The Heart of Matter: Odyssey One (20 page)

Possibly even Eric Weston himself, though the conversation seemed to cast doubt on that.

Even if not a gestalt, the entity was still dangerous. Central had manipulated either the laws of physics as Eric knew them or Eric’s mind, and done it with apparent ease. The worst of it was that, to be honest, Eric couldn’t decide which frightened him more.

Since that very discomforting meeting, Eric had been kept busy working alongside Rael and Nero as they pushed the proposal for the land grant through the Council. The Council had made their decision a lot faster than Rael had thought, giving the
Odyssey
’s troops permission to conduct live-fire exercises within only a couple of days. The idea of building a full-time facility out there wasn’t as pleasant to them, but from what the ambassador and Rael were telling him, they were coming around.

He’d had the numbers converted in the
Odyssey
’s labs and knew that the territory they were talking about ceding over to their military was roughly the size of the state of Texas. Which was a big part of the problem, actually, since the Priminae had a hard time understanding why anyone would need such a massive tract of land.

But Eric kept wondering if it was going to be enough.

Nero and Reed were already sketching out plans for a large training facility, enough to process probably twenty to thirty thousand boot soldiers in a month. Officer training facilities were also being sketched out now, though those were longer term, of course, and as of a day earlier, Rael Tanner had entered the fray, dragging Weston along with him.

The territory in question was now being considered as the potential primary training area for the Priminae Navy as well as their ground forces.

If things worked out as intended, it was likely that more then a hundred thousand people would be living, working, and passing through there within sixty days. God knew that the Priminae could be slow at making critical decisions at times, leaving things until the last-possible moment, but Eric was learning now that, when they made a choice, they moved very fast, indeed.

It made him wonder, actually, what they’d become in a few years if this war weren’t resolved quickly. Would the city he was watching become an armed camp? Did the people here have the steel it would take not just to survive that but to flourish? There was something about the military, about the idea of living under that kind of discipline, that was anathema to some people. They didn’t thrive in those conditions, at least not in the long term.

If it happened, the Priminae would have to get their people behind the military, actively supporting it rather than merely tolerating it. Honestly, they would have to do that anyway if they wanted an effective defense force.

A soldier fought better when he knew that he was not only needed, but appreciated back home. There were few things as degrading to man than to come home to the people you served, only to be shunned and reviled by them. It would sow a bitter vein in the forces here if it wasn’t prevented and cut down now—and quickly.

Something Eric knew to be dangerous, indeed, was a bitter military. It didn’t fight at its peak, and it could turn on those who had hurt it. The military sowed a spirit of brotherhood in its members, by necessity as well as plan, and that spirit was a vengeful one when its ire was aroused. The Priminae needed to learn that now, peacefully, before it was taught to them later.

The entity known as Central observed Eric Weston’s thoughts with a certain grim concern.

The concern came from the solid belief backing up the captain’s thoughts, and therefore, Central had to consider the possibility that he was right.

Central knew that there was even less sympathy for the military throughout the population of Ranquil. Most people felt distanced from the threat of the Drasin; even those within Mons Systema were largely untouched by the deaths that had overtaken their city only a few months previously.

The fact that it hadn’t been the local defense force that had saved them didn’t help, turning much of their fear into contempt.

For the moment, it wasn’t a threat to the structure of the society, Central concluded; however, it was a threat to the survival of the society. If that attitude didn’t change, then recruiting would eventually reach a plateau beyond which the defense forces would not be able to progress, and that would be disastrous in the event of another attack. They had to be unified against any invaders, Drasin or anyone else. Even the Terrans, if it came down to it.

Central, however, was a very old entity. It could look beyond the war; it had to do so, in fact. If the military emerged from this war victorious, then the future became uncertain.

Weston believed that the military might be a threat to the society it protected, though he believed that threat to be a minor one. Central wasn’t certain if it agreed with that sentiment, and it did not wish to save the society from one threat only to have unleashed another upon it.

A familiar voice called out Colonel Reed’s name as he supervised the construction of the final few emplacements being built by he and his team.
Nero?
Surprised, he looked over his shoulder.

Sure enough, it was Nero. There was no mistaking that wide stride, those hulking shoulders. He walked with a gait Reed had seen many times in the past, not that of a soldier or a warrior, but rather, the walk of a man who worked for a living. He’d seen it before, in more countries than he cared to name. The commander may not be a career soldier up to the standards of the forces, but if the Priminae could give them five hundred men like Nero…He liked his odds of creating a truly excellent irregular unit.

“Commander.” He nodded respectfully to Nero Jehan as the big man approached.

The commander didn’t mind getting dirty, and that was something that Reed approved wholeheartedly of, but he wasn’t out on the site that often, either. Considering that he was the de facto, if not official, commanding officer of the Priminae ground forces, Reed supposed that it was surprising that he had time to show up as often as he did.

It had been a week since the Council had decided to allow the land grant, and Reed was impressed with the speed of construction. There was an area carefully cleared to construct training facilities in, one that would occupy a hundred acres of land and be constructed complete with its own public transportation system and heavily fortified underground barracks and offices.

That was a long way from where Reed and the commander were standing now, though—on ground zero for the training
maneuvers to be executed by the
Odyssey
’s assault contingent the next day. The area was dotted with quickly molded bunkers, each of which was equipped with throwaway laser emitters and primitive computer control systems. When the
Odyssey
’s crew attacked, they would be broadcasting their IFF systems in a manner decidedly unwise for actual combat, but the signals would allow Reed and his team to control the low-powered lasers they’d installed all through the assault area to create a credible defense.

Nothing really distinguished the place. It looked like any number of similar places where Reed had conducted exercises in the past. Which made him feel oddly confident about their efforts.

“So how are the preparations progressing?” Nero asked, coming up to stand beside the colonel and overlook the field below. Reed couldn’t deny Nero exuded confidence; it could be intimidating. Not to mention, you might be shoved aside by a stray Nero shoulder if you didn’t watch yourself.

“Very well, indeed, Commander,” Reed said, nodding to the nearest group of workers. “You have some very good people here. Once we showed them how to do it once, they caught on fast, and I have to compliment you on the administrative work. Ithan Chans is a miracle worker.”

Nero seemed about to register that as an insult, but said evenly, “Building things is what we do.”

Reed gave him a crooked smile. “Well, we try for a more balanced approach. Sometimes you have to be able to rip them down as well.”

“Indeed,” Nero said, his inflection not giving away any of his thoughts on the matter.

“We’ll have the field ready for tomorrow, Commander. No problem.”

Nero nodded. “I can see that. I will be very interested to see the assault, Colonel. When the
Odyssey
’s soldiers were last on Ranquil, I was occupied with other matters.”

“I’ll bet,” Reed said a little sourly.

The fact that his world had been under a planetary assault by creatures intent on utterly destroying it would tend to take up a commander’s time, Reed was certain. As far as the colonel was concerned, it was a minor miracle that Nero hadn’t tried to blow away the
Odyssey
’s soldiers when they came tramping through the streets in full armor.

Reed knew that, if matters had been reversed, he would have blown the
Odyssey
’s soldiers right out of the sky, along with their Drasin counterparts, then lasered their remains into ash for good measure. There were times when it was better to beg forgiveness than ask for identification.

Reed glanced to one side, eyeing the imposing figure that was Commander Jehan, once again. The man stood a full head and then some over Reed himself and was built proportionately to his size, which made him probably more than a little scary of a figure. But it was his craggy, impressive face, with the weathered yet experienced look of a man who had spent his youth outside, that gave him such authority. Reed liked to imagine he looked a lot like Nero, except with a slighter build.

In the past decade, Reed had started to see a lot of changes in the Earth military. Too many good-looking soldiers, for one thing. The new armor had become a mainstay of a lot of the units, turning the hard and tough exterior of the soldiers who wore them soft. It didn’t mean that they were soft, Reed supposed, but the armor that protected them from bullets also kept the sun from baking in that leathery look of dangerous competence common to Reed’s generation of soldiers.

Added to that was the fact that, with the newer munitions, there were fewer scars on surviving soldiers. If you were hit, you died, and if by some miracle you didn’t, well, then the near-infrareds and medicines in your suits usually closed up anything short of an amputation, and as long as you stayed on treatment, modern medicine had pretty much done away with the scars that had once been badges of pride among some of the hardier men.

Modern soldiers were gym fit, and suit drills had replaced three-day marches, making a mere hundred-kilometer march something to be joked about rather than groaned at. Every time Reed saw some baby-faced master sergeant he winced, his first thought being that the service had gone to hell to be letting kids reach that age. Then he’d watch the “kid” rip into some poor recruit, and damned if he didn’t feel like an old man who was playing out of his league.

Maybe all of this explained why he liked Commander Jehan and the troops the man had offered up for training. They were all hard men who’d spent their lives outside. In the case of the Priminae, it was because they were Colonials in the true sense of the word, working a new planet and opening new resources to the use of their people. They weren’t military, it was true, and they weren’t Special Forces caliber by any stretch of the imagination, but Reed had made a career of turning lesser men than this into a workable, fighting force.

Nero suddenly broke into Reed’s thoughts: “I have something to show you, Colonel.”

He looked up to meet the commander’s eyes. “Oh?”

Nero nodded, waving a hand over his shoulder.

Reed turned around as two men came forward with cases in their hands, delivering the metallic-gray bundles to
the commander and setting them on the ground when he motioned.

“Prototype weapons,” Nero said, crouching down to one knee as he popped open one of the cases. “We were hoping for your opinion of them, Colonel.”

Reed nodded, looking on in interest. He’d seen the Priminae lasers in action and had been duly impressed with their power. The only problem he’d seen with them himself was the fact that they had proven ineffective in battle.

Which, he had to admit, was a pretty damned big problem.