“Damn it, Lieutenant, how can I let five of my people volunteer to go out in a nuke fireball when I won’t do it myself? My uncle would grab one and go in a second.”
“No. Your uncle knows that a very great deal of money, time, and effort has been expended in making him a general. The days when an officer led his men by running out in front of them and shouting ‘follow me’ are long over.”
“But—”
“Furthermore, Gunny, the platoon needs you. I need you. You know as well as I do—better, maybe—that a unit’s success and efficiency both depend on the experience of its senior NCOs. I cannot afford to lose you.”
Garroway had worked with Wilkie long enough to know that tone, to know that the lieutenant was not going to give in on this. The man might be barely out of Annapolis, but he could be as gold-plated stubborn a bastard as any gunnery sergeant when he set his mind to it.
“Therefore, Gunny,” Wilkie continued, “if you insist on going along, you will go in your capacity as senior NCO, to lead the other Marines and to support me as CO. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good. Are your Marines ready to boost?”
“Absolutely, sir.”
“Load-outs checked?”
“Yes, sir.” He resisted the temptation to add of course. “We’re going in light with expendables, but we have four extra pigs.”
“And the boom-packs.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good. Pass the word, then. Fifteen more minutes to launch.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
“Dismissed, Gunny Garroway.”
Garroway broke the link, and was again aware of his surroundings—sealed inside his CAS, squeezed into one of the chairs on the cargo deck of the autie with thirty other Marines. The lieutenant was riding this out in relative comfort up on the flight deck.
Briefly, Garroway considered uplinking through to his uncle, but decided against it almost before the thought had fully formed. No sense in risking having to disobey a direct order. Besides, once you started going around the chain of command to get what you wanted, discipline and order started to break down. There was a reason for the chain of command, and both Garroways were dedicated to upholding it.
Besides, he wasn’t sure his uncle even knew he was a part of Detachment Alpha. Generals didn’t usually pay much attention to the individual grunts, and the IMAC tests weren’t 1MIEU’s concern yet. Garroway didn’t know how his illustrious uncle had turned up on Phobos, but he doubted very much that it had anything to do with him.
Travis Garroway was a Garroway on his mother’s side, but, like several others in the family line over the past century or two, he’d chosen to take his mother’s family name at his Naming Day ceremony. His father, a psychtech applications speciatext with Dynate Systems in Atlanta named Travis Kraig, had been disappointed, understandably, but he’d understood. Travis’s father had never been in the military, but simply by marrying into the Garroway family, he’d come to learn a hell of a lot about the Corps, and what it meant to bear that name.
Hell, most of why he’d chosen the Garroway name was due to his Uncle Clint, who’d been a lieutenant and, later, a captain running a platoon in 1MarDiv when he’d still been in his early teens. Some of the stories he’d heard back then about the Corps had fired his passions … but even more he’d been hooked by the historical stuff involving his own family, Major Mark “Sands of Mars” Garroway, Lieutenant Kaitlin Garroway, Corporal John Esteban Garroway, and others. Many others. It certainly wasn’t true that all Garroways ended up in the Marines, but there were enough ghosts looking over their shoulders to make anyone in the family think twice about joining—for instance, and perish the thought—the Navy.
He sighed. Wilkie was right, of course. He didn’t belong on the suicide squad. But he didn’t have to like the alternative.
Suicide squad. That was what some of the Marines in the platoon were calling it, of course, though Garroway, Chrome, and the other senior people were trying to discourage that idea. This would be a team effort … gung ho. Everyone pulling together.
No one would be left behind.
Even so, it was hard to imagine hauling a thirty-one kilo pack containing a 120-kiloton nuclear device into the bowels of an alien starship without thinking in terms of suicide. No one knew what kind of close-in defenses the Hunter of the Dawn warships possessed. No one knew for certain what the crew was like. Xul starships appeared to be crewed, or at least defended, by mobile machines … though the vessels seemed also to be little more than bodies housing titanic and very alien artificial intelligences.
Did they possess other means for discouraging enemy troops from coming onboard and leaving unpleasant surprises behind, surprises such as a quintet of K-94s?
No one knew. But the Marines of RST-1 would be finding out for themselves very soon now.
“Equipment check,” Garroway called. “Everybody check your buddy.”
The Marines were paired off, each with a partner … except for Garroway, the platoon gunny. He watched the others check one another, moving down the crowded aisle. “Chien! Check your starboard-side harness. You’re dangling.”
“Right, Gunny.”
“Tomasek! Shorten up that strap on your ’thirty.”
“Aye, aye, Gunny Garroway.”
He continued making his way among the men, checking equipment, but mostly letting them see that he was there with them. Twelve of the thirty were newbies straight out of boot camp. And two of those, he saw—Istook and Lowey—had volunteered to backpack a couple of the ’94s.
Both were sitting next to each other on the starboard side aft, and their vitals readouts showed they both were scared. Well, hell. So was Garroway.
“Hey, Marines,” he said over a private channel. “How’s it going?”
PFC Gwyneth Istook was a pale, red-headed youngster from Sebree, Kentucky. Private Randolph C. Lowey was a black kid from Manchester, Georgia. “Doin’ okay, Gunny,” Lowey said.
“Yeah,” Istook added. “Ooh-rah!”
“I want you both to stick close to me, understand? No heroics. No wandering off.”
“Right, Gunny.”
“Okay, Gunny.”
“This is not a suicide mission. You will follow me in, place your devices, and follow me out. Got it?”
“Got it, Gunny.” Istook’s mental voice was level and hard.
“Good.”
He wished he could be as sure of that as he sounded.
“Uh … Gunny?”
