The Rods and the Axe

by Tom Kratman

  “Concur entirely, sir. A drink. Maybe three.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Alvarez. “If you would follow . . .” He stopped when Montoya shook his head. Oh, yeah. Right. People after near-death experiences, especially people who are trembling, just might not walk too well.

  “Duque,” said Alvarez, “I shall be back in a moment, with drinks.”

  As it turned out, Alvarez arrived later than indicated, about thirty seconds before Legate Puercel did, himself. Puercel seemed bitter, somehow, though Carrera let it ride until he’d managed to choke down a healthy dose of the rum-laced fruit juice provided by the mess.

  Carrera probably didn’t help matters initially when he told Alvarez to lead Montoya to the mess and Montoya to start making arrangements for the return journey. Alvarez left an opened coffee can with the rum and juice, resting in the sand.

  The silence lasted long enough to become uncomfortable after the departure of the pilot and cook. Finally Puercel broke it: “I don’t understand what I’ve done so wrong as to justify you coming here to take over.”

  “What?” asked Carrera. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  “Isn’t that why you’re here? To relieve me and take over yourself? Because you think I’m not good enough?”

  Carrera blinked a few times in disbelief, that, and disappointment. Where did these guys get the idea . . . shit. He filled up his own cup from Alvarez’s can, then passed it over with the words, “You need this more than me if you’re that stressed out. Friend, I wouldn’t have put you here or left you in command this long if I didn’t have faith in you.”

  “But you’re here,” said Puercel, rather needlessly. He didn’t, for the nonce, raise the cup to his lips. “What other reason . . . ?”

  “Three reasons,” said Carrera. “One is to share the burden with you and your men, since you’re the ones getting the worst pounding from the Zhong and Taurans.” He gestured generally out to sea where the remains of Montoya’s Condor still bobbed above the waves. “Second, inspection and getting a sense of the troops. I have to know they’ll stand . . . and before you go into a tizzy, remember that I know you didn’t train most of them yourself, so knock off the defensive bullshit. Third, to make sure that if there’s anything you need from the mainland—anything we can give you, I mean—you will get it.

  “There’s a fourth reason,” Carrera said, contradicting the previously given number. “Can you guess what it is?”

  “Relief was my guess,” said the legate. At that, he did take a generous drink from the cup.

  “Dipshit,” Carrera said, though he said it genially. “I’m here to take the blame if it all goes to shit. You know? So that you can fight the battle without worrying about your reputation. Whatever goes wrong you can blame on me.”

  “Oh,” said Puercel, feeling rather ashamed.

  “Oh,” echoed Carrera, not without a trace of sarcasm. Though, and I will never breathe a word of this, the very fact that you’ve got troops you didn’t train, that don’t know or trust you, means you do need me here, because they do know and trust me and they’ll fight the better if they do think I’m in active command.

  “Now, young Legate,” said Carrera, “if you would arrange a car and a driver for me, along with an escorting officer you can spare?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Oh, and see if somebody can get my bag out of the wreck of that glider, too, would you? It’s not worth risking a life over, but if it can be done safely . . .”

  Batería Pedro el Cholo, Isla Real, Balboa, Terra Nova

  The vehicle provided by Puercel was hidden in the lee of a couple of wrecked gun turrets. Leaving the temporary AdC, Signifer Torres, behind with the driver, Carrera stepped out onto concrete pavement with a rail line running through it, leading from a large set of doors to a similar set in the artificial hill below the wrecked gun turret.

  “Sig sends his love, Han,” Carrera said to the incredibly tiny and, if rumor was to be believed, incredibly foul-mouthed and vicious bitch the legion had inherited when Siegel bought her contract from the Cochinese brothel that had held it. There were only a few people in the legion who knew Han’s origins, and none of those were talking. This was not only a courtesy to their comrade, Siegel, but also to her. And, what the hell, it was hardly her fault she’d been sold as a young girl. Moreover, she’d been doing excellent work for the legion and for Balboa for quite a few years now. Perhaps more important, still, she was privy to any number of secrets.

  “He also says that you are to keep your head down and come home to him safely, once the war is over.”

  The tiny woman—tiny but shapely, almost a Cochinese version of Marqueli Mendoza, and similarly pretty—flushed with a mix of embarrassment, warmth, and gratitude. “Tell him back, please, Duque, that I miss him terribly and I would appreciate it if he would be very careful, as well. Also that you be careful with him, because he’s the only one I have.”

  Not for the first time, Carrera was impressed with the woman’s ability with languages. She had an accent, yes, but it was barely discernible. Also not for the first time he wondered if he ought have her transferred to Fernandez’s crew.

  “I’ll do my best,” answered Carrera, “though the Taurans may have other ideas. Now what am I looking for here?”

  “This battery and the next one clockwise are manned by Cochinese under Tribune Pham. They’re all here, now.

  “He’s pretty good, though I’d never tell him that to his face, especially for an air jockey turned into an artilleryman. His people aren’t bad, either, though they’re almost all pretty old. They’ve only got a couple of people cleared for the special shells . . . well . . . four, in total. No, wait. Five with Pham. And me, but I’m only cleared to know about them, not how to use them.”

  Carrera tried reading the subtext there, and was by no means sure he got it. She treats them badly. Politics or vindictiveness or just plain personality? Maybe some of all three. And, after all, she probably hates the side that let the Tsarist-Marxists win the war in Cochin, which is what led to her being sold to become a whore. Poor thing. It’s a sad fucking universe. But holding it against the people who lost, if that’s what’s going on, is . . . bad policy and probably unjust, too.

  “Okay,” he said, “introduce me.”

  After a brisk nod, Han turned and led Carrera into a side door to one of the “ammunition” bunkers. The door was thick steel, and stepped to fit snugly into a matching steel frame.

  One the other side, as soon as Carrera made his appearance, a series of sharp commands rang out in a language he didn’t understand. He really didn’t need to. The actions of the aged, bowed, leather-faced and weathered troops told of the commands’ import.

  One old man, almost as tiny as Han, turned to face Carrera, rendering a hand salute and shouting something in Cochinese. Carrera returned the salute, and ordered, “At ease.”

  Just as he didn’t need to understand Cochinese to understand Tribune Pham’s order, so Pham could tell quite well from the tone that Carrera had ordered him to put his men in a more relaxed position. He ordered them to Parade Rest on the theory of better safe than sorry.

  Han seemed quite nervous. Carrera noticed it, and asked, “You’ve never done this before, have you Han?”

  “No, Duque. What do I do?”

  “Just follow along . . . translate back and forth. It’s not hard.”

  The woman nodded understanding though her face said she still wasn’t sure.

  Pham, Carrera would have judged as being maybe eighty-five years old. Siegel, though, had said none of them here were over maybe sixty-five. It was life in the reeducation camps that had put so many years on them.

  Whatever Pham’s face looked like, his posture was immaculate and his handshake firm.

  “Lead me through,” Carrera said, with Han translating. Pham noticed that she left off her usual honorifics.

  “He doesn’t know how you address us, does he?” Pham asked in his own languag
e. “Hmmm . . . I wonder if one of us doesn’t have enough Spanish or English to explain it to him.”

  Which was actually the reason Han had been nervous. What? Do a little translating to and from languages she was utterly comfortable in? No big deal. Let the big boss find out she’d been verbally abusing his troops. Her husband had dropped a couple of hints here and there, without really meaning to and without any idea that they were necessary, that Carrera could be a real bastard.

  “I’m sure one of us does,” finished Pham.

  “Honored grandfather,” said Han, “I am sure we can work something out that will not require bringing unpleasant matters to the attention of people who do not necessarily understand the intricacies of our culture and—”

  “Shut up, whore,” said Pham, sensing the weakened position immediately and instinctively. “Your job is to translate and nothing but. Learn your place.”

  “Yes, honored grandfather . . .”

  Carrera left the battery sure of two things. One was that, when the time came, at Puercel’s command, the Cochinese would—if any of them were left alive and they had even a single 18cm gun working—put out the fire. They’d lost one home and made another; they were ready to die before giving that up. This was especially true since so many of them had sons and daughters, or grandsons and granddaughters, serving in the more mobile elements of the legion.

  The other was that there was something going on there with Siegel’s wife that he didn’t quite understand.Note to self; detach one of the younger, bilingual Cochinese to translating duties. Pull Han Siegel back to the mainland and give her to Fernandez’s department. I may not know what’s going on, but I’m pretty sure that fixes most all of it, and without any hurt feelings.

  Near Fixed Turret 177, Isla Real, Balboa, Terra Nova

  Carrera’s light vehicle arrived at the trail leading to a series of turrets manned by the Tercio Santa Cecelia just as the air raid sirens sounded. His temporary aide, listening to the radio, announced, “It’s a big one, Duque. Twenty or thirty Zhong, over two hundred from Santa Josefina, and twice that from Cienfuegos and the enemy fleets near it.”

  “Pull the car under cover and leave it,” he ordered. “We’ll take shelter in the fortifications down the trail.”

  The driver jerked the wheel to the right, pulling the vehicle under the trees but also nearly into a drainage ditch the trees covered. The gently sloping, concrete-lined ditch was more than half-full of foul, stagnant-looking water, suggesting that somewhere downhill from it, there was a bomb-induced blockage in the system.

  Springing out of the car, the small party began trotting down a trail that was clear at ground level, but somewhat obscure from above. On the other hand, the trees had already been thinned out quite a bit all across the island, and some places more than others.

  The sign by the trail read, “T-177,” and pointed to the left. There was a well-worn trail in that direction, as well. Carrera hesitated, in a moment of some doubt. The fixed turret positions were not precisely roomy. Then the first bombs hit perhaps a kilometer away, or a bit less.

  “Fuck it,” he said, “we can live with cramped.” He scampered down that second trail, followed by the other two. At length, they came to a mound of dirt with what appeared to be a tank turret atop it. The turret was reinforced with concrete, and a concrete frame set in the dirt indicated the way inside. There was a field telephone, a simple sound-powered version, hung beside the frame. Next to the phone, the thick metal door was surprisingly open. Indeed, someone was leaving even as Carrera and his party arrived.

  “Have you seen Pablo?” asked the mongoloid boy trying to make his way out the door.

  “No, son,” Carrera answered. “But you need to go inside. Pablo will be fine.” My ass. A six-hundred-and-fifty-plane raid? Maybe as much as three or four thousand tons of bombs? Anybody caught outside solid shelter is not all that likely to live at all, let alone be “fine.” But there’s no sense in throwing good after bad.

  “People say I look stupid, sir,” said Juan, shaking his head firmly, “but I’m not as stupid as I look. Pablo is my friend and he’s out there and he won’t be fine. I’m going to him.”

  And this, thought Carrera, is where a decent human being would either go with the boy or send him to shelter and go look alone. And maybe I’m decent and maybe I’m not, but the stakes are too big for me to go with him.

  Carrera looked at the aide.

  “I’ll go with him,” said Signifer Torres. At that, Carrera nodded, half in giving permission and half in appreciation: Thanks for picking up my cross, Torres. I don’t know if you’re a better man than I am but you’re a good one. And probably a better human being, where that differs.

  “Sergeant de la Mesa, sir,” reported the turret commander. “Late of Fourth Mechanized Tercio, now of”—the sergeant’s eyes scanned around the concrete of the position—“Adios Patria.”

  Carrera gave a thin smile as he took a seat on a bench resting against a wall. “Is that what you call yourselves?”

  De la Mesa seemed slightly taken aback. “I think it’s what everyone calls us, Duque.”

  “May be,” Carrera conceded. “Used to be I could get to know all the units, all the officers and centurions, most of the noncoms and even some of the rank and file. Now? Now I haven’t a prayer. I can’t even blame . . .”

  The ground outside must have been deluged with bombs, at that instant. The plywood lining the concrete walls seemed to reverberate, cans and other things flying off shelves, and a queasiness-inducing series of vibrations causing everyone’s internal organs to ripple alarmingly. Farther from the entrance, the one retarded boy remaining in the position began to wail. The lights flickered, were replaced by battery-powered ones, came back, flickered, then went dead. At that the boy began to wail more loudly still.

  To my dying day, thought Carrera, I will wonder whether I did the right thing in opening up the legion to all the disabled who could demonstrate ability to understand the oath.

  “Pablo,” said the sergeant, “the one who was outside, usually keeps up the internal generator. When he gets back . . .”

  Carrera gave a look that as much as said, “Nobody’s getting back.”

  Surprisingly then, the sound-powered phone on the inside of the concrete position began to chatter.

  De le Mesa gestured at his own withered legs. “Sir, if you could?”

  Carrera sprang up and began turning the wheel that opened the door. It was of a naval design, and may even have been salvaged from one of the Volgan heavy cruisers, the sisters of the Tadeo Kurita, that he’d ordered scrapped to provide steel for the island’s defenses. With about three-fourths of a turn the wheel, the restraining bars came out from the steel sides, allowing him to pull the door open.

  On the other side were Signifer Torres, a mongoloid boy Carrera hadn’t seen before, holding between them the limp body of the boy he had seen, leaving the position to look for Pablo.

  Carrera guided them in, Torres first, followed by the limp boy, then the one he assumed was Pablo. As soon as they were inside and safe, he pushed the heavy door shut and spun the wheel again to lock it in place.

  The wailing cut off. As if rising from the ground, the final boy of the crew sprang out and began to fuss over the limp boy, whom Torres said was called “Juan.”

  “He’ll be all right,” the signifer said. “Nothing broken. No bleeding that I could find. He just took a bad wallop from a flying piece of tree. Wish I could say the same for the car, sir. It’s scrap, last I saw it. Or it will be, if we ever figure out how to get it out of the tree.”

  “Cost of doing business,” said Carrera, stoically. “Besides, your legate will shit us a new one.”

  The previously unconscious boy began to stir, then gave off a moan.

  “Pablo,” asked de la Mesa, “are you all right?”

  Pablo forced himself to nod. “Just a little scared, Sergeant. And a little sorry. I lost our breakfast on the way.”

  �
��Screw breakfast,” said the sergeant, “as long as you’re here. Why don’t you break open one of the emergency ration boxes, then get the generator started?”

  “I’ll see to it, Sergeant,” the boy said weakly.

  Another string of bombs came in, but not as close as the last one. The bunker shook, of course, but the sickening organ rippling was barely noticeable. That, however, was followed by a series of blasts that were much closer. Julio screamed. Juan moaned. Even Pablo, who seemed too innocent for it, cursed. Glasses broke inside. And for some reason, a noticeable bulge appeared in the plywood paneling. De le Mesa looked nervously upward, his eyes questing for some indication that his turret had been deranged.

  “This is the worst so far,” the sergeant said. “I don’t think we’re worth a precision munition, but sheer bloody chance might do for us, even so, at this density. And . . .”

  “Yes?” asked Carrera.

  “Can you feel that, Duque?”

  “Feel what?”

  “The regular pounding. Airplanes bombing don’t produce regular shocks. That’s naval gunfire.”

  “Maybe so,” said Carrera, trying to pick up the regular shocks de la Mesa claimed. Maybe so, after all. He then thought, How do you measure the value of a pickle to morale, or the benefit of a “for whoso shares his blood with me”?

  “But . . . sergeant . . . boys . . . signifer . . . legionary . . . if I’ve got to die somewhere, there’s no place I’d rather be and nobody’s company I’d rather be in.

  “Now who’s got a deck of cards?”

  Under de la Mesa’s guidance, the other three, assisted by Torres and Carrera’s driver, were using a tree trunk to tap to turret back into its proper position. It hadn’t been damaged, exactly, but one of the all too near misses had deranged it a bit so that it didn’t rest quite evenly in the ring. The tapping—which more closely resembled battering ramming—might or might not work, but since the turret couldn’t turn at all now, there wasn’t much to be lost.