Grunts by Mary Gentle Read Free Book Online

is
Corporal
Shazgurim, and beside her
Corporal
Imhullu. You are not fit to even
think
about wiping their arses. And I, soldier, am
Gunnery Sergeant
Ashnak and you are not fit to even breathe in my presence,
do you understand me
?”
    “Wh’…” The strange words bemused Marukka.
    Barashkukor looked up at Ashnak, eyes shining.
    Beside him, Marukka shook herself and narrowed her eyes.
“Why you shit-faced—”
    Ashnak’s fist went up, came down on Marukka’s head, and the orc fell to her knees, poleaxed. A gasp went through the crowd. Growls and snarls sounded in the noon heat. A few dozen of the garrison orcs began to edge forward with drawn knives.
    The big Agaku turned his back and strolled across to the makeshift traverse, at which point he barked: “‘TenHUT!”
    The two
Corporals
and the
Marine First Class
slammed their heels together, bulging arms hanging at their sides, beetle-browed eyes facing ahead, narrowed against the light. Ashnak lifted his head and looked round the garrison again.
    “I’m here to make you balls of shit into soldiers,” he announced. “You sure as fuck won’t ever make the rank of
Corporal
. I doubt I’ll see any
MFCs
. You’re not the Agaku,but by the time I’m finished, I’ll make you dumb grunts into Orc
Marines
!”
    Jeers and yells echoes off the sides of the mountain pass. The garrison orcs leaped up and down, chanting, foaming at the mouth. Barashkukor fought to keep his balance.
    Gunnery Sergeant
Ashnak swung the heavy piece of metal off his shoulder, did something to it with his horny hands that made it click and slam, and lifted it to his shoulder. Barashkukor glimpsed something that looked like a crossbow trigger-grip and flung himself face-down on the earth.
    A loud explosion split the air, and a whoosh of heat scalded the compound. Barashkukor lifted his head as a loud
whumph!
sounded. Metal fragments sprayed the crowd of orcs, scything down bodies and slicing limbs from torsos.
    The chain of the portcullis flailed, cut cleanly in two. Three masonry blocks fell out of the gate-house wall. The portcullis itself, falling free, buried its spikes eighteen inches deep in the earth under the gateway, impaling three small orcs.
    Silence.
    Barashkukor slowly dared to breathe.
    “I’m here to make you into marines!” Ashnak bawled, “and you’re going to stay here until you
are
marines! Now
get in ranks
.”
    A minute’s furious shoving put Barashkukor in the front of the war-band as it straggled into an approximation of rank and file. Excitement burned in his breast. He put on his over-large helmet and pushed it down level with his eyes, sloped his mace across his shoulder, and drew himself up as straight as he could. The gunnery sergeant strolled up to one end of the ranks, and then back down, and heaved a deep sigh.
    “Standatt—
ease
!” he barked. The three Agaku relaxed their erect posture slightly. Some of the garrison orcs copied them. Ashnak spun round. “Not you! You’ll stand at attention until I tell you different. Attennn-
shun
!”
    Barashkukor thumped his bare heels down into the dirt. The big Agaku caught his eye for a moment, and Barashkukor straightened still further. Ashnak nodded slightly.
    “Now listen up!” Ashnak strolled back to the centre of the compound. “You scum can consider yourselves in training for a mission for the nameless. And since it’s an emergency mission, that means emergency training, and
that
means itcarries on, day and night, night and day, until you get it right. Right, marines?”
    “Erm…”
    “…well…”
    Ashnak shouldered his metal weapon threateningly. “Now listen to me, you…you…
halflings
! You’re talking to an officer! From now on, the first word and the last word out of your mouths is gonna be
sir
, you got that?”
    Barashkukor led the ragged reply:
    “Sir, yes
sir
!”
    Ashnak scowled and bellowed, “Can’t
hear
you!”
    Four hundred orc voices bellowed: “SIR YES SIR!”
    “That’s