The Reaper Plague Read Online Free Page B

was
impeccable, her eight-point cap starched to cut paper, and she
radiated a palpable intensity, an eagerness that translated into a
sense of urgency obvious to everyone there.
    Thus it was all the more surprising when the
pudgy Army staff sergeant standing in charge merely gave her a
casual nod and kept chatting with the front ranks.
    While of course enlisted ranks do not salute
each other outside of certain formal cases, she at least expected
an acknowledgment, perhaps a “what can I do for you?” Her mental
respect-o-meter, a little rusty from working in special operations
for so long, abruptly jolted to life in her head.
    “ Staff Sergeant.” Her voice
was sharp.
    He turned around to face her, an insincere
smile on his face. His name tag read Grusky . “Yes,
sergeant?”
    “ That’s Master
Sergeant ,” she ground out. “I know you’re not a Marine, so I’ll
overlook that error just this once. Now call this rabble to
attention and turn it over to me properly.”
    She heard some mumbles and a chuckle from the
rear rank. Grusky stared at her for a moment, evaluating. Finally
he said, his voice deceptively casual, “I don’t see how I can do
that.”
    Repeth stared at him in turn, shocked by his
indiscipline but determined not to show it. She took a long
side-step to the right so she could see the platoon, a formation of
some forty personnel, four out of five male, all wearing MP
armbands, their only uniformity. None were above the rank of
Sergeant E-5 or the equivalent. She could see a few Navy and Air
Force uniforms, with the rest about an even mix between Marines and
Army. She glanced to her right, where fifty yards away she could
see another platoon of troops – if one could call them that – in
navy blue that was almost black. Homeland Security…most of them
probably former Security Service. Great.
    Finally she addressed Grusky’s statement in a
glasscutter voice. “Really? Why?”
    “ The way I hear it, you’re
a deserter.” Muted laughter from some of the troops in formation,
with an unsettled undertone. Others looked uncomfortable, glancing
to the side or down at their boots.
    She clasped her hands behind her back. “So,
Grusky,” she said conversationally, keeping her eyes on the troops,
“the Marine Corps and the President of the United States are
idiots.” Her head swiveled toward him, a turret. “Right?”
    The man looked uneasy for the first time. “Of
course not, Sergeant.”
    “ Master Sergeant.”
Her eyes bored into him.
    He licked lips grown suddenly dry. “Master
Sergeant,” he finally repeated.
    As if to a small child, “So you think the
President and the Corps are fools.” This repetition brought
some muttering from the Marines in formation.
    “ Not generally, no,” he
answered more confidently.
    “ But you must ,” she
said with false brittle brightness. “After all, the Corps granted
me this rank based on my fourteen years of experience and
demonstrated fitness to hold it. When I left my unit the Unionists
were in power and I never took an oath to those pigs . When I
escaped from a Unie prison camp I had already been stripped of my
rank and status. I was a civilian. In fact, I was declared an enemy
of a state that does not even exist anymore. There is no more
‘United Governments of North America’. There is only the United
States of America , God bless her. ”
    This elicited more rumbling from the troops,
and a few cheers. “At ease!” called one of the squad leaders,
bringing back quiet.
    She plowed onward. “But recently the United
States Marine Corps, at the personal direction of the
President of the United States, saw fit to fully pardon and
reinstate me. So,” she raised her voice, making a parade-ground
left face and thrusting her nose to within an inch of his, “you must think those two sacred institutions have somehow been hoodwinked.” Her voice dripped sarcasm. “ Obviously they
couldn’t have actually meant to put me in charge, because