CHAPTER


SEVEN

Headquarters, Fourth Fleet Marines, Camp Basilone, Halfway

Lieutenant General Indrus was no longer as stoic about it as he had been the first time he’d sat down with Lieutenant General Kratson to discuss the complaint lodged by Colonel Evava and seconded by Major General Nikil. Not only did Indrus feel, as he had the first three times the army had insisted on these sessions, that his time was being wasted, this time he was angered by Kratson’s latest pronouncement: the XI Corps commander had forwarded a formal complaint to the Commandant of the Marine Corps and to the Combined Chiefs of Staff. Further, Kratson had forwarded a formal complaint against Commodore Petrch to the Chief of Naval Operations for, as the complaint alleged, “misinterpreting” the rules of the exercise.

“Well, sir,” Indrus said, standing, Colonel Szilk and Commander Obannion standing with him, “if you have already forwarded your complaints to the Combined Chiefs and the CNO, I see no point in—” He stopped and looked toward the door of the conference room at the sound of its opening. A captain from the Operations section stood in the doorway.

“Excuse me, sir,” the captain said, “but Comm just received a Most Urgent, Immediate Attention.” He held a crystal extended in his hand.

“Give,” Indrus said, reaching a hand out. The captain stepped forward and gave him the crystal. “Excuse me, gentlemen,” Indrus said to Kratson and his followers. He popped the crystal into his reader and set the display for privacy. He quickly read the message, then announced, “General Kratson, now you have an opportunity to see how Force Recon responds to a live call for assistance.” He slid his reader over to Colonel Szilk.

Szilk read the message, then asked, “By your leave, sir?”

“Do it,” Indrus answered. He told Commander Obannion to go with Szilk.

Szilk popped the crystal from the reader and briskly left the room, followed by the Force Recon commander.

Indrus looked at Kratson. “General, I have work to do. If you wish, you may accompany me to observe. But,” he finished firmly, “stay out of my way, and don’t interfere with my people.” To Commodore Petrch, he added, “Commodore, you may as well resume your interrupted duties.” He strode out. The chief referee closed his reader and excused himself, leaving Kratson alone with his officers, a sour expression on his face.

“You may as well return to your duties, such as they are,” Kratson said to Major General Olgah and Brigadier Generals Lusey and Judite. “You, come with me,” he said to Colonel Evava.

The others stayed and stood at attention as Kratson stalked out of the room. Evava waited until the other generals exited, then hurried to catch up with Kratson.


DIRECTORATE OF OPERATIONS
HEADQUARTERS
CONFEDERATION MARINE CORPS


***Most Urgent, Immediate Attention***Most Urgent, Immediate Attention***


***Immediate Action Required***


TO: INDRUS, CG4FM, CAMBAS, HALFWAY

RE: SUPPORT OF ONGOING OPERATIONS, RAVENETTE


1. You are required to deploy all available ForRec assets to support ongoing joint Marine/Army operations in the armed conflict currently under way on Ravenette. The ForRec mission will be threefold:

A. Conduct reconnaissance missions behind hostile lines as required by ComNavForRav.

B. Conduct raids on hostile rear areas as required by ComNavForRav.

C. Conduct raids on targets of opportunity on hostile rear areas.

2. All available ForRec assets are to be deployed, to include ForRec assets currently on deployment to other missions, provided those assets can arrive at Ravenette in a timely manner and their redeployment from current missions will not unduly jeopardize the operations that they currently support. CG4FM discretion to be exercised in said redeployments.

by order of
Eggleston, LtGen
for
Aguinaldo, CMC

***Most Urgent, Immediate Attention***Most Urgent, Immediate Attention***

***Immediate Action Required***


That was the order that Colonel Szilk showed Commander Obannion as soon as the two of them reached Fourth Fleet Marines Operations Center, the message that had allowed Lieutenant General Indrus to abruptly end the meeting with Lieutenant General Kratson.

“Start your preparations for deploying the people you have available,” Szilk ordered Obannion as soon as the latter finished reading the orders. “I’ll see which deployed squads can be redeployed.” Then to a gunnery sergeant: “Gunny, get him transportation—now.”

“Aye, aye, sir,” Obannion replied. By the time he exited the building, a landcar would be waiting to whisk him to his own headquarters.

Lieutenant General Kratson and Colonel Evava entered the OpCen immediately behind the Marines; Kratson tried to read the message over Obannion’s shoulder. Szilk saw and glanced at Indrus, who gave a curt nod. When Obannion had finished reading the order, Szilk handed the reader to the army general.

A grimace flashed across Kratson’s face when he read the orders. There was a real war on Ravenette, and one of his divisions was being wasted playing war games against Marines. “The Confederation forces on Ravenette need an army division, not a rump Force Recon company.”

He meant to say it so softly only Evava could hear, but Indrus also heard him.

“General,” Indrus said coldly, “you’re right that the forces on Ravenette need more army divisions, and some are on their way. But Force Recon, properly utilized, is a force multiplier.” He couldn’t resist adding a dig: “You don’t have to take my word for it, you can ask Major General Nikil what happened to his division when two Force Recon squads were added to the mix of Marines the Eighty-sixth Division is facing in its exercise.”

Fourth Force Recon Company, Camp Howard, Halfway

More than half of the members of Fourth Force Recon Company on base at Camp Howard were in training away from the company area, so it was two hours before they were all brought back and could assemble behind the barracks. The two hours were by no means wasted time. Commander Obannion immediately put his entire staff to work preparing to move the company out.

When Obannion marched out of the barracks, his entire staff marched out behind him and took position to his rear when he took the company from First Sergeant Robeer Cottle.

Fourth Force Recon Company had more holes in its formation than would be expected in any similar-size unit formation. Most of those holes were because of the absence of elements on deployments, but two squads had just made it in from the field and hadn’t had time to change out of their chameleons. Those Marines wore soft covers rather than helmets and had their gloves off, so at least their heads and hands were visible. First platoon was missing two of its eight squads, and fourth had four squads out. Third platoon was short an entire section, along with its platoon sergeant. Only second platoon was complete, but eight of its thirty-four Marines, including the platoon commander, were new, if not to Force Recon, at least to Fourth Force Recon Company. Moreover, not all of its men were fully recovered from wounds suffered in the platoon’s recent deployment to the Ununified World of Atlas, though they were all well enough to deploy if necessary.

Of 170 Marines in the company, forty-three, including the corpsman who went with third platoon’s first section, were absent on other duties; only 127 were on hand. And when the company departed, Obannion would have to leave behind a rump command element to handle matters in Camp Howard and deal with any currently deployed squads that returned before the rest of the company did.

Still, that left 120 members of the company available, and 120 Force Recon Marines could gather a tremendous amount of intelligence—and wreak unbelievable havoc in raids in the enemy’s rear.

After looking over his company, Obannion addressed them.

“As you may know,” he began, knowing full well that his Marines tried to keep current on events throughout Human Space so they could be as prepared as possible for deployments, “a coalition of twelve worlds is attempting to secede from the Confederation of Human Worlds. They have concentrated their forces on one of the twelve, a secondary Confederation-member world called Ravenette. All attempts by the Confederation to bring matters on Ravenette to a peaceful conclusion have been rejected by the Coalition, and hostilities have broken out.

“As of the most recent information I have, which could be seriously out-of-date by now, one FIST and two Confederation Army divisions are on Ravenette, and more are on their way. The Confederation Navy has control of the space lanes around the planet. But the rebels have at least an entire field army, which has bottled up the Confederation forces on a peninsula on the main continent. Those forces are hard-pressed and are in danger of being overrun. They need the intelligence and the raiding capabilities that Fourth Force Recon Company can provide—and they need them last week.

“To that end, the entire company is deploying to Ravenette.

“When you are released from formation, liberty call will sound for twelve hours. That should be enough time for you to put your personal matters in order. When you report back for duty—I say again, in twelve hours—we will commence final preparations for the company to deploy. Within twenty-four hours of return to duty, the company will board the fast frigate Admiral Stoloff for transit to Ravenette.

“That is all I have for now.” Obannion looked to First Sergeant Cottle. “Company Gunnery Sergeant, dismiss the company.”

“Sir, aye, aye!” Cottle said sharply, and saluted.

Obannion returned the salute, about-faced, and marched back into the barracks. The staff followed him.

Cottle waited until Obannion and the staff were inside, then faced the company. “You yardbirds heard the man. You’ve got twelve hours to straighten out all your shit so it doesn’t come apart while we’re gone.

“COMP-ney, dis-MISSED! Twelve hours liberty call. NOW!”

  

Force Recon Marines prided themselves on their ability to deploy on only a few hours’ notice, much faster than the two days it typically took a FIST to go from receipt of orders to liftoff to a waiting navy starship. All of the members of second platoon were back in the barracks within eight hours of being dismissed for liberty. Lieutenant Rollings and Gunnery Sergeant Lytle were waiting for them when they got back. Lytle assembled the platoon behind the barracks.

“While you were off in Havelock,” Lytle snarled, “getting your ashes hauled and enjoying your last drunk for who knows how long, the lieutenant and I have been cloistered with the company staff drawing plans for this deployment. The lieutenant will brief you on them.” He looked over his shoulder and nodded. Rollings had been standing just inside the rear door of the barracks watching. At Lytle’s nod, he stepped out and marched toward the platoon.

“’TOON, ten-HUT!” Lytle bellowed when Rollings came out. The Marines snapped to.

Rollings stepped in front of Lytle and the two exchanged salutes, then the lieutenant faced the platoon—his platoon. He’d been a platoon commander before, but that was in a FIST. And he’d been in Force Recon before—he couldn’t become a Force Recon officer without that prior experience. His most recent duty was as the company’s S2, intelligence officer, so he and the men who had been with second platoon prior to the platoon’s last mission had at least a nodding acquaintance with each other before he was given command, and he knew their worth. So it was with pride that he looked over his platoon.

“At ease,” he ordered after a brief moment. He waited a moment for the thirty-four Marines facing him to ease into relaxed positions, then briefed them. The briefing was far less detailed than he would have liked.

“A Confederation Army corps, reinforced by a Marine FIST, is under siege by a field army composed of units from a dozen rebellious worlds. The Confederation force on Ravenette is pinned on a peninsula, which means we will have no direct contact with friendly units once we are planetside.

“We will conduct reconnaissance, raids, sabotage”—he glanced at the sniper squad—“and, situation warranting, sniper operations against elements of the opposition field army. In short, we will be conducting the full range of Force Recon missions.

“The commander of Task Force 79, the navy forces in the campaign, is Rear Admiral Hoi Yueng. Fourth Force Recon will be operating under his orders.” To prevent his Marines from wondering why they were going to be operating under command of the navy element rather than under the ground commander, as was standard operating procedure for Force Recon, he continued without break; Lieutenant General Indrus had decided he didn’t want the Force Recon Marines to know about the prejudices of General Billie, not yet. “Admiral Hoi’s task force has almost complete control of the space lanes, so the Coalition forces are having a lot of trouble reinforcing and resupplying their units planetside. Admiral Hoi will be coordinating our missions with Brigadier Theodosius Sturgeon, commander of the Marine forces on Ravenette.

“That’s all I have at this time. Once we are aboard ship, study materials will be made available to you so you can bone up on Ravenette’s terrain, climate, flora, fauna, and population, as well as the nature and capabilities of the enemy forces we will be facing. When I dismiss you, hit the squadbay and prepare to move out.” Rollings abruptly stood at attention.

“Pla-TOON, aten-SHUN! Dis-MISSED!”

“Hey, did I hear him right?” Sergeant Bingh asked Staff Sergeant Fryman as they headed for the barracks. “We’re going to be working for the squid in the sky instead of the doggie in the dirt? What gives?”

Fryman shrugged. “Damfino.” He looked at Bingh and swung his glance around to see several other members of first section walking close and listening. “I’ll see what I can find out, though.”

Inside the barracks, Fryman went to the company office to see the sergeant major while the others headed for their quarters. Fryman was neither the only nor the first senior NCO who wanted to see the sergeant major.

Fourth Force Recon Company Office

Sergeant Major Periz took one look at all the curious and demanding faces in front of his desk and decided the company office was too crowded to deal with them. “Wait,” he snarled as he rose to his feet and stepped into Commander Obannion’s office.

“Sir, begging the commander’s pardon, but I need you to get out of here for a few minutes and let me and my top NCOs have a little tête-à-tête in private.”

Obannion turned to him with a look of surprise that quickly turned to one of understanding. “Ah, yes, Sergeant Major, I think we can manage that.” He stood and walked around his desk to vacate his office. “Good afternoon, Marines,” he said to the dozen gunnery sergeants and staff sergeants crowded around Periz’s desk.”

“Afternoon, sir,” they said.

“Get in here,” Periz snarled as soon as Obannion cleared the clot of senior NCOs. He went behind the desk and waited, glowering.

Obannion’s office wasn’t nearly big enough to hold a senior NCOs’ meeting, but at least they had some privacy. The four gunnery sergeant platoon sergeant and eight staff sergeant section leaders made space, filling the area in front and on both sides of the desk.

“All right,” Periz said as soon as the door was closed, “somebody surprise me and tell me you aren’t going to ask the dumb question I know you’re going to ask.”

“No surprise, Sergeant Major,” said Gunny Natilvash, the first platoon sergeant and senior enlisted man in the platoons. “We all want to know why we’re reporting to the admiral instead of the general.”

“Of all the goddamn dumb questions,” Periz snarled. “Natilvash, you’ve been in this man’s Marine Corps long enough to know the answers to questions like that.” He shook his head sadly. “Maybe I should have a career counseler talk to you about the benefits of early retirement, you’ve got to be losing it.”

Natilvash grinned. “You know better than that, Top. All I really need is the name.”

Periz looked at the others; they were all nodding. “You got it. It’s one General Jason Billie. Got promoted to four stars right before he shipped out to Ravenette. I’ve read his record, the man’s got a chestful of medals. Every last one of them’s an attaboy.” Marines called personal medals awarded for noncombat job performance “attaboys” and had no respect for them. The Marines only awarded campaign medals for those who went in harm’s way, and decorations for personal heroism under fire. “This is his first combat command.”

A murmur went through the senior NCOs; they didn’t understand how anybody could reach so high a rank without extensive combat command experience. And for his first combat command to be a corps in a major conflict was simply beyond their comprehension.

“You’d think a man like that would want all the help he could get,” Natilvash said.

“Anyone with brains would,” Periz grunted. “But this guy’s got no use for Marines—and he thinks Force Recon is a bunch of resource-wasting prima donnas.”

The platoon and section sergeants had begun shaking their heads at another army general who didn’t understand how valuable Marines could be in assisting his command, but stopped and gaped at Periz when he described Billie’s attitude about Force Recon.

“So that’s why we’re reporting to the squid in the sky instead of the doggie in the dirt,” Periz concluded. “Now, any more dumb questions?”

Natilvash shook his head. “At least there’s a good Marine unit planetside. Thirty-fourth FIST is just about the best there is.”

“Got that right. Now, if there aren’t any more dumb questions, we all have to get ready to move out—and the Skipper needs his office back. Wait until we’re in Beamspace before you tell your people about Billie.” Periz watched the twelve file out and Commander Obannion returned.

“They wanted to know why?” Obannion asked.

Periz nodded. “I straightened them out. They won’t tell their Marines until Beamspace.”

“Good.”

  

Ensign Arvey Barnum, the company’s S1 personnel officer, and First Sergeant Robeer Cottle were disappointed to learn that they had to stay behind to pass squads returning from other deployments through to the campaign on Ravenette. Lieutenant General Indrus provided them with a junior supply sergeant and a senior clerk from his headquarters battalion.

Aboard the Fast Frigate CNSS Admiral Stoloff

A fast frigate is small as starships go. Fast frigates weren’t designed for use as troop transports, though even back to the days of oceangoing warships they had sometimes been called upon to do exactly that. And when they are, they are very, very crowded. Crew are taken from their compartments and doubled up with other crew—hot-sheeting, in the ancient parlance—to make room for the troops being transported. Those troops are in turn double- or triple-billeted, two or three men assigned to sleep in shifts on the same bunks. A fast frigate’s physical-fitness and recreation facilities are of a size to easily accommodate the starship’s crew, but when those same facilities are required for the use of 120 Marines in addition to the crew, they can become congested almost beyond effective use.

To ease the congestion, Commander Stuard Alakbar, the Admiral Stoloff ’s skipper, and Commander Obannion worked out a schedule that gave everybody aboard the starship reasonable access to the facilities. The Marines, sleeping in three shifts, had four hours per shift in the gym and two in the library and entertainment facilities. Two hours was just enough time to watch a trid in the ship’s tiny theater. The rest of the time, the facilities belonged to the sailors, and the Marines were at mess or in their assigned compartments and adjacent passageways. That reduced the crew to half of their normal allotment of time in the gym and three-quarters of their recreation, but it was only for the few days the Marines would be aboard. Half of the allotted time in the gym was more than the sailors normally used anyway. And while the Marines of Fourth Force Recon Company used every minute of their alloted time in the gym, they took little advantage of their time in the recreational facilities. They were too busy maintaining their weapons and equipment, studying what they could find about their coming foes via the library hookups in the compartments assigned to them, and conducting limited training exercises in the passageways adjacent to their compartments.

All starships, regardless of type or class, whether military or civilian, travel through Beamspace at the same rate—slightly faster than six light-years per standard day. Fast frigates are so designated because of their speed in Space-3, and the Admiral Stoloff took little more than two days, standard, to reach jump point into Beamspace. Jump was somewhat problematic. There is a disorienting moment during transition between Space-3 and Beamspace when the universe seems to turn inside out, topsy-turvy, and every which way but up. At this time, everyone should—for safety sake—be strapped into a bunk, acceleration couch, or workstation. But with 120 or so extra bodies on board, there simply weren’t enough bunks, acceleration couches, and workstations to hold everybody. The way the crew was berthed allowed every sailor to be properly strapped in. The Marines secured padding to the deck in their spaces and jury-rigged strapping to hold themselves in place during jump. It worked well enough that while there were a number of bruises and contusions, there were no broken bones or other serious injuries among them.

The Beamspace voyage took five days, at the end of which the Marines again had to fake their way through the jump back into Space-3. They’d learned enough the first time through that in this jump there were hardly any bruises or contusions at all. The Admiral Stoloff then needed another two days of deceleration to reach a high orbit around Ravenette.

Within an hour after the return to Space-3, Commander Obannion was on a secure link with Commander Bhati, Rear Admiral Hoi’s N2, intelligence officer, as well as with Brigadier Sturgeon, commander of Thirty-fourth FIST.

Despite the Confederation Navy’s having full control of the approaches to Ravenette, planetside mobile weapons systems had been effective in preventing the navy from maintaining a complete string-of-pearls surveillance satellite system. Therefore, once Sturgeon had given Obannion his initial orders, Commander Funshwa, Sturgeon’s F2, had limited intelligence to give Obannion for the latter to use in making his plans.

Obannion wasn’t greatly concerned about the lack of intelligence from the forces already planetside. After all, finding the enemy’s positions, strength, and intentions was Force Recon’s job. Even if Thirty-fourth FIST’s F2 had been able to provide him with detailed intelligence, Obannion would have wanted to have his own squads confirm most of it, perhaps even all of it.

The first part of Obannion’s plan was easy. The Admiral Stoloff carried one AstroGhost stealth shuttle, capable of carrying eight fully equipped Force Recon squads from orbit to planetside. He’d use it to drop eight of his squads behind Coalition lines to begin gathering intelligence. The hard part was deciding where to drop the squads. The drop points had to be in places where nobody was likely to spot the AstroGhost as it came in, yet close enough to possible enemy locations for the Marines to reach them in a timely manner. And they had to be situated in locations so related to each other that the AstroGhost could safely and quickly maneuver from one to the next.

The AstroGhost, with its thirty-two embarked Marines, the four squads of second platoon’s first section and the four of fourth platoon’s second section, launched while the Admiral Stoloff was still a half day out from orbit around Ravenette. On its second trip, the AstroGhost took a section from first platoon and the sniper squads from second and third platoons.

Commander Obannion transferred his command post to the CNSS Kiowa, the flagship of Task Force 79, as soon as the last of his squads launched.