Chapter Seven

There will be formed a Legion composed of Foreigners. This Legion will take the name of Foreign Legion.

—Article 1 of the Royal Ordinance establishing the French Foreign Legion, 10 March 1831

A different corporal had the task of escorting Hauser and Suartana from the sergeant’s office to a barracks room on the second floor. The door slid smoothly open as the non-com approached, and from inside came a swirl of narcostick smoke and chatter in half a dozen different languages. There were perhaps thirty people in the room, some sitting around a small square table playing cards, the rest lying in three-tiered bunk beds. All of them stood as the corporal entered the room.

He jabbed a finger at the closest man. “You,” he said flatly. “Show these men their beds and let them know what’s expected of them.”

The man gave a broad, pleasant smile. “Aye, Corporal,” he answered. He spoke Terranglic with a lilting accent Hauser couldn’t place. It was nothing like the French-influenced tongue he’d heard in use here on Robespierre. “Dinna worry. I’ll see to the laddies.”

Apparently satisfied with this, the corporal left without another word, leaving Hauser and Suartana standing just inside the door, taking in their temporary home in silence.

They were still wearing the formal Besaran day clothes they’d worn for the duel, and were the only ones in the room in civilian garb. The others wore plain gray ship-suits, the simple coveralls that were standard for spaceship crews. Lightweight and comfortable, they would convert easily to pressure suits with the addition of gloves, boots, and a bubble helmet. No doubt they’d been issued so the recruits would be ready for the shuttle flight the sergeant had mentioned.

For the moment, though, they made Hauser feel uncomfortable. He knew he stood out from the crowd, and that was never a good thing even among social equals. With such a diverse mix of backgrounds represented among the people in the barracks, he would have preferred more anonymity.

“So, fresh meat for the Legion machine, eh?” the man appointed to look after them was still smiling. He was slightly built, with reddish brown hair and fine-sculpted features. The hand he extended to Hauser was soft and delicate, almost feminine. “The name is MacDuff. Robert Bruce MacDuff, Younger of Glenhaven. If you’re a civilized man, ye’ll ken that to be on Caledon.”

Hauser answered his smile as he took the hand. “Then I’m afraid I’ll have to own to being a barbarian,” he said. “I’ve never heard of Caledon, much less of Glenhaven. My name’s Hauser. This is Suartana.”

MacDuff flashed his easy smile at the Indomay, but something in Suartana’s stolid stance and expression kept him from offering his hand in that direction. Instead, he turned and pointed. “We’ve still got a few free bunks left. The accommodations are not precisely up to the standards recommended by Harker Travel Guides, but they’re tolerable. A mite drab, but ye’ll see worse, no doubt, if you stay in the Legion.”

They followed him down the double line of bunks. MacDuff paused once to tap impatiently on the end of one of them. “Here, Carlssen, why don’t you see if you can round up kits for our two new gentlemen of fortune, eh? They’ll probably be ready in a minute or two.”

The blond man in the bunk shrugged and nodded amiably. “Sure, Mac,” he said, rolling out of the bunk.

MacDuff grinned at Carlssen’s retreating back. “Poor laddie made the mistake of drawing tae an inside straight last night. He’s working off his debt in a few wee favors.” He looked at Hauser. “And do you play cards at all, lad?”

Hauser shook his head. “Sorry, not me. I decided a long time ago that you can’t call it gambling if you always lose.”

The Caledonian laughed. “A man who kens his ain limits. I like that.” He pointed. “One of those bunks will do for you and your quiet friend.”

He started in the direction MacDuff had indicated, then stopped at the sight of a short nonhuman figure lying on the lowest bunk in the tier. He turned toward MacDuff and gestured toward some empty bunks on the opposite side of the aisle. “How about those, instead?”

MacDuff studied him for a long moment with a poker face, then shrugged. “Suit yourself, laddie.”

Hauser nodded to Suartana, who sat on the bottom bunk without speaking. Checking the mattress on the middle bed, Hauser tried to ignore the feeling that the little alien on the other side was watching his every move.

Nonhumans made him nervous. The few aliens who lived on Laut Besar permanently knew their place in society, but since arriving on Robespierre Hauser had been thrown together with all too many who seemed to regard themselves as the equals of the humans they traveled among. It was an aspect of Commonwealth culture Hauser had never really been aware of. Back home the natural order of things was clear. Uros might be far above Indomays on the social scale, but any human, even the poorest Indomay peasant, came ahead of the things.

He thought of the Ubrenfars and shuddered. Mankind had made a sorry mistake leaving their worlds alone after the fall of the Semti Conclave. The attack on Laut Besar only proved how wrong it was to allow alien races free access to space.…

Did the Legion really accept aliens as regular soldiers? Or would they be assigned to segregated units once the selection process was completed? He hoped that would be the case. Soldiers had to know they could rely on each other, and he could never bring himself to trust a nonhuman.

Just then the recruit named Carlssen appeared, carrying two compact bundles. He passed one to Suartana, offered the other to Hauser, then headed back to his bunk without a word. He was tall and pale, with hair so blond it was nearly white, and younger than Hauser had thought when he saw him the first time. Shy, too, from the looks of it, completely unlike the brash Caledonian, MacDuff.

He had wondered if he would fit in among the “typical” prospective legionnaires, but now Hauser was beginning to wonder if there was any one type who was typical. So far he’d seen an alien, a shy teenager, and an enigmatic gambler with the composure of an aristocrat. In that mix, maybe he and Suartana with their military backgrounds were the closest to how he’d always pictured legionnaires.

Hauser laid out the shoulder bag on his bunk and opened it up. It was small but well stocked, with two of the gray shipsuits and a single set of hostile environment accessories to go with them, plus work boots, undergarments, and a personal kit that included grooming supplies and a small first aid pouch. He opened the bottle of antibeard lotion and wrinkled his nose. It was a cheap brand, the kind of thing Indomays might have bought at one of the teeming floating markets of Kota Delta back home. He replaced the cap hastily and checked the bag again, coming up with a small, cubical chip library.

The touchpad on the end accessed the index chip. Holding it to the side of his head just behind the left ear, Hauser closed his eyes and “saw” a catalog listing each of the tiny computerized books in the library. There were courses in Terranglic, Legion history, military protocol and procedures, and a variety of basic academic subjects. A careful thought brought up another, similar mental vision, this one a recommended study program. He knew there would be other information in the index program as well, such as a simple orientation covering various ships so that he could find his way around the transport they were embarking aboard in the morning. For now, he wasn’t interested in exploring the chips further, so he cleared his mind and lowered the box.

One of the listed chips, though, was important to him. This was his ident disk, which hadn’t been returned to him before. He removed the disk carefully from its slot in the box and frowned. It wasn’t the one he’d worn before. This one didn’t bear the familiar Hauser family crest.

Unlike the adchips in the library, the ident disk was meant to be accessed through a computer terminal. He spoke a soft-voiced command to his wristpiece, then watched the data scroll across the small screen. This disk identified him only by a serial number, and the credit balance recorded there was only five hundred sols, the enlistment bounty awarded to all new Commonwealth recruits. He frowned for a moment, then shrugged. He’d heard they made new recruits break with their pasts completely when they joined the Legion. If he ever needed access to his own credit balance or personal history again, he could get a new ident disk through Doenitz. Hauser touched the adhesive disk to its accustomed place on his neck, then started to strip off his civilian clothes.

MacDuff was still lounging against stacked bunks nearby. He cleared his throat and jerked his head toward the back of the barracks room. “If you want tae preserve your modesty, lad, you may want to change somewhere else.”

Following the gesture, Hauser finally noticed the woman lying in one of the bunks, staring straight up at the mattress above her. She was dressed in the same garb as the other recruits and seemed oblivious to the rest of the room.

Hauser hadn’t thought that the military career was open to women in the Commonwealth. No woman on Laut Besar—at least no Uro woman—would dream of joining any of the services. Thinking of the newscaster he’d seen on the trip in, he realized he probably should have made the connection. Women on these worlds didn’t lead the same sheltered lives they did back on Laut Besar.

He shrugged again. “Doesn’t look like she’s taking much of an interest,” he said, trying to sound nonchalant. He went ahead changing, though he turned away and stepped behind the bunks for some added privacy. There were a lot of things he was going to have to get used to, it seemed, before he’d be able to fit in to this new life.

As he closed up the coverall, he looked up at MacDuff. “Look, thanks for all the help. I’m going to need all the help I can get steering around all the cultural differences around here.”

The Caledonian nodded. “Dinna fash yourself, lad. It’s a big Commonwealth. Room for all kinds.”

“Yeah.” Hauser thought of the alien and the woman. That was already more “kinds” than he’d expected. “So what kind are you, Robert Bruce MacDuff? You look and sound like a gentleman, not a soldier. So how do you come to be in the Legion?”

“I’m not the only one who looks more like an aristocrat than a soldier,” MacDuff replied. “But—”

“Excuse me,” a quiet, diffident voice interrupted him. The alien had stood up and come up beside MacDuff. Short, bald, wearing a coverall that had been cut down to size and tailored to expose the ruff of quills at the alien’s neck, the humanoid figure was almost a parody of humanity. “It is generally considered to be very poor manners in the Legion to ask about another’s past. Such information may be volunteered, but should never be a subject for questioning.”

“This is a private conversation, ale,” Hauser said harshly. “And among humans it’s considered bad manners to interrupt someone who is talking or push yourself into the company of your betters.”

The alien’s quills moved as if they were being stirred by a summer breeze, but the expression on its face was unreadable. MacDuff took a step back, as if startled or shocked. “Look, Myaighee, don’t worry about it,” he told the little alien. “I don’t care who knows my story. But thanks for the reminder.”

Myaighee continued to study Hauser’s face for several long seconds. Then it turned away and walked back to its bunk.

“Take some well-meant advice, lad,” MacDuff added quietly to Hauser. “Ye’ll nae get sae far around here with that kind of attitude. Whatever it may be like where you’re from, here there is equality between species.”

Hauser bit back an angry retort and nodded. “Yeah … okay,” he said. “Sorry if I gave offense, MacDuff. Like I said, I’m new in these parts.”

The Caledonian let out a careful breath, then grinned. “Aye, and anyway we strayed from a subject of much greater importance. Namely myself! You were asking how I come to be in such princely surroundings.”

He nodded and gave an encouraging grin.

“Truth is, lad, my auld feether owns half the land in Glenhaven, and I was aince destined for a career as a banker. But cards and dice have always been my weakness, and while I’m more than a match for any honest gambler ye care tae set against me, even I canna beat the house when the games are rigged. After I ran through two trust funds and all the money I’d saved from my … other sources of income, the auld man cut me off cold. Said I had to reform before I could be trusted with high finance again.” MacDuff paused. “I had been considering the military life already, but with some more decent outfit like the Caledonian Watch. Unfortunately, one of the gents who claimed I still owed him money sent some laddies with more muscles than brains to collect the debt. I’m afraid we had a wee tulzie, and one of the braw lads happened tae end up on the wrong end of my needier. Rather than stay around tae argue the differences between self-defense and manslaughter with the compols, I felt a tour in the Foreign Legion might be just the sort of change of pace I was looking for. For my health, you’ll understand.”

Hauser studied the Caledonian. His expression hadn’t changed, but there was a faint twinkle in his hazel eyes that suggested the man wasn’t completely serious.

He didn’t know if the story was true or not, but there was something about MacDuff that made him instantly likable, and Hauser decided he wanted the man for a friend.

Nonetheless, he resolved never to underestimate the slight, inoffensive-looking Caledonian. For along with that humorous twinkle, Hauser had seen something else in those eyes. Something dangerous.

Bright and cheery, the shuttle terminal was a place of gleaming duraplast and cheap, gaudy furnishings. It was a civilian area temporarily appropriated for military use, and the thirty-four recruits in their matching shipsuits looked out of place in a lounge that should have been thronged with colorfully garbed tourists.

But all the regular military terminals were tied up with last-minute, feverish preparations to load troops and supplies outbound for a rendezvous with SOLOMON and the voyage to Soleil Liberté, and the draft of recruits setting out for Devereaux weren’t high enough on the priority list to warrant interfering with the logistical nightmare of supporting Brigadier Shalev’s expeditionary force. So instead they had been brought here to wait for a shuttle that would carry them to the Bir Hakeim, a transport lighter scheduled for an overhaul at Lebensraum’s orbital shipyards. Since the transport was heading in something approximating the right direction, it would carry the recruits from Robespierre until they met up with another ship bound for Devereaux.

Hauser leaned back in one of the molded chairs and studied the other recruits. Actually, only a few of them came from Robespierre. Aside from Suartana, there were two Indomays from Laut Besar. Hauser knew the type, poor, desperate men, probably on the run after breaking faith with a Uro employer or landholder. Most were like MacDuff, though, drifters from a score of worlds who had signed up for the Legion for one reason or another and who had been moved from one world to another following the vagaries of available shipping.

There was one group of recruits, though, who held themselves aloof from the others. MacDuff had told him that they had all been sent to the recruiting office from a regular Legion outfit, where they had already been serving as legionnaires for some time. Apparently the Legion did a lot of local recruiting, but regulations required that they all pass through the official training course on Devereaux at some point before they could proceed with their military careers. Both the woman he had seen in the barracks—her name was Katrina Voskovich, but beyond that and the bare fact of her Legion experience Hauser hadn’t learned much about her—and the alien Myaighee numbered in this group.

He saw the two talking together in the far corner of the lounge, Voskovich nodding vigorously at something the short humanoid was telling her. Hauser wondered how they had come to join the Fifth Foreign Legion in the first place.

“Out of my way, aristo,” a deep, gravelly voice growled. Hauser looked up, startled, taking in the sight of an oversized recruit he’d heard referred to as Crater, presumably from his scarred, pockmarked face … or perhaps from what he did to other people’s faces, judging from his bullying tone. “I want to sit here, and you’re in the way.”

Before Hauser could react, Suartana was there, looming behind Crater and reaching out to touch the man’s beefy shoulder. Crater jerked away and spun to face the Indomay, but stepped back as he looked into Suartana’s grim face. “Don’t make trouble,” Suartana said quietly. “It wouldn’t be smart. Got it?”

“What’s going on here?” a new voice broke in. A legionnaire in camouflaged fatigues and sergeant’s stripes had appeared behind the two glowering giants at the entrance to the shuttle boarding tube.

Suartana smiled gently at him. “Nothing at all, Sergeant,” the Indomay said. “I’m afraid I was clumsy and bumped into my friend here. He was startled.”

“Yeah,” Crater said, with a sidelong look at Suartana. “Startled.”

The sergeant studied them for a long moment, then nodded. As he moved off, MacDuff’s slender form settled into the chair beside Hauser. “Pretty good setup ye’ve got there, laddie. I never thought to bring my ain bodyguard into the Legion with me.” He was grinning, silently daring Hauser to deny it. But Hauser was still watching the sergeant, who had still been within earshot as the Caledonian spoke. The noncom’s eyes narrowed as he looked at Hauser, and he jotted a note down on his compboard.

“All right, you nubes, listen up!” the sergeant shouted. “I’m Sergeant D’Angelo, and I’m in charge of your little tour group while you’re enjoying the good life on the old Beer Hatch. Shuttle’s ready for boarding. Line up, single file, and get aboard. Let’s mag it!”

Hauser, MacDuff, and Suartana were near the end of the line. As they filed through the extendible boarding tube into the passenger compartment of the shuttle, another Legion NCO, a corporal this time, directed them into acceleration chairs. Gesturing with a stun baton that hummed faintly, the noncom placed Hauser into the seat next to the woman.

When the last of the recruits was strapped in, Sergeant D’Angelo sealed up the lock and faced them. He was another old veteran, like the legionnaires at the recruiting station, but he was easily the fittest man aboard. “For the benefit of you newcomers, I’m supposed to start exposing you to the Legion. Maybe one in five of you will actually make it in, but from here on we’re going to pretend you’ve all got a shot.” He glanced at his wristpiece. “In just under six minutes we’ll be boosting for orbit. The transport lighter Bir Hakeim will be taking us on the next leg of our trip to Devereaux.”

He paused before continuing. “The transports used by the Legion are operated by the CSN, but they are procured using Legion funds and are devoted exclusively to Legion missions, because the Legion is considered a part of the Colonial Army instead of being counted among the Regulars. Every other Colonial Army formation is supported by its own planetary navy, but even though the Legion calls Devereaux home it isn’t officially associated with any individual planetary government. So even though you’re headed for a navy ship, it’s really part of the Legion, as much a part of the service as any of our units. That may not mean much to you now, but those of you who make it through Basic will understand some day. Legionnaires have no home except the Legion … and ships like the Bir Hakeim are part of that home. After you’ve been shot up in a tough op on some godforsaken planet somewhere you might appreciate it.”

D’Angelo’s eyes roved over the recruits slowly. “Legion transports are named for the places legionnaires have shed blood for the Contract. Bir Hakeim was a battle fought on Old Terra long before they had spaceships. Like a lot of Legion battles, it was an uneven match between a small force from the French Foreign Legion—the original outfit we trace our descent from—and the forces of a nation-state called Nazi Germany commanded by a general named Rommel. The computer library aboard the ship has a full account of the battle. While you’re aboard, chip it. That’s not a suggestion … that’s an order.”

There was a murmur from some of the recruits, quickly stilled at the corporal’s shout of “Silence!”

“Before boosting to a rendezvous with any Legion transport, it is customary to remember the heroes who helped give that vessel its name. MacDuff … the names inscribed under the colors in the ship’s auditorium, please.”

MacDuff’s voice piped up from near the rear of the compartment. “Koenig, Pierre. Amilakvari, Dmitri. Messmer …”

The whole ritual struck Hauser as foolish, and the sound of the Caledonian faithfully reciting names of people long dead whose memories remained alive only in the traditions of these outcasts from the Legion made him smile. Then he chuckled. These legionnaires seemed to set more store in the past than the present. Would they be expected to ride animals into battle next?

Sudden pain lanced through his arm and shoulder as the corporal lashed out with the stun baton he’d used to direct traffic earlier. The man glared down at him. “Quiet, nube,” he growled.

“Messmer, Pierre,” MacDuff resumed after faltering for a moment. “Travers, Susan. And the other officers and men of the Thirteenth DBLE, First Free French Brigade.”

“We will remember them,” D’Angelo said quietly, his eyes resting thoughtfully on Hauser. He turned away a moment later and started strapping himself into an empty seat.

Hauser was still rubbing his throbbing shoulder as the shuttle lifted. He had learned an important lesson about the Fifth Foreign Legion already.…

They took their traditions and customs seriously here. And he would have to learn to do the same, if he intended to get along in this strange new life he’d chosen.