Hey, there, fellas. How about buying a vet a drink?

Tell ya what. I’ll trade you a story for that drink.

Well, how about one about the Battle of the Grape Arbor?

Laugh all ya want, boys. Some of us did make it out. That’s why I’m in this chair, ya know.

Thank ya kindly. Let me wet my whistle and I’ll start.

Most of us was young like you fellas. Full of piss and vinegar, and sure of ourselves. It was our third, no, fourth landing and we were beating the Bluecoats pretty good. Course the arty and air support made the difference. Pound for pound a Bluecoat is as good as most soldiers and plenty o’ Marines.

Yeah, laugh… Youngsters!

The whole 34th was movin to the front, troopers in trucks and armor on lowboys. We’d beat the Bluecoats out of the area weeks before and figured it was pacified. We didn’t know. Intel sucked, again…

We was all on this main road, Route Angel it was called. Goin through a long valley with a gentle rise on either side. The hillsides was covered in plants with the fruit that the locals used to make their hooch. Some newsie from Earth thought it looked like a grape arbor and that’s how the place got its name.

What we didn’t know was that the Bluecoats had left behind some fellas, in bunkers buried in the hillsides. They waited until we was in the valley good, then sprang their ambush. Blew up the front and rear of the column, and there we was, looking at fire coming from both sides.

I read that the experts now figure the Bluecoats had a nuke plant buried back there someplace to power all those energy weps. All I know is that there was lasers hitting us from both sides.

How about another one? Talking is thirsty work.

Thanks.

My truck didn’t get hit at first but the one in back of us did. We bailed, hearin the screams of the guys in that truck as they burned. Never forget it. Never…

Where was I? Oh, yeah. Wasn’t much of a ditch along the road but we got as low as we could. If we kept face down, the lasers just missed our heads. Course, every now and then some damn fool would just have to take a look…

The sarge and some of the lances were trying to get the fellas up and moving. Ya gotta maneuver in this sort of ambush, and get into the bunkers. Right then, them Bluecoats was killin way more of us than we was of them.

If ya kept low, and was lucky, you could crawl up the hill. There’s always some fool out in front. Drew a lot of fire but kept goin. Got grenades into a bunker slit and that opened some ground. Kept crawlin, kept bein lucky. Fellas behind used the open space to move up and pretty soon there was a bunch of bunkers that wasn’t shootin at us no more.

Fool’s luck ran out, though, and a laser creased his back and burned right through the armor.

There wasn’t but a handful of guys left and most of us hunkered down in some cleared bunkers. The Bluecoats tried to get at us through their supply tunnels but we just turned them lasers around and pointed them right down the tunnels. Bluecoats burns just as good as Terran Marines.

Evac finally showed up, with armor and air. That fool who led the charge up the hill was in one of the bunkers where the Bluecoats was pushing real hard. Told his buddies to get and lay there pointing that laser down the tunnel. Finally two guys in battle armor came in and hauled him out to the evac.

Well, fellas, was that worth two beers? Thank you, but two’s my limit. This damn chair, ya know.

The young Marines watched the old woman in the handichair glide out of the bar, a Terran Marine flag taped to the back of her seat. One of them asked the barmaid about the oldtimer.

Her? Don’t they teach you boys how to read these days?

The barmaid pointed to the wall, covered in Marine memorabilia, and then walked over and tapped one of the pictures hanging there.

It was a young woman, wearing private’s stripes, and below it the caption read:

The President of the Terran Union in the name of The Congress takes pride in presenting the MEDAL OF HONOR to

Private Lorili Gibson
Terran Marines

for service as set forth in the following

CITATION:
For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of her life above and beyond the call of duty while serving as a Cook, Headquarters Company, Thirty Fourth Battalion, First Marine Division (Planetary Assault), on 21 July 2184.

Private Gibson’s battalion was moving by truck to the front on Gemma Aquilon, near the town of Suzu, when it was ambushed by a large force of enemy troops in concealed bunkers and well equipped with high energy weapons.

Gibson found herself dismounted and under heavy fire in a ditch alongside Route Angel, with many of her fellow Marines who survived the initial attack. Seeing that the only way to end the ambush was to attack the bunkers firing on her fellow Marines, Private Gibson began to crawl up the hill using what little concealment that there was. When she reached the first bunker, and still under heavy direct fire, she was able to throw a grenade into the bunker silencing its occupants.

Still under fire she continued to crawl to the next bunker, and the next. Private Gibson managed to silence four bunkers before an energy weapon creased her back and left her paralyzed from the waist down.

Her bravery and leadership helped encourage her fellow Marines and they advance in her wake, silencing two additional bunkers. The ambush survivors recovered Private Gibson and took refuge in the bunkers while waiting for relief.

During this time, enemy forces attacked the bunkers through extensive tunnels that connected the bunker system. Fighting was hand to hand at times in all the bunkers. Private Gibson killed one enemy soldier in such combat using a knife while preventing the certain death of an unconscious Marine alongside her.

When relief arrived, with the enemy attacks continuing against her bunker, Private Gibson volunteered to remain behind, accurately directing energy weapons fire against the enemy in the tunnels.

By her undaunted courage, intrepid fighting spirit, and unwavering devotion to duty, Private Gibson was an inspiration to her fellow Marines and was responsible for the survival of many of her fellows in that battle, thereby reflecting great credit upon herself and upholding the highest traditions of the Marine Corps and the Terran Space Service.

That old vet, boys, earned her two beers the hard way. Best you remember that.