Mick Farren - Their Master's war

"What happened to them?"

Elmo treated the recruit who'd spoken to a withering look. "What the hell do you think happened to them? This is a combat outfit. They're dead, and you're their replacements."

Each of the five recruits stood by a coffin.

"Okay, if you look at the base of the unit, you'll see a green toggle. Flip it out and your kit will stow itself in the base of the coffin. You see the slot? That's the place, and the only place, where you keep your kit."

The five recruits did as they were told, and the five eases slid obediently into their slots.

"You will observe, above the head of each unit, there's a rack and lockers. These will take your suit and helmet, your boots and weaponry. You see that one section of your locker space is padded and has an independent environment. You may well be wondering why anyone should go to so much trouble over a locker, particularly a worthless trooper's locker. This section is for your suit. Your suit is your life and your constant companion, and you will cherish it even above yourself. After you have slept through, you will be introduced to your suits. Once the rest of your equipment has been issued, I will show you how to correctly square away your area. I will show you once, and after that, short of actual battle conditions, I never want to see it vary. On this deck, you do things my way or you come to understand grief. I hope you're all taking me seriously."

Just in case they weren't, he allowed them a few seconds of contemplation before he went on.

Inside the coffin was a blanket and a small pillow. These were folded and laid out with an exact regularity. Hark saw how, in this world of machines, the men were made closer to machines themselves. He had a sudden longing to see the sky.

Elmo dismissed them. At the far end of the deck there was an open area where the troopers could spend what off-duty time they were allowed. Though reasonably clean, the area had a certain air of chaos that stood in total contrast to the military order of the coffins and lockers. The chairs, couches, and other mismatched furniture were old and battered. The long table that provided a central focus for the area had been slashed and carved on until hardly any of its original surface was left unmarked. The bulkheads were covered with drawings and pictures almost exclusively of naked women in fanciful and occasionally outrageous poses. Hark wondered what had happened to the women in this strange, enclosed metal world. If this initial experience was anything to go by, he doubted that he would get any immediate answer.

One piece of furniture puzzled Hark. It was circular and plastic, with a slight depression in its middle. As far as he could see, it must have been originally created for I a very strange creature and been adapted for human use only by what had obviously been a good deal of applied violence.

A screen that showed moving pictures was set like a window in one of the bulkheads. A scratched and blotchy drama was being acted out by figures in strange armor who fought with swords. Back on his home world, this would have been a magical wonder to Hark; here, the new mind told him that it was only entertainment. There were just three men in the area. Two were staring at the screen while a third was winding tape around the handle of a large and vicious-looking knife. It was the same tape that affixed the pictures of naked women to the bulkheads, and it had also been employed extensively to repair the furniture. Hark, who was the first of the five to enter the area, nodded in greeting and was completely ignored. Finally the man taping the knife looked up and grunted. "New meat."

Hark nodded again. "We are new here."

The one with the knife spit on the floor and wrapped another twist of tape around the handle. This messdeck apparently had no tradition of hospitality or welcome for new recruits.

These troopers were hardly what Hark had expected. He had started to imagine that their future comrades would all be slick and polished like Topman Rance or Overman Elmo. These three were quite the opposite. They were close to ragged. The trooper with the knife was stripped to the waist, and an oily bandanna was tied around his head. There was a certain logic to that. It was hot on the messdeck. The man's chest was covered in scar tissue from old burns. His uniform pants were equally scrungy and crudely hacked off between knee and ankle. In total contrast, his boots were immaculate. The trooper had stopped winding tape around the knife handle and was now honing the gleaming blade with a small whetstone. His total absorption in the task made it close to an act of love.

Hark looked slowly around the room.

"Is it permitted for us to sit down?"

Again he was ignored. Hark glanced at the other recruits and shrugged. He selected a chair at the head of the big table and sat down. The other four did the same. Their attitude was one of uneasy defiance. What could these men do to them that hadn't already been done? A series of deep, rumbling shudders ran through the ship. The recruits turned to each other in alarm. The old-timers didn't even look up. The tremors subsided, and the recruits attempted to relax. Hark turned and watched the flickering images on the screen. The strange armored warriors were still hacking their way through their bloody intrigues. Unfortunately, when the characters spoke, their language was unintelligible. Even going deep into the new mind, he couldn't understand a word they were saying. After a while, he stopped trying to follow the story and settled into listening to the constant internal noises of the ship.

He was drifting into a half sleep when he heard voices from the other end of the messdeck and five men came down the aisle between the twin lines of coffins. They were an odd mixture. Two were in full harness and bulky black suits and carried black visored helmets under their arms. The new mind told Hark that these were the suits that Topman Rance had mentioned. These were the suits that the troopers wore into battle and into the emptiness of space. The material from which the suits were constructed was like nothing that Hark had ever seen. It was constantly in motion as if it were alive, molding itself to the wearer's body every time he moved. The other three men were dirty and oily, as if they had spent many hours doing hard manual work around machinery. They were dressed in ragged, cut-down dark green coveralls. One o them was a giant, his head shaved and his body such a mass of scars that it scarcely seemed possible that he could have lived through such injuries. Part of his left arm, a section of the forearm between the wrist and elbow, had been replaced by a steel and plastic prosthesis. Despite the fact that the section above it was entirely false, the giant's left hand seemed perfectly natural.

The giant was first into the rest area. He was so tall that he had to maintain a continuous stoop to avoid hitting his head on the ceiling. The trooper with the knife looked up as he approached the table.

"So how goes it, Dyrkin?"

The giant snorted. "How's it supposed to go when you've spent all the watch unblocking a filter in the forsaken twenties?"

The trooper with the knife shrugged. "You shoulda gone sick like me."

Dyrkin scowled. "Still jerking off that knife, Ren-chett? I wouldn't have thought you'd be so eager to use it again, not after the last time."

Renchett wiped the blade one last time and then slid it into his boot. "I'm in no hurry. No doubt we'll be dropping into some kind of shit soon enough… and talking of shit-" He jabbed a bony finger in the direction of Hark and the other recruits. "You see what we got here?"

Dyrkin nodded. "I seen it. I was just getting around to dealing with it."

He suddenly lunged across the table and grabbed Hark by the front of his singlet. "You're sitting in my chair, filth. What you got to say about that?"