25
It could be that bad. Even worse.
Rev stood at attention as the division CG left the fieldhouse, in a state of shock. As soon as the hatch closed behind him, the regiment—what little there was left—broke out into a dull roar.
The Gryphons had landed 2,406 and six Marines and sailors, and 540 were extracted. It had been a slaughter.
The CO and the sergeant major had been among those killed when the Centaurs counterattacked. Granted, on a personal level, they were just two more Marines among the losses, but each survivor felt the blow.
It had been obvious that things had gone bad from the moment they’d gotten back to Camp Nguyen. There just weren’t the numbers of Marines around. But there had been the hope that they were just waiting for more ships to return.
The camp was under a blackout, so even after getting to their barracks, no one knew what had happened. Eight hours after returning, Hussein Černý walked into the barracks, the one bright spot in a dim homecoming. But he had nothing more of a picture than they had.
Like Rev, he’d been inserted to the west of their AO, their Area of Operations. Unlike Rev, he couldn’t make it over the intervening range. He just managed to reach the sapper RP on that side of the range when the recall came.
The team was lucky. Rev was the only WIA. Second Team lost two Marines, and First never made it off the planet. Rev hoped that they were still there, hiding out until the Marines could return, but he realized that was just wishful thinking. He didn’t want to think that his fellow Raiders, the ones he’d joked with, eaten with, just such a short time ago, were dead.
And the Gryphons, despite the losses, had come out better than the other two regiments. The Bucks were almost wiped out, and the Lancers hadn’t fared much better. The division had been gutted. It was no longer a viable fighting force.
The CG had wanted to brief them face-to-face, and he looked like a broken man as he did so. He didn’t know what was going to happen next, but he promised to be transparent and timely once he found out.
“I didn’t think it was that bad,” Tomiko said. “I mean, when I saw how few were mustered here now, I knew it wasn’t good, but . . .”
Which was exactly how Rev felt. He thought he had been mentally braced, but he hadn’t imagined the depth of the loss. He felt like he’d been gut-punched.
“Rev! Miko!”a familiar voice called out.
The two turned in unison to see Bundy and Ten pushing their way over to them.
The four Marines hugged and slapped each other on their backs, happy to have at least some good news.
“Damn, I’m glad to see you!” Bundy said. “I was afraid for the worst.”
He looked down at the healing chamber on Rev’s foot and raised a questioning eyebrow.
“A Centaur shot his sabaton off, just before he ghosted the fucker,” Tomiko said. “Our lieutenant already put him in for a PN.”
“A Platinum Nova? No freaking shit? You’re going to have to tell us about that,” Ten said.
“But you guys, what happened to you? What can you tell us? We were out of the loop out there in the boonies.”
“We were hoping you can tell us. We never made it to the ground,” Bundy said. “Fyr’s platoon never made it, either. I saw him on the way over.”
That meant at least five of them had survived.
“What about Udu? She’s mech, too.” Rev asked.
“We haven’t seen her, but I don’t think any armor made it down,” Bundy said, shrugging.
“Pelletier, Reiser, back to the barracks. Lieutenant Smith wants a meeting. You can talk to your buddies later.”
“Are we still confined to the barracks, Gunny?” Rev asked.
“No outside comms, and no one’s getting off base for now, but the regimental area is OK.”
Rev turned to Bundy and Ten and said, “Look, let’s meet up at the club tonight. Just get there when you can. And tell everyone else to meet . . . uh, whoever else made it, to be there, too.”
He didn’t want to bring up that Cricket and Yancey were infantry, and that’s who took the brunt of the casualties.
“Got it,” Ten said. “If you beat us, grab a table.”
“So good to see you,” Bundy said, giving Rev, then Tomiko a hug.
“You’ve got that right,” Rev said.
“Let’s quit the jaw-jacking and go,” the gunny said.
After losing a full team, Rev knew this wasn’t going to be a pleasant meeting, but still, he was happy that at least some of their crew had survived. He was fearful for the others, but at this point, any good news would be welcome.
* * *
“You’ve got the next pitcher,” Rev told Yancey. “Just because you’re drunk doesn’t mean you get out of it.”
“I’ll buy if you fly,” Yancey said. “If your little foot boo-boo will let you hobble that far.”
“I’ve got it,” Bundy said, getting up a little unsteadily from the table. “But he’s right. You’re paying.”
The crew—the whole crew—had made the little reunion. Yancey was in a hoverchair. He’d been partially fried, his left side from his knee to his shoulder paralyzed, and he was leaving in the morning for the Naval Hospital at the capital for a nerve transplant and a few months of accelerated regeneration. He was probably breaking all sorts of rules, drinking not the least of them, but if the doctors didn’t want him to go out, the clinic shouldn’t have given him the hover chair.
With so many losses, it was nothing short of a miracle that they had all survived. All of their original crew, minus Krissy, but everyone who had taken the oath to meet when their commitment was up, was there, drinking in companionship, in celebration that they had made it, and in sorrow for all those who hadn’t.
Rev hadn’t been drunk since the night he’d spent with Mr. Oliva and the other vets, and he was making up for lost time now. Everyone was.
Rev had come close to getting ghosted, too close. Yancey had been even luckier—without the heavier infantry combat suit, he would have bought it as well. Orpheus’ platoon had been part of the flank security, and lucky for him, the Centaur counterattack had come from the other side.
Udu’s mech company had landed outside the city. She immediately lost half of her squad to a Centaur buzzball, but the recall had sounded before the rest of her unit started their advance.
Bundy, Fyr, and Ten never made it down. They’d been loaded and ready to go, but that was as far as it had gone.
But it wasn’t just the original crew who had joined in the drink-fest. Hundreds of Marines were crowded inside the club, doing their best to drain it dry. And Rafer, Giselle, and Cali had joined them.
With both Rafer and Giselle, their recon teams never got into contact. Cali Hu, however, sat quietly along the bench seat, downing one beer after another. Cali was a Drop Marine, and the word was they’d taken huge casualties. Rev had been tempted to ask her about it, but it was obvious she wasn’t in the talking mood.
“If that’s true, it sucks about the CG,” Fyr said.
“Sometimes the shit rolls uphill. Top me off,” Udu said, holding out her glass.
They still didn’t know much of what was going on, but a lance corporal from Fyr’s company had just told them that both generals, the division CG and the task force commander, had been fired.
“Serves the assholes right,” Cali muttered, the first thing she’d said in at least forty-five minutes.
Rev didn’t know what to think about that. Was it really their fault? Did the task force commander implement a bad plan? Did the CG, who wasn’t even on the mission, have any input at all?
He took a long swallow of beer. All that stuff was way, way, way over his pay grade. This wasn’t the night to be thinking about that, about the future. This was a night to drink with his friends and forget.
“I think Pikachu’s drunk,” Tomiko said, giving out a loud belch. “The bitch can’t hold her booze.”
What? Was that even possible?
“Hey, wake up. Can you get drunk?”
<An AI cannot get drunk, per se. However, as I share parts of your nervous system in order to operate, any degradation of your bodily functions can impair my capabilities.>
“Shit, you do get drunk, then. Are you enjoying it?”
<Enjoyment is a human emotion.>
Rev stood up, swayed, and caught the edge of the table to hold him upright. “Marines, I’ve got our new mission. Miko here says her AI is drunk, and I just confirmed that it’s possible. So, for the rest of the night, no more Preacher Rolls, no more stars getting fired. We’ve got one mission, and one mission only. Get our AI’s stinking drunk!”
There was a round of cheers, and Rev drained his glass. He grabbed the pitcher from Bundy as he returned to the table and filled it up again. He had a lot of drinking to do.
The order had been given, and a Marine always completed the mission.