"Softhearted, I guess," Thompson shrugged. "Besides, it was within my discretion. You object?"
Actually, that was the first remotely human response Hamilton had ever seen from his commander. He answered, "No, sir, it just surprised me. It's a . . . weakness. I didn't think you had any."
"I'm human enough, I assure you," Thompson said with a grim smile. "Those kids will be sent to a Christian orphanage," he explained. "There, they'll have the religion knocked out of them. Rather, they'll have their religion knocked out of them and ours, one of ours, substituted. In time, they'll become assets."
Hamilton raised one eyebrow doubtfully. "That's not why you saved them."
Thompson shook his head. "No . . . no, I saved them to sleep better at night. If you stay with the Army, young lieutenant, I suggest you find ways to help yourself sleep better at night, too."
"I haven't done anything yet that bothers my conscience," Hamilton said.
"No? You will."
The captain directed his gaze out to sea where a dozen large amphibious craft were bringing in new, Christian, settlers to occupy the area just cleared of Moslems. The landing craft, under escort, of course, would be used to cart off the remaining original inhabitants— even now moving under guard to the shoreline—and dump them on the Malaysian or Indonesian coasts. The villagers hadn't been driven off with nothing; they still had their eyes to weep with.
"All this would have been unthinkable, you know," the captain said, gesturing with one armored hand at the surrounding destruction, and not neglecting the long lines of Moros being ushered into tents where courts-martial were being held by the Army of the Philippines. "Even a century ago it would have been unthinkable, though a century and a half ago it was all too common.
"The old law of war, you see, was a fragile thing, easily broken. And when the enemy ignored it and some of our own people tried to mold it to do too much, it broke. Now there's no law except for who is fastest, who is best armed and trained, who is most ruthless. And when the enemy demonstrated that the planet wasn't big enough for both of us and we demonstrated that it didn't necessarily have to contain both of us? That's when—"
The captain's words were interrupted by a massive burst of weapons fire as the Filipino troops working with the company shot the first dozen of those villagers convicted of war crimes into the ditch they had themselves been forced to dig.
By the fire, unbothered by the shootings, the troopers sang:
"In that land of dopey dreams
Happy peaceful Philippines . . . "
Al Harv Barracks, Province of Affrankon, 10 Rajab,
1531 AH (1 July, 2107)
They started the boys off with light rifles, .22 caliber repeaters. Nazrani were barred from owning or holding arms by law. Yet the boys were no longer Nazrani and so they all—being, after all, boys— were simply thrilled. Here was power. Here was delight in destruction.
The paper targets being destroyed would not have been thrilled, had they been anything other than paper targets. The one hare who bumbled onto the rifle range was definitely not thrilled. That hare had had too many close calls with death already in the last few years.
Fortunately for the hare, the boys had not learned yet to be nearly as proficient with the rifles as falcons are born to be with their talons. Though little devils of dust burst all around the hare wherever the bullets struck, none of them struck the hare. A few hops and it was lost in the grass, trembling.
The tent shuddered as its flap billowed in the midsummer's evening breeze. Within the tent, by the flaring light of a gas lantern, the instructors for the new recruits gathered to discuss their charges over coffee and tea. The senior drill instructor of the company, Abdul Rahman, held forth a number of names, Hans' among them, of recruits for whom it might be well to give advanced training in marksmanship, in time, and perhaps even in leadership.
The boys slept out in the open under the stars.
"Minden missed the hare, just like all the rest of them did," objected Abdul Rahman's senior assistant, Rustam. Where Abdul Rahman was tall and beefy, Rustam was shorter and much more slender. Both had the blue eyes that were typical among the janissaries of the Caliphate.
"Buck fever," Abdul Rahman answered. "He still is proving a better shot than all but a few of the others."
"He was among the very last to accept the faith."
"That's true," Abdul Rahman conceded, "and it speaks well of the boy. He doesn't give up easily." He raised one sardonic eyebrow. "And I seem to recall another ex-Nazrani revert who likewise didn't give up his religion lightly or easily."