Part 15 (2/2)
”Weapons Battalion, Aviation Troop on patrol. Battalion present or accounted for, sir!”
”Headquarters Company present or on guard, sir!”
The adjutant returned each salute, then wheeled crisply to salute the colonel.
”Regiment has four men absent without leave, sir.”
Colonel Falkenberg returned the salute. ”Take your post.”
Captain Fast pivoted and marched to his place. ”Pa.s.s in review!”
”Sound off!”
The band played a military march that must have been old in the twentieth century as the regiment formed column to march around the field. As each company reached the reviewing stand and men snapped their heads in unison, guidons and banners lowered in salute, and officers and centurions whirled sabers with flourishes.
The visitor nodded to himself. No longer very appropriate. In the eighteenth century, demonstrations of the men's ability to march in ranks, and of the non-coms and officers to use a sword with skill, were relevant to battle capabilities. Not now. Still, it made an impressive ceremony.
”Attention to orders!” The sergeant major read from his clipboard. Promotions, duty schedules, the daily activities of the regiment, while the visitor sweated.
”Very impressive, Colonel,” he said. ”Our Was.h.i.+ngtonians couldn't look that sharp on their best day.”
John Christian Falkenberg nodded coldly. ”Implying that they mightn't be as good in the field, Mr. Secretary? Would you like another kind of demonstration?”
Howard Bannister shrugged. ”What would it prove, Colonel? You need employment before your regiment goes to h.e.l.l. I can't imagine chasing escapees on the CoDominium prison planet has much attraction for good soldiers.”
”It doesn't. When we first came things weren't that simple.”
”I know that too. The Forty-second was one of the best outfits of the CD Marine-I've never understood why it was disbanded instead of one of the others. I'm speaking of your present situation with your troops stuck here without transport-surely you're not intending to make Tanith your lifetime headquarters?”
Sergeant Major Calvin finished the orders of the day and waited patiently for instructions. Colonel Falkenberg , studied his bright-uniformed men as they stood rigidly in the blazing noon of Tanith. A faint smile might have played across his face for a moment. There were few of the four thousand whose names and histories he didn't know.
Lieutenant Farquhar was a party hack forced on him when the Forty-second was hired to police Hadley. He became a good officer and elected to s.h.i.+p out after the action. Private Alcazar was a brooding giant with a raging thirst, the slowest man in K Company, but he could lift five times his own ma.s.s and hide in any terrain. Dozens, thousands of men, each with his own strengths and weaknesses, adding up to a regiment of mercenary soldiers with no chance of going home, and an unpleasant future if they didn't get off Tanith.
”Sergeant Major.”
”Sir!”
”You will stay with me and time the men. Trumpeter, sound Boots and Saddles, On Full Kits, and Ready to Board s.h.i.+p.”
”Sir!” The trumpeter was a grizzled veteran with corporal's stripes. He lifted the gleaming instrument with its blue and gold ta.s.sels, and martial notes poured across the parade ground. Before they died away the orderly lines dissolved into ma.s.ses of running men.
There was less confusion than Howard Bannister had expected. It seemed an incredibly short time before the first men fell back in. They came from their barracks in small groups, some in each company, then more, a rush, and finally knots of stragglers.
Now in place of bright colors there was the dull drab of synthetic leather bulging over Nemourlon body armor. The bright polish was gone from the weapons. Dress caps were replaced by bulging combat helmets, s.h.i.+ning boots by softer leathers. As the regiment formed Bannister turned to the colonel.
”Why trumpets? I'd think that's rather out of date.”
Falkenberg shrugged. ”Would you prefer shouted orders? You must remember, Mr.
Secretary, mercenaries live in garrison as well as in combat. Trumpets remind them that they're soldiers.”
”I suppose.”
”Time, Sergeant Major,” the adjutant demanded.
”Eleven minutes, eighteen seconds, sir.”
”Are you trying to tell me the men are ready to s.h.i.+p out now?” Bannister asked. His expression showed polite disbelief.
”It would take longer to get the weapons and artillery battalion equipment together, but the infantry could board s.h.i.+p right now.”
”I find that hard to believe-of course the men know this is only a drill.”
”How would they know that?”
Bannister laughed. He was a stout man, dressed in expensive business clothes with cigar ashes down the front. Some of the ash floated free when he laughed. ”Well, you and the sergeant major are still in parade uniform.”
”Look behind you,” Falkenberg said.
Bannister turned. Falkenberg's guards and trumpeter were still in their places, their blue and gold dress contrasting wildly with the grim synthi-leathers of the others who had formed up with them. ”The headquarters squad has our gear,” Falkenberg explained. ”Sergeant Major.”
”Sir!”
”Mr. Bannister and I will inspect the troops.”
”Sir!” As Falkenberg and his visitor left the reviewing stand Calvin fell in with the duty squad behind him.
”Pick a couple at random,” Falkenberg advised. ”It's hot out here. Forty degrees anyway.”
Bannister was thinking the same thing. ”Yes. No point in being too hard on the men.
It must be unbearable in their armor.”
”I wasn't thinking of the men,” Falkenberg said.
The Secretary for War chose L Company of Third Battalion for review. The men all looked alike, except for size. He looked for something to stand out-a strap not buckled, something to indicate an individual difference- but he found none. Bannister approached a scarred private who looked forty years old. With regeneration therapy he might have been half that again. ”This one.”
”Fall out, Wiszorik!” Calvin ordered. ”Lay out your kit.”
”Sir!” Private Wiszorik might have smiled thinly, but if he did Bannister missed it.
He swung the pack frame easily off his shoulders and stood it on the ground. The head- quarters squad helped him lay out his nylon shelter cloth, and Wiszorik emptied the pack, placing each item just so.
Rifle: a New Aberdeen seven-mm semi-automatic, with ten-shot clip and fifty-round box magazine, both full and spotlessly clean like the rifle. A bandolier of cartridges.
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