Diablo knew the way home and had broken into a trot beyond the construction on the wall so before Herzer knew it he was at the gates of the Academy. He realized it when he heard a familiar voice.

“You appear to be thinking deep thoughts, Lieutenant.”

“Just considering the lack of manpower, Gunny,” Herzer replied with a grin.

Master Centurion Miles A. “Gunny” Rutherford had been a reenactor prior to the Fall. In his latter career he had specialized as a noncommissioned officer in the Norau Marines, a position called “Gunnery Sergeant,” and he had lived his life for years in that role to the point that he lived, ate and breathed the model, in his mind, of such a person.

As it turned out, he had more background for the role than most people had realized. He was born shortly before his parents decided to move to the province of Anarchia, a region that was maintained, prior to the Fall, in a nontechnological environment. Gunny had never been too sure what happened to his folks after they emigrated but it was probably similar to what had happened to Duke Edmund’s brother. It was an area used as a “bleed off” for people who didn’t want to live in paradise and it was anything but. Anarchia, in those days, had been run by groups of feudal warlords, and newcomers had a tendency to die in distressing numbers. Gunny had grown up in that environment, eventually becoming one of the punk soldiers of the “Baron” of Melbun. It was there that he had first run afoul of Duke Edmund, when the man born by the name of Charles came looking for his missing brother and decided that Anarchia needed a good shaking up. The “Baron” had learned, the hard way, that undisciplined gang members didn’t stand a chance against a disciplined army. The survivors of the Baron’s men had been inducted in the burgeoning army of Charles the Great.