Stark's War Read Free Page A

and sprawling in that dust.
    Too monotonous and too damn quiet. Stark activated his pirate tap on the command circuit to see what the Lieutenant and the rest of his superior officers were up to.
    ". . . dull! We're losing audience points by the second!" That sounded, Stark thought, like the Brigade's Commanding General. What the hell is he talking about? Audience points?
    "There's nobody to fight, General," someone else complained.
    "That's because you're moving too slow! Take that unit. Who is that? Who's the commander?"
    "That's part of Lieutenant Porter's Platoon," another officer reported. Stark felt a chill run down his back at the words.
    "Porter! You're way off your timeline!"
    "Yes, General," Porter responded immediately. "We were dropped twenty kil—"
    "Why isn't your unit moving faster?"
    "Uh, General, doctrine—"
    "To hell with doctrine! I need some action here. Get those troops moving!"
    "Yes, General. Right away." Stark braced himself as Porter called him over the official command link. "Sergeant Stark, advance at double time."
    "Lieutenant," Stark stated with careful precision, "at double time we'll be moving too fast to react so we can evade any incoming covering fire."
    "There's nothing to evade, Sergeant! Get them going, now!"
    It all runs downhill, and I'm pretty damn near the bottom of the hill. Stark checked his scan once more, biting his lower lip, finding nothing there but friendly symbology. No threat visible, and if I can't spot enemy positions at this speed we might as well go faster just in case surprise hasn't gone to hell. "Third Squad, advance at double time." Groans and curses rippled up the circuit. "Stop complaining and move! Gomez, keep your end of the Squad up with my end. Don't let anybody lag."
    "Yes, Sergeant."
    Disorientation threatened as the pace increased. Dust and rocks skimmed by below, their height and distance distorted by the lack of atmosphere. Something that clear should be close by, but up here you couldn't count on that. Look down and you got dizzy from the dead-black and dazzling-white contrasts zipping past. Look up and the trillion stars seemed to be sucking you into space, so legs and arms started flailing as the mind convinced itself you were falling up. Looming over everything hung a white-spangled blue marble where humans by all rights belonged and where anyone with common sense knew they were supposed to fight their wars.
    "Son of a—" Acting Corporal Gomez started to yell, the curse broken by a heavy grunt.
    "You okay, Gomez?" Stark demanded, checking her suit's status.
    "Yeah, Sarge. I just tripped and did a nose dive."
    "Your suit looks fine."
    "It's fine. How come that damn horizon is so close but we don't get anywhere no matter how fast we go?" Gomez demanded sourly.
    "That's easy, Anita," Chen chimed in cheerfully. "It's like a nightmare, because you actually bought it and went straight to hell when our APC crashed."
    "Sure. I'm in hell. The fact that you're here with me supports that."
    "Kill the chatter, you clowns," Stark ordered. There shouldn't be any problem with the troops working off a little tension by bantering, given that someone had decided the threat was so low they could just run toward their objective. But he'd long ago learned not to trust any assessments from higher than company level, most especially those emanating from any place behind the lines. "We're on a combat op, not a walk in the park. Maintain comm discipline."
    "Yes, Sergeant." Gomez sounded uncharacteristically abashed. "Sorry."
    "Sorry?" Stark questioned sharply.
    "I'm acting corporal. You shouldn't have to tell me that stuff."
    "Right." Sometimes a little extra responsibility brought out a little extra in a soldier. Sometimes not. Gomez obviously felt the burden. "But don't apologize. Just do the job."
    Stark cut into the command circuit again, worried about threats that might be developing elsewhere and half hoping to hear Porter being chewed out by his own superiors again,