The Complete Hammer's Slammers, Vol. 2

"Nobody was expecting it, Captain Ranson," Hammer said. The whiskers on his chin and jowls were white, though the close-cropped hair on the colonel's head was still a sandy brown. "The National Government wasn't,weweren't. It'd been so quiet the past three months that we—"

His eye twitched. "Via!

" he cursed. "Ithought, and if anybody'd told me different I'd 've laughed at them. I thought the Consies were about to pack it in. And instead they were getting ready for the biggest attack of the war."

"But Colonel,"Cooter said.His voice sounded desperate."Theylost

. They got their butts kicked."

"Tell that to a bunch of civilians," Hammer said bitterly. "Tell that to your Colonel Banyussuf—the bloody fool!"

Somebody at Central must have spoken to Hammer from out of pickup range, because the colonel half-turned and snarled, "Thendealwith it! Shoot 'em all in the neck if you want!"

He faced around again. For an instant, Ranson stared into eyes as bleak and merciless as the scarp of a glacier. Then Hammer blinked, and the expression was gone; replaced with one of anger and concern. Human emotions, not forces of nature.

"Captain Ranson," he resumed with a formality that would have been frightening to the junior officer were she not drifting again into glassy isolation. "In a week, it'll all be over for the Consies. They'll have to make their peace on any terms they can get—even if that means surrendering for internment by the National Government. But if a district capital falls, there won'tbea National Government in a week. All they see—"

Hammer's left hand reached for his eye and clenched into a fist instead. "All they see,"he repeated in a voice that trembled between a whisper and a snarl,"is what's been lost, what's been destroyed, what's been disrupted. You and I—"

His hand brushed out in a slighting gesture."We've expended some ammo,we've lost some equipment. We've lost some people. Objectives cost. Winning costs."

Sergeant Wylde nodded. Blood was seeping from cracks in the Spray Seal which replaced the skin burned from his left shoulder.

"But the politicians and—and what passes for an army, here, they're in a panic. One more push and they'll fold. The people who pay us will fold."

One more push . . . . Ranson thought/said; she wasn't sure whether the words floated from her tongue or across her mind.