Empyrean Iris Story Collection Vol. 3

The Steel Eye Files 1

What happens when Adam says: He wants to help

***

Ash coated the ground like snow.

Sharp winds whipped cinders into the air, painting the sky black, and reducing visibility to almost zero. The overhead flood lights in the forward operating base had been shut down, unusable as the light's reflection off the ash made the visibility worse not better, producing a halo of defused light that was simultaneously blinding and completely useless.

Two infantry men hunkered behind the protective tarping of a pop-up guard station, the tarping facing the wind and blocking the worst of the ash, though that didn't stop flurries of the stuff from spilling in from the open sides to create little mounds on the floor.

With its similarity to blizzard conditions, it felt like it should have been cold, though the temperature rarely dropped below fifty degrees.

Dim green lights blinked on their helmets casting eerie shadows over their faces.

One of the men looked through a night vision monocular, though he didn't see anything worthy of note.

They heard it rather than saw it, the sound of an engine over the flapping of the tarping, and one of the men stood upright, while the other crouched to cover him. Diffused red light approached through the ash, like a herald of hell, and they watched as a ground transport vehicle rolled slowly up the path, moving at a pace so glacial it made snails and slugs seem excessive.

The first man stepped forward into the path of the vehicle, unconcerned about potentially being run over as he could walk faster than the vehicle was going. The ground vehicle pulled to a halt, red light glowing over his body and he motioned for the driver to roll down the window.

They did, though reluctantly, and he stepped over to the window.

"ID." He said

Inside the vehicle two men presented ID badges. One was a ground transport grunt, and the other, Admiral Ablemen, who members of the forward operating base had not-so-lovingly nicknamed Dr. Frankenstein. From looking at him you would never have been able to tell the kind of bullshit he was involved in. Some of the women on the base might have described him as a silver fox type, the kind of man who aged annoyingly well in comparison to everyone else, keeping his looks while his hair faded to distinguished silver.

He had been a popular figure on base, respected by his soldiers before.....

Well

Before everything.

The man stepped back from the window and waved them through with a hand before returning to his station in the tent.

Over his com radio he heard, "Who was that?"

"Admiral Evil, who else?"

Beside him the other infantryman shivered and crossed himself.

He raised an eyebrow, "I Thought you said you didn't practice anymore."

"I'm don't."

The two men fell into an uneasy silence.

"Creep."

Up the road, the ground transport pulled into the open end of a collapsible ground shelter and the engine was shut off. The two men stepped from the interior and were greeted by a nurse in stained blue scrubs flanked on either side by two very uncomfortable looking infantrymen, doing their bese to conceal their faces behind goggles and neck scarves. One of their faces held the perpetual Grin of a gaping skeleton as the pattern on his face covering concealed his own expression underneath.