Tilting The Balance Read Online Free PDF Page B

villages of the SSSR . Besangon was certainly different from those. He didn’t quite know what to make of it. Compared to the tall, blocklike structures of steel and glass that formed the cities of Home, its buildings seemed toys. Yet they were very ornate toys, with columns and elaborate stone and brickwork and steep roofs so the frozen water that fell from the sky hereabouts would slide off.
    The Race’s headquarters in Besangon was on a bluff in the southeastern part of the town. Not only was the place on high ground, Ussmak discovered on alighting from the transporter that a river flowed around two sides of it. “Well sited for defense,” he remarked.
    “Interesting you should say that,” the driver answered. “This used to be a Big Ugly fortress.” He pointed to a long, low, gloomy-looking building. “Go in there. They’ll process you and assign you to a crew.”
    “It shall be done.” Ussmak hurried toward the doorway; the cold was nipping at his fingers and eye turrets.
    Inside, the building was heated to the point of comfort for civilized beings – Ussmak hissed gratefully. Otherwise, though, the local males were mostly using the furnishings they’d found. A planet was a big place, and the Race hadn’t brought enough of everything to supply all its garrisons. And so a personnel officer seemed half swallowed by the fancy red velvet chair in which he sat, a chair designed to fit a Big Ugly. The male had to stretch to reach the computer on the heavy, dark wood table in front of him; the table was higher off the ground than any the Race would have built.
    The personnel officer turned one eye toward Ussmak. “Name, specialization, and number,” he said in a bored voice.
    “Superior sir, I am Ussmak, landcruiser driver,” Ussmak answered, and gave the number by which he was recorded, paid, and would be interred if he got unlucky.
    The personnel officer entered the information, used his free eye to read Ussmak’s data as they came up. “You were serving in the SSSR against the Soviets, is that correct, until your landcruiser was destroyed and you were exposed to excess radiation?”
    “Yes, superior sir, that is correct.”
    “Then you’ve not had combat experience against the Deutsche?”
    “Superior sir, I am told the guerrilla team that wrecked my vehicle was part Deutsch, part Soviet.
    If you are asking whether I’ve faced their landcruisers, the answer is no.”
    “That is what I meant,” the personnel officer said. “You will need to maintain a higher level of alertness hereabouts than was your habit in the SSSR , landcruiser driver. Tactically, the Deutsche are more often clever than perhaps any other Tosevite group. Their newest landcruisers have heavier guns than you will have seen, too. Combine these factors with their superior knowledge of the local terrain and they become opponents not to be despised.”
    “I understand, superior sir,” Ussmak said. “Will my landcruiser commander be experienced?” I hope.
    The personnel officer punched at the computer again, waited for a response to appear on the screen. “You’re going to be assigned to Landcruiser Commander Hessef s machine; his driver was wounded in a bandit attack here in Besangon a few days ago. Hessef compiled an excellent record in Espafia, south and west of here, as we expanded out of our landing zone. He’s relatively new to the northern sector.”
    Ussmak hadn’t known Espafia from France until the moment the personnel officer named them. And no matter what that officer said about the superior skills of the Deutsche, to Ussmak one band of Big Uglies seemed pretty much like another. “I’m glad to hear that he has fought, superior sir. Where do I report to him?”
    “The hall we are using as a barracks is out the door through which you entered and to your left. If you do not find Hessef and your gunner – whose name is Tvenkel – there, try the vehicle park down past the antiaircraft missile launcher.”
    Ussmak