The Complete Hammer's Slammers, Vol. 2

The orderly sergeant blinked."AHanPOW camp,"Des Grieux amplified."Our good wog buddies here—" he kicked out at the chair of the nearest clerk; the boot missed, and Des Grieux almost overbalanced "—picked me up when they swept Morobad. Baffin's troops got paroled out within twenty-four hours, butIgot stuck with the Hindi prisoners 'cause nobody knew I was there."

The orderly sergeant's name tag read Hechinger. His nose wrinkled as Des Grieux approached. The Han diet of the POW camp differed enough from what the Hindi prisoners were used to that it gave most of them the runs. Latrine facilities within the camp were wherever you wanted to squat.

"Well, why didn't you tell them you were a friendly?" Hechinger asked in puzzlement.

Des Grieux's hands trembled with anger. "Have you ever tried to tell a woganything?" he whispered. "Without a gun stuck down their throat when you say it?"

He got a grip on himself and added, more calmly, "And don't ask me for my ID bracelet. One of the guards lifted that first thing. Thought the computer key was an emerald, I guess."

Hechinger sighed. "Mary, key data," he ordered the artificial intelligence in his console. "Name?"

"Des Grieux, Samuel, Sergeant-Commander," the tanker said. "H Company, 2nd Platoon, Platoon Sergeant Peres commanding. Shewascommanding, anyhow. She may've bought it last week."

The console hummed and projected data. Des Grieux, standing at the back of the unit, could see the holograms only as refractions in the air.

"One of our trucks was going by and I shouted to the driver," Des Grieux muttered, glaring at the clerks. The three of them hunched over their desks, pretending to be busy. "He didn't know me, but he knew I wasn't a wog. I could've been there forever."

"Well,"said the orderly sergeant,"three days longer and you'd sure've been finding your own transport back to the Regiment. We're pulling out. Got a contract on Plessy. Seems the off-planet workers there're getting uppity and think they oughta have a share in the shipyard profits."

"Anyplace," Des Grieux said. "Just so long as I've got a gun and a target."

"Well, we got a bit of a problem here, trooper," Hechinger said as he frowned at his display. "Des Grieux, Sergeant-Commander, is listed as dead."

"I'm not bloodydead," Des Grieux snarled. "Blood'n Martyrs, ask Sergeant Peres."