Jandarma: A very short story.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

Jandarma

I am naked.

We are all naked. About fifty, or so, of us who are standing together in an antiseptic steel and plastic room under harsh blue-white lights. Men, and a few women, of roughly equal height. All of us equally lean and sinewy; our bodies shine in the light, fully-shaven and completely waxed. We are absolutely confident in our nakedness; secure in the knowledge that we are without peer. Our bodies tell the world who we are, and what we have trained for.

"Jandarma, fall in!" A man yells. He is dressed in a crisp blue and white uniform. We obey him, falling into perfect formation. If I think hard enough, I can almost remember a day when I didn't find such things effortless. I don't try too hard to remember, for I am beyond such awkward days.

We stiffen as the door at the far end of the room disappears into the wall. I look forward, as I was trained. Yet, I tingle with excitement. All of us do, for we are being granted an honor few people will ever experience. Even now, I can make out the sound of footfalls coming closer and closer to me.

Suddenly, a dark-skinned man stands before me. The gold trim on his vibrant blue fez glitters in the light. He is flanked by two uniformed figures who stand at the edges of my peripheral vision. They do not matter to me. Only the man in the fez matters.

"Who are you?" The man asks.

"I am jandarma, your Majesty," I reply. My voice swells with pride. I am jandarma. That is all that identifies me. To be identified as anything less would be insulting.

The man in the blue fez studies me. Sharp eyes peer out from behind a hawkish nose. I feel like he is staring into my very soul. This man knows me well. He knows me better than anyone who isn't of my brethren.

"You are jandarma," the man pronounces. The word fills me with pride. Pride in the knowledge that my sovereign has judged me worthy of serving him.

"I live to serve your peace, your Majesty," I reply, feeling as though I've gained two centimeters on pride alone.

The man moves on. I stand at attention. I don't know for how long.

"Jandarma, at ease!" The uniformed man yells. "You have shed sweat, blood, and tears to get to where you are now. You began as mere plebes. Now what are you?"

"We are jandarma!"

"Yes, you are," the man replies. "What are the jandarma?"

"We are the peace-keepers! We are the peace-bringers! We are the open palm and the striking hand!"

"Yes you are," the man says. He is as caught up in this as the rest of us. He is our father. He is the man who has raised us up from the things we were before, to the jandarma we are now.

"Today is your last easy day," he says. "You are His Majesty's striking arm and sword. You will now go forth and bring order to those who would oppose civilization with anarchy, and peace to those who would oppose civility with baseness. Who are you?"

"We are jandarma!"

We fall out after that. Lesser men and women would return to their racks after an inspection. Not us. We have no further need for barracks. We certainly have no further need for them here. Greater things await us . . . far greater things.

~~~

They were naked.

All of them. Lined up in plastic trays in an antiseptic steel and plastic room. Waxy bodies, appearing hollow and sunken in the harsh blue-white light. Bodies marred by stubble, by contusions, by stab wounds, and by bullet holes. The bodies told the tale of how they lived, and how they had died. As they were in life, they were immodest in death. Only it was the garish immodesty of those who were beyond caring.

Captain Karl Erdogan of His Majesty's Eleventh Battlewagon Sword of Mars looked upon the bodies in his ship's morgue with distaste. As one, they looked like plastic men and women of near-identical height and physique. The pallor of death only enhanced their waxy appearance. Were it not for the lurid deep red-brown of congealed blood around ragged wounds, Karl could almost pretend these . . . jandarma . . . were artificial people.

He sniffed. Artificial. They smelled antiseptic, even in death. Turned into near-soulless toy soldiers for the good and the glory of the Empire. Jandarma indeed, he thought. A brotherhood of men and women who'd given up everything for the chance to die in some star system they would never have heard of otherwise.

And die they did. For every cohort of fifty that Sword had dispatched, no more than twenty Gendarmes had returned alive. They'd given back far better than they'd taken . . . the Empire always did. The orbital habs and the planet they orbited had been pacified in the name of His Majesty Emperor Zareb I, and all that, but the surviving Gendarmerie were now going to be a much-hated occupational force; having been responsible for the butchery of a full quarter of the system's young adult population.

Karl shook his head. At least he wouldn't have to carry them back to Sol.

"Useless dead-weight," he said. "I shudder to think of the cost in antimatter required to bring you here." The only things to hear him were the custodial 'bots. For that, he was grateful; a starship captain who complained too loudly would not remain one for long.

"Hmm . . . What to do with the rest of you jandarma," he mused, spitting out the last word. Clouded, empty stares offered no reply to his question. So, instead, he looked up at the lights, and thought some more. Finally, he nodded to himself.

"Fertilizer for the gardens of the conquered," Karl finally said. "Perhaps you will better serve the Emperor's peace that way."

[Mayabird]

A vignette of your future timeline?

So the jandarma were all volunteers? Are they sorted by height so each cohort will be similar?

[MysteriousDarkLordv3]

Me no likee this Empire.

I get an impression of a huge corrupt oligarchy with rigid class distinctions - not full-on castes but worse than 19th-century Western society. And a huge impovershed underclass.

When the Empire needs soldiers, there's probably a huge sweep of the poor sections of the cities. The press gangs round up any healthy poor people and ship them off in starships. En route, they are subjected to brain-rape - that is, special conditioning, and physically trained in the skills needed. when they get to their destination, they're sent out like empty-minded swarms of locusts to kill and die. Preferably both - a corps of jandarma with a proper regimental tradition and multiple campaigns experience would be a great instrument for a dynasty change.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

A vignette of your future timeline?

So the jandarma were all volunteers? Are they sorted by height so each cohort will be similar?

Yes, it's a vignette of my future timeline. It takes place some centuries before the Fair as Death story linked in my sig; in the earlier days of the Empire.

As for the jandarma themselves: Yes, they are sorted to ensure uniform height among the cohorts. And, yes, they all volunteered for this. Well, the "Join the Empire and see the worlds" part. Not so much the "Die ignominiously" part.

Me no likee this Empire.

I get an impression of a huge corrupt oligarchy with rigid class distinctions - not full-on castes but worse than 19th-century Western society. And a huge impovershed underclass.

That is quite a sweeping impression to get from 974 words covering the life and death of a single cohort of fifty. I mean no disrespect, I'm just genuinely curious what leads you to the train of thought in your post.

[MysteriousDarkLordv3]

My impression was derived from the attitude and mindset of Captain Erdogan. This was not an officer who was proud of the heroes under his command - this was a man who was accustomed to thinking others were less than him. And I don't mean that in the military fashion, either. To him, these dead soldiers who had given their all were garbage, and not because they were dead. He even spat the word jandarma.

A ship's captain is a product of his military organization, which is a product of his society. I doubt that Erdogan could have been the product of an enlightened democracy. His concern for his position ("A starship captain who complained too loudly would not remain one for long") indicates that he lacked immunity from voicing his opinion. Which implies that there is limited advancement based on ability but substantial advancement for political orthodoxy, much like the old USSR.

Besides which, the very concept of the jardarma bespeaks of a hideous lack of humanity, a complete disregard for the people who make up the bulk of the soldiery. The society that made this concept not only workable but routine cannot have much in the way of egalitarian beliefs.

That's the impression I got.

[Bladed_Crescent]

This was a very nice story; kudos.

That being said, I'll have to echo Mysterious's comments ; the captain's attitude towards the jandarma really speaks volumes here. Mysterious already covered much of my own opinion on the matter, but just to reiterate:

the captain sees the dead jandarma as garbage - their corpses to be used as fertilizer and be more effective peace-keepers that way, not even worth the effort required to bring them to the planet or carry their bodies home and thinks nothing of their sacrifice. I don't know if I'd go so far as to say that there's an impoverished underclass, but there's a distinct undertone of stratification just from the small glimpses we see. Granted, this is the military aspect of the society we're seeing here. His entire segment comes across as someone who is deeply unhappy with some aspect of his society but unable to voice his concerns, while at the same time having (or seeming to have), a fair amount of contempt for those he deems "less than".

Even the interactions of the man in the fez come across as... I can't quite pick the right word, but they seem very dogmatic - he gives them a lot of empty words 'you are the peace-keepers, the peace-bringers, you are jandarma' and not much else. It comes across as very effective at reinforcing a societal norm that you'd see in a master/slave relationship - 'be happy what you are, for that's all you are' - and the pack mentality of the jandarma has its own unsettling quality.

Just my two cents; it's quite a good vignette, but it does seem to open a window looking onto a society with some very unpleasant habits.

[Junghalli]

Plus there's the creepy vibe from the first part where the viewpoint character seems to think of himself as a superior class of being to the "plebs" (and the apparently unironic use of that word alone sets off an alarm in my head, as does the reference to Emperor and Majesty - I see that and I think "dictatorship").