An Uneasy Alliance Read online

  Rev frowned. He’d have to get to know just what was different with his battle buddy now.

  “So, with that, I’ll have the vice-counsel say a few words.”

  The man, in a natty dark blue ribbon-collar suit and CoH-blue shirt, stood and moved in front of the Marines.

  “I am Assistant Vice-counsel for Military Personnel Screening and Acquisitions Djell Mortensen, and let me officially welcome all of you to the Home Guard. As General Platte said, I think you are going to have a rewarding tour here as the premier military force throughout humanity . . . and as it seems with the defeat of the Centaurs, in the galaxy.”

  He waited expectantly with a sly smile and seemed taken aback when no one laughed.

  “Uh, anyway. This is an opportunity for you to serve a greater good than pure national interests. But, make no mistake, you will be learning, absorbing from your fellow troopers, and that will not only help forge bonds with troopers from other services, but it will give you new insights when you return to the Rigel Cluster.”

  The general pointedly coughed, and the assistant vice-counsel looked about confused until it dawned on him what he’d just said. “Oh, I’m sorry. Union. Perseus Union. I don’t want to make that mistake again in a room full of Marines, not if I want to make it to my next meeting.”

  If he thought that would get a laugh, he was again mistaken.

  “Well, well. Onward and upward. Where was I? Oh, OK.” He paused a couple of seconds to gather himself. “Like I said, you can learn things here that can benefit your Marine Corps, so please, go into this with an open mind.

  “But, you may ask, with the war over and humanity at peace, what will there be for the Home Guard to do?”

  He’d slipped into a pattern that Rev figured was because he’d said the exact same spiel hundreds of times over the last several months. His mistake with the Rigel Cluster/Union threw him off-balance, but now he was slipping back into his rhythm.

  “The Scutum-Centaursian War had one benefit. It brought all the nations, territories, and multi-galactals together, united as one, for the first time in centuries. However, there are and have always been outliers, those scum who prefer to live outside of the norms of civilization.

  “With the armies, navies, and police forces of humankind focused on the alien threat, that meant that these scum crawled out from under their rocks to pursue their own selfish goals. Since the year before the war, criminal events have risen by an astounding 678%.”

  Rev shook his head in shock, wondering if he’d misheard.

  “Is that right? Almost seven hundred percent?”

 

  “These events include but are not limited to piracy and mass kidnapping, but also armed takeovers of stations and resources such as mines and manufacturing facilities.”

  “And now the multi-galactals want us to take them back,” the lieutenant whispered out of the corner of his mouth.

  “We will clean up these dregs of humanity. If we could defeat the Centaurs, we can mop up these criminals. Most of the clean-up will be relegated to the local forces, but there will be a need for a highly trained, highly capable force to react to emergent situations where lives are at stake or for particularly difficult missions. While the major forces—including the Union Navy and Marines, of course—can handle most situations, the criminal elements have largely taken over areas where local forces are not as capable.

  “To meet this need, the Home Guard is transitioning. We will be adding another brigade over the next six months, and that will allow us to forward deploy units, ready to react where needed.

  “What does that mean for you? Well, I’m sorry to say, you will not spend the next three years in the Fort Nkomo Resort, with all its natural beauty.”

  This time, there were chuckles, and the assistant vice-counsel gave a smile of relief.

  “We are working out the deployment schedules now, but each of you can expect to spend between one and one and a half years deployed, being the tip of humanity’s spear. I have full confidence that you will reflect the Council’s mission of serving humanity and make the Union proud of your contributions.”

  He stepped back and turned to nod at the general.

  “Attention on deck!” the general said.

  Rev stood to comply, making sure his feet didn’t leave the deck this time.

  “On behalf of the counsel general, I will now administer the oath of office. Please raise your right hand,” the assistant vice-counsel said.

  “I, state your name.”

  “I, Reverent Pelletier . . .”

  “Do solemnly swear . . .”

  “Do solemnly swear . . .”

  “To support and defend humanity under the guidance of the counsel general, against all enemies, alien or domestic, foreswearing allegiance to my national origin, tribal affiliation, family, or any other social or religious entity . . .”

  Rev hesitated at that. He was briefed that he had to put the needs of the Congress of Humanity first, even over those of the Union, but to foreswear allegiance to his nation? He hadn’t known that was required.

  He stumbled through the phrase, and he wasn’t the only one to falter.

  “I will obey the lawful orders of those appointed over me and perform my duties to the best of my abilities.

  “I give this oath freely, of my own will, and without mental reservation and under my personal bond as a citizen of humanity.

  “I do so swear.”

  “I do so swear,” Rev intoned along with the rest.

  “Congratulations, troopers,” the vice-counsel said, a smile breaking out across his face. “You are now a duly recognized member of the Congress of Humanity’s Home Guard.”

  6

  “I think you’re gonna like this,” Daryll said.

  “No more duct tape?” Rev asked, taking care not to call it “duck tape.”

  He’d made that mistake on the Alacrity when they were trying to jury-rig him an EVA suit, only to be corrected by a sailor.

  “No, no duct tape,” Daryll said with a laugh. “But this will work.”

  Rev had been overjoyed when he found out that Daryll was being sent to the Home Guard as a contractor—head of IBHU maintenance. At least he was a friendly face among a sea of strangers. Lieutenant Macek, too, but Rev had barely met the officer before departing Safe Harbor. He wasn’t a friend like Daryll.

  It would get a little better in four days with Randigold scheduled to arrive, and there were the other three IBHUs coming, but for the moment, Daryll was his only anchor to Safe Harbor.

  He’d only been on Enceladus for two days now, and he hadn’t even checked into his unit, but from the contact he’d had with other troopers and support staff, he wasn’t sure he’d ever fit in. They might all be homo sapiens, but these people were not Union.

  “Well, then. Let’s get you in this.”

  The CoH combat EVA suit, the OCR-60—known as an “Oscar”—was the issued vacuum suit for Home Guard troopers. Except for cases such as Rev’s with his IBHU, as much as possible in the Guard was standardized in combat, from weapons to field uniforms to assault kits. It made sense from a logistical standpoint, but that meant learning new equipment before being able to join a unit.

  The only things a trooper kept of their home service issue were their combat armor and their dress uniforms, but even with the dress uniforms, that wasn’t complete. Each trooper was issued a CoH-blue ballcap—hence the “blue-hats” nickname given to Home Guard troopers.

  Rev’s Oscar looked more martial than the Navy EVA suit he’d worn on the asteroid. It screamed danger, even when, in Rev’s case, it was missing the left arm. He stepped up to the opening in the front of the suit, twisted, and pushed himself up and in. It took a bit of poking to get his right arm in, but as it slid down his sleeve, the suit adjusted to his body, connecting the contact points.

  The Union EVA suit connected through the jack at the base of a sailor or Marine’s neck. Given that jacks were not universal throughout the galaxy and some troopers from various militaries didn’t have any, the Oscar had a series of sensors that read the electro-muscular pulses of the wearer and magnified those into movement.

  “Hey, I’m not getting a green light,” Rev told Daryll.

  “Not surprising. You’re missing an arm. So, let’s take care of that.”

  Daryll pulled in the hoist. It looked like the same Sieben hoist he’d had back at Nguyen. Rev stood still as the hoist guided Pashu in and slipped her into Rev’s sleeve.

 

  “Thanks, Punch.”

  Rev flexed Pashu, extending her and rotating her at the shoulder. This was the first time he’d worn her since arriving, but the trip hadn’t seemed to affect her.

  “Can you hold still for a moment? I can’t seal this up if you’re gonna knock my head off.”

  “Oh, yeah. Sorry.”

  He dutifully held still as Daryll picked up a strip of copper-colored metal, about four centimeters wide and possibly seventy-five centimeters long. He folded it around Rev’s sleeve, not on Pashu herself, before taking out a mini-welder and zapping it into place. He gave it a few tugs.

  “The connection’s not on Pashu herself?”

  “If you lose her in combat, I don’t want you losing suit integrity. Better the sleeve.”

  Didn’t think of that. And now, why the hell didn’t they do that on the Alacrity?

  Daryll yanked on the edge of what was left of the Oscar’s left arm and pulled it down over the copper-colored band on his sleeve. It took him several tries until he was satisfied, then he pulled up a lever covering a circular knob and gave the knob a hard clockwise twist.

  The suit’s ready light blinked green three times before reducing and shifting to the side of his display.

  Daryll ran a sensor around the seal and nodded in satisfaction. “We won’t know for sure until we get you into a chamber, but this looks like it’ll work.”

  He reached up and tried to pry the edge of the suit free, grunting with the effort, but it held firm.

  “Remember, clockwise seals it, counter breaks the seal. The lever over the top is the safety. Try not to break the seal in space, or you’ll be breathing vacuum.”

  “I’ll try to remember that.”

  “See if you can break it now, though.”

  Rev reached over with his right hand, afraid that its bulk would make that difficult, but the gauntlet was far more flexible than it looked. Rev flipped up the safety and turned the knob. Immediately, his display started flashing an alert.

  Daryll must have seen the red flashing light because he said, “Oh. I’m gonna have to get someone to program that. These Oscars aren’t used to having the seal broken on an arm.”

  He unhooked Pashu, and Rev wormed his way out of the suit.

  “Who makes the Oscar?” Rev asked Daryll.

  “It’s a Heg suit.”

  Makes sense. They’re the kings of space.

  “That’s why it’s so good.”

  Daryll gave a huff and said, “You think these are good? These are their Papa models. Their rejects. They keep the Quebec and Romeo models for themselves.”

  “But they feel better than the ones we had on the Alacrity. More maneuverable.”

  “Well, they are that. That’s what the Heg wanted. But they gave up a degree of robustness. Easier to puncture and tear.”

  Rev frowned and reached out to touch the Oscar’s skin. It felt strong to him.

  “Could be, but so what if it gets punctured? They’re self-sealing.”

  “A kinetic round? Sure. They’ll seal up fine. But a tear? These aren’t compartmentalized as well as others. Cross over the compartments, and it can be catastrophic.” He must have seen the confused look on Rev’s face, so he added, “You’ve heard of the Titanic, right?”

  “Yeah, the battle moon in The Last Journey.”

  “Not that Titanic. A real one. An old wet-water cruise ship on Earth. Hit an iceberg and sunk?”

  “OK, I think I remember.”

  He made a mental note to ask Punch about it.

  “Well, it was advertised as unsinkable. But when it hit an iceberg going from Ireland to New York, the iceberg cut through the hull and across a bunch of the compartments. If it had only been one or two, the crew could have sealed those off. But because the damage was across so many, they couldn’t, and the ship sank.”

  “So, you are saying that the Oscar is like the Titanic?”

  That wasn’t something Rev wanted to hear, not if he might wear one into combat.

  “Oh, not that bad. But between you and me, if I were going to choose between this version of the suit and the one you wore at the asteroid, I’d take that one. It might not be as maneuverable, and it might not be as high-tech, but it’s a lot tougher.

  “Don’t get me wrong. The Heg can sure make a good EVA suit. And the chances of something going wrong are next to nothing. But I think it says something that they took these Papa models out of their supply chain for their own soldiers and sailors and gave all of them to the Home Guard.”

  The chances being “next to nothing” didn’t mean the chances were zero. Now he looked at the Oscar with a little bit of uncertainty. Daryll had it right. If these versions were not good enough for the Heg military, what would make them good enough for the Home Guard? His preconception that the Home Guard got the best in equipment just took a hit.

  With a sigh, Rev went to Daryll’s bench to retrieve his social arm. He paused to look at a new weapon of some kind sitting behind his arm.

  “Is that . . . ?”

  “Yep. I still have to run some mods on it, but that’s your new cannon.”

  Rev grunted. He was pretty happy with his braided beam cannon. It had killed Centaurs and gotten him through some tough scrapes. But he knew it was just too much for ship-boarding operations. Depending on the ship, he could punch right through a bulkhead. He didn’t know the specs of the new cannon yet, but while it would be powered by the same source as his current cannon was, the projector and frequencies would be different, giving a wider, more diffused beam. Great for clearing a ship’s corridor of bad guys while not taking out a chunk of the ship’s hull.

  The need to be able to switch out his braided cannon for the shipboard one hadn’t been something the Sieben developers had even considered, and retro-engineering his IBHU to accept both had taken longer than expected.

  “I also need to rig up a remote glove. These Oscars have some commands in each gauntlet, so I need to rig up something so you can use your IBHU fingers to relay those commands. Shouldn’t be too difficult. Give me four or five days, and I’ll have everything ready for you. When do you join your unit?”

  “Supposedly on Monday. Five days from now.”

  “OK, give me four days. I’ll have it done. You got any questions for me?”

  “Yeah. What’s that thing?” Rev asked, pointing to what looked like a blue piece of curved metal of some kind.

  “That? That’s your CoH pauldron.”

  “Pardon, pauldron?” Rev asked, quite pleased with himself with the play on words.

  Daryll ignored the weak attempt at humor. “Council blue. It’s for your PAL-5.”

  Rev picked it up and turned it over. Staff Sergeant Patrice had said something about a blue shoulder something-or-other, and this must be the thing. It didn’t look like much. “And what’s it supposed to do for my combat suit?”

  “Nothing, really. It’s just that with every infantry trooper using their home-service combat armor, you need something to identify you as part of the Home Guard. They’ve got Friend or Foe technology embedded in them, but other than that, it’s just for show.”

  “So, when I’m out in the bush, and my PAL goes into cammo-mode, this thing is going to be shining a bright blue?”

  “Yeah. You’ve got it.”

  “What freaking genius thought that through?”

  “It’s the Home Guard. Politics takes precedence over tactical concerns. But, it’s not all that bad.”

  “Sounds pretty bad to me,” Rev said, tossing the blue pauldron back on the workbench.

  “I’ve talked with some of the other techs. They all have modified the things so they can be taken off if you need to do that. I’ve got someone coming over tomorrow to show me how it’s done.”

  “Well, I guess that’s OK. But it’s still stupid. Playing politics over tactics, as you just said, is a recipe for getting troopers killed.”

  “Agreed. But from what I’ve gathered, most of this is for when you’re under the flagpole. And it’s not as bad here as it is on Titan. If the shit hits the fan, most of the BS gets ignored.”

  It would be better not to have the BS in the first place.

  “So, with that, any more saved rounds?”

  “Nope. None I can think of. You’ve answered most everything.”

  “OK, then let me get back to work. If you see Lieutenant Macek, can you please tell him he can come now if he wants and not wait until his time slot?”

  “Will do.”

  Rev watched him move Pashu to his workbench. None of the other troopers had seen her yet. That was going to happen soon, though. As he exited Daryll’s shop, he wondered what his reception was going to be when they saw Pashu for the first time.

  7

  It wasn’t Rev who drew the most interest when he reported in to Fox Company, Second Battalion, Second Home Guard Brigade. That would be Over-Sergeant Lincoln Kvat from the Manifiest Destiny Sphere Army.

  Kvat was a karnan.

  The two had checked in with Brigade Admin first thing Monday morning along with a dozen other new joins, but Kvat had immediately caught his eye. The soldier wasn’t a giant, but he had the same kind of bulkiness that Rev had from his augments and IBHU harness. It wasn’t that, though, that caught his attention. It was two things. First, it was a degree of arrogant swagger of someone knowing deep in his heart that he was superior to everyone else in the room. Second, he sported two gold earrings, each consisting of crossed knives with what looked like an eye at the tip.