A World of Hurt Read online

  "Well, we all want you in command of that platoon, but you've created a problem for me. So this time I'm making you an officer and that's that." He nodded to Bass, giving him permission to speak.

  "You can't do that, sir."

  "I don't care what you say, Charlie. I'm doing it."

  "Sir, with all due respect, you can't. As you said, sir, Marine Corps regulations allow for the commander of a forward FIST to permanently assign a senior NCO as a platoon commander, but they don't allow for a Marine to be assigned to the Officer Training College against his will. Besides, the last I heard, 34th FIST was quarantined and nobody is allowed to be transferred, so I couldn't go to Arsenault even if I wanted to."

  "You're absolutely right, Charlie. I can't make you go to Arsenault against your will, and I wouldn't if I could--if I did, I wouldn't get you back after you received your commission. And we are still under quarantine, so Arsenault is a moot point."

  "Sir?" Bass said, confused. "How can you make me an officer if I don't go to the finishing school?" The pill Doc Horner had provided may have eradicated most of Bass's pain, but his neural pathways weren't quite up to snuff yet, otherwise he wouldn't have called OTC "finishing school" in front of the brigadier.

  Shiro and Parant both sharply elbowed him in the ribs, and he bit off a grunt.

  Sturgeon bowed his head to hide a smile. Stone-faced again, he looked up. "Gunnery Sergeant, yes, there is some etiquette instruction at OTC, but more than ninety-five percent of it is in matters such as leadership, tactics, weapons, combined arms--courses you're well qualified to teach. Frankly, sending you to OTC would be a waste.

  "Do you know what an Executive Order is, Charlie?"

  Bass was startled by the abrupt change of subject. "Yessir. It's a law the President of the Confederation makes by fiat, without going through Congress."

  "That's right. I have here," he lifted a sheet of foolscap and turned it so Bass could see its ornate calligraphy and ornamentation, "an Executive Order empowering me to grant commissions as I find necessary."

  The blood drained from Bass's face.

  "You see, Charlie, President Chang-Sturdevant couldn't go to Congress for this legislation. Hardly anybody in Congress knows that 34th FIST is quarantined, much less the reason for it. She also understands that 34th FIST is better off if some replacement officers come from within than if they come from outside and get the shock of their lives when they find out what they're in for only when they get here."

  He grinned. "Charlie, this document means I can make you an officer. You don't have to go to OTC for the small amount of training it offers that you're ever likely to need--there isn't that much in the way of 'polite society' on Thorsfinni's World." He shook his head. "Which is a very good thing. I've seen your scandalous behavior in 'polite company.'

  "So, Charlie, all you can do at this point is smile and say, 'Thank you, sir!'"

  Bass's face went from pale to flushed in a flash. He started to rise, but dropped back onto the chair when he saw Shiro and Parant start to reach for him. "Damnit, sir, I'm a gunnery sergeant, I outrank almost any damn ensign. You're busting me!"

  "AS YOU WERE, GUNNERY SERGEANT!" Shiro bellowed.

  Parant jumped to his feet and leaned over Bass, his fists clenched at his sides. "You've already been busted a couple of times, Bass. You're bucking for another!"

  "But--"

  They all turned to Sturgeon, who was almost doubled over with laughter.

  "Oh-my-Charlie," he gasped as he struggled to get himself under control. He weakly waved at the two sergeants major to resume their seats. After a moment he gained enough control to assume a stern expression, but wasn't able to hold it and broke up laughing again. It took a few more moments before he calmed down to occasional laughing barks.

  "Charlie, Charlie, Charlie," he said, and took a deep breath. "Yes, yes, your final enlisted rank does outrank the final enlisted ranks of most ensigns, but really, an ensign outranks a sergeant major." He held up a placating hand to Shiro and Parant. "Technically outranks." Shiro and Parant looked only partly mollified.

  "As I was saying. Your pay remains the same, but you get additional allowances. Seniority for ensigns is a bit more complex than it is for other officers; as final enlisted rank enters into the calculation, it's not based simply on date of commission.

  "Charlie, you've been doing the job, and in a most exemplary manner." He had enough control now to turn serious. "Any ensign doing as good a job as you've done would be strongly recommended for promotion to lieutenant--I think you know that. You don't lose anything by accepting a commission. Instead you gain. I've got enough officers now, so I have to fill your billet with an officer. I'd rather keep you in it, but there are things even the commander of a forward outpost FIST--even one under quarantine and with an Executive Order in hand--can't do."

  "Sir, with all respect," Bass said, speaking more soberly as well. "You were an NCO yourself once. You remember how senior NCOs feel about ensigns. They're mostly kids, even if they were sergeants or staff sergeants before they got commissioned. They need to be nurse-maided and trained. I don't want to be nurse-maided."

  Sturgeon shook his head. "That attitude was supposed to change when the Marine Corps decided only to commission officers from the ranks. Sadly, it hasn't, and that leads some senior NCOs who would make outstanding officers to decline commissions, thus depriving both themselves and the Marine Corps." He tapped the Executive Order. "There's something else this does. It authorizes me to promote officers under my command as needed."

  "Sir?"

  "There's nothing in Marine Corps regulations that says a lieutenant has to be a weapons platoon commander or a company executive officer."

  "Sir?"

  "There's nothing that says a lieutenant can't be a blaster platoon commander."

  "Sir?"

  "If I feel like it, I can make you, by rank, the senior blaster platoon commander in the infantry battalion." He nodded to van Winkle. "With Commander van Winkle's concurrence, of course."

  "I have no problem with that, sir," van Winkle said.

  "It's settled then." He looked at the assembled officers and senior NCOs. "After operations on Kingdom, 34th FIST has quite a few men who merit decorations and deserve promotions. There will be a combined award and promotion ceremony in a FIST formation four days from today." He looked back at Bass. "I'm glad the staff sergeant and the sergeant I'm going to commission then haven't given me the same grief over it that you have, Charlie.

  "Now. The new officers will need new dress reds. Thirty-fourth FIST is going to revive a discarded tradition; their first set of officers' reds will be a gift from the FIST's other officers." He looked at van Winkle. "Two of the new ensigns are yours, Commander. Will you take care of that?"

  "Yessir, gladly, sir," van Winkle said with a grin.

  Sturgeon looked around the room again. "Gentlemen, this is Sixth Day. Why aren't you off base enjoying some liberty? Not you, Charlie. You're going to New Oslo with the other two who are about to be commissioned to get your new uniforms."

  On the flight to New Oslo, Bass ignored the staff sergeant from Mike Company and the sergeant from the transportation company who were going with him to Thorsfinni's World's finest men's clothier for the final fitting of their dress reds. Instead he mused over the sequence of events that culminated in his getting a commission.

  The scientific team on Society 437, more commonly called "Waygone" because of how far it was from inhabited worlds--an Earthlike planet that was being examined by the Bureau of Human Habitability Exploration and Investigation for possible colonization--had missed two consecutive routine reports. His platoon was detached from 34th FIST and dispatched to investigate. They discovered that Society 437 had been invaded by an alien sentience armed with acid-shooting weapons who wiped out the entire thousand-person team. In a harrowing operation, the platoon met and wiped out the small invading force. On their way back to Throrsfinni's World, their ship was intercepted by a major
general from Headquarters, Marine Corps, who ordered them never to speak of what they'd encountered on Society 437. Any slip would result in automatic sentence without appeal to the penal world of Darkside--a prison from which no one was ever paroled.

  Not long afterward, third platoon along with the rest of Company L was sent on a secret mission under the command of an army general. This time they went to Avionia, a world that was quarantined, the public was told, because of virulent pathogens that killed all who landed on it. The truth was far, far different. Avionia was home to yet another alien sentience, one that had only reached the cultural level of fifteenth-century Earth. Avionia was quarantined for the protection of its native population. But the world also held a unique commodity--a type of gemstone that became highly prized when some were leaked into the marketplaces of Human Space. Not only were outlaws secretly landing on Avionia and smuggling the gemstones out, they were providing some of its inhabitants with weapons four or five centuries beyond anything the local technology was capable of producing, thereby threatening to disrupt the natural development of the Avionians in ways that could conceivably lead to their extinction. Company L's mission was to put the smugglers out of business and retrieve the weapons from the locals who had them--to kill that technology.

  Thirty-fourth FIST was normally a two-year duty station, but transfers had stopped without explanation or notice. Brigadier Sturgeon had made a trip to Earth to find out why. Assistant Commandant of the Confederation Marine Corps, Anders Aguinaldo, found out 34th FIST was quarantined to prevent knowledge of the alien sentiences from spreading. Not only were transfers to other units canceled, so were releases from active service due to end of enlistment or retirement--assignment to 34th FIST had, in effect, very quietly become a life sentence.

  Thirty-fourth FIST had recently returned from Kingdom, a human world that had been invaded by a major force of Skinks--the name the Marines had given the aliens who invaded Society 437. They had been joined on that campaign by 26th FIST. Bass wondered if 26th FIST was also quarantined now. And what about Kingdom? Or the sailors of the CNSS Grandar Bay, the ship on which the Marines had gone to Kingdom and that supported them in the operation?

  For that matter, was the civilian population of Thorsfinni's World also closed off from two-way contact with the rest of humanity?

  Ah, thinking about it did no good. All that accomplished was to raise questions and make him think the situation wasn't fair. Great Buddha's balls! One lesson lengthy service in the Marine Corps had taught him was that nothing was ever fair. Anyway, through the window he could see they were on the final approach to New Oslo, the capital city of Thorsfinni's World. Capital city? With its million-plus population, New Oslo was the only real city on Thorsfinni's World, and it looked like a village compared to cities he'd visited on other worlds. New Oslo was on the southern part of Niflheim, a fjord-rent island roughly the same shape and size as the Scandinavian peninsula on Earth, and at about the same latitude. That, and the fact that it was the largest island on the continentless planet, was why Ulf Thorsfinni had selected it for his settlement when he'd led the first colonists there.

  New Oslo. Bass wondered if Katie still lived there, and if she was still single and available--and still willing to talk to him after he'd been out of touch for so long. He flinched when he realized he hadn't seen her since before the Diamunde Campaign. She was probably a fat, contented hausfrau with three fat, happy babies by now. Still, they'd had a lot of fun together. It wouldn't hurt to look her up. Anyway, she was more pleasant to think about than aliens and quarantines. And certainly more pleasant than thinking about how he was going to walk out of that clothier with an officer's dress reds.

  The bloodred tunic with its stock collar was fine; the only difference between it and the dress reds tunic he'd worn through his entire career was it was made of better material and was tailored. Not even that--he'd had his tunics tailored for the past fifteen years! But those gold trousers--the agony! He liked the blue trousers with blood-stripe outer seam that showed he was a noncommissioned officer. Like most enlisted Marines, he'd always thought officers' dress reds were entirely too gaudy.

  And he had to turn in his hard-earned--and more-than-once-earned--chevrons, rockers, and crossed blasters for the lousy single silver orb of an ensign's rank insignia. They'd let him keep the wound stripes on his sleeve. As if he wanted entire worlds to see them and know how many times he'd done something dumb in the line of fire and gotten injured. If the tailor had put the wound stripes on his sleeve, he decided, he'd have him take them off. That was one benefit of being an officer--officers didn't have to show off that badge of error.

  The aircraft landed. Bass and the other two soon-to-be officers piled into a waiting courtesy car and were whisked off to the clothier.

  The other two were greatly impressed when they saw the mass of decorations and medals already mounted on Bass's waiting tunic; he had more than both of them combined.

  In less than an hour they left, each carrying a bundle. On the way to the hotel where they would stay until returning to Camp Ellis in two days, Bass gave his companions directions to a not-too disreputable establishment where they could find decent food, inebriating drink, and willing women.

  As for him, once he stowed his new uniform, he got out his personal comm and punched up Katie's number.

  She wasn't there anymore, which didn't much surprise him. Comm Central reported that while he was away on Kingdom she'd moved to--

  Bronnysund?

  Bronnysund--"Bronnys," as the Marines of 34th FIST called it--was a fishing town in the northern reaches of Niflheim. More to the point, it was the local liberty town for Camp Ellis. Why had Katie moved to Bronnys? Had she met and married a fisherman? That didn't seem at all like the Katie he'd known and very nearly loved. Did she go there in search of Charlie Bass? That didn't seem very likely either, but the thought certainly stoked his ego.

  Maybe she'd like to come to his commissioning ceremony. Yessir! Katie pinning on one of his silver orbs. That would almost make having to go through the stupid ceremony worthwhile!

  To hell with his orders to remain in New Oslo for two more days. He caught the next flight back to Bronnys and looked for Katie. He found her too.

  Chapter Two

  Minister of the Interior Anton Elbrus sighed dramatically. "Where did he go? Do any of you have any idea?" he asked the quintet of Firstborn who stood in a loose group before his desk. Nobody spoke right away. Instead, they cast secretive glances at each other and avoided looking at him.

  Elbrus's fingers drummed a brief tattoo on his desk. He was a middle-aged man who looked exactly like what he'd been most of his life--a mild-mannered bureaucrat. So it came as a surprise to the younger people in his office when he slammed the flat of his hand onto his desktop with a sharp crack. He further surprised them by shouting, "Come on! You're supposed to be Samar's friends. You know how long he's been gone. You know the last time he contacted any of you. And you know he's missing! Don't you care that your friend is missing, that he might be injured or lost and needs help? You, Yenisey." He thrust a finger at one of them. "Since childhood you two have always done everything together. I'm surprised you didn't go with him. Where did he go?"

  Kerang Yenisey quickly looked around at the others, but if he looked for help, none appeared--the others studiously avoided making eye contact with him. "He said he wanted to find a way into one of the hidden valleys," Yenisey finally mumbled.

  "I think we all know that," Elbrus replied dryly. "There are hundreds, maybe thousands, of hidden valleys. Which one? "

  The young people, all members of the first generation of colonists born in Ammon, the only populated area on Maugham's Station, cast nervous glances at each other, but nobody said anything, even though they all had a general idea where Samar Volga had gone.

  "He went into one of the interdicted areas, didn't he?" Elbrus asked. That wasn't a wild guess--most of the land area of Maugham's Station was interdicted. "Well?" he
asked when no one spoke up.

  Yenisey looked at the others again, and when they still didn't speak up, he said, "He went to Haltia. Almost a month ago."

  Elbrus squeezed his eyes closed for a moment; that was even worse than he'd expected. Haltia wasn't far outside Ammon, but it was one of the most rugged of the interdicted areas, and it would be a very difficult area to search.

  "Why did he pick Haltia?" he asked so softly it was almost a whisper.

  Volga's friends exchanged quick glances, a couple of them nervously licking their lips. They also knew it would be harder to find their missing friend there than in almost any other area on the continent.

  "Almost a month," Elbrus said. "I know he's been gone for almost a month." He fixed Yenisey with a sharp glare. "How long did he say he'd be gone?"

  "A couple of weeks," the young man mumbled.

  "A couple of weeks," Elbrus repeated. "A couple of weeks! And how much longer were you going to wait before any of you mentioned he was overdue? Don't you realize how much trouble your friend could be in? Didn't it occur to any of you that he might need help?" He stood abruptly and leaned forward, fists planted aggressively on his desktop. "Do you realize he could be dead because none of you thought it was important to report him missing?"

  "He's been overdue before," Tanah Ob murmured.

  Elbrus looked at her coldly. "Before? You mean this isn't the first time he's gone into Haltia?"

  "No--I mean yes--I mean, I mean--" the young woman stammered.

  "He hasn't gone into Haltia before," Yenisey said.

  "Then where has he gone before?"

  Yenisey hung his head and sighed though not as dramatically as Elbrus had earlier. He was already talking, he decided, so he might as well give up on holding anything back. "He's been to Baltica, Aland, and Ugric before."

  "To get into the valleys?" Those three areas, all interdicted, were within an easy day's land travel from Olympia, Ammon's capital city.