Minutegirls

by George Phillies

  "Oh, that's terrible," Rubenstein rolled her eyes. Why had someone bothered with demerits? "How can our girls think of such things, when they have ChiComms to ambush? What was Smart Blond thinking?"

  "I think she lets her friends talk her into things, and they owe her favors. Which she keeps careful tabs on," Roth explained. "She really wasn't underarmed for a little walk in the dark, given she and Rachel each had a good thousand rounds and a dozen grenades for their M-31s. Not to mention whatever else Rachel had that I missed. The ChiComms--and I don't care what brigade intelligence says, if Rachel says there was a ChiComm on top of her, there was a ChiComm, not a shadow; that girl is too overconfident to frighten--just got incredibly lucky. Ruth had better line of sight and saw them first, fired the distractors before Gail and Rachel knew there was something to distract. Gail and Rachel did the drill, trusted their ultracamou--which worked, by the way. If Ruth had just been a teeny bit slower, Rachel and Gail would have opened fire, and we'd have a stack of bodies to point to."

  "Top," Rubenstein said, "These filter failures are getting too common. I want you to crank up the training schedule. And the Cantonment manning. The girls are supposed to have heavy infantry backup. Do some joint drills soon on the handoff. My girls are scouts, not main line. The main line should be there when needed."

  CANTONMENT REFECTORY

  DEBORAH TROOP, ESTHER-3-FIRST, BELLA ABZUG BRIGADE

  SOUTH HARBIN STATE PARK

  HARBIN, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

  May 15, 2174, 8:30 AM HLT

  "So," Trainee Troop Leader Rosenblum asked over the breakfast table, "Did you guys get your 2000 demerits each, or only 1000?" Perfection Queen, Smart Blond, and WonderChick glared back at their Leader, whose ego had led her to ban use of her nicktitle.

  "Did we get any demerits, Ruth?" Smart Blond asked.

  "Me? No, I didn't. Did you?" Perfection Queen answered. "And you just get to work yours off, right WonderChick?"

  "Me? Demerits? I have demerits?" WonderChick countered. "They were worth it. I get to do extra weight training without cadre complaining." She felt Smart Blond nudge her under the table.

  "Guys, should we tell the Troop Leader?" Smart Blond asked.

  "Tell her? What's to tell," Perfection Queen grumbled.

  "That." WonderChick waited for Smart Blond to spring something on Rosenblum. Rosenblum had been leaning on them a little too hard, and was about to get a reward for her concern. WonderChick allowed that this was how Smart Blond got a rush. For her, last night had been incredible, even better than the occasion at age fourteen when she had gone out to a remote firing range with a MinuteBoy classmate, and successfully gotten across that his Thayer M-41 had not been the gun of his that she was interested in. He had been remarkably slow to take the hint, which had been incredibly frustrating, and then anything but frustrating when he had then been remarkably slow...but she had to play along with Smart Blond.

  "Surely the Troop Leader recalls that all demerits are not individual?" Smart Blond asked. "Rulebook, page 247?"

  "Oh, of course," Rosenblum answered, not realizing that she was painfully unable to hide her ignorance. Page 247 discussed field sanitation.

  "Sometimes individual demerits are not appropriate. Sometimes a failure shows a failure of the Troop to show unity and strength. Then demerits are levied where the failure lies," Smart Blonde said. "To the Troop." Rosenblum blanched.

  "You guys earned us troop demerits?" a horrified Rosenblum asked. "We've never had troop demerits, not Deborah Troop. Many?"

  "Would two hundred count as many?" Perfection Queen asked. "Or only as a reasonable number?"

  "Two hundred? You guys got us two hundred troop demerits?" Rosenblum's jaw sagged. Two hundred troop demerits was an astronomical number, a killer to remove from your record. "What did you do, deck the Training Director?" she asked.

  "Should we tell her?" Wonderchick responded.

  "Tell her what?" Perfection Queen asked innocently.

  Rosenblum slumped. "You idiots!" she mumbled. "How?"

  "I think you had better tell her," WonderChick said. Smart Blond was going a bit far.

  "OK," Smart Blond. "The truth." Pause. "Word of honor, sworn on the sword." Pause. "We got a number of troop demerits." Pause. "Zero being a number, that is. And no individual demerits either." There came a gleam of recognition in Rosenblum's eyes. She had been strung along like a fat carp on a thousand pound test line.

  Chapter 13

  "In understanding the guiding genius of Dr. Morbius, recall that he did his military engineering before genetic medicine revolutionized America. When Morbius worked his magic, Americans had vermiform appendices that sometimes burst and killed them. Americans died of cancer. Americans were born with some color of skin and hair, and had to live with it for the rest of their life.

  "Most important, American women of 2035 -- the women who became the original MinuteGirls -- averaged four inches shorter and 50 pounds lighter than American men. Don't you believe me? Go to your house library. Download a martial arts manual of the period, one written for women. It warns women, strange as this will sound, not to try to compete in speed, weight, reach, or upper body strength with men.

  "It was these women, shorter, lighter, and weaker than women of today -- but just as strong-willed, with the flame of liberty burning just as brightly in their hearts -- who Morbius turned into the core of the Popular Army."

  ...Peter Gustafson, "The Guiding Genius of Morbius, Heroic Savior of Our Glorious Republic", RST Books, Cosmopolis, 2113.

  MAO TSE-TSUNG INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

  PEKING, PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA

  2000 HOURS CT 13 JULY 2174

  The Airport Immigration and Customs Lobby channeled people by nationality. PRC and FEU citizens were channeled right, where a minimal inspection awaited. Visitors from other foreign places were channeled through the center. Residents of the various Chinese nations were channeled left to be inspected thoroughly for subversive materials. A painted arch on a reinforced concrete wall bore the large sign 'American and Japanese Devils to Wait Here for Execution and Arrest'. At least, thought Bernard Rohan, his StarFleet tabletcomp was making that translation.

  Genevieve Villiers took Rohan's hand and led him to the appropriate gate. Officially, they were only tourists taking a vacation. A search of StarFleet Europa records would show they were both on leave, relieved for the duration of leave of all command responsibilities. He had not expected her, when she scheduled the details of the trip, to put them in romantically designed resorts in a series of capacious single bedrooms. Beyerlein had complained. She responded that anything else would be astonishingly suspicious. How could they be on vacation if they showed no plans for enjoying themselves? Of course, the Chinese would have every room wired, but this merely provided an opportunity for Frenchmen to educate ignorant orientals about the finer aspects of life. Rohan was still surprised. After all, she'd never appeared interested in him before. That must, he concluded, have been professionalism triumphing over normal human nature. He'd have to discourage her from doing a career sabbatical with Internal Security. They had all too many fanatics in that operation without giving them someone who was also highly competent.

  Bernard reminded himself that the resorts had been chosen for their proximity to various bases of the People's Liberation Army. He and Genevieve would provably take a vacation, and return with an adequate tonnage of souvenirs and tapes to prove it. Their trip would include substantial public exposure, so that the ubiquitous agents of the American CIA, NRO, FBI, OHS, HSA, and other American government bureaus whose actual names remained secret -- Eye-on-EU had to be a joke -- could confirm that they were vacationing. If on the vacation he occasionally encountered old friends in the PLA, that was only to be expected.

  GREAT MUSEUM OF CHINESE HISTORICAL ARTS

  GREAT SQUARE OF THE ENTIRE CHINESE PEOPLE

  PEKING, CHINA

  1314 HOURS CT 15 JULY 2174

  Rohan and Villiers s
tood hand in hand, admiring a long series of funerary urns. Their hosts had expressed a preference for afternoon meetings. Bernard decided to be grateful for good fortune. A morning meeting today would have been challenging. Some young women proved to be gratifyingly voracious. There, behind the fifth vase, was the promised small door marked 'Special Collection Number One'. He led Genevieve through, and held his balance as the disguised elevator accelerated into the earth. In a few seconds, the corridor would be reinserted, and the American spies pursuing him would be able to walk through the door, down a short corridor, and into the mazelike Special Collection in which they would doubtless almost find him.

  The elevator shuddered to a stop. Genevieve squeezed his hand. Had the acceleration had been very sharp indeed, or were PRC gravitics even worse than StarFleet Europa Intelligence believed? Doors slid open.

  Awaiting their guests were the expected Marshals of the People's Liberation Army. Instantly Rohan shed his relaxed pose. "Good Day, Admiral Rohan. Welcome to China," said the older of the two. Rohan took their hands in turn. Marshal Tsien, the shorter and older with a few silver hairs amidst the black, had been a senior officer of the PLA for as long as Rohan had been in StarFleet. Rohan wondered to himself if the Chinese were allowing their elite to claim medical privileges that the rest of their people were denied. The younger Marshal Wu was reputed to be something of a firebrand, her tall Shanghai figure little hiding her iron determination to be revenged on the world that had so wronged her country...at least, thought Rohan, that was the way she saw it. One might have proposed, a century and a half ago, that starting simultaneous wars with the most populous country in the world, the two richest countries in the world, the country that occupied your indefensible northern border, and the country whose national guard had thoroughly thrashed your regular army 40 years previously, was not the best way to win international friends and influence favorably their public opinion. The Chinese leadership of the time had reached different conclusions.

  "It is truly a delight to be here, and to be enjoying your magnificent hospitality," Rohan answered. Captain Villiers had dropped the appropriate 0.7 meters behind and to the right of her superior officer. "My schedule is at your disposal."

  "We are most grateful," Marshal Tsien answered. "Alas, the proper state banquets to which you are most thoroughly entitled would be a little hard to explain, given that you are officially tourists. There are, however, several modest restaurants here in Beijing with private dining rooms, and we hope the two of you will be able to join me and a few of my colleagues. Our timing is seriously constrained. It's an intelligence issue, which perhaps my colleague can better explain."

  "We have set decoys, and stationed pairs of agents who will appear to be you, all to distract the Imperialist Agents," Wu said. "But the American Devils are remarkably clever, and we are never sure that we have caught all of them."

  "You are catching many," Rohan answered, "making you the envy of the world's counterintelligence agencies." He did not dwell on the issue that FEU Internal Security was not catching any at all who appeared to be guilty, at least who appeared to be guilty to anyone other than Internal Security and its Special Administrative Tribunals, though Paris and Berlin ought to be thick with American spies.

  "In the last six months, we have arrested, detained, and interrogated no fewer than 846 running dog lackeys of the imperialist warmongers," she said matter-of-factly. "I should be happy to supply you with details. Many of them confessed to a wide variety of nefarious plots before being shot. Others managed to kill themselves before being questioned adequately."

  "I would have to refer that to my staff," he answered. Beyerlein hadn't mentioned that Marshal Wu was a fanatic. "In principle the possibility is very attractive. From the numbers of American agents you have caught, it seems that you have much to teach us."

  CONFERENCE ROOM NUMBER THREE

  HEADQUARTER, PLA GENERAL STAFF

  PEKING, CHINA

  1325 HOURS CT 15 JULY 2174

  Huge maps of Old China, the world, and the solar system dominated three walls. His hosts gave Rohan a brief tour. The two-dozen Chinese nations were all labeled 'temporarily under the control of bandits styling themselves..." The Staff headquarters of the Szechuan Democratic Republic had had a remarkably similar map, if you ignored the phrasing of two of the two dozen labels. He wondered how the various Russian Republics would take to the 'Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, temporarily in political disarray' label. Probably better than they would take to the asserted northern Chinese border, across which broke the waves of the Arctic Sea. American Russia and American Manchuria were marked as being under foreign occupation.

  Rohan steeled himself for the negotiating session. Was there any direction or wavelength on which his hosts were not recording the meeting, down to the waver of his eyelids? Internal Security provided the same service for the Azores sessions. It appeared to be an expensive affectation. Not two months ago, the fools running the IS American Directorate had assured him that the Americans were not surprised to see a Felifer delegate.

  "I believe we are quite close to agreement," Marshal Tsien began, "based on Chairman Fu's visit to Paris and Berlin. You are willing to give us uncontested use of the hyperspace network starting on K and M class stars near to Earth. I agree it takes a while to get to them, and that they do not instantly lead to attractive worlds, but we are a patient people. You will also support us if we recover the Chinese lands stolen from us by the Tsarists, the Bolshevik Revanchists, and the American Imperialists under various unequal treaties. In return, over the next years we are to ensure that enough patriotic volunteers contest our border with Occupied China that the attention of the American land forces -- such as they are -- is focused on their one vulnerable land frontier. You have given us a specification as to what forces we are to tie down. Are there further revisions to your proposal?"

  "I have only positive news to report," Rohan answered. "As you know, we recently learned that the Americans have a secret colony in the Alpha Centauri system. They must have found a masked warp point, so they travel from here to there without our knowledge. Very soon, the forces of progress will be putting that system under siege, a siege sufficiently loose that the Americans will be able to reinforce their defenses -- with forces that they would otherwise turn against you." And if you are playing a double game, he thought, I have told you nothing the Americans would not already figure out -- except that the Alpha Centauri events will not be tying down Union forces.

  "We are aware of the American colony, and I am not sufficiently knowledgeable in gravitronics to discuss this new concept of masked warp points. The experts on my staff would, however, like to discuss this issue further." Marshal Tsien shrugged. For if there is one masked point, he thought, there are doubtless more, and if we can find our own, we will break the monopoly you Europeans have on interstellar travel. "I understand the strategy that you are describing, and allow that at some point, after the remote citadel has drawn sufficient American reinforcements, the trap will snap shut. Though I suppose such a remote citadel could also be made a second Verdun, used to bleed white the Army of the American Imperialists, even as you French used Verdun to bleed white the Imperialist Germans three centuries ago."

  "There are a variety of options," Rohan agreed. "A choice between them cannot be made before we see what the Americans do. The colony appears to be very large, so we believe that they will try to defend it if they can." And I will not correct you about Verdun, a battle that bled both sides. Or is it your hope, he considered, that the Union will be so weakened by the Americans that you and your equally unprogressive friends can effect a new calculus of forces in world affairs?

  "I trust your adjutant can exchange additional information on this with Marshal Wu," Marshal Tsien said. "I also have good news, notably that we believe the Americans will find their entire border to be under stress, not merely the short section where we directly confront them. We have now filled out our plans, in somewhat more deta
il than Chairman Fu was prepared to describe. We believe that our plans will preoccupy the entirety of the American Army, and even so they will be unable to hold their frontiers. Allowing, that is, that StarFleet Europa is able to secure for us the skies over the battlefront." Allowing also, thought the Marshal, that the Intelligence Bureau has actually made sense of the data they have been collecting this past century and a half. The Americans seem to be remarkably fond of girl toy soldiers and dress parades, and remarkably short of real men training with real weapons under realistic conditions.

  "You are proposing operations more ambitious than those discussed previously," said Rohan. "However, if you can deliver what you have promised, I would anticipate that extensive Union support would be available. The Azores Temporary Armistice specifically forbids all parties from using spaceships for ground support, so a Union intervention to keep the American Fleet off your backs would appear not only allowed but mandated under the Armistice. We have promised to do it, and we will. If the Americans commit their fleet so close to Earth, it will be pinned in place and unable to avoid the blows of our superior fleet." You, Rohan thought, may want them kept off your back, but we prefer they be on your back where we can shoot them to pieces by firing down from above, and too bad that your hypertrophied military will take collateral damage in the process. "Might I ask how you expect to hurt the Americans so badly?"

  "We have well over a century of studying the American forces," Marshal Tsien said. "Their border has never been fortified. They keep light forces near the border, and progressively stronger reaction forces further to the rear. However, their reserves are quite light -- they expect only an occasional border clash, not the full scale invasion that it had always been inadvisable to launch." Namely, Tsien thought, if we had tried it without FEU support and with our other neighbors sitting on their hands, the Americans would have handed us our heads again. "So we shall emulate the successful strategy used by the Vietnamese against the Americans during their final War of Liberation. They didn't launch a crude mass invasion, the way the unsubtle Koreans did in 1950. They ran up the war, one step at a time, every time calculating the step for maximum effect, every time handing the Americans a spectacular propaganda defeat via an unexpected change in the correlation of forces. In the historical case, the Americans had one of the larger and stronger armies in the world, backed by overwhelming resources and technology. The Americans won most engagements. However, the Americans allowed their opponents to control the tempo of the war, and that factor was decisive."