The Kinsmen Universe (Kinsmen #1-3) - Ilona Andrews Page 0,22
the opposite side of the planet. It would have made absolutely no difference to her life. The war had dragged on for so long, with both sides claiming they were winning and trying to demoralize the other, that whatever personal victories she had achieved seemed completely meaningless.
Claire stared down to the hazy street below. If she opened the window and jumped, she would fall for about ten seconds before splattering on the pavement.
If she jumped.
To end one's own life was the most unnatural urge, but standing there by the window, she couldn't really muster any anxiety about it. She simply didn't care one way or the other.
"You have fifteen minutes until scheduled departure..."
"Dismissed."
Claire stripped and stepped into the shower. The lukewarm water washed over her. She pushed the knob all the way to HOT, but the water remained mildly warm. Heat, like all other resources, had to be conserved. They were at war.
They had been at war for the last sixty-eight years. War everlasting.
She stepped out of the shower, toweled off her hair, and put on her undergarments and her grey Intelligence uniform with black captain stripes on the left shoulder.
"You have one minute until scheduled departure..."
She stepped into the hallway. The door hissed closed behind her. She took the elevator to the seventh floor, to the mess hall. It was half full, as always, and she scanned it with her mind out of habit. People moved aside for her, an automatic privilege of rank afforded to her captain stripes painted in black. Most had inert minds. A few with a predisposition to psycher activity had thoughts that luminesced slightly, and to the right, at the usual table, four soldiers of her unit glowed. She shut down the mind vision, picked up her tray with a mound of nutrient paste on it, took her vitamin-enriched water, and went to join them.
The psychers stood at attention at her approach.
"At ease."
They sat as she took her usual spot. Nobody smiled. They were at war, after all, and extreme expression of emotion was frowned on, as was bright color, loud noise, and leisure. If they did smile, someone would come up and ask, "Why are you smiling? Don't you know we're at war?"
She didn't examine their minds out of courtesy but she'd learned to read their faces, and she noted the small signs of relaxation: the softening of Nicholas' lips; the way Masha held her spoon, picking at the paste; Dwight's easy pose; Liz's nails, sheathed in transparent coating... manicured nails. Something new.
"Good morning, Captain," Liz murmured. Slight, with thin blond hair cut short, she seemed washed out, her skin nearly transparent, her hair almost colorless.
Claire envied her. Of the five of them, Liz was the youngest, barely seventeen. She still had some impulse, some spark of life. She'd joined the unit last year, and since then keeping her alive during the missions had proven to be a full-time job. It was a job the rest of them shared, but Claire shouldered the lion's share of it.
Liz's brain activity spiked, her thought tentatively brushing against Claire's mind. Claire accepted the communication, opening the link between them.
"I was wondering if I could get a plant," Liz said. "For my room. I was wondering if you knew where I could get one."
"It will be confiscated," Claire responded.
"Why?"
"Because a plant requires nutrients, light, and water. It will be tagged as inappropriate expenditure of resources."
The younger woman recoiled.
"I'm sorry," Claire told her aloud.
Liz ducked her head. "Thank you, Captain."
A vague feeling of alarm tugged on Claire. The other psychers sensed it as well and the five of them turned in unison toward the incoming threat.
Major Courtney Rome was making his way through the mess hall toward them. His psych-blocker implant was on, smudging his mind. Smudging but not obscuring. No psych blocker could lock out a psycher of her level completely.
Her team's minds dimmed around her, as her soldiers snapped their mental shields in place. Courtney couldn't read their minds: they simply reacted to a perceived threat on instinct.
Courtney halted a few feet from them. She liked calling him by his first name in her mind. If he ever found out, he would take it as an insult, which it was. Trim and middle-aged, Courtney wore a flat expression. She looked past the blocker into his brain and saw anxiety churning. He came to deliver unpleasant news. He never brought any other kind.