by Nick Cole
It’s what we do best.
Each team shifts positions one more time to take out some of the leaders trying to get things under control and then Stinkeye orders a withdrawal via comm. I get a location tag for team four to pick him up down close to the action, and we divert a few streets over.
In the distance ambulances and emergency personnel are coming, but they’ve halted blocks away from the massacre. They’ve been attacked before by the “army” they’re coming to save over the last two months. More than a few times. They’re not eager to go in and help now that there’s been shooting. The local police aren’t responding at all. In fact, many of them are now Resistance Army units geared up and ready to do battle on our side.
We pull our technical over and try to look normal as the mob runs through the streets, eyes wild and screaming in horror at what has been done down there back at the First Landing Mall on a world called Crash. The snipers are in the back, resting under the tarp. Kids, bloody, bruised, and dying, come streaming past us, crying and shouting bloody murder at what has been done by the unseen death squads.
Us. In fact. We did it. We are the death squad. Technically though, one of Dog’s platoons is called Death Squad. And for good reason. But these kids running past us for their lives have no clue. Just some shady dudes sitting in a truck watching it all go down. That’s all we are.
War is hard.
It’s amazing what you miss when you’re the self-absorbed star of your own reality show. That’s the piece of advice I’d give the children, my enemies, running for their lives past our technical.
They’re just figuring that out now. Which is late in the game to know such. I should feel bad for them. But I don’t. Where did they think this was all going? That’s the thing. You can’t just start playing a game and decide to stop when it gets rough. They should have known. It was always going here. It was always going to go badly. For someone.
And if Strange Company shows up, it’s gone real bad.
But then again, they’ve never been on the other ruined worlds of war I’ve seen. If they had, or if they’d read their histories even though if they are not official then they’re illegal, well then, they would have known this was where it was all going. They would have known that all the drum circles and broken glass lead here, to this moment, all along. And that when the free guns and uniforms were handed out… they weren’t actually free. They came with a price. There’s always a price to be paid.
They were going to do the paying now, and for a while to come.
The wind already smells like a hot bag of diarrhea as the kids pass by our technical sitting along the street and loaded with dudes who look like more trouble they don’t want. Stinkeye was right. Breakfast burritos were a big mistake as the wind turns hot and awful in the afternoon.
Nothing is easy. Nothing is free.
Stinkeye slides into the cab and he reeks of sweat and blood and alcohol. And maybe even weed. He’s not smoking and he merely grunts, “RTB.”
I nod to the driver and watch our Voodoo asset in the rearview mirror as we pull away from the curb, the driver delicately pushing us through the fleeing hordes as we return to base. Stinkeye’s faded fatigues and open tactical equipment carrier are covered in blood spray turning rust-red. That meant he was down in it. Close to where the snipers fired? Using his powers to alter the perceptions of the already anxious kids? Fear and elation aren’t that far apart. Ask any soldier who’s almost been overrun on some hellhole. He’ll tell you that. He’ll tell you the line between those things is thin. Real thin in fact.
Stinkeye wears this necklace that dangles down across his open carrier. It’s got teeth in it. And other things. Charms. Totems. Idols. Memories. I watch him in the rearview mirror, his lips moving silently, chanting some old song like an incantation, his dark skin weathered and ancient, his eyes roving and watching the seen and the unseen. The galaxy’s Heart of Darkness.
I seen it once. And it wasn’t a thing I wanna see ’gain, tell you so.
He said that to me. I don’t know what he’s chanting now in the back of the cab. But I know what I’m thinking as we drive through the foul smell of the first day of the war that will ruin this world. The dead back down there on the grass. Never believe in anything, Sergeant Orion. It’ll just get you killed.
Chapter Two
The loss on Astralon, or Crash, was ignominious.
It’s been six months since Stinkeye’s First Landing Mall Massacre kicked this whole mess off. “Astralon” was what the new upstart micro-empire paying us for our services wanted to tag their world, after they rebranded themselves and threw off the yoke of the Monarchs, ditching the name “Crash” that had been marked on the stellar maps for more than eight hundred years. The company took a brutal beating there, on Astralon, or Crash, as did all the other private military contractors fighting that loser of a war. But of course, that’s what we get paid to do. Fight for the losers when no one else wants to. On the last day, or so we thought it might be but it wasn’t, when the pols were hammering out some kind of cease-fire that was really just a surrender, and while we, all the merc companies, were being thrown under the bus in hopes of avoiding payment of services, we were fighting to hold the evac LZ at Syro so we could get all the NGOs and Astralonian Resistance units off-world to wherever it was they thought they could run to and hide from the Monarchs.
It had been implied that we, the merc companies, were somehow going to get a ride off-world too. Implied being the active word. File that under Hopes and Dreams and, trust me on this one, have I got a deal for you.
But sometimes all you got is hope and so you keep playing your part as though there’s actually a good outcome besides the one you know you’re gonna have to pay for. Dreams are what you tell yourself you once had before you became a private military contractor. A mercenary.
I knew we were getting close to something when the First Sergeant came into the burned-out building Reaper was holding, with a new recruit for the company. Some local kid, I thought. Just like every local kid who ever ended up being a part of Strange Company. New. Frightened. And just trying to look hard because somehow he thought he was a pro now that he’d signed up to merc with an off-world company. Just like we all once looked. Even me.
You have to be honest about those things. Especially about yourself. There’s something in all of us that we see in the people we have casual contempt for. Even ourselves.
“Sergeant Orion!” shouted the First Sergeant grandly. Everyone in the company loved him because there was just no other choice but to. “Got you a new one, Sar’nt Orion. Kid’s as hard as nails and twice as tough. Never seen another like him ’cept maybe myself back when I was a cold-blooded killer with the batts and all. Trust me. Hells o’ Suth, if he don’t remind me of myself when I was tough as anyone you ever met. He’s new to the company and I thought he’d be a good fit for your platoon. Put him with the best so he learns the company right and all, Sar’nt Orion.”
All that was just advertising for the kid’s sake.
Every new recruit to the company, on every world we managed to end up dying on, started out in the Reapers. SOP. Standard Operating Procedure. Just like I did, once and a long time ago. Just like everyone else did once and also long ago. The fun was when they realized it was always so. It usually took about two weeks. Everyone started in Reaper. Reaper was the bastard child of Strange Company.
Eventually they all realize that. If they live long enough to do so. But by then it’s too late.
We called my platoon Reapers because it made the new ones think they’d ended up in something elite right from the get-go. How else were you gonna get someone to sign the contract that would land them with a bunch of mangy war dogs that did all the dirty that needed doing? Reaper just makes it sound cool. You can almost see the old First Sergeant rubbing his chin during the intake interview as he smooths his bone-white handlebar mustache, s
tudying the kid now standing here in front of me. Giving the new recruit a look that indicates he sees something extra-special in this one.
Joke’s on them. They are far from special. They’re just new. And new is nothing in warfare. Now old… old is something to measure twice and cut once on. You meet an old guy in battle rattle out on the field one day and you best be careful. This ain’t a business you grow old in. Unless you’re good at it. And that means you’re deadly.
Reapers are the intake platoon, and we’re used for all the worst jobs. That’s the other reason it’s called Reaper, because most new intakes don’t survive past here. If they do, given a campaign or two, or sometimes even just one nasty firefight, then they’re pushed out into the other platoons who’ve taken casualties.
Ghosts. Good for them. Nice outfit.
Dogs. Whoops. You really are unlucky, buddy.
Or if they’re particularly jacked up in the head… but got some special skill—read “weird” for special—then Voodoo. Which is just the unluckiest kind of luck to draw if you ask me for comment. It’s like you can’t play Cheks at all.
“He’s all kitted with the basic setup, Sergeant Orion,” continued the First Sergeant as though he were delivering a speech at some awards ceremony instead of a very hot war zone that had seen brutal fighting within the hour. “So take good care of him and show him the ropes, won’tcha, Sar’nt?” The old man in his ever-pristine battle rattle slapped the kid on the dingy OD-green shoulder armor the kid had been issued and banged his dented helmet with one assault-gloved hand.
“You’ll do just fine here. I expect great things outta you, kid. Sergeant Orion’ll show you how we operate here in the Strange Company and get you up to speed and all. Welcome to the company.”
And then the old NCO was off with his ever-tired driver in tow, headed out through the rubble at the back of the old bank we’d withstood three days of shelling and enemy attacks in. Not to mention a battalion-sized push from the enemy rebels who’d just left their dead down the street we called our sector.
The rest of Reaper, in their improvised fighting positions across the ruins of the bank, noted the new kid and went on with their business. Cleaning their weapons, grabbing some chow out of their rucks, or changing socks.
Changing socks. Changing socks is my big thing. They know. They’ve learned. Most of Reaper has been together for the campaign on this world. Other than the four that got killed here. Sergeant Orion is big on changing your socks. Every one of them will tell you that about me.
“Prior?” I ask the kid, leading him over to the vault and the shot-to-hell teller’s console I’ve been using as a command post.
“What?” he whispers. Low and unsure of himself now that he’s been left alone among trained killers.
“Prior service?”
I’m looking at the kid’s gear and know the answer already. I also know this kid’s a dead man. I’m super optimistic that way of course. The First Sergeant has kitted him with our standard company gear draw. Polymer camouflage OD-green chest armor where I can see some other now-dead guy’s name has been laser-etched off by Biggs who runs the company’s mobile supply crawler. Ballistic shoulder pauldrons. Slightly used TEC. Tactical equipment carrier. Of course, bloodstained, but Biggs got that out with some harsh solvent and bleach. And probably a lot of swearing as his fat lips worked his ever-present chopped cigar. Thigh and shin guards that don’t do squat against most modern ammo types. Brand-new combat boots because the First Sergeant, like me, is a fiend for proper foot care. A helmet with a ceramic patch where someone took one right in the brainpan. Combat tanto to make the kid feel hardcore and all. I doubt he knows how to even fight with it. A very worn ruck to carry everything else one can call their own in.
And an S-16. The all-purpose battle rifle everyone gets issued unless they’re pros from other services who’ve managed to defect with their own personal and preferred weapon systems. Or bought some really slick high-speed gear at some weapons bazaar hauler we’ve docked alongside when we’re slowly crawling between worlds in the Spider.
The S-16.
We call it “the Bastard” because it fights like one and no one wants it. It’s not heavy. Burns through ammo rough and dirty. It’ll shoot dirty too, waterlogged or even recently used as a club at close quarters in a sticky situation that suddenly got outta hand. This tells me one of two things.
If a new guy shows up and Biggs and the First Sergeant have stuck him with one of the seemingly endless supply of S-16 combat rifles we have on hand, rifles the Old Man got paid in surplus for on some pacification gig that went down just before I joined up, this tells me the guy is probably on the run and has no money for a good weapon system to fight for his life with. Most likely he’s wanted for murder or something similar. The other possibility—he’s just some new kid with no prior service in anyone’s military and he wants to get off-world and go kill strange people in exciting new places.
“Prior service?” I ask the kid again as I get him to drop his ruck and sit down at my makeshift little desk for our first interview and welcome presentation to my platoon. “Who’d you serve with?”
The blank stare tells me everything.
No one, and nobody.
I sigh and hand him a protein bar.
“Eat this. No hot chow for the foreseeable future. You murder anyone?”
The kid takes it and doesn’t open the pack. He’s probably ready to vomit from fear because you can hear enemy mobile artillery pounding the hell out of the outskirts of the city. Again. Trying to go for the Astralonian Resistance units doing their best to get to the LZ and off-world quick. In other places, just blocks away, firefights are underway with no sign of letting up until everyone on one side is good and dead.
Any illusions this kid had about what war is really like are being quickly dispelled by the second. I can see it in his eyes. Right now, instead of burning ammo and throwing grenades at close enemies to die gloriously and prove to everyone you’ve left behind that you were actually a real live hero, instead you get to experience what real combat feels like for much of the time you’re in it. Sitting around waiting to get killed by random artillery you can do nothing about. Or suddenly cut to pieces by a hurricane of gunfire stealthily applied your way and which you had no clue about in the last seconds of your very short life.
What he doesn’t know is… we’re fine here right now. The enemy probed an hour ago and we murdered them flat-out. Wasn’t even a fight. They won’t be trying this street until someone figures out that a missing platoon is overdue for check-in. Tries their comm or whatever they’re using for traffic and finds out no one is answering ’cause they’re all dead in the dark and rubble-strewn street out there.
Sucks to be stupid.
But it sucks worse to be dead. Better them than us.
And they were stupid. Walked right into our kill zone, and I just whispered, “Light ’em up.”
And Reaper lit ’em up good.
Ten seconds later a bunch of loyalist guerilla fighters were dead or bleeding out on the street in the night as the moon disappeared behind the skeletal remains of skyscrapers to the west. I bet they’d wanted to die gloriously just like this kid sitting in front of me wanted to when he decided to try PMC’ing. Instead they made the mistake of running into us one dark and arty night. We waited for a few minutes and then sent Choker and Punch in to finish everyone off and get a unit ID for the bounty.
The company can turn the body count in for cash. But I have a gut feeling we’ll be lucky to get off this world alive much less get paid in any kind of stellar currency. Fat chance on seeing actual hard mem.
Last time I checked, the Coreward Currency Market was trading Astralonian baht at seventy-thousand to one against CoreBit. One mem is worth a thousand CoreBit.
A case of six-point-five for the Bastard costs twenty CoreBit on the black market.
But CoreBits are hard to come by and beggars can’t be choosers when it comes to hard mem. And that’s the thing no one ever tells you about being a merc. Yeah, you got freedom. But freedom’s just another word for nothing left to spend on something that might save your life when everything goes spinward.
So you’re kind of always begging. Especially if you’re not too proud. And merc’in and pride do not, I repeat, do not go hand in hand. There’s no pride in running when the contract’s dead and the LZ’s getting shelled. The locals who you’ve been defending want your blood, and the hoochies you promised were gonna end up on the right side of the conflict are now wondering why you’re running and not fighting like they thought you would when they gave away their goods for free.
Nothing’s free. Nothing. Is. Free. That can be read and believed both ways.
Nah, pride’s just a slick dress uniform and a cheap lie that’ll get you killed when the people you’re fighting for, who aren’t doing any of the actual fighting, start selling you out and making their best deal… for themselves and themselves alone.
So, chuck that. You don’t need pride. Not here. Not in the company. Full mags, working weapons, and some dudes who got your back. That’s what you need if you’re gonna see the other side of this. That’s what makes us brothers. Whether we like it or not. It’s the galaxy against us and the sooner you realize that the better.
“I’m Sergeant Orion,” I tell the kid. “First rule in Reaper is you do everything I tell you. Got that, Kid?”
He doesn’t realize it but for the foreseeable future Kid is his new name.
The Kid, holding the protein bar and staring wide-eyed at me who looks like he’s going to vomit and who has not eaten the bar as I asked him to, just stares at me, unsure what to do… not just next… but at all.