Read The Lazarus War: Artefact for Free Online

station for psych-eval and a check-up. After that, you’ve earned yourselves seven days of station-leave. Enjoy it.”
    “I’ll try to.”
    “I mean it, Harris.”
    He continued rubbing his neck, and I caught the flash of the tattoo on his wrist – the number fifty-seven.
    He left the bay, and I stood shivering and trying to forget what it was like to die. Hoping that I would never end up like Dyker: drummed out and dried up.
      
    The medteam checked me out. I had the usual tests and the usual results.
    No cerebral feedback.
    The physical pain would fade.
    The stigmata would eventually disappear.
    Lasting brain damage was unlikely.
    They went through the motions. The medtechs had stopped really bothering with the checks. They were cursory and brief; I had proven that I was a stable platform for a bio-engineered killing machine.
    Of course, there were real and practical dangers to operational soldiers like me. An operator might suffer a cardiac arrest, or some extreme sensory overload while jacked into a simulant. Such an eventuality was often fatal, but it was also incredibly rare. Far more likely was a slow psychological breakdown, brought on by the inability to tell reality from a simulation. That happened more often than the Alliance military cared to admit, but such operators were usually identified early in their induction. In my case, after so many transitions, there was nothing more to be said. Unless I crashed and burnt, I would stay on the Programme.
    I showered and dressed in Sim Ops shipside fatigues. I was used to the disorientation caused by transition back into my real body, and the effects faded fast. Olsen would probably find the whole experience disabling, but twenty or so minutes after I had made extraction I felt recovered.
    I left medical and headed down to the inner ring of the station. Kaminski ran to catch up with me.
    “Wait up, Cap,” he called. “You planning on some rest and relaxation? We could head into the District, maybe hook up with some company? Blake, Jenkins and Martinez are coming.”
    “I’ll join you for a drink. Nothing more.”
    Kaminski laughed. “You always get more in the District.”
    A siren sounded nearby. We didn’t flinch – it was a familiar occurrence on-station.
    “This is an emergency,” said a female operator over the Point ’s PA system. “All available military police units attend Sector Five. Terrorist attack in progress.”
    We casually made our way through the crowd of civilians and soldiers, heading away from Sector Five. A unit of troopers in black military police uniforms, carbines shouldered, passed back towards the affected sector.
    “Looks like more trouble,” Kaminski said. “If we’re not fighting the Krell, we’re fighting each other.”
    “The Directorate will never learn,” I said.
    The monorail station was quiet; a handful of off-duty soldiers and Navy boys milling around.
    “Are you taking the monorail?” Kaminski asked. He seemed to realise his mistake immediately.
    “I’ll walk,” I said.
    Kaminski just nodded.
      
    I left Kaminski at the monorail stop and took an elevator further up the hub to Sector Three. This was my ritual, after every simulant operation, and I had to do it alone.
    Sector Three was virtually abandoned. Except for the occasional bereaved parent, it saw little traffic. Mom and Pop spending their life savings on a Q-space ticket, desperate for a last chance to say goodbye to Jonny or Joanne . The place gave me room to think.
    I walked the empty corridors, heading towards the Memorial Hall. I passed view-screens showing the exterior of Liberty Point . It was the largest Alliance forward operating base on the boundary of the Quarantine Zone; housing several thousand troopers, and just as many Aerospace Force and Naval personnel. Not as big as the Venusian cloud habitats, but still a remarkable feat of human engineering.
    Near-space bustled with combat ships and assorted shuttles embarking or disembarking