by Mark Rounds
Jeffy hustled all the ambulatory cadets to the training area in the high gravity portion of the habitat, mainly to calm their stomachs. The healthiest of the cadets were picked to unload the cargo capsules. These contained uniforms, documents and any personal items that had been brought along.
Sergeant Tierney, our mobility and maintenance specialist, was put in charge of breaking down the pallets which contained weapons, vehicles, ammunition, food, and all the other items that Jeffy and Harm thought the new mercenary company might need.
Jeffy had set up the training schedule for this first day to be fairly easy. For one thing, all of the earth borne recruits had the Coriolis Effect to get used to. For another, many cadets were still pretty wobbly from the flight. As soon as all the gear was stored, the former cadets were given an hour to get settled before the first training meeting.
Under the rules set by the Gaming Commission, both teams had a small area available to train at the habitat. However, the teams would not be able to see the actual terrain or each other until the blast doors were raised and the game began. Maps were available, but they were purposefully inaccurate. This was done to retain some of the surprise that was felt by historical participants in battle at the conditions and terrain they faced.
All of the company’s personnel were seated in a rough semicircle around a podium with a holo tank behind it. This was everyone’s first look at the training area. The space itself was no more than six hundred meters on a side with just a few small bumps and gullies. There was little vegetation as it wasn't worth the effort to keep reseeding and then force growing the plants just to let a bunch of mercenaries tear them up. The temperature was comfortable with just a little breeze from the air circulation units to move the air.
Taol stood up as Jeffy and the rest of the staff had agreed the he would open the meeting, and began the presentation.
"Troopers of the Condor Legion," said Taol in the most official voice he could muster. Things were so rushed that they hadn't had time to come up with a name until right before the ride up to the habitat. This was the first time that most of the troops had heard it. As expected, it brought a few chuckles.
"We will begin our formal training tomorrow. I just have a few preliminaries to get out of the way.
"Battle will commence in thirteen days. Our training will be quick but thorough. Sergeant Major Jefferson will be in charge of all training until the battle begins. He may bounce you out of this organization for any reason he sees fit. There will be no recourse. That individual will take the next shuttle down. If you have second thoughts about what we are about to do, let him know, you also will be on the next shuttle down. All of my officers will be training right alongside of you, myself included. There will be no distinction based on rank."
At this point Taol removed the colonel's insignia from his uniform and handed them to Jeffy. Harm and Jarl followed suit.
"Sergeant Major, you are now in charge." And with that Taol, followed by Jarl and Harm walked off the lectern and sat down among the other troopers.
"Attention!!" he bawled. The former cadets all bolted to a standing position. Life as a cadet kind of drilled that reaction into muscle memory.
"Colonel Ubner thinks that you will make good troopers for his Legion," Jeffy said as he paused and looked over the crowd. "Looking around, I can see that the raw material is available. However, I expect a certain level of professionalism. When some of you reported this morning, I noticed that you were intoxicated. That will not happen again, either in training or combat. Furthermore, those of you who have made that mistake will receive no mercy. We only have twelve days to get you ready to fight and I'll not waste one minute on some cadet who thinks he knows better than I do."
"These NCO's on the lectern with me will be your instructors. Their words are my words. Disobeying them in any way might make me unhappy. Does anyone here want that?"
"No Sergeant Major!" the former cadets raggedly chorused back.
"I can't hear you!"
"NO Sergeant Major!" This time in unison.
"I think I detected a little vibration, but I still can't hear you!"
"NO SERGEANT MAJOR!!!!"
"Passable. Sergeant Svoboda, I think a brisk run to loosen up the troops is in order. See to it."
"Yes, Sergeant Major!" she replied.
Sergeant Svoboda was a petite young woman who, under other circumstances, might have been considered pretty except for a scar on her cheek that ran from her ear to her lip and purpled when she smiled. Taol later found out that she'd had it done on purpose.
"You heard Sar Major, it’s time to run!" she said as her cheek began to purple. "Let's see if some of you long legged cadets can keep up with little ol' me."
With that she started off at a slow jog, which even the sickest could keep up with. As she started around the training area she began to pick up speed. After the first two hundred meters it was obvious that she done some running before. After the first two laps, the troops wondered if she did anything else.
Soon, the sickest of the group began to slow down but Jeffy would have none of it. He followed in his powered chair with a light plastic cane that was about three meters long. If anyone started to lag behind, Jeffy caned them across the calves. It stung and was tremendously embarrassing.
After three laps, some of the sicker troopers began passing out. They were left were they fell. Jeffy would leave a small plastic disk by them as he passed. The disk had on it the number of laps they had to accomplish before they could rejoin training. After six laps, everyone was blowing hard, but it didn't seem to faze Svoboda at all. She was chatting with Jeffy and joking about the various students that were wobbling and passing out.
"Svoboda," hollered Jeffy, "take them back to the common area."
"Yes, Sar Major," she answered. "All right kids, let's sprint."
And with that, she took off like a rabbit. The rest of the runners started breathing harder but there was no detectable increase in speed. As they got to the common area, the fastest forty or so were separated out. These troopers became the infantry.
Jarl had been one of those who had imbibed the night before and had passed out on the run. Instead of completing his assigned laps, he came straight in.
Sergeant Svoboda stopped him and said, "Trooper, you still have three laps to finish."
"Stuff it, lady. There is no way I can even run one," He puffed hoarsely.
"Trooper, you may either run three laps or fight me hand to hand. It's your choice."
"Let me catch my breath and I'll show you a little hand to hand," he said with a leer.
"Jarl, you get one warning,” said Jeffy. “Back off, or this lady will teach you some manners."
Jarl whirled around and saw Jeffy.
"Don't you think I can take her, Sar Major?" said Jarl, his manhood suddenly threatened.
"I don't think you can remain standing for more than thirty seconds with her," he said off-handedly. "Still, every group has got to learn.
“Mason, gather the rest of the troopers. It's time for a little object lesson. We don’t have time to do this more than once."
As the new recruits gathered around Jeffy laid out the rules.
"Svoboda," Jeffy cautioned, "nothing permanent. We may need this young man. Jarl, you may use any hold, blow or dirty fighting technique you know. Good luck."
As they squared off, Taol was struck at the difference in plain old body mass. Jarl was over one hundred and ninety centimeters tall, massing eighty five kilos or so. Svoboda was less than one hundred and sixty centimeters and only massed fifty five kilos soaking wet. This was like watching a child fight an adult.
Jarl began some complex martial arts ritual, no doubt to impress the good sergeant. Before he even got warm, Svoboda launched a devastating kick to his knee. Jarl was able to lift his leg and rotate it a little and take it on the fleshy part of the calf so it cramped muscle instead of breaking bones.
He was able to ignore the pain and launched w
hat appeared to be a perfect lunge punch.
But when his hand got there, Svoboda wasn't. She had hit the ground and had caught his ankle between her feet. She then reversed the position of her feet and dumped Jarl on the ground. His cramping calf muscle made him a little slower to rise and so Svoboda got to her feet quicker. She was able to kick his good leg out from under him and down he went again. As he tried to rise a second time she planted her foot in his solar plexus. This time he went down and curled up into a fetal position.
"Let this be a lesson to all of you," shouted Jeffy. "Sergeant Svoboda is a professional. She can kick any one of you around this compound without even working up a sweat. The Krasni we will fight are also professionals. They also have the training to do just what you saw Svoboda do. If you listen very carefully to what she and the other NCO's say you might live. Playing the holovid hero will get you nothing but pain and death."
Jarl was now moving a little. He struggled until he was standing and after taking a couple of shuttering breaths said "OK Sergeant, how many laps was that?"
Svoboda, without batting an eye said "Three, trooper."
The rest of the morning was filled with various kinds of physical exercise. By the time the noon meal came around, most of the troops had little appetite. The NCO's however, made all the recruits eat.
"We don't have the luxury of letting you find out on your own what it takes to keep your strength up," said Jeffy. "Your meals, from this point forward, have been selected and specially prepared to get you into peak physical condition. Each of you will eat everything that's on your plate. Oh, don't worry about how it tastes. The goal is to keep you healthy and strong, not happy."
After lunch the recruits worried about what new torture awaited them but instead Jeffy was strangely subdued.
"You have now had most of the bravado kicked out of you,” said Jeffy almost conversationally. “I think you are ready to learn. Sergeant McIntyre will begin teaching you the basics of the weapons we will use."
"I want three volunteers who think they know how to shoot," said McIntyre as he stepped up to the lectern.
Immediately a forest of hands went up. Sergeant McIntyre selected the first three troopers he saw.
McIntyre then passed out some 98K bolt action rifles and lined them up facing a series of silhouettes about fifty meters distant. "OK, open fire. Ten credits to the first trooper that can drop five silhouettes."
Shots immediately rang out. As the fusillade increased in tempo, we noticed that not many of the silhouettes were dropping. After all the rifles ran out of ammunition, they had not dropped five silhouettes between them.
"All right, do you think you can hit moving targets that are trying to shoot back?" said Sergeant McIntyre. He let the silence drag on. "I am not trying to be hard on you guys. I know most of you have only trained with plasma weapons. Now watch how it's done."
With that, he reloaded one of the rifles the troopers had used and hit five targets with five shots as fast as he could work the bolt.
"That's how well the Krasni shoot,” said McIntyre. “Furthermore, we don't have time to let you practice enough to get that good. We have to out think 'em instead."
He picked up an MP-38. The weapon was a simply made submachine gun common to the German army.
"This weapon is not especially accurate," said McIntyre. "It’s one function in life is to shoot a lot of bullets fast. Every other round in this magazine is a tracer. Watch the result."
McIntyre then fired a five-round burst. He started a little high then used the stream of tracers to walk the rounds on target, just the way you would do it with a plasma rifle.
"OK you three, let's try it again with MP-38's."
He passed out the weapons and stood back. The recoil of the first burst usually took the trooper by surprise. But after they got the hang of it, every one of them was able to knock down five or more silhouettes.
"Each and every one of you will become infinitely familiar with this weapon, and you will do it in three days," said Sergeant McIntyre.
All the recruits were issued an MP-38 except for those individuals who had purchased weapons who were allowed to use their own.
"All right troopers," yelled Sergeant McIntyre. "This is your personal weapon. This will be the one you will go into combat with. Attached to each weapon is a list of all the parts. You will be required to recite this list at any time from this point forward. Let's start."
"Barrel."
"BARREL." Everybody all chorused.
"Slide."
"SLIDE."
"Receiver."
"RECEIVER."
And so on through the rest of the parts of the weapon. As McIntyre went through the parts he disassembled his weapon. When he finished he reassembled the weapon in less than twenty seconds and the only tool he used was his combat knife.
"OK," said the sergeant. "Now you break down the weapon. And, as you do so, recite the correct name of the part you are removing. Begin!"
"SLIDE."
"BARREL."
Taking the weapon apart was fairly easy. The hard part was reassembling it. McIntyre was amazingly patient the first time anyone attempted the task. He and Sergeants Mason and Svoboda, who were assisting him, patiently explained the procedure.
On the second attempt, mistakes and confusion brought more shouts and verbal abuse. On the third attempt, many troopers were doing pushups for errors in the sequence.
After each weapon had been reassembled to Sergeant McIntyre's exacting specifications, they were all issued ten clips of ammunition totaling three hundred rounds. This was not a trivial amount of weight so part of the issue was web gear with pouches to hold all the ammunition. There was also instruction given on how to wear it.
"This will be your basic load," he said. "You will carry it for the rest of the time you are training, unless otherwise instructed by one of the training NCO's."
The rest of the day was spent learning the technical foibles of the weapon and how to clear various types of mechanical faults. Later in the day, the troops actually got to shoot a couple hundred rounds at stationary targets. Of course, in the real battle, the targets would not be stationary.
Chapter VI
After dinner, when everyone else was headed to the berthing area either to study or sleep, Jeffy corralled Jarl, Harm, and Taol.
"Time for a staff meeting gentlemen," Said Jeffy
"Aw, Sar Major," said Jarl raggedly. "You said this was going to be an easy day."
"Today was just a warmup for tomorrow. We need to start thinking about the battle," said Jeffy who was now all business.
"Jeffy's right," said Taol wearily. "We won't be in any better shape to start planning tomorrow than we are today. Let's head for the office."
The staff went to a cheaply furnished conference room. On the wall was a holographic presentation of the terrain they would be fighting on. Looking at the map, everyone could see that the Condor Legion’s training area and the Krasni's were back to back, separated by a blast door. This door would remain in place for the entire time the mercenary companies were in the habitat.
On the opposite side of the habitat, equally distant from each team's starting point was a hill. This hill was marked with a blue star and was considerably larger than any other terrain feature on the map. The rest of the terrain was rolling, heavily wooded hills. There was a winding road that crossed the hill with the blue star.
"Make yourselves comfortable gentlemen," said Jeffy. "As you can see by the map, the Gaming Commission has released the terrain. This road, which runs the length of the habitat, is twelve kilometers long. The hill marked by the star is exactly six kilometers from either side. The hill is our objective. Buried at the crown of the hill is the three hundred kilo credit winner’s prize. The side which holds the hill at the end of the game will be the winner."
"How long will the game last?" asked Sergeant Mason.
"Four hours, with a break at the half way point for the Regens to clear the field
."
"It's obviously easier to take an unoccupied hill verses a defended one," said Taol. "Harm, what have you managed to beg borrow or steal the way of fast, light vehicles?"
"Well, considering the size of the GE habitat and the small size of forces involved, I figured that high speed reconnaissance type vehicles would be essential. So, I picked up some salvage from one of the AA games. All in all, I came up with twenty motorcycles, ten Sdk 251 halftracks, four Pzk 222 armored cars, three Sdk 250 command tracks, and two Pack 40 75mm anti-tank guns. Sergeant Tierney, our mobility and maintenance expert, assured me he could mount the anti-tank guns on halftracks instead of towing them for greater mobility."
"Sounds good," said Colonel Ubner. "Sergeant Tierney, how serviceable is this salvage?"
"Sir," said Sergeant Tierney, "I figure if we cannibalize some of the worst machines for parts, we can end up with enough vehicles to motorize our whole force. But what will we train with? I can't have all of these abused heaps of machinery ready in the next three days even if I get considerable help from the troopers."
"Just come up with representatives of each type of vehicle, starting with the motorcycles," said Taol calmly. "We will just have to phase the troopers through them in shifts. Are there any problems with that, Sar Major?"
"None we can't handle,” said Jeffy. “Could you get one of the halftracks mounting a 75mm ready fairly quickly though? Gun crews will need the most training."
"I'll have one ready in two days," said Tierney.
"Tell me Harm," said Jeffy with a twinkle in his eye. "Did you get a price reduction on the bent-up machines?"
"No, Sar Major. I didn't think of it," said Harm with alarm.
"I feel a whole lot better Colonel," said Jeffy winking mischievously. "I was beginning to think our Business Agent here was perfect!"