Starfist: Blood Contact (11 page)

Captain Conorado came out of the barracks accompanied not only by Bass and Hyakowa, but by Top Myer, the company's first sergeant, and that was unusual. Top Myer almost never attended morning formation. Conorado looked displeased about something, and Bass and Hyakowa didn't look happy either. Myer was glowering, but that didn't mean anything—Top Myer usually glowered.

Gunny Thatcher didn't wait for Giordano's instructions—he called the company to attention as soon as he saw Conorado. The men waited expectantly while the captain took the company from Giordano and quickly went through the short list of business items he had for everyone. Then Conorado studied his company, looking more searchingly at third platoon than any of the others. Sharp-eyed Marines saw that the captain was nibbling on his lower lip.

"You all know that 34th FIST is one of the most active in the Marine Corps," Conorado began. "This FIST and its subordinate elements have been on more operations, expeditions, and other missions than almost any other unit in the entire history of the Confederation Marine Corps."

He paused a moment, then continued. "As you may know, the Bureau of Human Habitability Exploration and Investigation has research and exploration stations on numerous uninhabited planets throughout Human Space—and even beyond its fringes. One of those stations missed a reporting cycle.

The bureau has asked the Marine Corps to dispatch a platoon to investigate. Thirty-fourth FIST is the closest to this world, Society 437, so the job falls to us. In particular, third platoon gets the call, and will mount out on a special mission in two days.

"Some of you have gone on investigations such as this before, so you know there's probably no emergency. Usually when a Behind mission fails to report as required, it's because the scientists got so wrapped up in what they were doing that they forgot to report. Either that or there was a malfunction in the courier drone." He stifled a shrug. "Sometimes pirates or some natural disaster wiped out the scientific mission. In the first case, the scientists and technicians don't need any help, just a reminder. In the other case..." This time Conorado did shrug. "By the time third platoon reaches Society 437, nearly a year will have passed since the courier drone should have been dispatched, and it will be too late to fight off any dangers."

The captain abruptly stopped talking and pursed his lips. It seemed to him that sending Marines to investigate the situation was a waste of valuable manpower. And he knew if 34th FIST mounted out during the three or four months third platoon was gone, his company would be dangerously shorthanded.

But there were things he couldn't say. "That is all." He pivoted to face Gunny Thatcher. "Company Gunnery Sergeant, the company is yours."

"Sir," Thatcher said, pivoting to face Conorado, "the company is mine." He saluted and held the salute until Conorado began marching back to the barracks. Then he watched as the other officers and the first sergeant followed, and only then turned to face the company and dismiss it from formation.

The woo felt the mood in the platoon behind it and broke from its position to join the Marines.

"Woo?" Owen seemed to ask a question as it jumped onto Dean's shoulder. It rippled through several colors, not at all sure what its emotional state should be.

Bass went to the company office while Hyakowa instructed the squad leaders to get their men packed and ready to go. As soon as the squad leaders had the men moving, Hyakowa went to the company supply room to make arrangements with Sergeant Souavi for the storage of personal gear the Marines of third platoon would leave behind and the issuing of gear they'd need where they were going. Then he went to the company office looking for Bass.

"He's not here, Staff Sergeant," Corporal Doyle, the company's senior clerk, told him. Doyle was a bit surly; having one platoon detach for a mount-out meant more work for the two clerks. "He wanted to see the Skipper, but the Skipper was busy with the Top and couldn't see him."

Top Myer wasn't at his desk, and the door to the company commander's office was closed. Thatcher wasn't there either.

"Where'd he go?"

"I think he went to his quarters to pack."

Hyakowa grunted, and headed toward the wing of the barracks where the officers and senior noncommissioned officers had their private rooms. Bass's door was open.

"Why us?" Hyakowa demanded as soon as he entered the room. "Why are they sending third platoon?

We've got more new men than any other platoon in the battalion, more new fire team leaders and squad leaders learning their new jobs. Hell, I'm a long way from fully knowing my job. We need the training time! We're the last platoon that should be sent out on something like this."

Bass was sitting on a chair in front of a chest of drawers, sorting through its contents, separating the items he was taking from those he was leaving behind. He didn't look up; a head shake was his only reply.

"Gunny, we need to talk to somebody, get some other platoon sent on this mickey mouse errand. Our Marines need to be spending their time on training exercises, not lounging around on a troop ship."

Bass looked up and snapped, "You think I don't know that, Wang? We have our orders, even though we disagree with them. We'll set up the best training program we can manage on board ship, that's all.

This trip doesn't have to be a complete waste."

" ‘We have our orders.’ We follow them ‘even though we disagree with them.’ Gunny, do you have any idea how strange that sounds coming from you?"

Bass nodded. "I speak up when I disagree, yes. But when Mother Corps tells me to go someplace, I go. Doyle tell you about that?" He indicated a sheet of paper on top of the chest of drawers.

"No, what is it?"

"Read it."

Hyakowa stepped closer and picked up the page. It was orders from the battalion headquarters, signed by Commander Van Winkle himself, instructing Captain Conorado to detach third platoon under the command of Gunnery Sergeant Charlie Bass for an investigative mission to Society 437. At the bottom was an endorsement:

Heartily concur

(signed)

Theodosius Sturgeon

Brigadier, Commanding 34th FIST

"Doyle gave it to me when I went to see the Skipper," Bass said.

"Do you think Van Winkle asked the Skipper what platoon he wanted to send?"

"Didn't you notice how mad the Skipper seemed when he told us before formation? I don't think he was consulted. I think he was given orders just as we were given orders."

"But why us?"

Bass finished with the chest of drawers and stood to face his closet. "Maybe it's a test. Maybe someone wants to see if they promoted the right people. Then again," he turned to Hyakowa, "maybe somebody just thinks we're the best platoon in the FIST and they trust us to do the job right without having a higher ranking officer along to supervise."

Hyakowa looked at him oddly. That didn't sound right; it made too much sense.

When orders came down for a mount-out, they were always drop-everything, hurry-up-and-do-it-right-now. It didn't matter that third platoon had two days to get ready—the men had to pack and store, right now, whatever they weren't taking. So what if getting ready only took an hour?

People higher up the chain of command had things to do and wanted to make sure the men were ready first.

"So now what do we do, Corporal Kerr?" MacIlargie asked an hour after morning formation.

Kerr glanced around the fire team room. Everything they were taking was packed, other than a few last minute items they'd need over the next couple of days, and was either stowed in the company supply room or secured in the fire team room.

"Field day. When I get back I want this room so clean you'd be willing to let Top Myer eat off the deck." He left Claypoole and MacIlargie alone and went in search of Sergeant Bladon. Kerr knew MacIlargie was right. What were they supposed to do for the next two days?

Claypoole glared at MacIlargie. "You had to ask, didn't you." It took a struggle, but he managed not to shout too loudly. "You couldn't keep your mouth shut—you had to ask. Now we have to clean this room again."

"What's he talking about?" MacIlargie said, giving the room a puzzled look. "This room is clean. Since he got here it's been cleaner that it's ever been! What do we have to clean?"

"Since it was your big mouth that caused this field day, I'm going to stand here and supervise, make sure you do it right."

"There's nothing to clean, I mean look at this." MacIlargie bent over to brush his fingers across the floor. Then Claypoole's words hit him. Still bent over, he looked up. "What'd you say?"

"I said, ‘Since it was your big mouth that caused this field day, I'm going to stand here and supervise, make sure you do it right.’ "

"What do you mean, you're going to supervise and I'm going to do it?"

Claypoole leaned forward aggressively and tapped the insignia on his collar with his thumb. "See that?

I'm a lance corporal. You're a PFC. I rank you. In the absence of the fire team leader, I'm in charge. Get to work."

MacIlargie stood and gaped at Claypoole. Maybe he really should put in for a transfer, he thought.

Two days after getting their mount-out orders, third platoon assembled at the Camp Ellis landing field, which sometimes doubled as an orbital-craft terminal. Again, it was hurry-up-and-wait. They were on time, but the shuttle that would ferry them to the orbiting ship was an hour late. When they first saw the Essay, the navy's surface-to-orbit shuttle craft, it was a speck descending in a speed-eating spiral. When the Essay was still a thousand meters up, its coxswain pulled it out of its spiral and popped the drogue chute, slowing its speed further. At two hundred meters, forward-facing jets fired downward until nearly all forward motion was canceled and the Essay touched down with a slight bounce.

"It can't be," Charlie Bass murmured when he read the stenciled name on the side of the Essay.

"Can't be what?" Hyakowa asked.

"The
Fairfax County
. That ship was due for decommissioning the first time I mounted out on her." He shook his head. "That was more than twenty years ago."

"It's got to be another ship with the same name."

Bass looked beyond the stenciled name. "Nope. It's the AV-27 1. That was the Fairfax's number."

Hyakowa shrugged. "I guess they refurbished her, made a new ship in the same hull."

"I hope so. The old Fairfax was a real scow." But Bass didn't believe it; the Essay needed to be scraped and painted. That wasn't a good sign.

The ramp dropped and two Dragons from the ship's compliment scooted out on their air cushions.

They needed scraping and painting too. Bass groaned. Hyakowa swallowed.

"Let's do it," Bass said softly.

"Aye aye, boss." Hyakowa shouted orders to the squad leaders to have their men board the Dragons.

Owen the woo perched on Lance Corporal Dean's shoulder and restrained its eagerness to examine the interior of the Essay. It had ridden on Dragons, though, and simply hopped into a niche in Dean's webbing for the trip to orbit.

The smudges on the null-g vacuum suits of the sailors who affixed the tunnel to the Essay so the Marines could exit the shuttle through the well deck into the ship proper did nothing to inspire Bass's confidence in the ship. Neither did the chief petty officer who oversaw the actual transfer—he needed a shave, and the cuffs of his uniform shirt were frayed.

The thrumming of motors and the whining of heavy equipment, noises that always assaulted the Marines' ears when they boarded ships in orbit, sounded a bit off as if they were missing an occasional beat. The bulkheads of the passageways needed scraping and painting, and the decks were embedded with deeply ground-in crud. At one point, as the sailors towed the weightless Marines along the passageways to their compartment, Bass noticed that the gasket on a safety hatch was corroded badly enough to prevent it from making an airtight seal. He closed his eyes and forced himself to relax.

"It's a hold!" Hyakowa exclaimed when the Marines reached their destination. "This isn't a troop compartment, it's some kind of hold."

The large room the Marines were deposited in had rows of metal pipes going from the deck to the overhead three meters above. Horizontal metal frames, two-thirds of a meter wide and little more than two meters long, were supported by the pipes. The frames were half a meter apart. Each had a sheet of polymer stretched across it. Cots. Passages less than a meter wide ran between the rows of cots. A quick calculation showed two hundred cots.

Bass shook his head. "It's a compartment all right. This is what they used to look like. The
Fairfax
was built for use in the Third Sivistrian War. The Confederation had to move a lot of Marines and soldiers in a hurry, so the troops got packed into compartments like this." He sighed. "But they used to be in better condition."

The compartment's deck was as filthy as the passageways had been. The lighting was uneven, since some fixtures weren't working and hadn't been fixed or replaced. There were no personal lockers for the troops. Even the woo looked dismayed at the living conditions.

"All right, listen up!" Bass called out. His men turned to look at him from whatever perch or handhold they were anchoring themselves to. From their expressions, he knew they were more put out than he was by the compartment and the ship.

"You heard the Skipper when he gave us our marching orders—this isn't an emergency operation. As you can tell by our luxury accommodations, the navy doesn't put a high priority on it either. We'll be getting underway soon. Once we have gravity again, we'll rearrange this compartment to make it more livable. Now stand by, I'm going topside to see—"

He was interrupted by static from the ship's PA system. "Now hear this, now hear this," a slightly annoyed voice said through the static. "All hands not at duty stations, secure yourselves for getting underway. Gravity will go on in thirty seconds. That goes for the Marines too."

The static clicked off.

"You heard the man," Bass said. "Secure your gear in a lower rack and get into a higher one. Do it now."