by Tom Kratman
Note to self: Next time I really need to ask for body armor.
* * *
Chu let go the wheel to pull Rodriguez back behind fuller cover. The blood flowed too thickly for the sailor to see the damage. He pulled a water bottle from a holder above deck and poured its contents over the centurion's eye.
This is probably a mistake, he thought, as he reached to remove a thin spike of wood from the white of the eye. Rodriguez screamed, once, as the splinter was removed. Blood flowed even more freely afterwards. Still, the pain became more or less manageable.
"Thanks, Chu," he whispered. "See to the defense . . . I'll be all right."
* * *
Blast the pirates into eternity Jaquelina could do, wounded or not. What she could not do was stop the progress of their boat. It continued on, closer and closer, until it rammed the side of the Suzy Q, staving it in and causing water to pour through the rupture.
"Marta!" she screamed, "See to the wounded boy and let's get the fuck out of here!"
Jaquelina stood up and backed away from the gun. Blood suddenly began to rush from her wounded side.
"Mierde," she muttered, and promptly fainted.
* * *
The bilge pumps kicked in automatically, relieving Chu of the burden of flipping a switch while trying to lead his own crew and the Cazadors. Whatever or whoever it was who'd taken over the central .41 on that side might have knocked the pirates' dicks loose, but just couldn't stop the boat or kill them all.
Well before he'd been enticed into becoming a squid, Chu had been a pretty fair riflemen with the Fourth Tercio. He picked up Rodriguez's bayoneted rifle and, screaming something unintelligible even to himself, launched himself bodily to the spot where his hull was breached and the pirates oozing over the side.
He was joined at the boarding point by Legionario Tomás Guillermo, the latter likewise charging forward with bayonet point to the front. The prow of the pirate vessel was on a rough plane with the side of the Suzy Q. They met, Chu and Guillermo on the one side, half a dozen half-panicked pirates on the other. The pirates towered over the little legionaries but, since both the legionaries had body armor—better still, training—the first two Xamaris met went down with screams made gurgling by the blood filling their lungs.
"Get the fuck away from my fucking ship you scum-sucking bastards!" Chu cried.
* * *
By the time Marta got on deck, Jaquelina carried under one arm and the burnt legionary slung over her shoulder, the other hookers had also emerged. Marta set Jaquie down gently and just as carefully laid the legionary alongside her.
"Does anybody know first aid?" Marta asked.
"Sure," answered one of the girls, brightly. "I know just what to do; I've watched the legionaries." She then proceeded to fill her not unimpressive lungs with air and screamed "Medddiiiccc!"
* * *
With their own boat sinking under them, the legionaries had little choice but to swarm the other. Leaving their machine guns and grabbing rifles, they followed Chu and Guillermo in a surge over the gunwales. The pirates had little chance of stopping that charge. While the bodies and not-quite-yet bodies were being rolled over the side to the gathering sharks, the legionaries collected their wounded and dead and carried them across. A half dozen pirates they saved for questioning. Besides, Fosa had said he thought it would be good for morale for the rest of the fleet to see some of their enemies hang.
UEPF Spirit of Peace
"We'll call that one a draw," High Admiral Robinson decided, looking at a high resolution recording of the Suzy Q's fight with the Xamaris.
Wallenstein shook her head. "No . . . I don't think so. Sure, the pirates managed to sink the mercenaries' yacht, and sure the mercenaries only got a crappy, slow, tramp fishing boat in return. But all the pirates died, if you count the ones the mercenaries hanged off the flight deck of their aircraft carrier and those they fed to the sharks. Those pirates won't be going home and people in Xamar are eventually going to wonder what horror it is out at sea that eats their sons and doesn't even spit out the bones. No, Admiral, sorry, but it was a loss."
Robinson, being a Class One, hated being corrected by lesser castes. Even so, he was willing to admit Wallenstein was right to the extent that he changed the subject slightly.
"I understand that the FSC is considering rehiring those mercenaries for employment in Pashtia."
"For a very impressive amount of money," Wallenstein agreed. "How do we use that?"
She already had a number of ideas of how to put the deployment out of country of the legions to good use but, since she wanted Class One status more than she wanted life, she thought it best to let the High Admiral recoup from being corrected.
"They're going to have to send sixty-five or seventy percent of their force over if they're going to do any good," Robinson said. "The Taurans are collapsing in Pashtia. That will put the Tauran forces in Balboa on a rough par with the legions, not counting the mercenaries' reserves. It might be enough for the Taurans to interfere with the election there. Our ambassador says that this Parilla bastard is certain to win any open and fair election."
"What do you have in mind?" Wallenstein asked.
"Well . . . suppose we have the World League and the Tauran Union insist on sending observers to oversee the election. Perhaps we can have that idiot ex-president from the FSC go, too. You know the one, Wozniak. No matter how the elections go, they can insist there was voter intimidation, ballot-box fraud, the usual. Then the Government of Balboa can refuse to step down. The Tauran troops can protect that government as long as they match the rump of the Legion in power."
"What about the FSC?"
"About one quarter of the FSC is Progressive, which is to say, Taurophile and United Earthophile, at heart. That's probably enough to stymie any FS support for mercenaries that even the more fascistic among them consider to be distasteful. So it would be just the Taurans against the Balboans."
Wallenstein considered that. "I don't think the Taurans are enough."
With that, Robinson agreed. "They're not; no tolerance for heavy casualties. The Taurans and the Zhong together might be enough though."
Robinson had no clue he was almost echoing Gallic General Janier. Still, the objective reality of the matter was available to both men. Why should they not draw similar conclusions?
"They might," Wallenstein conceded. "I wonder though, if we're not actually creating exactly the threat we fear."
And that was as far as she was willing to go. She did, after all, want Class One status.
Interlude
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
CORDER, GOVERNOR, UTAH v. SIMPSON, COMMISSIONER, INTERNAL REVENUE SERVICE
CERTIORARI TO THE TAX COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Argued October 13, 2104–Decided March 1, 2105
The overwhelming weight of international opinion that fair and just taxation of the richest portion of humanity for the benefit of the poorest and most exploited is not controlling here, but provides respected and significant confirmation for the Court's holding that the Fairness in Taxation Act of 2101 is both constitutional and binding upon those states which have, so far, failed to implement its provisions. See, e.g., Tomlins, supra, at 831—832, and n. 30. The United States is the only country in the world that continues to deny to its superior organization, the United Nations, its fair and just due in fiscal and tax matters. It does not lessen fidelity to the Constitution or pride in its origins to acknowledge that the concept of national—still less so, state—sovereignty has grown dated, and no longer meets the aspirations of a kinder and more enlightened world. Express affirmation of certain fundamental rights by other nations and peoples underscores the centrality of those same rights within our own heritage of freedom. Correspondingly, their entitlement to support and development lays a duty upon the so-far privileged portion of humanity to pay. The duty to pay implies, indeed, requires, the right to tax.
Chapter Nine
"S
o where are those villainous louts, those mercenaries?"
—Mohammad Saeed al Sahaf (aka "Baghdad Bob")
Old Earth year 2003
10/7/467 AC, Isla Real
The airplane, a legionary Cricket but fitted out with VIP seats, landed in the typical Balboan swelter. Its landing roll was a bit under eleven meters. As soon as the door opened Rivers felt a wilting blast of wet heat. Carrera's AdC, a junior tribune named Miranda, met Rivers at the airfield with apologies from Carrera for not being there personally. The tribune took Rivers' single bag, himself.
"The Duque is in the field with a cohort at the moment, sir," Miranda explained. "He'll be along within the hour and hopes you will understand."
Rivers grunted a noncommittal response, while thinking, He's got to know why I came. Is this his way of saying, "Stuff it; I won't work for the FSC while the Progressives are in charge," I wonder.
Miranda showed Rivers to a gleaming staff car, a Yamatan job, and then held the door for the general to enter. He then took over the front passenger seat and directed the driver to proceed.
You've got to be impressed, thought Rivers as the staff car took him on the short ride from Punta Coco airfield to Legion Headquarters. Seven years ago a single brigade without a home; now it's grown to a fair-sized corps with a damned nice home.
On the way in, Rivers had counted the ships anchored in the bay from his aircraft porthole. Now, on the ground, Rivers took the trouble to count filled and empty aircraft parking spots as the car eased along the road. What he counted impressed him still more. Over five hundred aircraft. Christ, he's outwinged PanColumbian Airlines and half the Tauran Union. Of course, most of his aircraft are smaller.
And the troops looked fit, well-fed and disciplined, he thought, too, as the car passed a company-sized unit. The troops wore helmets and body armor, but had a spring in their step that told of a light and comfortable panoply. I like that camouflage pattern.
The pattern was a pixilated tiger stripe material Carrera had had made up by a company in the FSC that specialized in such things. The material was printed, and the uniforms cut and sewn, by a factory in the City he and Parilla had set up to provide employment to war widows, reservists and their wives, and disabled legionary vets. Those folks put a lot of care into the uniforms they made. They made other clothing, too, which sold rather well in the Republic and had even begun to acquire a small overseas market.
The staff car stopped at an intersection as a column of nineteen Volgan-built tanks rolled across, each preceded by a walking ground guide. And they're pretty professional in other respects, too. Well . . . I suppose I should have expected that.
The car turned left at Miranda's direction and entered into a long, tree-lined thoroughfare before ending at a ring road surrounding an amazingly green parade field with a large, white-painted headquarters building on the other side of the field. It navigated around the parade field, pulled up to the columned front of the building and then stopped. Miranda got out, opened the door for Rivers, and led him between the columns and into the building.
The door opened into a broad interior vestibule, reaching up three floors to a battle scene-mural painted on the ceiling. On the upper floors it was surrounded by a marble rail. The bottom floor, the planta baja, was of a locally cut and polished, golden oak-colored granite. Upon the floor stood a slightly larger-than-life-sized marble statue of a fully equipped legionary holding a bayoneted bronze rifle in "charge bayonets" pose. The walls were mostly bare, though portraits of uniformed men with decorations for valor about their necks hung in places. Officers, a few, plus centurions, noncoms and enlisted men, all in undress khakis, bustled from room to room, across the vestibule and through the corridors. The whole place had an air of elegant efficiency.
If he can afford to build this, Rivers thought, he's not hurting for money. Oh, Lordy, is this going to sting.
Miranda beckoned Rivers on, through a door, up two flights of steps, down a quiet corridor and, finally, into Carrera's office. Rivers noticed the secretary was male and uniformed as well. He also noticed the boy was missing an arm.
Waste not, want not.
"The Duque said to make you comfortable, sir. Is there anything I can order for you? Coffee? A beer? Whiskey or mixed drink from the mess in the basement, if you like."
"Coffee would be fine . . . ah . . . Tribune. Just fine, thank you. Cream and sugar."
"Very good, sir."
Miranda turned and left as Rivers sat on one of the chairs. In a few minutes, the one-armed boy brought in a tray holding a cup of steaming hot coffee. He set it down and left without a word.
The rear wall of the office was mostly a very large window, Rivers noticed. He walked over to it and looked out on the scene of cows and the solar chimney that ran up the island's central massif. The cloud formed and continuously renewed above the chimney was . . . rather soothing to watch, Rivers decided. He was still watching when he sensed a sudden stiffening that seemed to take in the entire building. A few minutes later Carrera entered the office.
"Sent you back to try to rehire us for Pashtia, didn't they?" were the first words out of the Duque's mouth. "Good to see you, Virg," were the second set, uttered as Carrera stuck out a hand in friendship.
Rivers shook his head, then Carrera's hand. "How do you do that?"
"Do what?"
"Predict things like that."
Carrera shrugged, then answered, "I keep up with the news. I also spy on the Army."
Yes, and you have enough friends in the Army—Marines, too, now, for that matter—to keep pretty up to date, too, don't you? Rivers thought.
"I meant what I said back in Sumer," Carrera continued. "The Progressives pissed me off royally. They're going to have to pay through the nose to get back in my good graces and get my troops into the war."
"I think they know that, Pat. That piece of filth undersecretary, O'Meara-Temeroso has been . . . let's say, offered up as a sacrifice."
"Was he? Good. Do they? Do they know how much?"
Carrera went to his desk, bent to a drawer and pulled out a file. From this he took a small spreadsheet and passed it over.
"That's what I need to re-establish something like control over the important parts of Pashtia, if I begin moving in three months. I'll only begin moving in three months if the FS hires me now."
He pulled out another sheet. "This is what it will cost next month." Another. "And the month after." Another. "And the month after that."
He pulled a fifth sheet out and handed it to Rivers. "And that's the penalty for trying to stiff me in Sumer."
"Jesus, Pat," Rivers said, more than half in shock. "We can't pay that. Congress would freak out."
Carrera smiled. "Oh, yes, you can. It will cost you a third of your gold reserves and that's the form I want it in. For that, you don't need congressional approval. The President owns it."
Rivers went from half shocked to fully so. Gold was . . . special. To give away a third of it . . . ? Sure, that asshole, Malcolm, mentioned gold, but I don't think he was serious.
"For that you get a small corps with the equivalent of twenty-six FSA combat battalions, with adequate combat support, service support and aviation, for a year," Carrera continued, "of which I guarantee two hundred and fifty days' of active campaigning. After that, if things work out, I can cut back both the scale and the intensity to the point that you won't have to pay all that much more than what it cost to keep a full legion in Sumer. Tell that orange-faced, windsurfing gigolo, Malcolm, that he can take it or pound sand. It makes no difference to me. Tell him I'll also have a list of various war materials the FSC will let me buy and intelligence and support they will provide or it's no deal.
"In addition, there is the matter of support to my naval forces . . . "
12/7/467 AC, Hamilton, FD
"Where the hell does this arrogant son of a bitch think he comes from?" asked Malcolm in a fine rhetorical rage. "Who the fuck does he think he is? Doesn't he know who the fuck
I am?"
He thinks he's the only one who can save your bacon and the only one who both can and will provide troops willing to fight. He thinks that he has you over a barrel, thought Rivers, back in the SecWar's office. And he's right, too.
Rivers felt guilty—he really did—at the Progressive SecWar's discomfiture. He should be, he knew, more apolitical, even totally apolitical. Oh, well, tough shit; I despise the Progressives and I do enjoy watching the SecWar impotently rage.
In a repeat of Carrera's performance back on the Isla Real, Rivers took a sheet from a folder and passed it over. "This is what it will cost if we don't hire him now. And this," he continued, passing over another sheet, "is how much it will go up in two months. He didn't say so, Mr. Secretary, but I think that if the situation gets worse any faster than he has anticipated, these prices will go up even more."