Freehold

by Michael Z. Williamson

  There was a pause, then the rest of the U.N. troops swarmed forward as the initial flash died, desperately seeking cover in the same trees that protected the defenders. She raised her weapon and fired a string of fifteen grenades along the approaching front, the recoil hammering into her shoulder. There'd be bruises there tomorrow. She reloaded quickly as the second wave hit the dense cover of the trees. Her squad was taking shots at the attackers and she could see them falling. There were six directly ahead of her, less than one hundred meters away and closing at a run. Her rifle pointed almost of its own accord and she commenced careful, rapid single shots as they appeared through gaps between the boles. Six rounds, six hits, then three more as others appeared. Another light winked on her visor. "Eighteen, Two, fall back and fill in," she shouted to hear herself. "And fire the tubes!" Her own weapon was relatively quiet, but the simple mass of fire brought the volume up. There were explosions among the trees that threw sparks and debris across her vision and added to the din. She moved farther to her left, the south, where the shooting was heavier. She scrolled through her vision options, but found nothing obvious to shoot at. A glance at the other two squads she commanded didn't offer much. On the other hand, the reservists leading them seemed to have their heads on straight. They were following her lead and keeping order.

  The shrieking hiss of the Dragonbreaths startled her, even though she expected it. Three tongues of flame lashed into the approaching mob, the flash ruining night vision and momentarily blinding sensors. Men and women screamed as the chemical fire reacted with their skin to burn hotter still. They thrashed in agony as their squadmates recoiled in horror. The weapon was intended for bunkers, not open terrain. Temporarily stunned and illuminated, they dropped by the tens from desperately accurate rebel rifle fire from Kendra's platoon and the flanking units.

  Movement. It was too high to be ground troops and too small and low to be an aircraft. It was a recon drone, hovering quietly on its impeller, guided through the trees by its robotic mind. She took careful aim, letting the grenade read the image, then squeezed the trigger. The small hyperexplosive charge smashed the pod, its turbine shattering at high revs, the pieces tearing chunks from nearby limbs.

  Becoming resolute again as the incendiary brightness faded, the enemy advanced en masse. Kendra shot dry, reloaded quickly and tried to shoot back to her previous line of aim, now covered with incoming troops crashing through the underbrush. There was a brief pause and she switched to a fresh clip. She had two full clips of one hundred left and one of thirty-seven. After that, hand to hand. After that, she didn't want to consider. The war was lost, that was all.

  Another casualty, only two spaces from her. "Fourteen, fall back and fill in," she ordered again and retreated one tree during a lull. It had a boulder next to it she could use as a better defensive position. She had barely reached it when another salvo of mortar bombs detonated. Before the firecracker pops of antipersonnel rounds finished, a second one of standard high-explosive hit, booming echoes through the trees. Illumination flares were glaring overhead, but the shadows confused what vision the light gave. She hoped that was true for the enemy, also. The occasional canopy fire they ignited was quickly doused by the rain, but hot cinders of twigs blew down here and there. She slapped at her neck and brushed off a glowing ember.

  She could hear fire from the sides, indicating that the other sectors were still holding to some degree. How much longer? She wiped droplets from her sight screen. Water was running into her boots now and her pants were soaked and cold. Her breasts were tingling from the chill as they had in basic training, a lifetime ago. Branches fell from the trees as cannon fire shattered them. The occasional trunk exploded in a shower of wooden needles. The forest was just one more casualty of the battle.

  The enemy was well into the trees, crawling and darting through the weeds toward her position and shouting. She leaned across the rock, breathed and commenced firing. Pops and louder bangs sounded all around her and more of the enemy collapsed, some screaming for help, some silent and some wiggling closer. She set her grenades for minimum range, airburst, and fired three down the center. She had two hand grenades, but hoped it wouldn't get that close. She knew better.

  The enemy was covering and creeping nearer. She sighted one figure as he shimmied forward and put a bullet through the top of his head. That earned her a torrent of return fire from his comrades, rock chips slashing and stinging across her face as she ducked. Time to move.

  "Elements retreat twenty meters by leapfrog. Provide cover," she ordered her whole force. Then she slid low and lizard-crawled backward, rifle over her arms in case she needed it in a hurry. Another light blinked. Dead. An explosion shattered the ground next to her, spraying her with mud and stinging like a hard slap. Whatever it was, it was a thankfully small charge and the soft wet ground had tamped it just enough to expend its force upward. Her hearing dropped a level despite the helmet cushioning and a ringing sound drowned out much of what she could hear.

  She hoped they retreated in an organized fashion. They were doing admirably well for predominantly untrained amateurs; only nine of sixty were veterans of active duty. Most had some experience, but guerrilla fighting was different from a stand-up battle. None of the guerrillas had ever used tac helmets, and she worried that the wealth of intelligence displayed would distract them.

  As she slithered farther, her hand brushed a mate to the bomb that had just missed her. This one was sunk into the dirt but had not hit hard enough to explode. Perhaps it had ricocheted off a tree. No matter, it was still live and she shied from it and worked her way around.

  Clicking in her ears indicated a scrambled and burst message being decoded. "Pacelli, retreat at once to Zeta Three. Report when clear," Naumann's voice was barely audible in her ears. She boosted the gain.

  Retreat? At once? How the hell do I do that? she thought. If we cover, they'll kill us as they roll over us. If we run, we get shot in the back. If we retreat piecemeal, we get cut to shreds. The only thing that came to mind was to let them roll through and attempt to surrender, then hope to survive whatever Naumann planned. That was suicidal, too. Zeta Three was the grid mark south of them along the ridge. So what was happening up north?

  She forced herself to think. "Forward elements, fall back forty meters soonest. Report when done." Leapfrog them back a few meters at a time, covering each other as they did so? What would conserve troops and be effective? A click signaled another message.

  "Pacelli. Retreat to Zeta Three immediately. We're—" it chopped off.

  Her helmet was dead. More jamming. The sights on her weapon and the grenade controls were frozen, too. Directional EMP.

  She realized now why the fire was so heavy—it was all concentrated at her position in an attempt to break through. Naumann was going to blow holy hell out of the area. If her troops were there, they'd be hamburger.

  The problem was that the platoon on her right flank was no longer capable of holding. There was fire coming from that direction, indicating that they were either being forced to retreat or had been subdued. If she pulled back from the right flank, the UN troops would simply follow her. Some would die, but they'd be inside the perimeter. Naumann certainly had the temperament to kill his own troops to get them, but not enough soldiers to waste. If she retreated, they would be swarmed. If she held, they'd be under whatever Naumann was about to throw. Either way, her troops were dead. And she had no commo or night vision.

  She stood and sprinted, tossing her helmet aside. Fire spattered the ground around her feet as she dodged trees. She counted paces through her rasping breath and angled downslope. She was working on eyeballs alone, assisted by flarelight, hindered by smoke and dark. A sharp pain burned across her left arm as a branch snagged her, but she kept running.

  The end troop, whose name she didn't know, turned at her approach and fired. He yanked the weapon aside as he identified her, and missed. "Incoming!" she shrieked, gasping for breath. "Move out Now!"

  He s
tood and ran, taking a supporting position behind a tree and waiting for her.

  "Go now!" she screamed and pointed. "Twenty meters, then right and keep going!"

  A hum alerted her. She spun and saw another recon drone, hovering and scanning. She swung her weapon up and fired a grenade. It arced away, struck a limb and detonated. She cursed. Her weapon had been set to minimum airburst when the EMP hit them, but it had defaulted to contact fusing. It couldn't accept proximity fusing, as the sensors and controls were damaged. She took careful aim and fired again at the small pod. She missed as it easily evaded, and fired at it again. This time she hit and it exploded, metal and fiber confetti drifting out of the smoky cloud.

  The damage was already done. The incoming fire was intensifying and seeker projos swarmed down. She ran back upslope obliquely, hearing them zizzzzz! behind her as they sought human body temperature. The enemy knew what line they were on now.

  She had a repeat of her first warning, as the second woman in line almost wasted her, too. "Incoming! Run!" she repeated and staggered past. She ordered the next one to get the message to the other side and pull them back, then alert the next unit. He nodded and ran.

  She ducked past a tree and another drone sat a bare two meters from her, drinking in data. She fired bullets at it as it tried to dodge. It thrust up then over and down again. Finally, a few shots grazed it and she caught the main probe panel with a lucky shot. It drifted away, weaving as it did and she downed it with two more shots. A distant series of thumps indicated another salvo of canisters full of seekers on the way from small mortars.

  The squad was peeling back slowly, which was still dangerous, but might let some of the others survive. They'd have to clear a safe distance, then hold it against anything that came. If she could get a runner to the next platoon for support, they could keep the UN where it was until the artillery arrived. Seekers swarmed through the woods like angry hornets, seeking warmth to bury themselves in. The cold wetness of the trees made it easy for them to find the blazing heat of the defenders' bodies, but also interfered with their flights. Kendra heard a zizzzzz! and a meaty thunk as one caught her in the calf.

  She stumbled, rolled upright and kept limping, shrieking under her breath in tortured agony. It felt exactly as she'd been told it would to get shot—a freezing, burning, electric cramp through the muscles.

  She reached the second man from her position, whose leg was shattered. He'd tied a tourniquet and stopped the bleeding, but couldn't possibly walk. He was barely conscious. She slung her rifle, pulled at his arm and began dragging him, fire lancing up her leg. Waving her left arm, she stumbled toward the last troop in line. He came running to help. "No!" she shouted. "Retreat!"

  Through the roaring confusion she somehow detected death approaching from all sides. She spun and walked a burst of automatic fire into a disorganized gaggle of UN soldiers just coming through the trees, shooting offhand with her left hand, the weapon a heavy, kicking weight on her wrist, an ache in her arm. Sighting movement in the dying flicker of a flare, she lobbed three more grenades, still set to contact fuse, into an approaching knot from the right flank. The enemy were spilling through the gap to her right, pounding for the summit to hold the position and fight an attrition battle that they would surely win. She fired to her left again, then to the right, while backing away with her burden.

  Her good ankle twisted on a branch, spilling her to the ground. She stifled a scream as her casualty groaned, still alive, and she forced herself to her knees and up under him. She muscled him into a rescue carry, more painful but faster. After nearly three hundred meters of sprinting through rough terrain, with a burden for the last fifty, she was seeing black spots. A hidden tactical part of her brain made her reach for, arm and throw her two hand grenades to keep the enemy's head down. They were small charges, but even with the cover of the trees they were close enough after her feeble throws that the blasts ripped at her. She ate up one clip and let the weapon hang from its sling so she could reload with her single available hand, falling uphill and to the right.

  Her last right-flank troop had either not heard her or ignored her. He dropped two clips at her feet, took the limp form from her shoulder and hefted it easily across his brawny back. "You have the rifle, you cover me! Back soon!" he shouted and took off at a sprint.

  Kendra grabbed the clips and turned, throat too dry to talk or swallow, and pumped out her last nine grenades. There were figures darting all around her now and she wasn't sure if any were friendlies. There wasn't time to decide. She leaned against a tree for support, raised her rifle and used the iron sights. She had no idea how many she killed, but the barrel was hot enough to burn her hand by the time she finished the next clip. She reached for another as she retreated. Then her unconscious kicked in again. She threw herself flat.

  * * *

  Rob threw his craft over the ridgeline inverted. That allowed maximum gees and better control. He grunted as the strain hit his guts and legs, and triggered the cannon. I hope the friendlies are clear, because I'm killing everything, he thought. He raked the fire straight down, rolling around his point of aim to right the craft. That was as close as he dared get to the reported Freehold line, not wanting to perpetuate the oxymoron of "friendly fire." As he leveled across the plain, he unloaded incendiary and HE bomblets and a canister of butterfly mines. They were nasty little things, basically two razor blades and a detonating cap. They'd cripple anyone who stepped on one.

  He Immelmanned back on his course, straining the engines and the airframe, and locked missiles and rockets back along the route he'd come. He designated two points on the top of the ridge and tossed HE that way, then tore to his right along the treeline. He dumped the racks on what looked like an entire regiment of dismounted infantry, their vehicles parked and useless. He lit a few tanks, just because he could, and any ADA, because he had to and to keep them too busy to worry about the friendlies, and headed south. He'd swing between the chain of hills and come back to the aviation position that way. He hugged the earth for safety as he went, driving the speed up past 2500 kpd. "Target tank, target ayda priority, target, one, two, thermal, selsee, three retar antarm, target target four five, reset dez, target one, target mortar two, eecee flare, left cannon target three, target four thermal, mass target five cannon . . ." He controlled his craft with the surety of years of practice, straining the system to the edge of its envelope with the mass of targeting data.

  He punched through a large, low cloud of smoke, lifting slightly, just in case. Sensors didn't show anything in it, but he wasn't taking chances.

  Pain!! Shock. Heat. Cold. Electromagnetic pulse directed at his craft was powerful enough to overload the shielding capacity of his craft's frame and hit his implant. The controls flickered in his sight, resumed chaotically with figures that made no sense. He scanned, still stunned, head throbbing and eyes blurring. He'd dropped dangerously low while recovering.

  WARNING! flashed in his environment. He scanned the telltales and saw nothing, and felt no touches at his temples. Control link gone or implant module damaged. Vision began to fade. He swore and slowed. At least he was clear of the UN lines. Now what?

  Control was failing. The ground was coming up fast. He pulled and nothing happened. Boosting throttles didn't help.

  Shit.

  * * *

  What the hell was up there? Meyer wondered. He'd saturated the area with what support weapons he had and the drones showed only a few infantry. The squad leaders were still reporting heavy small arms fire and the casualty count confirmed it. Could they all be in dug-in positions? But sonar and seismograph showed no major holes. Individual positions shouldn't be hard to overrun . . . unless there were a lot of them. That many should show some kind of thermal reading, sound or something the drones could measure. Nothing. The rebels had just plowed the area with close support, so it had to be clear now. He relayed that advice and ordered them to push harder. This should do it. If they could break through now, the enemy would have
to surrender or be slaughtered and he could call for reinforcements.

  The sky filled with the basso fabric-ripping sound of high-speed cannons. Hatchets made that sound, and nothing else. Wet splinters showered Kendra as the swath of death moved within meters of her and downslope. She stood quickly, surprising a Peacekeeper about to step on her. He staggered, confused and staring blankly and she kicked his kneecap, wondering why her calf no longer hurt. As he stumbled, she brought her leg up, knee in his face, and crashed her rifle on the back of his neck. She jerked a half step, knee searing, and shot again. The buddy of the last assailant appeared next to her, pointing the muzzle of his weapon into her face. She stared down the black hole for only a microsecond, then parried it and smashed him in the face with her muzzle as she shot. She swung around and fired at another trio stumbling into view. Her clip ran out and she reached for another. She had none. She buttstroked another soldier as he charged blindly past, kicked his ankle from under him and circled her foot over to crush this throat, feeling the gristly crunch up her leg. She grinned unconsciously. This was it. Time to die. A ripple ran up her spine.

  Slinging the weapon and drawing her sword, she turned and ran uphill. Another drone sat in the crotch of a tree, trying to be inconspicuous. She jabbed the blade into the nacelle and the turbine shredded, throwing needlelike shards into her hand. They didn't do much damage, but her hand blazed with white-hot pain. As she ran past, the sky was ripped again, level with her, as a pilot gunned along the bottom of the hill. Ahead of her, two UN troops were braced against a tree, shooting at someone from her squad. She slashed across the spine of one and thrust into the kidney of the second. The first one screamed and thrashed to the ground, half paralyzed. The second simply collapsed. The keen blade had sliced through fabric designed to resist impact, not cutting.

  Sheathing her sticky, gory blade, she grabbed the weapon and magazines from the dead one as she rolled for cover, bullets cracking past her. It was familiar from practice years past and Freehold training, and she retreated backward, shooting at anything that moved, starting with the one she'd wounded with her sword. The targets were backlit by the roiling fires below and she picked them out and picked them off. Fire. Aim. Fire. Aim. A round cracked past her ear, ignored in her current frame of mind. Shoot. Shoot again. Reload.