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  “Not the systems?” asked the captain. It was a test. The captain might learn a smattering of the equipment, but for the moment getting the parts out off the supply chain was much more important.

  “Not if you want to have any running in a month,” said Sharon, shortly. “The Fleet floats on electronic paperwork. And my AID is about to give your AID a crash course. Starting with how messed up the parts program is.”

  CHAPTER 15

  Ft. Indiantown Gap, United States of America, Sol III

  1427 EDT September 13th, 2004 ad

  “Yes, Ampele?” First Sergeant Pappas looked up at the image of the operations sergeant displayed by his AID. The call had interrupted his attempt to reduce the mass of paperwork that had built up while he was on leave and he suppressed an illogical snarl; the recently promoted ops sergeant was famous for not wasting his time.

  “Top, battalion PAC just called and we’re getting another E-6.”

  “We’re up to strength,” responded Pappas as a knee-jerk reaction.

  “No, we’re down one, according to PAC, and technically they’re right.”

  “If you’re talking about Stewart’s squad, you’ve got to be joking.”

  “I don’t know what else we’re going to do with him. He’s senior to Stewart and all the other squads have staffs as squad leaders.”

  “Do we have his two-oh-one? And where are we on getting Stewart his Six?”

  “The two-oh-one’s still queuing from all the transfers, but PAC is ‘very confident’ that we will have it in hand by the time he arrives, and he has a hardcopy with him. And there is no way that battalion is going to board Stewart. He’s barely out of basic!”

  “So are you, and I got you your five stripes. Never mind, I’ll take another hammer to the sergeant major. When the new guy arrives, send him straight in.”

  “Roger.”

  * * *

  “Staff Sergeant Duncan,” said the new NCO, from the doorway, “reporting to the first sergeant as ordered.”

  Duncan had been around — he was entering his twelfth year in the military — and he knew that when you reported to your company, whatever the procedure might say, you usually saw other NCOs before you were introduced to your new first sergeant or commander. Because they were very busy people with tight schedules, if you were ordered to report directly to one or the other on arrival, it usually meant trouble. And he really had no interest in trouble. Especially from the big son of a bitch that was his new Top.

  “Come on in, Duncan was it? Pull up a chair.” Ernie Pappas, who still thought of himself as a gunnery sergeant, could tell when someone was on pins and needles and suspected he knew why.

  “No big problem,” he continued. “If you’re wondering why I asked to see you right away, just a couple of things I wanted you to be aware of. Termites in your new home, so to speak.”

  First Sergeant Pappas did a quick perusal of his newest NCO and came away with varying first impressions. For one thing, the guy was no rejuv. Pushing thirty probably, though it was hard to tell with his eyes. He had a battered look, kinda shocky, that reminded him of the Old Man when he first arrived, and a pin that he had only ever seen before on the captain, the one that meant that the person had been in nuclear ground combat. Despite how bad it was on Barwhon, the pin had only been earned in one engagement.

  He held out his hand for the hardcopy personnel file clutched in the new NCO’s hand. “Diess?” he asked, softly.

  “Yeah. And I just got back from Barwhon,” the staff sergeant replied, surprised. “How’d you know?”

  “I’ve seen the pin before.” Pappas let it lie at that and started reading the file. He skipped all the marketing bullshit at the front that was mainly for promotion boards and went straight to the military history file. Several items leaped off the page. After a few moments’ scan he closed the file and smiled.

  “What?” Duncan asked. He knew that his new first sergeant had seen something that made him adjust his first impressions, probably either the Article 15 just before Diess, or he had read through the lines on his most recent transfer. The smile could mean anything.

  “Well, I have the old good news, bad news routine,” said Pappas with a slight smile. “And I’ll lay it out with the intermediate news first. I wanted you to know that your platoon sergeant is a female.

  “Sergeant First Class Bogdanovich was an instructor for the Marines before they opened up the combat arms and she jumped at the chance to go to Strike. She is extremely competent and runs a helluva platoon. I doubt that you’re going to have problems, but you’re not prejudiced against women, are you? I’d appreciate an honest answer; I can shuffle things if you are.”

  Like I could say yes? thought Duncan. “No, that’s fine. I’ve never worked with a female boss, but we were having them trickle in as I was leaving Diess. The ones who are professional are fine.”

  “You got a problem with some that aren’t professional?” asked the first sergeant cautiously.

  “Top, if one of my troops starts bawling because I told them they fucked up, that’s their problem,” said Duncan with a frown. “I do not coddle my male troops, I damn sure won’t coddle any female ones. Yeah, I had a little problem with that on Diess, not one of my troops. She eventually decided that maybe Fleet Strike wasn’t the place for her.”

  The first sergeant decided to take that one on faith. It sounded like a couple of incidents he’d heard about, but not in Bravo since they’d received their first group of women. Fleet Strike was composed of multiple countries’ forces, some of which had a tradition of women in combat. It made no allowances for feminine virtues or perceived weaknesses. It was not that what was generally considered a feminine approach did not have merit, it was just that it had no merit in combat. The Fleet forces were slowly coming to terms with that fact, the American forces generally much slower than others. From Pappas’s point of view, it was up to the Bogdanoviches and the Nightingales to prove that they had a place. There were no freebies in the infantry. Not with a war on.

  “Okay,” he said with a nod, scratching the back of his head with a pen. “I don’t think you’re going to have a problem with that. Now for the really bad news. We’ve already completed our FSTEP, and maxed it, so I’m understandably proud of our junior leadership and don’t really want to mess with it.

  “The only squad that does not have an E-6 squad leader is headed up by an E-5 who is so outstanding I’m considering offing you to keep him in charge.” Pappas smiled to show he was joking. “Unfortunately, he is also so incredibly junior — he’s practically straight out of boot camp — that you virtually have to take the squad.”

  “Well, Top,” said Duncan, furrowing his brow, “you know that thing about a lazy man? If I can let my Alpha team leader run my whole damn squad…” He held up his hands as if taking them off.

  “Sure, sure, I believe that. Anyway, I think you can handle Stewart. You’ll find this out soon enough, but I came here from the Fleet Basic course at McCall with the skeleton of the company, and Stewart came with me. Nonetheless, he really is extraordinary. Wait’ll you deal with him. Last but not least, I think you should know that I doubt I will be able to do anything about it even if you do have problems with Stewart. Or Bogdanovich, for that matter. Or even me.”

  “Why?” asked Duncan, sensing a trap.

  “You know how I said I’d seen that pin…”

  * * *

  “Sergeant Bogdanovich,” said the first sergeant as he walked into the Swamp, “meet your new second squad leader, Staff Sergeant Duncan. He was in the Old Man’s platoon on Diess.”

  Natalie Bogdanovich hesitated fractionally as she extended her hand, then took Duncan’s in a strong grip. “Welcome to O’Neal’s Traveling Circus.”

  Duncan sized up his new platoon sergeant and was immediately impressed. Bogdanovich was a short, heavily muscled blonde with engaging blue eyes and her hair pulled back in a bun. Her fresh good looks were barely undone by a nose that was slightly
crooked from being broken some time in the past. But the energy and enthusiasm she exuded quickly drew the attention away from that tiny defect. Duncan could feel a restrained power behind her grip that reminded him of Lieutenant O’Neal.

  “I didn’t even know he made captain, although I’m not surprised.”

  “Given the size of Fleet Strike,” pointed out Gunny Pappas, “we were bound to get someone who knew him on Diess. There’s not that many units.”

  “Well,” Duncan noted with a grim shake of the head, “there were only twelve of us left and three are on permanent disability.”

  “How do you get permanently disabled?” asked the first sergeant. “Galactic Medical can fix anything that doesn’t kill you outright.”

  “Psychiatric,” Duncan and Bogdanovich said together, then looked at each other quizzically.

  “Boggle did a tour on Barwhon, first,” said Pappas.

  Bogdanovich nodded, somberly. “It seems there’s still some things they can’t cure.”

  “Yeah,” Duncan agreed quietly. “Although I think in the case of Private Buckley, they let him off ’cause they didn’t want to put up with the stories.” Duncan gave a grim chuckle.

  “Private Who?” queried the first sergeant.

  “What, Mighty Mite never told that one?” said Duncan with a smile. Two combat vets and Mighty Mite as a commander. It looked like this might be a good place to call home for a while.

  CHAPTER 16

  Ft. Myer, VA, United States of America, Sol III

  1825 EDT September 13th, 2004 ad

  “All work and no play makes Mike a dull boy,” said General Horner, leaning casually in the doorway of Mike’s tiny office; his junior aide, Captain Jackson, hovered at his side.

  “Well, sir, the nightlife in Georgetown ain’t what it used to be.”

  Since being given the almost overwhelming task of writing employment guidelines for the Armored Combat Suit units in the upcoming defense, Mike had been working sixteen to twenty hours a day, seven days a week. Work was actually a relief compared to contemplating the current situation. As the world hurtled to its inevitable rendezvous with the Posleen, society had begun a slow process of meltdown.

  Once the full import of the upcoming invasion became apparent, a radical shift in economic and population emphasis occurred. Seventy percent of the world’s population and eighty percent of its wealth was concentrated in coastal plain zones or plains contiguous with coastal plains. While these areas had many noteworthy features, defensibility against the Posleen was not one of them.

  The developing “Sub-Urbs,” underground cities for the refugees from the plains, had been designed with locations for businesses, factories and all the other necessary organs of society. However, like many things Galactic related, they were not being completed as fast as originally anticipated. The waiting list for businesses and manufacturing locations was even longer than the one for residences.

  Businessmen, insurance adjusters and the common man could often do enough math to make their own decisions. Areas that had become moribund due to the previous decades’ shift away from montane zones suddenly began to experience a rebirth.

  The faded industries of Bavaria and the American Rust Belt, especially the cities of Detroit and Pittsburgh, saw a massive influx of new plants, as GalTech and more mundane terrestrial industries relocated their fixed facilities to locations that could be defended.

  With this movement of industry and services came a matching movement of labor. The workers, managers and executives of the moving firms followed the jobs, but others could put two and two together and a massive movement of people without any fixed employment flooded the Ohio Valley and the Midwest in the United States, and Switzerland, Austria and the Balkans in Europe. In Asia, more limited infrastructures and disputed borders did not permit mass migrations such as occurred in the United States and Europe, but there was significant movement towards and into the Himalayas, Hindu Kush and Caucasus.

  In Japan, meanwhile, all the industry remained on the plains, but massive civilian shelters were being dug and populated throughout the country’s many mountain ranges. The Japanese experiences in World War II and their extensive civil engineering infrastructure continued to serve them well.

  This mass migration and the flickering disruptions it caused in supply and demand of goods, services and labor were causing every kind of shortage in one area and oversupply in another.

  Many individuals were getting rich on these supply problems, most of them ethically. Shortages had always been the creators of fortune. These individuals and anyone else with an income were then faced with the problem of where to put their money.

  In most cases this was still the currency of whatever country the transaction occurred in, rather than Federation Credits. However, there was no convincing evidence that banks or even countries would survive the invasion. Thus, the cautious investor would prefer placement in a Galactic bank or a Terrestrial bank in a very secure location. Although most funds were merely electrons, a brick and mortar location remained a necessity. There was more to store than money. People had valuable artworks, personal treasures, precious gems and other items of “real” value. Terrestrial banks had, early on, joined in partnership with Galactic banks and, using this conduit, funds and goods began to flow outward from Earth.

  However, the inevitable law of supply and demand again reared its ugly head, and as the flow continued from Terrestrial currencies to FedCreds, the exchange rate went up and up. Now, along with a famine of hope, was the specter of inflation. There were two exceptions to this.

  Switzerland, already a renowned financial center, had been given the highest possible Galactic bond rating. Not only was it a major financial center already. Not only was it seventy percent mountains. But the Swiss militia had gone through several tests against notional attacks and every single assault had been beaten off with ease. However, another player had entered the banking market.

  The ancient and secretive Buddhist country of Bhutan was briefly conquered by its neighbor, Bangladesh, for the purpose of becoming a leadership haven. A single visit by a British Armored Combat Suit battalion returned things to their original structure, but the Bhutanese had learned their lesson.

  Obstructed by their religion from engaging in violence, they could still hire mercenaries, and a new Ghurka regiment was born. Ghurkas were mountain troops from Nepal that had a reputation as the best light infantry in the world.

  To pay for it Bhutan opened a few small branch offices of major banks. Since the kingdom was determinedly old-fashioned and environmentally rigorous the bank branches were shoehorned into millennia-old massively built stone monasteries. Now, defended by the most renowned fighters in the world, massive stone walls and terrain obstacles to daunt Hannibal, the banks began to receive a tsunami influx of precious artwork, gems, metals and funds. A fractional tithe of this flood served to pay for the most advanced military equipment on Earth for the Ghurkas. The Ghurkas, and their British mercenary officers, were only too happy to put it to use.

  Inflation, deflation and shortages wracked the world, causing famines and plagues in their wake. But through all of it most continued to work and struggle: to labor for a possible victory.

  “Actually,” said Horner with a smile, “I hear the ratio of unmarried females is even higher than ever.”

  “As, I said…”

  “Well, you’re getting out of this office tonight. You have to be about done.”

  “I am done,” Mike answered, gesturing at a massive stack of hardcopy on his desk: reports and presentations. “That’s it.”

  “Okay, good,” Horner said, pleased but not surprised that everything was just so.

  Mike had worked for him for two years when he was in charge of the GalTech infantry team, initially as a civilian TechRep and later as his aide. Horner had learned early that the junior officer had an intense ability to concentrate on getting a job done. He had chosen him for this job for that reason as much as fo
r his ACS experience. Time had been short. There was a tiny list of people who could design the operational strategy for ACS employment in Fortress Forward. And there was a different tiny list of people who could pull something like that together in the bare two weeks he had had at his disposal. The only officer that Jack was aware of who was on both lists was sitting in the chair.

  “As long as you’re ready for the all-commands conference tomorrow, you don’t have a reason not to come to the Fort Myer’s club tonight, all spiffy in your Fleet Blues.”

  “Well, sir,” said Mike with a not particularly false yawn, “actually I have about thirty reasons, starting with sleep.”

  Jack seemed to pay no attention to his rejection. “Besides welcoming all the Army commanders to this official kickoff of ‘Fortress Forward’ we will be celebrating the visit of the new French Ground Forces commander with a dining-out. I thought you might like to attend.”

  “Well, sir, as I said…”

  “His name is Crenaus.”

  “The Deuxieme Armore commander, sir?” Deuxieme Armore, along with the Tenth Panzergrenadier and a scattering of British, Chinese and American armor units was rescued by then-Lieutenant O’Neal’s platoon on Diess, when they had been encircled by Posleen in the Dantren megascraper. The platoon had dropped megascrapers on two sides of the encirclement and cracked the Posleen on the remaining side with a barrage of antimatter grenades. The French general — a gangling firecracker of a man who bore a remarkable resemblance to the scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz — had been notably impressed. Mike, in turn, had been impressed with how well the general had held his unit together in such an impossible situation. Deuxieme Armore had come out of the conflict with lower losses than any of the other units in the mobile defense, to a great extent because they retained cohesion when others broke like glass vases. The strongest reason for that cohesion was the guest of the dining-out.