Chapter 4

It was located near the northern pole of the planet, a large, seemingly endless plateau of ice, ringed by glaciers and tundra like a mountain of glass. All very nice on a postcard or photo, but after more than a few seconds glance the landscape became dull and monotonous, especially if you were present in the biting cold. About the only thing of interest was a small but determined group making their way through the world of sheer cold, the leader, in particular observing the ice formations he had found with awe. Spiraling upwards into the heavens, sunlight shone down through them, creating a dazzling display of sparkling light. Most of the others wore sunglasses, the last detachment hadn't and had gone temporarily blind; they were the only dark objects for miles and as such got a lot of the reflected sun, there were already many cases of sunburnt *and* frostbitten noses.

"Commander?"

The voice pulled the leader back to the here and now, and the dull and unrewarding task with which he was charged; the ice caps were melting again, even as they trudged he could see rivers flowing across the tundra in the distance, rivers that had been absent only months ago and flowed from underneath the icecap itself. Of course there was a solution; greenhouse gas reduction for one, or a solar shade, but nobody wanted the expense or sacrifice that involved, so what did they do? Send in the 'ice man'

Sighing deeply, he got to his feet, took off his jacket and placed it around his waist and continued onwards. Every step they took towards the source of the problem, the ground continued to grow more unsteady. The melting was centered at well, the center of the icecap, where the submerged mountain range of Klinz barely poked through the ice, absorbing sunlight and leaving gigantic crevasses floored with jagged volcanic rock. Even with his efforts the journey had taken three days; it was a wonder no lives had been lost, there were a few near misses, the ice was treacherous and his fractures and caverns beneath its serene surface. It was arduous work, despite the freezing cold everyone was sweating, they had to climb their way towards the center; the military wouldn't bother sparing a simple transport for such a 'trivial' mission. The sun beat down on everyone as they took their morning break; the place was like a desert in a freezer.

"...Stand back."

The commander flung his jacket aside and stretched out his arms. His grey singlet seemed to offer him little protection from the cold, but it didn't matter. Flicking back the black hair that had gotten into his eyes, he thrust his right arm forward, creating a shimmering beam of blue-white energy. As it arced across the sky the air itself began to freeze, a faint wind sprang up and the air began to taste of tin as water vapor was drawn inexorably drawn toward it. Oddly shaped pillars of ice sprang up around the commander, leaning toward each other as they rose, connecting about twenty feet high an blossoming into a flower of jagged ice. The growth slowed, and then stopped, leaving what looked for all the world like a mushroom of ice on the side of the glacier. The ground trudged underneath it, thankful to be out of the sun's glare and the chilling wind.

"Excellent job, Commander Zac!" Many of the soldiers cheered.

"Heh..."

Still enrolled in the military, Zac's life was constantly busy, investigating problems that threatened the well-being of the planet during his brother's absence. Such as it was; even though the major threats had been dealt with, natural disasters still posed problems. He'd been downgraded from hero to packhorse, performing cosmetic surgery on the world, patching things up here and there before they got out of hand. That was they way of things; people always wanted magical solutions to their problems; they were quick and cheap. It didn't exactly gain him any popularity or social ground, but being through all the things so far had changed him. He figured he'd be himself for awhile, and just try to help out. It helped to keep his mind on something, something he could do a lot better than Josh. He smiled as he recalled reading his brother's psych report. Of course *his* wasn't exactly a glowing reference, but everything tragic about his past had been erased, and his sights were focused on the future, and at least his avoided phrases such as 'highly unstable' 'overly emotive' and 'possible psychosis' Those shrinks were tough, but they had a point.

It was sometime later when a signal came from Headquarters. They ignored three summonses before bothering to answer; they'd had time to allow Zac to resurface most of the cap and everyone was tired and eager to finish up and go home. Despite the necessity of their work and their inspired leadership, Zac's team was still known as the brushes. (It was fairly solid barracks rumor that to get in you had to scrub down a building with an old toothbrush, many of the team often said that doing so would be a nice break from routine.)

"Yeah? Zac Lightwalker reporting."

The transmission itself was quite faint, and three replays had to be requested before they had any idea what was going on; apparently a solar flare was interfering with communications. Eventually by editing out the static and background noise, it became apparent that they were being ordered back to base immediately; a ship was being sent to pick them up and would arrive within the hour. They had a new assignment.

Like his brother, Zac was slightly paranoid; it was the only flaw in his character. (One that his team had learned to respect when a surprise birthday party landed two of them in hospital with broken legs.) Something was up; and it had been gnawing at the back of Zac's mind for weeks now. He'd been especially busy lately doing especially unpleasant work, it seemed he was doing less patching, more rescuing and a disturbing amount of corpse recovery. And there were inconsistencies. Granted, Zac suspected foul play in almost everything, (He had a pretty good suspicion that someone was deliberately stealing his socks to sell on Ebay.) but the station above Mobius, well, that had really spooked him.

At first it was said the accident was due to a minor error by the carelessness of a new recruit. Nonsense; you'd only need a small investigative team if that were the case, yet they'd called him in, and there hadn't even been much he could do. After they'd poked around all they could say was that it had been plain oversight, just like the military maintained, and a total waste of time to investigate, tragic, avoidable, but what happened now and then. Yet for some reason there had been an issue of arms to citizens and rumors of sabotage that wouldn't go away.

* * *

Headquarters here was an impressive building indeed, seventy, maybe eighty floors above ground; the best positions were around floor 50, above recruitment but below transmission and filing. For some reason, the higher your rank, the closer to floor 60 you got. Indeed the floor itself was used for entertaining VIPs and was more a penthouse than military installation. Below ground well, who knew how many floors it went down or what was hidden under there. Plumbing and heating the administration said, but Zac knew different.

Despite his previous exploits, or maybe because of them, Zac had been forced to start from the ground up, there were no favorites here, at least, none that weren't blood relations. He'd rapidly moved from rank 99 to rank 8; the ranking system was arbitrary, stupid and outdated, but in the best traditions of the army, nothing was fixed unless it killed someone. Zac had a very personal hatred for the system, the administration and the access coding, but at his current rank he could go almost anywhere, do almost anything and most likely there was little else he could gain from advancement except pampering. He was one of the best.

"Lightwalker...Zachary. Proceed to your previous lodgings and remove your belongings. Your rank has been moved up to Number 4. We wish to discuss a matter of great importance to you. The meeting begins in twenty minutes."

Zac blinked. Well, that was sudden; the rest of his crew were told to sign off and go on leave; they looked a little worried, promotion could quite possibly remove their leader and halt their work. After considering this last part, they brightened up considerably. Zac swiped his ID Card underneath a series of lights and scanners. It tested a precoded DNA sample and confirmed his identity. Actually it identified his brother's DNA sample, but the system was so easy to fool it wasn't funny, anything that screwed with it was fine by him. The elevator leapt upwards at a rapid pace, almost making him fall to the floor, efficiency beat comfort any day; rumor had it the top brass got a slower ride with classical music to boot.

The ride was short, and removing the things from his previous room wasn't very difficult. Much of his belongings were clippings from various newspapers, old magazines, pizza boxes and standard issue bedding and entertainment. He saved a spot in his bag for a photo of the Gaming Force, in which he'd be almost out of sight...if it wasn't for Joshua lifting him up on his shoulders.

"..."

His mind began to drift to the 'good old days' as he walked back to the elevator and punched in his new floor. He reminded himself of everything that had happened, it all seemed so far away and unreal, his life read like a comic strip. Despite the evidence of everyday life, Zac harbored a deep hope that one day everything would settle down and nobody would need military force anymore. This mad him very dangerous to a lot of people. He'd done all he wanted in life, he'd met his full potential, there really wasn't much else to do except to just try and help out any way he could.