Free Infernal Sky by Dafydd Ab Hugh

would have been horrified to discover human plans for a New Eugenics to build the future. This is not a plan of the human collaborators. The traitors have their own genetic plans for “improving” that part of humanity the new masters will allow to survive.
    The New Eugenics is a plan devised by our side. The good guys. The ones fighting the invaders. Who knows? Maybe they will deliberately create more computer adjuncts like me! It’s a dead certainty that they will begin making breeding decisions for the survivors on our side. Warriors like Flynn and Arlene will be spared this nonsense. They were born to die in battle. They are too valuable to use in non-military operations. I have accessed plans for them. Theydon’t know it yet, but their time on Earth is limited. Very few people have their skill as space warriors. Flynn is Flash Gordon. Who is Arlene? Barbarella?
    Marines Taggart and Sanders will follow orders even when it involves facing hundred-to-one odds and near-certain death. I’d like to imagine some bureaucrat, human or otherwise, telling them with whom they should go to bed and how many children they are expected to have. They will be spared this future Earth that I believe to be inevitable, no matter which side wins. Times of crisis are made in hell—and made for the kind of man who has a plan for everything.
    Jill and I are to remain on Earth! If Albert is fortunate, he will go with Fly and Arlene. He is too religious a man to stay. Where would he turn when he found out there’s no side for him? Would he try to return to Utah? He doesn’t know about Utah yet. He’ll probably find out today.
    They have a lot to cover today. The service for Ackerman and his staff was held this morning. I watched it on the monitor. So much has happened since yesterday.
    First, the admiral will pretend there was a possibility of sabotage even though the video recordings show that the killings were the result of simple carelessness on the part of one of Ackerman’s staff. Plain incompetence led to the holocaust. Those tapes remain classified, naturally. The possibility of a traitor does more for gung-ho morale than an admission of incompetence. I can hardly fault our new leaders for being students of history.
    Besides, my friends will be receiving a big dose of declassified material relevant to their next mission.They shouldn’t be greedy for too much declassified material all at once. It causes indigestion. Besides, their marine colonel will be giving them a nice dessert.
    I should have a better attitude about this. The other side is so terrible that we should forgive our own shortcomings. Isn’t that what they said when they were fighting Hitler? The doom demons, as Jill likes to call them, are perfect enemies. In the name of fighting them, we can do anything we want. No, it isn’t fair to say we want to do terrible things. We will win by any means necessary, as Malcolm X used to say.

9
    B y the time I joined Fly and Jill, I could breathe easy again. It was Fly and Jill. He saved her. I knew the big lug would. There was no way I could have left a man bleeding to death when I had the training to save him.
    Of course, the navy’s security forces were swarming everywhere by then. I didn’t mind that two of the first of Kimmel’s finest were Mark Stanfill and Jim Ivey, my poker playing buddies (Fly wasn’t in our league).When everything’s gone to hell in a hand basket, personal ID can make the crucial difference in whether somebody panics and pulls the trigger. Ackerman’s facilities had been turned into a zombie cafeteria, and that was enough to make anyone panic.
    Fly, Jill, and I were hustled into a decontamination chamber. After all the contact we’d had with these creatures I almost laughed at precautions this late in the game. Then again, I shouldn’t criticize Hawaii Base for being thorough. It would be a kick in the ass if we defeated the enemy