Chapter 15: Fighting Demons

I walked off the shuttle with returning men and women on leave. I crossed to the sergeant on the orders desks and slipped my ID tags across. She looked at me for a minute before touching them and then smiling, “the Demons have been waiting sir.”

I smiled, “so I was told sergeant.”

She handed the tags back, “My cousin top sergeant Samantha Morgan said you were nice.”

I looked her over, “how is Sam?”

She grinned, “suffering a term teaching the basic training course.”

I laughed and glanced back, “let her know I will ask for her when her tour is up.”

She laughed, “she would like that.”

I nodded and headed through the hatch. This time I was taking a battalion in fifth regiment called Fighting Demons. I headed towards the line units area and walked into the large regiment headquarters. I was wearing a class C uniform and stopped at the regiment duty sergeant’s desk. A senior sergeant looked up and smiled, “what can I do for your sir?”

I nodded to the commanders door, “I need to report.”

He sat back, “you are not in the proper uniform sir.”

I smiled, “he was notified sergeant.”

He nodded before touching the intercom, “Light Colonel England is here sir.”

“Send him in.”

I headed for the door and knocked before opening the hatch. Colonel Sarah Marie McCandless sat back and smiled as I approached the desk, “you are a bit of a disappointment colonel. You seem shorter then you should and you are not breathing fire and spitting bullets.”

I smiled, “I am saving up.”

She laughed and stood to lean over her desk and hold out her hand, “welcome to the fifth regiment.”

I nodded and shook her hand and she gestured to a chair, “your executive officer is on her way.”

I sat and leaned back, “I received a couple of briefs from her before I got here. The Demons are scheduled for an op?”

She sat and turned to bring up an operation holo above her desk, “hopefully it will be nothing more then a show of force. Fifth is headed out in one week to a twin sun system called Sirus. The eighth planet is mostly jungle with some nastys that have been causing problems. According to the settlement charter the colonist are restricted to a single continent. They claim they have but the Siruness say otherwise.”

She glanced at the door as a commander walked in, “We are going to land along the coast by the largest colony town. Your battalion will be to the north by a second town called Trollhome.”

She grinned, “named for what they thought the Siruness looked like.”

She glanced at the holo, “as you see the other battalions will occupy similar positions. We were warned to shut down all unshielded electronics when both suns are up.”

The colonel shut the holo down and looked at me, “we do not want incidents if they can be avoided but we do not back down if we are right.”

She rubbed her temples, “the problem is we do not know we are right.”

She waved, “go meet your people.”

I smiled and stood, “thank you.”

I followed the commander out of the regiment headquarters area and down a wide vehicle corridor. Commander Vicky Torres had been my pick for executive officer out of all the available officers in the regiment, she and Sergeant Major Duncan. I nodded to the six captains at attention when we walked into the battalion headquarters office.

I glanced at the almost tiny sergeant major talking to several top sergeants. I relaxed and gestured, “relax, as the sergeant major obviously knows I prefer a more relaxed atmosphere in barracks.”

I looked at each of the captains, “we can get together tonight at eighteen hundred to get to know each other. What I need right now is a training status of your company and do not pad it.”

I nodded to commander Torres and she waved, “back to work.”

The captains grinned and I headed for sergeant major Duncan with the commander beside me. She grinned as I stopped, “so the fifth’s hero returns.”

I smiled, “had to go someplace and the admiral said this was the only place that would be insane enough to want me.”

She laughed and turned, “meet my boys and girls.”

One week of paperwork and training and another in transit before I looked at the bright bluish green world of Sirus. I turned back to commander Torres as the regimental commander whispered in my ear, “time to earn our princely pay.”

She grinned as Duncan laughed and turned to nod to the comm tech, “go.”

Thirty five shuttles dropped away from the shadow of the carrier and joined the other sparkling clusters of ships heading towards the planet. My shuttle was the first down in my battalion and I walked off and glanced towards the small city of Trollhome. We were along the coast north of the city.

I slipped my new command holo glasses on and watched as the companies moved into place to form a perimeter. I waited for the sergeant major before starting towards the city. After my first meeting with the city mayor and his council I knew something shady was going on.

Trollhome was a coastal town barely fifty kilometers from another occupied continent the Siruness use for farming. It was eight hours before the second sun began to rise and most of our electronics would normally start to be effected.

I had talked to a couple of friends about the electronic interference and had each company shield their comms and scans, the rest of the electronics were shut down. Ten minutes into the double sun exposure the battalion comm sergeant contacted me, “Sir, we have several out going vessels from what looks like the city docks.”

I was eating dinner and set everything aside as I stood, “heading?”

The sergeant major stood with me as the sergeant answered, “northeast at about fifty kilometers per hour.”

I glanced at the sergeant major before opening a comm to colonel McCandless, “we may have something here colonel. Several surface vessels are headed out towards the continent to the northeast.”