by Chris Hechtl
“Thank you, sir.”
“Now that we've buttered you up, it is time to send you and some of these folks off to do that very thing,” the general stated.
“Thank you, sir,” the bear said. “Thank all of you,” he said.
<)>^<)>/
Valenko shook his head as he made the rounds. They were almost done. That ceremony had thrown off his schedule for the morning, but since it was the general's fault, he was pretty sure the delay wouldn't be held against him.
“I'm about done,” the newly-minted colonel said as he noted Ted coming over to him. “Getting eager to see our backside?” he asked.
“Some of you have quite an ample backside,” the captain teased. The colonel growled. The captain made a show of mock fear before he chuffed. The colonel sniffed at his sense of humor.
“You are as bad as Quinn these days. So, I think we can do without the landing prep drills. Do you have anything fresh to contribute?”
“Just that I wish I was going with you,” Ted said with a shake of his head. “Is that why you are haunting the SIM complex?”
“Well, I don't want my people to get bored in transit,” the colonel drawled, “or stale.”
“Somehow I doubt they'll get there,” the captain drawled back. The colonel snorted. After a moment, he shrugged. A few weeks before the ships had shown up, he had focused his people on the urban warfare SIMS instead of the landing since that was what they were about to experience on Protodon. There was no sense going overboard; the bean counters tended to frown on that. They'd gotten in some good training with Third Division before Dana had left.
There was also the case about overtraining he thought. PT, KP, and light training for the first couple of jumps to keep his people ready. Then he planned to step up the training when they were passing through the Kathy's World star system.
The urban warfare training had been as realistic as it could have been. It hadn't been in VR, which had made a world of difference for some who suddenly were smacked in the face with reality. Working in mock villages, towns, farmhouses, and mills had been an eye opening experience for a few of his people. Also the series of field exercises with shoot houses that were similar to what they were about to experience should help.
There was some concern that some of the troops had not taken it too seriously and that others were going to get PTSD just from the exercises.
“Any more paperwork? Or did you get the paper pushers to run and hide?” Ted asked slyly.
The bear snorted. “I can do paperwork in my sleep. It'd be nice if they'd get around to assigning us A.I., even dumb A.I. to us. As usual the Navy sucks them all up,” Valenko said with a shake of his massive head.
“True,” the Neochimp grunted. “I'll miss you,” he said.
Valenko eyed him for a long moment. “No you won't,” he said in retaliation.
Ted snorted. “Okay, I admit I won't. I definitely won't miss the bruising I get from tangling with you.”
“If all I can do is bruise you, then you should do fine,” Valenko rumbled.
“True. Opening night jitters?” Ted asked, cocking his head.
“No, I just wanted to get as much training time in as I could before we get stale sitting in the transports scratching our ass and going nuts with boredom,” the bear replied tartly. “I was hoping someone would have a new twist. I want to run past ONI and Marine Intelligence before I go to get their latest downloads too. I know they'll be out of date, but this is when I can get the most detail. Anything else will be limited.”
“True,” the Neochimp replied thoughtfully. He scratched under his chin. “I always thought it'd be smarter if we used stasis pods. Put the troops in, they'd be fresh when they decanted. No downtime in-between to worry about problems cropping up. But …”
“Too many negatives to go with the positives,” Valenko interrupted. He grimaced.
“What?”
“All the hoopla made me skip lunch,” the bear said. He shrugged indifferently.
“Well, I for one don't want to be around a hungry bear. You get even meaner if that is even possible,” Ted teased. “I'll treat you if you want,” he said gruffly. Valenko looked at him suspiciously. “Not that I want to be anywhere near that massive head of yours when you start chewing on anything. Other than my troops,” he said dryly.
“Works,” Valenko replied with a nod. “I won't turn down free food.”
“My poor, poor wallet. What was I thinking?!” Ted mock moaned, making the bear chuckle.
Chapter 27
Once he was officially reactivated in the Army and out of the clutches of the medics, Nohar helped to take charge of the Army with Captain SG Yee. He realized after their second meeting that Yee was suffering time shock and had focused too much on the artillery side for his tastes, letting infantry, armor, and the other branches hang in the wind under Captain Church. He'd left a lot of the duties to Captain Church, but Church had obviously fumbled too much. Church was good at leading people, but he hated paperwork and spent a majority of his time dreaming up or running simulations.
He couldn't blame the humans completely; both men were clearly overworked and overwhelmed. Church was a hard-charging jarhead transplant with delusions of being a general. He needed a sharp yank on his leash to get him refocused on the here and now, but that wasn't up to Nohar. They also didn't have the right people in the right places to get the job done; most had been pushed up the ranks without having the time-in-grade to learn what they entailed. Training was the job of the noncoms after all.
Basics had been neglected. Troops were lounging around with little to do. Litter was everywhere. The grounds were overgrown. Some of the troops were doubled up in barracks while other barracks had been vandalized or turned into game rooms or clubhouses.
“What a mess,” was his favorite phrase for the first week. The rest was unfit or unintelligible. Even officers learned to cringe and step up when he roared at everyone to get their shit together. There were no guards. Discipline was almost completely out the window. There were the occasional idiots with weapons popping shots off or getting drunk or both for the MPs to contend with.
Most of the equipment and buildings were used and on loan from the Marines. The permanent buildings had been built by contractors and were barely shells.
Getting the unholy mess untangled was an incredible chore. One of the first things he did was get the junior enlisted organized under corporals and then off doing KP, yard work, and the basics that had been oh-so-long neglected. No one dared argue with him.
The Army had sixteen officers, over eighty noncoms, and four thousand enlisted, most of which had been transferred from the Marines. They had a half-ass military police unit. The only two companies that were halfway squared away were Captain Church's and Captain Yee's. Yee's people were out drilling on artillery all the time, so they didn't have the time or energy to get into trouble.
He found that the Army had little support and practically no direction or budget. No wonder morale was in the crapper. It didn't help that many of the officers and enlisted that had come over from the Marines had been the dregs. People who'd been disillusioned from their time in the Marines and wanted a safe place to coast and collect their pay while they dressed in a uniform to impress the girls in the bars.
Some of the noncoms had come over as well. In fact, just about all of them had and every officer or noncom had gotten a promotion when they had transferred between the branches. That wasn't how it was supposed to work, especially when none of them had proven they could handle the job, which none of them could.
Right off he ran into resistance from the officers who didn't like his bucking the system. Some of them were ROTC grads who didn't like a sergeant ordering them about. That was fine; it was to be expected. But he was the highest-ranking noncom, and they were screwing up by the numbers so he'd done his best to politely but firmly tell them to get with his program. Most had swallowed their pride and stepped up.
The most junior
officers, ensigns, he sicced on spot-checking the cleanup crews. He then worked with Captain Church to get a better TOE sorted out since Captain Yee was out training his company.
Once Yee got back, the duo had to do a dog and pony show for him. Yee had agreed and given Nohar a blank check to reform the Army into what it should be.
When news of that got around, the remaining holdouts scrambled to get with the program. By the second week, the base was starting to look shipshape again. Patrols were standard, there was no more discipline problems, and there were proper guards at their posts. Troops did regular PT, and the junior enlisted marched or jogged every morning. The morning bugle call had been reintroduced as had the raising of the colors at the repainted and freshened-up flagpole.
The units had been fleshed out, and the barracks had been restored. By the middle of the second week, each of the units were on a strict schedule of manning a post, training, PT, KP, or rest. The officers were no longer playing games in the SIMS. They were also held to the schedule, something Captains Yee and Church first protested, but after a talk about setting the right example from Nohar, they reluctantly agreed to follow.
Unfortunately, to go further he needed funding. That meant a budget, which Captain Yee wasn't thrilled about handling and Captain Church passed off or said he'd get to “eventually.” It was frustrating. Every officer wanted their own battalion or brigade, but they didn't want to put in the time to get there it seemed.
Officers and noncoms that had transferred in got a promotion as an incentive but then the promotions had stopped. Most didn't know what they were doing for their rank.
He needed an administrator. Yee was a hands-on person; he was good at training the troops to handle his specialty. At least Captain Yee had agreed to give the tiger his head and let him get the rest of the Army sorted out. The progress they had made up to that point was proof enough that he could and would work wonders.
A brief talk with his counterpart in the Marines, Schultz, had gotten some additional Marine support in the way of used office furniture, equipment, and some other things that needed mending. That was fine with Nohar; the Marines had been about to sell it off in an auction. He'd take their castoffs and hand-me-downs if it meant it advanced the Army.
In a way, the Army was in the reverse position of the Marines. For ages the Marines had gotten the hand-me-downs. That had been up before the first A.I. war of course. The Space Marines that had supplanted all the old Earth Marine units now came first.
Once they had things moving along, he got the lieutenants to train against each other or with each other. He also got them to “borrow” Marine training gear or facilities and sometimes shipped them over to a Marine exercise site for further training. Getting their asses kicked meant the loser got KP, so they had extra incentive to try harder.
While they were doing that, Nohar got the more senior leadership to start to think about expanding the Army and breaking it up into the traditional departments. Infantry, artillery, armor, aircav, support—they were all needed. Whenever he could, he pulled stuff from his memory and implant files to help that process along. Most of what he had been doing up until that point, he could do in his sleep.
He hadn't expected to start a friendship with Gunny Schultz. The two had hit it off when the gunny had realized Nohar was a doer. He'd griped a bit over beers but then picked Schultz's brain for ways to get through to the former Marines to get them off their asses. Most of the tricks had worked.
Even the occasional visit by the gunny had kicked things into gear. Fostering an air of competition with the Marines also helped to rebuild their pride and awaken their desire to succeed. That changed when the convoy carrying new members of the Marines and Army entered the star system.
<)>^<)>/
Two days after the departure of the latest convoy, the routine ship from Pyrax arrived carrying the much anticipated Bekian Marine and two Army officers. When news spread to the planet, it kicked off a last ditch explosion of work to get the bases ready for the hoopla that would follow upon their landing.
Three days after their arrival in the star system, the Liberty class ship docked with the station. A few hours later the three officers shuttled down.
They were met by a delegation led by General Forth. General Forth passed Major Bear over to his own people to guide to the base, but he took the Army officers right off. He wanted the Army situation handled and most importantly brought up to speed and out of his hair and hands.
<)>^<)>/
“It's a pleasure to see you, sir,” Captain M'mbeki said as he saluted Major Bear. The Neopolar bear grunted then returned the salute.
“I thought someone higher would meet me,” the bear rumbled, looking around the passenger section. “We met General Forth, but he seemed to have other plans,” he rumbled.
“That's because he wants to get the Army out of his hair, sir. Once he's got them off and on their own, he's going to want to meet you of course. But until then I can help you settle in and get you up to speed.”
“Good. I hadn't received a formal assignment when we left Pyrax. Any ideas on that?”
“I believe your orders will come from General Forth directly. But I believe he's going to sic you on First Division since some of the senior leadership are out on leave at the moment. That is unofficial, sir,” the Neochimp warned.
The major nodded slowly. “Understood.”
“I've got a detail getting your luggage. I'll show you to your quarters and give you a tour, sir,” the Neochimp offered.
“I'd like that. I took a virtual tour on the ship. I think I can figure out my way around,” the major said. “And I downloaded the map,” he said, tapping his temple with one long clawed finger.
“Yes, sir. If you'd prefer to go it alone …,” Ted made a step back.
“No, no, you've made transport arrangements and gone through the trouble of meeting me this far. Let's see how it goes,” the bear said. “My memory may not jive with reality,” he said.
“Yes, sir. The motor pool is this way,” the captain said, waving a hand to the door.
<)>^<)>/
General Forth took the time to escort Lieutenant Colonel Pasha 1010111, the Nuevo Army militia officer, and his Lieutenant Olivia Lincoln to the Army base.
It was clear that it was a bit of a big mess. It was laid out, there were changes being made, but it was also clear that most of the work was new. They took a short tour. From the stoic expression on the colonel's face, he seemed put out over the problems. But he also looked like he was taking mental notes.
“You’ve got your work cut out for you,” Jersey said as they finished the tour of the Army base. It was small, about the size of a brigade. Most of the housing was temporary. The permanent buildings were basic shells with used furniture and equipment. Some of the offices weren't even painted and had cobwebs.
“Yeah, I see that,” the Army colonel said with a grimace as he worked his jaw. He'd heard it was bad in Pyrax, but he hadn't known it was that bad. “Though I see some progress has been made lately to fix things.” He indicated the yard work and the troops out exercising under Nohar's baleful gaze.
“That one is good, damn good. I wish I'd had him earlier. He and Schultz get along like a house on fire. Two peas from the same pod. He's been working at it for a month, and he's made some solid progress,” the general said.
“I see that. There is still a long ways to go though.”
“I know. I'm officially handing the Army over to you, Colonel. Make the best of it,” Jersey said. He transmitted keys. “After this, I've got general oversight since I am ranking officer in the star system, but you call the shots on the base and how to run it, as long as you follow the UCMJ of course.”
“Of course.”
“That's it? Just dump it all on the colonel? Usually a unit is stood up from the top down not … this,” Lieutenant Lincoln complained.
The general eyed her coldly. She didn't blink or look away.
“It's fi
ne. We'll get it sorted out, Olivia,” the colonel said. She turned to look at her boss. “Do I have a budget?”
“They didn't tell you in Pyrax?” the general asked. The colonel shook his head. The general sighed and shook his head. “Typical. Disgusting, but typical. Okay so you came in relatively blind?”
“I have read some of the initial briefings. I've also been going over the files, mission objectives, and current TOE. I didn't see a budget or timeline on the mission objectives.”
“You'll have to take those up with Admiral Irons I'm afraid. Right now your people are “borrowing” some of my equipment and facilities. I'll want them back eventually. The order to start the Army came down from on high when Captain Yee showed up. But there hasn't been a budget or impetus to get it moving until a little while ago. Then things kicked off more when Sergeant Rajestan showed up and more or less took over.” He shook his head. “He doesn't have a budget, but he has a plan, guts, and sweat equity in the troops. I bet they hate him for what he's doing, but tough nuts,” the general said as he rang his ear out with a finger. “That tiger can roar,” he said in approval.
“Great,” the colonel sighed.
“What else were you doing on the trip out?” the general asked curiously.
“I was getting used to my implants,” the colonel said bluntly, “and reading up on the news.”
“Understood. Okay, I'll get you what I can then get out of your …,” he looked at the bald man and then shrugged. “ …way,” he finished.
“Thank you, General.” The colonel made a show of cracking his knuckles. “I'm actually looking forward to this. We had reserve units on Alpha; getting my hands on troops for more than a weekend a month and two weeks a year will be a new experience.”
The general eyed him for a long moment and then slowly nodded. “Jays, you've got a lot of things to get used to then. We've got the call out for more experienced help. I'm not thrilled about the pouching from my people. I'm trying to keep it to a minimum naturally.”