A Desert Called Peace

by Tom Kratman

  "Today marks your first day as soldiers of the Legio del Cid. It will be a day you will never forget. It will not be the hardest day you will ever face. Each day here will be worse than the day that preceded it. We will make it so, I promise. I promise you also hunger and fatigue, thirst and forced marches, hardship and pain. I promise misery. In the end, your only release will be when you yourselves are too tough to notice anymore. That . . . or when you die. To me it makes no practical difference which happens first.

  "Centurions, take charge of your centuries." Martinez returned the salutes of his subordinates.

  It was just ten o'clock at night, as Cruz lay on his cot waiting for sleep to overtake him. Outside a bugle played a soft call.

  Oh, God, I hurt. First Bastard Martinez was right. To lie on this cot and not be in pain is the best thing I've ever felt, even though everything still hurts.

  The day, too, had been as miserable as the first centurion had promised. From about a quarter to four to six in the morning, the company had learned the basics of marching. Then, from six to seven thirty, had come physical training. Given the number of push-ups awarded during the close order drill instruction, PT was agony. Cruz had lain on his back with his body twisted and his legs to one side until he thought his abdomen would rip apart from the stress. God, it had hurt! Push-ups had been interspersed with other exercises until Cruz's arms would no longer support him.

  Sure, his previous life had been hard, as was to be expected on a cattle ranch and farm that occasionally dabbled in pigs and kept a coop of trixies, megalapteryx fowl, for their olive-green eggs. Even so, it was nothing like as bad as his first day in the legion.

  A year on the farm wouldn't be as bad as today was.

  Arms quivering, Cruz had flopped onto the ground, head held high to keep his face from the muck. Pain lessened immediately, though the horrible burning in his arms did not abate at all. I can't do this anymore, he'd thought. No fucking way. These guys are insane.

  He was sadly mistaken, of course, except about the insanity part. Two instructor corporals had come up on either side of Cruz and convinced him he was underestimating his own strength; seriously underestimating it. A sneakered foot slammed into Cruz's left side, by his stomach so as not to break any ribs. Even as he writhed, arms crossing to protect himself, another foot rather more than nudged his kidney. Cruz barely held in a scream. More kicks followed. "Get back to your position, you fucking maggot," said a corporal.

  Cruz strained to do so, arms quivering like jelly as he tried to hold himself off the ground.

  The corporals waited until he had both his trembling arms beneath him. A shared nod and the feet moved together to kick his arms out from underneath him. Uncontrolled, Cruz flopped belly down to the mud. After his torso stopped descending, his face continued on. Mud filled his mouth and nose. More kicks followed. "Get up, shithead."

  Strangely, from somewhere inside, Cruz found the strength to get his body back off the ground. Assholes.

  After Physical Training, the corporals had turned hoses on the dripping volunteers. Since no other showers had been made available, Cruz guessed—correctly—that the hoses were all the showering he was going to get anytime soon.

  Breakfast had been served, though "served" may not have been precisely the right word, immediately after the hosing. Cruz had taken a full plate before discovering that he was too exhausted to be hungry. Yet another corporal had disabused him of the notion that food could be taken and not eaten. That, too, had been a painful lesson.

  Issue of initial equipment had gone very quickly. There hadn't been much to issue: a plastic foot locker with a lock and key, several pair each of underwear and socks, a black baseball cap, a two-quart canteen, another set of running shorts, a toilet kit with toothbrush and paste, soap, shampoo and a razor with blades. First Centurion Martinez had told the troops that, until they had proven they were worth the expense, there was no reason to waste money on uniforms for them. In fact, uniforms were for the time being unavailable, but there was no reason to tell the recruits that.

  The rest of the day had consisted of lectures, meals, close order drill, all interspersed with pushups and more creative punishments. Cruz's section leader, del Valle, was very fond of what he called "the low crawl." After hours of dragging his poor tired, scraped and battered body across the gravel and sand, Cruz's elbows and knees were weeping sores. By day's end two cots in Cruz's tent had been folded up and taken away, their former occupants kicked out after an interrupted public beating by the corporals.

  Halfway through the beating a relatively tall, relatively light- skinned officer appeared. Cruz couldn't see his name tag and didn't know enough to tell as yet the man's rank. It must have been very high though, so he thought, since the corporals stopped the beatings as soon as they spied him.

  "And just what the fuck is going on here?" the white officer quietly demanded.

  "Just a little discipline building, sir. We're making an example of these two to convince the others they can't quit."

  Carrera held his temper in check, though he was truly pissed. He stood tense for several minutes as he gained control of himself. The corporals' nervousness increased in proportion to the time it took for Carrera to control his anger.

  Finally he asked, genially enough, "Tell me, Cabo, just what do you think you can do to these men that the enemy won't be able to do more of and worse?" There was no answer. "At a loss for words, I see. Good. Let me tell you that there is precisely nothing you can do worse than the enemy. These beatings. Why bother? Who wants quitters? You? Would you trust your men in battle if the only reason they stayed was because they were afraid of a little beating?"

  "Put that way, sir . . . I guess maybe not."

  "Look, Cabo, I know this is all new to you, that you were probably a private just a few months ago. Maybe there might be a time and place for this kind of thing. But this is not the time and place. We are selecting the future of the legion. Even though we are a nongovernmental organization for now, we are building the future of Balboa, right here, right now. I want, I need, we all need, people who are not afraid of a little pain and people who will do what needs doing on their own."

  "No physical discipline, sir?" The corporal sounded incredulous.

  "Didn't say that," Carrera corrected. "There's nothing wrong with an occasional kick in the pants. And if someone mouths off to you, you deck him on the spot; hear me? There are some crimes that demand punishment public, graphic and as immediate as possible. But I do not want you frightening people into staying with us that really have no business in this business. Let them go. Encourage them, even. Make the training—the training, I say!—so fucking hard that only the best can make it. That will give you soldiers to count on. Now finish up these two—I don't want anyone thinking their corporals can do wrong—as soon as I leave. But don't do it again. And pass the fucking word."

  Cruz had heard none of that. The white officer had left, the beatings had resumed but then ended shortly thereafter, and the miscreants were marched out of camp under guard. He fell asleep with dread in his heart about what tomorrow would bring.

  Hotel Metropole, Saint Nicholasberg, 21/3/460 AC

  In the hotel bar pretty, but altogether too young, Volgan prostitutes solicited the business that might keep them fed for another week or even another day. Easterners—journalists and businessmen, mostly—flirted, or negotiated, or simply bantered with the whores. Along the bar sat a balding, Russian-looking, man. The hookers paid him no mind. He didn't seem like he had the money they, or their pimps, required.

  Being a bureaucrat, thought Dan Kuralski—seated at the bar, ought to be a capital offense. He sipped at his nearly frozen vodka. And I was so happy to be coming here for this mission, Patrick, old friend. "One big shopping spree," isn't that what you said?

  In the days since arriving in "Saint Nick" in search of arms, Kuralski had been up one dead end after another. One bureaucrat in the Ministry of Defense told him that MoD didn't have au
thority to sell arms to other nations, let alone NGOs; that was for the Foreign Ministry. In the Foreign Ministry he had been told that, "Sorry, no, the actual sale of arms was being conducted by the military itself." Kuralski had managed to corner one Volgan general. This hadn't worked either; the general was too drunk at the time and reportedly too much of a worm when sober. Dan was about ready to go directly to a factory and make a private contract for what was needed. He would have, too, if it had been possible to go to a single factory and get each of ten thousand different items. There was no such factory or warehouse or, so far as he'd been able to determine, business. And precisely where the particular items required were being manufactured was still a closely guarded state secret. It was sometimes even a silly state secret. Who cared who made one-liter water bottles, anyway, for Christ's sake? But that was still Top Secret, Special Compartmentalized Information in Volga.

  Preferably something slow and painful, Kuralski amended his earlier thought. He contemplated the very unhappy tone Carrera had used when last they'd spoken. He did not want to disappoint Carrera or to fail in his mission. The legion needed that equipment, dammit!

  Kuralski sipped again at his vodka. Attention on the glass, he failed to notice at first the man who sat down beside him. When he did notice, and looked up to see, the Russian asked him, quite directly, if he was "the Balboan arms agent who was looking for heavy equipment for the upcoming war in Sumer?"

  Arms agent? Me? I am just an errand boy.

  "Not just heavy equipment," answered Kuralski. "We need virtually everything from rifles and machine guns on up. Why do you ask?"

  In slow, heavy but correct English the newcomer said, "Ah. Permit me to introduce myself. I am Pavel Timoshenko. Word came to me of a Russian- and English-speaking Balboan looking for reasonably modern arms. Since I am in Economic Planning, I thought I might be of assistance. And you would be?"

  "Forgive my rudeness. I'm Daniel Kuralski."

  Timoshenko reached out a hand. "A Volgan?"

  "Sorry, no. My grandparents were. They fled the Red Tsar, though. I was born in the FSC. I live in Balboa now. It is perhaps a silly question, but what does Economic Planning have to do with arms sales?"

  Timoshenko smiled. "In this country, Daniel, Economic Planning has to do with everything. Yes, even now, even after the fall of the empire. Not that the plans work, mind you." Timoshenko looked wistful, sighed resignedly. "When I was young it used to seem that they did, somewhat. In any event, nothing much works anymore." He shook his head dismally.

  Timoshenko continued. "Right now, we are planning our upcoming economic collapse. It will happen, too; that plan we can be sure will work, unless we can get a major infusion of hard currency and technology. Which is why I am here to see you. What are you looking to buy?"

  Kuralski answered, "Equipment for a large brigade, with technical experts to teach our men how to use it. However, whatever you might sell to me, I don't think we are in a position to regenerate the Volgan economy."

  "My new friend, after three generations of Tsarist-Marxism, no one is in a position to regenerate the Volgan economy, at least, no one who would be willing to do so. We can still help each other, though."

  Immediately suspicious, he didn't really believe in win-win situations, Kuralski asked what the Volgan was getting at.

  Timoshenko looked up. For a moment he seemed lost to philosophy. When he spoke, he said, "What we need is good advertising. For decades we have been selling shitty equipment to everybody who couldn't afford better or was cut off from better for political reasons. Now that particular chicken is about to roost. The Volgan Republic is sitting on more than thirty thousand tanks; actually a lot more than that, if one counts everything. Some of them are crap, of course; the kind of dreck we used to barter for political influence to the undeveloped world. Still others are relics from the Great Global War. But we have first class equipment, too. Who will believe that, when the East's second best has been beating what we have been calling our best for so long that no one remembers that we—not the Sachsens, but we— built the best armored vehicles of the Great Global War?"

  Blood will tell. Kuralski, too, felt a small pride in his ancestors and relations in thinking of both their tanks, and their courage, in fighting the Sachsen.

  Timoshenko shifted gears a bit. "Tell me something; when you get over there, to the war zone, I mean, are your men going to fight?"

  Kuralski thought about it for a minute. "My boss, though he is officially the deputy for the legion, is really in charge. He will fight. I don't think he would obey orders that kept him out of the fighting." Kuralski laughed, "He's pretty selective about obedience in general. So, yes, if there is fighting we will be in it."

  Timoshenko turned his bar stool around to lean his back against the bar. "That's what we need. If we sell you some of our best equipment—maybe better than our usual best, and you take it to battle against the Sumeris, then the rest of the Yithrabis—especially the Oil Yithrabis—will see that we can still be their best buy for defense. It is only necessary that a couple of our tanks survive hits and kill the older tanks we sold Sumer for the point to be made. Besides the Federated States and the Sachsens, who would never help us, the Oil Yithrabis are the only ones with the money to make a difference to our economy."

  Kuralski shook his head. "We couldn't afford to buy your best if it cost half, even a quarter of what the FS, Sachsen, or Anglia would demand for their equipment. We are not a rich country and the legion's—Carrera's—private resources are limited."

  Timoshenko gave a deep belly laugh. "I see that you are unacquainted with the miracles of Socialist Accounting. Trust me on this. Things cost precisely what we say they cost. You can afford it."

  Interu Inn, New Giza, Misrani Islamic Republic,

  23/3/460 AC

  On Old Earth it had once been possible to determine to a considerable degree of certainty the degree of oppression in any given country by the words used in its title. Generally speaking, the rule had been: "Republic equals republic. People's Republic equals dictatorship. Democratic Republic equals really oppressive dictatorship. People's Democratic Republic equals really oppressive and corrupt dictatorship, amounting to a family corporation, with genocidal tendencies."

  This rule had held good, in general terms, on Terra Nova. Moreover, it had been taken and applied by Moslems, as well, for their own little experiments in statehood and linguistic sleight of hand. Thus, for example, the Misrani Islamic Republic was, in fact, a corrupt family-run dictatorship, with said family being among the most devout atheists to be found in the known universe. Much like "democratic" and "people's," "Islamic was a mere sop.

  The suite Kuralski had taken at the Interu Inn of the Misrani "Islamic" Republic was, at best, tacky, all gilt over cheap wood held together by glue. In this, it resembled the country as a whole.

  While a hotel servant unpacked his bags in one room of the suite, Kuralski brought Carrera up to date over the salon's telephone line. The hotel's own phone he'd unplugged, substituting an encrypted one. Carrera spoke from Balboa on a similar device.

  Kuralski felt flushed with success. Even so, he kept his voice low enough that the bellhop couldn't hear. "Yes, Pat, everything we wanted and more. And they're selling us good stuff, too. Some of it has never been on the general market before. White Eagle tanks, Pat, latest upgrade. Matter of fact, they're offering special upgrades for the thirty we need. Pat, the Volgans have never sold White Eagles to anybody; and it isn't because they're shit, either. They gave me a tour, including a ride and a firing exercise. Harrington would love them if he weren't too fat to fit inside. And we're getting PBM-100s for the light armor and mechanized infantry requirement. They've actually offered to let us have the PBMs at cost plus . . ."

  "Yes, they've got some of their people working on the right allocation of spare parts. They also corrected a few mistakes in the publicly available information on some of their capabilities."

  As Carrera's voice sounded in his
ear, Kuralski turned to keep a watchful eye on the Misrani bellhop. Yep, still out of the way.

  "Right. Their trainers are coming in three echelons, Pat. Expect the first at Herrera Airport on the sixth of the sixth month, and the next on the ninth. The last won't arrive until the end of the month . . . yes, they're sending enough to train our leaders. . . . Yes, we agreed that their folks get paid Balboan scales. It's princely to a place as depressed as Volga is now. Wait a sec, Pat . . ."

  Waiting until the bellhop left the suite, Dan added, "Yes, from here I'll be moving on to Zion for some of the individual equipment. After that I'll go to Helvetia, then Sachsen followed by Castille. I have a very good line on five to twelve thousand Castilian-made, Sachsen-pattern helmets for cheaps, though the Helvetians are offering what might be a better helmet for about the same amount. . . . Yes, I'll check out both. Both governments are basically dumping them."

  Kuralski was briefly silent, then answered, "Right; I'll keep you posted. I'm meeting with a Misrani about the tents tomorrow morning. When I get to Zion, how high are you willing to go on the Remotely Piloted Aircraft? Right. . .

  "Okay, Pat. Of course I'm great. I'm lucky, too. . .

  "Oh, I almost forgot; while I was in Volga I ran into a Volgan Airborne colonel with a serious problem. Things are bad over there, very bad. Even the army is not always getting enough to eat, and that is so even with the troops growing a lot of their own food. This colonel— Colonel Samsonov . . . yes, he's related, distantly, to the small arms designer—said they were going to close down his unit. I think I can put Samsonov and his regiment on retainer for very damn little. Do you think you might have a use for an airborne regiment, possibly reinforced to maybe two thousand men? Okay, I'll make a deal with this guy. It shouldn't cost more than about fifteen, maybe twenty thousand drachma a month to have them wait for the call. Those poor fucks will soldier for food. Pat, it was sad; Samsonov actually looked hungry."