Pritchard’s image looked around the gathering. “Any questions?” he asked.
“I don’t like to complain, Major . . .” said Sergeant Jellicoe, lacing her fingers in front of her. “But do you suppose after this, somebody else in the bloody regiment can get a little action too?”
Everybody laughed; but everybody, Pritchard included, knew that the comment hadn’t entirely been a joke. “I’ll see what I can do,” he said.
On the fiddler’s platform below, the woman dancing had stripped off her panties as well. Huber glanced down at her . . . and turned his head away.
He was going to need his rest. The next part of the operation sounded like it was going to be even rougher than what it’d taken to get Task Force Sangrela this far.
* * *
Huber called up a remote from Flame Farter, on the move with White Section for the past ten minutes. The Fiorno River was only thirty meters wide and almost shallow enough to wade where it curved around the north and east of Midway. The scouts’ skimmers danced in rainbows of spray out in the channel to avoid the reeds along the margins; the combat car was chuffing down the bank, spewing mud and fragments of soft vegetation from beneath her skirts.
“Red Section, move out!” Captain Sangrela ordered. The main body with Jellicoe’s Floosie in the lead was already lined up on the Axis north of the Assembly Building. Dust puffed beneath their skirts as they lifted from the gravel. One at a time, carefully because objects so powerful must move carefully if they’re not to destroy themselves and everything around them, the seven vehicles of the main body started down the avenue. The doughnuts of dust spread into wakes on either side.
Sergeant Nagano glanced over from Foghorn’s fighting compartment; Huber was keeping his section on the Mound till the main body had cleared the road beneath. Huber gave Nagano a thumb’s up. Nagano hadn’t commanded a car before the operations against Northern Star, and he was doing a good job.
“How’d you make out last night, El-Tee?” Sergeant Deseau asked, stretching like a cat behind the forward gun.
“I slept like a baby,” Huber said. “I never sleep that well on leave when I’m in a bed.”
The Assembly had offered the Slammers any kind of billets they wanted, but Captain Sangrela had decided to keep his troopers beside their vehicles for the night. Nobody’d argued with him. The weather wasn’t unpleasant, and chances were some Freedom Party supporters had stayed in Midway. The risks of going off by yourself were a lot greater than any benefit a bed in an unfamiliar room was going to bring.
“Not me,” said Deseau, grinning even broader. “The people here are real grateful, let me tell you.”
Learoyd looked around from his gun. Shyly he said, “The girls didn’t charge nothing, El-Tee. I never been a place before that the girls didn’t charge.”
A Gendarmery aircar came up the Axis from the south, flying low and slow. Huber caught the motion in the corner of his eye, then cranked the image up to x32 as an inset on his faceshield. As he’d thought, Captain Orichos was in the passenger seat.
The fourth D company tank pulled out at the back of the main body, accelerating with the slow majesty that its mass demanded. Floosie was out of sight beyond the northern end of the Axis, into the mixture of forest and scattered houses that constituted the city’s suburbs.
“Fox Three-six to Three-one,” Huber said to Sergeant Nagano. “Move into the street. We’ll follow you down and bring up the rear. Three-six out.”
Foghorn lurched from its berth and ground through a hedge that’d survived Task Force Sangrela’s arrival. Whoever was driving for Nagano today must be keyed tighter than a lute string, Huber thought; he grinned faintly. Which showed the driver understands what we’re about to get into.
“Sir, shall I shift us now?” Sergeant Tranter prodded from the driver’s compartment.
“Give me a moment, Tranter,” Huber replied. “I think I’ve got a visitor.”
“Hey, it’s your girlfriend, El-Tee,” Deseau said cheerfully. He waved at the aircar swinging in along Fencing Master’s port side.