Dust World Read online

  “Lucky you,” Carlos said. “You would have been reported AWOL if you hadn’t shown up by tomorrow night. Anyway, here’s the update: our contract was canceled. We’ve got a new one, though. We ship out in less than a week. No one seems to know where we’re going or what the mission is.”

  I nodded. “I hear there are a lot of legion contract cancellations happening.”

  “Figures,” Carlos said. “Everyone’s getting a vacation except for us. Same old Varus bullshit. Whatever the new job is, I bet it’s going to suck.”

  I couldn’t argue with him on that point.

  On the way down to Legion Varus’ offices, which were located on the lower floor, we ran into two legionnaires. They were standing on either side of the escalators, loitering.

  I could tell right off they were from a different legion than we were. They had shiny black boots, and their legion patch depicted Taurus, the raging bull. The emblem indicated they were both from Germanica, a respectable outfit. I noticed that the symbol was bigger than our wolf’s head symbol. In fact, their patches were so wide they were hard to ignore.

  Germanica was one of the famous legions. I’d tried to join them when I’d first come to the Mustering Hall last year. They hadn’t wanted me, and I’d joined Varus instead.

  Carlos and I glanced at these two, then moved to walk between them to the escalators, but they moved to bar our way.

  “What do you losers want?” asked the legionnaire on the right. She was a black woman with a pair of the thickest thighs I’d ever seen on a fit person.

  The legionnaire on the left gave a bark of laughter at her comment. He had his arms crossed—and they were big arms, I had to give him that. He had reddish curly hair that was cut so tightly it looked like he had a cap on his head. He was a specialist too, same rank as me, but his second patch indicated he was a weaponeer.

  “You want to go downstairs where the rats live?” the woman asked. “That’s it, isn’t it, rat?”

  “Yeah?” Carlos said, puffing up his chest a bit. “You clowns from Germanica shouldn’t talk big. I hear your last contract was cancelled. And I do mean your last.”

  Their faces, which had been bullying and amused, suddenly displayed rage. Carlos had a special gift when it came to making people want to hit him. I knew Germanica had lost their contracts, everyone had. Their contracts had mostly come from Steel World, but that was all over with now.

  “You little shit,” the redheaded weaponeer said, stepping forward and poking Carlos with a thick finger. “That’s why we’re here. We want to talk to you Varus bastards. You’re the reason we lost our contracts in the first place.”

  As legionnaires from different legions, we were technically in the same overall force. But there was a strong sense of rivalry between the different outfits. In the past, troops from various military services hadn’t always gotten along. There had always been Army-Navy rivalry, for example. But with legionnaires it was even stronger than that. We were more like armies from different allied countries. We operated independently, and we had complex relationships.

  In the case of Legion Varus, however, the relationships weren’t complex. Pretty much everyone else despised us.

  I put my hands up in a cautioning gesture. I figured we could settle this calmly. After all, I’d just been in one fight, and that was usually my limit on any given evening. But before I could speak words of peace and wisdom, Carlos had his mouth open again.

  “Unemployed,” he said, then laughed. “We’ve got a contract, and you’re standing in the way of one of Earth’s few sources of hard currency. I wonder why the aliens picked us over you guys? Maybe because we get the job done instead of whining about how our cush deals went sour. I’m glad you pukes got cancelled. Maybe you’ll have to do some real fighting next time out.”

  The redhead’s fist was pulling back before Carlos even finished his little speech. I couldn’t recall seeing a guy’s face go from white to red quite that quickly before. The situation might have been a record for Carlos, who often generated this sort of response from people.

  “Stand down, Specialist!” called a voice.

  We looked and saw an officer striding in our direction. She looked small but mean. She had a Hegemony patch on her shoulder, a globe, and under that there were two bars which served as the universal emblem of rank for adjuncts.

  I could tell the redhead was uncertain. His arm stayed up and cocked. I could almost see in his mind that he was weighing a night in the brig against the joy of punching Carlos. It was a tough call, and I couldn’t blame him for hesitating.

  Not helping matters, Carlos was smiling at him and tapping at his chin with his middle finger, begging for the punch.

  The female legionnaire from Germanica defused things. She put her hand on the redhead’s fist and gently pushed it down.

  “These rejects aren’t worth it,” she said, giving each of us a sneer. “You know, you’re right, we did lose our contracts. But we got new ones: bullshit missions because of Varus!”

  The two stepped aside and left. The adjunct glared us, watching as we separated. When we’d safely passed down the escalator, she disappeared.

  “I was totally going to take down that ginger-headed moron,” Carlos said. “He’s lucky a couple of girls were there to save his sorry ass.”

  “Uh-huh,” I said.

  Carlos looked at me, and his expression turned thoughtful. “What do you think she meant about getting new bullshit contracts?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe they have to take on crappy jobs like we do. Maybe that’s why they’re hating us right now.”

  “They always hate us. But yeah, that makes sense. I bet they’re trying to carve out new territory. Ha! That serves them right! Let them do some hard fighting and dying for a change.”

  “You’re a bitter little man, Carlos,” I told him.

  He glared at me, but then he looked thoughtful again. “Do you think everyone on Earth blames us for what happened? For the lizards dropping contracts with all the legions?”

  “Probably. The news-nets are pushing that idea. They never accuse us directly, but they hint around all the time. They talk about how the very last legion to set foot on Cancri-9 was the ‘notorious’ Legion Varus. Then they go into a brief discussion about what a bunch of losers and misfits we all are.”

  “But that’s just a cover story, right? I mean, Hegemony Gov knows we’re the best, right? That’s what you said the Tribune told you.”

  I glanced at him and felt a guilty pang. The truth was the Tribune hadn’t told me any such thing. He’d said we took on the jobs that no one else wanted, and that we did essential work. But that pretty much describes morticians and school janitors who sprinkle smart-dust on barf stains, too. Just because you had a hard, necessary job didn’t guarantee anyone would respect you for it.

  I decided to maintain the fiction, however. Now wasn’t the time to bring Carlos down any further.

  “Yeah,” I said. “That’s right. We’re the best in the system. They’re just jealous.”

  “Damn straight.”

  We reached the Varus offices and walked into a wardroom. It wasn’t big enough to hold all the soldiers present, so we had to stand in the back, shoulder to shoulder. There must have been a hundred people in the room, which was built to hold half that number.

  “Glad you could make it, McGill,” Veteran Harris rumbled at me.

  I touched my fingers to my cap and flashed him a smile he didn’t return.

  “Eyes front,” he said.

  I looked forward and saw another familiar face. It was Primus Turov. She was the leader of my cohort, which was mostly made up of people from North America Sector. She didn’t like me, but fortunately she wasn’t looking in my direction right now. The only thing I liked about the woman was her posterior, which I found myself staring at right off.

  With an effort, I tuned into the briefing. I had the feeling she’d been talking for quite a while.

  “Our destination wor
ld is still a secret, but our mission is not. We’re to grow Earth’s territory. We’ve lost certain critical accounts, and they aren’t coming back. Because of that, our entire world is feeling an economic bite.”

  “More like an economic swallow,” whispered Carlos.

  Veteran Harris must have been waiting for this moment, as he’d positioned himself nearby. It was like he’d known that one of us would eventually make a comment. His boot slid sideways, crashing into Carlos’ shins. It was a move I’d seen him use before, usually on recruits who weren’t showing the appropriate level of respect. Carlos made an odd sound that made me wonder if he’d consumed a small animal in a single gulp. The troops around us grinned faintly, without ever taking their eyes off the Primus. I had to admit, I was grinning too.

  The Primus’ head turned, and she stared at us coldly for a second or two before continuing with her speech and her walk. That woman really knew how to walk. It had to have something to do with her hips and the heels of her officers’ boots. Hell, I don’t know. I felt like I was being hypnotized by some kind of exotic snake as I listened and stared.

  “This campaign will be different,” she said. “As you muster back in, you’ll all be required to pass a specialized battery of tests.”

  There were groans. I glanced at Carlos, but he was keeping his lips compressed together tightly, resisting his natural urges. Veteran Harris’ arm lashed out twice, slapping recruits who’d dared to voice their dismay.

  Discipline in a modern legion was very physical. I’d read a bit about the old Roman legions during my shore leave. The historical records had stipulated a long list of harsh punishments for soldiers in ancient times. One or two had stuck out in my mind. When a Roman citizen signed on for military service and took the oath known as the sacramentum, he knew what he was in for. The sacramentum stated that he would serve Rome on pain of punishment up to and inclusive of his death. The discipline was much more rigorous in those days, and Earth had revived the old model in response to the Galactic Empire’s requirements.

  In ancient Rome, an officer had the power to summarily execute anyone under his command. Depending on the nature of the crime and the disposition of the commander, punishments varied. A man might be fined a few silver coins for minor infractions, or he might be publicly flogged until his skin hung from his back in bloody strips. For serious crimes like treasonous behavior, the standard penalty was to be sewn into a leather sack full of snakes and tossed into a nearby lake or river to drown while the serpents presumably went mad and chewed on the disgraced soldier.

  Although I’d never heard of anyone being drowned with reptiles, I was pretty sure some commanders had thought it over—especially if they were dealing with a guy like Carlos.

  “Yes,” said the Primus loudly with her hands on her hips. She’d stopped strutting around and now looked deadly serious. “I’m talking about a few tests: blood, core-samples, the works. You’ll have to pass physical stress-tests, too. I don’t want any weaklings on this campaign. The stakes are too high.”

  Core-samples? I didn’t even know what the hell that was, and I exchanged worried glances with a few others nearby.

  “We’re heading to a harsh environment,” Turov continued as if that explained everything. “I’m only making sure we’re all fit to do our duty. Accordingly, I want everyone to spend the night in the Hall instead of heading out to the spaceport. We don’t have the facilities to do the testing on the transports, and Corvus won’t be in orbit until the very hour we launch. We’ll do the tests here, and they will be administered by Hegemony personnel.”

  Another round of groans and cuffing sounds swept the chamber. This wasn’t good news. As harshly as my legion’s personnel treated us, they were at least on our side. They’d been in battle with most of us, and some of us had even developed personal relationships with the bio specialists.

  That wouldn’t be the case with the Hegemony people. They weren’t our friends. If the reaction of the two Germanica legionnaires was any indicator, this was going to go badly. Most members of other legions had spit on us before, but now they thought they had a real reason to hate us.

  “Any questions?”

  I knew I shouldn’t, but I did it. I raised my hand.

  “For God’s sake, McGill…” Harris muttered.

  I knew why he wanted me to stay quiet. Primus Turov and I went way back—in a bad way. She’d tried to have me executed—in fact, Harris himself had done the job, killing me with a grin on his face. But I’d managed to weasel out of that with an unauthorized revival. That had never sat well with Turov. The very fact I was still breathing annoyed my superior officer. It hadn’t been a good place to start off a relationship, but I hoped she might forget about it eventually.

  “Sir?” I asked when she called on me. “Has the legion considered trying to counter all the bad press we’re getting? I mean, everyone on the planet hates us now. They think we single-handedly brought financial ruin to Earth.”

  I don’t know what Primus Turov had expected me to ask—maybe something like “where’s the bathroom?” but I was pretty sure from her shocked expression that my question had taken her by surprise. She paused for a moment before answering.

  “Legion Varus’ reputation isn’t an issue,” she said. “Remember—all of you! We aren’t in this for the glory. Fame would only make our job harder. We’ll fix public opinion by fixing the problem, not by going on a PR campaign. What we want is to be forgotten about again. We fix things, but we don’t do it with fanfare. That’s our mission.”

  The meeting broke up after that. Carlos let out a sigh.

  “My life flashed before my eyes when you opened your big yap,” he told me. “But she took your question seriously. Must be bothering her, too.”

  “Yeah, sure,” I said. “It has to be bothering all the brass. How’d you like to be in charge of a unit like this for years only to have people talk crap about you online all day long?”

  “That’s the sad thing about it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Carlos shook his head. “I mean that even if we do fix it, we won’t get the credit. People will stop being mad, sure, but they’ll probably never know what we did or why.”

  I thought about it, and I had to admit to myself that he was probably right.

  “How about that Turov, huh?” Carlos asked when we’d rolled out insta-mats alongside the train-gliders and stretched out to sleep.

  I’d thrown my arm over my eyes—they never turned off the lights down here. I lifted my arm slightly and looked at him with bleary eyes.

  “What about her?” I asked him.

  “I’m talking about her butt,” Carlos said, rubbing his face and yawning. “Don’t pretend you didn’t notice. How can I want to screw someone and want to kill her at the same time?”

  I chuckled. “My father could explain that to you. He says that’s what marriage is all about.”

  -4-

  The next day was an entirely new flavor of Hell. These Hegemony bio-types had to be the most heartless bunch I’d ever encountered.

  It turned out that a “core sample” was just what it sounded like. They drove little round tubes of steel into our abdomens, tubes that had very sharp ends to them, and left them in our guts while we howled, squirmed and sweated.

  The real trick came when they pulled these meat-thermometers out of our bodies. They didn’t want to give us infections or cause organ failure—that would be inconvenient and require an expensive regrow. They wanted to take their measure of our guts and heal us back up from the inside.

  In order to accomplish this, the tubes were equipped with flesh-spraying tips. Ever so slowly as the tubes were withdrawn, they spit out enough fresh human cells to knit up our punctured bodies. We were left with nickel-sized scars on our bellies and tears running down our faces.

  “I want to congratulate you, Specialist Franklin,” Carlos said, his voice coming out in hitches. “You’ve invented the perfect torture device: plenty o
f pain, but no chance of relief through death.”

  He got a laugh out of Franklin with that line. She laughed quite heartily. I had to wonder if she really did get a charge out of taking core-samples.

  Afterward, the circular scars were tender, but we could function. Holding our sides, we moved slowly and painfully to the next chamber, anxious about further tests.

  I was surprised by what happened next. Instead of giving us a break, or making us take a sit-down test at least, they put us into sparring chambers. These were sealed, bubble-like affairs. They looked like tents. Carlos and I separated with a nod.

  “Good luck, buddy,” Carlos said. “The bio told me what’s coming up next, and you’re going to need some.”

  “What—?” I began, but he was gone, shunted off down through a line of groaning troops. Everyone had a hand on their side and a grimace on their face.

  As I entered my tent a robot grabbed me. It was skinny, a pile of wires and steel tubing. It had fingers—lots of them, and the damned thing seemed to be trying to frisk me.

  I’ve gotten into trouble in the past by abusing robots. In fact, I take a certain degree of pride in my ability to mess with them. But as the legion people never seemed to be happy with my changes to their scripts, I thought I would give the tech who operated this thing a chance.

  “Can someone please explain why I should put up with this?” I asked loudly of the plastic, shivering walls.

  No one answered me. That was typical of legion tests. They often wanted to see how I would handle a situation. Sometimes they were testing my psychology as well as my physical abilities. On other occasions, they just didn’t give a damn what I thought about anything and didn’t feel like bothering to tell me what the plan was.

  It was hot and humid in the tent. The pressure felt higher, too. There were no ventilation sources I could see, and as far as I could tell, the whole chamber was being filled up with a continuous blowing fan that pumped hot wet air into the dome. It was about thirty feet around and nearly as tall. I could easily stand up and walk around inside—that was, if the robot let go of my shirt.