Imperial Recruit (Book 2 of The Imperial Marines Saga)

by Terry Mixon

  Page looked interested. “You said you trained her? How?”

  “Before the fighting? I showed her how the weapons worked, put her in unpowered mercenary armor, and taught her enough to make a last-ditch stand if the Singularity tried to take the raiding ship.

  “On the captured ship, I showed her how to link her implants to her weapons and use them to fire from concealment. She acted as a sniper and made a real difference. She proved her loyalty and courage that day.

  “When I got out of the service, some thoughtful souls had taken one of the marine pinnaces aboard the ship we freed and stocked it with all kinds of interesting equipment. Equipment that would be extremely useful in training someone to become an Imperial Marine. I claimed it as my booty, and over the last six years, I’ve done what I can to impart some knowledge to her about how to use most of it.”

  Martelle and Page exchanged a look.

  “Your record indicates that you have quite a bit of combat experience, so I’m going to assume that she’s coming into this with a larger range of knowledge than most recruits would have,” Page said. “That’s going to make an interesting challenge since she’s mixed in with people that don’t know their ass from a hole in the ground.”

  “I’d say that I’m sorry, Senior Sergeant, but I’m not,” Fei said. “I already knew that the deck would be stacked against her, so I did what I could. She has experience with as many weapons as I could get my hands on, she can use powered armor well enough to get by, and she can fly—for certain values of the word—a marine pinnace. I’d give her better than 50/50 odds that she could take off and make a survivable crash landing.

  “Her genetics are also going to cause you some headaches. I told her to obscure her capabilities, but she was designed from the ground up to be an enhanced human. She’s around half again stronger than she looks, her reaction times are off the charts, and she’s incredibly bright.

  “She’s also dedicated and caring. She’s a truly good person. Someone who doesn’t deserve to be discriminated against, though it’s going to happen. Hell, I’m sure that it’s already happened.

  “How you treat her isn’t up to me. I’m a marine, and I trust the Corps to do right. What happens next is up to you.”

  Martelle considered them both and shook his head. “Senior Sergeant Page brought her here to answer some questions, but I think you’ve assuaged my curiosity. It would probably be best if she doesn’t realize that you’re here, so I suggest we keep that fiction in place.

  “I’m not going to pull you out of the platoon because I think your experience and insight would be beneficial. Page, see that the recruits get a version of the chain of command that still has Lieutenant Evans running the platoon.

  “As for the rest, we’ll play it by ear and hope that we don’t get any outside interference. If the girl has what it takes to become a marine, I’m not going to deny her that opportunity.

  “That said, she’s going to have to be more thoroughly vetted than any of the other recruits. This isn’t going to be a pleasant experience for her. She’s going to run into trouble with other trainees and, potentially, even some drill instructors, though I expect the senior sergeant to mitigate that to some degree.

  “You’re not going to be able to interfere with that. I think you’ll have the most challenging job of all, Lieutenant Na. You’ll have to oversee training remotely and sit on your hands while she struggles.

  “Senior Sergeant Page, you’ll make sure that the girl is pushed hard. We have to be sure of her character. She has to be put through the wringer.”

  Fei finally felt the knot of tension inside her start to relax. She was going to be able to keep an eye on her girl.

  She’d trained her well enough to take what was coming, but it was up to Page to referee the scrum. That would have to be good enough.

  “Oh, there’s one other thing,” Martelle added with a slight smile. “Since you know her training better than anyone, I’ll rely on you to work with Senior Sergeant Page to devise some challenging ‘extra credit’ exercises for her. Our training is meant to push the recruits to the edge and beyond. I’ll rely on you to make sure that happens.”

  So, in effect, Fei had just made Andrea’s training significantly more difficult. Perfect.

  Page left the impromptu meeting in the major’s office and escorted Tolliver back to the warehouse to get her gear. He left the actual work of that to Gomez while he returned to his office to think.

  He sat at his desk, allowing himself a few minutes to think. The situation had grown complicated in a hurry. He needed to plan for what was coming and start visualizing potential obstacles.

  The first likely obstacle was Lieutenant Na. Not that he thought she would actively obstruct him and his people, though he couldn’t rule that out, but she was an unknown with an agenda of her own. That was undoubtedly going to introduce complications he’d rather avoid.

  There was also the matter of exactly how much information he could pass along to the other drill instructors. They had to be made aware of some of the challenges they were going to face, but he had to be circumspect, since they didn’t need the full story.

  He’d tell them as much as possible. If they didn’t know to plan for complications, something would come up that bit them in the ass. That wasn’t a position a drill instructor wanted to be in. He and his people always tried to envision as many potential issues as possible to mitigate adverse outcomes.

  And he was quite sure that Tolliver was going to generate some adverse outcomes.

  A follow-up conversation with the marines in the pinnace had revealed that Tolliver seemed to have made a friend and a rival on the flight out. A friend would be helpful to the girl because getting through basic training was a team exercise. It would be useful to foster that friendship from behind the scenes and keep an eye on the obvious antagonist.

  Not because Page wanted to stop the boy but because he wanted to manage the confrontations. Seeing how the girl responded to someone acting directly against her would be a handy tool in judging her character.

  What he wanted to avoid was any possibility that the confrontation could spill over into something that would be career-ending for either of them or make the platoon as a whole take sides.

  He didn’t know anything about the boy at this point, not even his name. He had to get that information as quickly as possible and start assessing the likely outcomes of their budding competition.

  With proper management, he could balance the two to the point that they’d become foils. That kind of rivalry inside a training platoon usually goaded everyone to try harder.

  Unless it was allowed to poison the whole unit, which he and his people wouldn’t allow.

  Well, this particular Gordian knot would have to wait until tomorrow. He needed to get some sleep, but first, he needed to talk with the new officer and see just how much trouble he was in.

  10

  The medical exam and her trip to battalion headquarters—though no one had actually spoken to her there—delayed Andrea long enough that she drew her gear long after the rest of the recruits had finished and departed.

  The waiting marines took their frustrations out on her, and she couldn’t blame them. Even so, the process went smoothly enough. They stripped her down and put her into a scanner that noted her measurements precisely and printed uniforms for her that fit perfectly.

  The rest of the gear she drew was familiar enough, Fei having educated her in its use over the last six years. She hadn’t lived the life of a marine, so it hadn’t been constant training, but she’d learned what marines did with the gear and how they did it.

  Once she had everything she needed, including personal items for brushing her teeth and showering, Drill Instructor Gomez put her in a chair and cut her hair off. She’d known it was coming, but the event was still traumatic.

  The drill instructor made her sweep up her own hair and dump it into a bin. Then she escorted her to the barracks that would be her home for
the next three months.

  The long room on the ground floor was bustling with activity when they arrived. The other recruits had claimed their bunks and seemed to be working at setting everything up.

  Andrea turned to Drill Instructor Gomez to find out where she needed to go, but the drill instructor withdrew without a single word. It looked like she was on her own.

  “Over here!” a voice called out.

  Andrea spotted Diana about halfway down the side of the barracks, waving at her. She hefted her duffle bag and hurried over.

  The curvy girl looked completely different with her long red hair gone. It made Andrea wonder how she looked now.

  The area her new friend was waiting in was set up very much like what she’d grown up with inside the crèche. There were two small bunk beds, one on top of the other, and two wall lockers side by side. Diana had claimed the lower bunk and the leftmost wall locker. Andrea could tell because the doors were open, and all of Diana’s gear was laid out inside it.

  “They gave us instruction on how everything was to be done, so I went ahead and left my wall locker open so that you could see how you need to put yours. The beds aren’t going to be made a specific way tonight, but they’re going to teach us how to do them tomorrow. Also, don’t walk into the center of the room. That’s off-limits to us. Where did you get off to?”

  The other girl’s eyes were bright with curiosity, but there was no obvious malice. Maybe she really was that friendly.

  “They gave me a medical scan and asked me some questions,” Andrea said with a shrug as she started unpacking her gear and putting it away. “That’s not surprising, really. They’re curious about where I came from, and I think they’re worried that I’m a spy or something.”

  Diana’s left eyebrow rose. “Are you a spy? That might be something my father would think was interesting.”

  “Your father? Is he one of those people that likes spy thrillers?”

  “That’s probably about the safest way to explain him, yes,” the girl said with a laugh. “In fact, he loves spy thrillers to an unhealthy degree. In any case, let me help you get set up so that we can get some sleep. I’d wager that we’re going to get a very early wake-up call.”

  “Earlier than you’d think if my guess is right,” Andrea said as she eyed the layout in Diana’s locker. “They’ll let us get a little sleep, and then they’ll make a huge ruckus to totally disrupt us way too early in the morning.

  “It’s supposed to keep us off balance and start deconstructing us before they put us back together in ways that are useful to the Corps.”

  As they put Andrea’s gear into the wall locker, Diana smiled at her. “You seem to know quite a bit about what’s going to happen. Considering your background, that’s kind of weird, isn’t it?”

  “Not as weird as you think. I was rescued by marines, and two of my guardians are ex-marines. I’ve had six years to pester them for details of what basic training might be like. They didn’t tell me any of the really secret stuff, but I got a feel for how things worked.”

  Diana chuckled. “I picked a good partner, then. You have the inside straight on this game.”

  They’d almost finished putting Andrea’s gear away when something struck the back of her wall locker, knocking its contents over. The two girls startled and leaped backward.

  Moments later, Claudio stuck his head around the side of the locker and grinned evilly at them. “Sorry about that, girls. Space over here is kind of tight, and I accidentally hit your lockers with my shoulder. Hope I didn’t mess them up too much.”

  Andrea had never heard a more insincere excuse in her life. She felt her eyes narrow to slits. This guy was going to be an epic pain in her ass.

  “That’s too petty,” she growled. “Why don’t we make ourselves a wager, big man. We’ll start doing real training tomorrow. Let’s do this man to woman and keep it out of the barracks. Best one wins.”

  He considered her for a moment and then shrugged with a grin. “You might as well accept that I’m going to kick your ass. Think about that while I get some sleep. Night night, girls.”

  The man’s head vanished, and she could hear him laughing with somebody on the other side of the lockers. He was her neighbor. Great.

  Diana was fuming as they started putting the wall lockers back into shape. “You can’t let him get away with this.”

  “He’s bitten off more than he can chew,” Andrea said in a low voice. “I don’t trust him to stay in his lane, so I’ll be pondering my revenge for when he pulls more of this crap.”

  It only took them a couple of minutes to get the wall lockers back into order. Unlike those in the crèche, these used thumbprints for the locks, so hers should be safe enough from casual intrusion.

  Andrea stripped out of her outer clothes, put them in her locker for tomorrow, climbed onto the top bunk, and wiggled under the covers. Her internal chronometer said that it was almost one in the morning. She figured they had a couple of hours before all the fun started.

  Everyone—including her—was going to be exhausted. Her enhanced metabolism would help, as would her medical nanites, but it still wasn’t going to be enough.

  Senior Sergeant Page knew what she had under the hood and would make sure that she was worked harder than anyone else. The goal was to push her, and they would.

  Fun times ahead.

  With that cheerful thought, she closed her eyes and forced herself to relax. Lying awake until they came would only make tomorrow worse.

  There was a knock at her office door half an hour after she’d left the major’s office. She opened the door after confirming that it was Page and gestured for him to have a seat.

  She ignored the desk and took the uncomfortable chair beside him. “I’m sorry that all this is coming as such a surprise to you, Senior Sergeant. As I told the major, if I’d had my way, no one would’ve ever known why I was here.

  “I’m not trying to influence how you treat Andrea; I just want to be sure that she gets a chance to succeed on her own merits. Only now, I’ve got to make sure that these recruits do the best they can and learn everything we can teach them, which I’m sure is exactly what you were already doing.”

  Page considered her for a few seconds and then nodded. “I haven’t formed an opinion about the girl yet, but I can already tell that her presence is going to be divisive. Basic training, as you already know, is stressful by design.

  “The problem I see is that she’s going to be a magnet for trouble, so not only are we going to have to see that she gets stress tested and trained, we’re going to have to make sure that no one does anything they shouldn’t.

  “There are going to be fights. We just need to keep them from becoming general brawls and make certain that nobody gets seriously injured.”

  “Then I think we’re in agreement,” Fei said. “How do we do that?”

  He leaned forward. “Could you share more about your background so I can figure out what you’re bringing to the table?”

  Fei began going over places that she’d served, tasks that she was trained in, and what her work had been like six years ago. She hadn’t made senior sergeant or officer, but she’d been a working sergeant in charge of a combat platoon.

  Sadly, that left her ill prepared to be in charge of the training platoon as an officer. Her experience revolved around taking the strategic decisions and turning them into tactical directions.

  Page quickly seconded her concerns. “Did you actually attend officers’ school? If not, you’ll be walking into some blind spots.”

  “I know,” she admitted with a sigh. “And I’m going to have to work hard to try to figure out what they are and correct them as we move forward. Thankfully, you’re doing tasks that you’re familiar with, so you’ll know if I’m missing something.

  “I’m going to try to stay out of your way as much as possible, but this is going to be a delicate situation. We’re going to have to work hard to foresee the problems Andrea’s presence wil
l cause for the rest of the platoon and the issues they might cause her.”

  “I’ll have my instructors keep an eye out for trouble,” he said. “Once we have the lay of the land, we can generate some separation between her and any really hardcore haters.

  “We can’t protect her entirely—and I wouldn’t want to—but we have to make sure that the fire happens under controlled circumstances so that we don’t get an explosion.”

  “What about the staff?” she asked. “Are we going to have trouble with any of the drill instructors?”

  “Possibly,” Page said in a grudging tone. “They’re going to wonder why we’re keeping your presence a secret from the platoon too. How should we handle that?”

  “Tell them the basic truth. That I’m somebody that has experience with Andrea and her capabilities, and my presence here is to make sure that not only does she get the training that she needs but that it’s done in an evenhanded manner.

  “I’m giving directions, but you and your people are going to be carrying them out. If we all know what page we’re playing from, we might be able to manage an understandable tune. If we’re working at cross purposes, somebody is going to get hurt, and I don’t want that.”

  He nodded, his expression approving. “I think that’s a good start, ma’am. We’ll tweak whatever plans we make as we move forward. We’ll only have the recruits for twelve weeks, so I don’t have to train you to be an officer. I just have to shield everyone from your inexperience in this role, including you.

  “I’m assuming that once she makes it into the marines, or washes out, that you’re going to return home to your family. Let’s make the best we can of the situation and hope we don’t run into any insurmountable problems.”

  “I love your optimism. When do you intend to wake the recruits?”