Old Man's War Read online

  I had another idea. Our BrainPals made it possible for us to maintain constant, silent contact with each other regardless of whether we were standing close to one another or not. Other platoons seemed to be missing the implications of this fact, but that was too bad for them. I had every member of the platoon open a secure BrainPal communication line with every other member, and then I had each platoon member head off individually, charting terrain and noting the location of enemy squads they spotted. This way, we would all have an ever-widening map of the ground and the positions of the enemy. Even if one of our recruits got picked off, the information they provided would help another platoon member avenge his or her death (or at least keep from getting killed right away). One soldier could move quickly and silently and harass the other platoon’s squads, and still work in tandem with other soldiers when the opportunity arose.

  It worked. Our recruits took shots when they could, laid low and passed on information when they couldn’t, and worked together when opportunities presented themselves. On the second day, I and a recruit named Riley picked off two squads from opposing platoons; they were so busy shooting at each other that they didn’t notice Riley and me sniping them from a distance. He got two, I got three and the other three apparently got each other. It was pretty sweet. After we were done, we didn’t say anything to each other, just faded back into the forest and kept tracking and sharing terrain information.

  Eventually the other platoons figured out what we were doing and tried to do the same, but by that time, there were too many of the 63rd, and not enough of them. We mopped them up, getting the last of them by noon, and then started our jog into base, some eighty klicks away. The last of us made it in by 1800. In the end, we lost nineteen members of the platoon, including the four at the beginning. But we were responsible for just over half of the total kills across seven other platoons, while losing less than a third of our own people. Even Master Sergeant Ruiz couldn’t complain about that. When the base commander awarded him the War Games trophy, he even cracked a smile. I can’t even imagine how much it hurt him to do that.

  “Our luck will never cease,” the newly minted Private Alan Rosenthal said as he came up to me at the shuttle boarding area. “You and I got assigned to the same ship.”

  Indeed we had. A quick jaunt back to Phoenix on the troop ship Francis Drake, and then leave until the CDFS Modesto came to call. Then we’d hook up with the 2nd Platoon, Company D, of the 233rd CDF Infantry Battalion. One battalion per ship—roughly a thousand soldiers. Easy to get lost. I’d be glad to have Alan with me once again.

  I glanced over to Alan and admired his clean, new Colonial blue dress uniform—in no small part because I was wearing one just like it. “Damn, Alan,” I said. “We sure look good.”

  “I’ve always loved a man in uniform,” Alan said to me. “And now that I’m the man in the uniform, I love him even more.”

  “Uh-oh,” I said. “Here comes Master Sergeant Ruiz.”

  Ruiz had spotted me waiting to board my shuttle; as he approached I put down the duffel bag that contained my everyday uniform and few remaining personal belongings, and presented him with a smart salute.

  “At ease, Private,” Ruiz said, returning the salute. “Where are you headed?”

  “The Modesto, Master Sergeant,” I said. “Private Rosenthal and I both.”

  “You’re shitting me,” Ruiz declared. “The 233rd? Which company?”

  “D, Master Sergeant. Second Platoon.”

  “Out-fucking-standing, Private,” Ruiz said. “You will have the pleasure in serving in the platoon of Lieutenant Arthur Keyes, if that dumb son of a bitch hasn’t managed to have his ass chewed on by now by some alien or another. When you see him, extend to him my compliments, if you would. You may additionally tell him that Master Sergeant Antonio Ruiz has declared that you are not nearly the dipshit that most of your fellow recruits have turned out to be.”

  “Thank you, Master Sergeant.”

  “Don’t let it go to your head, Private. You are still a dipshit. Just not a very big one.”

  “Of course, Master Sergeant.”

  “Good. And now, if you will excuse me. Sometimes you just gotta hit the road.” Master Sergeant Ruiz saluted. Alan and I saluted back. Ruiz glanced at us both, offered a tight, tight smile, and then walked away without looking back.

  “That man scares the shit out of me,” Alan said.

  “I don’t know. I kind of like him.”

  “Of course you do. He thinks you’re almost not a dipshit. That’s a compliment in his world.”

  “Don’t think I don’t know it,” I said. “Now all I have to do is live up to it.”

  “You’ll manage,” Alan said. “After all, you do still get to be a dipshit.”

  “That’s comforting,” I said. “At least I’ll have company.”

  Alan grinned. The shuttle doors opened. We grabbed our stuff and went inside.

  NINE

  “I can take a shot,” Watson said, sighting over his boulder. “Let me drill one of those things.”

  “No,” said Viveros, our corporal. “Their shield is still up. You’d just be wasting ammo.”

  “This is bullshit,” Watson said. “We’ve been here for hours. We’re sitting here. They’re sitting there. When their shield goes down, we’re supposed to do what, walk over and start blasting at them? This isn’t the fucking fourteenth century. We shouldn’t make an appointment to start killing the other guy.”

  Viveros looked irritated. “Watson, you’re not paid to think. So shut the fuck up and get ready. It’s not going to be long now, anyway. There’s only one thing left in their ritual before we get at it.”

  “Yeah? What’s that?” Watson said.

  “They’re going to sing,” Viveros said.

  Watson smirked. “What are they going to sing? Show tunes?”

  “No,” Viveros said. “They’re going to sing our deaths.”

  As if on cue, the massive, hemispherical shield enclosing the Consu encampment shimmered at the base. I adjusted my eyesight and focused down the several hundred meters across the field as a single Consu stepped through, the shield lightly sticking to its massive carapace until it moved far enough away for the electrostatic filaments to collapse back into the shield.

  He was the third and final Consu who would emerge out of the shield before the battle. The first had appeared nearly twelve hours ago; a low-ranking grunt whose bellowing challenge served to formally signal the Consu’s intent to battle. The low rank of the messenger was meant to convey the minimal regard in which our troops were held by the Consu, the idea being that if we had been really important, they would have sent a higher-up. None of our troops took offense; the messenger was always of low rank, regardless of opponent, and anyway, unless you are extraordinarily sensitive to Consu pheromones, they pretty much all look alike.

  The second Consu emerged from behind the shield several hours later, bellowed like a herd of cows caught in a thresher, and then promptly exploded, pinkish blood and bits of his organs and carapace momentarily splashing against the Consu shield and sizzling lightly as they drizzled down to the ground. Apparently the Consu believed that if a single soldier was ritually prepared beforehand, its soul can be persuaded to reconnoiter the enemy for a set amount of time before moving on to wherever it is Consu souls go. Or something along that line. This is a signal honor, not lightly given. This seemed to me to be a fine way to lose your best soldiers in a hurry, but given that I was one of the enemy, it was hard to see the downside for us in the practice.

  This third Consu was a member of the highest caste, and his role was simply to tell us the reasons for our death and the manner by which we would all die. After which point, we could actually get to the killing and dying. Any attempt to hasten things along by preemptively taking a shot at the shield would be useless; short of dropping it into a stellar core, there was very little that could ding a Consu shield. Killing a messenger would accomplish nothing other than causing
the opening rituals to be restarted, delaying the fighting and killing even more.

  Besides, the Consu weren’t hiding behind the shield. They just had a lot of prebattle rituals to take care of, and they preferred that they were not interrupted by the inconvenient appearance of bullets, particle beams or explosives. Truth was, there was nothing the Consu liked better than a good fight. They thought nothing of the idea of tromping off to some planet, setting themselves down, and daring the natives to pry them off in battle.

  Which was the case here. The Consu were entirely disinterested in colonizing this planet. They had merely blasted a human colony here into bits as a way of letting the CDF know they were in the neighborhood and looking for some action. Ignoring the Consu wasn’t a possibility, as they’d simply keep killing off colonists until someone came to fight them on a formal basis. You never knew what they’d consider enough for a formal challenge, either. You just kept adding troops until a Consu messenger came out and announced the battle.

  Aside from their impressive, impenetrable shields, the Consu’s battle technology was of a similar level as the CDF’s. This was not as encouraging as you might think, as what reports filtered back from Consu battles with other species indicated that the Consu’s weaponry and technology were always more or less matched with that of their opponent. This added to the idea that what the Consu were engaging in was not war but sports. Not unlike a football game, except with slaughtered colonists in the place of proper spectators.

  Striking first against Consu was not an option. Their entire inner home system was shielded. The energy to generate the shield came from the white dwarf companion of the Consu sun. It had been completely encased with some sort of harvesting mechanism, so that all the energy coming off it would fuel the shield. Realistically speaking, you just don’t fuck with people who can do that. But the Consu had a weird honor system; clean them off a planet in battle, and they didn’t come back. It was like the battle was the vaccination, and we were the antiviral.

  All of this information was provided by our mission database, which our commanding officer Lieutenant Keyes had directed us to access and read before the battle. The fact that Watson didn’t seem to know any of this meant he hadn’t accessed the report. This was not entirely surprising, since from the first moment I met Watson it was clear that he was the sort of cocky, willfully ignorant son of a bitch who would get himself or his squadmates killed. My problem was I was his squadmate.

  The Consu unfolded its slashing arms—specialized at some point in their evolution to deal with some unimaginably horrifying creature on their homeworld, most likely—and underneath, its more recognizably armlike forelimbs raised to the sky. “It’s starting,” Viveros said.

  “I could pop him so easy,” Watson said.

  “Do it and I’ll shoot you myself,” Viveros said.

  The sky cracked with a sound like God’s own rifle shot, followed by what sounded like a chain saw ripping through a tin roof. The Consu was singing. I accessed Asshole and had it translate from the beginning.

  Behold, honored adversaries,

  We are the instruments of your joyful death.

  In our ways we have blessed you

  The spirit of the best among us has sanctified our battle.

  We will praise you as we move among you

  And sing your souls, saved, to their rewards.

  It is not your fortune to have been born among The People

  So we set you upon the path that leads to redemption.

  Be brave and fight with fierceness

  That you may come into our fold at your rebirth.

  This blessed battle hallows the ground

  And all who die and are born here henceforth are delivered.

  “Damn, that’s loud,” Watson said, sticking a finger in his left ear and twisting. I doubted he had bothered to get a translation.

  “This isn’t a war or a football game, for Christ’s sake,” I said to Viveros. “This is a baptism.”

  Viveros shrugged. “CDF doesn’t think so. This is how they start every battle. They think it’s their equivalent of the National Anthem. It’s just ritual. Look, the shield’s coming down.” She motioned toward the shield, which was now flickering and failing across its entire length.

  “About fucking time,” Watson said. “I was about to take a nap.”

  “Listen to me, both of you,” Viveros said. “Stay calm, stay focused and keep your ass down. We’ve got a good position here, and the lieutenant wants us to snipe these bastards as they come down. Nothing flashy—just shoot them in the thorax. That’s where their brains are. Every one we get means one less for the rest of them to worry about. Rifle shots only, anything else is just going to give us away faster. Cut the chatter, BrainPals only from here on out. You get me?”

  “We get you,” I said.

  “Fucking A,” Watson said.

  “Excellent,” Viveros said. The shield finally failed, and the field separating human and Consu was instantly streaked with the trails of rockets that had been sighted and readied for hours. The concussive burps of their explosions were immediately followed by human screams and the metallic chirps of Consu. For a few seconds there was nothing but smoke and silence; then a long, serrated cry as the Consu surged forward to engage the humans, who in turn kept their positions and tried to cut down as many Consu as they could before their two fronts collided.

  “Let’s get to it,” Viveros said. And with that she raised her Empee, sighted it on some far-distant Consu, and began to fire. We quickly followed.

  How to prepare for battle.

  First, systems check your MP-35 Infantry Rifle. This is the easy part; MP-35s are self-monitoring and self-repairing, and can, in a pinch, use material from an ammunition block as raw material to fix a malfunction. Just about the only way you can permanently ruin an Empee is to place it in the path of a firing maneuvering thruster. Inasmuch as you’re likely to be attached to your weapon at the time, if this is the case, you have other problems to worry about.

  Second, put on your war suit. This is the standard self-sealing body-length unitard that covers everything but the face. The unitard is designed to let you forget about your body for the length of the battle. The “fabric” of organized nanobots lets in light for photosynthesis and regulates heat; stand on an arctic floe or a Saharan sand dune and the only difference your body notes is the visual change in scenery. If you somehow manage to sweat, your unitard wicks it away, filters it and stores the water until you can transfer it to a canteen. You can deal with urine this way, too. Defecating in your unitard is generally not recommended.

  Get a bullet in your gut (or anywhere else), and the unitard stiffens at the point of impact and transfers the energy across the surface of the suit, rather than allowing the bullet to burrow through. This is massively painful but better than letting a bullet ricochet merrily through your intestines. This only works up to a point, alas, so avoiding enemy fire is still the order of the day.

  Add your belt, which includes your combat knife, your multipurpose tool, which is what a Swiss army knife wants to be when it grows up, an impressively collapsible personal shelter, your canteen, a week’s worth of energy wafers and three slots for ammo blocks. Smear your face with a nanobot-laden cream that interfaces with your unitard to share environmental information. Switch on your camouflage. Try to find yourself in the mirror.

  Third, open a BrainPal channel to the rest of your squad and leave it open until you return to the ship or you die. I thought I was pretty smart to think of this in boot camp, but it turns out to be one of the holiest of unofficial rules during the heat of battle. BrainPal communication means no unclear commands or signals—and no speaking to give away your position. If you hear a CDF soldier during the heat of battle, it’s because he is either stupid or screaming because he’s been shot.

  The only drawback to BrainPal communication is that your BrainPal can also send emotional information if you’re not paying attention. This can be distract
ing if you suddenly feel like you’re going to piss yourself in fright, only to realize it’s not you who’s about to cut loose on the bladder, but your squadmate. It’s also something none of your squadmates will ever let you live down.

  Link only to your squadmates—try to keep a channel open to your entire platoon and suddenly sixty people are cursing, fighting and dying inside your head. You do not need this.

  Finally, forget everything except to follow orders, kill anything that’s not human and stay alive. The CDF makes it simple to do this; for the first two years of service, every soldier is infantry, no matter if you were a janitor or surgeon, senator or street bum in your previous life. If you make it through the first two years, then you get the chance to specialize, to earn a permanent Colonial billet instead of wandering from battle to battle, and to fill in the niche and support roles every military body has. But for two years, all you have to do is go where they tell you, stay behind your rifle, and kill and not be killed. It’s simple, but simple isn’t the same as easy.

  It took two shots to bring down a Consu soldier. This was new—none of the intelligence on them mentioned personal shielding. But something was allowing them to take the first hit; it sprawled them on whatever you might consider to be their ass, but they were up again in a matter of seconds. So two shots; one to take them down, and one to keep them down.

  Two shots in sequence on the same moving target is not easily accomplished when you’re firing across a few hundred meters of very busy battleground. After figuring this one out, I had Asshole create a specialized firing routine that shot two bullets on one trigger pull, the first a hollow tip, and the second with an explosive charge. The specification was relayed to my Empee between shots; one second I was squeezing off single standard-issue rifle ammo, the next I was shooting my Consu killer special.