Caliphate (12 page)

"All this would have been unthinkable, you know," the captain said, gesturing with one armored hand at the surrounding destruction, and not neglecting the long lines of Moros being ushered into tents where courts-martial were being held by the Army of the Philippines. "Even a century ago it would have been unthinkable, though a century and a half ago it was all too common.

"The old law of war, you see, was a fragile thing, easily broken. And when the enemy ignored it and some of our own people tried to mold it to do too much, it broke. Now there's no law except for who is fastest, who is best armed and trained, who is most ruthless. And when the enemy demonstrated that the planet wasn't big enough for both of us and we demonstrated that it didn't necessarily have to
contain
both of us? That's when—"

The captain's words were interrupted by a massive burst of weapons fire as the Filipino troops working with the company shot the first dozen of those villagers convicted of war crimes into the ditch they had themselves been forced to dig.

By the fire, unbothered by the shootings, the troopers sang:

"In that land of dopey dreams

Happy peaceful Philippines . . . "

They started the boys off with light rifles, .22 caliber repeaters.
Nazrani
were barred from owning or holding arms by law. Yet the boys were no longer
Nazrani
and so they all—being, after all,
boys—
were simply thrilled.
Here
was power.
Here
was delight in destruction.

The paper targets being destroyed would not have been thrilled, had they been anything other than paper targets. The one hare who bumbled onto the rifle range was definitely not thrilled. That hare had had too many close calls with death already in the last few years.

Fortunately for the hare, the boys had not learned yet to be nearly as proficient with the rifles as falcons are born to be with their talons. Though little devils of dust burst all around the hare wherever the bullets struck, none of them struck the hare. A few hops and it was lost in the grass, trembling.

The tent shuddered as its flap billowed in the midsummer's evening breeze. Within the tent, by the flaring light of a gas lantern, the instructors for the new recruits gathered to discuss their charges over coffee and tea. The senior drill instructor of the company, Abdul Rahman, held forth a number of names, Hans' among them, of recruits for whom it might be well to give advanced training in marksmanship, in time, and perhaps even in leadership.

The boys slept out in the open under the stars.

"Minden missed the hare, just like all the rest of them did," objected Abdul Rahman's senior assistant, Rustam. Where Abdul Rahman was tall and beefy, Rustam was shorter and much more slender. Both had the blue eyes that were typical among the janissaries of the Caliphate.

"Buck fever," Abdul Rahman answered. "He still is proving a better shot than all but a few of the others."

"He was among the very last to accept the faith."

"That's true," Abdul Rahman conceded, "and it speaks well of the boy. He doesn't give up easily." He raised one sardonic eyebrow. "And I seem to recall another ex-
Nazrani
revert who likewise didn't give up his religion lightly or easily."

"I was just stupid, mule headed," answered Rustam. "It signifies nothing."

Abdul Rahman, who had been a junior drill instructor when Rustam had first been gathered to the janissaries, barely suppressed a snort. "You were the most mule headed, if not the most stupid. As you are among the most faithful now, if not the most clever. I think we'll give this boy the same chance I gave you."

Rocking his head from side to side, making the crescent decoration on his neck swing, Rustam reluctantly and doubtfully agreed. "Oh, all
right
. Have it your own way. And I suppose it isn't as if we had a better candidate."

"No, and with the American Empire almost done tidying up their perimeter, I have no doubt it will be our turn soon enough, certainly within the lifetime of the boys."

"Is the
ordu
scheduled to move to the Atlantic Wall when the boys are ready in six years?"

"I don't know," Abdul Rahman answered. "And who really plans anyway? Who even
can
plan. We'll go wherever the will of the Almighty sends us, east or west or south."

"South? Greeks? Serbs? I
hate
the Greeks and Serbs," Rustam said with a noticeable shudder. He'd been on the Balkans Front for some years and found too many comrades staked out, castrated and with their eyes gouged out. War was endemic around the borders of the
Dar al Islam
and the
Dar al Harb
, the House of Submission and the House of War. But in the Balkans it wasn't just endemic, it was virulent.

"Not a lot of quarter given or received with either of them," Abdul Rahman agreed, a little sadly. "Not a lot of quarter given or received by anybody anymore."

There was little in the way of fun and games anymore, not with Besma living in terror of the beatings al Khalifa would administer to Petra for the slightest failings of either of them. It was all Besma could do to keep her promise to Hans to teach Petra to read. And she couldn't let her stepmother see that, either, lest she decide that was a sufficient excuse to beat Petra again.

There was something deeply sick, Besma thought, about the look on al Khalifa's face when she took her whip or a switch or a belt to Petra's back and rear. She was enjoying it, yes, that much was clear. But there was something more, too, something Besma didn't understand and perhaps didn't want to. She found the slack lips, the glassy eyes, and the heavy breathing sufficiently frightening in themselves without delving into whatever thoughts and feelings lay behind those external symptoms.

"School will start for me soon," Besma announced, as she and Petra practiced Petra's reading by a flashlight hidden under the covers of Besma's bed. "I'll be gone most of every day. I'm frightened of leaving you alone with al Khalifa."

Petra didn't say anything but began to chew her lip nervously. "Please don't," she begged. "I'll do anything . . . carry your books for you . . . anything. But that woman will
hurt
me every day; I know she will."

"I know. I'm terrified of it, too. But I don't know what to do about it."

Petra began to rock and softly to cry. "I'm just a poor slave girl," she whimpered. "Why does she hate me?"

Besma shook her head. "I don't even think you exist for her," she said. "It's
me
the bitch hates. She'd much rather have me stretched over the table with my skirt up, but she doesn't dare."

"Your father's a good man," Petra said, still crying. "Can't he help? He helped me before."

"My father
is
a good man," Besma agreed, putting one arm around Petra and using the hand on the other to gather the slave girl's head into her shoulder. She rested her own cheek on the top of Petra's head. "But he is also a pious one and the law gives the management of the household to the woman. He would never interfere. Oh, he might beat al Khalifa himself if she ever gave him cause, but she never does. If he calls for her she will come even if she's in the kitchen making bread. And she lets him plow her as he will; I've heard them."

"Plow her?"

"I'll explain when you're older. Now stop crying and get back to your reading."

The Philippine Scout, in this case a genuine tracker and not a mere infantryman, read the signs by the charred corpse. The scout—he went by Aguinaldo—was perhaps forty, though the years, the sun and the rain had aged him beyond those years. He had probably been an Imperial retainer since youth. His English was, in any case, quite good though he still had some of his native accent.

Some of what there was to see was obvious: the single bullets in the power packs that had rendered two suits helpless, the scraps of armor chiseled apart . . . the tripod under which one soldier had apparently been roasted with his belly down towards the coals.

Hodge had taken one look and run off, vomit pouring into her helmet and down the flexible neck guard to gather on her breasts.

Well, it had been her man, after all. Originally she had dispatched two soldiers on a patrol. One of them was still missing.

Hamilton refrained from following her, in both senses, but just barely.

"Over there," the Filipino said, pointing towards some vine- shrouded rocks. "They fired from over there." The finger rotated to a cave in the side of the jungle-clad hill to the east. "Some ran in there from the west. Your men followed. They were ambushed. Then the Moros in the cave came out and dismembered their armor. They want you to think they roasted this man alive but he was already dead when they strung him up over the fire. The other they dragged off, I think . . . alive. Initially they went south. I can't tell from here if they kept going that way."

Thompson nodded. He'd had opportunity enough these last few weeks to have learned to trust the scout's eyes and senses. "Can you track them?" he asked.

Aguinaldo said he could but, "Captain . . . they want you to follow. They didn't have to leave the trail so well marked and they usually don't. Then, too—" the scout hesitated.

"Yes, go on," Thompson commanded.

"You're the least suitable type of unit to track them."

"I know," the captain sighed. "But we're here . . . and nobody else is."

Thompson had already radioed for a light infantry unit to insert and track down the Moros. None had been available. He'd had high altitude aerial recon check out the area for twenty miles around. They'd seen nothing.

And yet,
Thompson thought,
we know they're out there. If they can't be seen that means they're ready, waiting and, just as Aguinaldo said, they want us to follow.

Hodge returned, a little unsteady in her armored feet. "I'm sorry, sir. I—"

"Never mind, Laurie," Thompson cut her off. "No shame."

It's not like I have all that much choice,
the captain continued with his musing.
If I owe the men nothing else, I owe them that they won't be abandoned while we can still try to help. Is this going to cost me more? Yes, probably. But the soldiers can be replaced. What can't be replaced if it's lost is the faith that we—this company—won't give up on them.

Then, too, assume the worst, that there's a company or two of unusually well armed, well trained, and well led Moros out there. So we follow and they get in the first licks...maybe hurt us, maybe even badly. After they get in their first licks, we get in the last ones. How many lives do I save if that group of Moros can be destroyed?

Man,
all
my choices
suck;
not a good one to be had. Hell, I don't even
have
a choice. I'm not going to leave one of my boys out there to be skinned or roasted alive.

So the question is, do I have everybody strip down to just Exos and follow or only enough to catch the Moros and pin them in position. The latter, I think. One platoon should do.

Thompson looked directly at Hodge. "Lieutenant, you want to get your own back?"

No hesitation: "Yes,
sir
!"

"Fine. Have your children strip down to just Exos, helmets, chest plates and small arms. That will give you the speed and the endurance to follow and catch them. The rest of the company will follow you as fast as we can, carrying your extra armor. I'll arrange for aerial recon and fire support . . . that, and an on-call power pack drop. I'll
try
again to get some light infantry inserted to block their escape but I can't promise it.

"Sergeant Aguinaldo, you go with them."

"Yes, sir," the scout answered.

"Be careful with my boys and girls, Laurie," Thompson cautioned. "Now
go
!"

Hodge was just as glad that the captain had ordered her platoon out of their suits. She wasn't sure she'd have been able to stand the stench of her own puke fermenting in the jungle heat.

That wasn't all that dumping full armor had done for her. Thus lightened, the suits were quieter, faster, and had a
lot
greater endurance. Since all the processing power was located in the back and all the sensing was in the helmets, she and her platoon lost nothing in those departments.