“Lieutenant, I’ve got Kvat, and I’m heading back. I don’t know if I’m going to be able to haul him out of this wash, though.”
“Thank the Mother. You just get back here. We’ll get him out.”
Rev half ran, half shuffled with Kvat on his shoulders. If he wasn’t augmented, there was no way he could have made it. Probably without Pashu, he wouldn’t have made it. As it was, he was huffing and puffing in the thin air, his right arm and his back screaming in pain. Pashu was the only part of him that didn’t hurt.
He came around the last curve to see Bob and Rice down in the wash, each holding the ends of two cables. Rev almost collapsed in a heap as he tried to put Kvat down.
“We’ve got him,” Bob said as he and Rice whipped the cables under the karnan’s arms and around his chest. Rice stepped back, gave a thumbs-up, and shouted, “Now!”
Kvat started jerking up the wall, his body bouncing and scraping against the dirt and stones. He got caught once, and Rice had to pull him free.
“You look beat. Can you make it up?” Bob asked.
Rev looked up the wall. It wasn’t sheer, but close to it. Without lugging Kvat, though, he knew he could manage.
Bob waited until Rev made it up, though. Ten troopers, five on each cable, were out of the Anaconda, pulling up a karnan that most really didn’t like as a person. Ten troopers who were putting themselves in danger by staying there.
Not just the ten. The Anaconda was still there, too, with the others in the squads watching.
Bob scrambled up right as the ten got Kvat to the top.
“That’s it,” Bundy yelled. “Into the Anaconda, now, now, now!”
There was a scramble as Kvat was carried in, the rest crowding around. Rev was a little slower, and there wasn’t enough room for him when he got to the vehicle, not with Pashu.
“In the turret, Rev,” Bundy said, giving him a boost up
Bundy stayed below to help close the hatch, fighting against the crush of bodies inside. For a minute of panic, Rev thought he planned to stay behind for some unfathomable reason, but then Bundy scrambled up to the top of the vehicle as well.
“Get us out of here, Schmidt!” he shouted.
The Anaconda lurched into motion just as Rev lowered himself into the turret. Bundy almost fell off, but Rev snagged him with his IBHU.
Rev pulled Bundy close and asked, “Is the Taka going to hit the place?”
“Just watch.”
Rev faced the rear, his eyes on the section of tortured exclusion zone. As Schmidt lengthened the distance between the Anaconda and the area, Rev began to feel a little bit better. When nothing happened, he wondered if he’d been wrong after all.
Then the air seemed to shimmer, like a mirage on a hot day. Dust started to rise over the entire section as the ground shuddered. Even this far away and inside his PAL-5, all of the hair on his body stood on end.
Rev flipped down his overlay. The dust was rising only from the section within the exclusion zone. The area outside of that looked untouched.
But inside, tetra joules of power were being poured into one square kilometer. It was being scoured. Any CMG mercenary still in the area was no more.
With a shrug, Rev turned around and face the front where he could see Second Platoon’s Anaconda come to a stop.
From a tactical standpoint, at least, the incursion had come to an end.
34
“What the hell did you do to him?”
“What?” Rev asked, opening his eyes. After the mission to rescue Second Squad, the debriefs, then going out again on their own patrol, the troopers of First Squad were exhausted, and all Rev wanted to do was get some sleep.
An angry Corporal Wymont was standing at the foot of his rack. “What did you do to Staff Sergeant Kvat? He’s in the aid station, and word is he’s getting medivaced back to the home system.”
“Go back to your bivouac, Wymont.” Rev closed his eyes, hoping that would dissuade the corporal from whatever crusade he was on at the moment.
Fat chance. The corporal slapped the sole of his foot with karnan muscles. “I want to know what you did to the staff sergeant.”
Rev might have erupted at that, but he was just too tired. He needed some sleep. He raised himself to his elbows to stare down the MDS soldier.
“I saved his damned life, if you must know.” Again, something he might not have said if he was rested and alert.
“That’s not what I heard.”
What the hell now?
“Well, Corporal, I don’t know what you heard, but facts are facts. Now, get out of here and leave me alone.”
Wymont stood there for a moment, then said, “You yooties, you always want to prove that being an android freak is better than the karnan way,” he said, the “karnan way” spoken with almost religious intensity.
“I heard you abandoned Staff Sergeant Kvat, left him to get overwhelmed, then when it was safe, marched in to save the day. All for the fucking glory and to put karnans down. You know nothing about loyalty and brotherhood. You yooties, especially you oners, will sell your fucking souls for a medal.”
Rev was shocked more than angry. There was just so much wrong there that it was difficult to unpack.
Beside him, Bob sat up from where he’d collapsed onto his rack after the mission. “You’d better watch your ass, baby pit bull. I’ll have you know that it was Staff Sergeant Pelletier who—”
Rev cut him off with a raised hand. In a voice so sharp it could cut a diamond, he said, “I don’t care what the hell you heard. But I will tell you this. If you don’t get out of here and back to your bivouac, I’m going to invoke combat contingency regs and have you arrested.”
Rev didn’t know if he really could do that. He expected not. But he was betting that Wymont didn’t know that, either.
“Is that what you want? A Mad Dog karnan getting arrested in a combat theater? Do you know what that’ll look like?”
Rev could see the expression flow across his face as he took that in. He opened his mouth twice to say something, only to close it. Finally, he said, “OK, I’m leaving. But if I find out that you’re the reason he’s getting medivaced, I’m coming for you, yootie. I don’t care what crap you pull; I’m coming for you.”
He spun around and stormed out of the shelter.
“What a piece of shit,” Bob said. “You saved Kvat.”
“If you need a witness, I’m here,” Akkeke said from down the line of cots.
“Me, too,” a dozen other voices echoed. They’d been listening in during the entire thing, and Rev knew that if Wymont had tried anything, they’d have been there in his defense.
It was a good feeling.
“Thanks, but I think it’s over. He’ll find out what really happened.”
“Even if he does, he won’t thank you,” Bob said.
“What makes you think I need thanks? All I need now is sleep.” He raised his voice. “And I think all of us need sleep. We can get called out again at any time.”
He lay his head back. Within seconds, sleep claimed him.
35
“One more week, I bet, and we can get off this shithole of a planet,” Sergeant Lines said.
“Watch it, Lines,” Sergeant Racine-Okan snapped.
“But it is a shithole.”
“It’s not that, Lines. It’s the you saying out loud we’re leaving and when. Good way to get the gods of war all sorts of pissed off, and they’ll like as not change that just to fuck with you,” Rice said.
Rev was never superstitious back on New Hope as a kid, but being around other Marines and troopers, where superstition was almost as bad as it was in professional sports, it wasn’t surprising that some started creeping up on him. He didn’t really believe there were actual gods of war, nor did he think anyone else did. It was more of being just a way of expressing themselves. And even if there were, he didn’t think they’d screw with a Home Guard battalion just because some trooper made the comment. But still . . .
Lines frowned, but he didn’t say anything. He might have been right, Rev thought. Things had moved quickly after the “incident,” as it was being termed. Not “battle.” First of the Second and First of the Third had arrived, and while they were kept in orbit, their presence was no secret. Maybe the corporate leaders of Evvo, or even Chang-Moud Group, having had their noses swatted, thought it was time to compromise. Or maybe it just was the assistant vice-counsel. The woman was a force to be reckoned with, and Rev, as part of the show guard, had been able to witness at least some of it.
The CoH never intended for her to be the go-to diplomat, but somehow, after the incident, she came up with a solution. There were lots of moving parts, but the gist of it was that the Scratchers would gain permanent residency, and not only that, would receive shares in Evvo.
Things could still go haywire—there was always that possibility. But both FIS and Alyanz fleets had departed the system while the details were worked out. Without that Sword of Damocles hanging over their head, and with the arrival of the other two battalions, chances were that Second of the Second would soon depart, if only for show and nothing else.
“I hope it’s OK to say I’ll be glad to get off this place, whenever that is,” Corporal Akkeke said. “It’s hell on my delicate skin. I’m going broke on skin conditioner.”
Rev laughed. The image of the big, hulking Millsap soldier using conditioner, even if they could find it, was pretty funny.
“Just try the stew we had for dinner last night. That grease will protect any hunk of hide, even yours,” Randigold said.
There might be some truth to that. Their fabricator, acquired from the local market as an attempt to bolster morale, was acting up, and the food it produced had more grease than substance. Chow was better with the D-rats they had before.
“Did you come up with that all on your own, PFC, or is that another Cruella joke,” Sergeant Crocker asked.
“Oh, that’s one all on me. You only get one Cruella a joke per day.”
Rev sat up from where he was leaning against the empty crate.
Eth is telling battle buddy jokes to her platoon? Why didn’t I know that?
Rev knew that Punch wasn’t the only battle buddy who told jokes—or at least Punch used to tell jokes. And it shouldn’t have surprised him. He was sure that the jokes—or songs, or whatever some battle buddies did—were simply tools the Union used to psychologically monitor and influence the fully augmented Marines. And for the IBHU Marines, this went double.
So why should it be any different for Randigold? Or that with her personality, she would share jokes on a daily basis.
He looked across the “plaza,” as they called the beaten-down area between the platoon bivouac areas, to Sign of Respect. The sergeant was sitting quietly on top of an ammo pack, seemingly just listening to the chatter as they waited for the officers to return and give them an update. Rev wondered if his AI told him jokes. Or played classical music. Rev hadn’t heard anybody say their battle buddies did that, but that would seem to fit the serious nature of the sergeant better.
Heck, Reverent. It’s the quiet ones you have to watch out for. For all you know, his battle buddy is feeding him porn right now, and he’s quiet because he doesn’t want to admit it.
He almost laughed out loud at the thought, but then . . . is that even possible? Do the AIs have access to that stuff?
He quickly tried to get the thought out of his mind. That wasn’t something he wanted the minders that he was sure were there to pick up on. But deep down, he knew the Navy psychological types would send porn if they thought it would make for a more capable Marine.
He needed to banish the thoughts, and in a slight panic, he asked the question he’d been wondering about since the Centaur invasion of New Hope but had been afraid to ask.
“Why have you stopped telling me jokes?”
He immediately regretted slipping like that, so he added, “Not that it matters. Just . . . uh, you know, so I can share them around.”
He winced, knowing that was lame. If he was being monitored, that would stick out like a sore thumb.
There was a small flash, like an eye floater, but more vivid. But eye floaters are spots, not words, and that was what it looked like to him.
What the hell?
This wasn’t the first time he’d had these, and usually when Punch was on his mind or in his speech. But this was something different.
“Are you trying to—”
There was another flash, and this time, it stayed. “Don’t respond” appeared as if floating in the air in front of him.
“What—”
The message flared brighter as Punch said,
Rev stopped dead as he tried to figure out what was happening.
Another message, even longer, seemed to form out of the empty air.
Rev had no idea what was going on, but he slowly raised his right hand and scratched his nose.
“Uh . . . yeah. That would be OK.”
Rev didn’t know what to think. This was decidedly weird. And being told not to respond was unnerving.
Rev’s heart jumped into his throat. Secure manner? Covert?
“Why? I mean, why did you think I didn’t like your humor?”
He hoped that Punch knew he didn’t care about the humor comment. That was just cover for the word “why.”
I knew it! Rev thought. He’d long assumed that Punch reported what Rev said and did. But to have Punch confirm it . . . and now Rev worried about what had been reported. He hadn’t done anything wrong that he knew of. But everyone had things they said and did that they’d prefer to keep private.
“When did you come to that conclusion? I’ve laughed at your jokes sometimes.”
A new message appeared.
“I asked you before why you quit telling me jokes, and it’s been a long time since you came to that conclusion. I even asked what your PQ was and if the limitations for me being with the Home Guard had any impact on you.”
Rev was taken aback by that. Not that there was underlying programming that was outside of his scope. He’d long suspected that. But for Punch to take time to know where his loyalties lay? Why so long? And despite Punch telling him this, could that all be part of some big game played by the Corps?
No, not the Corps. This has to be J-2.
Was that the floaters I saw on Barclay?
The message flickered and disappeared. Rev wondered if Punch was done, but after about fifteen seconds, another message appeared.
Rev frowned as he took that last bit in. Punch could project images, video, diagrams, or whatever directly into his optic nerves. That was over a mechanical interface, though. Rev didn’t have a firm grasp as to how sight actually worked. He opened his eyes, and he saw. That was about the extent of it. But he knew the nerves transmitted data via both a chemical reaction and electrical impulses. If Punch was stimulating both a chemical and electrical reaction to project the words, then maybe it really was that much of an undertaking.
So, what did all this mean? Was either the Corps, J-3, or J-2 monitoring everything he did? Were they doing it to all IBHUs, and why? Was it even beyond the Corps, with D-4?
“What about the others? I know some battle buddies tell jokes, like Randigold’s Cruella does.”
An Uneasy Alliance: Book 4 of the Sentenced to War Series Page 33
