http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/photo-of-the-day/white-rhino-africa/

Normally, troops were mustered inside or right in front of the barracks. So the cavalry men were surprised to hear the orders to meet half a mile outside the fort itself. But a few of them knew what that meant. They hustled out, and the others caught up. Despite the distance to the muster point, not a man among them was late to the call.

Fences, wooden pickets that had no hope of preventing ingress or egress, surrounded the main steed pens. In most of the pens, horses and oxen grazed under the watchful eye of those on guard duty. The muster point was not by these pens. It was by the pen at the far edge. The pen that did not hold hooved animals.

Colonel Livingstone emerged from the watchtower. He stomped across the grass with purpose toward the waiting dozens. He began shouting before he came to a crisp stop in front of the troops.

“You are the best riders of your units,” he bellowed. “Which means something to me for a very short period of time. No longer than the duration of this speech, in fact. After that, you are recruits once more. Given the locale of today’s muster, surely you know why the best riders of the cavalry units have been gathered.”

He swung his arm around to the sparsely treed grasslands of the huge pen. In the middle distance, three hulking forms meandered through the greenery. Heads slung low, they ate without hurry. Armored Steeds. The Bulls of the Blast-horn. Paired only with the best riders in the army.

Rhinos.

“Horses have speed. Oxen have brawn. If there are any territory boys out there… Elk have agility and grace,” Livingstone continued. He added with a grin, “And enemy-skewering antlers.” The gathered boys laughed.

“Rhinos are as fast as horses when needed, stronger than oxen all the time, and they too have head-mounted spears. They are the perfect steed, but that perfection comes at a heavy price.

“You will be tested, starting today, like you have never been tested before. You will run and jump and climb. You will read the land, you will dissect enemy tactics, you will show your prowess at charge and retreat, at sword-work and ax-swinging. In the end, none of that will matter without something more.”

Livingstone let out a low whistle, almost a musical note. From around the far side of the watchtower, there was a low rumble. Those in the front rows could feel the ground thump beneath their feet as Kawa emerged. She trotted to her rider, snorted in greeting as she pulled to a thunderous stop beside Livingstone.

She was a massive beast. Livingstone, not a short man, was only just as tall as Kawa was at her shoulders. With her head held high, she loomed over him and the young cavalry men. Her horns were ancient, natural weapons. The front one was an elegantly arced spire of destruction, honed to a point at the end and nearly as thick around its base as Livingstone was at his waist.

The perfect steed. Pace and power jammed into an arrow-proof casing. Livingstone pat her shoulder with a dull slap.

“The Rhino Unit exists because of a connection with the young steeds. There is, historically, no telling who among you will connect and who will not. Sometimes it happens right away. Sometimes, it does not. For what it’s worth, Kawa tried to spear me twice in the first month. I didn’t get on her back until month seven. Didn’t get a full charge out of her until a year into my training.

“I say all this as both warning and offering. You know what it means to be in the Rhino Unit. You are the face of our army to our enemies. You are first into battle. You are the terror in the nightmares of those that want to take this land from us.

“And for all the brilliant tactics and physical prowess and endless determination, you can only be that with a connection. You can only be that if you already are that. The rhinos will know. Be you, work hard, and you may one day take to the fields of battle astride the unstoppable force and immovable object that is a Rhino.”