Deathstalker 04 - Deathstalker Honor

too ill to fight. Colonel William Hand and Otto had ended up guarding the main gate and overseeing tactics, much to their disgust, and now used their military experience to deal with the business of the dead. There were always more, as men and women died waiting to get to the infirmary. Hand and Otto weren’t bothered by the dead. They’d seen enough bodies in their time to know the trick of treating them as objects rather than the people they’d been. Tobias Moon worked with them. He hadn’t been allowed to go outside and fight, because he might easily have been mistaken for one of the enemy. So now he carried the dead into the long, narrow hut and laid them out in neat rows, his augmented arms carrying the load long after even the most determined of the lepers had been forced to give up through sheer exhaustion. He was glad for a chance to be doing something to help. The dead bodies didn’t bother him at all. He’d been there.
    William Hand walked slowly up and down the ranks, giving each body a number and making notes of things like personal jewelery, to help in identification. Otto staggered in and out with blankets wrapped around collections of body parts. They’d be matched up later, if possible. For now he just dumped them all in a pile in one corner, and thanked God there were no rats on Lachrymae Christi. He dropped his last
    load onto the chest-high pile with an emphatic grunt, turned around, and pulled a face.
    “Jesus, this place stinks, Colonel. Couldn’t they at least have chosen a hut with windows?”
    “Splash some disinfectant around,” said Hand, not looking up from his clipboard.
    “And if you see anything small and wriggling, hit it with something heavy.” “Can’t,” said Otto. “Saint Bea’s commandeered all the disinfectant for the infirmary. She’s even rounded up all the booze in the camp as backup. Next time, Colonel, let’s not get distracted from the fighting. I’d rather take on a whole army of Hadenmen with my hump on backward than go through this shit again. Too much like working for a living.” The dwarf looked around him and was quiet for a long moment. “We lost a lot of good people out there, Colonel. Fifteen, maybe twenty percent of us. And a lot more’ll be dead by morning.”
    “Hadenmen lost a damn sight more.”
    “Yeah, but let’s face it, that was just a preliminary skirmish. An advance force sent in to test the defenses. That’s what I’d have done. The real army is still out there in the jungle somewhere, digesting the lessons it’s learned. And they could come at us anytime.”
    “You know, Otto, it’s your cheerful personality that keeps me going. Don’t you have any work to do?”
    “Nope. No more body parts. I had to use a shovel and a bucket for the last lot, though how you’re planning to match up things like ears and teeth and red and purple blobby bits is beyond me. Don’t know what we’ll do with them if they’re not claimed. Except maybe make soap out of them. Or soup, if things get really desperate.”
    The Colonel looked up from his clipboard. “Of course, your people were cannibals, weren’t they?”
    “Only on holy days. And only if we really didn’t like someone.” “Finished,” said Tobias Moon from the doorway. “There are no more bodies, though many remain gravely ill. I think you two should rest for a while now. I can continue with your work. I’m not tired at all.” “Then you’re the only one in this Mission who isn’t,” said the Colonel. He looked at his clipboard, then opened his hand and let it drop to the floor.
    “Take ten, Otto. I think we’ve earned it.”
    The two of them sat down on the floor, as far away from the bodies and the smell as they could get, and wearily set their backs against the hut wall. Otto produced a battered gunmetal flask from somewhere about his person, winked at the Colonel, and they both drank deeply from it. Moon hovered uncertainly in the doorway. Hand beckoned for him to come over.
    “Join us, sir Moon. You’ve earned a break too, even if you don’t need it. Pull up a floor and sit down.
    Fancy a drop of something bad for you?” “Thank you,” said Moon. Alcohol did nothing for him, but he took the proffered flask anyway. He understood that was part of being sociable. He sat down beside the Colonel, took a modest drink, and then passed the flask back. “It has an… unusual flavor.”
    Otto laughed. “The flavor isn’t why you drink it, friend. You’ve