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  The noncommissioned officers of Company L held poker games once a month. They played cards the old-fashioned way, with pasteboards. Very large sums of money were never bet or lost, though, because they played for the enjoyment of the game and the comradeship, not for the money. Of course, a casual observer would've thought differently, because once seated around the table they pretended to be vicious competitors out to cut each other's throats. That was part of the charade. Regard for rank was temporarily set aside for the evening, so the games were unruly, noisy affairs, with plenty of good-natured grousing and cursing. Brags, insults, and gossip flew about the smoke-filled room. Even business of one sort or another might be conducted over a slow hand of cards. And sometimes, as on that evening, they were joined by senior NCOs from battalion headquarters.

  They played in a back room at Big Barb's, where buxom serving girls kept the beer flowing and it was not unusual for an evening's big winner to treat the bar afterward—and the girl of his choice, upstairs. They could have played back at Camp Ellis in the NCO quarters, but at Big Barb's they could put aside the strict military discipline that ruled their lives. The raunchy exchanges that were such an important part of these monthly get-togethers stayed inside the little room. It just would never do for a lance corporal casually passing by to overhear a staff sergeant and his first sergeant nonchalantly calling each other names and then laughing it off. But such name-calling was confined strictly to that little back room at Big Barb's.

  The cards they used were the type the 'Finnis liked to play with, decorated with designs of gods from the ancient Norse mythology. Aces were represented by Ymir, the primeval giant, the equivalent of Chaos to the Greeks. Kings bore the image of Odin, and queens were Frigga, Odin's consort. Jacks were Thor, the second principal god after Odin. Tens through deuces were identified by their value, and otherwise the 'Finni decks consisted of the traditional fifty-two cards in four suits-clubs, spades, hearts, and diamonds. The games they played were also traditional dealer's choice, draw and stud poker mostly, with some ingenious variations. Wild cards were not permitted.

  "Gimme one," Top Myer announced, holding up a huge forefinger.

  Aha, Bass thought, two pair! He could outdraw Myer. "Three, please," he announced.

  "An honest man," Hyakowa said as he dealt Bass his three cards.

  When Bass got the cards, he did not look at them, just shuffled them together with the Odins. He would not look either, until he'd seen what the other players were taking.

  "I'll play these, thank you very much," Sergeant Major Parant announced. He smiled smugly and folded his hands across his stomach.

  A bluff? Bass asked himself. Not likely. The most Bass could expect to hit was three of a kind, maybe a full house, if he was lucky. Parant had to have a straight or a flush or a boat if he really was standing pat. But Bass knew that if he folded, he was out until the game was over, that was the rule. So he had to stay in—and probably lose.

  "Pat hand, you lying bastard?" Top Myer almost shouted.

  "Looks like it," Horner said glumly. "I give you blood when you're wounded, you suck my blood in these games. It's only fair. Give me three cards, please, Wang."

  Hmm, Bass thought, another pair. How high?

  "One card for me," Boyle announced.

  Easy hand to read, Bass thought: drawing to a straight or a flush.

  "Dealer," Hyakowa announced smugly, "takes—none!" He smiled victoriously at Sergeant Major Parant, who smiled back and just shook his head slowly.

  "Great Buddha's cock on a platter! Two freaking pat hands at one time! You unbelievably lucky turds!" Horner shouted, banging the table with a fist so hard the coins jumped.

  "Careful, there, clap-checker," Sergeant Major Parant cautioned, "that's my retirement fund you're disturbing." He grinned again, showing his teeth to Hyakowa.

  "Fragile vessels for liquid excretional matter, that's what you are, all of you," Boyle muttered as he looked at his cards and grimaced.

  "Pisspots? Don't you use them to cook our stew?" Hyakowa asked innocently.

  "Naw, he drinks outta 'em," Horner said. "Whose bet is it?"

  Hyakowa nodded toward Sergeant Major Parant. "Our fearless enlisted leader raised; it's his bet. Bet a lot, Top, I need your money."

  "You guys been to college, or near one at some time or other. You should have guessed I'm betting the limit, gents. Please contribute generously." He shoved six more kroner into the heaping pile of coins.

  "I see that obvious bluff and raise back six kroner," Horner announced calmly.

  Shit! Bass thought. He hit! With two pat hands in the game Horner couldn't be raising on three of a kind, the most likely combination, since he took three cards. Bass made up his mind to fold when it came his turn. He couldn't compete with those guys. At least one of them had to have a winner.

  "And I raise—you—all—back," Boyle said, carefully pronouncing each word as he shoved eighteen kroner into the pot.

  Now Bass considered himself more an observer of the game, not a player. Well, Boyle had hit his flush, and probably a high one at that.

  "Ahem, my dear friends and comrades," Hyakowa said gravely, counting out a stack of coins, "I reluctantly—I emphasize ‘reluctantly,’ because I hate to take money from the mentally retarded—raise you all back six kroner. This is the last raise, gentlemen, only three to a hand. House rules."

  "We all know the goddamn rules," Boyle muttered.

  "Twenty-four kroner to you Top, you too, Charlie," Hyakowa said as he shoved a pile of coins into the ante, a dangerously smug expression on his face.

  "Fuck you!" Top Myer snarled, "Next goddamn deployment, I'm gonna brief your ass the whole flight! I'm out." He showed two Ymers openers and some other cards that Bass did not see before the old first sergeant tossed them into the center of the table atop the coins and the other discards.

  "Charleee, it's on you." Hyakowa grinned. "You might—I only suggest it—look at your cards now, before you reluctantly, but with your usual gracious and consummate good taste and superb sportsmanship, fold and let me at last scrape into my hugely depleted coffers the winnings I have so richly earned."

  Bass shook his head. Wouldn't hurt to look. Bass looked. He pursed his lips. He scratched his head. "Uh, I need some change," he said, drawing a fifty-kroner note out of a pocket. He tossed it into the ante and counted out twenty-six one-kroner coins in change. "I call," he announced.

  "Well, girls, read 'em and weep," Sergeant Major Parant said as he laid down a full house, three tens over a pair of fours.

  "Beats my small straight," Horner admitted, throwing in his cards. "I'll go to Havanagas next year, maybe."

  Boyle showed a spade flush, Ymer and Frigga high. "The fate of my sainted mother is now on your head, Sergeant Major," he announced sadly.

  Hyakowa grinned and spread out four nines. The other players groaned. Sergeant Major Parant disgustedly gathered up his full house and pitched it into the center of the table. "Wang, you eat shit and whistle at the sailors."

  "He never whistled at me," Horner announced sadly, and pouted.

  "Yes, yes, indeed, my most respected sergeant major—you have too many teeth, Larry," Hyakowa said as an aside to the corpsman. "And now, Charles, the finest platoon commander in the Corps, what, pray tell, are you holding onto so tightly over there? It is only you, Dear Gunnery Sergeant Charles Bass, who stands between me and the delightful spread of fiduciary opulence on the table. Reveal thyself!"

  "Well," Bass said slowly, grimacing, "I have two pair."

  "Charlie!" Top Myer shouted. "What are you doing still in this game with only two pair?" The other players looked at Bass as if he'd lost his senses. Hyakowa laughed and reached for the money in the pot.

  "Not so fast, respected and dearly admired platoon sergeant," Bass said. "That's two pair of Odins. With a five kicker." He laid his cards down and spread them out. "One, two, three, and four. Four Odins. You can keep the five-spot kicker, Wang. I got two Odins on the draw." Ba
ss grinned victoriously at Hyakowa.

  Hyakowa, entirely deflated, slumped back in his chair. "Four nines and I get beat," he whispered incredulously. "God?" he shouted toward the ceiling. "Why are you screwing with me like this?"

  "Fine hand, Charlie," Sergeant Major Parant said. "You played it like you knew what you were doing." He leaned over and whispered, "When the game's over, I need to see you and Top Myer in private for a little while, okay?"

  Parant would not say what it was he wanted to talk to them about until they were back in his quarters at Camp Ellis. He handed each a cold beer produced from a tiny kitchenette and indicated they should take seats in the small alcove that served as a living room just off his sleeping compartment. Bachelor NCO quarters at Camp Ellis were comfortable but cramped.

  "I had a little talk with Sergeant Major Shiro this afternoon," he began, nodding in the direction of the FIST sergeant major's room, just down the hall from where they were sitting. "Did you know Brigadier Sturgeon's gone back to HQ at Fargo?"

  Top Myer's eyebrows shot up in surprise. He glanced over at Bass, who shook his head slowly. "The word we got was he took home leave. Fargo? Was he called back?" A worried expression crossed the first sergeant's face, and Bass leaned forward anxiously. The character of a FIST was determined by its commander. Thirty-fourth FIST was the best strike team in the Corps because Brigadier Sturgeon could bring out the best in a Marine. If he was being reassigned, that certainly was news, and it would affect every man in the unit.

  "He took home leave to go back to HQMC and talk to the Commandant," Parant announced slowly. The others just stared at him. Take home leave to go on official business? That was unprecedented. "Something's not right in this universe, and he took it upon himself to go back to Earth and find out about it. I don't need to tell you, we've got Marines in this FIST who are way beyond their scheduled rotation dates. Way beyond. That's unprecedented. We are being deliberately isolated on Thorsfinni's World, and the brigadier wants to know why." Parant paused and took a sip of beer. "Gentlemen, I think it's got something to do with Lima Company and its deployments to Society 437 and Avionia.

  "Now I don't know what you did on those deployments and I don't want to know," Parant continued, "but no Marine commander would ever, I mean ever, quarantine a whole combat unit just because some of its Marines had gone on a hush-hush mission somewhere. Negative. So if this does have something to do with your company, it means someone very—very—high up is fucking with us."

  "And the brigadier's gone all the way back to Earth to find out about it." Top Myer shook his head. "That's only what I'd expect him to do."

  Sergeant Major Parant took a long drink of his beer. "That's not all," he announced. "Colonel Ramadan got a message from Fleet this afternoon. Charlie, the Commandant himself has issued verbal orders assigning three men from your platoon TAD to some—some," he shrugged, "nowhere-place for an unspecified period of time. No explanation, just do it."

  "Who are they?" Bass set his beer carefully on the table. A cold knot of fear was beginning to form in the pit of his stomach.

  "That new corporal of yours, Pasquin, and lance corporals Dean and Claypoole. A whole fire team."

  Oh God, Bass thought, they talked! They're going to Darkside and this "temporary additional duty" crap is just the Corps' way of handling it quietly!

  "Captain Conorado will have battalion orders on his desk first thing in the morning," Parant continued. "I just thought you should know."

  "Well, I've been in the Corps all day," Top Myer said, "and this is not the first time I've been told to jump through my ass. So we'll get those lads ready to go, won't we, Charlie? And they're keepin' us all here on Thorsfinni's World till we croak?" He shrugged. "That ain't so bad, long's I got Charlie Bass commanding my third platoon." He laid his hand on Bass's shoulder.

  Bass smiled weakly. Hell, he thought, before long they'll have the whole damned FIST in that penal colony! Then he did smile. A pissed-off Marine FIST on Darkside? Worst mistake those Ministry of Justice farts could ever make!

  Captain Conorado sat at his console, reviewing Company L's training schedule for the next month. A block of three days had been set aside for low-gravity training on a navy vessel in orbit around Thorsfinni's World. Marine Corps regulations required that every Marine undergo the training annually unless excused by his commander. He was about to ask for a personnel status projection for the coming month, to see who wouldn't be available for one reason or another—men were always being detached for schools and special duties—when his console blinked a warning that a high-priority message was coming through.

  Damn! he thought at first. Another deployment? He was both angry and excited. Angry because he felt his company had had its fair share of deployments recently, the affair on Society 437 involving his third platoon, and then the Avionian affair that had almost gotten him court-martialed. But he was also, paradoxically, thrilled, because deployments are what Marines live for. Then he thought, No, it's about those orders from Fleet. Top Myer had briefed him first thing that morning on the news Sergeant Major Parant had given him and Bass after the poker game last night. Sure enough, it was Commander Van Winkle, his battalion commander. "Captain, I'll be in your orderly room in five minutes. Be sure your first sergeant and Gunny Bass are there." The screen went back to the personnel projections, but Conorado was no longer interested in them.

  Gunnery Sergeant Bass reported to his commanding officer three minutes and twelve seconds after the battalion commander's image blinked off Conorado's computer screen; Commander Van Winkle and Sergeant Major Parant arrived one minute, fifteen seconds later. Conorado, Top Myer, and Bass were waiting when they came through the door.

  "You're early," Conorado joked as they came in.

  "Into your office, Captain." Van Winkle nodded toward Conorado's open office door, not taking the humor of the moment. The four Marines trooped in and the door closed behind them, leaving the three enlisted Marines sitting in the outer office looking at each other in astonishment.

  "I don't like it when things I don't understand begin to affect the men assigned to my command," Van Winkle began without preamble. "This," he handed Conorado a set of battalion orders, "I do not understand." Conorado glanced at the orders, looked up questioningly at his battalion commander and then handed them to Myer and Bass, who pretended to look surprised when they read them. Sergeant Major Parant, standing behind his commanding officer, nodded at Myer and winked.

  It was just like Top Myer had said. The authority line on the orders read VOCCMC, "verbal orders, Commandant of the Confederation Marine Corps." The Commandant himself had given the order to detach the three Marines and send them off to—to someplace so remote nobody had ever heard of it before.

  "Any idea what's behind this, Captain?" Van Winkle asked.

  "No, sir. I was going to ask you that same question."

  Commander Van Winkle shook his head and sighed. "I guess we're not supposed to know what's up with L Company, Captain. God knows, it's got to be harder on you than anybody else. Well, better get them up here and break the news."

  "Where are they now, Charlie?" Conorado asked.

  "Down in the VR chamber, practicing aerial gunnery spotting, Skipper," Bass replied. "I'm on my way." He left without further protocol.

  "Now I want to know if you have been talking," Bass demanded. Pasquin, Dean, and Claypoole stood at rigid attention before their platoon commander's desk in his tiny office.

  "About what, Gunnery Sergeant?" Pasquin asked.

  "About Waygone or the Avionia deployment, goddamn it! Have you three been talking down in Bronnys or anywhere to anybody? Out with it!"

  "No!" all three answered as one.

  Bass stared at the trio silently for what to them seemed a full minute. "Okay," he said at last. "All right. You know the penalty for talking about those operations. Well, digest these, then," he said, handing each a copy of the battalion order.

  Each read them once, then twice. "Holy Hann
a," Pasquin exclaimed. "Where's No-Novo Khongor, Gunny? What's the Wanganui?"

  "One set of dress reds?" Claypoole asked, reading the orders. "What kind of deployment is this, Gunny?"

  "Khongor is way the hell and gone from here, and we're nowhere," Bass replied. "The CNSS Wanganui (AGS 742) is a goddamned surveying ship," he added disgustedly.

  "Oh, no," Dean whispered "Surveying" reminded him of Society 437. "Gunny, are we being sent out as Marine guards on some surveying mission?" The question was so preposterous Bass had to laugh. Dean's face turned red. Pasquin and Claypoole joined in the laughter, but they weren't so sure the question was such a dumb one.

  "Okay, here's what this means," Bass said at last. "The Commandant of the Marine Corps himself has issued verbal orders detaching you for some kind of duty on the Wanganui. I thought at first you'd blabbed and this was just the Corps' way of covering up an embarrassment, three of its men being sent off to Darkside—"

  "Shit!" Pasquin exclaimed. Dean and Claypoole started violently.

  "Belay that!" Bass commanded. "Belay that. I don't think that's what this is all about. I did at first, but not now. You said you didn't blab, so you didn't. Besides," a wry smile crossed the platoon commander's face, "who ever heard of going off to jail in your dress reds?

  "All right. We're going up to see the Skipper, and then Top Myer wants to talk to you three."

  Within twenty-four hours every man in L Company was convinced Pasquin, Dean, and Claypoole were in fact on their way to Darkside, and each began uneasily reviewing every word he'd said, drunk or sober, since the company had returned from Avionia. One thing they all knew for sure: Pasquin, Dean, and Claypoole were definitely in some very deep shit.

  Top Myer accompanied the trio into orbit. There he swung every bit of weight a first sergeant can swing to be allowed onto the fast combat support ship, the CNSS Yi Sun Pok, which would carry them to Novo Khongor and eventual rendezvous with the Wanganui. He needed a private meeting with his Marines before the starship launched.