Refuge: The Arrival: Book 1

by Doug Dandridge

  “No friend of yours, Jew,” said the man, spitting on the ground and turning around, walking away and pulling his acquired assault rifle free of his shoulder.

  “I guess that answers that,” said Mier, circling a finger at his temple. “Neo Nazi swine. But at least of use this time.”

  “And who are you, young lady?” said Levine, looking at the young black woman who was standing there holding an oversized mace.

  “I’m not really sure,” said the woman in a hushed voice. “I think I’m dead, but my body doesn’t seem to know it.”

  “Why do you say that, my dear?” asked Kurt, looking down on the woman, captivated by her strength and beauty.

  “I had an arrow through me,” she said in a whisper, her hand fingering the hole in her bloody shirt. “And one of those monstrosities used me for a golf ball. But I don’t feel a thing.”

  “She’s one of us,” Levine said to Kurt, catching the big man’s eye. “We need to keep her near us, so we can talk.”

  A sudden roaring from the edge of the woods captured their attention. The group turned, cursing as they saw five more of the large creatures come from the woods, a couple score of the Orcs arrayed around them. The Trolls came forward, swinging maces and roaring in rage as they saw the four of their kind reduced to burning piles in the grass.

  The three immortals grasped their weapons, waiting for the onslaught, while the German soldier looked nervously for a place to gain cover. As he looked back he shouted and pointed. The other three had no time for it as the mass came at them.

  Suddenly the air was filled with the barking of auto cannon, and bursts of fire stitched across the five Trolls and into the Orcs on either side. Orcs went down immediately. Trolls roared, staggered and came on. A score of assault rifles and light machine guns joined the fray, and Ishmael, Kurt and Jackie fell to the ground beside the prone Sergeant. The Orcs fell swiftly as they were eaten alive by the bullets. The Trolls continued to stagger, and Kurt, looking up, thought the monsters would fight their way through.

  Fire rockets ended that thought. Coming from a pair of hand held launchers, the rockets rippled in, striking near the Trolls on the ground and blasting out in gouts of fire. Within seconds the Trolls were down, twitching as their bodies burned, until the twitching stopped and the truly dead monsters lay there at last.

  Kurt stood and looked back at the quartet of Marder III APCs moving forward, three squads of infantry fanned out around them. He waved at the infantry, then looked over at Levine.

  “We still have a battle to fight, my friend,” he said to the smaller immortal. “I think we can talk on the march, while we help to clean up this mess.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  “Charge them,” screamed the commander of the Ellala cavalry as they swept around the bend. The strangers in their weird battle uniforms knelt or lay on the ground, shooting with their rapid fire weapons. The fine armor of most of the cavalry repelled the bullets, but some found marks on faces or the unprotected legs or mouths of mounts. Here and there a man fell from a saddle or a horse toppled. But the hundreds of troopers continued on. Swords swung down to cut open the lightly armored enemy. Lances stabbed into men on the ground or into the backs of those running. Arrows took down enemy at range before they could reach the woods.

  “Ignore the others,” yelled the leader, looking at a Mage near the front who unleashed a fireball that hit one of the small wagons of the strangers and blew it into the air. “We will capture them later to bring to our leader. Kill the soldiers.”

  A lightning bolt came down from the heavens, striking into a group of soldiers who had been taking cover behind a log near the edge of the woods. A couple flew into the air, clothing smoking. Several others lay on the ground, twitching from electric shock.

  “Keep moving,” yelled the knight leading the charge, swinging a sword that cut a stranger down from behind as the man tried to run away, panic keeping him on the road instead of moving off of it. An Ellala cavalryman went down, a hole appearing in his helmet and blood splattering those around him. A dozen arrows were fired toward the edge of the woods, where a soldier was aiming a large weapon. Four arrows struck the stranger and pierced him. He convulsively pulled the trigger of his weapon one last time. A horse screamed when the round tore into its belly, blasting out the other side and killing another mount.

  “We have them,” screamed the leader, following a gaggle of enemy infantry as they turned another bend. Ahead were a pair of their armored wagons, spitting out death in streams as they fired into the cavalry column in a crossfire.

  The leader ducked his head and looked over at his nearest Mage, while a dozen men around him went down, great smoking holes torn in their armor. The Mage reached forward, throwing a bright ball at the nearest vehicle, just before a line of explosions tore his ragged flesh from the top of his panicking horse. The vehicle went up in a ball of fire, flaming crew spilling from its hatches. The second vehicle went up a second later, and the cavalry sped on.

  The leader looked back, seeing that he still had almost two hundred men with him. And the two thousand Orcs sweeping behind him through the woods and along the road would complete the victory. He had lost some men, but he was killing far more of the enemy. And the sight of a massed charged would have to break their spirit. Cavalry charges had always done that to unsupported infantry. This was a day to feel immortal, leading good men onto a killing field.

  Another bend in the road, and he was around it, his horse flying across the ground as he led his column. Far ahead was another bend, and several of the large war machines used by the strangers. More victims for his mages. He looked closely at the machines, focusing across the kilometer distance. The one closest to the road look similar to the ones his column had just dealt with. The other two looked much larger, with a much longer and wider projection sticking out of the rotating box on top. He pointed it out to his chief Battle Mage and the man looked, looked back at the commander, and nodded his head.

  The Mage’s arm went back while the Ellala mumbled the triggering spell. The arm came forward and a small ball of fire, no more than a couple of inches across, left his hand and flew through the air, expanding slowly and building energy as it flew. A pair of lesser mages threw their fireballs at the other large vehicle. The commander smiled, expecting to see the burning wrecks occupying the far end of this section of road after the dozen or so seconds it took the balls to hit the target. My name will be written in the books of our people, thought the commander with a smile on his face.

  * * *

  “Aim at that one in the front center, Hanz,” ordered Leutnant Franz Sturgil, scanning the target with his binoculars. “The one with the fancy robes. And reload with shredder after that shot.”

  “Ja, Herr Leutnant,” said the gunner, and the turret began to traverse toward the indicated target.

  “Grosser,” he called over the radio to the tank stationed fifty meters on the other side of the clearing that encompassed the road. “Shredder for the second shot. Then probably HE.”

  “Ja, mein Herr,” yelled the Feldwebel commanding the other tank.

  Sturgil looked up in time to see the glint of light that flew from the hand of one of the horsemen and flew lazily toward his tank, growing by the moment.

  “Fire,” yelled the platoon leader. He grasped the handles of the twenty millimeter gun mounted as the tank commander’s AA weapon, swiveling the cannon to point at the enemy.

  The tank bucked back slightly as the main gun fired, the coaxial mg opening up at the same time. The other tank was half second behind the first. Sturgil pulled the triggers of the twenty millimeter and sent a stream of rounds downrange, adjusting them into the cavalry with the tracers, then sweeping them from the front to back. The Marder between the tanks opened up with its thirty-five millimeter auto-cannon a second later, rippling off an antitank missile for good measure.

  Eat this, you fuckers, thought the Leutnant as he cycled through the box magazine on the side of his
weapon. I hope it sticks in your craws.

  * * *

  The two 120mm discarding sabot rounds streaked downrange at over three thousand meters per second. Hitting the target in less than a second after leaving the barrel, the rounds arrived before the roar of the guns. The tungsten carbide penetrator from Sturgil’s tank hit the fire ball a hundred meters out from its caster. The round swept through the ball of energy, blasting it apart in a wave that swept out fifty meters in each direction. The round continued on, unfazed by the heat, to streak through the center of the Ellala formation.

  The round and its shock wave tore into the front of the column. The tungsten carbide arrow hit the Senior Mage in the upper right chest, vaporizing light armor, flesh and bone while it pushed through. The decapitated head, left torso and right forearm flew through the air, picked up by the shock wave that radiated around the projectile. The round went through a dozen cavalrymen, killing them and in most cases their mounts. The shock wave knocked troopers off to both sides of those it destroyed, killing many with the overpressure that ruptured eardrums and burst lungs.

  The round from the second tank hit initially between the two lesser mages that were in the process of throwing fireballs at that vehicle. The shockwave detonated the fireballs while they were still small and compact, less than twenty meters in front of the mages. The packets of heat energy spread out thirty meters in each direction, washing over the front of the formation and immolating man and beast alike. The round continued on through the column, doing much the same sort of damage as the first round.

  The twenty millimeter rounds from the tank commanders’ guns and the thirty-five millimeter projectiles from the APC struck an instant later, blasting holes in cavalrymen and mounts, knocking scores from their saddles in as many seconds. Horsemen piled up at the rear, compressing the formation and bunching them up in the killing field, and more went down to the front.

  The tanks fired again, within less than a second of each other. This time they fired hundreds of small fletchets per round, like a giant arrow launcher. Called beehive by the Americans, the Germans had given them the name Shredder for the effect they had on infantry formations. The mini projectiles did not travel as fast as the AT rounds, a mere two thousand meters per second. They still came in fast, spread to take the entire front of the column as they hit.

  Those horses and men still standing in the first ranks were blasted, a red mist rising into the air above them, and scores of cavalry teams were destroyed. The mini arrows continued through to kill and maim scores more. The cavalry attack was essentially stopped at that moment, with the survivors only interested in swinging their mounts around and getting away.

  Across the distance the tanks lurched forward, accelerating up to their off road cruising speed, coming swiftly at the panicked cavalry. Both fired again, sending HE rounds in to explode with fire, dirt and blood in the center of the cavalry. Infantry, including armed civilians, fired from the woods, knocking down horses, aiming for the unarmored spots on the beasts. A roar overhead announced the arrival of artillery rounds that pounded the cavalry as they desperately spurred their horses away from the carnage.

  * * *

  “Sir,” said Leutnant Sturgil, standing at attention and saluting the Oberstleutnant.

  “Fine job, Leutnant,” said the senior officer, looking down from his perch in the hatch of an APC.

  “How bad did they hurt us?” asked Sturgil, glancing at a burning APC twenty meters away.

  “They hurt us,” said the ranking officer. “At least two hundred dead. As many wounded. Fifteen destroyed armored vehicles. But we hurt them worse. They probably suffered two thousand dead, and not many of their cavalry, the damned Elves, made it out of here.”

  “This still seems like a nightmare,” said Sturgil, looking back up at the battalion commander. “How in the hell did we end up in this place, wherever this place is? And what are we going to do when we run out of ammunition? Or at least ammunition that works?”

  “What did that last remark mean, son,” said the battalion commander, frowning.

  “My twenty millimeter jammed during the action,” said the platoon leader. “The same happened to the gun on the supporting APC, and one of my other tanks had a misfire. That normally doesn’t happen within a minute in the same action.”

  “That does seem to be a problem we’re going to have to face,” said the Oberstleutnant, nodding his head. “That’s why we need to go on the offensive as soon as we’ve delivered our cargo to the rally point. We…”

  “Excuse me, sir,” said a large man, wearing plate armor and walking up with an armored companion and a tall black woman.

  “Lieutenant Smith,” said the battalion commander. “Are you OK?”

  “I’m fine, Colonel,” said the woman, turning her intense blue eyes on Sturgil. The Leutnant felt a shiver move up his spine at a glance of those unusual orbs.

  “I need to get to higher command with these gentlemen,” she said, looking at her two companions. “We have much to discuss with General Taylor.”

  “Our Troll killers,” said the Colonel with a smile, looking at the two men. “I have heard much of you. The rumors are spreading as to what you really are. Angels or devils?”

  “I am not sure if we are either, Colonel,” said the smaller of the men, who was still larger than most people Sturgil had been around. “But we do have knowledge we need to share with the overall commander. I would appreciate it if we could be given priority transportation to the rally point we have heard about.”

  “Do you think this is necessary, Lieutenant Smith?” asked the battalion commander. “I know you are really under the command of the United States Army, but we have come to know you. I heard about your exploits as well, though there seems to be some confusion about injuries you sustained. You don’t look like someone who took an arrow through the chest.”

  “I’m not at liberty to talk about that right now sir,” said the beautiful American. “But I agree with Herr von Mannerheim here and his friend. We do need to make contact with the General as soon as possible. He needs to hear what we have to tell him.”

  “OK,” said the officer after a moment’s thought. “Leutnant Sturgil. See if you can locate transportation for these three and have them conveyed to the valley. On my orders they are to be passed through with all available speed. Then report back to me and we’ll see if we can find something for your platoon to do to further the war effort.”

  “So we are at war?” said the other armored man in lightly accented German.

  “Yes, mein Herr,” said the Colonel, nodding his head. “We are definitely at war. And we are called upon to teach these people that they should not have aggressed against us.”

  * * *

  Lightning crackled, and the smell of ozone filled the air. The bolt struck the solid mass of a dried log. Smoking bark flew through the air while the log burst into flame. Electricity sparked around the burning wood for a second, then dissipated into the air. Men ran up to the log with wooden buckets in their hands, water sloshing onto the ground. They tossed the water onto the wood and extinguished the flames with the squelching sound of liquid hitting heat. Steam rose into the air.

  “And how did he unleash that blast?” asked Professor Margaret Deitricht, running a hand through her graying hair and ignoring the sweat dripping down her brow.

  The Conyastaya woman looked at her for a moment, thinking about the words, then turned to the Conyastaya Mage, repeating the question in their mutual language. Deitricht noted that a technician was recording the conversation so that it could be fed into the computers of the half dozen linguists who were working on the language part of the problem. It was all well and good that the natives could use spells to understand the Germans, but Deitricht wanted a handle on their language as well. The Elf woman turned back to the professor and spoke in heavily accented German.

  “He says he concentrated on the image of lightning in his head, focused on the target, and said the words of
the spell.”

  “And where did he get those words?” asked the German physicist.

  “He of course learned them from another,” said the woman, herself the practitioner of another form of magic, that involving the power of the Gods.

  “And he knew those words would work? How?”

  “Because they have worked for many others,” said the Conyastaya woman, a frown on her face. “Why do you ask these questions of all these people?”

  “We’re trying to figure out how these magical forces are controlled,” said Deitricht, smiling. “How these spells were formulated in the first place. Why do they work?”

  “Someone in the past got them to work,” said the woman, shrugging her shoulders. “Sometimes someone with enough will power comes along to make a new spell, when there is a need for one. Then they show it to others, prove that it works, and others use the new spell.”

  “But this doesn’t happen very often?” asked the professor.

  “Not often at all,” said the woman. “Maybe once in a century. Then another hundred years for the knowledge of the spell to spread.”

  “And is it the same with your spells? The ones your God gives to you?”

  “No,” said the woman, shaking her head in imitation of the Germans she had been around for the last couple of days. “The Goddess comes to us in our sleep and gives us the words to say, the gestures to make.”

  “And you believe that these words and gestures will trigger magic?”

  “Of course,” said the woman, smiling. “They come from the Goddess after all. Why would we not trust that what she tells us would work, will work.”

  Deitricht nodded her head in return and smiled.

  “Thank you, Sistarash. It has been most enlightening. And thank your friend.”

  The Wood Elf bowed, then turned to walk away. Deitricht shook her head as she thought over all they had observed this day. From the simple Kashana’liya farmer mending the leg of an animal, to the Battle Mage of the Wood Elves unleashing lighting. It was most impossible and hard to believe, but she had seen it with her own eyes. She shook her head again and walked into the large command tent that had been requisitioned for her team.