The War for Profit Series Omnibus (76 page)

Chapter Two

Lieutenant Colonel Karen Mitchell was the Brigade Logistics officer and stood behind her desk staring at the man before her. He was Chief Pescador, the Chief of Artillery for the Brigade. At a hundred and seventy centimeters tall he was the same height as Karen but his thin frame made it difficult for him to intimidate anyone and he rarely tried. He was all business and stuck with the facts, very technical-minded.

Karen said, “Do we really need to bring the Ajax gun section? Those things are huge. They each need a drop boat all their own.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“You… why do you wear glasses?”

“To correct my vision.”

Karen exhaled heavily. “I mean, you could get your vision corrected surgically just like everyone else. Cheaper than it costs to have glasses made.”

“Oh.” Chief Pescador removed his glasses and looked them over. “It’s because I like having eye protection at all times. Have to wear goggles or safety glasses or a visor most of the time at work anyway. This makes it automatic.” He put his glasses back on.

“And I suppose you have prescription safety glasses and dust goggles and tactical visors and night vision and everything else.”

“Yes ma’am. The night vision—”

“I know, they’re adjustable. Stop changing the subject. Tell me why we need all five Ajax tanks for this contract.”

“Ma’am, we’ve already sold off our heavy guns. We don’t have time to get them back and wouldn’t have time to re-train the crews. The
Ajax, it covers all the gaps in other supporting fires of our battlefield doctrine and the crews are trained to a high level of expertise right now. We need them.”

Karen sat. “Their mass is ninety five tons. Fleet has to bring in modified drop boats just to carry them and we won’t be able to skid-drop them. They’re a pain in the ass.”

“They’ll be more of a pain in the ass for the enemy. They have a two hundred and eight millimeter rail gun, the same gun used on Fleet destroyers. That is significant.”

“I thought they were two hundred millimeter.”

Chief Pescador puffed his chest. “They fire a two hundred millimeter projectile but there are four millimeters of space left around the projectile; the inner diameter of the gun tube is two hundred and eight millimeters.”

“You’re too smart for your own good.”

“Ma’am?”

“It was your experience with the modified gun carriages on Grinder that brought about the development of the
Ajax. You managed to figure out the secret of the lifters, that they were actually anti-gravity devices. Your knowledge of that made us worry that you might try to share that knowledge outside the Brigade and that made us cooperative with your desire to develop the Ajax.”

“Ma’am I assure you, I have only the best interest of the Brigade at heart. Sure, I realize you’ve mastered the use of some recovered technology. But my mind doesn’t work the way you think. I’d never disclose classified information and would never resort to extortion. I just submitted a proposal to develop a heavy fire support vehicle that can also serve as a tank and it was accepted. I now feel that the presence of the
Ajax guns are beneficial to the execution of the Fairgotten contract and I’m here begging you to take them. We need this.”

Karen leaned back in her chair. “Have a seat.”

Chief Pescador sat.

Karen said, “Is this about Tumbler?”

“Yes ma’am. Just one Ajax on Tumbler could have, would have…” He looked away.

“We can play ‘what if’ all day long and never know for sure. The burden of supporting the
Ajax is another consideration. But here we are now, to make a decision based on the here and now.”

Pescador nodded.

Karen said, “The Colonel will be here shortly. He’ll decide after discussing it with us. Just relax and when he comes in keep your seat. It’s my office and you already reported to me. Would you like something to drink?”

“Yes ma’am.”

She pointed at her office refrigerator. “Help yourself.”

He got up and took a bottle of ale and sat back down.

A knock came at the door. Karen said, “Come on in.”

Colonel Galen Raper entered and went to the refrigerator and took a bottle of ale and sat in the chair beside Chief Pescador. “So, Mister Pescador. I hear you want to bring the
Ajax tanks.”

“Yessir.”

“Karen, any reason we shouldn’t?”

“They’re too damned big.”

Galen turned to Pescador. “Any reason we should?”

He grinned. “Firepower. Strike fear into the hearts of our enemies and help keep our employers honest.”

Galen thought for a moment. “You know about the lifters.”

“Yessir. They’re installed in the
Ajax tanks. Four each. Best way to keep them secure and secret is to keep them installed.”

“And?”

Pescador leaned back in his seat. “The gun is capable of overwhelming point defenses designed to defeat artillery shells. It can launch shells at various trajectories and various velocities to impact the same target at nearly the same instant. Great way to eliminate point defenses early on and lay the rest of the target area bare to more conventional artillery attacks.”

Galen said, “Problems with mobility?”

“Not really, sir. The lifters push away from gravity at twenty tons each and there are four on each Ajax. That reduces its ninety five ton weight to a footprint of only fifteen tons. The tanks can even swim. It’s like they can walk on water, sir.”

“And climb mountains?”

“Yessir. They can climb a one hundred percent slope without any specialized adaptations.”

Karen said, “They can climb straight up?”

Pescador said, “No ma’am. A one hundred percent slope means one meter of gain in elevation for every meter of forward movement. An eight hundred mil angle is a one hundred percent slope.” He held up his left forearm diagonal in front of his chest to demonstrate the described angle.

“Thank you,” said Karen. “Anything else special about these monster tanks?”

“Power. They use a dual setup of old Hercules tank fusion bottles. They can fire projectiles up to a velocity of seven thousand meters per second. They—”

Colonel Raper said, “I like that. But do you think we need all five of them?”

“Sir?”

“Wouldn’t just one or two be sufficient?”

Pescador drank the last of his ale. “Far be it from me to match your tactical expertise, sir. My concern is more mundane. The Ajax tank represents a leap forward in armored technology. What we have here is a super tank that is actually practical, made practical only because of the lifter technology. That’s not something we want everyone to know about. We have to take all the Ajax tanks with us so that we can keep control over them. With the entire Brigade deployed on this contract, that doesn’t leave us much for pulling guard duty on them back here. And working together, the five tanks can avoid falling into enemy hands. Just one or two, that’s sketchy. And the crews left behind, they would be a little upset about missing out on this contract. They’re eager to get out there and use these tanks in battle. Sir, they want to fuck up some shit.”

Galen glanced at Karen and she shrugged. Then Galen said, “All right. You load first and blast out of here before everyone else. You have about sixteen hours to have your five
Ajax tanks loaded and tied down. Karen?”

She handed a slip of paper to Pescador and said, “Just outside the marshalling yard gate to the right at 0700 hours. First five boats.”

Pescador stood and said, “Thank you, sir, ma’am. You won’t regret it.” Then he left the office.

Karen said, “Galen, you know those
Ajax tanks are unnecessary.”

Galen finished his ale. “I know. But they’re cool. The pay we’re getting for this contract is over the top so we can afford it. We’ll have a little fun this time out. Besides, there’s nothing like overkill to reduce casualties. For us, anyway.”

Karen smiled. “You plan on using one as your command tank, don’t you?”

“Maybe.” Galen winked and stood to leave. “No, not really. But I wouldn’t mind standing up in one during a victory parade.”

Karen grinned. “Me too.”

He set his empty bottle aside. “You and everyone else. We’ll have to work that out with Pescador after we get there, after we win this little war.”

Karen said, “Is Command and Staff Call still on for this afternoon?”

“You know it.” Galen left her office.

Chapter Three

Galen entered the conference room and said, “Keep you seats.”

Seated around the conference room table were the four Brigade staff section heads, three support staff members and the eight battalion commanders, as well as the Legion commander and Lieutenant Colonel Sevin, the Brigade troubleshooter. Galen sat and leaned back in his chair. “Tad, start us off.”

Lieutenant Colonel Tad Miller was the Brigade S-3 operations officer. He stood and moved to the display controller table. An image of Fairgotten showed on the screen. He zoomed in on an air station near the coast, about five hundred klicks northeast of the disputed border between the
Northern Republic and Batista. “What we have here is where we will land and stage, acclimatize for a week and then load out on the Republic’s surface fleet to make an amphibious landing.” He scrolled down to show a port city on the east coast of Batista, nearly four hundred klicks due east of their capitol city. “We’ll land at a currently undecided location north of this port city and then seize it and then push west on a campaign to seize their capitol. Any questions?”

Lieutenant Colonel Delagiacoma, the Mechanized battalion commander, raised his hand. “Yeah. Why are we screwing around with a surface fleet?”

Tad said, “The opposing force won’t expect it, and insertion by air could be problematic if we fail to establish a stable landing zone in time. Also, follow-on logistics by sea are more reliable.”

Lieutenant Colonel Day, the Light Tank Battalion commander, raised her hand. “How good is this Republic surface fleet?”

Tad said, “They’re the only surface fleet of any consequence on Fairgotten. When they broke ties with their home world they adopted the doctrine that they would oppose colonial power over any portion of their planet. They defeated the surface fleets and military garrisons of off-world militaries in a brief campaign that allowed the other countries on Fairgotten to gain their independence. Since then they have improved and expanded their surface fleets and local space fleet as well. They are the dominate force on the seas and in the space around Fairgotten, and by a wide margin. But in response, many of the other countries have highly developed air and space defenses guarding their cities, plus strong coastal defenses in key areas. Hence the Republic’s need for land warfare, their need for us.”

The Public Affairs officer said, “The noncombatants in Batista. What are they like?”

“Well,” said Koa, “The bulk of the rural population is descended from the original terraforming workers left behind more than a thousand years ago. The ruling elite came from off-planet nearly three hundred years ago and essentially enslaved the population and imported some clone workers that have since become free to breed and integrate. In general, the rulers pursued a policy of snatching up all the wealth and power for them selves. Now that Batista is independent, what’s left is a society with an extreme gap between the have and have-nots. The general population is indifferent about who is in control of the government and their conscripted military suffers an annual desertion rate in excess of ten percent.”

“Clones? I thought cloning was banned.”

“Not everywhere. The importation of clones is banned on Fairgotten, now that it’s independent. But the definition of ‘clone’ is a bit shaky, especially in the Northern Republic.”

“Really. Are they producing clones there?” The public affairs officer leaned forward. “That could tarnish the image of the Brigade, working for cloners.”

Koa sighed. “They don’t produce clones there. But when the clones breed and have children, those children are also considered clones.”

“That defies the very definition of the word.”

“Right. It’s a big point of political contention in the Republic right now. Some states don’t recognize clones at all and declare that anyone born in the Republic is equal to all others under the law, and in other states, the children of clones are clones as well and are the property of whoever owned their parents. And mixed blood, half or a quarter or a sixteenth of clone heritage—”

Tribunus Tribula said, “Enough of that. Clearly, the Republic has a few problems of its own to work out over time. The societal status of clones in the
Northern Republic is an interesting but useless debate for us. Today we need to know the mind of our enemy. Who is their leader?”

Tad said, “I’m so glad you asked. During the past two years, Batista has changed Presidents four times. Currently their head of state is a military dictator. He was in exile from Batista, living in the Republic. He negotiated with the Republic and made agreements with Batista’s government. He promised to favor an end to the war on peaceable terms, if he were allowed to return to Batista as the nominal head of their military as an advisor with no real authority. He promised to make no claim to the Presidency of Batista, and was allowed to return to his home in Batista, a lavish estate. First thing he did was stage a military coup and declare himself President General, and then he marched his army north to seize the disputed border land between Batista and the
Northern Republic.”

Tribula said, “Sounds like a very interesting man.”

Tad said, “He was the duly-elected president of Batista about five years ago. A northern province declared itself independent from Batista so he marched his army north to crush their rebellion but he over-extended his forces and got his ass handed to him. He left office in disgrace and was sentenced to banishment in lieu of execution. He lived in the Republic after that, until now.”

Tribula said, “Is he from Batista?”

Tad said, “No sir. He’s a scoundrel I know well. Colonel Norbert Theil. He was the charter commander of the Jasmine Panzer Brigade and built this unit up from day one. He was relieved by me and Galen personally during the battle on Alamo. He left the service in disgrace and was banned for life from professional mercenary service by the Bonding Commission itself. He washed up here on Fairgotten and managed to re-establish himself. Now he leads the forces that oppose us.”

“So this is personal for you.” Tribula cracked his knuckles.

Galen leaned forward and grimaced. “It won’t affect my judgment as commander but I will enjoy kicking his ass. Again.”

Sevin said, “If I get a shot at him there won’t be enough left to identify.”

Galen said, “That’s fine with me as long as you don’t go out of your way to do it.”

“Don’t worry about that,” said Sevin. “I’ll do my job.”

“Okay.” Galen stood. “Let’s get this powwow back on topic. Around the horn, if you have any little comments or whatever, say it now.” The action went around the table clockwise, the assembled officers each waving off their opportunity to speak in turn. Galen said, “That was your chance to pop off with anything you wanted to say and you passed. I’m not impressed but I’m not disappointed either. Dismissed.”

The group stood and went back to the business of getting their units ready to deploy on a combat contract.