First To Fight

by David Sherman

  Other members of the platoon stepped into their rooms to meet the new men and introduce themselves during the unpacking, but neither Leach nor Ratliff let them stick around where they'd be in the way. Second squad's first fire team leader, Corporal Tim Kerr, who got McNeal, said it as well as any of the others: "Get out of here. When the new guy's unpacked, I'll bring him out for you to confuse with all of your names."

  Nobody argued the point, not with the third man in the fire team, Lance Corporal Dave "Hammer" Schultz, standing there looking at them. Schultz was acknowledged as the platoon's crazy, and nobody wanted to cross him.

  When he was almost finished unpacking, during a moment when nobody from one of the other squads was interrupting, Dean asked Leach, "Chief, how come everybody's hanging around in the barracks? I thought every-body'd be doing something."

  "You mean like hand-to-hand combat training, or classroom work?"

  "Yeah, something like that."

  "You just got here, right?"

  Dean nodded. "It's been less than an hour since we got off the Dragons at Battalion."

  "How long did it take you to get here?"

  Dean thought that was an odd question. Everybody who knew where Thorsfinni's World was knew how far it was from Arsenault. "Six weeks."

  "Did you go home on leave after Boot Camp?"

  "No. I came right here from Arsenault. A transport took us someplace where we split up. McNeal and me and a couple others transhipped directly onto an assault carrier coming here. We didn't even make planetfall; I don't even know what planet we orbited then."

  "You're from Earth, right? That's what your accent sounds like."

  Dean hadn't known there was such a thing as an "Earth accent." He'd always thought it was everybody else who had accents. "That's right, New Rochester."

  "Let's see, a standard month from Earth to Arsenault, five standard months there, then a standard month and a half in transit here." He cocked his head. "You haven't seen a calendar in more than half a standard year, have you?"

  "That's right." Until that moment Dean hadn't realized he hadn't seen a calendar in all that time.

  Leach grinned broadly at him. "Well, Dean, nobody's doing any work because this is Saturday. We're all on liberty."

  That didn't explain why they were all hanging around the barracks, though. Leach and Goudanis quickly filled him in. Payday was every other week, and last week had been payday. On payday weekends almost everybody left the base Friday evening for shore liberty in Bronnoysund, which the Marines called "Bronny" for short, the town right outside the main gate, and didn't come back until Sunday. Some went farther, to the larger cities of Troms or Bergen—or even went all the way to the other end of Niflheim to the big city, the capital, New Oslo. That day, between paydays, the Marines were preserving their money to spend tonight.

  Claypoole came around to call Dean New Guy again and arrived in time to hear the end of the explanation.

  "You have any money, New Guy?" Claypoole asked. "You must have money if you just got off ship. I'll take you into Bronny tonight, show you the sights. Hey," his eyes glowed, "I'll even take you to a real restaurant so you won't have to eat the swill they serve in the mess hall."

  "You think he's got all that back pay in his pocket and he's going to pay for your dinner, right?" Leach asked.

  "Go away, New Guy," Goudanis said. "I'm taking him on liberty tonight."

  Dean didn't have a chance to tell them that in his entire time in the Corps he'd received only a few credits in pay.

  The notes of the chow call bugle had barely died away over the parade ground before the men of third platoon were back in the barracks, making sure their garrison utilities were clean and squared away. Hardly anybody was going to stay on base to eat at the mess hall, not on a Saturday night, not if they had any money in their pockets.

  "You haven't been paid yet, right?" Goudanis asked Dean.

  "No, Lance Corporal. We didn't need any money on Arsenault and I didn't bring any from home."

  "Call me Juice, Dean. Okay. Staff Sergeant Bass'll get you squared away at the finance office on Monday. Here." He handed Dean a wad of bills he took from a compartment in his locker. "Take this. It should cover you for tonight. You can pay me back when you get paid." The bills were green, blue, and white with a picture of a fierce-looking, bearded man on the front and an imposing public building of some sort on the back. The denominations were clearly printed in Arabic numbers in each corner. The wad added up to 100 kroner, whatever that was.

  "Well, thanks," Dean said, flattered but at the same time embarrassed at the lance corporal's openhandedness.

  "Don't mention it, Dean. We take care of each other in this platoon. See?" He tapped the touchpad locking device on his personal gear locker. It didn't activate when it came in contact with Goudanis's fingertips. "No locks on our personal stuff. We don't have any thieves in this company. That's enough cash to get you through a good liberty night in Bronny. Since it's Saturday, there's no curfew for Marines until midnight tomorrow. M'boy," Goudanis clapped Dean on the shoulder, "we're gonna see just how good you are with a schooner of beer this evening!"

  "Juice!" Claypoole shouted from the doorway. "What's taking you so long!" Claypoole glanced at Dean, still in his Class A parade uniform. "New Guy, get a move on. You're holding up the whole Third Herd!"

  Dean was beginning to tire of Claypoole. He reminded him of that bully long ago who'd tormented him on the playground about his middle name. But he sensed that Claypoole's foolishness was being tolerated by the other Marines in the platoon, and he understood instinctively that overreacting would be a mistake.

  "Pipe down, New Guy," Goudanis muttered. "PFC Dean is 'PFC Dean,' until we come up with a new name for him, and as for you, reindeer face, you always were New Guy, you're New Guy now, and you'll always be New Guy."

  Claypoole ignored Goudanis and said, "New Guy, you got money? You'll need money in town tonight." He dug deep into a cargo pocket and produced a wad of bills. "Here." He looked about defiantly. "See, it isn't like Chief said, I don't expect you to spring for me tonight. I know you haven't gotten paid yet."

  "Uh, thanks, New Guy," Dean said, surprised a second time by the generosity of the men but determined not to give in to Claypoole's badgering. "Lance Corporal..." Claypoole snickered and Dean paused briefly. "Uh, Juice gave me some already."

  Claypoole shrugged and put the money back into his pocket. "You run out, New Guy, give a holler. I'll be around. Unless you call me New Guy again. Then we got trouble. Okay, Juice, main gate? Fifteen minutes?" Goudanis nodded. "Hey, Juice," Claypoole added as an afterthought as he went out the door, "let's fix New Guy up with Big Barb tonight." Claypoole laughed raucously and ran down the hall, shouting to other Marines to meet him at the main gate in fifteen minutes.

  "Uh, Juice," Dean was having trouble calling a lance corporal by a nickname, "isn't it against regulations or something for Marines to go on liberty in utilities?"

  "In a civilized place, yes. But you're on Thorsfinni's World, just outside Bronnoysund. This place is the tail end of the planet that's been called the lower colon of Human Space. There isn't much in the way of what anybody would consider civilized amenities. We're better off wearing clothes that can stand hard wear when we're on liberty. Besides, these people are as hard as the rocks in their fjords. So no frills with these folks, and the colonel doesn't play garrison dukshit games with his Marines. And do you think the 'Finnis up here care what a man wears when he's on the town? Did you know that in winter, when it's fifty below, they think it's fun to break the ice on the Bothnia and go swimming in the goddamned river?

  "Now, it is against regs to wear civilian clothing around here, unless you go to New Oslo," Goudanis continued. "But for that you've got to take leave, unless you get lucky and pull courier duty to the embassy there. But let me tell you something about leave: so long as you're with the 34th, when you aren't deployed on a mission, you'll be training in the boonies, so you won't have much tim
e to vacation. Save up your leave to use when you go to a real world, or cash it in when you're discharged. I been in six years now and got over a hundred days on the books. Man, that's more'n three months' pay! And if you ship over, well, you can go home or someplace." The way Goudanis emphasized "someplace," it was evident to Dean that he did not think much of wherever home was for him. "And remember this," he added, "travel time doesn't count as leave."

  Dean zipped up his utility jacket. "Who's Big Barb?"

  "You don't wanna know," Corporal Leach said as he looked through the door to see if they were ready yet. Juice, you been tellin' him about Big Barb?"

  "Nah, Chief, bigmouth Claypoole just had to bring the subject up."

  Leach grinned. "Don't let him get on your nerves," he said to Dean. "Claypoole can be a pain in the ass, but when the going gets rough, he'll back you up. All right, people!" Chief shouted. "Transportation to the frigid delights of Bronny awaits us!"

  The liberty bus bounced and swayed as it roared down the steep gravel road to Bronnoysund, snuggled in a bend of the Bothnia River about five kilometers from the mouth of the fjord emptying into the Nordenskold Sea. The town wasn't far from the main gate, within easy walking distance, but the Marines going on liberty rode the bus anyway. The bus wasn't going on its rounds to carry them, it was on its way to pick up the men who'd stayed in town overnight and were too hungover or otherwise disoriented to make it back to base on their own.

  The twenty Marines seat-belted into straight-backed and thinly cushioned seats in the passenger compartment laughed and shouted back and forth, eagerly anticipating their night on the town. "You see, Dean," Chief shouted into his ear from the seat next to him, "we don't use liberty passes in the 34th. Most places you gotta get a pass from your first sergeant to go on liberty, if you're a sergeant or below: You sign it out from the duty NCO before you go out and sign it back in when you return. The duty NCO, who's usually a PFC or lance corporal who screwed up and got stuck with the duty, checks you out and checks you back in, and if you screw up, he'll log you in and the Skipper'll pull your pass for punishment."

  Dean nodded.

  "See," Goudanis shouted from the seat behind him, "this is a hardship post, and they give us a break from the normal dukshit rules that apply throughout the rest of the Fleet, where the pogue Marines go."

  Claypoole, sitting up behind the driver's console, began to sing, and several other men took up the tune in time to stamping feet and clapping hands:

  You ever been to the Grenadines

  Where the place is full of shade-tree queens?

  Oh, the grout is bad but the scabs is worse,

  So beat your meat for safety first.

  "Pipe down back there!" the driver shouted over the intercom. "You're making so much noise I can't concentrate on the goddamn road!"

  The noise level increased and the men began shouting in unison for the driver to turn the bus on its side.

  Chapter Ten

  The bus ground to a halt and the driver pushed the button that whooshed the door open, but he was barely fast enough to keep the first men from slamming into it. "First fire team: lock and load!" Leach hollered as he rushed headlong out, followed by the rest of the platoon.

  Bemused, Dean scrambled off the bus and stood in the settling dust a safe distance from the Marines who were still exiting. The bus was parked by itself in one corner of a huge graveled lot. The lot sat beside a dirt road lined with wooden buildings, none of which was over two stories high. At the end of the road, about half a kilometer beyond where the Marines stood, Dean could see the light from the setting sun glinting off the Bothnia River. The communications masts of several large commercial seagoing vessels poked up above the buildings situated down there on Bronnoysund's waterfront, the main commercial district of the town.

  Much of the town was in the shadow of the rugged peaks that formed the walls of the fjord, and a chill wind swept small clouds of dust and pieces of wastepaper across the parking lot. Dean drew his field jacket closer.

  Claypoole, his face flushed and eyes twinkling with amusement, slapped Dean on the shoulder. "Cold, New Guy? Hell, this is summer in these parts. Wait'll winter comes!"

  Nobody took off right away; they gathered in an informal formation in front of corporals Eagle's Cry, Leach, and Kerr. Eagle's Cry, as senior man present, addressed the junior men. "Listen up," he said. "We've got three new people with us tonight. They don't know their way around Bronny, they don't know the people, they don't know anything about the local customs. Do not, I say again, do not let them wander off by themselves or otherwise leave them alone tonight. Be a damn shame to lose a man before he even gets to meet everyone in his squad. Also, don't let them—and don't you—get into any trouble you can't get out of on your own. We," he gestured in a way that included the other corporals, "don't want to have to dig you out of any pit you get yourselves into. And if you get into more trouble than we can get you out of, don't worry about what the Skipper or Staff Sergeant Bass will do to your sorry asses, worry about what we're going to do to you when you get out of the brig. Now, get out of my parking lot and have a good time."

  Everybody scattered.

  "C'mon, New Guy, we're goin' to see the elephant." Claypoole trotted off down the road.

  Dean looked around for McNeal and Chan. The three of them fell in with Ratliff, Goudanis, and a couple of other Marines whom Dean had probably met but whose names he couldn't remember. They trailed along behind Claypoole. "New Guy can do whatever he wants to," Ratliff said. "But first we're going to Helga's for a steak."

  Steak? Dean had had a real steak once, from a cow, a tough, well-cooked piece of meat about two inches square that he'd consumed in two bites. He hadn't liked it very much.

  "C'mon, Dean," Goudanis said, putting his arm around the new man's shoulder. "First we eat and drink, then we drink, and then we drink some more."

  None of the citizens they passed on the street paid the Marines much attention. Many of them were big people, even the women, with fair complexions and light-colored hair, though there was a large minority of other physical types and complexions. Their cheeks were ruddy with the glow of good health and they wore simple, sturdy outer garments that looked to be made from natural fibers of some sort. Noisy vehicles running on oversized wheels lurched and sputtered along the rutted roadway.

  "What's that smell?" Dean asked. Ratliff shrugged. "You'll get used to it. It's a combination of the wood and coal they burn to heat their homes, the cheap tobacco they grow in greenhouses to smoke, and the, uh, internal combustion engine. Yeah," he said when he saw the surprised expression on Dean's face, "their vehicles operate on gasoline-powered engines. This world has vast oil reserves and the stuffs easy to get at, so they got used to it. Now you go to New Oslo, which you will before you leave the 34th, they have modern energy systems there, but this place is several hundred klicks from New Oslo and four hundred years behind the rest of Human Space. This is the frontier. Enjoy it while you can, 'cause when we go on a deployment, you'll consider this real good living."

  "And don't forget the fish," Juice said. "That smell's from the canning company that operates down at the waterfront. Fish, lumber, and reindeer meat are the major industries for the people who live in Bronny."

  The signs they passed on the shopfronts and street corners were in a strange-looking language Dean had never seen before. The letters were the same as the Roman alphabet he was used to, but some had lines through them, and there were extra dots and circles in unexpected places. The conversations he overheard as they passed people along the street were in a guttural language that seemed to rise and fall in tone as the people spoke. "Hey, do they know English in this place?" he asked.

  "Oh, yeah," Juice replied, "but they also speak the language they brought with them from Old Earth: Norwegian. These are very traditional people."

  "Well, do they resent our being here or something?"

  "Why do you ask that?" Ratliff asked.

  "I dunno. N
obody's even nodded at us since we got off the bus. They just seem to be ignoring us."

  Ratliff laughed shortly. "Sure they like us, Dean. What looks like them ignoring us is just their way of being polite. They think it's rude if you look at a stranger on the street. Nah, they like us sure enough. We spend our pay in their town, and when we get drunk we don't mind fighting with them. The 'Finnis love to drink and they really love to fight when they've been drinking. We have that in common."

  "Hell, Dean, what do you think they have to do for entertainment around here but fight and drink?" Juice added.

  "And fuck," McNeal said.

  Ratliff laughed. "That too, but they don't talk about it—and they don't do it in public."

  Helga's was a warm and clean family restaurant with a well-stocked bar along the back wall. A dozen tables, each set for four, filled a spacious dining area. Only one was occupied, by a middle-aged couple apparently in their late sixties, finishing a quiet meal. The man was wearing a large bandage on his forehead. He looked up and smiled when the Marines came in. Dean noticed he was missing several front teeth. "Hah, Rabbit," he shouted. "Ve haf gud fight last Saturday, yah?" He pointed to the dressing on his head.

  "Yo, Mr. Malmstrom. Hi, Mrs. Malmstrom," Rabbit called to the pair. To Dean he whispered, "She put the bump on the old guy's noggin, not me. It was Claypoole who started the fight when he tried to pick up Mrs. Malmstrom. He mistook her for a whore. She was gonna bean him with a beer schooner, but Claypoole ducked and she bounced it off her old man instead." Goudanis led them to a corner near the bar, where they put two tables together and seated themselves. Instantly a huge blond woman bustled up to the Marines.

  "Helga!" Juice shouted. "Food! Steak!"

  "Ach, my boys!" she squealed. "You eat good tonight, but no fighting!" She wagged an index finger as big as a sausage at the Marines. "Oooh, who are dees gud-looking young men wit' you tonight?" she asked, hands on her enormous hips, looming over Dean, Chan, and McNeal like a mountain.