Gust Front

«Stand at ease, damnit,» snapped the general. «I heard you weren't even wearing a goddamn nametag. So I acquired that for you. Do you feel like you need anything else?»

«No sir,» said Cutprice quietly. He shifted his feet shoulder width apart and looked at the general, as the command allowed. The door behind him opened and closed again and someone came up beside him and came to attention as well.

«Sergeant Major Wacleva, reporting as ordered, sir,» said the soldier. Cutprice gave the individual a quick glance. He was a short, ski

«At ease, rest even, both of you,» said Horner shaking his head. «I think you've met.»

«Have we?» asked Cutprice.

The sergeant major just smiled, extracted a pack of Pall Malls and tapped one out. With a flick of a lighter the room was filled with the pungent odor of unfiltered cigarette. «Yeah,» he answered in a surprisingly deep voice. It was almost gravelly, which was unusual for a rejuvenated individual. «We did meet. Briefly.» He blew a smoke ring. And coughed.

«Oh, shit!» said Cutprice with a laugh. «You're trying for new lungs already?»

Horner just shook his head. «I want you two to get the rest of your respective groups together and get down to the Washington Mall. Most of the units that survived Lake Jackson and the rout are there. I want you to see if any of them are fit to fight. I've got an ACS unit on the way and an intact division assembling. I'm worried about the Posleen capturing a bridgehead. If they do, it will be fight or die time.»

«Yes, sir,» said Wacleva. «We let 'em get over the Potomac and it's go

Horner nodded. «The big problem will be that we probably won't be able to dislodge them before the main landings. That means all the production and control that is in this area will be lost. There's actually not that much that was vital in the area between the James and Potomac. Not that we're not going to take it back. But losing the area north of the Potomac this soon will kneecap us.

«So, go get your band of brothers,» he continued with a faint, real, smile, «and get down to the Mall. Find some that have a spine left and get them organized. Get ready to use them, too. 'Cause I got a bad feeling about the Potomac.»

He smiled again. «Fortunately, besides your 'band of brothers' there's another card up my sleeve.»

* * *

In the dawning light O'Neal waited on the Crosby Road overpass of I-695, the Baltimore Loop. The smell of jet fuel from the departed Kiowa still filled the air when the first of the apparitions came in sight.

The armored combat suits were delivered and stored in large Galactic-supplied storage containers. The silvery «Morgues» looked like oversized shipping containers and held forty suits. They came equipped with a Federation Class Two fusion plant or antimatter generator for recharging.

The Morgues were designed for the suits to be readily accessed, each suit stored in an interior pod, the double row of pods aligned down both sides of the large container. When the troopers suited up they went into the container, tossed their uniforms in the provided laundry bin and loaded up in the pods. The struggle of naked bodies in the narrow corridor normally led to a certain amount of playful grab-ass, but it was an efficient process. The suits exited through portals in the sides of the container.

The Fleet Strike Armored Combat Suits included a full suite of inertial compensators and drivers. Given enough power, the suits could and did «fly» under the combination of compensator and drivers. The process, however, was power-intensive. A normal combat suit could only sustain about ten minutes of flight, a command suit twenty to thirty, compared to three days of use before having to recharge if conditions were perfect.

However, as stated, the Morgues had their own onboard power source. And they were designed for high-intensity charging.

* * *

Mike thought the silvery containers probably caused their fair share of accidents as they floated down the interstate. The speed was not much, not more than seventy or eighty miles per hour, but it had permitted the battalion to cover the distance from Harrisburg to Baltimore in an hour. And it would permit them to continue on to D.C. in no time at all—once they picked up a stray captain.

* * *

The giant boxes floated noiselessly to a halt around the overpass and began to drift downward to the roadway. The control on the way down, managed by forty AIDs in each container, was spotty and most of them dropped to the roadway with rumbles that shook the early morning air. Many of the remaining residents rushed out to see if the sound was landing Posleen. When they saw the strange and obviously alien objects scattered down the road many of them took it as a final sign that it was high time to head for the hills.

The nearest conex began to spit suits and Mike let go of a deep sigh. He had not even realized how uneasy he had been until that moment. A soldier without his unit is like a man with one arm. He was finally home.

The first suit sprinting towards him was the unmistakable outline of Gu

«Goddamn, am I glad to see you, boss,» said the NCO, quietly. «We've got a hell of a situation on our hands.»

«Yeah, same here. How's the XO holding up?» he asked, almost afraid of the answer.

There was a momentary hesitation. «Lieutenant Nightingale is doing fine, sir,» the NCO answered baldly.

O'Neal stopped and turned towards the NCO. He wished, not for the first time, that he could see the first sergeant's face. «Does that mean that she's marginal?»

«No,» said Pappas instantly and definitively. «She's made a hell of a lot of improvement. I think she'll be fine.»

«This is going to be the real deal, Top,» said the captain with steel in his voice. «I can't take any chances. She'd better be ready.»

«I know that, sir,» answered the NCO. «She's ready. I'd say that . . . anyway. She's ready.»

O'Neal tilted his head to the side and wrinkled his forehead. «Say that again?»

«She's ready, sir. She'll do fine. I'll make sure of that.»

Mike had thousands of hours in and around suits. They had virtually no body language, but virtually was not the same thing as none. And the first sergeant's body language was contradicting his words. O'Neal placed both hands on his hips. «Top, what the fuck is going on?»

The gu

Mike shook his head and sighed. «Okay, Gu

«The landers are everywhere, sir,» grumped the first sergeant as he gestured towards the container. The subject of whatever nonsubject they had just not discussed was obviously dropped. «We actually got jumped by a lander on our way down.»

«Any casualties?» asked Captain O'Neal. He stripped quickly and unselfconsciously, tossing his gear in the bin. The stuff would get sorted out if and when.

«No, sir,» said the sergeant. «We mounted sensor balls all over these things so we could see where we're going. We spotted it coming in and landed our ownselfs. The horses had a kinda hot reception.»

Mike shook his head with a smile and headed for his pod. The container popped open before he even reached it and the suit was opened up like a lobster as he stepped up. «Missed me, did you?» he chuckled. He slapped Shelly into her interface slot and stepped into the future.