Countdown: M Day

by Tom Kratman

  Von Ahlenfeld stopped for a moment and listened. “You know, I haven’t heard a generator since I got here.”

  “And you won’t,” Stauer said. “Up until about two years ago you would have; we had a battery of generators. Fuel supplies, though, have gotten a little iffy—and even when not, getting enough diesel up here via LCM is a bitch—so about two years ago we bought a power module, nuclear, from Hyperion up in New Mexico. That’s one of the reasons we provide free electricity; the thing produces five times more energy than we can hope to use.”

  A feral dog ran yelping past, chased by half a dozen laughing and shouting children, bearing sticks. The kids wore things that were way past the point of being called “rags.”

  “Whose—”

  “Nobody really knows,” Stauer answered, shaking his head. “Not for most of them. The chaplain makes sure they don’t starve, and brings them to the clinic on Camp Fulton if they need it. And Tatiana—”

  “She’s the Romanian hooker you mentioned?” von Ahlenfeld asked.

  “Yeah. There were thirteen of them on their way to a slave auction—we think—when Biggus Dickus and his pirates rescued them. She’s …well, you’ll see. She was kind of scrawny when we …umm …acquired her. She’s grown.”

  The road turned to the right, edging closer to the river. It led between two rows of well trimmed hedges. Just past the hedges the scene changed radically, from an open human sewer to a manicured lawn, and extensive flowerbeds, surrounding a very large, white-painted, single floor bungalow raised up on columns. A new Lexus, also white, was parked out front, with a dark man, in shorts only, painstakingly waxing the thing. On the porch, relaxed in a wooden chair by a table, an iced drink beside her, a very young women, wearing sunglasses, a white hat and a dress that was mostly red silk but patterned with flowers of blue, white, and purple, fanned herself. She rose to her feet and pulled off the sunglasses with a graceful gesture. Then she smiled in a way—brilliant white and darker than sin, all at the same time—that seemed to rob the surrounded jungle of all its oxygen.

  “Tatiana’s house. And”—Stauer sighed—“Tatiana.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  From the moment that [Clearchus] led them to victory,

  the elements which went to make his soldiers efficient

  were numerous enough. There was the feeling of

  confidence in facing the foe, which never left them, and

  there was the dread of punishment at his hands to keep

  them orderly. In this way and to this extent he knew how

  to rule; but to play a subordinate part himself he had no

  great taste; so, at any rate, it was said. At the time of his

  death he must have been about fifty years of age.

  —Xenophon, Anabasis

  Karl Marx Impact Area, Guyana

  In another place, with a different organization and organizational ethos, the area might have been named for some geographic feature, or some widely revered hero. Here it was a case of, as Reilly said, “the sheer joy of being able to shoot the son of a bitch on a daily basis.”

  Reilly’s battalion was the regimental mechanized force. It consisted of two infantry companies, a tank company, and a headquarters and headquarters company.

  The infantry companies consisted each of three rifle platoons in turretless Elands, plus a weapons platoon with two 120mm mortars that were carried by more Elands and had to be dismounted to fire, nine forward observers, and an antitank section with three gunned and turreted Elands and two antitank guns, plus a small headquarters. The infantry companies were almost pure American and European, with only thirteen to fifteen hand-picked locals, each. Generally speaking, the Guyanans were there to learn, before being sent back to one of the other battalions to become junior noncoms.

  The infantry companies were commanded by Hilfer, in Alpha, and Snyder, in Bravo.

  In the tank company was a weapons platoon indistinguishable from those of the rifle companies, except that there were only four forward observers, rather than nine. There were also three platoons of six each heavily modified T-55’s or Type-59 tanks, with another two tanks in the headquarters. Green commanded the tank company. Only the weapons platoon and company headquarters had Guyanans on strength, since there wasn’t a lot of point to teaching them to become tankers, only to send them back to become infantry team leaders.

  Reilly had developed, rather he had borrowed, four standard methods of task organizing the battalion, dubbed, “ companies pure,” “armor Alpha,” “armor Bravo,” and “companies balanced.” All he had to do was give one of those phrases, preceded by the command, “reconfigure,” and the battalion would shift its setup with a minimum of fuss. Even on the move.

  The former, pure, required no cross attaching; each company kept its own organic forces. For the second and third, Green sent either his first platoon to A Company and picked up A company’s first platoon in return, or his second to B Company, picking up B’s second platoon.

  For the last, “balanced,” the tank company gave up both its first and second platoons, picking up A Company’s first and B Company’s second.

  The last company in the battalion, Headquarters and Headquarters Company, was commanded by Reilly’s South African-born, Israeli-national wife, Lana Mendes-Reilly. She had, it was generally acknowledged, the toughest command in the battalion, with twenty-seven different job skill sets—“MOS’s,” the mother Army would have called them—and more than a hundred if one counted different skills being required for different ranks within the same MOS, organized in twelve different platoons and sections: Command, the four staffs, S-1 through -4, Maintenance, Medical, Supply and Transport, Signal, General Support Mortars, Scouts, and her own company headquarters. The complexity of the job was perhaps part of the reason she’d never acquired a nickname.

  HHC had two hundred and seventy-five men (and one woman) on strength, the bulk of them being Guyanans. That was another reason the bloody job was so hard; the unit was twice as big as any other, bigger, in fact, than some of the regiment’s battalions and squadrons. At the end of any given day, Lana’s right hand was cramped and sore from the sheer frequency she had to scrawl her name across some document or other.

  She was also responsible for the twenty-two cooks the battalion picked up from the regimental mess company, still slaving under Master Sergeant Island, whenever the battalion was in the field. Which was often.

  Still …

  I love my job, Lana thought, stroking her elegantly rebuilt nose lightly as she observed some of the mechanics struggling with, and finally conquering, a recalcitrant camouflage net that caught on every little projection and corner of the truck they were trying to screen. The men worked diligently, and with only the minimum necessary cursing for a job that every soldier who’d ever had to do it simply hated.

  The nose Lana stroked was perfect, as it ought to have been since the regiment had paid for a new one, or the old one in a new and improved shape, after she’d smashed it to pulp in combat in Africa. The rest of her wasn’t bad, either. She was tall, slender—with “cute, but not large, tits”—and olive-toned, shading to dark under the Guyanan sun. Lana’s face was high-cheekboned, with large, liquid-brown eyes, full lips, and a delicate chin. The thing everybody remembered about her, at least when they’d seen her in mufti, was her hair. It was said of many women that their hair “cascaded.” In Lana’s case, it was true; she had—when she let her hair down—an auburn waterfall that simply flooded her shoulders and upper back.

  In the present case, of course, being in uniform, and in the field, that waterfall was dammed up into a tight bun at the back of her head, just below where the helmet band kept her helmet firmly fixed in place.

  I love my job, she thought again, but God it’s hot. I’d love to take my helmet off and just let my hair down, but Seamus is death on taking your helmet off in the field, no matter how fucking hot and miserable it is. And, being his wife, while I could get away with it, it would hur
t him if I presumed and that would hurt me.

  And my “cute but not large tits” are getting larger and they’re miserable too, but I can hardly go braless out here. Note to self; maternity bras, padded against external irritation, to mail order, soonest. Unless I can find a couple in Georgetown. Further note to self: Long talk with Seamus about whether I continue to command or turn the company over to someone else when I hit about the five month’s point.

  And, speaking …errr, thinking …of things that come in twos, I’d better go see if Danni Viljoen and Dumisani have C15 up and running yet. Since I’m not going to get First Sergeant Abdan out of my hair until he leaves, with the tank.

  Honey Camp, Guyana

  In their own closet Tatiana still maintained the uniforms and field gear she’d been issued back when she was still a member in good standing—or kneeling, or lying down, or on all fours—of the regiment. She’d be loath to admit it to anyone, but those uniforms and that gear were stored lovingly, and regularly taken out and cared for. Just because the regiment hadn’t been what she’d set her heart on in life, didn’t mean she wasn’t fond of it, or proud of her service as a medic in it.

  And I was a damned good field medic, too, she thought.

  Tatiana sighed, thinking, I miss it sometimes, too. It was the only decent family I ever knew. And the only system that ever treated me fairly. But I had my goals and I had my needs …still …if they ever really needed me …

  And I see that I have guests.

  “Jesus!” von Ahlenfeld breathed as Tatiana smiled in his general direction.

  “Closer than you may think,” Stauer chuckled. “By all reports, a night with Tatiana is as near to Heaven as a man may come on this Earth. Not that I’d know. And, as with any drug dealer, the first taste is always free …for field grades and top three noncoms, anyway. And just like with the drug dealer’s free samples, I strongly advise against accepting.

  “C’mon, I’ll introduce you.”

  When von Ahlenfeld didn’t move, but just stood there, staring, Stauer plucked as his elbow. “C’mon, before you embarrass us.”

  The woman met them at the head of the stairs. “My dear Colonel Stauer,” she said, offering her cheek to be kissed. “You never come around. I’d almost think you don’t like me.”

  “It’s not that at all, Tati,” Stauer answered. “But I’m only mortal and Phillie would make me very dead if I came around too often.”

  “Nonsense,” the hooker replied, her smile, if possible, even more brilliant. “I know Phillie very well and she’d never …oh …cut your balls off, say, and feed them to you while you slept.” Tati’s head tilted. She reconsidered her previous statement and amended, “Um …yes, she would. Now be a gentleman and introduce me to your friend.”

  “Easy enough,” Stauer said. “Lee von Ahlenfeld; Tatiana Manduleanu. Lee’s taking over Second Battalion, Tati.”

  Tatiana asked, “Really? I suppose you already advised him against the free sample?”

  “He’s my friend, Tati, and I’d hate to see him impoverish himself through instantaneous addiction. That, or have a heart attack.”

  “Tsk,” the woman said. “He wouldn’t have a heart attack; a man is only as old as the woman he feels. And you know I have a very busy schedule and can’t afford to spend enough time on any one man to outright impoverish him. Though there is one …oh, never mind.”

  Stauer smiled, wickedly, saying, “The sergeant major sends greetings, too, Tati.”

  The woman shook her head, plainly perplexed. “For him all the samples would be free. And my schedule would always be open. But does he take me up on it? No. I seriously wonder. Colonel Stauer, if you do not have a madman as your regimental sergeant major.”

  Stauer, too, shook his head. “He’s not insane, Tati, just very, very proper. If you would treat it as a professional liaison, he’d be glad to spend some time and some money on you. But since you refuse to take any money from him, he feels that it would be both improper and unprofessional.”

  “Fool man,” the Romanian clucked. “Still,” she conceded, “it’s an admirable foolishness. Part of the reason why I love him so, too, I suppose.”

  Tatiana clapped her hands for one of the half dozen servants she kept on staff. When one arrived, white-liveried, dark-skinned, and earnest-looking, she commanded, “See to my guests, Arun, while I change into something that will either send Colonel—it is ‘colonel,’ isn’t it, Lee?—von Ahlenfeld into cardiac arrest or increase my client base by one.”

  “Yes, Madam,” the Indo-Guyanan said, with a half bow.

  “She was one of yours?” von Ahlenfeld asked, incredulously.

  “A corporal, there when she left,” Stauer acknowledged, nodding. “Good one, too, for being all of just turned eighteen. See, we—which is to say Biggus Dickus Thornton’s boys …errr …liberated some Romanian girls on their way to a slave auction. The thirteen of them were locked up in a shipping container. We couldn’t let them go at the time and they figured they owed us and wanted to help. So we made them medics. Tati was one, and the only one who didn’t necessarily object to the fate that would have been in store for her. Still, she did her duty for as long as it was her duty. Then she took her walking papers and set up in business here.

  “Her …earnings don’t seem to stay just in her account. She had this house built on her own ticket. And,” Stauer pointed through a gap in the trees to where a white spire was slowly rising, “she’s having a chapel built over there, with a school for the little rabble you saw chasing that dog. I’m told she’s hunting for a Romanian Orthodox priest, though whether a priest can accept being supported by a whore, I don’t know. Supposedly, she’s contracted for someone to put in a sewer system, though in this part of this country I’ll believe it when it happens.

  “To the extent anyone is, she’s sort of the mayor of this …place.”

  “And Joshua?” von Ahlenfeld asked.

  “Well …I was being tactful. He likes her a lot, but can’t fuck her for free or a presumption of affection, affection that would also presumably run both ways, would arise. As the RSM, his position doesn’t permit him to have what amounts to a girlfriend who damned near everyone else of any rank in the regiment is fucking or has fucked. Simple, brutal fact of life.”

  Von Ahlenfeld caught a glimpse of an extremely feminine figure through the gauze of the curtains on the windows. He drew breath in a rush.

  “You say the first sample is always free, is it?”

  “For field grades and senior noncoms only. And to get anywhere near her you have to produce a clean blood test from within the last week.”

  “So how do you …?”

  “Just ask her to put you on the schedule. For today, however, we have a schedule to keep.”

  “By the way,” von Ahlenfeld asked, “why do you call the pilot, ‘Doc’?”

  Stauer laughed. “Because Doc McCaverty’s a neurosurgeon that we can only keep on strength—for what we can afford to pay—if we let him fly, generally, and fly combat, in particular.”

  “A neurosurgeon? You, Wes, have a very odd crew here.”

  “You don’t know the half of it.”

  Karl Marx Impact Area, Guyana

  “And that’s the other reason,” Lana said, in Reilly’s tent a few dozen meters from the battalion command post. “I’m …I’m …”

  “‘Um, um,’” Reilly gently mocked. He was over fifty, compared to his wife’s mere thirty-one, and tended to tease her for her youth, among other things.

  “Gonna have a baby,” Lana finished. “In about six months.”

  Reilly had been sipping at a folding tin cup of coffee when Lana had come into his tent. Sua sponte, his hand opened up, letting the cup fall to the tent’s dirt floor.

  “No shit?” he asked, unintelligently.

  “No,” she answered sardonically, “shit comes out of one side. Babies come out the other side.”

  He was on his feet in the next instant, physically picking her up
and setting her protesting form—“I am pregnant; I am not fragile!”—down on his field chair. Then, legs gone weak, he sat straight down onto the dirt. “No shit,” Reilly muttered.

  “I take it, then,” Lana said, “that you do not object to the idea?”

  Speechless for the nonce, he just shook his silly-smiling head in negation.

  I’ve made you happy, she thought, also smiling. That, alone, is worth what I’m going to go through.

  Still smiling, she said, “Good. But we still have the problem of the company. Doc Joseph isn’t an obstetrician—we don’t have an American or Euro-trained obstetrician—but he made a call to a friend of his in the states who is, and the two of them decided I’ll be fine up to about the end of the fifth month. At that point, it would be better—safer, anyway—for me and the baby, both, if I stay out of the excessive heat and generally take it easy. That’s not consistent with being a company commander.”

  “We’ll worry about the company later,” Reilly answered, finally finding some meaningful words. “We have time. What’s more important is that the regiment’s hospital doesn’t have an obstetrician on staff.”

  “That’s not true,” Lana said. “There is one, though all of his patients tend to be local, like himself.”

  “Where did he go to medical school?” Reilly asked. “If it wasn’t top notch from America, Israel, or Europe . . ”

  Lana held up a shushing hand. “He delivered both of Phillie Stauer’s without a hitch.”

  Reilly took her small hand and wrapped it in his own. “I’m not in love with or married to Phillie Stauer,” he said. “I am with you. So I don’t care what was good enough for her and hers. I care about what’s good enough for you and ours, and a local isnlikely to cut it.”