by Chris Bunch
"Follow me, like the ossifers say," she said, and Yoshitaro obeyed, sidling along the ledge, not looking a hundred meters down to jutting crags, until it indeed became a path, winding upward.
"Aren't you glad I think you're sexy?" she said.
Njangu managed a nod, while panting.
"Not like Faull, old strong-and-silent low-class 'Raum," she said. "I would've let him rot hanging there." She gave him a sly look. "Or made sure Lir heard him quit."
"Doesn't matter," Njangu said. "Easy way, hard way, I'm still out of this shit."
"Aw, c'mon," Angie said. "We've only got, what, another two lifetimes, then they'll put us into a fighting team. Doncha wanna be a real soldier boy?"
"Whoopie." Njangu bent double, sucked air. "I'm history, I'm gonna be a nice happy grass-trimmer and garbage-can-emptier 'til my enlistment's up."
"And then what?"
"I'll find a job somewhere."
"Maybe working for my da," she suggested.
"What's he do? Probably, with my luck, guide mountain climbers."
"Nope," the woman said. "He's got six department stores, so you'd best be nice to me."
"If he's so rich, what're you doing in the service?"
"I thought it'd be a hoot,' she said, defiance coming into her voice, then she looked away. "And me and Da weren't . . . getting along."
"Foolish girl," Njangu said.
"Shut up," Rada hissed. "We've got to get up to the crest and look proper exhausted for Monkeytits Monique."
"No you don't," a voice came. "You can stay just like you are."
The two trainees froze, turned slowly. Just ahead of them on the path stood Dec Monique Lir.
"How'd you—" Angie managed.
"Beat you? Because I'm strong, clean-living and your friggin' god," Lir growled. "Now, double-time right on up to the top."
Before they reached the crest all the aches came back in waves to Njangu. The other three recruits were waiting, grateful for any respite from Lir's sadism.
"You were correct, Recruit Rada," said Lir, who didn't appear to even be slightly out of breath. "I didn't say how you were to get to the top of this, and I&R does encourage creative thought. I'm actually proud of you two."
"Uh-oh," Yoshitaro said under his breath.
"So proud, I'm going to let you be an example to the rest of us. I want you to go back down the cliff, while the rest of us stroll leisurely to the bottom and take a long break. Go back down . . . straight back down. Is it clear?"
"Yes, Dec," the two chorused.
"Bad harmony," Lir said. "Drop down and do me some press-ups. Maybe twenty-five or so."
She waited until they finished.
"Now, let's see some nice technique in descending," she ordered. "No slips, deaths, or even screams. You first, Rada."
Angie gave Lir a hate-filled look, slid cautiously backward over the edge. Lir peered over.
"Do try not to fall," she advised. "Now you, Yoshitaro."
Njangu obeyed.
"Oh, by the way," the dec asked. "Did I understand you have something you want to tell me?"
Njangu was about to bellow his resignation, and then suddenly everything was funny. He'd broken through some kind of inner barrier, and from now on, it might not be easy, but he'd do it. Hell, he felt good. He could duckwalk down the cliff if Lir wanted him to. Yoshitaro laughed.
Lir looked at him closely.
"That's all?"
Njangu nodded.
"Then get your ass down this cliff. It's a long run home, and I want to be back before retreat."
———«»———«»———«»———
The Grierson grounded at the same instant as the other Aerial Combat Vehicle and the two Zhukovs to make the points of a perfect square.
A moment later a courier boat settled in the middle of the formation.
Its nose was the dark-blue/white of the Confederation, with a ring of stars behind it. Below the pilot's cabin window on either side was the green/white/brown flag of Cumbre.
The Combat Vehicle's ramps dropped, and their crews formed up in front of their craft. All wore dress uniforms.
The lock of the courier ship opened, a gangway slid down, and Governor General Wilth Haemer strode out, flanked by Caud Williams and a polish of aides.
"Couldn't you have left a big booger on the pointy end, dammit?" Garvin whispered out of the side of his mouth. "We didn't have to look this sharp."
"Quiet, Gunner," Dill said. "You don't have anything to worry about."
"Easy for you to say," Jaansma said. "You weren't the one who got told by His Holiness if he saw me ever ever again I was for the high jump."
"Don't worry," Kang said. "He isn't interested in reviewing us. Too windy, too cold."
It was that on Dharma's high plateau, wet mist blowing past the ghostly trees. Haemer and the others walked quickly, trying not to look like they were hurrying, to the formation of Musth waiting outside their headquarters, a series of high-ceilinged, polygonal buildings seemingly made of clear glass broken with onyx paneling.
The Musth were in a formation humans found strange. A dozen, probably underlings, formed a wide, shallow vee, and two others stood in the mouth of the vee, one behind the other. One Garvin guessed was the Musth's commander in the Cumbre system, Aesc.
Jaansma shut the governor general out of his mind and stared at the Musth. He'd only seen the aliens in holos, and found them mildly awesome. They were big, almost three meters, with long, sinuous necks.
They were fur-covered, their only clothing a wide belt with crisscrossed straps to a neck-ring and a pouch in front like an oversize Scottish sporran. On either side were sheathed weapons. Garvin craned for a look, but all he could determine was that one was an incredibly long-barreled pistol-looking object, the other was an unprepossessing box with a strap on it.
Their fur was color-banded, coarse, light to reddish-brown, going to black on their paws and tail; with a solid patch from throat to stomach that was anything from yellowish-orange to rich orange.
Their lower legs were big, almost like a kangaroo's, but intended for upright walking; their front arms were smaller, ending in double-thumbed paws with retracted claws that would work well in a knife fight. They had short tails for balance.
The Musth ceremonials evidently didn't require rigidity like Man's, Garvin noted, seeing their heads dart about, peering here and there.
Dill's Grierson had been chosen with three other combat vehicles as honor guard for the governor general's monthly visit to the Musth base on Dharma's Highlands.
Haemer bowed to the forward Musth, half whistled, half hissed something in the alien's language.
"And I greet you, Governor General," the alien replied. "It isss well to face you once more."
He turned.
"I would like to ssshare with you the knowing of my sssoldier-leader, Wiencing."
The Musth behind Aesc bobbed his head. "It isss interesssting to sssee your face," he said.
"Ssshall we go into the building?" Aesc said. "I sssee you mussst be chill."
"If you have no objectionsss," Wiencing said, "perhapsss I might view your sssoldiery, for I have encountered Man but ssseldom, and am poor at diplomacccy."
"Of course not," Caud Williams said. "I'll be happy to come with you."
"There isss no need," Wiencing said. "You have busssiness with Aesssc, I am sssure, and I am content to find my own obssservations."
Williams frowned, then nodded reluctantly. "Very well. I'm sure you'll be impressed."
"I'm sssure," Wiencing said, and came toward Dill's Grierson.
"Do I salute him?" Dill whispered in panic.
"You better," Gorecki said. "We ain't fightin' them yet."
Ben smashed his hand against his forehead, held it there. Wiencing's neck extended sharply another 30cm in surprise, darted back and forth like a snake's. "That isss a sssign of recognition?" he asked.
"No, sir," Dill said. "It's honor to a superior."
/> "I sssee," and Wiencing brought his forearm up, lowering his head, and stood motionless. "I asssume it is to be anssswered in same, like thisss."
Both creatures dropped their arms.
"You have large beingsss in thisss crew," Wiencing said.
Dill wasn't sure what to reply, so just said, "Yes, sir. Pure chance, sir."
"Which one isss the gunner?"
"I am," Jaansma said.
Wiencing walked to Garvin. "Are you good?"
"I'm still learning," Garvin said.
"But they choossse you, and your crew, to guard your highessst? That is unusssual," Wiencing said. "Let me asssk you, Gunner. When you practissse, do you ussse machines?"
"Yes, sir," Garvin said, suddenly at ease. "We call them simulators."
"Sssimulators," Wiencing said, tasting the unfamiliar word. "Who are your enemiesss on these sssimulators?"
"Other machines," Jaansma said. "Spacecraft. Armored ground vehicles. Soldiers."
"Are the sssoldiers Musssth?"
"Nossir," Garvin said. "Men. They wear different uniforms, depending on the problem."
"I wasss told different," Wiencing said.
Garvin started to argue, kept his mouth shut. The Musth eyed him. "But of courssse you would be told to lie and not embarrasss yourssselves," he said, and went to Kang.
"Your dutiesss?"
"Electronic countermeasures, sir."
Wiencing hissed, "Are you good?"
"I am the best," Kang said firmly.
The Musth snorted, a noise Garvin thought might be approval, might be amusement. "That isss a warrior ssspeech," he said. "Each of usss is the bessst, are we not?"
"But I really am," Kang said firmly.
"It isss a pity there isss no way of tesssting your boassst," Wiencing said. "We ssshould play gamesss of war between our two racesss. It would be good for usss, good for you." He turned away, then his head swiveled.
"It will have to passsss another time," he said. "When the war comesss."
Wiencing saluted again, walked toward one of the Zhukovs.
Garvin glanced sideways at Dill, found the big man looking at him.
"I hope he's still learning Common Speech," Jaansma said, "and didn't mean what he said."
"Want to bet you're wrong?"
"Not a chance."
———«»———«»———«»———
"Can I ask something," Njangu said, "without pissing you off too bad?"
"You can try," Hank Faull said amiably. The two sat on Faull's bedside locker, cleaning field gear.
"You're a 'Raum, right?"
"Ex-'Raum," Faull said wryly. "Or so my soh would tell you. He'd also call me a backslider, a traitor, an unbeliever . . . you know, the general sort of thing that makes up a good soldier."
"Soh?"
"An Elder," Faull said. "A deacon. Someone who intercedes with the One, and interprets the Task for us."
"One is like God, right?" Njangu said. "But Task? I can hear capital letters."
"Task is our mission . . . all of us and each of us . . . here on D-Cumbre."
"What's the group goal?"
"All of Cumbre," Faull said precisely, "should belong to us. As should all of space."
"Nice unambitious ideals," Yoshitaro said. "What about the rest of us?"
"You can either join us, or else . . ." Faull drew the back of his thumb across his throat.
"How very excellent," Njangu said. "By what right do you . . . sorry, the 'Raum who still believe . . . claim this?"
"Our sohs tell us that we are First Men, both in creation and here on Cumbre. We came here hundreds of years before the Rentiers and their cronies, even if archeology tends to suggest we showed up in steerage about a hundred years after the first non-'Raum."
"But the legend says when the men who became Rentiers arrived, they had the guns, and we were forced to do whatever they wanted. Into the mines, which is where most of us work today."
"How'd you get here first? And from where?"
"That," Faull said, "is one of those things we're a little vague about. Our holy writ is called The Crossing, and it's very mystic about that. Our homeworld is never named, just described as a paradise, of course. Some say we came here pre-stardrive."
"What, in one of those old-timey punt-it-out-with-a-rocket-and-pray?'
"The Crossing says the Sail brought us here, on a wind given by the One."
"A solar sail?" Njangu said.
"I don't know," Faull said. "Our sohs aren't real great on us reading The Crossing for ourselves. Better we let him or her read it to us, and tell us what it means. Mostly the book is a bunch of lectures that somebody gave to a Fold, a congregation. The guy, or maybe it's a woman, who's preaching never gets named. That's really when I started getting in the shit, when I got a copy of The Crossing for myself, read it and had a whole bunch of questions the soh didn't do a real good job of answering."
"My father taught me to make up my own mind from whatever facts I could come up with. Maybe good, maybe bad, but that's the way I was taught, and that's why I started having trouble."
"'Kay," Njangu said slowly, "I understand the programming. But do the sohs tell the 'Raum they've got to live separately, like I gather they do?"
"If you're a 'Raum," Faull said, some bitterness in his voice, "everybody knows it. Knows it by your name, by your address, by where you went to school."
"With no way out?"
"Except maybe the Force."
"Which is what you're doing?"
"Which is what I'm trying," Faull said. "At least you off-worlders don't seem to give a rat's nose about shit like that."
"If you'd stayed a 'Raum," Njangu asked, "you would've had to become a miner?"
"Actually, there's a ton of us who never pick the pick," Faull said. "We're merchants, traders . . . a lot of us are fishermen or live outside the cities, small-farming."
"I'm missing something," Njangu said. "If you've got all those options, why'd you go soldiering?"
"Those options are bullshit," Faull said sharply. "You can trade . . . to other 'Raum. Farm . . . but you better not get too big. Open a store . . . but it better not compete with the Anciens and their crew."
"That," Njangu said, "sort of blows corpses."
Faull nodded, turned back to his gear.
"That's the system the Force is defending?"
Faull nodded again.
"One other question. Everybody calls the rich types Rentiers. What's that mean? Or was that the name of their ship, or something?"
"That was something I had to look up for myself," Faull said. "It's an old-Earth word for rich people who get richer by making everybody dance around their money piles."
"Shit. So much for Truth, Justice, and the Confederation Way," Njangu said. "It's the same here as anywhere else. We got the Golden Rule whoever's got the gold, rules."
———«»———«»———«»———
Gorecki was teaching Jaansma how to pilot a Cooke. "It's bone-simple," he finished. "Now let's take it out for a field test."
"Good," Jaansma said. "Like where?"
"Off post, maybe around the island," the driver said.
"Even better," Garvin said, and climbed into the driver's seat. The drive was already on. Jaansma fastened his safety straps as Stanislaus clambered in. He eyed the empty gunmount in front of him. "If we had some ammo, I'd chance doing a little cross-country," he said. "But I guess—"
"Hoy," someone shouted, and Garvin saw Ben Dill trotting toward them.
Over his shoulder was a belt, and bolstered on it was the biggest handgun Jaansma'd ever seen. "You two clowns thinking about going for a ride without me?"
"Never happen, Dec."
"Good," Dill said, vaulting into the passenger compartment. "Let's get out of here before somebody finds work for us to do."
"I was gonna have him do a circumnav," Gorecki said.
"Sounds good to me," Dill said. "Let's go beachcombing. Take it away, Miste
r Jaansma."
"Immediately, Mister Dill," and Garvin pushed the drive pedal, and pulled the upside-down U of the control stick toward him. The Cooke hiccupped, then soared away.
"Didn't like that sound," Dill said.
"If you don't like failure," Gorecki said, "don't hook with a Cooke."
"Funny," Dill said. "I'm choking with hysterics. Take it low and fast, Garvin. I want to eat some spray."
"Happy to oblige," Garvin said, and dived toward the water.
———«»———«»———«»———
"Come on children," Lir shouted, "or we'll be late for our morning prayers."
Njangu wanted to curse, but was too out of breath. He thought he heard Gerd wheeze something obscene, but it was probably wishful thinking. Lir seemed determined to make sure none of them survived training, and had started taking the recruits for daily two-kilometer beach runs, with a five-klicker every third day.
"Most important muscle a good rifleman's got is his legs," she observed cheerfully, easily running backward along the water's edge.
"Wrong," Angie Rada managed. "It's what's between them that's important."
"You got enough breath for talking," Lir called, "sing something."
"Aw shit," Rada moaned, but obeyed:
"Oh once I was happy, but now I'm forlorn,
Riding in Griersons all tattered and torn
The drivers are daring, all caution they scorn,
And the pay is exactly the same, the same,
The pay is exactly the same.
We glide through the air in our flying caboose,
Its actions are graceful just like a fat goose,
We hike on the pavement till our joints all come loose,
And the pay is exactly—"
She broke off, hearing the whine of an approaching vehicle.
"Straighten up, you hounds," Lir shouted. "It's liable to be your mother!"
The five closed into tight formation, and a Cooke flashed around the point ahead. As it closed, the vehicle slowed. Njangu wondered who'd be this far from Camp Mahan. Probably some officer with his popsy, he thought wistfully, trying to remember the last time he'd made love to anything other than his hand, and wondered why he'd never tried to see if Angie was serious.
He squinted at the Cooke, saw three men in it. The man in the back stood, and Yoshitaro blinked at how goddamned big the bastard was. The man wore the four rank slashes of a dec. He threw an elaborate salute, and shouted, "Hyp, heep, hoop, there, brave soldiers! Give us a cheer for the Force!"
