Rick Shelley - 06 - Colonel

VIP免费
2024-11-29 0 0 406.25KB 131 页 5.9玖币
侵权投诉
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E-books/Rick%20Shelley%20-%2006%20-%20Colonel.txt
Dirigent Mercenary Corp
Book #06
Colonel
by Rick Shelley
The year is A.D. 2830. The interstellar diaspora from Earth has been in progress
for seven centuries. The numbers are uncertain, but at least five hundred worlds
have been settled, and perhaps well over a thousand. The total human population
of the galaxy could be in excess of a trillion. On Earth, the Confederation of
Human Worlds still theoretically controls all of those colonies, but the reality
is that it can count on its orders being obeyed only as far as the most distant
permanent outpost within Earth's system, on Titan. Beyond Saturn, there are two
primary interstellar political groupings, the Confederation of Human Worlds
(broken away from the organization on Earth with the same name, with its capital
on the world known as Union) and the Second Commonwealth, centered on
Buckingham. Neither of those political unions is as large or as powerful as they
will be in another seventeen decades, when their diametrically opposed interests
finally bring them to the point of war. In the meantime, humans who need
military assistance, and do not want the domination of either Confederation or
Commonwealth, have only a handful of options. Those who can afford it turn to
mercenaries. And the largest source of those is on the world of Dirigent....
1
Although Christmas was a week past, a decorated tree still sat in one corner of
the Nolan living room. Each of the three strings of lights was guaranteed to
include bulbs of 120 distinct colors. They twinkled in unpredictable sequences
and combinations-"Like snowflakes, no two patterns will ever be exactly alike,"
the advertisement had promised. The only other light in the room came from the
screen of the entertainment console. For the past three weeks, Dirigent City's
special-events channel had been offering holiday music of the last thousand
years. Although there was video to go with most of the selections-performance,
dramatic, or simply mood-Lon had muted the monitor to leave only the dark blue
background of a vacant screen.
Lon Nolan and his wife, Sara, were sitting on the sofa, snuggled close. For the
moment, their attention had been diverted from hypnotic staring at the tree
lights to watching the timeline on the entertainment console as it counted down
the seconds of the final minute of the year 2829. Lon, Junior, stood leaning
against the mantel of the room's decorative fireplace, a bottle of beer in his
left hand. Junior had been nursing the same bottle for nearly an hour. When the
countdown reached twenty seconds, he set the beer on the mantel and straightened
up. Although he was not in uniform. Junior stood almost at attention. He was
nearly two inches taller than his father now, and perhaps five pounds heavier.
As a boy. Junior had appeared to be the image of his father; now he seemed to
favor his mother more, at least through the face. His complexion was lighter
than his father's, even though his face was tanned and beginning to show the
weathering of a life spent largely outdoors.
The screen of the entertainment console came to life then, programmed earlier by
Lon, Senior. The several hundred couples who were seeing the new year come in at
the grand ballroom of Corps Headquarters had stopped dancing. They were counting
down the last seconds. The band on the stage at the east end of the ballroom was
ready to jump straight into the traditional music for welcoming the new year.
"Happy New Year!" the master of ceremonies shouted at the appropriate second.
Balloons, streamers, and confetti filled the air at the grand ballroom. The band
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E...ks/Rick%20Shelley%20-%2006%20-%20Colonel.txt (1 of 131) [12/29/2004 1:12:22 AM]
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E-books/Rick%20Shelley%20-%2006%20-%20Colonel.txt
launched 2830 with "Auld Lang Syne," a song whose origins had been partially
lost in the mythology that had grown up around it when the song had been chosen
as the accompaniment to the start of the journeys of early colony ships leaving
Earth.
Lon and Sara welcomed the new year with a long kiss. Sara twisted around on the
sofa until she was almost sitting in her husband's lap. Junior turned half away,
as if distancing himself from the demonstration of parental emotion. He occupied
himself by finishing the beer on the mantel. It was almost room temperature by
now.
The new year was a full minute old when Junior cleared his throat and said,
"I've got a taxi on order for quarter past."
That interrupted his parents. Sara got up from the sofa and took a step toward
her son. "Your sister won't be home yet," she said.
Junior shrugged. "I promised some friends I'd meet them in Camo Town. They'll be
more than half plotched by now, but they'll remember enough if I don't show up
at all. Besides, they'll need someone around who's going to stay at least
halfway sober to get back to barracks by dawn."
His father was slower to get up from the sofa, but put his hands on Sara's arms
as if to keep her from going to their son. "I appreciate you seeing in the new
year with us," Lon said.
Junior shrugged again. "There haven't been all that many years when we've all
been together for the holidays." He grinned. "And this time it's Angie who's
missing, after all the times she moaned when you were away on contract, and she
sure let me know how she felt when I was off on contract last year."
"Oh, it's not the same," Sara said. "Angle's just out for a few hours. We were
all together for Christmas, and all your grandparents as well."
"I know. Mama," Junior said, crossing and giving her a serious hug-picking her
off the ground with ease. "But you can bet I'm going to use it just the same."
He grinned as he let her go.
"Stay out of trouble. Junior," Lon said.
Junior's grin threatened to become a laugh. "Don't worry. Dad. I'm not about to
do anything you'll have to convene a court-martial for. They don't call me 'Old
Sober-sides' for nothing." The two had quit hugging the day Junior had put on
the uniform of the Dirigent Mercenary Corps. He had enlisted as a private
shortly after his eighteenth birthday, seen combat, then been chosen for officer
training. Eleven months earlier, he had earned his lieutenant's pips after
seeing combat as an officer cadet. Now he was a platoon leader in Delta Company,
1st Battalion, 7th Regiment. His father was the regimental commander, a full
colonel and member of the Council of Regiments that governed the DMC and the
world of Dirigent. The Corps was full of cases where more than one member of a
family served in the same regiment. Over many generations a set of rules and
commonsense traditions had grown to make sure that nepotistic favoritism did not
weaken the fabric of the Corps. Every man wearing the uniform had to earn his
own way, and being related to a senior officer had at least as many drawbacks as
advantages.
"Will you be here for dinner tomorrow ... today?" Sara asked.
"One o'clock?" Junior replied. When his mother nodded, he said, "Sure, I'll be
here. Now I'd better get my coat. On busy nights, the cabdrivers start their
meters when they honk to announce they've arrived."
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E...ks/Rick%20Shelley%20-%2006%20-%20Colonel.txt (2 of 131) [12/29/2004 1:12:22 AM]
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E-books/Rick%20Shelley%20-%2006%20-%20Colonel.txt
"There are times when I think it's all a conspiracy against the women of
Dirigent," Sara said when the taxi's tail-lights blinked out as it turned the
comer.
"What are you talking about?" Lon asked.
"You finally get to the point where I don't have to worry about you going out so
often and I've got to start worrying about Junior off on contract." Regimental
commanders only went off-world on single-battalion contracts under the most
extraordinary conditions. If two battalions-half the regiment's line companies
were involved, the commander might go ;/ it were an especially important
contract, or one including considerable ancillary forces; otherwise, his
executive officer was more likely to draw the assignment. Only if three
battalions or the entire regiment went off-world on a contract was the commander
certain to go, and contracts that large were relatively infrequent.
"I tried everything I could to convince him not to enter the Corps," Lon
whispered. There were still moments when he found his mind trying to decide what
more he might have done to prevent Junior's enlistment.
Sara turned away from the picture window at the front of the house and walked
toward the Christmas tree. "I know," she said, so softly that Lon hardly heard.
"It was a losing fight from the start. This is Dirigent. The Corps is what we're
all about. We send our men off to war, and sometimes all that comes home is a
box and the official regrets of the General."
Lon went to Sara, stood behind her, and put his hands on her arms, resting his
cheek against her hair. "I know it can't stop the worrying-it doesn't keep me
from worrying about him-but he is good. He's one of the coolest junior officers
in the regiment. He keeps his head in combat and he's careful, with himself and
his men. He's got good people around him and they take care of him, the way Phip
and the others took care of me when I was in the same position."
"He could have gone into the technical end, become an engineer, and worked in
the munitions side of things," Sara said. "He's got the brain for it. He's got
the brain to tackle any job he could dream of. No one on Dirigent would have
thought the worse for him. The Corps can't take every boy, and he could have
done a lot more good for the world developing better equipment."
Lon swallowed the sigh that wanted to come out. Nothing about this conversation
was new. Alone or together, Lon and Sara had gone through every phrase, every
word, uncounted times, spoken or thought.
The romantic holiday mood was gone, and Lon saw little chance of recapturing it
that night. When Sara got fixated on this, there was seldom any cure for it but
sleep and-sometimes-crying. It was holidays more than anything else that could
bring this mood out in her. It didn't happen often, and it had rarely happened
before Junior neared the age when he could enlist. The Corps was so integral to
the existence of Dirigent that the need for young men to become soldiers had to
be the highest priority, and schooling and social pressure had always been used
to impress everyone with that need. Dirigent is the Corps. Without the Corps
there would be no Dirigent. The truth of that was unfortunately easy to
demonstrate. Without the Corps and its ancillary munitions industry, Dirigent
did not have the resources to support 10 percent of its current population at
anything beyond the subsistence, everyone-a-farmer, level. It certainly wouldn't
be one of the dozen most prosperous colony worlds.
"You know his argument," Lon said after a long silence. "He figures he'll have
time to do both, learn firsthand what soldiers face on the ground, then continue
his education and find ways to make things better for them. Look on the bright
side. He doesn't plan on spending his entire working career in the Corps. He
talks about five or ten years, and if he gets some idea that really catches his
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E...ks/Rick%20Shelley%20-%2006%20-%20Colonel.txt (3 of 131) [12/29/2004 1:12:22 AM]
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E-books/Rick%20Shelley%20-%2006%20-%20Colonel.txt
imagination, he might cut even that short, anxious to get involved in the
research and development end of the business."
"If he lives long enough," Sara said. Then she expelled a sigh and turned to
face her husband. "I know, I'm making a botch out of the holiday and I
shouldn't."
"You worry because you care," Lon said. He knew it was a cliche, but he had
learned years before that cliches were the safest way to handle a situation like
this. "You wouldn't be much of a wife and mother if you didn't worry about us.
We might get to thinking that you didn't love us."
Sara buried her face against his shirt. To avoid a show of tears, Lon changed
the subject. "What time is Angie supposed to be home from that dance?"
"By one-thirty," Sara said, pulling away from Lon. "The dance ends at one
o'clock." It was a well-supervised affair, chaperoned by teachers from the high
school on base that Angie attended and teachers from the three civilian high
schools in Dirigent City that also were taking part. "The bus will have the kids
back on base by one-twenty, and it shouldn't take her more than ten minutes to
walk home from the bus stop. And, no, I don't think you should walk over to meet
her there. She'll have friends with her."
Lon chuckled. "I wasn't going to suggest that. The only thing I was thinking was
that I might stand on the porch and watch."
"Not even that," Sara said. "Angie is sixteen years old now, and you know how
touchy she is when she thinks we're still treating her like a little kid."
"I can't help it. Where I grew up on Earth it wasn't safe for a cop to be out
alone after dark, let alone a teenager. My hometown had more crime in any given
week than the entire world of Dirigent has had in the past quarter century. I
still think about that at some level."
"The kids think you're making that up, you know, even after they looked up the
statistics on the net. Besides, Angie probably won't be alone. She's got a new
boyfriend, and I imagine he'll walk her home."
"New boyfriend? Not that Bobby anymore?"
Sara laughed. "You're way behind times. There have been two others since Bobby.
Three with this latest boy."
"Who's she seeing now? Someone from her school?" Lon did not even notice that
Sara had come out of her funk.
"His name is Gordon Aruba. His father is a battalion lead sergeant in 10th
Regiment."
Lon closed his eyes for a moment, trying to make a connection to the name. He
shook his head. "I don't think I know him."
"No, you probably don't, but Gordon knows who you are, so you can bet he'll be a
perfect gentleman. Now, let's get back to the music. We don't want Angie to come
home and spot us standing around looking like we're just waiting for her to
check in."
2
Dirigent City and the DMC's primary base woke on New Year's Day to a fresh
coating of snow, slightly more than two inches in most places, which made it the
heaviest snowfall of the winter. So far. The snow had started falling, lightly,
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E...ks/Rick%20Shelley%20-%2006%20-%20Colonel.txt (4 of 131) [12/29/2004 1:12:22 AM]
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E-books/Rick%20Shelley%20-%2006%20-%20Colonel.txt
just after one o'clock that morning, before Angie Nolan got home from her New
Year's Eve dance. By the time Angie and her parents got to bed, near two
o'clock, there was already a dusting on the lawns and streets. The snow showers
peaked at about four, and started to taper off less than a half hour later. By
dawn the skies were clearing. The temperature was in the mid-twenties, and there
was just the hint of a breeze coming from the northwest.
Despite, his late night, Lon was out of bed by seven o'clock. He had already
been awake for an hour. More than a quarter century as a soldier had made it
virtually impossible for him to sleep past dawn in garrison. Lon avoided moving
or getting out of bed as long as he could, not wanting to wake Sara. Eventually,
though, he could take immobility no more. He got up, showered, shaved, and
dressed in comfortable civilian clothes, then went to the kitchen to fix his own
breakfast. When he heard Sara moving about, he doubled everything. There was
little chance that Angie would rise before nine, and even then she would
probably eat no more than a single slice of toast... if that. Angie had given up
on breakfast about the time she reached puberty.
"One of these days I'm going to leam," Sara said when she came into the kitchen
wearing robe and slippers.
"Leam what?" Lon asked.
"Leam to stick a sleep patch on you when you don't have to be up before the
chickens," Sara said. She sat at the table in her usual place-nearest the stove
and food replicator.
"I tried not to wake you," Lon replied. "Breakfast will be ready in two
minutes." He set a cup of coffee in front of her. Sara closed her eyes while she
took her first sip. Lon always made the coffee too strong, but-this mom-ing-that
was just what she wanted. Sara had only had three drinks the night before, but
that was more alcohol than she usually drank in a week. There was no headache-no
hangover. She had applied a patch, what men in the Corps called a killjoy patch,
to avoid that before going to bed, but she still felt a little sluggish.
"You called the officer of the day yet to make sure the whole regiment didn't
move without leaving a forwarding address?" Sara asked as she set the coffee cup
back down.
"No, I haven't called the OD yet," Lon said. "All I did was check the complink
to make certain there were no important messages. And I'm not planning on going
in to headquarters at all today."
"I noticed you weren't in uniform," Sara said.
"Come on," Lon said, starting to dish up the eggs and sausages he had cooked. "I
have learned to relax a little."
Sara smiled. "A little," she conceded.
"We've got snow on the ground," Lon said. He put one plate in front of Sara and
took his around to the other side of the table and sat across from her.
"I know. I looked out. Enough snow to look pretty, not enough to be a nuisance
if we want to go anywhere. A few hours and the streets will all be clear." There
were few wheeled vehicles on Dirigent. Most automobiles and trucks were ground
effect vehicles-floaters. The passage of one floater's fans normally left clear
pavement behind, except when there was wet, heavy snow. Then it might take
considerable traffic. It had been twelve years since the Corps had needed to put
snowplows on tracked vehicles to clear streets in the city or on base. This
time, the snow was not excessively wet and the temperature would probably climb
above freezing before noon. By sunset there might be almost no evidence left
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E...ks/Rick%20Shelley%20-%2006%20-%20Colonel.txt (5 of 131) [12/29/2004 1:12:22 AM]
摘要：

file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E-books/Rick%20Shelley%20-%206%20-%20Colonel.txtDirigentMercenaryCorpBook#06ColonelbyRickShelleyTheyearisA.D.2830.TheinterstellardiasporafromEarthhasbeeninprogressforsevencenturies.Thenumbersareuncertain,butatleastfivehundredworldshavebeensettled,andper...

展开>> 收起<<
Rick Shelley - 06 - Colonel.pdf

共131页,预览5页

还剩页未读， 继续阅读

声明：本站为文档C2C交易模式，即用户上传的文档直接被用户下载，本站只是中间服务平台，本站所有文档下载所得的收益归上传人(含作者)所有。玖贝云文库仅提供信息存储空间，仅对用户上传内容的表现方式做保护处理，对上载内容本身不做任何修改或编辑。若文档所含内容侵犯了您的版权或隐私，请立即通知玖贝云文库，我们立即给予删除！

相关推荐

更多
立即下载
分类：外语学习 价格：5.9玖币 属性：131 页 大小：406.25KB 格式：PDF 时间：2024-11-29

开通VIP享超值会员特权

  • 多端同步记录
  • 高速下载文档
  • 免费文档工具
  • 分享文档赚钱
  • 每日登录抽奖
  • 优质衍生服务

作者详情

相关内容

更多

热门标签

人际关系 动力学连接体 力的合成 配电装置 高考理综 全宋诗作者索引 公务员考试
/ 131
评分 收藏
分享
立即下载 VIP免费下载
客服
关注