Lieutenant, page 2
part #2 of Dirigent Mercenary Corps Series
Five minutes later, he had a call from Tebba Girana, whose squad had the point for third platoon. “We’re at the first checkpoint, Lieutenant,” Girana reported. “The food warehouse is across the street from us. Lights half a block on either side. The alley next to the building is dark.”
“Wait where you are until fourth is in position. I want both point squads to cross at the same time,” Lon said.
With an entire world available, the people of New Bali had chosen to make their cities almost as crowded as they would have been back on Earth. Although streets and alleys were broad, buildings pressed in against them. Where the New Balinese could have allowed acres of open space around each commercial or governmental building, they had instead lined them up next to each other along the streets. Instead of dozens—or even scores—of small green oases in the commercial zone of the city, there were only two large parks set aside, at opposite ends, nearly a mile apart. Government House and the central communications building bordered one of those parks.
It was 0349 hours when fourth platoon’s point squad reported that they were in position—two blocks from Tebba facing the same street. Lon acknowledged the report, then switched channels to talk to his platoon sergeants.
“We’ve got twenty-four minutes, and there’s still a fair distance to travel. Barring trouble, we start moving and keep going until we’re in position around our objectives.” As soon as Dendrow and Jorgen responded to that, Lon said, “Move ’em out.”
Awareness of the heat and humidity had slipped away from Lon. Once he was moving again, inside the city, closing on the two buildings that his platoons were to take, he was too tightly focused on the mission to worry about anything so trivial as personal discomfort. He was still new enough as an officer that he found it difficult not to try to do everything himself, keep track of every single man and watch every degree of the terrain around them. He could, at need, check on the vital signs of all of his men—pulse, respiration, and body temperature. He could monitor all radio traffic within the platoons. The temptation was there, but there was no way that one man could do everything—not with even moderate success. He did keep his eyes moving, scanning ahead and behind as well as to both sides, and he tried to listen to the environment rather than to intrasquad talk.
He had a mild adrenaline rush as he crossed the street into the alley next to the food warehouse with half of third platoon. But there were no alarms, and in seconds the men were across, split into two columns to walk down the sides of the alley.
At the next intersection, the point squad was waiting. That was the second checkpoint. From the shadows at the mouth of the alley, Lon could see Government House.
It was not particularly large, barely half the size of the analogous building on Dirigent—a structure that served both as the seat of government for the world and also as headquarters for the Dirigent Mercenary Corps. New Bali’s Government House was only two stories high, shaped like a letter E. The long side faced the mercenaries, and the smaller strokes were wings aimed toward the park beyond. The building was two hundred feet long across the front. The width was eighty feet. There were streetlights at each corner, lights over each of the three entrances that Lon could see, and lights on in several windows.
No police or militiamen were posted outside the building. There would be, at a minimum, guards inside each entrance, although only one of those doors was left unlocked at night, and there might be two or three roving guards inside—a total of no more than eight security officers. If the intelligence was right and the New Balinese had made no changes.
The number of workers in the building at night was uncertain. It should be small—New Bali was not large enough to require extensive round-the-clock staffing of Government House—consisting of one mid-level official, perhaps a few clerks, and the maintenance and cleaning staff. The estimate was between six and twenty.
The communications building would be an even simpler affair. Two people ran the operation at night, and there would be one guard, and perhaps one person to run the cleaning machines.
“Oh-four-oh-five,” Lon whispered on his connection to his platoon sergeants. “You both know the drill here. Get the men in position.”
Lon would go into Government House seconds behind the squad that was assigned the main entrance, along with one other squad. Fire teams, each half a squad, would force the other entrances to Government House and neutralize the guards there. Once the doors were secured, the rest of the building would be searched quickly to find the rest of the people on duty. If everything went perfectly, there would be no need for shooting. If …
All that Lon could do for the next few minutes was watch, his tension increasing almost with every second. This was when the chance of discovery was greatest. A civilian driving through might spot armed men scurrying toward the objectives and raise the alarm. A police patrol might happen by. A guard might step outside for a breath of air. Anything.
If surprise was lost, the operation might be lost as well.
No screw-ups, please! Lon thought. He wanted everything to go perfectly. Two hundred men attempting to usurp control of an entire world seemed almost insanely audacious, but Lon had put worries about the sanity of the exercise behind him. It was possible. It had been done on other worlds.
One by one, the fire teams reported that they were in position, close to the objectives. By 0410 hours, everyone was set. Lon moved closer with the last squad, crossing two streets and moving into the shadows on the lawn in front of Government House. The men went prone, half of them facing the building, the others facing the streets. Lon reported to Captain Orlis that third and fourth platoons were ready to move in, and that there was no sign that they had been detected.
“Good job, Nolan,” Orlis replied. “Wait for my command. Everyone moves at once.”
“Yes, sir.”
Time showed its own insanity for Lon then. The seconds dragged like hours, waiting for the order, but when Orlis’s order did come, it felt as if no time at all had passed.
“Go” was all the captain said. Lon repeated the order on a channel that connected him to all his sergeants and corporals. Then he got to his feet with the men of the final squad, and they moved toward the main entrance to Government House as third platoon’s first squad burst through the doorway to take the guard there by surprise.
For the first six seconds, Lon thought that luck would hold and that the two buildings would be taken silently, but before he reached the main entrance, he heard several gunshots off to his left, apparently from the door near that end of the building.
“What was that?” he demanded on the channel that connected him to third squad’s leader, Ben Frehr.
“The guard here spotted us coming in,” Corporal Frehr reported. “It’s okay, Lieutenant. We’ve got the situation under control now. No casualties.”
“What about the guard?” Lon demanded.
There seemed to be restrained amusement in Frehr’s voice. “He’ll live.”
Gunshots meant that the element of surprise ended a few seconds two soon. Two roaming guards within the building had time to report the sounds, and they were ready when third platoon found them. They did not resist, but they had had time to spread the warning.
“We’ve got Government House and the communications center secure, Captain,” Lon reported at 0420. “The guards inside here had time to raise the alarm, though.”
“We expected that, Nolan,” Orlis replied. “No matter. We’ve got the militia barracks and police headquarters surrounded. We’re negotiating for their surrender. They’re in no position to resist, and they know it.”
“Then we contact the governor?”
“Or he contacts us,” Orlis replied. “It shouldn’t be long. I expect we’ll have a final resolution within an hour or so. Set your defensive positions and wait.”
Wait, Lon thought with distaste after he had given his orders and moved up to the second floor of the building. He had sentries posted there, high enough to have a wider view of the area surrounding Government House. Ninety-nine percent of what we do is wait.
At 0447, Captain Orlis told Lon that the militia were stalling, refusing to capitulate. The police station had surrendered, but there had been only six officers inside—not the twenty to thirty that the Dirigenters had expected.
“Sounds like something might be up,” Lon suggested.
“If so, we’ll find out soon enough,” Orlis said. “I’ve given the militia a deadline—oh-five-hundred. I told them if they haven’t surrendered by then, we destroy the barracks with them inside.”
“I want everyone alert,” Lon told his noncoms. “The locals might have something up their sleeves. Except for the men watching the prisoners, I want every eye looking for activity outside. And keep the men down. I don’t want anybody where a sniper could take them out.”
Wait!
At 0501, Lon heard the dull crump-thump of two explosive charges going off in the distance. The militia didn’t surrender, he thought. He felt a tightening in his stomach. There might have been as many as three hundred men in the barracks compound, twenty percent of the world’s entire militia force.
“Foolish heroics,” he muttered, shaking his head. “Stupid way to waste people.”
Five minutes later, Captain Orlis had news. “We went in. There was only a single platoon of militia in the barracks—thirty-five men. Watch for trouble. The rest must be somewhere in the city.”
Lon’s stomach growled nervously. Most of the militia missing from where they were supposed to be. The same for the police. They knew something was up, he thought. Then: Where are they?
He alerted his noncoms. And sweated. Government House was efficiently air-conditioned, but sweat came to Lon anyway. He prowled the second floor, going from room to room, standing in the dark at the side of windows, looking out, searching for any hint of approaching soldiers. They’ll come, sooner or later, he thought—he knew.
It did not take much for his thoughts to move to We can’t hold. Surprise was all we had going. We had to take all of the local forces available in the city at once. We didn’t do it.
The waiting was different now. He knew what had to come. When a loudspeaker came to life outside, just minutes after five-thirty, as the sun was beginning to brighten the eastern horizon, Lon was not surprised. He had been expecting it.
“You, in Government House,” a metallic-tinged voice said, amplified far beyond necessity. “Lay down your weapons and come out. We have you surrounded and out-numbered.”
Lon immediately called Captain Orlis and reported. “What do we do?” he asked.
Orlis did not hesitate. He had just received a similar message. “Surrender, Nolan. It’s all we can do.”
2
The three mercenary officers were brought before the governor of New Bali together. Lieutenants Lon Nolan and Carl Hoper, platoon leader for the company’s first and second platoons, flanked Captain Orlis as they were returned to Government House and taken to the second-floor office of Governor Pranj Nuwel. The three ranking officers from the Singaraja militia barracks were also present.
Governor Nuwel stood behind his desk and stared at the Dirigenters for a moment. Then he smiled and nodded shallowly before coming out to the center of his office, coming face to face with the outworlders.
“Captain Orlis,” Nuwel said with a broader smile. “I think we can consider the contract fulfilled.” He extended his hand and the two men shook. “You and your men have done an admirable job of training our militia. The, ah, final examination you staged this morning was most impressive.”
“Thank you, Governor,” Matt Orlis replied. “The demonstration has to be as real as possible, or it doesn’t prove anything. Your men have been excellent students.”
“The people of New Bali will be able to sleep more soundly in future,” Nuwel said. “We survived the first coup attempt by the grace of God. If our dissident minority tries a repeat, they shall find us far more prepared, thanks to you and your men.”
“I hope it never comes to that, Governor, but if it does, I’m sure that your men will be able to cope with any situation that does arise.”
Governor Nuwel shook hands with the lieutenants, offering each a smile and a few words of gratitude. Then he returned to Orlis.
“Captain, I know that you’re in something of a hurry to return home, but I do hope that you and your men can see yourselves free to give us a few more hours. My government and the city of Singaraja have prepared a small celebratory party—a luncheon, if you prefer—for late this morning.”
“Thank you, Governor. We would be honored,” Orlis replied.
Huge pavilions of green and yellow fabric had been erected along the beach. Insulated tarps covered the sand under the canopies. Fans and dehumidifiers struggled to make the pavilions comfortable. In the governor’s pavilion, several long tables had been set. All of the mercenaries were there, officers at the head table that was perpendicular to the rest, sitting with Governor Nuwel and his chief civilian and militia officials, as well as the mayor and council president of Singaraja.
The festivities started two hours before noon, with the mercenary officers being presented to scores of local notables. Cameras and microphones were present for the inevitable speeches that preceded, followed, and interrupted the eating, and were broadcast to the people in the other pavilions and via the public complink net to the rest of New Bali.
Lon and his companion officers wore off-dress white uniforms. The enlisted men wore clean fatigue uniforms. None of them had brought anything fancier along on a contract.
“I’d just as soon use the time to take a nap in a refrigerator,” Lon had said earlier, when the three officers were alone together for a few minutes after their meeting with Governor Nuwel. “Get some sleep. Get away from the heat.”
Captain Orlis had laughed. “You’ll get your chance soon enough, Nolan. This is part of the business. We’ve got to leave a good impression. Maybe a reference from the people here will bring another job or two for the Corps in the future.”
By the time they were escorted to the beach for the luncheon, Lon was feeling very sluggish. There had been no sleep for the mercenaries the night before, and he had not slept well for several previous nights, basically since the Dirigenters had moved into the jungle, away from the relatively comfortable accommodations they had enjoyed while they were training the local militia. “We need to get in a little refresher training of our own” was the cover story that Captain Orlis had given the local militia commander. “You’ve got a sort of terrain that we don’t have back home.” Only the governor had known the actual reason: the training was a cover for some sort of final exercise to test the militia. And even he had not known exactly what the mercenaries were going to do or when, just that they were going to put the militia to the test.
In the governor’s pavilion, drinks were served early and often. The enlisted men had beer and wine. At the head table, the drink was a lemon-flavored liqueur of a yellow tint, served over ice. It was deceptively innocuous, sweet and mild in the mouth. But, as Lon quickly discovered, it seemed to erupt about halfway to the stomach, providing an inner heat that chased away any awareness of the outside temperature.
“Whew, that’s really something,” Lon said, turning to the militia lieutenant at his right after his first taste of it.
The New Balinese officer grinned. “This is but ice water, my friend. The yellow djorja is less than sixty percent alcohol, and watered down slightly in the mix. And this is on ice, diluting it further. The green djorja we drink in the evening—neat—now that is a real drink.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” Lon said, daring a second cautious sip of his drink.
The djorja lost its bite after a few more sips. Lon found himself taking more each time. It provided a pleasant sensation once the shock of introduction had passed. It’s a good thing I came prepared, Lon thought while a waiter refilled his glass for the third time—before the first course of the luncheon had been cleared away, I’m going to need a killjoy-patch before dessert. The patch, applied to neck or arm, would provide molecular agents to metabolize the alcohol quickly and remove any alcohol-related toxins from his system. A killjoy-patch could take a man from unconscious-drunk to duty-sober in twenty minutes.
Lon glanced along the table. Captain Orlis was also drinking freely and appeared to be showing no ill effects from the djorja. I’ll bet he stuck a killjoy on before we came, Lon thought. I wish I’d thought of that. He looked around, then tried to put on a patch of his own without being obvious about it. He applied the patch to his wrist, under the cuff of his shirt, then looked to see if anyone had noticed. No one was pointing and laughing. Satisfied, Lon rewarded himself with another drink.
By the time the formal festivities ended, it was past two in the afternoon. Lon had lost track of the amount of djorja he had consumed. Even with the killjoy-patch on his arm, he was feeling a slight buzz. He recognized the familiar euphoria of moderate intoxication, the feeling of reduced weight, a touch of light-headedness, the pleasant sense of satisfaction. All was well with the world. It felt eminently comfortable in the pavilion. Not even the assault of the sun and unconditioned air when he emerged from the pavilion could disrupt his feeling of well-being and comfort.
Captain Orlis showed no impatience. He conversed with a group of notables from Singaraja. The governor had said a few final thank-yous to the mercenary officers, then left to return to Government House. The four Dirigenter platoon sergeants were assembling their men (and making certain that everyone who needed killjoy-patches had them) for the march to the spaceport and the trip up to their ship for the journey back to Dirigent.
Lon stood on the periphery of the group surrounding Captain Orlis, trying not to look bored or impatient. He was almost startled by the touch of a hand on his arm.
