by Peter Grant
~ ~ ~
“Grasswren cutter to O’Reilly Base, five kilometers out and closing, request landing instructions, over.”
Steve decreased the power to the reaction thrusters, slowing the cutter as he passed a thousand meters over a wide, winding river that watered the farmlands in this area. The early morning sunlight cast long shadows from the trees on its bank.
The radio crackled. “O’Reilly Base to Grasswren cutter, what’s your cargo? Over.”
“Grasswren cutter to O’Reilly Base, I’ve got those parts for your sick bird, over.”
“O’Reilly Base to Grasswren cutter, that’s fast work! We only sent up the order yesterday. OK, put down right next to the shuttle. It’s the only one on the field right now. Someone will meet you there to get the parts offloaded. Over.”
“Grasswren cutter to O’Reilly base, understood, out.”
The Marine Corps assault shuttle was parked near a temporary storage building, its system access hatches open, showing that it was undergoing maintenance. Steve set his cutter down near it in a cloud of dust as a transporter rolled up.
Steve walked down the rear ramp, to be met by a Sergeant who climbed out of the cab of the transporter. Four Marines jumped down from the rear of the vehicle and ran past him up the cutter’s ramp.
“Hi, I’m PO3 Maxwell,” he introduced himself to the harried–looking Sergeant. “What’s going on? Where are all your other shuttles? There’s normally a dozen or more here.”
“I’m Shankill,” the other replied, holding out his hand. “All our shuttles are busy. Three of our patrols got hit last night — one ambush, two booby–traps. Trouble is, they weren’t wearing armor thanks to this damn fool ‘hearts and minds’ project the brass are trying out. They reckon, now that the terrorists have been confined to only one small area, we need to look less threatening than armored troops. Sounds good on paper, but when we’re not protected and the terrorists show fight, we take casualties! We’re trying to get our wounded out and secure the areas involved, but it’s slow, dangerous work. The shuttles are serving as makeshift armored ambulances and providing cover. They’ve spotted at least six more booby–traps so far. Looks like a deliberate, concerted effort to kill or wound as many of us as possible. Fortunately, no one’s been killed — not yet, anyway.”
Steve frowned. “The ‘no armor’ thing must be something new. When I got here five months ago, the rule for patrols was still ‘all armor, all the time’. When did it change?”
“A few weeks back the peacekeeping force got a new boss. He wants civilians to love us. Trouble is, the terrorists were losing big–time around here because their weapons couldn’t touch us. Bead carbines won’t hurt someone in combat armor, and mortars and rockets have to score a direct hit to do any damage. That’s hard to do with unguided weapons, which is why we’ve been able to contain them and press them back into their last remaining mountain stronghold. I reckon as soon as they heard about the new policy, they started planning these attacks. I bet we’ll be back in armor after this, and hearts and minds be damned!”
“Let’s hope so. I prefer carrying live Marines to ferrying them up to orbit in body bags! Why haven’t they let you go in and clean out their remaining stronghold?”
Shankill spat on the ground in disgust. “Politics, of course! The United Planets head honcho reckons it’ll be better for the planet if Radetski’s own forces do that after we hand over to them. They’ll be seen to be masters of their own security that way. I — ”
The Sergeant’s belted comm unit shrilled suddenly, interrupting his tirade. He plucked it from its holster.
“Sergeant Shankill speaking… Damn!… No, Sir, we’ve — hang on, there’s a cutter just come down from orbit. Its pilot might be able to help. Wait one, Sir.”
He looked at Steve. “Another Marine patrol just got hit by an ambush in a village about twenty clicks from here. They fought their way clear, but they’re under mortar fire from a mountain slope. They’ve got wounded, and the villagers are taking casualties too. The patrol’s running low on ammo and we don’t have a spare shuttle to resupply them right now. Can you help us get ammo in and wounded out?”
“Of course! Get these parts off, then you can load the ammo. Can someone show me where to take it?”
“I’ll come with you myself. Hang on.” He raised the comm unit to his ear once more. “Sir, the pilot will help us. I’ll guide him there… Aye aye, Sir.” He closed the unit as he yelled to his work party, “Let’s move! This bird’s gonna take ammo to our guys and bring out their wounded!”
The Marines unloaded the rest of Steve’s cargo at breakneck speed under the Sergeant’s vociferous, profane urging. As the last boxes flew out another transporter rolled up, braking to a skidding halt in a cloud of dust. The driver leaned out. “Ammo’s in the back!”
The working party swarmed the vehicle, tossing crates to the ground, wrenching them apart with pry–bars, extracting ammunition chargers and weapon power packs, ripping off protective packaging, and packing them into metal ammo boxes for easy distribution in the field. They stacked the boxes in several wheeled bins, pushed them aboard the cutter and tied them down. In minutes the shipment was ready to go.
Steve raised the rear ramp and fired up the reaction thrusters as Sergeant Shankill dropped into the co–pilot’s seat next to him. “Direct course to the target is 272 degrees,” he called over the throbbing of the thrusters. “You’ll have to dodge to starboard around a thousand–meter mountain just this side of the village. Stay low to avoid traffic from other sites. You’ll also present a more difficult target that way, in case anyone’s waiting to shoot at us.”
“Got it.” Steve passed the course to the AI console, and toggled the combat override to give himself greater control in case sudden emergency maneuvers were required. The AI software would still do its best to prevent him from crashing the cutter, but would now allow him to take the craft to the limits of its design if necessary, rather than minimize wear and tear by flying conservatively.
The cutter roared towards the village, flying at less than fifty meters’ altitude, sending animals scurrying in panic across the fields below. Steve called up a map of the terrain, then plotted a course to go around the mountain ahead of them, coming up on the village from the south. The AI automatically adjusted the cutter’s heading to follow his route, using the radar in terrain–following mode to maintain adequate ground clearance.
They banked around a shoulder of the mountain and slowed, the forward reaction thrusters automatically swinging to brake the cutter as it sank towards a village of twenty to thirty homes and barns at the foot of the slope. A heavily forested hillside towered above it, the trees displaying the greenish–purple tinge typical of Radetski’s native vegetation. Green terraformed fields lined the far bank of a stream that tumbled down a narrow valley, then broadened and slowed as it turned along the foot of the mountain. It would have been an idyllic pastoral setting except for the smoke rising from three burning buildings, several craters left by impacting mortar shells, and a few motionless human forms sprawled in the cobblestoned village square. They were wearing civilian clothing. Two were very small. Steve’s face tightened in furious revulsion at the sight. He couldn’t help remembering the desperately injured children he’d helped evacuate from this planet several years before.
Shankill tuned the radio to a tactical frequency and muttered into the microphone as Steve concentrated on his flying. He tapped his shoulder. “They say to pull in next to that church on the edge of the square, as close to it as you can.” he called, pointing through the viewscreen. “It’ll help mask this ship from enemy fire while we unload the ammo and get the wounded aboard.”
“I might damage it with my thrusters,” Steve warned.
“Better a thruster–damaged church than a mortar–damaged cutter that can’t lift casualties!”
“I read you loud and clear.”
Steve extended the cutter’s heavy–duty undercarriage and b
raked hard with the reaction thrusters for the vertical landing, the vehicle’s gel–filled tires bouncing and flexing beneath its weight. He engaged the wheel motors and pulled closer to the church while lowering the rear ramp.
“This church isn’t much taller than the cutter,” he called to Shankill. “If they’ve got a mortar, they’ll be able to range on us with only a few sighting shots.”
“Yeah. We’d better get out of here as quick as we can.”
As soon as Steve stopped the cutter, Shankill released the cargo net and pushed the ammo bins towards the rear of the shuttle. Several Marines ran up the ramp and hauled them outside.
Steve punched his harness release and ran to the rear ramp, looking out. Already more Marines were carrying stretchers towards the cutter. He turned back to open a series of support brackets on the sides of the load compartment, above the fold–down seats. Each bracket had sockets to take a stretcher’s handles and clamps to hold them in place, plus pull–out nets to secure an occupant and prevent their ejection in the event of sudden, violent maneuvers. He showed the stretcher–bearers how to use them to secure their burdens.
He was fastening the net over a stretcher, not looking at the occupant, focusing on his task, when a tiny hand crept out hesitantly to touch his arm. He jumped in surprise, and looked into the eyes of a young girl. She couldn’t have been more than six or seven years old. Blood showed on a bandage wrapped around her head. Her hand found his as she whispered something in a language he didn’t understand. His Personal Intelligent Assistant’s software instantly translated it as, “Where’s Mommy?”
He choked up for a moment. What the HELL do they think they’re doing, shooting at kids?, he raged mentally, even as he tried to smile reassuringly at the girl. For all he knew, her mother might be one of the bodies lying in pools of blood in the square. He didn’t dare answer — he knew he couldn’t trust his voice right now — but he squeezed her hand before he turned and crossed to the opposite side of the cutter, opening the support brackets on the other side wall, ready for more arrivals. He glanced around. Of the eight stretchers brought in so far, only half bore Marines. The rest held civilians.
An explosion rocked the cutter. Steve hurried to the top of the rear ramp and looked out. A mortar shell had arched over the church and landed in the square, knocking a pair of Marine stretcher–bearers off their feet. As he watched, their comrades ran to them, dragging the injured men towards the cutter. Two more hoisted the fallen stretcher and hurried towards him. One stumbled as he reached the ramp. Steve ran down it to assist him — just as a rising shriek warned of another incoming round. It hit the cobblestones ten meters away with a blinding flash and concussive roar, sending shards of its casing searing outward in a lethal circle. One slashed across Steve’s upper left arm, carving a bloody furrow in his flesh. He swore as he instinctively slapped at the pain, then grabbed for the fallen Marine instead, helping him up.
“Over there! Put the stretcher in those support brackets!”
Steve reached for the net and fastened the occupant in place, even as Sergeant Shankill tugged at his sleeve. “You’re bleeding! Let me put a field dressing on that!”
“To hell with it! I can still use my arm!”
“Then let’s get out of here before they zero in on us! This cutter’s not armored, remember!” As if to echo his words, another mortar bomb exploded, closer than the last, the vehicle rocking from the blast. Steve heard several sharp impacts as small pieces of metal struck the cutter’s pressure–tight alloy sides.
“Is that all the wounded?” Steve called.
“Yeah,” a medic yelled as he checked the second of the two Marine stretcher–bearers injured by the mortar bomb. He strapped him into a jump seat.
“How bad are those two? Do we need to get stretchers for them?”
“No, they’ve just got flesh wounds. They’ll be OK seated like this.” He pulled down another jump seat and strapped himself in. “Let’s go!”
Steve slid into his seat, slapping at the rear ramp controls with his left hand even as his right locked his harness in place, then dialed the reaction thrusters to life once more. With a roar, the lightly loaded cutter leaped into the air and accelerated away from the village, curving outwards over the meadows below the hillside.
As he fastened his straps, Shankill called across from his seat, “The Lieutenant in charge of the patrol says, thanks a bunch! They’ve got enough ammo to keep the enemy’s heads down now, until a couple of our shuttles can reach them and they can go on the offensive.”
“Are any of the wounded critical? Can they wait a bit longer for attention?”
“Wait one — I’ll ask.” Shankill twisted in his seat, calling out to the Marine combat medic, who shouted back. He turned back to Steve. “They’re all stable enough for the journey. No one’s likely to drop dead on us. What do you have in mind?”
“Do they know where that bloody mortar is?”
“Let me find out.” He muttered into his microphone, then listened intently. “They say it’s behind a fallen log at the foot of that scree slope above the village. See it?”
Steve twisted his controls, and the cutter swung in midair to point back towards the village. He slowed to a crawl, balancing the vehicle on its reaction thrusters as he peered through the viewscreen. “Do they mean the big fan–shaped scar running down that wooded hillside below the cliff? It looks like the aftermath of an avalanche or landslide.”
“That’s it. Why?”
“I think I can do something about that mortar for them.”
“What do you mean? This cutter’s not armed.”
“Are any Marines or civilians below the scree slope? If so, tell them to get the hell away from it, as far to one side or the other as they can.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Tell them, dammit!”
“I don’t know what you’re up to, but OK.” Shankill turned back to the radio.
Steve looked around. There was nothing suitable in the meadows and fields below the cutter, but further down the stream, at the foot of the mountain slope beyond the village… Yes! He grinned in satisfaction and gunned the thrusters. Bomb and shoot innocent children, will you?, he thought savagely to himself. It’s long gone time you bastards found out what it’s like to be on the receiving end!
Shankill called, “There are no friendlies anywhere near the mortar. It’s behind the fallen log at the center of the base of the slide zone, about a hundred fifty meters north of the village. The Lieutenant says, what are you going to do?”
“See that big rock?” Steve pointed to a boulder ahead of them on the banks of the stream. “It’s got to weigh thirty, maybe forty tons. This bird has tractor beams to carry underslung loads. I’m going to pick up the rock, then drop it on that scree slope. It should start an avalanche big enough to ruin that mortar team’s day.”
“You’re nuts, you know that?” The huge grin on the Sergeant’s face belied his words. “Can you hit what you’re aiming at? You don’t have a bomb sight or anything.”
“Who needs a bomb sight? All I’ve got to do is drop it somewhere in the slide zone above the mortar. Gravity and the scree will do the rest. Tell your Lieutenant to stand by to direct me onto the target.”
Steve slowed the cutter to a halt above the boulder, aimed the tractor beam projectors carefully through his console’s targeting grid, and activated them. Beams licked out from mounts beneath the cutter’s bow and stern and gripped the rock. He moved the vehicle from side to side, slowly increasing the pull of the beams to rock the boulder, breaking the adhesion between it and the ground. As he did so the flight computer calculated the weight of the huge rock by measuring the strain on the beams, setting them to the appropriate level. As soon as a green light flashed on his console, indicating that the beams were set, Steve applied more power to the thrusters. The cutter’s structure creaked and groaned as it took the strain, then the boulder lifted smoothly off the ground.
Steve
glanced at his displays. “It’s heavier than I thought. The tractor beam meter says it’s forty–five tons. That should be big enough to start a good–sized landslide.”
“Remind me never to piss you off, Spacer. You improvise much too well for my peace of mind!”
Grinning, Steve swung the heavily–burdened cutter back towards the village, pouring full power to the thrusters to gain altitude and get above effective small arms range. By the time he crossed the square where he’d landed, the cutter was already five hundred meters above the ground and still climbing. He knew bead carbine fire wouldn’t penetrate the pressure hull at that range. He headed towards the mortar position, slowing the vehicle as he approached, positioning himself higher up the mountainside above the scree slope, close to the cliff face from which it had eroded over the course of tens of thousands of years.
Shankill had bent to his radio again. Now he looked round. “The Lieutenant says to come fifty meters to starboard.”
“Got it.” Steve adjusted his controls, and the cutter crept sideways.
“You’re about sixty, seventy meters up–slope from the mortar, in the center of the slide zone. The Lieutenant says, let ’er rip!”
“Here goes!”
Steve cut the tractor beams. The cutter lurched upwards, freed from its burden as the boulder fell away. It crashed into the slope in a spray of flying gravel, an inverted–V–shaped ripple fanning out from the impact point. The scree began to slide downwards, dust rising in a choking cloud. Steve accelerated out to one side, turning to face the slope, but could see nothing through the dust.
“I can’t hang around to see how we did,” he called to Shankill. “We’ve got to get these wounded to medical attention. Ask the Lieutenant to let us know what happened.”
“I’ll do that. Don’t go back to our forward operating base — head for Battalion Headquarters instead. They’ve got a field hospital there.” He gave a set of coordinates.
Steve punched them into the navigation computer, then glanced at the new heading as it flashed onto his display. “We’re on our way.”
