Monstrous Regiment (Discworld 31)

There was chaos inside. The barracks was really just one large room which did duty as mess, assembly room and kitchen, with big bunk rooms beyond it. It was empty, and well on the way to decay. The roof leaked, the high windows were broken, dead leaves had blown in and lay around on the floor, among the rat droppings. There were no pickets, no sentries, no people. There was a big pot boiling on the sooty hearth, though, and its hiss and seethe were the only liveliness in the place. At some point part of the room had been set up as a kind of quartermaster's store, but most of the shelves were empty. Polly had expected some sort of queue, some kind of order, possibly someone handing out little piles of clothes.

What there was, instead, was a rummage stall. Very much like a rummage stall, in fact, because nothing on it appeared to be new and little on it appeared to be worth having. The rest of the squad were already pawing through what might have been called merchandise if there were any possibility that anyone could be persuaded to buy it.

"What's this? One Size, Doesn't Fit Anyone?"

"This tunic's got blood on it! Blood!"

"Well, it ith one of the thtubborn thtainth, it's alwayth very hard to get it out without - " ;I was just wondering why it's so crowded, corp," said Tonker. "If it's so bad, I mean."

"That's because they are a degraded people, private! And they've sent a regiment up here to help Heinrich take over our beloved Motherland. He has turned aside from the ways of Nuggan and embraced Ankh-Morpork's godlessn - godawful-ness." Strappi looked pleased at having spotted that one, and went on, "Point Two: in addition to its soldiers, Ankh-Morpork has sent Vimes the Butcher, the most evil man in that evil city. They are bent on nothing less than our destruction!"

"I heard that Ankh-Morpork was just angry that we cut the clacks towers down," said Polly.

"They were on our sovereign territory!"

"Well, it was Zlobenian until - " Polly began.

Strappi waved an angry finger at her. "You listen to me, Parts! You can't get to be a great country like Borogravia without making enemies! Which leads me on to Point Three, Parts, who's sitting there thinking he's so smart. You all are. I can see it. Well, be smart about this: you might not like everything about your country, eh? It might not be the perfect place, but it's ours. You might think we don't have the best laws, but they're ours. The mountains might not be the prettiest ones or the tallest ones, but they're ours. We're fighting for what's ours, men!" Strappi slammed his hand over his heart.

"Awake, ye sons of the Motherland!

Taste no more the wine of the sour apples..."

They joined in, at various levels of drone. You had to. Even if you just opened and shut your mouth, you had to. Even if you just went "ner, ner, ner", you had to. Polly, who was exactly the kind of person who looks around surreptitiously at times like these, saw that Shufti was singing it word-perfectly and Strappi actually did have tears in his eyes. Wazzer wasn't singing at all. He was praying. That was a good wheeze, said one of the more treacherous areas at the back of Polly's mind.

To the bewilderment of all, Strappi continued - alone - all through the second verse, which nobody ever remembered, and then gave them a smug, I'm-more-patriotic-than-you smile.

Afterwards, they tried to sleep on as much softness as two blankets could provide. They lay there in silence for some time. Jackrum and Strappi had tents of their own, but instinctively they knew that Strappi at least would be a sneaker and a listener at tent flaps.

After about an hour, when rain was drumming on the canvas, Carborundum said: "Okay, den, I fink I've worked it out. If people are groophar stupid, then we'll fight for groophar stupidity, 'cos it's our stupidity. And dat's good, yeah?"

Several of the squad sat up in the darkness, amazed at this.

"I realize I ought to know these things, but what does 'groophar' mean?" said the voice of Maladict in the damp darkness.

"Ah, well... when, right, a daddy troll an' a mummy troll - "

"Good, right, yes, I think I've got it, thank you," said Maladict. "And what you've got there, my friend, is patriotism. My country, right or wrong."

"You should love your country," said Shufti.

"Okay, what part?" the voice of Tonker demanded, from the far corner of the tent. "The morning sunlight on the mountains? The horrible food? The damn mad Abominations? All of my country except whatever bit Strappi is standing on?"

"But we are at war!"

"Yes, that's where they've got you," sighed Polly.

"Well, I'm not buying into it. It's all trickery. They keep you down and when they piss off some other country, you have to fight for them! It's only your country when they want you to get killed!" said Tonker.

"All the good bits in this country are in this tent," said the voice of Wazzer.

Embarrassed silence descended.

The rain settled in. After a while, the tent began to leak. Eventually someone said, "What happens, um, if you join up but then you decide you don't want to?"

That was Shufti.

"I think it's called deserting and they cut your head off," said the voice of Maladict. "In my case that would be a drawback but you, dear Shufti, would find it puts a crimp in your social life."