March Upcountry

Kosutic waited until the company's NCOs had gathered around, then raised an eyebrow.

"Well?"

"Just like you said," Julian said, taking a sip of water from the bladder in his armor. "Nobody had finished his water. Only a couple had refilled."

"Same here," Koberda said. "You'd think they'd learn. We're all vets, and we all went through RIP. Hell, most of us have spent time in Raider units! This is just same shit, different day."

"Uh-huh." Kosutic nodded in agreement. "How's your water level, George?"

"What?" Koberda's hand tapped the bladder on his back. "Oh." The bladder was mostly full, and Kosutic chuckled as he popped the drinking tube into his mouth.

"This is go

"The troops are go

"So you've gotta be their momma and their poppa. You've gotta make them eat. You've gotta make them drink. You've gotta make sure they keep up their hygiene. You've gotta make sure they keep up their heads.

"Let the troops keep on the lookout for the bad guys. You squad leaders and platoon sergeants have to keep an eye on the troops.

"And I'll keep an eye on you," she finished with a laugh. "Now, drink!"

"Have you had anything to drink this morning, Your Highness?" Captain Pahner asked as he watched the prince unpack his weapon.

The rifle would have been a point of contention if Armand Pahner had had an ounce of strength left for silly arguments. He had nothing against the weapon as a hunting rifle: the Parkins and Spencer eleven-millimeter magnum was a gem among heavy caliber rifles. True, it was a "smoke-pole" rather than a bead gun, but the selectable action weapon (it could be fired in either bolt-action or semi-automatic mode) was the end product of over a mille

Yet whatever its virtues, it was also incredibly heavy, nearly fifteen kilos, and used nonstandard brass-cartridge rounds, which meant the prince would be unable to trade ammunition with the other weapons. Eventually, the prince's own ammo would run out, and he would be left with an extremely expensive, very heavy stick.

But Armand Pahner was done arguing with the arrogant young prick. About most stuff.

"Not recently," Roger replied with a headshake as he snapped the receiver into the walnut stock.

"Then might I suggest that His Highness drink water?" Pahner said through gritted teeth. He knew that the prince had all the military's nanite and toot enhancements, and a few that even his bodyguards didn't have. But he still had to have some water in his veins for the nanites to swim in.

"You can suggest it," Roger said with a slight smile. "And I even will, in a minute. But I'm going to get my rifle assembled first."

"Very well, Your Highness," Pahner said after a calming breath. It was hot as the hinges of hell already, and he didn't need this. "We're going to be moving out in a few minutes." The captain smiled faintly. "O'er Marduk's su

"I'll be there," Roger said with a glance at the captain. The Marine's last phrase had not made sense to the prince, but he had other things to worry about, and he started loading ammunition into his combat vest. The handspan-long cartridges would eventually cover the chameleon cloth harness, actually providing an ersatz armor. He had a pack at his feet which was intended to accept additional rounds, and there were loops sewn into the legs of his combat suit. He would eventually be covered in bullets.

God help us if he gets hit by a stray bead, Armand Pahner thought.

Pahner glanced at Poertena. The armorer was racked out in the shade under one net-draped wing of the shuttle. The captain knew most of the troops had bitched about hauling the camo nets into place and staking them down, but he'd been adamant. The shuttles' hulls and wings were essentially one huge crystal display; as long as their internal power held out, their programmable skins could produce better reactive camouflage than a chameleon suit or even powered armor. But even though the power requirement wasn't huge, it was more than enough to eventually drain the shuttle capacitors, at which point the craft would stand out like elephants on a golf course if anyone happened to overfly them and look down. Even if that hadn't been the case, the best reactive skins in the universe couldn't do much about the shadows they cast, so he'd ordered the nets out. Not only would they take over when the power did run out, but they broke up the artificial angularity of the shuttle hulls and wings, which also broke up the artificiality of the shadows they cast.

Roger, predictably, had considered it a waste of time, although at least he'd managed to restrict his bitching about it to Pahner himself instead of whining in front of the troops. The captain had wanted—badly—to ask why he'd been so upset when no one was asking him to do the grunt work, but he'd decided against it after only a brief struggle. They'd already gone around and around about his decision to maintain a round-the-clock listening watch on all frequencies. It would only require a single trooper to monitor them through the sophisticated com equipment engineered into his helmet, which would hardly pose a crippling drain on their manpower. Despite that, the prince had done a deplorably poor job of concealing his opinion that worrying about possible communications traffic when the entire mass of the planet lay between them and the only high-tech enclave on it made no sense at all, and Pahner had no doubt that Roger had written him off as a terminally paranoid security dweeb.

Fortunately, the captain had discovered that he was remarkably immune to worries about the prince's good opinion of him, and Roger's arguments hadn't changed his mind about the listening watch or the camo nets. No doubt the prince was right when he pointed out that the chance of any one coming in low enough to see the shuttles, assuming there was any reason to be looking in the first place, on the completely opposite side of the globe from the only spaceport or landing facility on the entire planet was virtually nonexistent. Armand Pahner, however, was not in the habit of exposing his people or his mission to avoidable risk, however remote, even if the "extra work" did piss them off.

And it was remarkable how the troops' attitude had shifted when the sun came back up and they realized what nice shade the nets provided for anyone who could come up with an excuse to get under them. Like Poertena, who looked indecently comfortable as he snored with his head propped on a gigantic rucksack. The captain wondered, briefly, what was in it, then walked over and kicked the Pinopan on the sole of his boot. The armorer's eyes popped open, and he scrambled to his feet.

"Yes, Sir, Cap'n?"

"Circulate around. Leader's conference. Here. Now."

"Yes, Sir, Cap'n," Poertena acknowledged, and trotted off towards the knot around Kosutic, bead rifle at high port.