At the trigger crossed its first detent in its pull, the SABR’s ranging laser produced an invisible pulse of coherent light that touched its targeting point and reflected back. The microprocessor in the SABR’s stock computed a range from that laser reflection and as the grenade launcher itself fired, an inductance coil wrapped around the launcher’s barrel transmitted that range to a microchip buried within the shell as it screamed down the tube.
The shell itself dispassionately counted out the distance in flight and, over the target, it detonated, spraying the environment with a handful of shrapnel.
The Algerian trooper did not return.
“What’s happening, Five?” Trebain asked.
“Nothin’ much. Just a snooper. How are you doing?”
The breath rasped in the Texan’s throat. “You were right about the leg. I liked it a lot better when it was numb. I’m trying to tell myself I’m just imagining it, but I think I got a couple of busted ribs, too.”
“That’s no fun. That happened to me once when I fell off a hayrack. As long as you’re breathing all right you’ll be okay. You want a hit of feel good?”
“No. I want to stay clear. Maybe I can do something … Mary May, maybe you’d better start thinking about getting out of here. Like you said. I’ll be okay.”
She rolled onto her side and looked back at Trebain. “What’s with you, Lee? Do you honestly think I’m going to run out on one of my guys? Get real!”
“Aw hell, Five. It’s just that … I don’t like the idea of the Algis getting their hands on you is all.”
Mary May nestled back behind her weapon stock. “Well, thanks, but I don’t like the idea of the Algis getting their hands on any of us. And that’s not going to happen. The lieutenant’ll get us out of this. One way or another.”
Almost as if by one of Brid Shelleen’s conjurations, a familiar and most welcome voice sounded in their helmet. “Saber Six to Scout Lead. Do you receive?”
Mary May almost broke the transmit key on her lip mike. “Roger that! We copy, Lieutenant!”
“Okay, Mary May. We’ve got the Cipher drone up and we’re relaying through that,” Bolde replied over the circuit. “We also have you and Lee spotted, not to mention our friends the Algerians. We see three BRMs around the bend in the pass about two hundred meters south of your position. Do you verify?”
“I verify, Lieutenant. I can hear their engines idling. We’ve hurt them pretty bad. I don’t think they’re exactly sure of what they’re up against yet.”
“Better and better. We’ll be up with you presently, but we’re going to need a little bit of assistance. What’s your ammunition state in regard to 20mm grenade?”
“Uh, six clips between Lee and me, counting the one in my weapon. Mixed antiarmor and smart round.”
“Excellent,” Bolde’s filtered voice replied with satisfaction. “When I give you the word, I want you to rapid fire it all down the pass in the direction of the Algis. Don’t worry about hitting anything in particular. Just make a lot of noise and keep their heads down. Then you and Trebain stand by to mount up fast. Understood?”
“Understood, sir.”
“Very well. Then let’s proceed. Stand by to commence firing … now!”
Mary May’s finger closed convulsively on the trigger. As rapidly as she could she hosed the bend in the canyon with high explosives, the sharp popping of the grenade bursts reverberating up and down the pass, the echoes building upon themselves. Ejected shell cases tinkled around her and the frame of the SABR grew warm and then hot as she poured fire through it. Lee, ignoring the pain of his fractured ribs, fumbled clips out of his own harness pouches, feeding her.
She was down to her last three rounds when two massive, dark shapes roared past on the floor of the pass. ABLE and CHARLIE running side by side and charging headlong for the bend in the canyon. Mary May realized that her barrage had been performing multiple functions. Not only distracting and suppressing any Algerian forward observers but blanketing the sound of Bolde’s charge through the pass. In a moment someone was going to be most unpleasantly surprised.
The cavalry vehicles vanished around the curve and the silvery glare of muzzle flashes reflected off the walls of the gorge, strobing with the orange of explosion flame. The hills trembled with the piercing crack of booster-gun fire, the thudding cough of grenade streams and the slam of Claymore panels.
And then silence and darkness and a single satisfied voice over the radio link.
“And some damn fools say cavalry is no good in the mountains.”
ABLE reappeared around the bend in the canyon. Rolling to a halt below Mary May and Trebain’s position, its tail ramp swung open. Before the vehicle had even come to a halt, however, Mary May had Trebain to his feet. Supporting him they slid-hopped down the slope toward home.
“See, Lee, I told you we’d get out.”
The only answer was a tightening of the arm around her shoulders. Mary May lugged the injured trooper into the scout bay and dumped him into one of the air seats spaced around the bulkheads. As she secured his safety harness, the tail ramp lifted, and ABLE rumbled ahead.
“Hey, Lieutenant,” she yelled forward. “There’s still one tank destroyer left at the mouth of the pass.”
“Understood, Five,” Bolde called back. “Miss Shelleen is sorting that gentleman out right now.”
Wired into CHARLIE drone’s remote cyber senses through her Helmet-Mounted Display, Brid Shelleen snaked the big robot through narrowing confines of the pass, keeping the throttle trigger pressed to its limits. The enemy knew of their presence and intent. There was no room left for subtlety, no more than there would be in a high-noon shoot out between two old Western gunfighters. Speed and precision would decide this last engagement.
For a split second Brid toggled across to the overhead tactical of the area around the pass mouth. The Algerian Centauro was off to the right of the roadway by about fifty meters, covering the exit and waiting.
She built the engagement sequence in her mind. Fire smoke grenades … Clear the pass entrance and pivot to the right … Switch to thermographics … Acquire the target … Take the shot … Do it now!
CHARLIE’s grenade throwers hurled a cluster of smoke bombs out into the open ground beyond the pass mouth, the drone plunging into the dense swirling haze produced by the bursting charges. Brid started to brake for the turn when, abruptly, a shadowy outline loomed in her visor.
The problem with any military plan of action rests with the fact that the enemy rarely consults with you concerning his own intents. The Algerian tank destroyer crew had apparently elected at that moment to cut across the entry to the pass. Their intent, no doubt, was to take a snap shot at their oncoming foe. Instead, they had found themselves engulfed in an unexpected smoke screen and had come to a halt directly in the path of the charging US vehicle.
Brid locked up CHARLIE’s brakes, but before she could halt the drone it had plowed headlong into the Centauro, centerpunching it between its second and third set of drive wheels.
She hit the firing button of the booster gun, but the three-round burst blazed futilely over her opponent’s deck. The casemate mount could neither depress nor traverse enough to engage this closer-than-point-blank target. She saw the tube of the Centauro’s 105 swing across her video field of vision, then caught the vibration as the gun barrel jammed out of line against CHARLIE’s hull. The Algerian gunners were caught in the same conundrum as she, unable to bring an effective weapon to bear.
Unable to reverse away from the deadlock, Brid opted for her only other alternative, she rocked her joystick hard forward and crushed the power trigger to maximum output.
CHARLIE shuddered, its massive tires clawing at the unyielding stone. Red and yellow systems overload warnings flared all around the periphery of Shelleen’s Helmet Mounted Display and a grinding vibration blurred the camera imaging. But CHARLIE began to gain ground.
As the deck tilted beneath him, the Algerian driver frantically
and futilely attempted to break away but the five hundred horsepower of the Centauro could not match the twelve hundred of the Shinseki. Remorselessly the gun drone bulldozed the tank destroyer sideways and over, the Centauro’s wheels spinning helplessly, until the point of overbalance was reached.
With a final crash the Algerian vehicle went over onto its side. With the deadlock broken, Bridget backed CHARLIE off twenty meters and waited. The Algerian crew scrambled out of the hatches of their doomed vehicle, fleeing into the night, and she let them go with a prayer.
I thank you, My Lady, for granting me this option of mercy.
Then she tore open the belly of the tank destroyer with another booster-gun burst.
“The pass mouth is clear, Lieutenant,” she said, lifting her voice to the world outside of her helmet display.
Nate Grey Bird fed his last clip of 9mm into the butt of his Beretta. A lot of extremely odd noise had just come from over the ridge crest, and he sincerely hoped it was indicative of a relief-and-rescue operation.
“Nate, what’s your sitrep?” Lieutenant Bolde’s voice was coming in over the squad channel now.
“Pretty much the same, sir, except the Algerians are getting closer. They’re going to be in hand-grenade range pretty quick, and they have four throwing arms to our two.”
“That will be an irrelevancy here in a moment, Specialist Grey Bird. Roman, you still with us?”
“Yes sir!” Johnny’s enthusiastic response came back. “Right here.”
“All right, here’s the package. I have fixes on you and Nate as well as on the bad guys. In a second here I’m going to toss some CMMs over the ridgeline and onto the Algi positions. Crawl under your helmets because they are going to be close. After the rounds hit, the two of you fall back to the ridgeline and drop down to where we’re waiting. We’re parked almost underneath you.”
“Uh, begging your pardon, sir.” Johnny’s voice had lost a great deal of its enthusiasm. “But that descent is almost vertical. How do we get down?”
“The operative word here, Mr. Roman, is ‘almost.’ As for how you get down, I suggest you step off the edge and let gravity take its course. You can grow some new skin on your next leave. Dedigitate, gentlemen, we do not have a great deal of time here! Rounds on the way!”
Aimed almost vertically, the box launchers belched out their four preprogrammed missiles, the flame spraying over ABLE’s armored back.
“Rounds look good,” Brid reported from her workstation. “We have hits … Johnny and Nate are moving …”
“Right. Get CHARLIE moving, too, down and out onto the flats. Expedite!” Bolde swiveled the weapons pack around, intent on doing a little housecleaning. The Teal/Specter radar unit still sat at the edge of the plateau. Its crew had bailed out of the unarmed vehicle as the fighting had gotten close, and it was far too valuable an asset to leave intact.
Laying his sights on the generator trailer, Bolde demolished it with burst of 25mm from the OCSW. Elevating fire, he chewed away the antenna array and finally focused on the rear hull doors of the transporter track, caving them in and gutting the systems bay.
“Here they come!” Mary May yelled from the aft compartment. Turning his sights to the rear again, Bolde caught the last of Nate and Johnny’s wild slide down the slope face. They still had the Javelin launcher. Good men!
A sharp tack tack tack sounded against the windshield and bullet stars danced across the Armorglas. There were still Algerians out there trying to make a fight of it. Bringing the grenade launcher around, Bolde raked the stone outcropping across from their position, covering his last people home.
The ramp dropped and the deck rang as Johnny and Nate threw themselves and their equipment aboard. “In!” Mary May screamed.
Rick Santiago didn’t need a “go” order. All hands were thrown back in their seats as ABLE lunged forward at maximum acceleration.
Rick fought with the cavalry vehicle’s wheel as they tore down the first switchback below the pass. Dios! This thing is just a goat path! This grade will be hairy enough in daylight and at a sane rate of speed!
Beside him Lieutenant Bolde chanted a mantra. “Faster … Faster … Artillery … Faster!”
Artillery? Shit! Somebody up there in the pass must still have a working radio. They’d left a whole lot of really pissed off Algerians just on the other side of this hill range, and now they no longer had to worry about the presence of friendly troops!
ABLE tore into the next corner, broadsiding through it like a sports car, her outer set of tires more over the edge than on the road. Rick tore back his night-vision visor and slapped his palm down on the auxiliary panel, kicking on the headlights and running lights full beam. Screw stealth! He had to see!
One … two … three … four … five … six … interminable switchbacks, then a short down grade and then the gravel pans.
“Off the road!” Bolde’s yelled command rang in the confines of the cab.
Killing the headlights, Rick swung ABLE into the open desert. A dune loomed ahead, and the Shinseki didn’t as much drive over it as through it, blasting a bow wave of sand to either side. All eight wheels momentarily left the ground. She hit hard once and then concussion bounced her into the air again as the night cracked open and bloody orange light flooded in. There were no definable single explosions as much as a continuous ear-crushing thunder as the massed time-on-target barrage rained down on the Taoudenni caravan road.
Rick’s heart stalled in his chest. But after a moment he realized that they were steadily pulling away from the fire zone. The bombardment wasn’t swinging onto them but was only marching down the roadway. The Algerians were firing blind, raking the caravan route, a frustrated tantrum of high explosives hurled after a brazen and escaping enemy.
They were out. They were all out. Backlit by the shell bursts, Rick could even make out the battered silhouette of CHARLIE drone lumbering faithfully behind them. Then and there, Santiago made a pledge that the next time he got home, he would remember this night and he would go to church and light some candles. He would also go out and get really, really, drunk, but first, he would light the candles.
Over at the commander’s station, Lieutenant Bolde unsnapped the chinstrap of his helmet. Lifting its weight off with a sigh of relief, he ran a hand through his sweat-sodden hair. “Well, that wasn’t such a chore now, was it?”
45 Miles Southeast of the El Khnachich Range 0421 Hours, Zone Time; October 29, 2021
“You want me to push her for a while, Rick?”
“Nah, LT. I poured a little coffee down my throat, and I’m good to the replenishment point.”
“Just checking.”
Steel-splinter stars still gleamed overhead and the cracked cab hatches admitted a stream of pure, chill predawn air that blew away the stenches of powder and sweat and fear. Bolde and Santiago had the driving watch. The others caught what fragmentary rest they could.
Brid Shelleen drowsed intermittently in her workstation seat. Mary May lay on the deck beside her, her head pillowed on her flak vest. Aft, things were silent in the scout bay as well. Even Lee Trebain slept with the aid of a morphine ampoule.
Somewhere over the horizon, an Army heavy-lift quad-rotor was outbound to meet them. Aboard it would be fuel blivets and ammunition reloads and a flying squad from squadron maintenance to help repair their battle damage.
His injured man would be airlifted out to a field hospital for care. And maybe there would be hot A rations and a clean uniform and an extra liter of water for a bath. And maybe a chance to sleep. Maybe really sleep for several hours straight through.
Bolde grinned to himself. Luxury in the eyes of the field soldier. But not yet. Not yet. There were still things to be considered.
What had he done this night? What had he accomplished that had been worth the gamble of the lives of his people?
Destroying the Recon company had poked a sharp stick into the eye of the enemy. Worthwhile. The Algerian army was weak on logistics. There wo
uld be no replacements for those destroyed tankers. Another gain. And the attack on that Algerian mechanized battalion would have a cascade effect. Knock out one of a brigade’s three maneuver battalions and you cripple that brigade. Cripple one of its three maneuver brigades and you weaken the entire balanced structure of the division. A plus.
More importantly, though, was the time. It would take hours for the Algerians to re-form and resume replenishment. More hours for casualties to be dealt with and replacement supplies to be brought forward. More hours cautiously to probe forward and learn if any new and nastier surprises were set to be sprung.
Half a day bought? Maybe a day? It was enough. What was that rueful joke making the rounds within Third World military circles? If you are planning a war, best also plan to win it before the Americans can get there. The Algerian fait accompli had been blocked. Their aggression had been stalled. When they finally ventured south of the El Khnachich range, they’d find more than just a scattering of cavalry patrols waiting for them. They’d find an army.
Bolde slouched deeper into his seat. The risk and return had balance. It had been worth it.
Half-asleep at her workstation, Bridget Shelleen lifted her head as she heard a soft trilling whistle grow in the darkness. It had the lilt of the old country to it, and it took her a moment to place the melody over the rumble of the tires. When she did, she smiled.
“Instead of spa, we’ll drink down ale.
Pay the reck’ning on the nail.
No man for debt shall go to jail,
For Garryowen and Glory.”
GLOSSARY
Common Modular Missile System—The replacement-to-be for the US Army’s current TOW and Dragon antitank missile systems. An interchangeable family of warheads, guidance packages, and booster engines, CMM rounds can be assembled in the field to produce a number of differently missionformatted antiarmor and antipersonnel missiles. Capable of being launched from both Army land and air vehicles.
HMD (Helmet-Mounted Display)—An integral multimode imaging system built into the visor of a combat helmet. It can be used to present readouts of personal or Velectronics systems, as a video display for operating remotecontrolled vehicles and equipment via telepresence, or as an access to a virtual-reality environment.
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