They waited. Honestly, Dan wasn’t very upset. Jennifer, Abe, and he ended up playing cards while William kept an eye on the recruits to keep them from doing anything stupid under the influence of mana. Of course, Jennifer wiped the floor with both him and Abe, but Dan knew what to expect by this point. Abe, on the other hand, became more and more comically unhinged at his losing streak before storming off to “take a leak.”
No more supplies came, and HQ didn’t radio back. In the entire time, they didn’t see another Orakh. Either the previous engagement had cleared out the entire area, or the Orakh were backing off to plan something big. Whatever it was, he figured it wasn’t his problem anymore. After almost an hour, the drone of outboard motors informed Dan that the rest of the army had advanced past them.
Briefly, they paused the game to walk to the edge of their island and watch the boats going past. The New Orleans Army looked ragged. Most of the soldiers were covered head to toe in mud and more than one of them had large gashes cut in their uniforms. Only one or two even bothered to look up at their team and ensure that there were no nearby Orakh before they returned their gaze to the swamp itself. Dan tried to wave at them, but there wasn’t really a response. Eventually, they returned to playing cards and waiting for headquarters to call back.
He looked back down at his hand. Jennifer was smirking at him as she reorganized her cards. Whatever she had in store for him, it almost certainly wasn’t going to involve him eeking out one of his rare wins. Really, things were looking just like the stint in the tree all over again, except this time, he was covered in mud rather than literal shit.
The rattle of distant rifle fire provided Dan all the excuse he needed to throw down the cards and walk to the edge of their island. Abe stood next to the two boat pilots, still in their armor, staring out into the dim afternoon light of the swamp. He looked back over his shoulder as he heard Dan’s footfalls.
“Sounds like something’s going on, Thrush,” Abe jerked his chin toward the sound. “Mostly sounds like .223, AR-15s, and M-16s. Every once in a while, you’ll hear one of the boat-mounted guns let loose. The real problem is that it’s coming from everywhere. This isn’t some isolated engagement or island-hopping. They’re hitting serious resistance all down the line.”
The drone of engines drew their attention as some of the older militia ships started passing their island. Some were loaded down with supplies, but many just had grim-faced Cajun soldiers, knuckles white as they held their mismatched weapons. They weren’t going to the front to resupply materials. They were there to provide fresh meat.
“How are our fuel levels?” Dan asked Abe as the whine of the engines was drowned out by the distant gunfire. “Are the suits ready to go? I wouldn’t be surprised if someone important suddenly remembered that they have a potent military asset waiting to deploy.”
“We’re good to go, even if ammunition and fuel are lower than I’d like.” Abe shrugged. “Given the sound of things, I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s the same story for everyone right now. Things must be pretty dire if they’re sending in the militia. Hell, half of them were using shotguns. I really don’t think the New Orleans Army is ready to resupply them if they run out of whatever ammunition they’re carrying.”
Jennifer strode up to the two of them, glancing past them toward the sound of gunfire.
“Any excuse to get out of losing another hand, Dan.” She shook her head while chuckling at him. “They aren’t even close. If it’s really a problem, HQ will call us and beg us to come back. If it isn’t, we did more than our fair share already. They wouldn’t have gotten this far without us clearing the way.”
“I, for one, hope they don’t need us.” Dan nodded to William as the older man approached on foot, his armor split open along its spine for easy access near the center of the island. “That last fight was bad enough. As far as I’m concerned, we’re owed a break of some sort. Of course, I’m not opposed to hearing offers. We could always use more food and equipment.”
“Boy.” William shook his head at Dan. “If they call us up, you let me do the negotiating. After watching you fight, I have to admit you know what you’re doing there, but I’m gonna be honest. You barely know what it takes to keep a unit running, and you couldn’t negotiate your way out of a wet paper bag.”
“You could at least be a little bit tactful about it.” Dan chuckled sheepishly.
“I’m too old to be tactful.” William snorted. “You can scrap with the best of them, and you’re not a megalomaniacal nutcase. That makes you officer material, in my book. That said, you’ve just spent the last however many months doing nothing but killing shit. You’re good at it. You just need someone else to handle the logistics and business side of things.”
“Hate to break it to you, Dan.” Jennifer shrugged. “Daddy has a point. We’ve been driving fair bargains so far, and look at what’s happened. New Orleans has taken advantage of us and left us in a lurch. Maybe it’s time to stop being fair and actually push for our market rate.”
“I know this isn’t a democracy,” Abe interjected. “But I’m gonna have to agree with the Finches. We’re gonna need to pay our troops soon, and that’s gonna need to be in something other than food and antibiotics. Same with expanding. I’d like to avoid street performing in the future, if I could help it. We’re gonna need more rigorous screening and training facilities, if the plan is to keep this mercenary thing up.”
Almost on cue, the walkie talkie chirped. Dan glanced down at it and back up at the rest of the team in indecision. Silently, William extended his hand. After a couple seconds of unanswered chirping from the walkie talkie, Dan sighed and wordlessly handed the device to William.
“William Finch speaking.” William winked at Dan. “Who am I speaking to, over?”
“This is General Richard,” an angry masculine tenor with a slight twang replied. “What the hell is this I’m hearing about your unit refusing to advance? You were given direct orders, and by God, I’ll have you all caned for dereliction of duty if you don’t get your sorry asses to the battle line in the next ten minutes.”
William simply held onto the walkie talkie. Dan frowned, opening his mouth to say something, only for the ex-general to raise an index finger to his lips, shushing him.
“Are you done, General Richard?” William asked bemusedly. “I didn’t hear you say over, so I just assumed you had more to say.”
“Now listen here,” Richard sputtered. “We’re in the final stretch, and I can’t have a unit sitting around lollygagging. We are under martial law, and I will have your entire unit dragged outside the city and shot at dawn if you don’t get your asses moving.”
After a pause, during which Jennifer did her best to avoid audibly laughing, Richard ground out the word “over.” With the way he dragged the word out, Dan could have sworn that William had just smothered his dog in front of the man.
“Interesting,” William replied cheerfully. “You do know that our unit isn’t part of your Army, right? As in, your only authority over us is related to the contract that we signed with the Mayor? Over.”
“What?” Richard half shouted and half questioned. There was a pause during which screaming could vaguely be heard through the walkie talkie as the General “interacted” with someone else on his staff.
“So,” Richard was notably calmer when he resumed speaking through the walkie talkie. “You’re the guys with the robot suits that I’ve heard about. I’m presuming that you’re holding out for a better contract from us, now that you know that we’re up against a wall. State your terms, but if you try to milk us too hard, I swear to Jesus, Mary, and Joseph that I will have your entire fucking unit executed for profiteering once this is all done, over.”
“Funny story.” William was smiling a little wider than Dan was comfortable with. “Your ops team ‘forgot’ to tell us that we were almost a half mile ahead of the rest of the line and let us get ambushed. When we radioed for help, no one came. When we radioed for a resupply, we got half of what we asked for, and the militia team bringing the supplies tried to short us, presumably to sell them on the black market.”
“What-” Richard began only for William to cut him off.
“I did not say ‘over,’ General, I am not done!” William’s voice grew heated as he revved himself up to properly chew out the officer. “We cleared an entire chunk of the front on our own, and without the support we were promised. Because your men didn’t get off of their asses, we lost 15% of our infantry. They would still be here today if anyone bothered to help. Then, when we asked to speak to you about the issue, we heard nothing. Now, here we sit, still undersupplied due to incompetence or malevolence on the part of your staff.
“We do not live in your city,” the old man’s voice ground out with all the warmth of gravel being crushed into dust. “We don’t owe you anything. Right now, our contract has been voided by my commanding officer for gross negligence on your part. Over.”
William spat the last word out with relish. Abe brought his fingers to his lips and made a chef’s kiss motion. Even Dan had a hard time keeping a straight face. He did have to admit, William tearing into the obviously in-the-dark general was exactly the level of catharsis he needed right now.
“Why is this the first I’ve heard of this?” Richard asked, confusion clearly audible through the static of the walkie talkie call. “I didn’t even hear that your unit was nearby, until I questioned my staff about unoccupied units, and Major Champlain mentioned that you were in the area, over.”
“We’ve only been talking with Captain Anderson,” William replied darkly. “I think the little shit screwed the pooch. He more or less admitted that he forgot about us and didn’t give us a call to slow our advance earlier. Then, every attempt to talk to either you or Major Champlain met interference from him. Eventually, we just told him we were sitting pat until someone other than him got on the line, over.”
“Shit,” Richard replied emotionlessly. “I’ve never trusted the little weasel. Endangering an entire operation just so he could cover his ass sounds exactly like him. Now, I get that you’re mad, but what is it going to take to get your men moving? Over.”
“We aren’t unreasonable, General,” William’s grin was borderline inhuman in the way it grew across his face. “We’ve lost a lot of custom one-of-a-kind equipment, and under the circumstances, you’re already responsible for triple damages. In short, $540 million. After that, well, you just triple our pay for the mission, and we’ll call it good. Over.”
“How much?” Richard practically choked. “Jesus fucking Christ, man, what are you going to ask for next, my daughter’s hand in marriage? My fucking car?”
“You already owe us the $540 million,” William winked at Dan. “Our agreed-upon pay for the operation included normal wear and tear for the unit, and it came out to about $20 million. As for your daughter, well, isn’t that usually the prize the heroes win for saving the kingdom? Over.”
For almost a minute, there was no reply over the walkie talkie. Dan began to fret. They were talking about a lot of money. Maybe New Orleans didn’t even have what it needed to pay them. Maybe William had overplayed their hand and asked for too much.
“Fuck you,” Richard’s dejected voice crackled back at them from the walkie talkie. “We’ll pay you the $600 million and not a penny more. I’m gonna have Anderson shot for this, and when you get back to New Orleans, you’re buying me a drink. Least you can do for fucking me like this, over.”
“A pleasure doing business with you, General, over.” William threw the walkie talkie to Dan, who caught it, an amused expression on his face.
“And that,” Abe said, clapping Dan on the back, “is how it’s done.”
