Narakan Rifles, About Face!

by Jan Smith.

_Those crazy, sloppy, frog-like Narakans ... all thumbs and six-inch skulls ... relics of the Suzi swamps. Until four-fisted Lt. Terrence O'Mara moved among them--lethal, dangerous, with a steady purpose flaming in his volcanic eyes._

Terrence O'Mara lay flat on his back trying to keep his big body as still as possible. Despite the fact that he was stripped to his regulation shorts, a large pool of sweat had formed on the cot underneath him. The only movement he permitted himself was an occasional pursing of his lips as he dragged on a cigarette and sent a swirl of smoke upward through the heavy humid air. Then he would just lie there watching as the smoke crept up to mingle with the large drops of water that were forming on the concrete of the command post.

"d.a.m.n! d.a.m.n Naraka, anyway! Outpost of civilization! Who'd want the blasted place except the Rumi?"

[Ill.u.s.tration]

At the words, Terrence moved his head just a fraction of an inch and his eyes only a little farther to look across the room to where Bill Fielding was twisting and turning on his cot. All he could see of the other man was the wet outline of his body under a once white sheet and a hand that every so often reached into a bucket of water on the floor and then replaced a soaking T-shirt over a red head.

"You'll feel it less if you lie still," Terrence said, distressed at the necessity for talking.

"Feel it less! My G.o.d, listen to the man! What difference does it make if you lie still or move around or even run around in the suns like a b.l.o.o.d.y Greenback? Dust Bin will get you one way or another ... and if it doesn't, the Rumi will."

The visible hand lifted the T-shirt and began to pop salt tablets into an open mouth like they were so many peppermints.

"I wonder where Norton is. Out reviewing the troops?"

"Reviewing, my eye. He's up at Government House sitting in that cool living room drinking one of Mrs. Wilson's icy drinks and admiring Mrs.

Wilson's shapely legs. From a discreet distance, of course. Being temporary Commanding Officer of even Dust Bin has its privileges!"

There was a rattle of drums and the blare of one or two off-key instruments from outside.

"Then why," asked Terrence, "are those poor beggars marching up and down in this blasted heat?"

"The Greenbacks? They love it! It would take more than a little heat to get under those inch-thick skins of theirs. They like to play soldier when it's a hundred and thirty under water."

There were a few more straggling notes and then the semblance of a march began.

"Listen to that, will you?" Fielding moaned, "They can't even keep time with a drum! They can't march, they can't shoot, they can't break down a Banning; they're all thumbs and six-inch thick skulls. 'Train local forces to take over'! Bah! Did those desk jockeys back in New Chicago ever see a Greenback? Did they ever try to teach a Narakan to fix a bayonet to the proper end of a rifle or to fire a blaster in the right direction?"

Terrence was lighting another cigarette with as little exertion as possible. "Yes, but they keep trying. Ten hours a day. You don't have to drive those boys. They want to learn. Listen to O'Shaughnessy barking out orders."

"Sergeant Major O'Shaughnessy of the First Narakan Rifles!" Fielding murmured sarcastically. "A year ago he was squatting in a mud coc.o.o.n at the bottom of Suzi swamp with the rest of the frogs. Now he's got a good Irish name and he's strutting around like a Martian Field Marshal."

"I thought the names might give them a sense of self respect. Besides we couldn't p.r.o.nounce theirs and I was tired of hearing Norris yell 'Hey, greenboy!' at them."

"Well, they picked the right guy when they made you Training Officer.

You and those d.a.m.n frogs get along like you came from the same county!"

"They aren't any great shakes for brains but you can't take anything away from me boys for willingness."

"Willingness! Hooray! They're willing, so what? So is a Suzi Swamp lizard. What'll it get them? A week after they pull the Terran forces out, the Rumi will gobble up the lot of them. Maybe they'll gobble them and us before we pull out. Who could fight in this place? Who'd want to fight? I say, to h.e.l.l with Naraka! It's so near to h.e.l.l already with those two blasted suns blazing sixteen hours a day. Let the Rumi have the stinking planet! Let them have the whole Centaurian System!"

"Speaking of pulling out, I wouldn't be surprised if Dust Bin wasn't the next place we let go of...."

Fielding raised himself on one elbow, "No kidding? Where did you hear that?" His sunburned and blistered face was alight with excitement.

"Well, you know how it's been. When we first came here twenty years back, we drove the Rumi out of all this country and more or less took their cat feet off the Narakan's backs but now that so much of the Earth garrison has been pulled all the way back into the Solar System, the Rumi are acting up again. So much so that the dope I got is that we may be pulling everything back into the Little Texas peninsula to wait for reinforcements and it will take four years for those to come out from Mars."

"Great! Great! But.... Ah, it's too good to be true. Can't you just picture Fielding and O'Mara parading down Dobi street in New Chicago with their first lieutenant bars on their collars? Say, you don't suppose that's why the _Sun Maid_ is sticking around out here, do you?

Imagine, free transportation! A two hour trip to New Chi!"

"I'd sure hate to march those two hundred miles at this time of year!"

"March? Through those swamps? Every time we run a patrol through them...."

Fielding was interrupted by a knock on the door and a skinny young Terran with sergeant's chevrons on his shorts stuck his head through from the other room and said, "Major Chapelle's on the voice radio, sir. He's calling from battalion headquarters and wants Captain Norton."

"Tell him Norton's up playing footsies with the Resident's wife,"

Fielding said, "You'd think those people down at the river would have enough to do without bothering us in the heat of the day, wouldn't you?"

The sergeant looked shocked and started to withdraw his head. Terrence frowned Fielding into silence and called to the sergeant, "Just a minute, Rogers. I'll talk to the Major."

Major Chapelle was a thickset, balding man in his late forties. Even the blazing suns of Naraka hadn't succeeded in burning the sickly yellow color off his face. In the vision screen he looked like a man on his last legs. Whatever was wrong with him didn't help his temper, Terrence thought as he lowered himself gently into a seat before the screen.

"O'Mara! Where in h.e.l.l is Norton?" he demanded.

"Well, sir, you see...." began Terrence.

"Never mind! I've a pretty good idea where he is. A fine time to be chasing skirts! Well, get this straight, O'Mara. Orders have come through and we're pulling the battalion out. We're ordered back to Little Texas. We're going to give up these positions along the river tonight and pull back into Dust Bin. The _Sun Maid_ will stand by to evacuate us. You people are to come too. Everybody has to get out, both the military and civilians. All h.e.l.l's broken loose down river.

The Rumi are across the Muddy in half a dozen places. They've cut the 5th to pieces. New Chicago thinks that those cats have been bringing troops in from s.p.a.ce all along despite the agreement by both sides not to do so. And now they have us way outnumbered." The Major's voice held a thin edge of hysteria.

"Is there any action along our front, Major?" Terrence asked quickly, hoping to stop the flow of talk before Chapelle's hysteria communicated itself to the enlisted men who were sitting or lying about the command post.

"Not yet; just patrols across the river so far. We've got to get out, O'Mara, and get out fast. They'll be all over us if we don't. The Colonel says for Norton to have everything ready to go. He wants the depot destroyed. Everything's got to go, everything we can't take along. The _Sun Maid_ won't have time for more than one trip. He wants the HQ company and the civilians on board by tomorrow morning at the latest."

"What about the Rifles, sir?"

"What? The what?"

"The native troops, sir. The Narakan Rifles." Terrence grated.

"The Rifles? Good G.o.d, man! We haven't time for nonsense. The Rifles are only Greenbacks, aren't they? You get Norton started burning those stores."

Terrence put down the microphone very carefully to keep from slamming it down and stalked back into his quarters. Angrily he began to take his radiation clothing from its hooks on the wall.

"What the devil is eating you?" demanded Bill Fielding.

"We're pulling out, lock, stock and barrel," Terrence told him.