Juno rubbed her eyes. She’d barely slept all night from the nerves and now her alarm bleeped at her. She dragged herself out of bed and into the living room where her father was preparing for work. The news was on, she hated the news. There were food riots in Dome 16. At least they were lucky there in Dome 28, to not be reduced to rationing, but it was probably only a matter of time. She looked out the window of their apartment on the 23rd floor, it was 06.00AM and the artificial daylight wouldn’t be turned on for about an hour. She could see the flicker and glimmer here and there of flyers buzzing around between the skyscrapers and in the sky under the protective roof of the Dome.
‘How do you feel?’ asked her dad, looking at her nervously. He didn’t approve of her joining G-Police. He thought it was too dangerous, but he worked in a steel factory and at least once a month he would mention one of his friends who died because the equipment wasn’t safe. She understood his worries but didn’t like the hypocrisy. “I’m fine”, She smiled softly. He carried on getting ready and watching the news.
She took the bus to the metro station and bought an expensive weekly ticket. If she was fired on her first day, the useless ticket would rub salt in the wound. People looked at her differently on the metro (when it arrived) now she had her uniform on. At least it was a G-Police uniform though, not the street cops, who would often be attacked for breaking up raves and spoiling people’s fun. The G-Police went after the real criminals after all, not like the street cops.
It was packed on the tube so she nearly missed her stop. By the time she exited the station the daylight was coming on. Here in Dome 28 they didn’t even play birdsong. People might come here to party, but you had to watch yourself. It was a short walk to G-Police Dome 28 HQ.
HQ was heavily guarded and a drone scanned the ID built into her uniform lapel. That didn’t stop two guards with machine guns checking her papers. They grunted and let her through. At least it wasn’t the street cops doing this job though. Now that she had finally reached the entrance, she took a moment to look up, G-Police 28 HQ loomed over her, all 80 floors of it. As the top 20 floors were launching bays for gunships, she could see a couple of gunships taking off and returning. That would be her soon!
The four trainees were sat together in an office. The room was grey, the tables were metal and a news monitor was droning on about politics. The trainees knew each other from basic training and that they would be assigned to Dome 26 together. Juno was sat next to Paul. He had strange blonde / black hair that he’d dyed, badly. She supposed it was an attempt to look cool, but it wasn’t really working. He was very thin, with his slightly sunken eyes, but he was in good shape and was a very good shot with a firearm. He seemed hard working. While they were waiting, he was checking his emails on his tablet.
“What did you get up to at the weekend?” asked L. Her name was Olivia, but she went by the nickname ‘L’.
“Not a lot”, replied Juno, wishing she could seem cooler, “I re-watched some of the training videos on Saturday and played football.” Juno loved playing football and was pretty good, if she said so herself. “What did you do, L?”
“On Friday we went clubbing” smiled L. Juno already knew that L was referring to her and Mitch. L and Mitch had known each other before enrolling and that they both loved the night scene. They both lived and went clubbing here in Dome 28. Juno would never have the nerve to go clubbing here. She felt a bit provincial in comparison. She wondered why L and Mitch wanted to join G-Police, but she assumed it was for the excitement. “Saturday was a bit of a write-off” L shrugged. She put her feet up on a spare chair. L had been a natural at flying, which had already bolstered her already high confidence.
“We went to that club, SkinTime, it was alright, not as good as Temple” added Mitch, “They do free shots with some drinks, so that’s alright. It got a bit hairy though, somebody was shot on level 4, they said it was a drug dealer.”
“Bit of an odd night out, going to a club where people just get shot” commented Paul.
“Better than staying in your apartment, though” replied Mitch, clearly having a go at Paul’s lack of activities. Juno knew that Paul struggled to find something he really enjoyed. It wasn’t that he was shy, he just struggled to find something for him. At least Juno had football.
“Don’t they have metal detectors on the doors?” asked Paul, curious.
“Of course they do, the cops would shut them down otherwise”, answered Mitch, “it was probably the bouncers, or bar staff, or management, the guy was probably undercutting them on the coke.”
Juno rolled her eyes. The drugs problem in Dome 28 was getting out of hand. She knew that more and more G-Police would be taking action. Up to now it was mainly the street cops and drugs squad who dealt with the drugs problems but there was political pressure for all branches of the police to step in. She wondered about L and Mitch at SkinTime, and their lifestyle, with the amount of coke around in Dome 28, it seemed that the pair had done drugs at some point. Hey, they were young, but they’d have to put a stop to that now, G-Police pilots were tested randomly at least 3 times a week and with good reason, flying a heavily armed gunship over crowded cities was a Health and Safety nightmare by anyone’s standards.
Mitch had probably joined because L had joined, thought Juno. They weren’t actually a couple, but thick as thieves. Mitch would probably be better suited to the undercover squad, she pondered. Still, he had passed his Basic Pilots Test, like they all had, which wasn’t easy. He’d also come highest on the written test. Not for the first time she wondered if he was actually smarter than he let on. Of the four of them, Paul had the lowest Basic Pilots score. Juno wondered if he might be more cut out for ground crew, but he had a better attitude and was better with a firearm. It was still early of course and so there was time to improve.
“Where the fuck is Mason?” moaned L, flicking her black hair moodily. It was ten past eight. He was probably busy, thought Juno, no need to be some impatient about it.
Squadron Leader Mason would be their commanding officer. They hadn’t had a lot to do with him during training, but they had met him after the exams when the four were assigned to Dome 28. He’d talked to them individually, but he’d spent more time with the trainers. He’d been a G-Police pilot for over 20 years.
“Probably finding some better pilots”, said Mitch.
“Talk for yourself” sniped L, “I’m the best of the best. I’m the best of you four fuckers anyway.”
There was slight rumble; a gunship must have returned at the top of the building.
“I wonder what our first mission will be”, said Juno, to no one in particular.
“Something boring” said Mitch, “we’ll be doing boring things for ages so we don’t blow something up that we shouldn’t.”
“We go out today though”, said Juno, “they said from the first day we’re flying.”
“Oh we’re flying alright”, agreed Mitch, “I’m just saying we’re not guarding the president, yet.”
“I’d be tempted to take him out myself”, sneered L. A silence of general agreement fell, even Paul nodded.
“It would be cool to do something in Dome 5” said Juno.
“And mix it up with the freedom fighters?” snorted Mitch, “ let ‘em keep it.”
The door opened and Squadron Leader Mason strode in. He was lean and muscular, skin like leather, short black hair and darting eyes. He stood in front of them. L took her feet off the chair and sat normally.
“Ready for your first day, recruits?” he asked, eyeing them up one by one, making sure they all met his gaze, which they did.
“Yessir” came the general response.
“First things first”, he started, “you two had better be careful going to SkinTime, you’re cops now.”
L and Mitch stared at him blanky in a way that made Paul laugh. “Were you spying on us?” asked Mitch.
Mason left a pause and then answered “while this is a G-Police HQ full of gunships, it is still, a police station. Every room in the building is bugged. Would you expect anything else?”
It was a reasonable answer, Juno thought to herself. She realised that Mason had kept them waiting to see what they would talk about and to learn about them. He already knew that L and Mitch enjoyed clubbing, so they would have to be careful from now on. She knew they’d carry on though. This could be interesting.
“OK”, said Mason, clearly smug he’d gotten the jump on them, “let’s get on with your first day…”
Ready for Part 2? Read it here!
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