Eye of the Storm

by John Ringo

  * * *

  "This is totally unacceptable," the Gil Etullu said, grinding his triangular teeth. The head of the Fauldor Clan-Corporation could not believe that the Tir upstart could send such a bald-faced message and expect instant cooperation. "There is no legal precedent for this. Send him a simple no."

  The message was an order to turn over all owned Posleen forges to some new "War Production Board." The Posleen forges were a nightmare for the Darhel. Darhel control of the Indowy rested primarily upon the expense of manufacture of all items in the Federation. Everything from building materials to cups and saucers to ships were produced by Indowy laborers using nannites to laboriously build parts one by one through greater or lesser levels of Sohon control.

  Since Posleen forges could automatically produce the same parts in massive quantities, the Darhel had been careful to snap them up. When they came up for sale, Darhel or their agents invariably offered sums for them far beyond the reach of anyone but a massive human corporation. And those corporations knew better than to bid against the Darhel.

  Once they had their hands on them, the Darhel mostly warehoused them. They gritted their teeth at the expense involved, dreading each new recovery of one, but they were willing to pay the price to prevent humans from having the manufacturing capability.

  And now, with no payment involved, that damned Tir was telling him to just turn over all his forges to humans! According to reports they were to then be turned over to the Indowy to produce war materials. But the same forges could produce consumer goods just as easily.

  "I will do so, Gil," the Darhel's AID said. "But I feel it wise to warn you that there is legal precedent; regulations covering this action and failure to follow the requested action places your clan under threat of both sanctions and physical destruction."

  "He would not dare," the Gil hissed. "The war between clans that would start would tear the galaxy apart."

  "The Tir would not order it," the AID said. "It is a standing order on the part of the Fleet Strike commander. Any clan failing to supply any requested support to the current war effort shall be destroyed."

  "That is wholy illegal," the Darhel snapped. "How could anyone . . ."

  "Gil, there is an inconvenient fact that since humans have a monopoly on raw physical force, absent shutting down their military in the midst of a survival-threatening war, they can destroy the Darhel at any time."

  "We will see about that," the Gil said, taking a deep, calming breath. "Send the order to the clan. Begin the shipment. But . . . take some time."

  "That, too, would be inadvisable," the AID said. "Two clan leaders that tried a similar tactic were advised by the Tir that failure to act in the most expeditious means had already been reported to General O'Neal, by others than he, presumably the Himmit, and if it continued the clan leader was to be terminated with prejudice."

  "This is not rule by law!" the Darhel said. "This is . . . Is . . ."

  "A dictatorship is the word you're looking for," the AID said. "A military dictatorship to be precise."

  "Thank you."

  "Shall I send the order to go slow?"

  "Yes," the Gil said. "Let him send his assassins. If it's war he wants, it's war he'll get. Contact my own human associates. Tell them he has become a problem . . ."

  "Cally, if you could come to my office, please," Mike said over the intercom.

  "What's up, Dad?" Cally said a few moments later.

  Mike had not, in fact, taken over the former commander's office. That was on the ground level with a great view of the western training area. It was a nice office but "secure" was not part of its features.

  Mike liked secure and after all the time he'd had on ships and in suits, being underground was fine by him. He could look at the western training area, or any other area, via large consoles on the walls.

  Cally had been installed in a similar office down the hall. She was functioning as something of a second G-2, that one in charge of keeping an eye on the Darhel.

  "You get the message about Gil Etullul?" Mike asked.

  "Just saw it," Cally said.

  "That's the fifth clan leader to try to fuck around with us," Mike said. "Technically, that's open season on the Darhel. But let's go slow. You up for taking a trip?"

  "Is my Dad sending me on an assassination mission?" Cally asked.

  "It's a Darhel clan leader, sweetie," Mike said. "I can delegate it to someone else if you'd like."

  "Oh, Hell no," Cally replied. "Killing Darhel is one of the things that makes life worth living. You're sure you want to is all? The rest of the Darhel are going to freak. There were major ramifications to taking down Epetar's clan head. Culminating with . . . well . . ."

  "Pour encourager les autres," Mike said, nodding grimly at the note about his father. "He's apparently sending assassins after me. Himmit are tracking the chain. When he's down, get with CID and round them all up. They'll be given formal trials, I suppose. But make sure if any slip the CID net, they don't last long."

  "Pour encourager les autres?" Cally asked.

  "Something like that," Mike said. "Get with the Rigas about transportation and support. I want this done quick and as clean as possible."

  "Will do," Cally said, skipping gaily to the door. "I get to kill a Darrrhelll . . ."

  "Sometimes I wonder about my family," Mike muttered as the door closed. He looked up, though, at a tap on it. "Come."

  "Boss, you know how we're dying for soldiers?" General Wesley said on entering in the room. He was looking at a printout. "My AID turned up something on that score. There's a group of former soldiers that formed a reclamation colony. Basically, at the end of the war their units were stood down pretty quick. Most of them took their money, families and such-like and moved out into the wilderness."

  "The rejuvs are going to be somewhat useful," Mike said. "But . . ."

  "Well, that's where it gets interesting," Wesley replied. "They sort of continued to train. The group's more of a military organization than your standard reclamation colony. Everyone's in a militia that trains to professional standards. And I do mean everyone. Even the kids grow up marching, drilling and getting firearms training. Their TOE frankly reads like a light infantry division. Just to protect themselves from Posleen, of course."

  "So you're saying we can draft these guys and we've got a formed unit?" Mike asked. "What about officers, NCOs . . ."

  "All there," Wesley said, flipping the sheet. "Rearm these guys, touch up their training and you've got a shake and bake infantry division. There's just one hitch . . ."

  "Generalfeldmarschall Mühlenkampf, reporting to Herr General as ordered!"

  Mike thought that he had a record of war, but when he'd looked up the "Generalfeldmarschall" he'd come away just a bit envious. Mühlenkampf had started off back in World War One in the German Army. He'd been in the Freicorps in the 1920s and 1930s, the Waffen SS in World War Two and ended up a Gruppenführer.

  Rejuved and recalled for the Posleen War, he'd been ordered by the German Chancellor to recreate the SS, the one remaining group of soldiers that Germany had not tapped. The unit had sustained enormous casualties during the Posleen War and had performed just as enormous service. Not that it had ever gotten much credit for it. However, Mühlenkampf had ended the War as a Generalfeldmarschall in command of the Army Group Reserve, prior to the final battles a force of nearly ninety divisions.

  After the War, however, he'd paid the usual price of the unloved and no longer needed: "Chuck him out; the brute." Mühlenkampf and the few survivors of the SS had been paid off and deactivated while fire from the Fleet was still wiping out concentrated pockets of Posleen. Their pay-out, furthermore, had been at a fraction of that of the "regular" forces. Many of whom had broken at the first touch of fire from the Posleen and whose survivors still tended to huddle in the untouched areas of Scandinavia and the Alps.

  Herr Generalfeldmarschall, however, picked up over ninety percent of the survivors of the SS units, from both the A
lps defenses and Scandinavia, and marched them into the howling wilderness left by a combination of the Posleen and the kinetic strikes from Fleet. Years of hard struggle had passed, spent building a colony in that wilderness without much if any help from the outside.

  Currently the "colony" was the third largest city in Europe with vast fields spreading out from its center. Herr Generalfeldmarschall had been busy.

  But, then again, the Waffen SS seemed to enjoy a challenge.

  "Stand easy, Generalfeldmarschall," Mike said, waving to a chair and opening up a humidor. Bill Boyd had been generosity itself with cigars, Lord Bless him.

  "Thank you, Herr General," the German said, extracting a cigar. He drew a silver washed dagger from his belt, cut the end, lit it with a match and drew. "This is truly a fine cigar, Herr General. My thanks again. Tobacco is short in Freiland."

  "I heard about you during the war, of course," Mike said, leaning back and tamping his dip. He'd chosen to use his "official" office up on the surface for the interview. He'd also forgotten that the weather today was crummy. So the room was darkly shadowed from the cold front that was washing the region with rain. "Through a bunch of filters is equally without saying. But I figured anyone the news community hated as much as you guys couldn't be all bad."

  "Thank you, Herr General," Mühlenkampf said, nodding brusquely. "As we heard of your exploits. Although the reports were somewhat more favorable."

  "Which probably makes you wonder about me," Mike said, grinning and putting in another dip. "That's fine. I can understand that."

  "You were recently court-martialed for excessive force, Herr General," Mühlenkampf replied. "Given that there is no such thing as excessive force in war, only impolitic force, I am sure you are as much a Soldat as I."

  "Actually, I always wanted to be a writer," Mike said.

  "I was once a student of art, Herr General."

  "And here we are," Mike said.

  "Yet the chancellor when he recalled me, spoke truth I think," the old German said. "I truly find peace only in war. These last decades have been peaceful for me only in that we could continue to clear up feral Posleen. A task, I must say, beneath most of my Soldaten."

  "You've heard about the new invasion."

  "Das Hedren, ja," Mühlenkampf said. "They do not yet threaten us. Only the Darhel."

  "And the Indowy," Mike said. "But the bottom line is that it's my job, God help me, to stop it. And the way that the Darhel have fucked everything up, I'm short on trained soldiers."

  "And you wish to recruit my force," Mühlenkampf said.

  "I could just conscript you," Mike said, shrugging. "But as Tam said, the way you're set up you're a shake and bake unit. So I'd like to pull you in as you are. I'll handle the political repercussions. Given the access the Darhel have given me, I may even be able to repair your reputation."

  "The latter is not to be ignored," the general admitted. "However, if you bring us in as a unit, we have certain traditions that must be observed."

  "Anything that's going to really hurt Fleet Strike politically?" Mike asked. He didn't really care a lot. Despite the off-putting uniform he found himself warming to the German officer.

  "I think not," Mühlenkampf replied. "We will have control of who joins our unit. Understand, we will accept any race or religion or ethnicity. We are very open about that."

  "Even, sorry for asking, Jews?" Mike asked.

  The Generalfeldmarschall actually smiled at that.

  "Herr General, over thirty percent of my people are Jewish."

  "What?" Mike asked. "Really?"

  "When Israel fell, the survivors were . . . still effectively pariah. There were few countries that could or would accept them. Deutschland still had open ports and was willing, for the guilt if nothing else. Portions of the Israeli Defense Force were evacuated with them. We were the only group willing to integrate them intact."

  "That must have been really interesting," Mike said.

  "I will not say that there were not, to an extent are not, anti-Semites in our ranks," the Generalfeldmarschall replied. "We do after all still have some rejuvs. But the core of our unit, our officers assuredly, are not . . . at least since that weenie, von Ribbentrop, was killed. Even in our darkest days, the Waffen SS was not a purely political unit. Ours was the only unit that promoted for merit in those days. In the Wehrmacht you could only be an officer if you were from the officer class. Thus we attracted many Soldaten, including myself, who were simply interested in advancement. They were Soldaten first, political a distant second. Not all of course, but many. After the war, this last one that is, many of the survivors who went into Deutschland were Jewish, the remnants of Israel. Others, of course, returned there but with the radioactive wasteland the IDF made of it at the end . . . It is much easier to survive in Germany.

  "We still maintain separate units but that is more of tradition than necessity. This is, however, one of the requirements that is nonnegotiable. We must retain our unit traditions, uniforms, medals and leadership. And we must be paid at Fleet Strike rates. Lifting our fighting force will require that those left behind have sufficient funds to continue to survive. Prosperity is far too much to ask."

  "Security?" Mike asked. "You're still in a reclamation zone."

  "There are young and old to maintain that," the Generalfeldmarschall replied. "But they will be stretched controlling the perimeter. They cannot defend and do all the work at the same time."

  "If there's sufficient additional manpower, I can probably do you a favor in regards to production," Mike said, his eyes on the far wall. "We're activating quite a few Posleen forges. I can probably move some of those to your colony. That would not only mean you could produce weapons and ammunition locally, the excess would be bought by Fleet Strike and Fleet to supply the war effort. And there would be excess."

  "That would be welcome," Mühlenkampf said, nodding sharply. "As to the rest?"

  "The only question I have is military law," Mike said. "In the end, who calls the shots if one of your soldiers breaks the law?"

  "The details can be worked out by lawyers, yes?" the Generalfeldmarschall said. "But we would require much control over that. We have a long history of being on the wrong end of legal issues. Especially those that are politically driven. I'm sure you can understand."

  "Oh, yeah," Mike said. "Been there, done that."

  "That being said, we are quite brutal in our discipline and follow the laws of war at penalty of death," Mühlenkampf said. "One aspect of being under our own jurisdiction is that our discipline is considered quite . . . old-fashioned by many other forces. It is, however, our way."

  "Flogging?" Mike asked, fascinated.

  "Rarely," the Generalfeldmarschall said with a shrug. "There are few offenses that are so minor as to require flogging but more major than those that give the penalty of hard labor. Generally it jumps from labor straight to hanging. If we flog someone it is only as a send-off. These days, we don't even give them a lift to the safe areas. We just throw them out of the colony with their personal weapons. If they make it to the Alps, more power to them. I have heard of few that did."

  "Okay," Mike said, his eyes wide. "One last thing. I don't have a position available for a 'Generalfeldmarschall.' You can anticipate that I'll be pulling you along when the time comes. I need competent generals nearly as much as I need soldiers. But for right now, I don't have a slot. What do you want to do about that?"

  "I will take command of my people, of course," Mühlenkampf said. "I will accept a reduction to Generalmajor as a temporary rank. My permanent rank remains, of course."

  "Of course," Mike said. "With that settled, Generalmajor, you can consider this a warning order for activation of your unit. How are you fixed for weapons and equipment?"

  "Poorly," the officer admitted. "Most of our weapons are left over from the war and very worn. Equipment is what we can buy when necessary but more usually make or scrounge."

  "We're short at the moment, too,"
Mike said. "On everything. But I've got a guy working on rectifying that and what we've got will go to you as a priority. But some of it's going to require training."

  "As long as it is hard training, that will be fine with us," Generalfeldmarschall Mühlenkampf said with a thin smile.

  "Oh, it will be hard," Mike said, looking at the wall. "But it's not going to be a patch on what I'm going to have you do . . ."

  "Frederick," Dieter Schultz said, shaking the young man's hand. "A happy day, yes?"

  Dieter Schultz was light. Light of body, light of hair, light of eye. He also looked quite young, until you looked at his light-gray eyes which were older than night.

  Dieter was a rejuv and had been rejuvenated quite young, the by-result of a long time spent in the regeneration tanks after a particularly horrific battle. He had been drafted into the German army and then transferred to the SS, a choice he'd been more than a bit doubtful about at first. But, later, he came to understand the esprit of that most reviled of units and fully accept it.