‘Military Base 79 Zulu,’ said the Captain.
I frowned. ‘But … there isn’t a Military base on Earth.’
‘There wasn’t two days ago, but there is now,’ he said. ‘There’s a map and other information on your lookups, but be advised we’re still building at high speed so the map isn’t always up to date.’
I headed out of the door with Fian trailing after me.
‘Why would they build a …?’
‘No idea,’ I said.
Next door was a large room containing four Military medical staff. Two of the staff pounced on us, waving scanners. I got an efficient looking young woman with short dark hair. Fian got an elderly man with a beard.
‘Jarra Tell Morrath,’ said the woman.
I was tempted to say I already knew my name, but this was no time to act like a silly kid. She was checking my identity because Alien Contact was classified code black.
I was dragged off into a cubicle and the woman checked my medical records. She scanned the leg that had suffered electrical burns during the Solar 5 rescue.
‘Perfect cellular regeneration,’ she said, and moved on to scanning the rest of me.
I hate medical scans. I didn’t like the compulsory sessions with my psychologist that Hospital Earth inflicted on me when I was a kid, because I didn’t like him trying to nose around inside my head. I didn’t like people nosing around inside my body either, and it always seemed as if doctors spent twice as long scanning me as anyone else.
‘You only have 90 per cent function in your left little finger,’ said the woman.
‘I know.’ I went around this every time some officious medic got a scanner on me. ‘Dig site accident when I was 15. They grew me a new finger, but the nerve connection wasn’t totally stable because my body was still developing.’
‘You’re 18 now. The finger could be removed and regrown to give perfect function.’
‘No thank you.’ I firmly defended my finger. ‘It works quite well enough.’
The woman put away her scanner. ‘Your annual inoculation and contraceptive shots are due for renewal in less than two months. We’d like to give you the inoculation shot early, combined with a few special ones. Do you want the contraceptive done as well to keep them in step?’
‘Yes please.’
The woman sprayed a few things into my arm, then lifted my top and held a strange looking object to my stomach. ‘There will be a barely perceptible pain.’
‘Wait a minute! What are you doing?’
‘Taking a genetic tissue sample,’ she said.
‘I don’t want … Ow!’ I glared at her. ‘That was definitely a perceptible pain.’
She glanced at the object and nodded. ‘All done. You’re free to go now.’
I gave her another glare, went out into the main room, and found Fian was already there. The second he saw me, he gave me a look of urgent appeal, used his key fob to gather up his clutch of hover bags, and headed for the door. I collected my own bags and chased after him.
‘What’s the big hurry?’ I asked when we were outside in the corridor.
‘I wanted to get out of there before they decided to take any more tissue samples.’
I giggled. ‘It didn’t hurt that much.’
He gave me a bitter look. ‘It’s all right for you. You’re female.’
‘What?’ I suddenly remembered the doctor’s words. ‘Oh. They’re taking genetic tissue samples, so …’
‘I just want to forget it ever happened,’ said Fian.
I shut up and led the way down to the end of the corridor, tapped on a door with a number 7 on it, and entered. This was a smaller room, containing only one Military Captain. He had a scanner, but only used it to check our genetic codes.
‘Jarra Tell Morrath and Fian Andrej Eklund,’ he said. ‘Jarra, please raise your right hand and repeat the words on this card.’
I took the card, read what was on it, but didn’t manage to say a single word. Aliens were really quite humdrum compared to this white plastic with neat black lettering. I stared at it, utterly grazzed. This wasn’t the Security Oath that civilian advisers and other people with access to classified information had to take. This was the Military Oath of Service. I was supposed to take the full Military Oath!
The structure of my entire universe gently crumbled around me and fell apart. I’d always known it was impossible for me to join the Military because I couldn’t leave Earth. When Alien Contact called me in, I’d assumed I’d be a civilian adviser, but if I was actually taking the full Military Oath then …
Earlier this year, I’d pretended to be a Military kid, discovered my real Military background, and even believed the fantasy myself for a while. This was no pretence and no fantasy. Taking this oath would mean I really was Military. This could not be happening.