March To The Stars

look soft. We swore that the way they made ChromSten armor was to have him eat nails for breakfast, then collect it from the latrines, because his anus compressed it so hard the atoms got crushed. If Julian passed the course with Tomcat teaching it, he's okay by me. Decide for yourself who should lead the instruction.'

'Okay. Consider it done.' Kosutic gave a wave that could almost have been classified as a salute, then turned away and beckoned for the other NCOs to cluster back around her.

Pahner nodded as he watched her sketching a plan on the deck. Training and doctrine might not be all there was to war, but it was damned well half. And—

His head jerked up and he looked towards the Sea Skimmer as a crackle of rifle fire broke out, but then he relaxed with a crooked, approving grin. It looked as if the Marines weren't the only ones doing some training.

CHAPTER TWO

Captain Krindi Fain tapped the rifle breech with a leather-wrapped swagger stick.

'Keep that barrel down. You're missing high.'

'Sorry, Sir,' the recruit said. 'I think the roll of the ship is throwing me off.' He clutched the breech-loading rifle in his lower set of hands as the more dexterous upper hands opened the mechanism and thumbed in another greased paper cartridge. It was an action he could perform with blinding speed, given the fact that he had four hands, which was why his bright blue leather harness was literally covered in cartridges.

'Better to miss low,' the officer said through the sulfurous tang of powder smoke. 'Even if you miss the first target, it gives you an aiming point to reference to. And it might hit his buddy.'

The shooting was going well, he thought. The rifles were at least hitting near the floating barrel. But it needed to be better, because the Carnan Rifles had a tendency to be in the thick of it. Which was a bit of a change from when they had been the Carnan Canal Labor Battalion.

The captain looked out at the seawater stretching beyond sight in every direction and snorted. His native Diaspra had existed under the mostly benevolent rule of a water-worshiping theocracy from time out of mind, but the few priests who'd accompanied the Diaspran infantry to K'Vaern's Cove had first goggled at so much water, then balked at crossing it when the time came. So much of The God had turned out to be a bad thing for worship.

He stepped along to the next firer to watch over the private's shoulder. The captain was tall, even for a Mardukan. Not as tall or as massive as his shadow Erkum Pol, perhaps, but still tall enough to see over the shoulder of the private as the wind swept the huge powder bloom aside.

'Low and to the left, Sardon. I think you've got the aim right; it's the motion of the ship that's throwing you off. More practice.'

'Yes, Sir,' the private said, and grunted a chuckle. 'We're going to kill that barrel sooner or later,' he promised, then spat out a bit of bisti root and started reloading.

Fain glanced towards the back of the ship—the 'stern' as the sailors insisted it be called. Major Bes, the infantry commander of the Carnan Battalion—'The Basik's Own,' as it was sometimes called, although any resemblance between the human prince it served and the harmless, cowardly herbivorous basik was purely superficial—was talking with one of the human privates assigned to the ship. The three humans were 'liaisons' and maintained communications via their Terran systems. But unlike most of the few remaining humans, these were still uncomfortable around Mardukans, and the team leader seemed particularly upset about the quality of the food. Which just went to show that humans must be utterly spoiled. The food which had been available since joining the army was one of the high points for most of the Mardukans.

'I like the food,' Erkum rumbled discontentedly behind him. 'The human should keep his opinions to himself.'

'Perhaps.' Fain shrugged. 'But the humans are our employers and leaders. We've learned from them, and they were the saviors of our home. I'll put up with one of them being less than perfect.'

There was more to it than that, of course. Fain wasn't terribly introspective, but he'd had to think long and hard before embarking on this journey. The human prince had called for volunteers from among the Diaspran infantry after the Battle of Sindi. He'd warned them that he could promise little—that they would be paid a stipend and see new lands, but that that was, for all practical purposes, it.

The choice had seemed clear cut to most of the Diasprans. They liked the humans, and their prince perhaps most of all, but things were happening at home. The almost simultaneous arrival of the Boman hordes and the humans had broken the city out of its millennia-old stasis. New industries were being built every day, and there were fortunes to be made.

As a veteran officer of the Sindi campaign, Fain was bulging with loot to invest, and his family had already found a good opportunity, a foundry that was being built on the extended family's land. A tiny bit of capital could see a handsome return. In fact, he could probably have retired on the income.

Yet he'd found himself looking to the west. He hadn't known what was calling to him at the time. Indeed, he hadn't even begun to understand until days after he'd volunteered for the expedition. But some siren song had been pulling him into the train of the humans, and he'd found the answer in an offhand comment from one of those same humans. Fain had made a pronouncement about the status of 'his' company, and Sergeant Julian had cocked his head at him and smiled. 'You've got it bad,' the NCO had said.

And that was when Fain had realized he'd been bitten by the command bug.

The command bug was one of the most pernicious drugs known to any sentient race. To command in battle was both the greatest and most horrible activity in which any adult could participate. Any good commander felt each death as if it were his own. To him, his men were his children, and holding one of his troops while he died was like holding a brother. But to command well was to know that whatever casualties he'd taken, more lives would have been lost under an inferior commander. And Fain had commanded well.

Handed a company out of the gray sky, he'd taken them into the most complicated environment possible— as outnumbered skirmishers on the flank of a large force—and managed to perform his duty magnificently. He'd lost troops, people he'd known for months and even years. But he'd also been in a few other battles, both before and since, and he'd known that many more of those people would have died under the commander he'd replaced. He'd kept his head, been innovative, and known when and how to cut his losses.

So when the choice came, to give up command and return to a life of business and luxury, or to take a command into the unknown, following an alien leader, he'd taken only a moment to decide. He'd sent most of his accumulated funds, the traded loot of four major and minor battles, to his family for investment, raised a true-hand, and sworn his allegiance to Prince Roger MacClintock and the Empire of Man.

And, to no one's amazement (except, perhaps his own), most of his company had followed him. They'd follow him to Hell.

Most of his troops were aboard the Ima Hooker with Sergeant Knever, but there was also a small detachment here on Sea Skimmer, and today was one of its twice- weekly riflery drills.

Fain made it a point to supervise those drills in person, because he'd learned the hard way that good marksmanship was an important factor in the sort of warfare the humans taught. The Carnan Rifles' entire battalion had gradually segued into a rifle skirmisher force, following the lead of its most famous captain, and with skirmishers, excellent marksmanship was paramount. They were supposed to get out in front of conventional forces and snipe the leaders of approaching formations. They had to be able to hit something smaller than the broad side of a temple to do that job, and the Carnan Rifles were proving they could do just that.

Well, most of them.

Then there was Erkum.

At almost four meters in height, the big Mardukan dwarfed even his captain. Mardukans generally ran to three meters or so, from their broad, bare feet to their curved double horns, so Erkum was a giant even for them. And, except mentally, he wasn't slow, either, despite his size. Fain had seen him catch spears in flight and outrun civan for short bursts.

But he couldn't hit a pagathar with a rifle at ten paces. If it was headed straight