Chapter 4

Helga looked at me sympathetically. "Feeling better, David?"

I told her brusquely, "I'm fine. Let's get started."

She wasn't quite ready to let it go. "There's nothing to be embarrassed about. It's called post-traumatic stress, and after what you've been through these last few days you've all got some. Crying it out in the arms of someone you trust is one of the sanest ways of dealing with it. I've done it myself, a time or three."

I stared at her in disbelief. Crying? Helga? She couldn't be lying, but the concept just wouldn't go into my head. I gave up and walked over to sit two places down from Michael. He had a few large sheets of paper in front of him, and such paper! They were perfectly white, perfectly smooth, with even edges and sharp corners. It seemed almost a sacrilege to see words and lines drawn all over them. Helga had a very big, thick white book with white shapes in a blue circle above the title: NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC ATLAS OF THE WORLD NINTH EDITION. ATLAS and WORLD were much larger than the other words. She seemed almost to be guarding it, while Michael tried not to stare at it greedily.

Helga must have considered that subject adequately dealt with. "I think we've figured out where we're going." She opened the book to a page marked by a long silver ribbon attached to its spine, showing an intricately detailed painting, mostly white and blue with colored lines and tiny words on it. "This is one of the Old People's maps of Labrador and Quebec. We are presently about here," she put her finger on the map, "flying over Quebec forty or fifty kilometers north of Manicouagan Reservoir, which is obviously an ancient impact crater filled with water. Here," she moved her finger several inches up and to the right, "is the Old People's town of Wabush, in the same location as modern-day Waknuk. Your father's farm is around five kilometers south of that. You traveled nearly a hundred and fifty kilometers."

Now I was a mite disappointed. Wabush was just a little black dot below a blue splotch called Shabogamo Lake. We called it Lake Waknuk and I didn't think it reached so far to the north and east. A wide green and yellowish-brown line surrounded Wabush on all but the north side, and there was another dot marked Labrador City just to the north-west where I knew there were only fields and woods. There was a kind of cross-shaped red mark between them and I knew there wasn't anything like that north-west of Waknuk. I looked up again with a wordless question-shape.

"This map was printed over three thousand years ago," Yvonne explained. "I'd be surprised if much of anything is still the same. Lakes fill up with sediment, rivers change course, and the Old People's towns and roads broke up and were buried and overgrown long ago. Only the largest terrain features would match what we see today. Such as that crater, which must be tens or hundreds of millions of years old."

Michael was gazing intently at the map, and the large ring-shaped 'reservoir', taking in every word. "That crater…?"

She tapped the spot. "It's where a huge rock fell from outer space and slammed into the ground, long before humans even existed. It made a hole over eighty kilometers across, and probably twenty deep, then over time the center pushed up to form that island in the middle. Mont de Babel," she mused. "Nine hundred and fifty-two meters. That would be the solitary mountain we see to the south."

"Now I've got even more questions," he complained.

Yvonne smiled indulgently. "That's usually the way of it, but they'll have to wait until after we rescue your friends."

Michael looked dissatisfied, but nodded. Then he touched the ancient map almost reverently, several inches east of Waknuk, or Wabush. "Where's Kentak?" he asked, puzzled. "It should be about here, but the map doesn't show anything."

Yvonne was looking, too. "There may not have been a town there in the Old People's time. They had much better means of transport than horses, so they might not have wanted or needed a town at that location. It's near this Kepimits Lake, so the name Kentak might be derived from that, as Wabush has changed to Waknuk over all this time."

I couldn't help it; I had to know. "What's that?" I asked, pointing at the red mark between Wabush and Labrador City.

"It's the Old People's map symbol for an airport," Yvonne explained, "a place where airplanes take off and land." She almost stopped there, but she could see in our faces that more was needed. "The Old People hardly used zeppelins at all. They considered them too big, too slow, and too expensive. They mostly used jet-powered airplanes," she sent us an image of a sleek, silver machine with a long row of rounded windows along the side and tail blades that looked only a little like the zeppelin's. "They're much faster than a zeppelin, and can fit in smaller places, but since they don't float in the air they can only fly when they're moving very fast." She thought for a few seconds. "More than a hundred miles an hour. They have to run along the ground until they are moving fast enough to fly, and they have to land going just as fast, and then slow down. They need a long, straight, flat, perfectly smooth road called a runway for taking off and landing, places for people and cargo to be loaded and unloaded, and large buildings where they can be protected from weather and repaired. That symbol means one of the Old People's airports was near Wabush, but there would be no trace of it now."

I thought of a goose running across a lake, flapping frantically to get into the air, and nodded.

Helga got us back on track. "Here," she tapped near Waknuk, "is the Inspector's house, east of this southern finger of Shabogamo Lake and about seventeen kilometers north-east of your father's farm. Michael has helped us make up drawings of the surroundings."

He took that as a cue to stop analyzing the Old People's map and spread out his papers. The first one showed us a small settlement, barely a village, with a stable, a smithy, a store, two wells and less than two dozen houses. The Inspector's house was near the south edge, three houses in. Michael's second drawing shrunk that to small shape in the center of the paper and showed fields, fence-rows and foot-paths. Helga pointed to a green X-mark. "We've located five suitable places to drop off our infiltration team, and pick them up again. We call them 'landing zones', or LZs for short. They're all about a kilometer from the objective, or eleven hundred yards. LZ-4, our preferred place to insert the team, is south-east of the target, and the primary extraction point, LZ-1, is south-west."

This wasn't the Inspector I remembered, who had given me one small morsel of comfort when Sophie was captured. This was the Inspector in the next district; Sally and Katherine were in his jurisdiction. I asked, "Why not just go back to the same place? We'd already know the way."

Helga said, "So could the enemy. It's bad operational practice to extract from the same place you insert. I admit the risk is extremely small in this case, since I doubt we're dealing with any kind of trained military force, but I prefer not to take unnecessary chances. The necessary ones are quite enough!"

I could agree with that.

She continued, "We'll make one slow overflight of the place at four hundred meters to check it out. I'd like to use IR and Night Vision, but we don't have either one on board so we'll have to make do with some big-eye binoculars. We do have plenty of those." She picked something black and complex-looking up off the table and took two round caps off one end. "The pupils of your eyes, where light goes in, are five to six millimeters wide in the dark. These binoculars have sixty-millimeter objectives, which means they collect at least a hundred times more light than your eyes alone, and focus most of it into your eyes. They make everything look brighter. Not bright as day, no matter what some idiots claim, but they'll help us see."

I'd take her word for it. Michael looked fairly bursting with questions, but manfully restrained himself.

Her forehead furrowed slightly with concern. "It'll never really get dark tonight, at least not dark the way we like it. It's the middle of June, and we're at almost fifty-three degrees north latitude. That puts the sun less than fourteen degrees below the horizon at local midnight. Even with no moon, the northern sky will still show a little light, and the best we'll get is a deep dusk." She sighed. "Oh, well, we'll deal with it."

I could almost see her shove that in the box of Things We Can't Do Anything About.

"Next, we have Mark and Rachel. I'd like to have Rachel meet us a good distance from both her house and the Strorm farm. David, do you have any ideas?"

I thought on that, and offered, "There's the bank. It runs south of both farms, and if she goes west along the top for a mile or so, there shouldn't be anyone around for a long way." Where I'd met Sophie, and more-or-less started down the path that led me here.

She asked, "Are there trees on the top, or heavy brush?"

I said reflectively, "It's been years, but I only remember a few patches. Nothing much seems to want to grow on it."

She nodded. "That should work. We can stop there at twelve-thirty and have plenty of time to reach the objective by one AM. We'll have to wait until Petra is asleep and we can talk to Rachel directly to find out about Mark. Speaking of, let's get her to call Rachel and tell her our plans. Where is she?"

Michael chuckled. "Petra's in the after lounge, charming the socks off people. You'd think they'd never seen an adorable little blonde girl before."

We all laughed, and he called, "Petra? We need you to talk to Rachel for us again."

She replied with a carefully restrained, "What do you want me to tell her?"

I sent, "Ask her if she knows the bank, the big one that runs south of her house."

We all sort of squinted mentally, then she came back with, "She says yes."

"Tell her we'll meet her on top of that bank, at least a mile west of her house, at twelve-thirty tonight."

She used less power this time, barely a dazzle-roar in our heads. "She'll be waiting. She's kind of all excited inside."

Michael said, "We all are. After we pick up our friends, we'll be on our way to Zealand."

Petra let out a strong happy-shape. "Oops. Sorry, everybody."

Helga signed off with, "Michael and David have to get ready to rescue your friends now."

"Okay."

Michael looked troubled. "Is there some way we can make sure Petra sleeps until morning? I think there will be things we should spare her from knowing."

Yvonne's perfect teeth nibbled her lip. "You may have a point. Doctor?"

A new mind-voice answered, "Yes, Yvonne?"

"I know you won't like it, and I don't either, but we need to guarantee that a certain seven-year-old girl will sleep through the night. We can't avoid what we find tonight, but we shouldn't expose her to it."

"You're right, I don't like it." She continued reluctantly, "You're also right, it needs to be done. I'll have something ready in ten minutes."

"Thank you, Doctor."

I called, "Rosalind, will you do something for me?"

"Of course, David. Anything."

"Would you go to sick-bay in ten minutes and get something from the doctor, for my little sister? Give it to her when she goes to bed, to make sure she sleeps all night."

She didn't answer for several seconds and when she did, her thought-shapes were subdued. "I think that's…not a good idea, but necessary. I'll take care of it."

"Thank you, Rosalind."

Helga was suddenly all business. "Now, we need to teach you both something about what we're going to be doing tonight, and the equipment we'll be using. I see neither of you can keep your eyes off those rifles, so we'll start with them. Michael, pass one to David and take the other one."

He did. I recognized the barrel, trigger and stock, but the rest was unfamiliar. It was entirely black, shorter than the guns I knew, with a short enlarged tube at the muzzle. There was no cock, pan or frizzen, just a long hole in the right side and another in the bottom. The fore-grip was completely separate from the stock, and there was some sort of hand-grip added behind the trigger. There was an obvious thick wire handle folded down on the right side. The sling was also black, ribbed, and with a wide padded section in the middle. I thought of all the sore shoulders I'd gotten from hard leather gun-slings and cursed the unimaginative souls who hadn't thought of this long ago.

Yvonne smiled, stood up and said teasingly, "I've seen all of Helga's toys, and there are a lot of other things that have to be taken care of. I'll leave you to your fun." Helga gave her an extravagant wave good-bye as she left the room.

Helga's voice took on a lecturing tone. "This automatic rifle is what the Old People called an FN-FAL. It's one of several hundred different kinds of guns they made, and the one we decided fit our needs best. If there was one thing the Old People knew how to do, it's pack guns away so they'd last forever. We've found tens of thousands of their guns, still working after more than three thousand years. These two were not actually made by the Old People, but in Zealand, following their designs."

"Before we go any further, can either of you tell me what is the first and most important thing to know about a gun, any gun, no matter how big or small, simple or complex it is?"

Michael said, "How to tell if it's loaded," and I nodded firm agreement.

Helga smiled. "Excellent. I'd go in a slightly different direction: how to be absolutely sure it's UNloaded. Very few things are more dangerous than a gun that's loaded when you think it's not."

We both agreed with her on that.

She continued our quiz. "What's the second rule of gun handling, almost as important as the first?"

I answered this one. "Never point it at anything you're not going to shoot."

She smiled again, almost proudly. "Very good. On this ship, there's an even more important rule —" She switched to thought-shapes, "Never, never point the barrel up!"

"Never!" She regarded us both with a sort of grave concentration. "Up there," she pointed to the ceiling, "is the lift chamber that holds our zeppelin in the air, and it's mostly full of hydrogen gas. There are a lot of precautions taken to keep it safely contained, but they won't stand up to a bullet. At the very least, if we're luckier than anybody deserves to be, it would make a hole, a leak that would cause us to lose altitude. If we're not unreasonably lucky, it would start a fire that would burn the entire zeppelin up in about a minute and kill us all." Her thought-shapes fairly blazed with her need to impress upon us the critical importance of her dictate.

We both nodded soberly and said, "Yes, Helga." I resolved to bear her warning in mind at all times.

"Develop the habit of keeping your guns pointed down whenever you're not aiming at a target. If I see either of you forget that in our training session tonight, I will think of some extremely unpleasant ways to remind you." She regarded us sternly, and when we both nodded she continued, "We don't carry our rifles like everybody else, either. We sling them with the barrel down, on the right side, or left side if you shoot left-handed. I don't recommend that. The FN-FAL is designed to be shot right-handed."

She gestured at the FN-FALs. "The basic form of long guns hasn't changed significantly since the Old People invented them nearly four thousand years ago. You have a stock which you brace against your shoulder, in line with a barrel that shoots something out when you ignite the propellant charge. This is usually initiated by pulling back on a small curved metal trigger under the receiver with your index finger. Your flintlock muskets follow this pattern exactly."

"The biggest difference you will notice is that you don't have to reload these automatic rifles by hand. With some practice you can reload your muskets twice in a minute; with a lot of practice you can get up to three times, but that's about the limit. Has that been your experience?"

Michael repeated an old joke, "I once heard about a man who could load and shoot five times a minute, but the man that said it was a famous liar."

We all laughed at that. Helga nodded approvingly at him and said, "He'd have to be. These rifles automatically load themselves, and they can load and shoot ten times a second. That is not a lie."

I was dumbfounded. One of these guns could shoot more bullets in one second than ours could in three minutes. One man, with one FN-FAL, could kill the entire posse that had pursued us in five seconds. I began to believe what Yvonne had told us, that the Old People had destroyed their world themselves.

She waited for that to sink in. "Just because the gun can shoot ten times a second doesn't make it a good idea. I'm sure you're familiar with a gun's recoil, or kick. How well could you aim a gun that kicks ten times a second?"

Michael let out an ironic chuckle. "Not. You'd wave it all over the place or, it would wave you."

Helga nodded. "Shooting full-auto, as it's called, is a great way to waste all your ammunition and hit everything except the target. The only time it makes any sense is if you're shooting into a packed mob of enemies running towards you at very short range. With a great deal of training, and experience, you could learn to shoot in short bursts, no more than five shots at a time, and maintain control. We don't have time for that, so you will stick with semi-auto if you shoot at all. If you turn your rifles over, carefully, without pointing them at any of us…" She waited as we obeyed her, "…you'll see the fire selector, that little black lever above and just behind the trigger. Right now, both of them had better be pointing to 'S' or I'll have to give you one of those unpleasant reminders for monkeying with it."

We both assured her that they were.

She smiled. "Good. I really didn't suspect you of being that stupid, but other people have disappointed me in the past. Right now it's in the Safe position, and the guns can't shoot. You can put your fingers on the triggers now, and see that you can't move them. If you can, tell me immediately because the gun is broken."

I tried to pull the trigger, awkwardly, and found that it wouldn't move. Michael encountered the same thing.

She waited a few seconds, until we tired of the triggers not moving. "Now you can move your select levers to R, for Repeat." She chuckled. "You can see why they couldn't use another S, for Semi-Auto."

We did as instructed. I found the lever quite stiff, and had to push it rather hard, but it snapped down to point at the R.

"You both noticed that it wasn't easy to change from Safe to Repeat. It's not supposed to be. You don't want to take the gun off Safe by accident. In the Repeat position, the gun shoots one time when you pull the trigger, loads the next round, and repeats that every time you pull the trigger. There are other reasons your guns can't shoot now, so you can go ahead and pull the triggers."

We did that, too. Mine moved smoothly, with a heavy pull, probably to keep us from shooting them by accident. These guns seemed to be loaded with things to prevent them from shooting by accident.

"Now for A, or Automatic. You will find that you can't push the selector past R. If you look at the pivot end of the select lever, you will see that it has a notch in it, and another little spring-loaded lever hooked into the notch. You have to push that lever up while pushing the select lever down and forward, and then all the way around to A." She waited patiently while we fumbled with them until we succeeded. "The Old People's FN-FALs did not have that feature. It was much easier, too easy in our opinion, to set the selector to A, so we added that little lever. Automatic is that ten-bullets-a-second I mentioned. You will not be using it tonight; I just showed you because otherwise you'd ask questions about it, and I'd have to show you anyway. Now move the levers back to S."

We did that.

"You saw that you didn't have to do anything special to take the gun out of Auto. We designed it that way to make it very hard to put them into Auto by accident. I'd like to say it's impossible, but I won't. Every time you think you've made something fool-proof, some damn fool comes along and proves you wrong."

All of us laughed at that one, too.

Helga picked up a round brass object about six inches long, bigger at one end than the other. "This is what makes our guns so much better than yours — the self-contained cartridge. To load your guns you have to pour gunpowder down the barrel, shove a bullet in after it, cock the action, pour priming powder into the pan, and close the frizzen. All of that takes twenty to thirty seconds if you're good. This has the bullet," she pointed to the small end, "propellant charge," she pointed to the middle, "and primer, that little silver button in the base, all in one unit."

She paused to ask, "Do either of you know anything about steam engines?"

We both informed her that we did. Michael's school had covered the basics, and he'd been interested enough to learn more, and share as much of it with us as we cared to know.

She nodded. "Good, that will make explaining this next part easier. When the propellant charge burns, it generates a lot of hot, high-pressure gas that shoots the bullet out of the barrel. Near the muzzle, there where the fore-stock ends, there is a tiny hole drilled in the barrel to let some of that gas out. When the bullet passes that point, gas is forced through the hole into that last piece, the gas block, and back down a cylinder above the barrel. It drives a piston, just like in a steam engine, that pushes the bolt back against a spring inside the bolt cover and pulls the empty brass case out from the back of the barrel. It flips the case out the ejection port, that hole in the side. When the bolt is pushed all the way back, it hits a stop and the recoil spring pushes it forward again. It catches the next cartridge, pushes it out of the magazine and into the back end of the barrel, and the bolt locks into place to hold it in. When you pull the trigger to shoot the next round, the hammer drives a steel pin into that primer hard enough to dent it, causing it to fire, ignite the propellant charge and repeat the whole cycle."

That was all a bit much for me to take in, but Michael asked, "How does that primer work?"

Helga countered, "Have you ever hit a bit of gunpowder with a rock?"

We both chuckled and nodded. At one time or another, every adventurous boy filched some gunpowder and experimented with it in secret. Mystery burns or the smell of brimstone about their clothing gave some of them away, but switchings were an accepted hazard in many of our escapades.

She smiled and shook her head slowly. "What I figured. Boys. Well, that's pretty much how it works. Different chemical, same principle."

She held the brass piece up again. "This cartridge is far too big to fit into any of the guns in this room. It's what the Old People called a 'Fifty BMG' or twelve-point-seven by ninety-nine millimeter. Like the cartridge, the guns it's made for are much bigger than these FN-FALs. As an additional safety precaution, I haven't brought any ammunition that will fit any of these guns into this room — and we will still check that they are not loaded, every time we pick them up. Drill, repetition and habit, until it would take a conscious effort not to follow proper safety procedures."

She put it on the table and picked up a black metal box, about six inches square and two inches thick. "This is another part of what makes these guns work, the magazine that holds the cartridges. There's a spring in the bottom that pushes them up as the gun uses them. Again, this magazine will not fit in those guns. It's made for the bigger guns that use the Fifty cartridges. You will use it later for practice."

She set that one back down and picked up two similar but smaller boxes, about six inches by three by one. "These are the proper magazines for the FN-FAL." She slid them to us. "You will now practice inserting these empty magazines into the rifles. Turn the rifle onto its left side, so the open port is facing up."

We did that.

"Now (-) and [-]," she sent us thought-shapes for the two men we hadn't met before, "will walk you through loading, charging and shooting the FN-FAL automatic rifle. They have a certain talent, and training, that allows them to teach things very rapidly and effectively. Keep your minds open and receptive, even though it might feel a little strange at first."

The man across from me smiled slightly and nodded. "Pick up the magazine and look into the open end. See that there are no cartridges inside, only the follower. That large slot in front of the trigger guard is called the magazine well. Hold the magazine with the open end facing the magazine well, with the longer side facing the rifle's stock. Tilt the magazine and insert the upper front corner into the magazine well first, then tilt it back towards the stock while pushing it into the magazine well until you hear and feel a click."

I listened, and followed his instructions. They had a quality like the thought-shape Helga had sent me, that showed me the way to this room. I knew exactly what every unfamiliar term meant, and what I was supposed to do. It did feel a little strange, but I felt a sense of accomplishment when everything happened just as it was supposed to. The other man had been working with Michael in the same way, and he looked pleased, too.

Both men nodded encouragingly. "Push that small lever on the right side, in front of the trigger guard, forward. Remove the magazine by tilting it forward and pulling it out." I did that. "Pick up the rifle like this and keep it pointed downward. Push down on the bolt catch, on the left side in front of the trigger guard."

I heard and felt a heavy KCHAK! as some part shifted inside, and a similar sound from Michael's gun.

"Good. Now put your right hand around the pistol grip and your left around the fore-grip. Reach up with your right thumb and pull the selector lever down one click to the R position. Put your index finger into the guard and pull the trigger."

This produced a loud click.

"Take hold of the charging handle with your left hand, pull it all the way back and let go. Return your hand to the fore-grip and pull the trigger again. This is called dry-firing, with no cartridge in the chamber."

Again I obeyed. Everything about this gun fitted and moved with smooth precision, showing me how crude and primitive our 'muskets' must be.

"To aim, look through the small hole in the rear sight and align the front sight with the target."

Michael and I practiced, aiming low down on the far wall.

"That is the procedure for loading and shooting the FN-FAL automatic rifle. Insert a full magazine, pull the charging handle and release it, set the fire selector to R, aim and pull the trigger."

He stopped. I shook myself a little, set the selector to S and laid the gun back on the table. As I sat back down I felt almost as if I had been half-asleep, half-dreaming, but I remembered everything clearly.

Helga smiled and said, "You did so well with that, I'm going to show you the other gun we'll be carrying tonight." What she picked up was much smaller, only about eight inches long. "This is what the Old People called a 'Forty-Five automatic pistol, Model nineteen-ninety-one'. The Zealand model differs from the original, which used a magazine holding seven cartridges in a single row. Ours takes a magazine that holds fifteen cartridges in two rows."

We each took one, and the two training specialists led us through their operation, inserting and removing the magazines, pulling back the slides, flipping the safeties on and off, aiming at the wall and dry-firing.

We peered through binoculars, unscrewed the caps of canteens, looked at 'combat knives' that were almost identical to ordinary knives except for saw-like teeth on the blade backs, practiced loading the huge 'Fifty BMG' cartridges into their magazine and popping them out again, then ran through another training session on each gun. Even Michael was beginning to weary of all these interesting new devices.

Helga held up yet another new piece of equipment, a black tube about seven inches long and an inch thick with one enlarged end with what looked like a piece of glass in it. She named it a 'tactical flashlight' and was about to hand them to us when we were interrupted by Petra protesting, loud and bright, "David, do I have to?"

I heard Rosalind explain patiently, "David and Michael are going down to save our friends from the people that want to kill us. If you wake up and have an accident, and distract them at the wrong time, they could get badly hurt, or killed. They might not be able to rescue the others if that happens."

That wasn't enough to satisfy a seven-year-old. She persisted, "Do you really want me to take this stuff?"

I could almost hear our father in my head growling, 'Shut up and take the blessed medicine', and resolved to treat her better than that. "Yes, I do. I know it's not an easy thing, and it's not something we really want to do, but we think it's for the best. Will you please trust us, and do as we ask?"

She digested that for a few seconds, then asked, "Do you think I should take it, Gary?"

He looked at me, surprised and embarrassed, and I shrugged. He nodded to me. "Yes, Petra, I think you should. For all the reasons Rosalind told you, and for some other reasons we don't want to talk about, or even think about right now. We'll explain more of them to you tomorrow, but for now will you trust your brother and your cousin? They both love you, and they would never do anything to hurt you."

She took some time to consider that, too. "Everybody thinks I should take it, don't they?"

Rosalind and I both sent her positive thought-shapes.

"Oh, all right. I'm ready, Rosalind." A few seconds later she said, "At least it doesn't taste awful."

I told her, "Thank you, Petra. I'm sorry we have to do this, and I'll tell you more tomorrow. For now, you're my favorite little sister, and I love you."

She sent a giggle-shape. "I'm your only little sister, silly."

I sent her one back. "You're still my favorite."

Rosalind sent, "Would you like me to stay with you until you go to sleep?"

She sent an almost contented, "That would be nice."

"Then I'll stay. Tomorrow morning, when you wake up, our friends will be on board with us, and we'll be on our way to Zealand. We'll go to the after lounge, look out the windows, and see things none of us have ever seen before. We'll have to ask Yvonne what all of it is."

"That will be nice, too. I like looking outside." Were her thought-shapes starting to get just a touch fuzzy 'round the edges?

Helga smiled. "I'm glad she's taking it so well. Here are the flashlights; listen closely to your teachers."

I took the flashlight, and paid attention. "These tactical flashlights are a lot better than lanterns. Hold it in one hand, not pointing at anybody's face, and twist the back cap clockwise, just a little."

I did that, and the front end lit up. I waved it around a little, shined it on Michael's hand-drawn maps, then turned it towards my face and looked into it. That was a mistake. I turned it away hastily but still saw a dozen little burning spots.

He was grinning at me through the spots. "I'd have told you not to do that, but nobody has ever listened before. You probably won't do it again, though!"

No, I wouldn't. The spots were starting to fade and I saw Michael blinking and squinting the same as me.

He went on, "It's on a low setting now. You twist the back cap to adjust brightness, and the front to expand or narrow the beam. Twist the cap all the way clockwise, until it stops."

Gary turned off the room lights, and I was amazed how bright the little flashlights were, like a dozen lanterns each. We turned them wider and narrower, brighter and dimmer for a few minutes.

He told me, "With practice you'll learn how much light you need for different things. Try to use only that much because the more light you make, the better the enemy can see you. The ring changes colors, but we won't need to do that tonight. Give it a try, though, to get it out of your system."

It was next to the end cap and I clicked it through green, red, blue, yellow, kind of bluish-green and purplish, and back to normal. Some of the colors made things, and people, look decidedly strange. Gary turned the lights back on, we turned the flashlights off, and we moved on to the next strange thing.

This was a wide, long, thick piece of material with parts sticking out and straps hanging from it. We stood up as directed, and I found that it was heavy, too. My teacher instructed me in wrapping the 'ballistic body armor' around myself, making sure the long flaps hung half-way to my knees, front and back, and pulling the shoulder pads over, fastening them with straps. I felt like I was wearing a barrel with a skirt, and said so. They all laughed.

"That barrel will stop bullets," Helga informed me, chuckling. "Not rifle bullets, but you're well armored against the Forty-Fives and your muskets. You can still be shot in the arms, legs and head, but most of your vital areas are protected. You'll find it's not so bad after a little practice, and that 'skirt' covers a few things I'm sure you really want protected!"

I couldn't argue with her about that. We were handed helmets, and shown how to adjust them to fit. Gary joked, "You could cover your head completely, and get better protection, but all you'd be able to do is wander around bumping into things."

"Petra? Petra, can you hear me?" We caught Rosalind's insistent thoughts. "All right, she's asleep. I tried words, too. She looks just like a little angel."

I answered, "If she didn't hear that, she's definitely asleep. We're trying to let her remain an angel, at least a while longer."

One of our teachers mentioned something about an 'IR flashlight' and Michael dragged a few words out of him. Seeing my confused look, he relented and explained further. "We've got IR and UV flashlights, but since we don't have the vision gear for 'em, they're useless. We didn't even unpack 'em. They shine…colors of light that our eyes can't see. If we've got the IR or UV vision equipment, and the enemy doesn't, we can see just fine in what looks like total darkness to them. It's like fighting a blind man — they don't have a chance."

Michael wryly thought-mumbled something about it not being very sporting.

He jumped all over that. "This ain't a sport, boy, it's war! There's no such thing as cheating. You take, and make, every advantage you can get over the enemy, and you don't fight fair! Anything less is treason to your own people. Never give the enemy a break. They won't give you any."

He went on, "Now, that gear's really effective when it works, but it's not perfect. It's complex, and hard to make, so there aren't many of them. It doesn't work well in some weather conditions, or extreme cold, and it can fail just when you really need it. We use it, but there's another solution — you learn to fight in the dark. That's something you can't lose, or break; the batteries can't run down; and the enemy can't take it away and use it against you. It's what we'll be doing tonight."

Helga added, "You guys should have a good start on that, coming from…a society without electricity. You should already be able to function fairly well in the dark. Stick with us, follow our directions, and you should do okay, but remember we're in charge. If any of us tell you to do something, do it. We'll have a good reason. Don't do anything unless we tell you to. You might get in our way, and then we'd have to work around you, making what is already a difficult and dangerous job even worse. Make no mistake, you're not trained. You're just not completely un-trained, and you're less likely to be more of a danger to your friends than our enemies. If you have to shoot tonight…it will mean we're so deep in the shit it won't make much difference."

All four of them continued working with us, going over each gun twice more, having us handle each piece of equipment again and again because it 'added more depth' to the memories we were forming. We were learning more about how to learn than we'd ever imagined. Helga called it 'a crash course in Soldier 101' and laughed.