“REPLACEMENTS,” announced Sergeant Black pontifically, “aint worth the powder it takes to blow them to hell. And when they finally learn enough the hard way to be of some use around here, it usually ain’t soon enough.
“Now listen, and listen good. We got that whole damn ridge to hold, and only half enough men to hold it with. Eighteen men got it during the last attack—for replacements for which I get you characters. I got just one word for you and I want you to remember it anytime you get a sudden impulse to make like a hero. You only got one body. When that’s gone, the QM ain’t going to issue you another one. So take care of it and don’t get it full of holes.
You ain’t much, but you’re all I got—and God knows when I’ll get any more once you’re gone!”
* * *
Private Hatch wiggled slowly along the shallow furrow in the hard ground that passed as a communication trench until he reached an emplacement on the crest of the ridge, a natural cleft in the rock that had been banked with sandbags.
“Sergeant Black said I was supposed to relieve you,” he said to a hollow-eyed pfc who squatted listlessly beside the machine gun that poked out through a narrow slit to cover the forward slope. The other gave a tired nod and moved over to give him room.
“Got a cigarette?”
Hatch slid down beside him and handed over a crumpled pack.
“How many did they send up this time?”
“Eleven.”
The pfc let out a low groan. “That means I don’t get out of here for another two weeks anyway. Your first time up?” It was a statement rather than a question but Hatch nodded anyway.
“Fine experience for a young man,” said the pfc with a sour grin. “Builds character.” He took a last drag on the cigarette aimed carefully, and with a quick flip of his index finger sent it arcing toward the machinegun slot in the sandbags in front of them. When it went through without touching either side he gave a little grunt of satisfaction, and picking up a small sharp rock, made a scratch on the boulder beside him.
“I’m getting better,” he said. “That’s thirty-six straight without a miss. Six more and I’ll have the company record. There’s no real competition left, though, with the lieutenant gone. That boy really had a good eye.”
Hatch thought of the thing under the canvas and swallowed with difficulty.
“What happened?”
“Damn if I know,” said the pfc. “Patrol came over last night—nothing special, they were just feeling around—and suddenly for no good reason at all the lieutenant starts to blubber like a baby and takes off over the skyline. They got him before he got twenty yards.”
“I had to help bury him,” said the blond boy. “I got sick.”
“You’ll get used to it,” said the pfc. “Guess I’d better get down and get some chow and a little shut-eye. I’ve got a hunch it may be rough out tonight. You hold the fort. I’ll be back to relieve you about sundown.”
Private Hatch peeped cautiously out through the firing slit at the arid expanse of rocky ground that stretched down in front of him, and then back at the pfc.
“Anything special I should watch for?” he asked uncertainly.
The pfc showed yellowed teeth as he gave a short bark of a laugh. “Yeah, our friends across the way. They start coming, you stop ’em. The machinegun jams, you use your carbine. Your carbine jams, you use your teeth. Your teeth jam, you send a letter through channels and requisition a new set.” He laughed again and then slapped the blond boy on the shoulder. “Relax, kid. Nothing ever happens around here until after sundown, and I’ll be back to show you the ropes before then.” With an expert wiggle he slipped into the shallow communication trench, and in a moment was gone.
Hatch found his fingers shaking a bit when he tried to light a cigarette. It didn’t taste right and without thinking he flipped it toward the machinegun slot. It hit six inches to one side and rolled back to his feet. He sat staring at it for a moment and then picked it up and stuck it back in his mouth.
It was a good quarter of a mile back to the training stations and Larn had to run to make it on time. Cadets weren’t allowed to use the gray tubes except during emergencies and this wasn’t an emergency—it was just the second day of advanced training. The other cadets in his section were already strapped into their transpsych trainers when he got there. Nobody said anything but he could tell from the way they were damping their thoughts that they hadn’t forgotten his fiasco with the Blue lieutenant the day before. His fingers felt thick and clumsy as he slid the shining helmet over his head and adjusted the webbing that held him inert in his elongated cradle.
“Ready?”
He wanted to strip off his harness and run back to the cramped security of his quarters, but he didn’t. Instead he reached out his foot and kicked over the switch that connected the helmet on his head with the disassociates.
THE pfc had guessed wrong.
For once the enemy didn’t wait for darkness. One minute there was only sun and dust and the shrill chirp of a small bird hidden in a little pile of brush to the left, and the next a shrieking human wall structured itself out of nowhere and came howling up the arid slopes toward the forward positions. If anybody thought of the green kid sitting alone in the observation post, they didn’t have time to do anything about it. The enemy was almost through the left flank and were still coming.
The blond boy did the best he could: Two dozen figures were working their way up the slope toward him. Once his position was taken, heavy machine guns would be mounted in it to sweep the exposed flanks below.
Just a second before the yells had sent him diving to his gun, he had smiled for the first time that day and scratched his name and a single line on a clear spot on the boulder. After three hours of trying he had finally managed to flip a cigarette end through the firing slot. And then, glad in a way that nobody was there to see how scared he was, but wishing at the same time that there was somebody around to tell him what to do, he found himself. at the gun, firing quick bursts at the sweaty faced men who were running up the slope toward him.
He broke the first wave, and then the second, and then, when they started up again, the gun jammed. Closer they came, and closer, until he could almost make out individual faces. They were more cautious now. They came in quick rushes, darting forward and hitting the ground to take advantage of every broken bit of shelter, He stood frozen, watching them as they worked their way closer, and then suddenly, without warning, he felt his nerve break and his legs bunch under him for the leap that would take him out of the foxhole and down the back slope to safety.
And then, before his brain could release the signal that would send him running like a rabbit, something happened. He fell back against the parapet as he felt an indescribable twisting inside his head, a wrenching feeling. as if blunt probes were being punched through his brain pan into the quivering grey matter cupped within—and then he was rammed back into the tiny corner of darkness and left impotent as some strange other took over the neural controls that operated his strong young body.
Cadet Larn couldn’t control the shudder of revulsion that swept through him as he took control of the strange new body. But, physically loathsome as it was with its pulp covered bone and light and almost hairless outer surface, he knew he had to control his disgust and use it as efficiently as he could in the short time that was alloted to him.
He knew what he was supposed to do, but when he managed to focus the oddly placed pair of eyes and saw what was coming toward him, the same feeling he had known the night before flooded into him. He wanted to get away, as far away from the snarling men below as he could force his new legs to carry him. He’d be sent back in disgrace, but even garrison duty on Deneb, dull as it was, was better than this. He poised to run, but then something—perhaps the dreams he’d had before he knew the reality—stopped him. Maybe he could hang on just a little while. Maybe he could get used to it. Maybe it wouldn’t be as bad as it was yesterday. Slowly, holding the body in the empla
cement by sheer force of will, he began a check of the weapon that rested on its tripod in front of him.
This they called a heavy machinegun.
He tried to remember the diagram he had been shown during briefing. The force of expanding gases pushed this back this way and in turn activated that. It was crude, but it was deadly to soft bodies such as the one he controlled. Experimentally he peeped down over the sights and swung the weapon back and forth on its tripod. This was better than the clumsy hand weapon he had been equipped with the night before. Now the firing lever. He had dozed a bit during the lecture but this must be it. He pressed it. Nothing happened. If he retreated now, he was justified—but after last night the umpires might misunderstand his motives.
It took him another precious second before he could figure out what was wrong. When he did, he grabbed a heavy rock from the bottom of the trench and smashed at the clearing lever again and again until with a sudden snap the off-size cartridge that had been jamming the mechanism came flying out.
During the briefing lecture he had been instructed to fire in short, careful bursts, but the ones in the differently colored uniforms were so close, and there were so many of them, that he just held the trigger down and swung the muzzle back and forth like a deadly hose.
Twice men reached him. The first put a bullet in his right shoulder, the second jabbed him in the stomach with a long knife that was fastened to the end of his weapon before he could be disposed of. After that he found it increasingly difficult to make the body follow his commands. When a fragment of the grenade that smashed the breech mechanism of his machinegun ripped open his forehead so that he was blinded by his own blood, it was even worse. All that he could do was to fumble down into the red darkness for the grenades piled by his feet and hurl them as fast and as far in the direction of the firing as the weakening organic machine he was in command of would permit. The last thing he heard was a shout from behind him, “Hold on, we’re coming!” and then he slumped down into blackness.
Cadet Larn sat on the edge of his trainer with his helmet in his lap, unable for a moment to disassociate himself from the savage action that was still going on ten thousand miles below. It wasn’t until the speaker set flush in the bulkhead behind him boomed out, “All cadets report immediately to the briefing room for combat analysis!” that he was able to pull himself together enough to shuffle wearily over to join his fellows for the march down to the great hall in the belly of the training ship.
Talking in the ranks was strictly forbidden, but by properly focusing one’s tendrils and using a minimum of power it was possible to communicate to the cadet next to you without the platoon leader being aware of it.
“How did it go today?” came a whisper from Larn’s left.
“Rough. But not as bad as yesterday. At least I didn’t run.”
“Which side did you draw?”
“The Blues again.”
The cadet to his left let out an incautious snort that drew an angry “No talking!” from the platoon leader.
“You think you had it rough? That’s a laugh. I was assigned to the Reds. We had to go up a slope in broad daylight against a crazy human who didn’t know enough to lie down and die. He hammered six slugs through my gut while I still had a good twenty yards to go. One of the umpires spotted it, too. I bet I get slapped ten demerits for not making use of available cover.”
“Cadet Clung!”
The cadet that had been whispering to Larn stiffened apprehensively. “Yes, sir?”
“I warned you once. Book yourself five demerits for talking in ranks.”
The rest of the march was made use of available cover.”
The hollow-eyed pfc stared down at the stretcher containing the unconscious form of the blond boy with something approaching awe.
“He going to make it through?” The medical corpsman looked up from his bandaging and nodded briefly. “He’ll be ready to go home and sell bonds in a month. They’re hungry for heroes stateside. He a friend of yours?” The pfc shook his head. “I never saw him before this morning. I sure never figured him for a Congressional medal.”
The cadets sat at rigid attention as the umpires’ reports were read.
“. . . the decision of the judges in the case of Cadet Sergeant Stlarz is that his unorthodox expenditure of Red forces in a daylight raid though almost successful, was tactically unsound because of failure to employ available artillery support. Twentyfive demerits.”
As one by one his fellows were censored or commended, the tension grew within Larn until he didn’t see how he could stand it any longer. And then at long last his name was called.
“The case of Cadet Larn has given rise to considerable discussion. Although his defense of his position left much to be desired—the clearing of a routine jam in his weapon, for example, taking twice as long as it should have—it cannot be denied that his actions prevented the Red force from overrunning the blue positions. As a consequence, the hundred demerit penalty he incurred yesterday is hereby canceled, It was further felt, however, that Cadet
Larn did not exercise sufficient care in protecting the training device that was assigned to him for use during today’s action. Five demerits.”
Cadet Larn didn’t mind the five demerits. Cadet Larn had been blooded and he knew he would never run again. He was already dreaming of the time when he would no longer have to use clumsy substitutes but could instead hurl his own beautifully coordinated bulk against such enemies of the Empire as were important enough to demand the attention of an officer in the Frontier Service . . .
THE pfc looked sleepily at the sky and yawned. Maybe he could get some sleep tonight for a change. After the way they’d been hurt, they should take it easy for a day or two. He leaned back, took a last drag on his cigarette, and flipped it lazily through the slot between the sandbags. As he reached over to mark up another point on the flat rock, he noticed for the first time the name scrawled a few hours before by the blond boy and the single scratch beside it.
“That guy ain’t human,” he said to nobody in particular. “First day up and he goes and wins himself a one-man war. Wonder what the hell ever got into him?”
NO GUN TO THE VICTOR
Competitive sport is a healthy program for any youth; Alan’s participation in the games was competitive—but healthy only if he survived!
CON.SUM.ER (KON-SUM-ER), n., 1. a person who destroys, uses up, or wastes industrial production in order to control the size of the population and make possible the full employment that is necessary for a healthy economy. 2. one who has not yet achieved producer status. 3. Any person under twenty-one, 4. (Obs.) A person who uses goods or services to satisfy his needs rather than to resell them or to produce other goods with them.
—The Authorized Dictionary (New Washington, Kansas: The Federal Printing Office, yd ed., 1944)
IT was Saturday so Alan had to go out and get the mail. Just as the letter carrier’s tank clanked away, he got his cousin Alf to man the front door turret and went zigzagging down the communication trench that led to the street.
As he reached cautiously up to open the small door in the bottom of the armored mail box, there was a sudden crack from across the way and the whine of a near miss sent him tumbling back into the slit trench. A moment later there was a coughing stutter as Alf opened up with the fifty and pounded a burst into the tungsten steel shutters of the house across the street. Alan jumped to his feet, dumped the mail out of the box, and then made a quick dive for safety just in case Alf’s fire hadn’t completely discouraged the Higgens kid.
The mail didn’t look particularly exciting. There wasn’t anything for him, and aside from a few letters for his uncle, most of what had come consisted of advertisements for sniper-scopes and stuff like that. The only exceptions were two small black boxes. They looked like samples of something, and since, as the only consumer left in the family, samples were Alan’s perquisite, he promptly stuffed them into his worn grenade carrier, and just as promptly forgot ab
out them. Until that evening when the man from Consolidated Munitions stopped by, that is.
MR. Flugnet was so disturbed that he’d forgotten to take off his white truce hat. “We think the promotion crew passed out a batch on this street,” he said as Alan slipped into the room and sat down quietly in the far corner. “But we’re not sure.”
“Why not?” asked Alan’s uncle, a weedy little man with a somewhat nasal voice.
“Because some damn kid dropped a mortar shell on their halftrack while they were on the way back to the warehouse to pick up another ‘load. Got every one of them. Were any samples dropped off here?”
“Alan brought in the mail,” volunteered Alf.
“Was there anything in it that somebody wanted that they didn’t get?” asked Alan in a small voice. They all turned and looked at him, aware of his presence for the first time.
“I’m from Consolidated Munitions,” said Mr. Flugnet.
“Yes, sir.?”
“Did you find a small black box in the mail? We’ve been passing out samples of our new concussion grenade and we just discovered today that several . . . uh . . . overpowered experimental models had got mixed in with them by mistake. We’re trying to track them down before it’s—well, before something unfortunate happens.”
Alan was just about to reach into his grenade case and produce the two little cartons when the word “overpowered” registered. He struggled briefly against temptation and lost.
“I dumped all the advertising stuff on the hall table.” He felt suddenly that his grenade case, had become transparent and that the little black boxes inside, now grown to quadruple size, were visible to everybody in the room. He knew it couldn’t be, but even so he let his hand drop casually over the carrier just in case there might be a revealing bulge. “I’ll go check.”
Collected Fiction Page 34