Free Empire of Man 01 - March Upcountry by David Weber, John Ringo Page B

three, but it also had hydrogen thrusters for space maneuvering. Similar to a ground support pinnace, it had lighter weapons and a single top-mounted quad-barreled bead cannon, and thus correspondingly more room for personnel and equipment.
    " '. . . with a median temperature of thirty-three degrees and a median humidity of ninety-seven percent,' " he continued. There'd been nothing in the Marine databases on the planet, but it turned out that one of the corporals in Second Platoon had a Fodor's Guide to the Baldur Sector . Unfortunately, it offered only a limited amount of data on the planet . . . and what data there was only made a gloomy situation worse. "Jesus Christ, that's hot!"
    "Oh, just fucking great," Lance Corporal Moseyev said as he trotted out of the shuttle with a case of penetrator ammunition in his hands. "I only had three weeks and I was transferring to Steel!"
    " 'The native culture is at a stagnant level of low-grade firearms technology. Politically, the Mardukans—' Hey, there's a picture!"
    The Mardukan native, a four-armed biped from a hexapedal evolutionary line, was pictured next to a human wiredrawing for size. From the scale, the Mardukan was the height of a grizzly bear, with broad, long feet on the ends of long, backcurved legs. The hands of the upper and lower arms were about the same size, with the upper shoulders wider than the lower, which were in turn wider than the hips. The upper arms ended in long, fine, three-fingered hands with one fully opposable thumb each. The hands of the shorter, lower arms were heavier and less refined, with a broad opposable pad and two dissimilar fingers. The face was wider and flatter than a human's, with a broad nose and small deep-set eyes. Two large horns curled up and back over the head. They were obviously functional weapons; the inner curve looked razor-sharp. The rubbery-looking skin was a mottled green and had an odd sheen to it.
    "What's that?" Moseyev asked, pointing to the sheen.
    "Dunno." Julian tweaked the cursor over the skin and rolled up the magnification. "'The skin of the Mardukan is covered in a polycy . . . polyss . . . in a something something coating that protects the species from casual cuts and the various harsh funguses of its native jungle home," he read, then thought about it for a second. "Ewww."
    "It's covered in slime ," Moseyev laughed. "Yick! Slimies!"
    "Scummies!" Sergeant Major Kosutic snapped from the hatchway, and strode into the launching day. "I thought you were told to get the extraneous equipment out of the shuttle, Julian?"
    "We were getting updated on the mission, Sergeant Major!" Julian was suddenly at attention, the pad held alongside his trousers. "I was briefing my squad on the enemy and conditions!"
    "The enemy are the fucking Saints or pirates or whatever-they-are that hold the port." Kosutic stalked up to stand so close to the braced sergeant that he could smell her breath mint. "The scummies are what we're going to have to cut our way through to get there. Your mission, right now, is to get the shuttle unloaded—not to sit around on your ass cracking wise. Clear?"
    "Clear, Sergeant Major!"
    "Now get your asses to work. We're on a tight time schedule."
    "Moseyev!" Julian said, turning hastily back to his squad. "Get your team unloading that ammo. We don't have all day-cycle! Gjalski, your team on the powerpacks. . . ."
    "Not the powerpacks," Kosutic said. "Leave all of them. We're going to add extra, as a matter-of-fact. Thank Vlad we don't have a heavy weapons platoon with us."
    "Sergeant Major," Julian asked as the squad began to scurry around, "you called the Mardukans 'scummies.' Where'd you hear that?"
    "Knew somebody that went through here once." The sergeant major pulled at an earlobe. "Didn't sound like much fun."
    "Are we really gonna have to walk all the way across the damn world?" Julian asked, aghast.
    "There ain't many choices, Sergeant," the sergeant major snarled. "You just stick with