Eye of the Storm

CHAPTER EIGHT

“You want me to be a what?”

Brigadier General Thomas Cutprice had only permitted the increase in rank when he retired. What the hell, it was a jump in retirement pay.

During the war, though, he had insisted on never being promoted over colonel. He’d retired once from the Army at that rank, back when the Army had tired of him and vice versa, and he saw no reason to reach for stars. Not that he didn’t have the position.

Cutprice had commanded the Ten Thousand, assuredly the most elite, and high casualty, unit defending the US outside of the ACS. The Ten Thousand were picked fighters, all of them with previous combat experience, who used converted Posleen weaponry for that extra spicey punch. Numbering, with supports, well in excess of fifteen thousand personnel, it was unquestionably a division and had the direct combat power of most corps. The commander should have been at least a brigadier general and more likely a major general.

Cutprice had refused to be promoted and nobody was going to push the issue.

But that didn’t mean he wanted to be a captain again!

“Look, General, this is happening to everyone,” the captain behind the desk said. “Everyone who is being recalled is being given a reduction in rank. You’ve got some good news, though.”

“It better be very good,” Cutprice growled.

“Recalled veterans are being given an automatic reduction in rank,” the captain repeated. “It’s more complicated than any brigadier goes to captain, but it’s close enough. But then each of them gets a set of points on the basis of a matrix. The main axis of the matrix has to do with combat command vs other command or staff time. You’ve got a very high point set; I don’t have to look at your record to know that you’ve had a lot of combat time and a lot of that as a senior commander. That means you get certain choices. Basically, you can use your points to decide what sort of position you prefer then you can use them to add staff of your choosing. Depends on how many points you have what you can do. Trust me, it will all make sense when you use the system. But be aware that you’re going to be bidding for all this.”

“That is the screwiest thing… ” Cutprice said, shaking his head. “You mean you bean-counters are staffing the TOE via EBAY?”

“More or less,” the captain said, smiling faintly. “Not the first time I’ve heard that, sir. But, sir, you have the highest set of points I’ve ever seen. Look, let me walk you through it. For your first tour, what you’re getting when you finish in-process, do you want a staff position or command of a company.”

“Command, of course,” Cutprice said.

“Then you go on the board and check to see what the bids are for company commands, sir,” the captain said. “You’ve got over two thousand points. The last time I checked the board, the high bid for a company, and it was a particular company in a particular unit, was seven hundred points. I checked and the captain making the bid was placing it all on that company. If you just bid for any old company command, those are going for around four hundred points.”

“Heh,” Cutprice said, nodding. “Former commander wanting to relive his glory days.”

“Probably, sir,” the captain admitted. “Then you take a look at the recalled personnel board. The highest bid I’ve seen is for a first sergeant who had a string of medals and retired as a sergeant major with nearly twenty years in grade! He’d been a first sergeant four times. The high bid last time I checked was fifty-three points. Most sergeants major don’t even make it to E-8, they’re getting recalled as E-7s.”

“I’m beginning to see your, forgive me, point,” Cutprice said.

“Sir, you have the most time in a combat command with the most days in combat of the recalls I’ve seen or checked,” the captain pointed out. “At least at your rank. You can write your ticket. Any unit, any personnel. Former sergeants major as platoon sergeants. Majors as platoon leaders. Guys with a string of medals and lots of combat time. Of course, as soon as we get more bodies to fill the slots everyone who has prior experience at a higher rank is probably going to advance really quick. So it’s not as bad as it seems.”

“A company again,” Cutprice said, nodding. He smiled, ever so slightly. “The are worse things in life. Where’s this board?”

“Your paperwork has all the information, sir,” the captain replied. “The board can be accessed through any secure internet browser. All you have to do is log-in with your username and password and start building your unit. Oh, uhm, one thing, sir.”

“Go,” Cutprice said with a sigh.

“If you pick a particular unit but a higher rank requests you as a company commander, you have to use some points to avoid it. It won’t show up that way, exactly. It will show that someone outbid them. If two officers are bidding on you, you can add points to one for example.”

“And people can, presumably, do the same to me,” Cutprice said.

“Yes, sir,” the captain replied.

“Shouldn’t have problems down-line,” Cutprice said. “Upline? I can see some former commanders bidding on me just to screw me. I’m going to have to think this over carefully.”

“The full initial recall will be complete in two weeks, sir,” the captain said. “At that point, all the bids are final. Good luck, sir.”

Captain Cutprice walked in the door of the O-Club and snorted.

The Officer’s Club was usually a scene of somewhat raucus drinking as officers blew off steam and complained about the red-tape or dumb-ass juniors they’d had to deal with during the day. Deals were made, business conducted in the politics that drove any military as much as did its vehicles.

Despite it being after-hours, the Recalled Personnel O-Club, a recently refurbished building on the sprawling Ft. Knox Reservation, was fairly quiet. That was because just about every officer was consulting a Buckley or laptop. Except for the occasional outburst of profanity or cheering and some soto voce conversations, the mood was downright business-like.

Cutprice walked to the bar and found an open stool then set his antiquated laptop down and started it up. He had been given an access code for the local wireless router and logged in then surfed over to the Recalled Officer Placement Board.

“Fuck,” he muttered.

“Somebody outbid you?” the lieutenant sitting next to him asked, looking up from his Buckley.

“No,” Cutprice said, sourly. “I haven’t even placed a bid, yet. But I’ve got seven bids for me and six of them are total asshats.”

“Seven?” the lieutenant asked, leaning over to read the nametag. “Holy shit! Colonel Cutprice? The Ten Thousand Colonel Cutprice?”

“Captain Cutprice, now, LT,” the captain said. “Got up to General Cutprice.”

“I was a lieutenant colonel,” the officer grumped. “But I was just CONARC staff the whole time. I’m hoping to get a platoon this time around. But I’ve only got, like, five points. Platoons are going for nearly as much as companies.”

“Are they transferrable?” Cutprice asked.

“Yeah, but hardly anyone will,” the lieutenant admitted.

“Well, I’m no wiz at this internet shit,” Cutprice said. “And I’m having a hard time. Gimme a hand and I’ll give you some points.”

“Can I get a platoon?” the lieutenant asked. “With you?”

“That’s a tough one,” Cutprice admitted. “Like everybody else, I’m going to be looking for LTs with experience. Training a newbie platoon leader is one chore I’d like to avoid. I’ll think about it but I’ll definitely cut you enough points to get you into some platoon.”

“You’ve got enough?” the LT asked.

“Looking at this board?” Cutprice said. “My main problem will be outbidding the bastards that want to hire me.”

“See, since everyone’s gotten a point score, you can sort for highest points in each category,” Lt. Norris said.

“Who the hell is Digermon?” Cutprice said, looking at the database for 11B6 personnel.

“See how it’s highlighted?” Norris replied, hitting the link. “That’s an abbreviated service record.”

“WWII vet,” Cutprice said, nodding. “Third Infantry Division. Korea, Vietnam, Posleen War… And he’s a damned staff sergeant! I don’t feel so bad.”

“Somebody really wants him,” Norris said, pointing at the bid. “You can’t see his point total but it’s got to be high. He might have thrown in some points.”

“Can you search by name?” Cutprice asked.

“Just type it in the search box.”

“W-A-C-L-E-V-A… ”

“Hoowah!” Master Sergeant Wacleva said, holding up his Buckley. “We are triumphant!”

“What you got, Wac?” the Master Sergeant sitting next to him asked.

“Cutprice is now on the board,” Wacleva replied. “And I’m going to put all my damned points on his bid. If I have to deal with that asshole Jackson as a CO, I will frag his butt as soon as we’re in combat.”