“El-Tee?” called Learoyd. He pointed to Fencing Master’s port wing gun, slewing incrementally under the control of gunnery computer. “There’s something coming.”
Huber looked south again, noticing this time that two enclosed aircars were approaching fast below the dirigibles. His eyes narrowed: the cars’ IFF must have been responding correctly or else the tribarrels on air defense would’ve shot them out of the sky a minute ago, but the drivers were taking a chance anyway. Even with the war over …
“Hey, what d’ye have?” Deseau said. He couldn’t see what was happening from ground level, but he’d noticed Learoyd’s and Huber’s interest. Instead of immediately jumping onto the plenum chamber to see for himself, he first latched the access port closed so that Fencing Master would be able to maneuver again.
The aircars came over the berm twenty meters up, braking to a hover with a slickness that showed the drivers were expert. They set down in front of the TOC, between two of Battery Alpha’s dug-in howitzers; dust skittered, dancing away to the west.
Huber jumped from the berm to the plenum chamber, his boots clanging. He climbed into the fighting compartment just as Deseau did; both men reflexively checked their tribarrels. Learoyd locked down the third barrel on his gun and slipped the adjustment wrench into its pouch on his belt.
“What d’ye think, El-Tee?” Deseau asked. “Did that bastard Lindeyar have second thoughts about terminating our contract?”
“None of them are Lindeyar,” Learoyd said. “They’re the other politicians’ cars.”
Fencing Master’s tribarrels couldn’t bear on the aircars because they were straight behind them, and anyway you didn’t point a gun across a firebase unless you wanted to lose your rank. Frenchie was holding his 2-cm weapon in the crook of his arm, and Learoyd unclipped his sub-machine gun from the bracket on the inside of the armor.
The limousines’ doors opened. Huber recognized Minister Graciano and his three colleagues, and the woman in battledress getting out of the front was Mistress Dozier. From the other aircar came President Rihorta and another member of the Solace delegation. The man accompanying those two was a stranger.
Aloud Huber said, “I don’t know who the tall guy is. He’s off-planet, that’s for sure. I’ve never seen a hat like that—”
It was more of a turban; the stranger donned and adjusted it carefully before proceeding with the others toward the ramp down to the TOC.
“—on Plattner’s World before.”
“That’s the Colonel waiting in the entrance for ’em,” Deseau said. “I swear it is!”
“What do we do now, El-Tee?” Learoyd said. He knew the situation’d changed. He wasn’t worried, just looking for direction from somebody smarter than he was.
“We wait for orders, trooper,” Huber said. He pursed his lips, then added, “And while we’re waiting, I think we’ve got room here to stow another case of tribarrel ammo. Let’s see if the quartermaster can help us out.”
Huber’s mind registered motion—a streak of light across the purple-black sky. He opened his mouth to shout a warning over the squadron net, then realized it was a shooting star rather than incoming artillery.
Padova stood on the plenum chamber where she could quickly slide down the driver’s hatch. She looked into the fighting compartment and shook her head. “How can Frenchie sleep?” she muttered.
“I’m on watch, Rita,” Learoyd said. “Why shouldn’t he sleep? The El-Tee’s awake too.”
He blinked. “And you.”
“Frenchie’s been here a lot of times, Rita,” Huber said, using that formation instead of “Frenchie’s a veteran,” which the driver might find insulting. “As soon as there’s a reason, he’ll be up and doing his job.”
He grinned with a kind of affection he felt only because he and Deseau were part of the same family. “Besides, if the job’s killing, Frenchie could do that without waking up.”
Padova’d seen the elephant by now, that was for sure; but there was a difference between one hard run punctuated by firefights and the bone-deep awareness that this might be the last chance to sleep for days or longer. Frenchie’s body understood that sleeping curled up on the floor of the fighting compartment was best present use of his time.
“You think it’s going to be fighting again, don’t you?” Padova said angrily. “But who? The only people who could hire us is Nonesuch, and who would they need us to fight? They’ve got a fucking division on the ground, we saw them land it!”
“We’re going to fight Nonesuch, Rita,” Learoyd said calmly. He withdrew the loading tube from his backup sub-machine gun, wiped it with an oily cloth, and clicked it home in the receiver again. “We’re going to take the port back.”
“And who the bloody hell is paying us to attack Nonesuch!” the driver snarled, balling her fists in frustration. “Are we going outlaw, is that what you mean?”
“I don’t know who’s paying us,” Learoyd said, bending to check the bearing in the pintle supporting his tribarrel. “But there’s nobody else to fight here, so we’re fighting Nonesuch.”
He shrugged. “The El-Tee knows we’re getting ready to fight, we all know that. So it has to be Nonesuch.”
Huber looked at Learoyd’s round, placid face; as calm as a custard, reddened as usual by sun and wind. None of them understood how the Regiment could be going into battle again on Plattner’s World. Learoyd was the only one who wasn’t bothered by ignorance: he didn’t expect to understand things.
“Yeah, Bert’s right,” Huber said. “Curst if I know how or why, but I can’t say I’m sorry. I didn’t like Lindeyar when I first met him, and he hasn’t improved with time.”
Padova hugged herself in frustration. “If we’re really going to fight,” she said, looking in the direction of the TOC, “why hasn’t Central signaled us to stand to?”
“Do you see anybody in the base who isn’t at his action station?” Huber said. “An alert might warn other people. Everybody’s waiting for it, even Frenchie. Especially Frenchie.”
He brought up the F-3 stats again on the C&C display. They were still at four cars. Sergeant Bielsky was bringing a repaired vehicle up from Benjamin, but he wouldn’t arrive for thirty hours. The four cars of the present complement had shaken down during the run and attack, even Gabinus’ Three-eight—which now had Flamingo Girl painted in fluorescent blue on both sides of the fighting compartment. All the guns had been rebarreled, all the fans were running within seventy percent of optimum, and each car had a full crew.
He glanced at Learoyd, his right arm in a stiff bend though the hand was free to grip with. Replacements had flown up from the UC in aircars, but there was no way in hell that Deseau—the car commander—or Huber wanted to go into battle with a trooper they didn’t know in place of Learoyd with one arm. There were a couple more wounded crewmen in F-3 for the same reason; it wasn’t ideal, but …
Huber chuckled.
“Sir?” Padova said, frowning at what she didn’t understand.
“Kind of an old joke,” he said. “If everything was ideal, nobody’d be hiring mercenaries, would they?”
He chuckled again; and as he did so, the alert signal pulsed red. Sergeant Deseau was on his feet, reaching for his tribarrel’s grips before his eyes could focus.
Colonel Hammer’s voice rasped in their commo helmets, “Troopers, the United Cities and Republic of Solace in combination have hired us to wrest control of Port Plattner from the foreign invaders now holding it. Normally I don’t discuss the financial details of the Regiment’s contracts, but in this particular case I’ll mention that our payment is guaranteed by a consortium of planets which in the past have purchased about half the Thalderol base produced on Plattner’s World. They seem to feel it wouldn’t be to their benefit if Nonesuch controlled access to the product.”