The Thunderbolt Division was cheap because it wasn't much good. Its equipment was low-tech, little better than what Meridienne's indigenous forces had bought for themselves. The mercenaries' main benefit to their employers was their experience. They were full-time, professional soldiers, not amateurs getting on-the-job training in their first war.
Then the Sincanmos met the threat head on: they hired Hammer's Slammers and prepared to smash every sign of organization in the northern half of the continent in a matter of weeks.
Des Grieux didn't see any reason the Sincanmo plan wouldn't work. Neither did Captain Garnaud, the commanding officer of Delta Company.
Normally line troops expected to serve disciplinary sentences after the fighting was over.In this case, Garnaud had decreed immediate active time for Des Grieux. D Company didn't need the veteran against the present threat, and Garnaud correctly believed that missing the possibility of seven days' action was a more effective punishment for Slick Des Grieux than a year's down-time restriction.
But now he was getting out early . . . .
Des Grieux followed Daniels into the close quarters of the jailor's office. The communications display was live with the angry holographic image of a senior lieutenant in battledress.
The face was a surprise.The officer was Katrina Grimsrud, the executive officer of H Company,rather than one of D Company's personnel."Where the bloody hell have you been?" she snarled as soon as the jailor moved into pickup range of the display's cameras.
Daniels sat down at the desk crammed into the half of the container which didn't hold his bed and living quarters. His artificial feet splayed awkwardly at the sudden movement; they needed tuning or perhaps replacement.
"Sorry, sir," he muttered as he manipulated switches. His equipment was old and ill-mated, cast-offs from several different departments. Junk gravitated to this use on its way to the scrap pile. "Had to get the prisoner."
He adjusted the retinal camera. "Okay, Des Grieux," he said. "Look into this."
Des Grieux leaned his forehead against the padded frame."What's going on?" he demanded.
Light flashed as the unit recorded his retinal pattern and matched it with the file in Central Records. Daniels' printer whined, rolling out hard copy. Des Grieux straightened, blinking as much from confusion as from the brief glare.
"Listen, Des Grieux," Lieutenant Grimsrud said. "We don't want any of your cop in this company. If you get cute, you're out. D'ye understand? Not busted, not in lockup: out!"
"I'm not in Hotel Company," Des Grieux snapped. He was confused. Besides, the adrenaline sparked by a chance of action had made him ready—as usual to fight anybody or anything, including a circle saw.
"You are now, Sarge," Daniels said as he handed Des Grieux the hard copy.
"Get over to the depotsoonest,"Grimsrud ordered as Des Grieux stared at his orders. "Jailor, you've got transport, don't you? Carry him. We've got a replacement tank there with a newbie crew. Des Grieux's to take over as commander; the assigned commander'll drive."
Des Grieux frowned.He was transferred from Delta to Hotel, all right. It didn't matter a curse one way or the other; they were both tank companies.
Only . . . transfers didn't occur at finger-snap speed—but they did this time, with the facsimile signature of Colonel Hammer himself releasing Sergeant-Commander Samuel Des Grieux (retinal prints attached) from detention and transferring him to H Company.
"Look, sir," Daniels said, "it's not my job to dr—"
"It's bloody well your job if you don't get him to the depot ASAP, buddy!" Lieutenant Grimsrud said. "I can't spare the time or the man to send a driver back. D'ye understand?"
Des Grieux folded the orders into the right cargo pocket of his uniform."I don't understand,"he said to the holographic image."Why such a flap over the Thunderbolt Division? We could put truck drivers in line and walk all over them."
"Too right," Grimsrud said forcefully. "Seems the towel-heads figured that out for themselves in time to hire Broglie's Legion. Colonel Hammer wants all the veterans he's got in line—and with you, that gives my 3d Platoon one, I say again one, trooper with more than two years in the Regiment. Get your ass over to our deployment area soonest."
Lieutenant Grimsrud cut the connection.Des Grieux stared in the direction of blank air no longer excited by coherent light. His whole body was trembling.
"Don't sound like she's lookin' for excuses," Daniels grumbled as he got to his feet. "C'mon, Sarge, it's ten keys to the depot from here."
Des Grieux whistled tunelessly as he followed the jailor to an air-cushion jeep as battered as the equipment in Daniels' office. His kit was still in D Company. He didn't care. He didn't care about anything at all, except for the chance fate offered him.
Daniels started the jeep. At least one drive fan badly needed balancing. "Hey, Sarge?" he said. "I never asked you—what was the fight about? The one that landed you here?"
"Some bastard called me a name," Des Grieux said. He braced himself against the tubular seat frame worn through the upholstery. The jeep lurched into motion.
Des Grieux's eyes were closed.His face looked like the blade of a hatchet."He called me 'Pops,'" Des Grieux said. Memory of the incident pitched his voice an octave higher than normal. "So I hit him."
Daniels looked at the tanker, then frowned and looked away.
"Thirty-two standard years don't make me an old man," Slick Des Grieux added in an icy whisper.
A starship tested its maneuvering jets on the landing pad beside the depot's perimeter defenses. The high screech was so loud that the air seemed to ripple. Though the lips of Warrant Leader Farrell, the depot superintendent, continued to move for several seconds, Des Grieux hadn't the faintest notion of what the man was saying.
Des Grieux didn't much care,either.There was only one tank among the depot's lesser vehicles and stacked shipping containers.He stepped past Farrell and tested the spring-loaded cover of a step with his fingertip. It gave stiffly.
"Right," said Farrell. He held Des Grieux's transfer orders and, on a separate flimsy, the instructions which Central had downloaded directly to the depot. "Ah, here's the, ah, the previous crew."
Two troopers stood beside the depot superintendent. Both were young, but the taller, dark-haired one had a wary look in his eyes. The other man was blond, pale, and soft-seeming despite the obvious muscle bulging his khaki uniform.
Des Grieux gave them a cursory glance, then returned his attention to the important item: the vehicle he was about to command.
The tank was straight out of the factory in Hamburg on Terra. Farrell's crew would have—should have done the initial checks, but the bearings would be stiff and the electronics weren't burned in yet.
The tank didn't have a name, just a skirt number in red paint: H271.
"Trooper Wartburg will move to driver," Farrell said. The dark-haired man acknowledged the statement by raising his chin a centimeter. "Trooper Flowers here was going to drive, but he'll go back to Logistics till we get another vehicle in."