too late. T h e others had the w eapons and the organization and the

  fighting spirit. T h ey ’d been knocked dow n too m uch, an d they’d

  been cut u p too m uch — do you understand w hat I mean? If you take

  people like that, and beat them over and over and over again, m ost of

  them stay beaten. O ne or two will go the other way — become so hard

  and strong th at they’re as good as an y th in g you’ve got. But not

  m ost of them . So w hen the one or two try and lead them , there’s no

  support. T h e n too, there’s the sexual effect. Maybe I sh o u ld n ’t talk

  about this. Do you w ant to turn off the recorder?

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  When I Was Ming the Merciless

  “ Well, all right. Everybody saw, alm ost from the beginning, that

  the wom en w ould have to fight ju st like the men. Ja n was the best

  w om an w arrior we had, and she came ou t for it from the beginning.

  T h e Blues were already doing it, and if we d id n ’t, w e’d lose. Besides, if

  the w om en d id n ’t fight, there co u ld n ’t be real equality, because if a

  w om an said we o u g h t to stand up to the other colors, all the m en

  w ould say it w asn’t her that was going to bleed.

  “ Some of the w om en d id n ’t w ant to, of course. And some of the

  men d id n ’t w ant to have them do it, either. I ’d say that there were

  perhaps eight w om en against, and five men. T h a t was where the drill

  came in. Most of all, there. I t’s h a rd —very hard to get people to drill.

  You’ve got to w ork it in a little bit at a time. But once they do it, they

  learn to obey orders, and w hen you say, ‘Come o n !’ they follow. I

  started them w ith practice in using w eapons (it was ju st the knives

  and clubs then) and formalized it later. I said even if they w eren’t

  going to fight, the least they could do was practice w ith the rest of

  us; and then if they had to som etime, they’d know how. Of course

  after we were better organized I could have sim ply ordered it; bu t I

  d id n ’t have that kind of authority then —I w asn’t Em peror.

  “ No, I was a political science m ajor. A lot were psych students,

  and a lot m ore were from the school of sociology. I never noticed

  that they behaved differently th an the rest of us.

  “ W hat I was com ing to, was that w hen a m an —a male, let’s call

  him —has been fig h tin g a w om an, and he w ins and knocks her

  down, and she drops whatever it is she has, a club or whatever, and

  perhaps she’s bleeding where he cut her or broke her lip, and often her

  shirt and shorts are torn, there is an im pulse that takes com m and.

  Perhaps wom en d o n ’t feel that way, but m en do. And then, w hen a

  w om an has had that h ap p en once or twice, it takes everything ou t of

  them. T hey w on’t fight anym ore; they ju st w ant to run, or

  sometimes to hide. Some of the men said that they really liked it,

  underneath, but I d o n ’t th in k so. Still, they were the ones, mostly,

  w ho w anted to jo in us.

  “ No, of course we d id n ’t let them. We co u ld n ’t let them. T h a t was

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  Plan[e]t Engineering

  the p o in t of the w hole thing. We had the b ands— I ’ve still got m ine,

  see, aro u n d my w rist—and we co u ld n ’t get them off. You c a n ’t get

  them off. Once they clam ped your bracelet on you, you were a Yellow

  or a Blue or a Green; and that was it. Some of the Greens,

  particularly, tried to cut them off before we got control of all the

  tools. It co u ld n ’t be done; a file w o n ’t even scratch them.

  “ Did that bother you? T h e clothes? Yes, we had colored clothes to

  begin w ith —yellow shorts and shirts. But they d id n ’t really m atter;

  it was the w ristbands. In the end I had all my guards go naked to the

  waist, w ith ju st a strip of yellow cloth aro u n d their heads to identify

  them . You see, I had noticed that the braver som eone was, the m ore

  torn u p their shirts got, u n til the best of them really d id n ’t have any

  at all.

  “ Yes, the wom en too. I ’ll tell you a secret. W hen you go o u t to

  fight, an y th in g you can do th at w ill make you look differen t—

  strange—helps. It takes the heart o u t of the others. I th in k the Blues

  had the advantage at first— those dark blue shirts an d shorts. T hey

  looked like Federal Police. But the naked chests and the yellow

  head-rags took care of that. We kept together and came at them in a

  solid m ass—swords in front, an d the polearm s p o k in g between

  them , and everybody yelling. T h a t’s very im p o rtan t. A nd the flag. I

  gave my ow n shirt to m ake the flag. T h e front was all cut up by

  then, bu t there w asn’t a rip in the b ack —n o t one. T h a t was the p art

  we took off and used for the flag. A lthea sewed the L u n g -R in in it

  w ith red thread. Some of them said it w ould never stand o u t because

  there w asn’t enough air m ovem ent in the build in g , where m ost of the

  fig h tin g was. I told them th at if they w ent forw ard fast e n o u g h it

  w ould stand out, and I was right. It was useful in an o th er way too:

  once or twice we were scattered— I rem em ber one tim e w hen the Blues

  am bushed u s—an d it showed us where o u r center was. N ils carried

  it. I d o n ’t know w h a t’s h appened to it now. It w ould be nice to have

  w hen we get back together.

  “I ’ve already told you abo u t that. It c o u ld n ’t be done: if you were

  a Yellow, you were a Yellow; a Blue was a Blue, a n d a G reen was a

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  When I Was Ming the Merciless

  Green; and n o th in g anybody could say m ade any difference. Ja n had

  a G reen slave-lover for a w h ile—he even fought w ith us a couple of

  times against the Blues. T h e Greens were finished by then, and he

  w asn’t m uch good.

  “ No, as I said, the Greens had a few real fighters. I have no

  idea w hat their nam es were. T h a t was one of the first rules I

  m ade—Greens and Blues have no names. If you knew one of them by

  nam e before the experim ent, you forgot it as quickly as possible. If

  we had to talk ab o u t one particularly, we said: ‘the blond Blue

  w om an ,’ or ‘J a n ’s G reen boy.’ Like that.

  “A nother th in g that helped us fight was the idea of the Em pire. If

  you talk about a th in g like that, it becomes real. Ju st like the figure

  we set up. We had the Im perial G uards, an d they were brave because if

  they w eren’t, they’d lose their places, they w o u ld n ’t be guards

  anym ore; and the others fought harder h o p in g to get i n —if someone

  distinguished him self, or herself, I m ade them a guard. And if a

  guard did, I m ade that guard an officer. And once I had the guards, I

  used them to keep the rest in order.

  “W hat it was about? T h e w hole experim ent? You know — the

  world. O nly so m any resources, you see, and so many groups of

  people. I understand some of the other ru n n in g s of the experim ent

  came ou t a little differently; bu t they w anted to see how we worked it

  o u t—w hat o u r solution was. T h a t’s why I d o n ’t feel bad about

  w hat we did. It was o u r problem , set to us (if you w ant to p u t it that

  way), and we solved it. W hen they broke the wall we were

  organized—everyone knew his place, w ho he took orders from , and

  how m uch he got. H ow m uch food, d rin k in g water, bathw ater.

  T h a t was the Em pire.

  “ Mostly we ju st called it that: ‘T h e E m pire.’ Officially, we began

  by calling it M ongolia. Because we were the Yellows. Later we

  shortened it.

  “ No, I d o n ’t feel bad about her, whoever she was. We were all

  volunteers, originally, you have to remem ber. And she kept getting

  ou t of line, over and over again, w hen she was ju st a stinking Green

  Plan[e]t Engineering

  or Blue or whatever she was. I c a n ’t even rem em ber. So I decided she

  should be punished. We m ade a cerem ony ou t of it, w ith fire in the

  braziers, and the big gong.

  “ I had Ja n do it. Jan was a colonel. Neal and Ted held her, and

  Ja n p u t the sword thro u g h her belly — so she’d live long en o u g h to

  know w hat was h ap p e n in g . W hen Ja n p ulled it out, she licked the

  blood from the blade. T h e rest of the Greens and Blues w ould have

  obeyed after that, believe me.

  “ Yes, w hen she finally died. T h a t was w hen they broke dow n the

  wall. T hey were m o n ito rin g a few selected individuals, I suppose,

  though we d id n ’t know it. She m ust have been one of them .

  “ N aturally. I understand how you feel about it now — how the

  school feels and how the public and the President feel. But do you

  understand how we felt? You h aven’t been th ro u g h w hat we w ent

  th ro u g h together. We have learned a great m any things we w ill

  remember, but none of you could possibly know how it was then,

  w hen I was M ing the M erciless.”

  86

  HORARS

  T h e three friends in the trench looked very m uch alike as they

  labored in the rain. T h e ir hairless skulls were slickly naked to it,

  their torsos hairless too, and supple w ith sm ooth m uscles that ran

  like oil under the wet gleam.

  T h e two, w ho really were 2909 and 2911, did no t m in d the ju n g le

  aro u n d them a lth o u g h they detested the ra in that rusted their

  w eapons, and the snakes and insects, an d hated the Enemy. But the

  one called 2910, the real as well as the official leader of the three, did;

  and that was because 2909 an d 2911 had stainless-steel bones; but

  there was no 2910 and there had never been.

  T h e cam p they held was a triangle. In the center, the CP-Aid

  S tation where L ieu ten a n t Kyle and Mr. Brenner slept: a h u t of am m o

  cases packed w ith d irt w hose lower half was dug in to the soggy

  earth. A round it were the m o rtar p it (NE), the recoilless rifle pit

  (NW), and P in o c ch io ’s p it (S); and beyond these were the straight

  lines of the trenches: First P latoon, Second P latoon, T h ird P latoon

  (the plato o n of the three). O utside of w hich were the prim ary wire

  and an antipersonnel m ine field.

  A nd outside th at was the jun g le. But no t com pletely outside. T h e

  ju n g le set u p outposts of its ow n of sw ift-sprouting bam boo and

  elephant grass, and its craw ling creatures carried ou t u n tirin g

  patro ls of the trenches. T h e ju n g le sheltered the Enemy, taking him

  to its great fetid breast to be fed w hile it sopped u p the rain and of it

  bred its stin g in g g nats and centipedes.

  87

  Plan[e]t Engineering

  An ogre beside him , 2911 drove his shovel in to the ooze fillin g the

  trench, lifted it to shoulder height, dum ped it; 2910 did the same

  th in g in his turn, then w atched the ra in work on the scoop of m ud

  u n til it was slowly ru n n in g back into the trench again. Follow ing

  his eyes 2911 looked at him an d grinned. T h e HORAR’s face was

  broad, hairless, flat-nosed and high-cheeked; his teeth were pointed

  and w hite like a big d o g ’s. A nd he, 2910, knew th at that face was his

  own. Exactly his own. H e told him self it was a dream , bu t he was

  very tired and could no t get out.

  Somewhere dow n the trench the bull voice of 2900 an n o u n ced the

  evening meal and the others threw dow n their tools an d jostled past

  tow ard the bowls of steam ing m ash, but the th o u g h t of food

  nauseated 2910 in his fatigue, and he stum bled into the bunker he

  shared w ith 2909 and 2911. Flat on his air mattress he could leave the

  nig h tm are for a time; return to the sane w orld of houses and

  sidewalks, or merely sink in to the blessed nothingness that was far

  b etter...

  Suddenly he was bolt u p rig h t on the cot, blackness still in his eyes

  even w hile his fingers groped w ith their ow n th o u g h t for his helm et

  and w eapon. Bugles were blow ing from the edge of the ju n g le, but he

  had time to ru n his han d under the inflated pad of the m attress and

  reassure him self that his hidden notes were safe before 2900 in the

  trench outside yelled, “Attack! Fall out! M an your firing p o in ts!”

  It was one of the stock jokes, one of the jokes so stock, in fact, that

  it had ceased to be a n y th in g anyone laughed at, to say “ H o ra r” your

  firing p o in t (or whatever it was that according to the book should

  be “ m an n ed ”). T h e HORARS in the squad he led used the expression

  to 2910 ju st as he used it w ith them , an d w hen 2900 never em ployed it

  the om ission had at first unsettled him . But 2900 did not really

  suspect. 2900 ju st took his rank seriously.

  He got in to position just as the m ortars p u t u p a p arach u te flare

  that h u n g over the cam p like a w hite rose of fire. W hether because of

  his brief sleep or the excitem ent of the im p en d in g fight his fatigue

  had evaporated, leaving him nervously alert but unsteady. From the

  88

  The HORARS of War

  ju n g le a bugle sang, “T a -ta a ... ta a -ta a ... ” and off to the p la to o n ’s

  left rear the First opened u p w ith their heavy w eapons on a suicide

  squad they apparently th o u g h t they saw on the p ath leading to the

  n ortheast gate. H e watched, and after half a m in u te som ething stood

  u p on the p ath an d grabbed for its m idsection before it fell, so there

  was a suicide squad.

  S o m e one, he told himself. Someone. N ot something. Someone

  grabbed for his m idsection. T hey were all h u m an ou t there.

  T h e F irst began lettin g go w ith personal w eapons as well, each

  deep cough representing a half dozen dartlike flechettes flying in an

  inescapable pattern three feet broad. “Eyes front, 2910!’’ barked 2900.

  T h ere was n o th in g to be seen o u t there but a few clum ps of

  elep h an t grass. T h e n the w hite flare b u rned out. “T hey o u g h t to pu t

  u p an o th er one,” 2911 on his rig h t said worriedly.

  “A star in the east for men not born of w om en,” said 2910 half to

  him self, and regretted the blasphem y im m ediately.

  “ T h a t’s where they need it,” 2911 agreed. “T h e First is having it

  pretty hot over there. But we could use some light here too.”

  H e was not listening. At hom e in C hicago, d u rin g that

  inexpressibly rem ote tim e w hich ran from a dim m em ory of p laying

  on a law n under the supervision of a sm ilin g giantess to that

  m om ent two years ago w hen he had subm itted to surgery to lose

  every body and facial h air he possessed and undergo certain other

  m in o r alterations, he had been unconsciously p re p arin g him self for

  this. L iftin g w eights and p lay in g football to develop his body w hile

  he w hetted his m ind on a th o u san d books; all so that he m ight tell,

  m ak in g others feel at a rem o v e...

  A nother flare w ent u p and there were three dark silhouettes sliding

  from the next-nearest clu m p of elep h an t grass to the nearest. H e fired

  his M-19 at them , then heard the H O R A R S on either side of him fire

  too. From the sharp corner where their ow n p latoon met the Second

  a m achine g u n opened u p w ith tracer. T h e nearest grass clum p

  sprang in to the air an d som ersaulted am id spurts of earth.

  T h ere was a m om ent of quiet, then five rounds of high explosive

  89

  Plan[e]t Engineering

  came in rig h t behind them as th o u g h aim ed for P in o cch io ’s pit.

  Crump. C rump. C r u m p .. .C rum p. Crump. (2900 w ould be ru n n in g

  to ask P inocchio if he were hurt.)

  Someone else had been m oving dow n the trench tow ard them , and

  he could hear the m um ble of the new voice become a gasp w hen the

  H.E. rounds came in. T h en it resumed, a little louder and

  consequently a bit m ore easily understood. “ H ow are you? You feel

  all right? H it?”

  And m ost of the HORARS answ ering, “ I ’m fine, sir.” or “ We’re

  okay, sir,” but because HORARS did have a sense of h u m o r some of

  them said things like, “ How do we transfer to the M arines, sir?” or

  “ My pulse ju st registered nine th o u ’, sir. 3000 took it w ith the

  m ortar sig h t.”

  We often think of strength as associated w ith humorlessness, he

  had w ritten in the news m agazine w hich had, w ith the A rm y’s

 

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