This story is set in the world of Brad R. Torgersen’s science fiction novel A Star-Wheeled Sky, out in December. Torgersen is the author of numerous stories, novelettes, and novellas. A full-time healthcare computer geek, Torgersen also holds the rank of Chief Warrant Officer in the U.S. Army Reserve. He lives in Utah with his wife and daughter. He is also the author of the novel The Chaplain’s War, from Baen Books.

Elvin closed his eyes and let the tears silently drip down his cheeks. He knew it would not be good to cry. But the pain of the tattoo needle was unlike anything he’d ever experienced before, and his grandsire’s grip on Elvin’s wrist—to keep him from jerking his hand away—was like steel.

“The lad’s hurting,” said Elroy Axabrast, placing a gentle palm on Elvin’s head. Elvin’s sire was a practical man, and didn’t stand much on ceremony. He too bore the mark of their people. Which he’d never talked about much, nor seemed to find terribly important. Unlike Eltar Axabrast—Elroy’s sire—who bled Dissenter from every pore.

“The lad needs to know who he is,” Eltar insisted, not releasing his grip.

When the needle jabbed a particularly sensitive bit of skin, Elvin let loose with a tiny whimper.

“Who he is,” Elroy said gruffly, “is his own person.”

Eltar made a scoffing sound.

Tom Kratman’s latest entry in the Carerra series is November’s A Pillar of Fire by Night. Tom Kratman was a Regular Army infantryman much of his adult life. After the Gulf War, and with the bottom dropping completely out of the anti-communist market, Tom decided to become a lawyer. Every now and again, when the frustrations of legal life and having to deal with other lawyers got to be too much, Tom would rejoin the Army (or a somewhat similar group, say) for fun and frolic in other climes. He no longer practices law, but instead writes full time. His novels for Baen include A State of Disobedience, Caliphate, and the series consisting of A Desert Called Peace, Carnifex, The Lotus Eaters, The Amazon Legion, Come and Take Them, The Rods and the Axe, and A Pillar of Fire by Night, as well as three collaborations with John Ringo, Watch on the Rhine, Yellow Eyes, and The Tuloriad. Also for Baen, he has written the first three volumes of the modern-day military fiction Countdown series.

The Principles of Organization Explained:

As you read the following, it’s important to remember that no one principle or organization is dispositive. There is, in other words, no ideal; everything is a compromise. Moreover, as I’ve mentioned in discussions of principles of war, principles are not checklists to success; they’re study guides and things to think about. They’re also defenses against idiotic ideas.

1. Social cohesion: Organize your sub-organization for maximum feasible affection and group emotional attachment within and among the officers and men.

The company is the key element here; it is the tribe. It is the level at which emotional connection among the ranks, and interpersonal knowledge, is both possible and critical.

The company also has upper ands lower limits in size. The Dunbar number, about one hundred and fifty, echoes over and over again in the course of the history of infantry companies. However, Dunbar was reasoning more from brain size than from empirical data. I would suggest that the number can go up based on things like barracks size, separate messing, and longer service with less personnel turbulence. The outside limit, in ideal circumstances, may run around two hundred and fifty.

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