Earth Unaware (First Formic War) by Orson Scott Card, Aaron Johnston Page B

gentlemen,” said Wit. “All five of you have passed this preliminary exercise. My objective was to witness how you functioned as a team, and you did not disappoint. Your actions were especially impressive considering that each of you were handpicked from different units and had never worked together before. This suggests to me that you could easily be integrated into our team should you pass our screening. I should forewarn you, however. The screening is difficult. If any of you have had second thoughts and would rather not participate, now’s the time to say so.”
    No one spoke.
    “Very well,” said Wit. “As soon as you wake up, we’ll begin.”
    One of the New Zealander’s looked confused. “Wake up, sir?”
    Five MOPs raised handguns and shot the five New Zealanders with tranquilizers. The New Zealanders looked surprised. Then their eyes rolled back and they dropped.
    *   *   *
    Wit sat in the back of a rented semitrailer truck, heading northwest on Route 1 into Auckland. The trailer was long and wide and well ventilated, with more than enough room for the five men sleeping on stretchers.
    Wit didn’t particularly enjoy shooting men with tranquilizers. Especially skilled and capable soldiers who had served their country well. Yet Wit knew it was a necessity. He needed men who were utterly ruthless in the execution of their duty, and the screening, as ugly as it was, as inhumane as it was, measured exactly what Wit needed to know.
    A short Filipino soldier named Calinga walked up the line of stretchers, pausing at each one to check the men’s vitals. When he finished he sat beside Wit and gestured to the stretchers. “Who do you think will pass?”
    “All of them, I hope. We need a lot more than five.”
    “My money is on Mazer Rackham. The one who gave you his gun.”
    “Surrendering your weapon is hardly the trait of a supersoldier, Calinga.”
    “Under the circumstances I thought it smart.”
    “Would you ever give up your weapon?”
    Calinga shrugged. “Depends. If it meant I got a better, more powerful weapon in return, one that was better suited to the task at hand, then absolutely. I’d surrender that puppy in a heartbeat. And that’s what Rackham did. By giving you his weapon, he got a bigger, more powerful weapon in return. You. He knew that you with his weapon was better than him with the same weapon. And it paid off. You took out several men, including me. And I don’t go down easily.”
    “I don’t need me to take out the enemy. I need men who can take out the enemy without my assistance.”
    “You need men who can think unconventionally and do things that traditional soldiers would never consider. Him giving you his weapon seems like out-of-box thinking to me.”
    “It’s not enough to think outside the box,” said Wit. “We need men to tear the box to shreds and burn it.”
    “So he should have broken your gun into tiny pieces and set it on fire?”
    “I’m not criticizing his decision,” said Wit. “Under the circumstances it might have been the smartest course of action. But it would have been better if he had kept the weapon and taken out all those men himself instead of having me do it for him. Besides, knowing what and where to attack is far more important than knowing how to attack.”
    “But he was humble enough to realize that he wasn’t as good as you. That has to count for something. I’ve read the guy’s file. He’s young, but he has a head on his shoulders.”
    “They all have heads on their shoulders,” said Wit. “Although a headless army would certainly intimidate the enemy. What would we call ourselves, ‘The Sleepy Hollow Squad’?”
    “‘The Guillotined Gang,’” said Calinga.
    The noise outside the truck increased as they got closer into Auckland and traffic picked up. They exited the highway north of town and moved west toward the shipyards. After a series of stops and starts, the truck parked. Wit heard the driver and passenger doors