//------------------------------// // An Officer And A Gentlemare // Story: The Princess's Bit // by Mitch H //------------------------------// "It won't do, Glenda. We can't have it." "It don't 'urt none, Gil- Sergeant Gilda," squawked the little blue hen. "The captain and I will be the authority in this regiment as to what does and doesn't 'hurt none', Glenda. We can't have you rhyming cant in front of outsiders and the ranks. Let alone officers." "It's just a bit of honey, onion bhaji!" "No, it isn't. It's incoherent and confusing is what it is. You leave a trail of incomprehension behind you as wide and muddy as the Bridlederry Pike." "That were half a rhyme there, sergeant! Y'know, it don't feel 'alf right, callin' you that. Ain't you a sergeant major yet?" "Get used to it, corporal, I haven't been promoted yet. And you seem bound and determined to prove you aren't worthy of yours." Gilda threw a corporal's patch at the former lance corporal. "Marm! I'll do my best!" "Well, yeah. I couldn't winkle any more experienced non-coms out of artillery, it took all the juice I could squirt just getting those two mechanics from ordnance. You seem to be taking care of your lieutenant so far? No problems I've not heard about?" "Nawt of note, no. A bit of a wobbly over some chemicals, but we got it sorted." "Glenda…" "That weren't cant!" "It 'weren't' the Princess's Equish, either. I need you speaking the Princess's Equish." "Right, right, marm yes marm." "Glenda, a battery ranks a sergeant. Keep your beak clean, and the words that come out of it clean-ish, and there's room to grow. That sort of thing happens in a regiment being stood up, you understand?" "I ken- er, I understand, ma'am." "Right then! Go take care of your Derry an' Toms!" "Uh… yes marm." Corporal Glenda left the little closet Gilda had filled full of manuals and a little desk, down besides the troops barracks. Gilda put away the little phrasebook some autodidact out of ponyside Trottingham had gotten one of the libels to print, titled Cockerel Rhyming Cant and the Trottingham Docksides. Thinks she can talk her way around management, and spread this nonsense? Ha! Onion bhaji's ahead of you, Glenda me hen. "So we're not getting our ensigns?" asked Big Bell, making diamond-dog-puppy-eyes at Gleaming Shield. Gilda's captain was slumped in her office chair in the main office. The unicorn was pouting, and looking far too young for her uniform. "No, I didn't say that. I said we weren't getting them in time. If I wanted to wait until August for the next batch out of the academy, then we could have a full complement of fresh-faced colts and fillies all bright and cheery and useless because I expect to be somewhere north of Marapore in August!" "That kinda sounds like the same thing, ma'am," the big pegasus said. She had to stand mostly in the door, opened to the corridor outside, because the office wasn't big enough for both her and the usual inhabitants without crowding uncomfortably.  "They told us again that we could have Captain Falcon," Gilda offered from her own desk.  Ping snorted his opinion from the back, where he was messing with the files. "I don't get why you all are so down on Blue Falcon. At least he's an academy graduate!" Bell objected. "You can't be gettin' much traction from having me in here. Personnel and pony resources know better'n most that provincial regimentals ain't worth the brass on our belt-buckles." "Nonsense, Bell!" Gleaming Shield said, straightening up and meeting the big pony's gaze with a serious expression. "I expressly asked for you, and for good reason. The Marezonians were one of the most professional and effective regiments we ever had to work with. You know your evolutions well enough, and you've really got a hoof for the recruits. I don't know what we'd do without you!" Also, Big Bell hadn't said a word about the demotion to lieutenant or the endless, grinding work they'd dropped her, unprepared, into. Blue Falcon, aside from the whole business of being a terminal alcoholic, would have fumed at the prospect of rolling back to lieutenant and working for the pony he'd once bossed around as one of his ensigns. "It's a shame we couldn't talk Minuette into signing up," Gleaming Shield said, regretfully.  "Yeah, no, that ain't happenin'," Bell said, apologetically. "Some mares have lives and careers t' get back to once their tours are up." "You can't tell me you didn't have something like that," Gleaming objected. "With your leadership skills, you could write your own ticket!" "You'd think so, wouldn't you?" Bell sighed. "But th' army's been good for me. Aside from ward heelin' for Cherries, I've never really gotten any traction back home. I'd probably be mule-skinnin' or haulin' freight again inside of a week." "M-mule skinning?" Gleaming asked with a look of confused horror. "Naw, it ain't what it sounds like- you know what, we can talk about it some other time, this is important. We need more officers, soonest. I can't keep drilling every troop as if they was my own. I gotta sleep sometime."  Gilda looked up at that, and saw what the pegasus was talking about. Baggy eyes, dull coat, the distinct stink of a mare who hadn't seen the inside of a shower stall in way too long. Bell was right, they were overworking her. "Ping!" Gilda barked, making the batpony jump in his seat. "Give me three of the- What's this?" The bat-pony was offering Gilda a wingful of three personnel files. "The files from personnel. The only files they'd give us, other than y'know, Lieutenant Lulamoon's. And Captain Falcon's, if you want me to fish that out of the trash." He dealt them out like a three-card hoof of poker, and placed them on Gilda's desk, one by one.  "Lieutenant Rupert. Multiple harassment charges, two of which resulted in hung courts-martial. "Captain Annuity. Seventy-six years old. Bad hip. "Lieutenant Martin Gale. File full of commendations for efficiency." "Well, what's wrong with that last one?" Bell said, looking a bit crosseyed. "Efficiency is the word used in evaluations when the commanding officer hates the lieutenant, but can't find any reason to ding them on the merits," Ping said, stiff-faced. "Rumor mill has it that Martin Gale is a sadist and hates the enlisted." "Gah! Captain! Ma'am! What did you all do to get personnel to hate us?" demanded Big Bell. "More what the Duchess did," Gilda sighed, slumping. "They're really, really mad about Project Mustang. And they blame the captain." "Of course they do, it was my idea," Gleaming Shield said, proudly. "It was exactly what the Territorials needed, and the whole system was unsupportable and grossly inefficient to boot." "And we wouldn't have been around to catch the heat from the fallout, either," Gilda supplied, crossly. "Except we can't seem to get out of town!" "Well, I did tell Cadance to not launch it until we were safely on our way east," Gleaming Shield said, shrugging. "I can't help it the details leaked." Gleaming Shield leaned back, and put out one hoof. "Here, let me see Martin Gale's jacket." Ping held out the relevant personnel file, and Gilda made a mental note of the apparent synonym. Gleaming Shield had been part of the military for the majority of the young mare's life; Gilda was still stumbling over aspects, linguistic and otherwise, that still surprised or confused. The captain flipped through the 'jacket', muttering. Meanwhile, the big, burly pegasus had a far-off look, like she was zoning out, or thinking hard. Gilda eyed the ticking time bomb that was, in her experience, synonymous with two officers thinking hard. "Meh, she'll do if she's got a supervisor," Gleaming Shield concluded. "Shame she's got seniority on you, Bell. I think you could get work out of this Martin Gale. Wish I could brevet officers." Ping held out another file, startling Gleaming Shield almost out of her chair. "What's this?" "Yesterday's correspondence. Reply from Guard House to our queries." "Ping, did we have queries for guards headquarters? And did you send them?" "You were going to have questions, and yes, I did." "What did I tell you about anticipating my orders?" "You'll tell me good job in three minutes." "Why's that?" "Because they say-" "I really am the acting colonel of the regiment?" Gleaming Shield was speed reading again.  "Yes, captain ma'am. Also-" "Breveting authority! Ha!" "Once per officer on your own authority. Also, enclosed-" "Ha! Gilda! I'm now Major Shield! Take that, Pinkie Pie!" "Congratulations, major ma'am!" chorused Gilda and Ping together. "And Bell, that makes you Captain Big Bell, by my authority as colonel of the Sixth Guards, brevetted Major Gleaming Shield, Esq. Ping, draft a-" "Brevetting certificate, major ma'am. Just needs your hoofprint. There, and initial, there. Thank you, ma'am." Ping went off with the brevetting paperwork to file them in Gleaming Shield's and Big Bell's 'jackets'. Gilda's head spun a bit from the whirlwind which was their squadron clerk in action. Ping was being very… Ping today. "Well, why the sandy wastes don't we do that with the ensigns?" Big Bell finally asked, looking a bit poleaxed. "We don't have any officers to brevet to 'ensign', Bell," Gleaming said, looking cross. "There isn't anything junior to the rank, other than 'cadet', and cadets aren't officers. Nor do we have a local academy to mint any cadets. Although I left Cadance a proposal…" "No, not brevetting. Your new duchess's 'Project Mustang' thingamajig." "We don't have any sergeant majors, and Cadance needs hers. Garry and the others are mostly homebodies, anyways. If there were any sergeant-majors with wandering star syndrome, the service generally beat it out of them a decade ago." "No, not sergeant majors, we need tadpoles, not old toads. Corporals!" "We need our corporals, Bell. You just made a herd of lance corporals because we don't have enough non-coms." "More corporals are easier to find than officers, Capt- Major Shield! And there's a lot of talent locked up in the bat pony ranks. They-" "Never allow batponies in the academies, no, they don't. Good reason, isn't there?" "They don't let them into the Guards, either. You opened that door, Major. Might as well let the whole crowd in." "Hrm. Like Fruit Salad?" "Corporal Fruit Salad is far too old and grizzled and set in his ways to be a baby officer," Gilda said suppressively. "The same goes for Gustav, before you two get any bright ideas. Although I want them both for sergeants, since we're throwing around promotions left and right." They were going to steal all of her useful people! Ping appeared with a wing full of corporals' jackets. The thicker ones. "Captain, major ma'am, here you go. I suggest you start with the thicker ones, and work your way back." Big Bell grabbed a chair and pulled it halfway out into the hall so she had somewhere to sit. "Corporal Ping! Ah was lookin' for… where you comin' from? And why are you outta uniform?" "Paperwork delivery, Captain Bell." "At 3 in th' mornin'?" "I am nocturnal, after all, ma'am." "Are the ponies in th' other office nocturnal, too?" "We have a system, ma'am." "Don't think y'all can charm your way outta this because yer cute, corporal. Iffen you're on duty, why are you outta uniform? And sneakin' about?" "Night Infiltration Pattern 63 is an authorized field uniform, ma'am." "Ah have no idea what that is, but I'll look it up at some more ponylike hour. What do we do iffen that field uniform is authorized only fer skirmishers an' scouts?" "I am a batpony, captain ma'am. According to the regs I am a skirmisher and scout." "Yer a stampeded office clerk!" "I am exploring the limits of my office, ma'am." "By dressin' up like a stagehall comedy stagehoof, paintin' yer muzzle with coalblack, an' sneakin' about in the dead of night?" "Yes, captain ma'am. You now have eight replacement corporals transferred from four different Territorial battalions. Also, Corporals Tinker and Totem are now officially Lieutenant Lulamoon's. Or possibly mine, Sergeant Gilda hadn't finished the support company organizational proposal as of the last time I saw my desk. Please excuse, I need to change out of this catsuit." "Right. And go wash that gunk off yer muzzle, you look like a zebra." The big pegasus shook her head and went to find that warm toilet seat she'd been out and about lookin' for in the first place. "Colt needs a remedial course on two-consent bureaucracy, I swear t' apples..."