So many cruel equations.
He remembered the first contact with what Colonel Devers had euphemistically called “The Project.” It involved using a direct contact with the human brain to manipulate the prosthetic hand he was going to be fitted with. Wires going from just above the left ear to control the right hand. The brain just was that way. Right brain controlled left side of the body and vice versa. Soon he would do the surgery to put the implant in. It was designed to look like a cochlear implant for the deaf, the kind of implant that gave hearing to the deaf. They were going to pay him over $100,000 for it. Still, he would forgo the riches just to be able to get his hand back. If it worked out that he could help other vets, it might just be worth it.
* * *
James read more of Fletcher’s Inside Rehab. He found several points of interest. Insurance companies and state-supported treatment regarded it as a situation of having two silos of cash. One for chemical dependency and another for mental health. James thought the separation could be a blessing. His experience with mental health commitment led him to the belief that mental health was a disaster looking for a place to happen. In such treatment the practitioners actively tried to “break” people, ostensibly to create a surrender of sorts, like the embrace of sobriety found in CD treatment. Giving mental health practitioners license to assault people was dangerous. That the assault was not physical mattered not to James. It was still fearful and daunting.
If those silos got linked, it could mean an assault of depressive proportions. A new dystopia of trapping people in substandard health care.
He thought of Hank Sadler and the league of funny hats. Hank was the man who told James he had a good case for getting veterans’ benefits.
Hank had looked over the military records and found a loophole. James could contend he had come to a disability not just from having a mental illness but by merit of the fact that the Marines had made a pre-existing condition worse. The Corps had intensified and exacerbated his medical condition. It didn’t matter if it was a malady that the Marines had not known about.
James had a security clearance from typing in a secured facility. He had a meltdown of sorts when he came back stateside. He broke some windows and threw a beer bottle into a picture window, smashing it.
They sent him to see the doctor and he told the doctor of his prior commitment as a juvenile. He was out of the Corps and a civilian in six short weeks. Records like his prior commitment were usually sealed. His security clearance had been arranged through the Office of Personnel Management and they had done a poor job. They made phone calls and checked police records but James’ juvenile record was sealed, so James got his clearance.
Now the people with the Syntheris test wanted him to wear a virtual reality helmet and play video games. Whatever were they going at with this? Top-secret helmets and a mood-stabilizer drug. It was all secret and ever so psychedelic. He loved the video games. He would have three seconds to lock onto 15 targets and fire missiles at all of them in one huge shot. Over and over again, in various configurations, the helmet’s virtual reality visor would present targets and he would shoot them down.
James drank his coffee, smoked his tobacco and thought about smoking pot. His mind was clear so he thought about what Sean had said to him. They had been talking about Ecstasy, methylene dioxy methamphetamine. Some people were doing couples therapy with this old designer drug left over from the late ’70s.
The drug made people want to touch. Couples found they could get one treatment with MDMA and have it be the equivalent of months of talk therapy with a psychologist. The high was also attractive. It caused couples to feel as if they were “on the same plane.” It reinforced their bond in many ways.
Sean had told James to lighten up on the disorganizing quality of the marijuana. MDMA may be good for couples but the pot just turned you into a rock. Still, he enjoyed being a rock now and then.
James thought of Hank Sadler and the league of funny hats. All those Legion posts and VFWs. They all wore garrison caps with little insignias and badges on them. Hank had no clue as to what virtual reality helmets were about.
But if it kept the cash coming in, it was okay with James. Getting $600 a month to play video games was a cool dilemma. And if Doctor Witherspoon could help James get his disability payments, then it was all great.
Winning VA benefits was like arguing a tough case in a courtroom. Evidence and doctors’ reports. All submitted to a jury of veterans and experts.
The VA, no doubt, had a lot of experience with substance abuse issues. Alcohol and prescription drugs was cutting a swath through the ranks of the vets returning from Afghanistan and Iraq. These were kids coming back with amputations and shrapnel wounds. Lots of painkillers.
James thought about finding an NA meeting just for medical professionals. Doctors and nurses used to stealing oxycodone pills from the very patients they were tasked with assisting. Perhaps there he could share the unique perspective of being from a medical family and simultaneously being a recreational drug user. It caught him quite unprepared but the thought was there. If pot went legal he would have no problem. But who wants to wait for the law to change.
There was still that thing about “surrender.” He felt there were things wrong with it. In life sometimes you had to stand your ground. Times were changing. You could not just smoke a joint of pot in the street but the NA people he was meeting looked at his pot habit and said, “That’s just an herb. Unless you’re smoking crack, meth, or heroin, you have a small problem.”
He remembered hearing a man talk about a drug deal where he realized his dealer was a cop. The deal was going on through the open driver window of a 4x4 truck. The customer realized something was wrong and punched the gas pedal and tore off with the cop stuck half in the driver window. The cop was dragged a hundred feet and then let go. The cop had been wired for sound, wearing a wire. The sound was so distorted and garbled that when the police had tried to get an incriminating statement on tape, all they had was the pleas from the undercover cop as he tried to complete his bust and survive the ordeal at the same time. There was no arrest other than for dragging the cop down the road.
Those were the adventures James was hearing about. He packed his one-hitter pipe and settled in for a smoke. He settled in with his herb and the dedicated confusion that came with marijuana intoxication. He got high for 45 minutes and settled in with coffee and a cigarette.
His high came at a small price but if he wanted to be a nurse, he considered relocating to somewhere that pot was already legal. Perhaps Colorado. There was great skiing in Colorado.
But he would miss his friends. Still, Sean was a friend and there were no addiction issues there.
* * *
Tanner mixed some of his pain pills and some whisky. It was a nice feeling. He found he could position his right wrist on the steering wheel of his car and still drive almost as well as he could with his hand.
It was snowing out. These were the days of Minnesota in winter. A calm downfall of downy flakes coming in. They reminded him of the mountains of Afghanistan. Little people wrapped up in shrouds and shirts down to their ankles. Pashto being spoken with no clue as to what was being said.
Women in coats and burkas. Children in bright colors. Men with guns. Heroin. Afghani soldiers stoned on God only knows what. Opium, pot, heroin, who knew for sure, but you could tell they were stoned by the way they swayed as they tried to stand still. You could see it in their glassed-over eyes.
His own eyes were a bit glassy but not like the Pashtuns he had seen in Kabul.
He thought about the Syntheris, the implant and the helmet. It was obvious what was going on. The helmet and implant had military applications. This was as much innocent video games as was a drone aircraft loaded with real hellfire missiles guided by troops taught how to kill from video games.
It was only a matter of time before the end effect was put into motion. Soon he would be tested on the real thing. It was only a matter of time
now. With the latest occurrence of ISIS terrorism in Paris, there could only be one application for this new hardware. He was being directed back to the Middle East. No matter how he got back, there was clearly the push in that direction. The only question was would he be less of a man than before, thanks to the grenade? Or would he be more, with the implant?
* * *
“They are experimenting on us,” said James.
“Well, aren’t they supposed to do that? It’s a trial of a new experimental drug,” said Sean.
“Yeah, but this goes more than that. Have you ever heard of the science fiction novel called Ender’s Game?” said James.
“Yeah, that’s the one where the kids go to space camp and learn to defeat each other. It ends when the kids play a video game that kills off the enemy of the human race while the kids think they are just playing a video game. I have heard of it. It’s a movie. Came out three years ago,” said Sean.
“Well, they are doing video games with us. Air war. Fighter jets,” said James.
“There is no call for that sort of thing anymore. Russia lost a jet around Thanksgiving but people don’t send fighter jets out to go beat each other up anymore. That’s antique. I mean, yes, there is deterrence with Russia but ISIS is the big threat now. They don’t use jets,” said Sean.
“I don’t have all the answers yet but I am collecting data. They reactivated my security clearance. I am not supposed to be talking about it,” said James.
Sean looked relaxed. “All we have to care about is that you are not going back to combat. You’re safe. You live in Minneapolis.”
James looked at his friend and smiled. “Yeah, man, you’re right. All is well. If the Syntheris trial turns out to be video games for the military, then so what. They will get their data from another source if not from me. As far as I can tell they are testing a new drug, but then came the helmet and the virtual reality visor and the video games. I just have no clue as to why the drug is so important to the video games. They aren’t telling me anything.”
“That’s the whole idea to being a guinea pig. They aren’t telling you a damn thing. You get six hundred dollars a month. They should even up with you. You should be getting more money and a straighter answer. You could find your brain hooked up to some weapons system and that’s not cool for six hundred dollars per month.”
James paused for a moment and said, “I think the end result of this is somebody is going to get hurt real bad. The end result of all things military is their philosophy about putting the bad guys into a world of hurt. That’s all they care about. Every weapons system in the world ultimately falls into the wrong hands. Then it just becomes a philosophy of the rich getting weapons to fight against the poor. I have no mercy for ISIS but this is getting wicked. Way wicked.”
* * *
Jerry and Frog were at the bar in Palmers. A policeman was getting charged with murder after killing a suspect. Cameras on phones were changing the whole face of law enforcement. Now with smart phones the whole experience was moving toward a change from the dominance that voters put into their local police.
For the first time the technology was supporting a greater knowledge of what was going on in the streets. The general evolution was defending the general traffic of people just going about their business.
For the first time in history the general traffic of people had a tool in hand to defend themselves from excessive force. This did not sound like much to Jerry and Frog but they were reeling in amazement as police were increasingly getting caught, “red-handed,” abusing people.
“I hope those guys get thrown into prison. It doesn’t matter a damn what people used to do. The change is a ‘now’ thing. It’s what’s happening in our modern culture. I think these characters are just losing grip of what’s really going on. Cell phones are starting to stop police brutality. It’s grinding to a halt,” said Frog.
Jerry scratched his head and puzzled for a moment. “We can actually fight back? That’s new.”
“Never surrender, never give in,” said Frog. “That’s from the movie Galaxy Quest. It’s a parody of Star Trek. It’s very funny but you’d have to see it to understand.”
“I’ve seen it. It’s funny.”
* * *
Lieutenant Andei Sergeiovich looked at his Somalian driver and felt a surge of pride. Here was a global collection of brothers in Islam. The time of the Mahdi must be coming soon. ISIS had taken an airfield from the Syrians under the Assad government and this time they had seven fighter jets captured intact. They were only older MiG-21s but if managed well, they could do great damage to these devils of the west.
Sergeiovich was a Russian Muslim by birth from eastern Russia. At the young age of 42 he had left Russia to fight for the Islamic State. The mosque in Kargan, Siberia, had only a few of the original families keeping the faith, a faith that had lasted for centuries of persecution from the czars and later from Stalin.
He was a pilot and it was his greatest pleasure to serve in the army of the Prophet Mohamed. Here in Syria it was the final chapter in the liberation of the Muslim peoples. He would gladly lay down his life for a Caliph.
His driver leaned forward in the four-door Toyota pickup truck coming onto the air base. There Sergeiovich first saw a glimpse of the silhouette of the impressive outline of a MiG-21 fighter jet, half out of its hangar with its cockpit glass canted to starboard.
The nose of the plane housed the skip spin radar he would need to hunt airliners. He would go aloft into the skies as an ambassador of faith and ambush the devils of the West when they least expected it. It would come as an ambush as laid out in the sword verses of the holy Q’ran.
He reached into the pocket of his jacket and stroked the top of his Russian translation of the holy book. Soon we go hunting together, my friend. Soon.
* * *
Tanner accepted his fate. For $135,000 he would allow the implants to be done for the prosthetic hand. He also was finally told the master plan. Flight simulators at Grand Forks Air Force Base would be dedicated for his use. He would be trained to fly with his new helmet and implants as an advanced gunner on a reconnaissance jet.
He would be schooled in how to receive and approve of up to 18 targets at once. These targets would be air-to-air combat units. He would be going up against the tactics of all the world’s best fighter pilots. He would approve or disapprove the actions suggested by an air war–based strategy computer. All done in three seconds with the prosthetic hand and the virtual reality helmet.
He was in a civilian hospital in a private room. He reached up with his left hand and touched the bandages over his left ear. A huge bandage covered his entire ear and the shaved portion of his skull.
They told him about his airplane. He would be connected to an RF-111. Its bomb bay had been modified with a cylinder cassette of 11 missiles. Sparrows and Sidewinders would be at his command.
He was dually trained in how to target the rockets from remote locations or from a seat directly in the plane itself. He could control the actions of a plane 6,000 miles away. He was being transformed into the ultimate drone pilot. He would be able to shoot down 11 airplanes with one F-111.
He suddenly found his fate to not only be fulfilling, but even exciting.
He felt something else too. He was back in the saddle again. And it felt good.
* * *
“I like beer, Sean,” said James.
“You like some parts of sobriety and some parts of the liquor life,” said Sean. “To what do you want to surrender? There are several paths you can choose. Sobriety is only one of them.”
“But we have been shoved around for so long it seems like we have waited for these privileges for centuries,” said James.
“Indeed we have. But now things are different. Sobriety is a calling, like the draw of God to a priest. Or the call of husband and wife. You cannot do it a little. It’s very binary. It’s either all the way or none at all. At least that’s the twelve-step reality. The therapists
will help you quit a drug and if it’s marijuana you want to leave behind, then go ahead and do it. You will have my support either way.”
“I only need to kick the drugs long enough to get my nursing degree,” said James.
“But what then? After nursing, then what? I think you will find a new reason then and a new answer after that, and so on and so on,” said Sean. “You seem to be on a path. It isn’t festive in the same way but there are moments to celebrate. You have your first-day keychain. I have a black one for two or more years. I have been involved in the scene for half my life.”
“How’s your wife?” said James.
“Oh! Low blow!” said Sean. “I have a few social contacts of the feminine persuasion. My wife and I are under good terms. We share duties on the kids. We divorced well, my friend. I now have a lover and a few friends. That’s all I need. The social ritual of buying you a beer is not my choice but coffee and tobacco are acceptable. Come and let’s grab ourselves some fruit of the bean and a smoke.”
James reached into his pocket and withdrew a pack of Camel Wides. He pulled out one cigarette and lit it.
* * *
Tabqa Air Base had been taken by ISIS in November of 2014. Sergeiovich had arrived in ISIS-held northeast Syria in April of 2015. Now was the first time the MiGs were getting a serious look. Three were in good working order. Two more required only minimal repair. That meant ISIS had a small air force. Sergeiovich was dedicated to being the first Air Force General of the Islamic State.
Many aircraft mechanics lived in Raqa. The ISIS fighters who took the city went on the usual raping, pillaging frenzy of revenge that they had always done when seizing new territory. Eventually, though, the new landlords and warlords settled in and stole everything they could in a much more organized, sober manner. It was then that they discovered the aircraft mechanics.
That was in July of 2015. By October the ISIS-supervised mechanics had gotten the first three MiG-21s operational. Sergeiovich was the first pilot to even think of flying any of these old hangar tramps. Pilots had not been the highest priority to the ground combat forces of the Islamic State. He had carried an AK-47 for the first seven months of his Islamicist career.