The Complete Hammer's Slammers, Vol. 2

Troops were moving about the Slammers' portion of the encampment in a much swifter and more directed fashion than they had been the afternoon before, when Dick Suilin first visited this northern end of Camp Progress.

The reporter glanced toward the bell—a section of rocket casing—hung on topof the Tactical Operations Center. Perhaps it had rung, unheard by him while he drove past the skeletons of National Army barracks . . .?

The warning signal merely swayed in the breeze that carried soot and soot smells even here, where few sappers had penetrated.

Suilin had figured the commo gear would be at the TOC, whether Captain Ranson was there or not. In the event, the black-haired female officer sat on the back ramp of the vehicle, facing three male soldiers who squatted before her.

She stood, thumping out her closing orders, as Suilin pulled up; the men rose a moment later. None of the group paid the local reporter any attention.

Suilin didn't recognize the men. One of them was fat, at least fifty standard years old, and wore a grease-stained khaki jumpsuit.

"No problem,Junebug,"he called as he turned away from the meeting."We'll be ready to lift—if we're left alone to

getready, all right? Keep the rest a' your people and their maintenance problems off my back—" he was striding off toward a parked tank, shouting his words over his shoulder "—and we'll be at capacity when you need us."

Suilin got out of his truck.

They called their commanding officer Junebug?

"Yeah,well,"said another soldier,about twenty-five and an average sort of man in every way.He lifted his helmet to rub his scalp, then settled the ceramic/plastic pot again. "What do you want for a call sign? Charlie Three-zero all right?"

Ranson shook her head. "Negative. You're Blue Three," she said flatly.

Blue Three rubbed his scalp again. "Right,"he said in a cheerless voice. "Only you hear 'Charlie Three-zero,' don't have kittens, okay? I got a lot to learn."

He turned morosely, adding, "And you know, this kinda on-the-job training ain't real survivable."

Suilin stood by, waiting for the third male mercenary to go before he tried to borrow the Slammers' communications system to call Kohang.

Instead of leaving, the soldier turned and looked at the reporter with a disconcertingly slack-jawed, vacant-eyed stare. The green-brown eyes didn't seem to focus at all.

Captain Ranson's eyes followed her subordinate's.She said angrily, "Who the bloody hell are you?"