‘You better get signed in.’
He walked over to the desk and picked up a clipboard.
‘Okay.’
He pointed at Reave.
‘You, come over here.’
Reave sauntered over to him and stood in front of him with his hands in his pockets.
‘I’m Sperry, kid. Master of Warriors. You train with me and I get to choose whether you train easy, or you train hard. You got that?’
Reave straightened his back and took his hands out of his pockets.
‘I got it.’
‘I got it, sir.’
‘I got it, sir.’
‘Okay, name?’
‘Reave.’
‘Place of origin?’
‘Pleasant Gap.’
‘Do-you-solemnly-swear-to-serve-in-the-Army-of-the-Sovereign-State-of-Dur-Shanzag-for-a-period-of-not-less-than-seven-hundred-days-in-accordance-with-the-Code-and-military-regulations-of-that-said-state? Say “I do”.’
‘I do.’
Sperry handed Reave the clipboard and pen.
‘Make your mark here.’
Reave scrawled his name and handed them back. Sperry looked towards Billy.
‘Next.’
Billy stepped up.
‘Name?’
‘Billy Oblivion.’
‘Place of origin?’
‘Pleasant Gap.’
‘Do you solemnly swear what he just did?’
‘I do.’
‘Okay, make your mark and stand over there with him..’
Billy made his mark and stood by Reave.
‘Next.’
The Rainman stood in front of Sperry.
‘Name?’
‘People call me the Rainman.’
‘Ain’t you got a proper name?’
‘It’s the only one people use.’
‘Okay, Rainman. Place of origin?’
‘Hell, how should I know? That’s a helluva question to ask a travelling man.’
‘Where was the last place you stopped? You remember that?’
‘Why, sure I do, it was Dogbreath.’
‘Okay, Dogbreath. I gotta put something. Do you swear too?’
‘Sure, I ain’t got no choice.’
‘You should remember that. Make your mark and get over with the others.’
Once the Rainman was in line with Billy and Reave, Sperry came over and inspected them.
‘You got any weapons?’
Billy nodded.
‘We all got handguns.’
‘Okay, fetch ‘em out.’
He looked at Billy’s and Reave’s reproduction Colts and sniffed.
‘They’ll have to do.’
He seemed more impressed with the Rainman’s spiral needler on .75 frame.
‘Yeah, okay, put them away again. Your clothes are all right too.’
Reave looked surprised.
‘You mean we don’t get uniforms?’
‘Only when the things that you got wear out.’
He jerked his thumb towards the door he’d come out from.
‘Go through there, and tell the guy inside that you’re reporting for training.’
Training consisted of an intense ten days of being run around and shouted at by veterans who had been wounded at the front. Billy and Reave flopped into their bunks exhausted each night, and, all too soon, were roused out by Simp the one-eyed trooper, who seemed to be primarily in charge of them.
The command structure of the Free Corps was loose and haphazard. The only thing that Billy and Reave knew for sure was that they were very definitely the lowest of the low. The only group beneath them in the pecking order were the Shirik, who seemed universally loathed by the Free Corps mercenaries.
Surprisingly, the Rainman appeared very little worried by the hard training regime. He went through everything at the same leisurely pace, and treated the yelling officers with smiling contempt.
The final night, after they had completed the course, the three of them were given a recreation pass. This entitled them to spend an evening in yet another granite building, drinking flat beer and raw spirits in the company of a small group of depressed whores.
The next day they were due to leave for the front. Billy was rudely awakened by Simp shaking him.
‘Come on out of it.’
‘It ain’t time yet.’
‘Sure it is. You want to die in bed?’
‘Would suit me fine.’
Simp tugged at the blankets.
‘Come on, start moving. Inspection in half an hour. Got it?’
Billy dragged himself out of his bunk and staggered across to the stone wash-trough. His head was splitting from the bad booze that he’d poured down himself the night before. He splashed cold water on his face and neck, and struggled into his shirt. He was pleased that the Free Corps barracks didn’t run to mirrors. He felt that that particular morning he really couldn’t face the sight of himself.
After a breakfast of grey porridge, Simp assembled the next recruits on the windswept expanse of stone that served as a parade, ground. Sperry made a short preliminary speech, and then moved down the line giving the recruits their assignments to the front. He stopped in front of Billy, Reave and the Rainman. He stared at them for a moment with one eyebrow raised.
‘For reasons unknown, the powers have decided to keep you sorry trio intact. As of now you’re a machine crew. You’ll pick one up from motorpool and join the Seventeenth Gorbűkh at Hill 471.’
He handed Billy an envelope.
‘Here’s your written orders, you’re off my hands now.’
The Rainman grinned.
‘Ain’t you gonna wish us luck … sir?’
Sperry sneered.
‘Why bother. You’re past help.’
The three of them were dismissed, and they walked to pick up the fighting machine.
The Dur Shanzag fighting machine was a squat iron construction. Its square box-shaped body, with riveted plates and tiny slit windows, housed the crew of three. Mounted on top was a small circular turret from which the gunner could direct fire from either the flamer or the repeating bolt gun. At each end were the huge spiked rollers which, driven by a low gear flutter engine, carried the dull grey monster along the ground at something like the speed of a man running.
The Rainman signed out the machine from a motorpool orderly with a bald head and thick, horn-rimmed glasses. As they climbed inside it, the orderly waved.
‘Don’t scratch the paint now.’
Reave gave him the finger, and slammed the iron door. Crouched inside, the Rainman grinned round at the others.
‘Either of you mind if I drive this here rig for a while?’
Billy and Reave shook their heads.
‘Go right ahead. It’s okay by us, we’ll just take it easy.’
The Rainman brought the motor to life, and the cabin reverberated with a teeth-jarring hum. The fighting machine wasn’t built for comfort. He guided it through the empty streets of Dur Shanzag to the Black Gate, and then they were out of the city and running along a road that stretched out into the bleak desert. The Rainman gave the machine full power, but it was incapable of going any faster than the stage that had carried them out of Dogbreath. It seemed that the fighting machines weren’t built for speed either.
The journey across the desert very soon became monotonous as they clanked and rattled along the desert road. Occasionally they would pass columns of Shirik heading for the front at a last, loping trot, and once they passed a train of wagons pulled by scrawny mules, returning to Dur Shanzag loaded with Shirik wounded.
Reave pointed out of the narrow slit window.
‘They must lose millions of those dumb brutes, the rate they seem to be sending them out to the front.’
The Rainman grimaced.
‘I hope they don’t lose millions of us dumb brutes as well.’
The three of them fell silent, and Billy stared cut at the endless dull brown dust. The only break in the desert was the odd clump of thorn trees. Apart from that, it was completely barren. Only the continuous jolting of the machine stopped Billy from falling asleep.