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  “How long can this go on?” shouted Turbo.

  “I’ll tell you how long: Until the Highborn decide.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Marten.

  The corporal shouted, “Couldn’t the Highborn take Tokyo if they really wanted? I think so. They’ve taken everything else. Why not here?”

  Marten and his sergeants must have looked unimpressed.

  “Hey,” said the corporal, “I saw what the power-suited giants could do the first day of the invasion. Nothing could stand against them. If someone could stand, they simply leaped to a different place and attacked from the opposite direction. None of that matters to you. At o-three hundred tonight you’re moving into your defensive position. So good luck.”

  He held out his hand, Marten shook it. “You’re not going with us?”

  “No, sir. I’m getting off at the next stop to instruct the next batch of fodder.”

  “Fodder?” asked Turbo.

  “Sorry. I wasn’t supposed to say that.” The corporal grinned, but it lacked sincerity. “Show them what Aussies are made of, mate.”

  7.

  Heavy shelling made the trucks shiver so badly they halted twenty kilometers short of their destination. The men dismounted and entered an inferno. Rubble and ruined, smoldering buildings towered all around them. Smoke billowed into the night sky and flames shot up high in the distance. They felt the heat of it on their faces and the acrid smell seared the inside of their nostrils. Exploding rockets shook the ground and made them duck and start walking in a bent-over crouch. In the near distance mortars crumped. Farther away artillery boomed and occasionally a hellish red laser beamed down from somewhere unseen in the sky. That sound was the worst, a high whine that grated on the nerves and always caused a gut-wrenching explosion.

  Hunch-shouldered guides led them through the shattered mess of the city. As they marched, they crunched over broken glass, concrete, spent casings and shredded clothing.

  For three hours, they marched, getting sweaty in their steel and ceramic helmets, armor vests and leggings. Sometimes men popped up from trenches or foxholes and gave them a thumbs-up. At other times, hollowed-eyed soldiers simply stared at them. The worst were those who refused to glance over, as if they didn’t exist.

  “Look at those guys,” muttered Turbo. “That’s what we’re gonna look like soon.”

  “Quiet in the ranks,” said Marten.

  They marched to the front, to endless screams, whistles, bangs and thundering guns. And always that red glow showed where Tokyo burned hottest. The stench grew worse and finally they slipped in their nose filters. It was highly uncomfortable, but it made breathing possible again.

  A unit of glassy-eyed troops staggered along the other side of the road, away from the front, probably for refit. Their armor-vests stank of smoke and gore, their skin was either chalky or filthy from dirt. None of them could work up a cheer for the 93rd Slumlords.

  “See,” Marten shouted to Second Platoon, “if we work as a team it’s possible to survive.”

  Ex-Sydney slum dwellers stared at him in disbelief. They looked more than ever like smalltime gang members, drug runners and misfits. Slapping armor onto them and giving them guns wasn’t going to turn them into soldiers, not after a mere six weeks of basic training.

  Finally, the guides brought the 93rd to a set of underground bunkers. It was five in the morning and Second Platoon, given its own bunker, was exhausted physically and mentally. The men threw down their arms, slipped off their armor and sank onto cots and chairs.

  A man popped into the bunker, shouting, “Lieutenant Marten!”

  “What?”

  “Follow me, sir. Conference, two bunkers over.”

  Marten hurried after him into another bunker and to a small room filled with the combat officers of the 93rd Battalion/20th FEC Division. Captain Sigmir signaled him to sit beside huge Kang, the Lieutenant of First Platoon/Tenth Company.

  Charts came out, a fast pep talk by the Highborn Colonel and some counsel on how to lead their men this first day into combat and then finally their objective. They would hold a ‘quiet sector,’ a huge hulk of a granary. It seemed the enemy had found underground entry holes into this food storage complex, so they were to watch for crafty, sneak raids. The granary was part of a slow, encircling siege-move on the merculite battery. The massive granary was made out of old-fashioned plasteel. Neither continued enemy shelling, plasma nor wave-assaults had taken it out. Since it anchored tomorrow’s planned assaults, the granary had to be held at all costs. Tenth Company would have floor and basement duty, and as it turned out Second Platoon would be the point unit down there. More was said, but after learning his brief, Marten paid the rest slight attention.

  “This is it,” said the Colonel, another Lot Six Highborn, but saner than Captain Sigmir. “This is what you trained for. Now show us that you premen are worthy of retraining and rank in the New Order.”

  A half-hour later Stick complained to Marten, “Why us?”

  “Why do you think?” asked Omi.

  Their part of the basement duty proved to be a maze of fallen rubble, blasted holes in the ceiling that rained a couple bricks every now and then, narrow corridors from one point to the next and a groaning mass above that threatened a cave-in at any moment.

  As he’d been trained, Marten put his eighty men into their positions. At the very least, he always left a corporal in charge of a squad. Some of the men grabbed shut-eye—the smart ones, it turned out.

  After six hours of waiting, Japanese tunnel rats boiled out of the sewers. They attacked with bellowing yells, vibroknives and shock grenades. From every direction around Second Platoon, or so it seemed, the enemy drove in. The newly trained FEC soldiers screamed in fear, their carbines chattering in the dark. Grenades roared. There was more screaming, and then vibroknives hacked and slashed. The screaming grew higher-pitched. From above, as if timed, the entire granary shook. Static cut out communications. Helmet lamps snapped on, the light washing through chalky dust that floated everywhere. Shock grenades flew at every point of light.

  “Turn them off and snap on your infrareds!” Marten yelled. He stood behind a chunk of fallen ceiling. Behind him, two privates fired blindly into the dark. He used his sidearm, firing at anything that moved.

  “Omi!” he shouted into his mike. Crackle filled his earphones.

  “Banzai!” screamed out of the darkness.

  Marten whirled around. A grenade landed at his feet. Marten lunged, scooped and hurled it back, then ducked. It flashed. The blast knocked him against his concrete slab. Three howling enemy soldiers threw themselves at him. One FEC private gurgled as a blade whipped through his throat. Marten rapid fired. Two Japanese flopped against the wall. The last one tried to skewer him in the gut. For a second Marten’s armor held as the vibroblade whined against it. He clouted the soldier with the butt end of his pistol. Then he stomped on the man’s knife-hand, who grunted in pain. Finally, Marten put the barrel against the helmeted head and pulled the trigger. Gore and blood stained his armor, but Marten was past caring. Six weeks of training and something else deep in him bubbled to the forefront.

  “Come on!” he shouted. The remaining private followed him into the darkness.

  Picking up men as he went, Marten rallied what was left of his command. Too many, far too many of the former slum dwellers lay sprawled in death or scattered in bloody pieces. The survivors of Second Platoon demanded blood in return. Kicking, biting, firing, stomping and smashing they drove the tunnel rats back into their holes. Then a lull hit as the remaining enemy gasped his last on the floor. Single shots rang out as untrusting FEC soldiers checked the supposed dead.

  Second Platoon was learning fast that only fools took chances. Shocked, pale-faced men, their chests heaving, looked to Marten for an explanation. He stared at the darkness out of which the enemy had come. His eyes narrowed. He was a soldier, eh? Then he was gonna do things right! He motioned them to follow him as he retreated, blowin
g corridors as they went, working their way topside step by step. Ten minutes later a headcount showed him fifty-eight men out of eighty had survived this first encounter with the enemy.

  After manning the new positions, Marten called in to report. Captain Sigmir demanded a face-to-face encounter.

  “Should I join you?” Omi asked.

  Marten eyed the dark stairwell leading down to the basement. He didn’t want to face the captain alone, and Omi was his toughest, steadiest man. But that meant the ex-gunman was needed here.

  “No,” said Marten. “I’ll be fine.” Besides, what could Omi really do against Captain Sigmir?

  “I’m coming then,” said Stick.

  Marten shook his head and humped alone to Tenth Company’s HQ in what had once been the granary’s receiving office. There was hot coffee and donuts, of all things. A man typed a report on a computer. The other HQ Company staff, including the two bodyguards, watched and listened.

  Captain Sigmir leaned back in his chair. He sat behind a desk. Marten stood at attention before it.

  “Lieutenant,” asked Sigmir, “how many enemy dead?”

  Marten shrugged.

  “Lieutenant, you surprise me. You left your basement post, retreated in face of the enemy—”

  “Begging your pardon, sir, we first killed them all.”

  “I fail to understand then why you retreated.”

  “Because I took heavy casualties, sir.”

  The captain drummed his huge fingers on the desk.

  “Your orders included no such provision as retreat. You must hold your post until relieved or until you’re dead.”

  “That isn’t what you told us in training, sir.”

  The captain raised his eyebrows.

  “You said a good commander saves his men through maneuver instead of being bullheaded. I retreated so I wouldn’t be outmaneuvered again. They know that basement too well, sir.”

  “Spurious reasoning, Lieutenant. A barracks lawyer is what you sound like to me.”

  “I repositioned Second Platoon at the two stairwells that are left, sir. They won’t slip up here so easily.”

  Captain Sigmir slapped a hand onto the polished oak desk. “What? So the enemy is free to dig through the other stairwells!”

  “No, sir. I put sensors amid those pile-ups. If they’re able to dig through there… sir, we’ll know right away.”

  Captain Sigmir stood. Everyone around them stopped what they were doing, glancing up in fear at the massive, Lot Six, brain-damaged Highborn.

  “Lieutenant, you realize that because of this act of cowardice on your part that I could have you dragged behind the office and shot in the back of the head.” Sigmir snapped his fingers. “Then you’d be dead and Top Sergeant Omi would take your platoon into the abyss.”

  Marten stiffened to absolute attention.

  “Or perhaps I should march you back to your platoon and throttle you myself, as an example to the others.”

  “Sir, I—”

  “Silence!” roared Captain Sigmir.

  Marten’s fingers twitched, the only indication that he almost drew his pistol to try to gun down this monster. He was certain that it would be futile, but he didn’t want to die without a fight.

  Captain Sigmir’s eyes gleamed as his weird smile stretched into place. “Step outside with me, Lieutenant.” The captain strode ahead and out of the office.

  A moment later Marten stepped through, his hand on the butt of his pistol.

  Captain Sigmir stood several feet away, his hands on his hips as he peered down at Marten. “So, the preman has balls, does he?”

  Marten gulped the lump out of his throat, closing the door behind him.

  “You could draw, Lieutenant, and then you’d be dead.”

  Marten wondered if that was true.

  Captain Sigmir showed his teeth in a feral grin. “How little you premen understand us, even me, a damaged beta. Yet I am a Highborn. Do you doubt that?”

  Marten slowly shook his head.

  “I herd premen into battle, trying to make warriors out of you. It isn’t an enviable task, but it is a purpose, and it is one that I will succeed at. Lieutenant, you can’t pit your skills against mine. To even think so is sad and hopeless. And so few of you actually have any potential. Yet… I will admit that there is something different about you.”

  “Sir?”

  “Your men look up to you, Lieutenant, and do you know why?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Come now, don’t be humble. I dislike such pretense.”

  Marten licked his lips. Sigmir seemed capable of anything, of any absurdity. He dared say, “I’m not fond of pretense either, sir.”

  That wolfish grin grew. “Well said, Lieutenant. They look up to you because you’ve dared to stand up to me. They rightly recognize that as an act of bravery. And now you’ve taken your platoon out of the tunnels. Yes, it was the correct military move. I knew you were the best of my tacticians.”

  Marten was bewildered. “I don’t understand, sir.”

  “You’ve shown initiative, Lieutenant, and you’ve gained the thanks and respect of your men because of it.”

  “But…. I’ve only fifty-eight men left.”

  “Premen. Untermensch.”

  “Sir?”

  ”Untermensch, Lieutenant, sub-humans, sheep, fodder, take your pick. So few of them are soldiers, none warriors. The enemy has now shed the useless ones for you.”

  “Sir?”

  “Fifty-eight men out of eighty, Lieutenant, the ones who fought their way out of the horror of hand-to-hand combat in the dark. The fifty-eight: those who might yet make passable soldiers. By posting you where I did, I’ve done the hard work for you.”

  Marten stared at Captain Sigmir, at the nakedness of the man’s arrogance and madness.

  Sigmir clasped his hands behind his back. “Do you know, Lieutenant, that I will gain rank because of the Siege of Tokyo? I will gain a high place in the New Order.”

  “On our bodies, sir?”

  “Exactly! Yes, you do understand. I suspected you might. I have given you the respect of your sheep, Lieutenant. It is my gift to you because of what I will demand. Consider my revelation, and perhaps someday I will allow you to be my aide as I rise in rank.” The smile became a trifle sad. “For premen, I’m afraid, true rank is impossible to achieve, no matter what the Colonel told you.” The smile became crooked and Sigmir’s eyes gleamed. “Do you know, Lieutenant, that in reality Lot Six wasn’t a failure?”

  Marten spoke carefully. “No, sir, I didn’t know that.”

  “Lot Six was the first of the new men, the Herrenvolk, the Master Race.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Do you truly understand?”

  “I think so, sir.”

  Sigmir nodded. “Yes, perhaps you do. You may go, Lieutenant.”

  Marten saluted crisply, turned and marched back to his platoon. He realized that as long as Sigmir ran the company that all their lives were in danger. The captain viewed the world through the prism of Highborn concepts of glory.

  Marten soon climbed over hunks of concrete and coughed dust out of his throat. Through a hole in the wall, he saw blazing, burning Tokyo. Even though it was day, the black smoke overhead produced a pall of gloom over the doomed city. Tracers flashed and a glob of plasma flew somewhere that thankfully wasn’t here. He strode a little farther and shouted the password to a hidden sentry.

  Marten soon flopped down within the strongpoint. His men trained their guns at the open stairwell a short distance away. It led into the basement none of them ever wanted to reenter.

  “Drink this,” said Turbo.

  It was hot and jolted Marten’s tired brain. At the other strongpoint, Omi commanded the other half of Second Platoon with help from Stick. At least his friends hadn’t died in what already was blurring in Marten’s mind as a mad, senseless killing frenzy.

  He studied his men. Tired, determined soldiers watched that stairwell with g
rim intensity. Grime streaked their faces, and cuts and bruises. They no longer looked like slum dwellers to Marten.

  Turbo had a gash under his eye to add to his puffy lips. He sipped the hot liquid. “This don’t make sense,” Turbo suddenly whispered, as he leaned near Marten.

  “Huh?”

  “We can’t afford to take losses like this.”

  Marten thought about Captain Sigmir’s words, but he said, “Why do you think the Highborn keep feeding more and more of us into battle?”

  “That’s just it,” Turbo whispered. “That nuke took most of our convoy. How many other convoys have they decimated?”

  Marten envisioned the enemy using nukes here. The thought made him sick. “This is Earth’s holdout,” he said.

  “That’s what I’m saying. Why don’t the Highborn clean it out?”

  Marten nodded toward the dark stairwell. “Because these people can fight—and don’t forget those sea-launched nukes. Maybe the Highborn can’t get enough people here to take it.”

  “I wonder if that’s the reason,” said Turbo. “Maybe there’s a—I don’t know, one of their slick, Highborn plans behind all this.”

  “I don’t wonder,” said Marten, standing. “Grab some shut-eye. Take a pill if you gotta. I want you fresh in a couple hours when I try to sleep.” Then Marten made the rounds to see how his troops where holding up.

  8.