The Rats, the Bats & the Ugly

by Eric Flint

  The balding-bulldog-faced man tugged at his jowled chin. "My cousin. He's managing editor."

  "He has editorial control?"

  Bulldog-face grimaced. "I suppose he could have," he said. "He usually leaves most of the day-to-day running to his staff."

  "Leave it to me," said the only civilian present at the meeting. All of General Cartup-Kreutzler's lackeys—who, to a man, regarded those who were not in the army as nonentities—treated this man with wary deference. Talbot Cartup controlled the Special Branch of the HAR police force. That made the general's brother-in-law a man to be feared.

  "I play golf with Erwin. He'll be amenable to my suggestions. What did you have in mind, Henry?"

  "A blanket ban on coverage of this incident!"

  Talbot laughed. "Not a chance. Even I can't do that . . . yet. The anticensorship laws of the colony are rigid, Henry. The best I could arrange would be to plant a story about this military operation having been planned by yourselves, but kept a secret as you found that communications were being intercepted by the Magh'. I'll have them mention that the hoo-ha about this in the press has prejudiced further operations. That should provide me with a good reason to push the Board of Shareholders to legislate some limitations on freedom of speech clauses."

  The general nodded, grudgingly. "That'll have to do. But you won't get the Freedom of Speech stuff modified. I spoke to Aloysius Shaw about it, er . . . just after that unfortunate incident at the ballet, when the media had a field day about you. It would require a constitutional amendment and that would require a full sixty-seven percent of the vote. Even with Shaw's thirty-four percent block he'd didn't think it could be swung. With the vote passing to his daughter Virginia, now that she's still alive and rescued, thanks to this victory, there's no chance."

  Talbot Cartup's eyes glinted. "She's already been dealt with. Believe me, I have that matter in hand."

  Brigadier Charlesworth was slow on the uptake of anything except for whiskey. But he'd finally caught onto the idea of a planted story about the capture of the Magh' scorpiary. Major Fitzhugh had almost single-handedly directed and stage-managed this victory, despite the refusal of Military Headquarters in general, and General Cartup-Kreutzler in particular, to take any action. Fitzhugh—in charge of the pitiful HAR army intelligence unit—had spotted a situation created by some stray HAR troops inside the enemy's force field. The general had refused to act on the information, so Major Conrad Fitzhugh had gone right ahead and done it anyway, taking the law—and the chain of command—into his own hands. That had included having the brigadier arrested in his own comfortable chateau-headquarters!

  Charlesworth was not the forgiving kind. "I say! If you plant this story . . . then that blasted upstart bounder, Fitzhugh, will get away with it all."

  General Cartup-Kreutzler and his brother-in-law pinned the brigadier in spotlight glares. "Not a chance in hell," hissed the general through clenched teeth.

  Talbot Cartup rubbed his meaty hands together. "Fitzhugh has been a thorn in my flesh. We've already decided. He will be court-martialed and shot."

  General Cartup-Kreutzler nodded. "I had given orders for him to be arrested and brought for trial. I've changed those to orders for a field court-martial and summary justice, if possible. The MPs hadn't succeeded, and anyway, they're inclined to do things by the book. I've dispatched Lieutenant Colonel Jeebol from Divisional HQ. He'll deal with the matter immediately and personally. A good man. Expeditious. The sooner Fitzhugh is out of the picture, the easier the clearing up of this mess is going to be."

  "I think we might just put all the blame on him," said Talbot Cartup. "He was the leak. And when he discovered the Special Branch were onto him, he attempted to cover himself by doing some glory-grabbing."

  Brigadier Charlesworth nodded. "Let me know what witnesses you need. I'll see to that."

  Talbot Cartup smiled on him. "We also have some photographic morphing machinery from old Earth. I'll need some old confidential battle plans, Henry."

  The door of the room swung open. The guilty-looking group of conspirators tried hastily to look as if they'd been discussing football scores. A red-purple spiky beach-ball shape ambulated through the doorway on jointed flexing spines.

  "Ah," said General Cartup-Kreutzler, seeing the alien. "Advisor Tirritit. What brings you here?"

  "Good day, General." The Korozhet military attaché dipped his spines respectfully. "I have been dispatched by my commander to ask a favor of you. We would find it of great value to go and inspect this front your bold troops have opened up. A daring initiative! I gather you have captured some enemy territory. I should like to take a party of military advisors from my strategy group into the area."

  Cartup-Kreutzler was somewhat taken aback at this request. "Well, I suppose so, Tirritit. But what you'd want to see there I don't know. Battlefields have very little to do with military strategy. And you chaps know everything there is to know about the Magh'."

  Advisor Tirritit hissed a naphthalene reek at them. "True. But we'd like to gather fresh material. And to confirm certain things. I hadn't wanted to broach this with you yet, General, but, strategically speaking, this attack could have catastrophic side effects on the whole war effort. Really, you should not undertake such exercises without first consulting us."

  "It wasn't exactly our plan, Tirritit," said Brigadier Charlesworth sourly. "And we didn't know about it until it had happened."

  The Korozhet advisor gave a sort of hissing sigh. "You are Brigadier Charlesworth? This did happen in the sector of the front under your control, where, if I remember correctly, a planned strategic retreat was in progress. Most unwise!"

  Charlesworth looked sullen. "I told you. This wasn't our idea. Some blasted intelligence major did it off his own bat. We were just discussing how best to deal with him."

  The Korozhet military advisor spined forward into the ornately wood-panelled room. "Perhaps you should tell us more. This sort of individual could prevent you from winning the war if he continues this sort of interference. By the way, the request we put in for this . . . Private Charles Connolly. How is that proceeding?"

  "Ah. I am happy to say that he appears to be dead," said General Visse. "Our records show this clearly."

  Tirritit clacked his spines. "Most satisfactory. I mean, we did want to debrief him and question him about the death of the Korozhet tutor assigned to Virginia Shaw. But his death removes the necessity."

  Chapter 5

  A grim and debatable land: a captured Magh' scorpiary,

  newly conquered and still smoldering.

  "What in hell are we going to do with them, Fitzy?" asked Parachute Major Van Klomp, looking down over the red spiral walls of the Magh' scorpiary. His paratroopers had blown a hole in the roof to gain access to the brood-heart. Now Van Klomp had come up here to escape the chaos within. What was happening down there wasn't fighting. Not really. More like the butchery of rather nasty but stupid insects. The Magh' brains seemed to have died with their brood-heart. "We can't talk to the befokte things to persuade them to surrender, and we may just die of exhaustion killing them. I'm sick of it. I am almost missing parades by now."

  Major Conrad Fitzhugh, head of HAR Army Intelligence—at least until the MPs caught up with him—grinned tiredly. "You've always got something to bitch about, Bobby. Last time you wanted action, not display jumps. I get you action, now you want back to display jumps. There's no pleasing you!"

  Van Klomp exhaled gustily. "It's because you cheated me, boykie. You promised we could rescue some commando-heroes from certain death. And what do I find when we get in there? A bunch of drunken rats and bats having a Maggot barbeque. And a solitary troepie making whoopee with Shaw's bloody daughter."

  A sleek rat with ragged ears and a few new scars stuck her head out of the capacious magazine pocket of Fitz's BDUs. "You might have scrounged some of their drink, Van Klomp. Do you know how dry I am, and how irritable I get when I'm dry?"

  Van Klomp blew the most da
ngerous she-rat in the army a raspberry. But, to prove that, despite being big, he wasn't entirely stupid, he also produced a hip-flask. "You and Fitzy stole all my port. You stole my Christmas bottle. You even drank the cooking sherry. But Meilin got me some rum from somewhere. You don't like rum, do you, Ariel?"

  "It's at the bottom of my list of human drinks," said the rat, reaching for it. "As for your sack, 'twas terrible stuff. I was doing you a favor drinking it." Because Ariel had spent so much time in human company, her speech was less Shakespearean than that of most rats. But every now and then bits slipped out, especially when she was thirsty.

  Van Klomp poured some of the contents of the hip flask into the small silver lid-cup. "Here. And be happy. The stuff those rats were drinking made rum look like cola. A mouthful of the stuff nearly killed me."

  "And you let them take it away!" said Ariel, downing the small cup and shaking her head.

  Van Klomp shrugged. "I'd have liked to keep them all here so Fitzy could debrief them when he got through with playing chase-the-Maggot. But I wanted our late Chairman's daughter out of danger. Shaw wasn't going anywhere without them. And they weren't going anywhere without that grog of theirs. They'd kept her alive right through attacking this patch of hell with a fire bucket, so I reckon they must make a fairly good bodyguard. I'd have choppered them out except for this weather." The cold front was lifting now, but rain and mist had followed the army into the area. Not that it had made much difference. Most of the fighting had been in the labyrinthine tunnels of the scorpiary.

  Fitz stood up and yawned. "Well, aside from missing out on their booze, I'd have liked to talk to them myself. They know more first hand about Magh' than anyone else. And we owe our victory here to their efforts. I'd have liked an explanation of all of it—that dead Korozhet, and that other alien critter, to say nothing of all the dead Magh'—those huge bloated ones they said were the brains behind the whole nest. But realistically speaking, I won't be dealing with that intelligence. I've got to go back and face the music. I just came looking for you, to say goodbye."

  Van Klomp sighed. "I know you too damn well to think I'm going to change your mind, Fitzy. So." He reached out a large hand and took the cup from Ariel's paws. Topped it up. Handed it to the scar-faced intelligence major. "A last drink together, boykie. Bottoms up."

  Fitz took it. "To the living and the dead," he said, and drained it. "Pfeh. That's vile stuff. My God . . . it's strong . . . Ariel . . ."

  Van Klomp caught him as he fell, and lowered him gently to the ground. The silver cup was less lucky. It bounced and clattered away, rolling down the seven hundred foot slope of the scorpiary arms. "Sorry, boykie," said Van Klomp, quietly. "But you won't look after yourself, so your mates have to. Here, Ariel. Loosen his collar. And then go and give Cunningham and Garcia a call. They're waiting just inside the first gallery with the ropes and stuff."

  Ariel was already at her major's throat. "You're sure he'll be all right, Van Klomp? I'll kill you if he isn't." There was no hyperbole at all in that statement.

  "You can kill me right after I kill that damned doctor, if he isn't," said Van Klomp, heavily. "I never thought he'd swallow that bit about me drinking rum."

  "And I thought he'd notice for sure that I hadn't actually drunk any of it," said Ariel, feeling for the carotid pulse. "That's steady enough, anyway. You go and call your goons. I'll stay with him."

  Van Klomp shook his head. "If he stirs you won't be able to stop him rolling. I'll take care of him, Ariel." He gave the unconscious man a wry look. "I always have," he said quietly, "since we were kids."

  With no more than a disapproving sniff, Ariel left and ran to the hole that the attacking paratroopers had left in the Magh' adobe dome. In a few minutes she was back with two paratroopers, ropes, a field stretcher and the doctor. The doctor checked Fitz's breathing and pulse hastily. "I don't approve of this, Major," he said stiffly.

  "Ja. I know, Captain. You've said so maybe six times already. But short of me hitting him and maybe making an error of judgment—which could have been even more dangerous—how else are we supposed to deal with this? We've been leading that useless bliksem of a lieutenant colonel up the garden path for about as long as we can. He's met up with Colonel Nygen now and between them they would have found Fitzy soon."

  The doctor sighed. "Are you sure—"

  Van Klomp turned to the medical officer, his face grim. "I took the radio message myself, from General Cartup-Kreutzler. Fitz is to be arrested, by force if need be. To be captured dead or alive. Preferably, according to the general, dead. He is to face summary battlefield court-martial. You served under Major Fitzhugh in this campaign. He's determined to plead guilty. But it wouldn't make any damn difference. This Lieutenant Colonel Jeebol who is to chair the court-martial is Cartup-Kreutzler's hatchet man. He's already tried and sentenced Fitz. You know what the maximum penalty is, in a battlefield court-martial. All we're asking is that you see to it that he stays alive long enough to get a fair, open general court-martial, not a kangaroo court and summary execution."

  "I was trying to ask whether you were absolutely sure he had no preexisting medical conditions," said the doctor irritably. "It's something we normally try to establish before administering anesthetics. I'm well aware of what high command are up to. And they're not going to succeed. I'm a doctor because I want to keep men alive. He might have to face trial, although they'd be wiser to give him a chest full of medals. But no one, and I mean no one, is going to kill him while he is in my care."

  Van Klomp bit his lip. "Sorry, Doc. I spoke too damn hastily. Made a fool of myself, again. I know he had many anesthetics after his face got ripped up like that. I never heard of any problems. Look, along with Major Del'annancio of A company, I've arranged some extra stretcher bearers for you."

  "I don't need any. We've only got a few casualties, for a change. A pleasant change."

  Van Klomp smiled. "Doc. You've got the legal authority over any patient in your care. But your medics are—medics. They're unarmed. Lieutenant Colonel Jeebol has a number of armed men with him. If anything unpleasant happens . . . just remember these men are there, under your command."

  The doctor blinked. "It won't come to that, surely?"

  "It already has," the big paratrooper replied.

  "And always remember, I'll be right next to him," said Ariel. "Human throats are a lot softer than pseudochitin, and I haven't sworn any oaths to keep anyone alive." The rat left no one in any doubt that she meant every word, and that she'd be able to do it, too.

  * * *

  The medics had put together a makeshift ward in one of the now-empty scorpiary chambers. The upper levels were seldom disturbed by wandering Magh'—the leaderless creatures seemed to want to burrow down into the lower chambers. Nonetheless, there were two platoons in position behind the barbed wire and broken masonry fortifications. There were several other badly wounded soldiers in the other cots in the ward. At least, they all looked to be. They were heavily bandaged, anyway.

  Ariel lay just under the edge of Fitz's blanket and waited. She didn't have to wait long. Fitz was still in the whirly stage of semi-consciousness when they came.

  "Lieutenant Colonel Jeebol, 3rd Motorized Division," said the voice crisply from the next chamber. "I believe you've got Major Conrad Fitzhugh here. Number 24950101803371."

  "Yes," answered the doctor. "He's out of theater and recuperating in the ward. And where do you think you're going?"

  "I have to place him under arrest. He's to be taken for court-martial immediately. Now get out of my way before I have you arrested and charged as well."

  Ariel peeked. She couldn't resist it. The medic captain was standing four-square in the doorway. "No," he said, calmly. "He's recovering from an anesthetic. I must forbid it."

  "Sergeant," snapped the lieutenant colonel. "Arrest this man."

  "If you even attempt that, Sergeant," said Van Klomp's gravel-crusher voice. "I'll be obliged to arrest you."

  Ariel bli
nked. Van Klomp wasn't supposed to be here! He was going to keep his nose clean, in case he needed to stick it in later. Still, she'd been none-too-sure that the doc was going to be able to manage this. Van Klomp would.

  "I am entirely capable of dealing with this myself, Major," said the doctor, in a tone that explained very clearly that he might only be unit MO now, but he'd been a hospital senior surgeon before the war. "Understand this very clearly, Lieutenant Colonel Whoozit. This area is a field hospital. I am the ranking officer in charge of it. As such I have ultimate medical responsibility for the welfare of all the patients in my care. I am also the final authority on the conduct of military matters inside this area, as it may affect my patients. On medical grounds. I have given a clear instruction. Attempt to countermand it, and I'll have you thrown off the premises. And I will see you charged for it. It is a clear breach of military law. Do you understand me?"

  "You can't stop me! I've got orders from General Cartup-Kreutzler himself! Now out of my way!" yelled the lieutenant colonel.

  The small medic captain stood his ground. His voice was frosty enough to chill liquid nitrogen, now, never mind mere lieutenant colonels. "I've made it very clear to you, sir, that I don't care if you have orders from God. Unless they're from the Army Surgeon General and in writing, Major Fitzhugh stays here in my care until I deem him medically fit to leave. And I warn you, Lieutenant Colonel, if you shout again and disturb these critically ill men, I'll have you removed by force and give orders to the guards that you are not to be permitted into this area again."

  The lieutenant colonel was plainly unused to this. He gaped like a new-caught fish. "Don't be a fool! Fitzhugh is a dangerous criminal who is due for battlefield court-martial and summary execution!"

  "Then you can court-martial and execute him, once he is discharged from my care as fit and well," said the captain. "Now, I have work to do. And where are you going, Samuelson?"