Nanowrimo 2022

Champagne Flight

American Kingdom Day 28.3

Previous chapter:

Well, that was the party that wasn’t.

I mean, it started off well. Every one of us had a reason to celebrate. Except maybe myself and Hazel but we could fix that up later.

Besides, together we had cracked the code. That was a big tick of approval for sure.

I hugged Annie and wished her every happiness. I don’t think that she could have lifted any higher from where she was right now; every time I looked at her I couldn’t help but smile in return.

I lined another Lagavulin up in front of Oscar and gave him a hug as well. “Oh joy,” he said, “a morning of drill is just what I need to cure a hangover.”

“It works,” I told him. “By lunch you are feeling normal again. Never fails.”

I also told him about the actual never-fail Ranger trick of drinking a pint of water — maybe a quart, Oscar, you’re a big man — before retiring for the night. I’d never tried that with spirits but it worked just fine with beer. The hard part was keeping it all down, but once the water load had flushed out the kidneys — two or three times a night — the mornings were grand.

“What works even better,” Miss Airforce declared, “is a few minutes of pure oxygen.”

She was nursing a Bud Light and it occurred to me that maybe I should lay off the champagne otherwise I’d be no use to her. Fall asleep at a critical moment or collapse into a fit of giggles just when focus was required.

The two sergeants were working their way through a string of Buds. Sergeant Payne had served with the Palace Guard and was giving Nathan a few pointers about spit-polished boots and rifle magazines.

“Parade mag and desert mag,” she said. “You keep one fresh out of the box and that never goes out in the desert with you. You shine it up with boot polish and it stands guard with you. Desert mags are what you take out of the palace gate. You go crawling around the rocks and brush, your mag gets all scratched and beat up but so long as it holds twenty rounds and feeds well, who gives a crap what it looks like?”

Outside, a deuce and a half pulled up. A bit late for beer deliveries, I thought, maybe a platoon of regulars to join in the fun?

A moment later the music stopped, the lights came up and Sir Duane was bawling at us.

“Finish your drinks, get on the truck, grab a duffle, pack all of your shit inside. Make sure you have a cabin bag with your passport and anything you need on the flight. All of you are ordered to the Palace.”

We looked at him, jaws dropping in unison.

“Fucking move it! Now!”

We fucking moved.

“Five minutes, people! Everything in your bags. Nothing left in the rooms but the bedding. You’ve got twenty hours of flying ahead of you; pack your vital kit in your cabin bag, and your passport goes in your top right pocket. I’ll be checking.”

One thing was for sure. The King’s Army was about the same as the US Army for clusterfuck pandemonium, going by this shambles.

We scooped the contents of our closets and lockers into our duffles and bags. I tried to separate anything I might need on the flight — twenty hours! Sweet Jesus, where were we going? — into my battered rollaboard but basically everything was one unholy camo mess in my duffle.

Passport in my pocket, though.

One, two, three, four — and five was Nathan running down the corridor with a bag in each hand and his passport in his teeth — we hoisted our gear and ourselves onto the bed and as soon as the tailboard was rattled into place we were off. Two-hour hike to the landing strip maybe, but that truck made the trip in seven minutes.

No sign of a plane at the field. Of course. “Hurry up and wait” was the military’s real motto. Nothing but a hangar and an empty control tower. The truck's headlights shone on the hangar wall, so we weren’t jumping down into complete darkness.

Sir Duane leapt down from the cab, pointing.

“Boys to the right, girls to the left, change into civvies. Our plane will be here in five minutes. Move it, people!”

You ever pack and change for a long-haul flight in ten minutes total? You should try it some day. Cannot recommend it for a relaxation exercise.

The landing strip lights clicked on by themselves and gliding down on final approach five thousand yards away was a pair of landing lights and a distant hum.

The two sergeants inspected us one by one. Checking that we hadn’t taken any shortcuts such as leaving our uniform shoes on, and that we could all produce our passports.

We weren’t going to win any “Best-dressed” awards but we passed muster.

“Here’s where we say goodbye,” shouted Sir Duane over the engine noise of the approaching aircraft, now taxying up to the pool of light in front of the truck, which had turned around to illuminate what passed for a ramp.

The aircraft, an executive jet like the one I’d arrived on two days ago curved in, left side facing us, and the door folded down into a set of stairs. I half-expected Princess Dee to beckon us aboard but no, a young man with a crewcut, clad in a flight suit waved us in.

“Bags go in the compartment at the rear,” he shouted. “If they don’t all fit, find space on the floor. Nothing goes on my leather seats except your bottoms, clear? Once your bags are stowed, find a seat, strap in, hold your thumb in the air. When I see five thumbs, we light the rockets and off we go.”

I held back as the others filed aboard, one by one. I shook hands with the two sergeants, smiled goodbye, and gave Sir Duane a quick hug and a peck on the cheek.

“Thank you, Sir! I hope I see you again!”

“Good luck, Molly. You come back and take my job some day, okay?”

I smiled. “Deal!”

And then I was following Annie into the cabin. The baggage compartment was full. The man in the flight suit — “Vermin” reading on his nametag — indicated a spot in the galley for my bag and pointed to a vacant seat. I sat down, drew the seatbelt around my middle and held my thumb up.

He waved to the instructors standing outside, drew the door up, latched it shut. The noise reduced considerably; the engines had kept turning while we boarded.

“In an emergency,” he said, “if you are facing forward, put your head between your knees. If facing backward, lean back into the seat and smile at the guy opposite trying to wedge his head between his knees. Two exits: this door and the window on the right side over the wing. Everyone look. If the shit hits the fan, don’t take anything with you, just get out as quick as you can.”

He disappeared forward into the cockpit and the plane immediately began moving. I was facing backwards, so I was smiling as we rolled onto the runway and accelerated away into the night.

Next chapter:

The whole novel:

Notes

I’m almost at the end of NaNoWriMo. Just under 3,000 words to go and I should knock that off tomorrow.

The interesting part has been creating a significant global force from scratch. It’s one thing to come up with a bunch of bozos who decide that they are the true followers of Jesus — I mean that pretty much describes every Christian church ever — it’s another to get down into the details of what makes the thing run.

Here I am interested in the philosophy. I wrote down a few lines about what makes it go a couple of weeks ago. with Christianity it’s easy to be cynical. Basically every church is ripping off the poor people while directing a few shekels to the super-poor and squillions to the guys running the show — basically old rich white guys. That’s not what Jesus taught.

I can’t say I’ve got that nailed down here. What I’m looking for — and haven’t found it yet — is a way to have everyone believing honestly in their hearts that Jesus is the Heavenly King and will one day return.

That’s easy enough to say but if that were to happen — Jesus born in humble circumstances and preach his gospel — no church would pay any attention. They would require the one thing that Jesus never did: arrive in clouds of glory as the Son of Man and proceed to hand out divine punishments and rewards.

There’s also the issue of vast resources, pots of money, business jets on call etc. etc. How do you have all these resources and not misuse them? I haven’t worked that bit out either.

Nevertheless, I’m building the thing up as I go along. So far it’s been fun. No real antagonist identified yet, apart from hapless Ted who can’t keep his tongue in his pants, so it’s more of an individual against the system thing so far. This may be all I require but I feel I’m goin to be identifying some evildoers pretty soon. Stand by!

Molly