtly marked grave about a kilometer from camp. Each of his soldiers gathered around and offered prayers for the man who now lay beneath the dirt. Barbara’s prayer seemed sincere. Still, her eyes worried him.
Deborah shot out of the woods behind him, out of breath. She crouched next to him and lifted the sixth-generation night vision goggles away from her eyes. “I wish I had these when I was a kid. I could have been the cache-cache champion of the village.”
“Cache-cache?”
“Hide and seek.”
“And the others?” he asked without taking his eyes from the four women seated around the heater.
“We surrounded the camp. They’ll be popping up-” She paused a moment, then said, “Now.” Four women walked into the camp, surrounding those by the heater.
“Did you find the mark?” Hiram said.
Deborah pulled out a surveillance sensor Hiram had hidden before the exercise began. About an hour ago, he sent the women out in search of the sensor with only the night vision gear and a pre-programmed map of the area around the camp. He monitored their progress on the C2ID2.
“Good work,” he said, not taking his eyes off Barbara.
“Want to know what they talk about?” Deborah said.
Hiram looked at her, the flush of her cheeks obvious even in the pale glow of the lights. He nodded.
“They miss their families,” she said. “Sounds like mostly their husbands. Barbara said she would give anything to hear him snoring in her ear once more.”
“You’re joking.”
She shook her head. “Danette lost her husband well before this hell started. Ellen’s husband had a heart attack when the police came and rounded them up. Barbara’s husband disappeared from the camp. At least that’s what she heard.”
“And Rosette?”
“Rosette won’t talk about it.”
Hiram touched Deborah’s hand as she passed him the sensor. “What about you?”
She giggled, almost childlike. The adrenaline still pumped through her from the recent game of hide-and-seek. “No husband for me. My father tried to arrange a marriage once. Complete disaster. He didn’t try that again.”
He tried not to laugh. “Not the marrying type?”
“I don’t plan on being an old maid if that’s what you’re asking. One day I suppose.” She dug something out from under her fingernail and flicked it aside.
After a moment, Deborah took the C2ID2 from Hiram. This particular unit spent time in everyone’s hands. “Is the drone still grounded?”
“Yup. Fog this morning, wind this afternoon. Feels like we’ve got a storm moving in now.”
“What about him?” She pointed to the small recon robot. The women decided to name him Souri, or mouse, after seeing how he fit into tight places.
“Too far away. He’ll never be able to cover the distance before we need to move in.”
“Then we pray for clear skies tomorrow.” She put her hand on his for a moment, then stood, pocketing the surveillance sensor. “I’ll go prep for the next group of seekers.”