Death March

by James Rouch

  The country they raced through had changed dramatically, from the green of fields and woods they were now in the midst of shell torn ground where nothing could grow. This area was regarded as only lightly fought over and yet great swathes of the land had been churned and burnt again and again, by explosives and by the crushing tracks of tanks and the deep treaded tyres of armoured vehicles, by explosives and napalm.

  It was honeycombed with bunkers and gun pits. Torn sandbags and splintered baulks of timber flanked tracks worn deep by tramping boots and dragged equipment. Wire and tape cordoned huge swathes where every puddle had a scum of poisonous chemicals and the ground itself had a ghastly sickly look. As they travelled further in to the strip of land that separated the two armies so they encountered belts of razor wire, much of it torn about with ripped up posts. What remained was designed to channel attackers into minefields protected by interlocking fields of fire.

  The war in the Zone had taught the men who fought in it every conceivable skill in killing, brought to a pitch every art of defence and attack. One after another the squad were driving through positions that were mutually supporting and layered in such a way that attacks by armour or infantry would be sucked in to a maelstrom of destruction.

  Ahead of them a curtain of mortar fire was going own. Out beyond the front line positions a barrage warmed in intensity, waiting for them to run its gauntlet.

  A continuous curtain of dirt and shrapnel was lifting, becoming impenetrable.

  “We come out on the other side of that and we are going to run straight on to our own guns.” Revell was all too well aware that in that lay a risk as great as any they had faced in running through the Soviet positions. Possibly a greater risk. The hovercraft was a rare beast and was not even on a lot of gunner’s recognition charts. On either side. That might confer advantage among the Russians when, unable to positively identify the machine they had at times held their fire, but not when faced by their own sides anti-tank guns and teams when they would run the real risk of coming under attack for the same reason.

  Pulling hard over to avoid a falling salvo, Burke could not prevent the hovercraft side-slipping on liquid soil and dipping the machines nose in to a giant shell hole. They hit the bottom with a monstrous splash, throwing out much of the oily water lying there.

  The involuntary halt in no-mans land was an opportunity not to be missed Revell realised.” Simmons, Thorne, grab the recognition panels and fix them on the front.”

  With the front exit jammed in to the far wall of the crater and the rear access being rapped by machine gun fire and shrapnel where it projected above the rim of the crater they had to exit through the turret hatch, with streams of tracer passing close overhead.

  Sucking mud grabbed at them as they stretched the orange panel over the armour, securing it to any projection.

  “Major, we’ve got company coming.” Simmons saw the Russians first. They were running from one strip of ruined trenchf to another, pausing in shattered machine gun posts as they advanced on the stranded machine.

  About twenty men were in the advance. Their hands were filled with satchels and loose grenades and several had single shot rocket propelled grenades. Even as the two men saw them coming one launched a missile and it soared towards them, perfectly visible as it popped from its launch tube. A few metres from the tube the main motor cut in and its flight became a blur, the air behind it rippling in a haze from the super-hot gasses coming from the jet pipe.

  Simmons felt he could have reached up and touched it as it soared above him, going on to be lost amid the continuing mortar deluge. “Give me an M60, and make it fast.” Both men had only their side arms and the range was too far for their pistols to be effective.

  A machine gun was thrust up, butt first, and a box of ammunition was pushed up on the rooftop after it. At the same time the second hatch opened and the commanders cupola swung back.

  Revell had swapped his close range shot gun for an M16 and crouching on top of the hull he opened up on the nearing infantry. As he did the M60 also clattered into life and then jammed after ten rounds. The closest of the Russians was only fifty yards away and knelt to send another anti-tank round at them. He fell clutching his throat before he could fire and Revell switched his attention to two men who were dodging from cover to cover to get close enough to hurl the grenades they carried. When one fell his companion went to ground, and stayed down.

  Urged on by an officer about half the men left cover and began a dash towards the APC. Several became enmeshed in obstacles, sharp stakes and heaps of wire catching on their flapping coats and making them easy targets as they paused to pull themselves free.

  Having cleared the M60 Simmons sprayed wildly, using a short belt in seconds. He lay on the port Allison housing to reload. As he did Andrea pushed up through a hatch and without pause fired off three 40mm grenades from her launcher.

  The first struck the ground between two men and fragments of metal casing scythed their legs from beneath them. A second struck a charging rifleman on the chest and his upper body burst apart. The weapon he was carrying became a lethal projectile and decapitated the man beside him. A third grenade detonated in front of the officer and when the fountain of flame and smoke rose in to the sky he was down and moving only sluggishly. The barrage had driven the others to cover but several grenades flew from pits and dips in the churned terrain. All exploded well short of their target but chunks of casing still reached as far as the rear of the vehicle, zipping away in glancing blows that left only shallow silver scratches on the metal.

  “There’ll be more of the blighters.” Clarence joined the group and they formed a defensive half circle about the rim of the crater. “And here they come.”

  From the distant enemy emplacements sprang a full company of Russian infantry. They were shouting furiously and all had bayonets fitted to their rifles. Starting across open ground from a hundred metres away they were an easy target for the heavily armed squad and before they were half way many had been shot down and several more were limping back, holding heads and limbs, wounded by fragments from air bursts Andrea had sent over.

  The losses and casualties were near instantly replaced with another group that broke from cover far off to the right, splitting the squads fire. Another bunch appeared on the left, further diluting the massed effect of the squads weapons.

  “Burke, can you get us out of here, they’re starting to look awfully determined.” Libby had dropped down from the turret. With the APC nose down he was unable to depress the cannon or it co-axial weapon to bear and had joined in with an M16.

  “Sure, get me a crane, or a ramp.” Juggling the controls, Burke selected a combination of down draft ducting that would lift the Iron Cows’ nose and lifting it from the cloying mud bring it back nearer to the horizontal. He just had to avoid over doing it and digging the rear of the hull in to the crater rim as they reversed. “I think I can do it. Tell the major.”

  Revell was going to have to put more trust in their driver than he ever had before. He knew Burke was good and that their machine was versatile but their predicament was bad. With the full crew aboard he did not think they could do it.

  He felt a sharp pain in his arm as a splinter of grenade casing sliced through his uniform and made a long cut across his shoulder. It was Clarence who brought the man down before he could throw a second. From among the wet soil in to which it fell the grenade went off and lifted a body, minus its arms in a bizarre push-up.

  Thorne had been wounded also and blood poured from the side of his head, deeply grazed by a bullet that had clipped and removed the top of his ear. It was a growing attrition rate they could not afford. Revell estimated that at least two companies of men were trying to work their way towards them. Another missile streaked past, the roasting heat of its rocket motor starting a fire in a pack stored on the roof. Not seeing where it ended up, Revell fired off a whole clip at the direction from which it had come.

  “Get everyone out, just leave th
e prisoner.”

  Piling out at the command Libby glared back through the open hatch at the Russian, now looking white and trembling. “Great, the only one not living dangerously is the bugger who’d be happy to vaporise us all.”

  Other comments were lost as the twin turbofans screamed to top speed and the front skirt inflated, successfully lifting the machine out of the crater floor. The engine notes changed and the APC thrust backwards. As Burke had feared the rear edge of the hull, riding above a barely stiffened skirt dug hard into the clinging ground. The engine note increased further as he found some extra revolutions and then the Iron Cow flew back, covering thirty yards and coming within grenade range before its driver could bring it under full control. With a nose up attitude the hovercraft slewed across the front of the crater. While it gave the crew cover to board it prevented their firing and the storm of incoming rounds peaked at the slab sided target. Thump after thump marked bullets impacts against the skirt, some penetrating it. More bullets flattened them selves against the engine housing and hull. Mercifully the only anti-tank rocket fired was ill aimed and missed by a wide margin.

  The interior was a tangle of arms, legs and weapons as the squad flung them selves aboard. Libby raced to the turret and instantly machine gun fire was slashing back and forth against the lines of infantry who had suddenly got the courage to advance.

  They went down as though mown and when the high velocity cannon added its power, slashing bodies to ribbons before they fell, the rest turned and bolted. Whirling the APC in its own length Burke sent the craft howling into the continuing deluge of mortar shells.

  The last of the hatches was pulled shut just as a bomb exploded on the roof. They felt the air sucked from their punished lungs and then the over-pressure. Acrid smoke swept down and with it steel fragments that turned the interior in to a bloody shambles.

  Pieces of the casing lanced into the prisoners arm and chest. Another slashed across Dooley’s cheek and tiny razor slivers made blood well from Clarence back and neck.

  Hearing the pandemonium behind him Burke tried to select a level course but over-lapping craters made the ride a nightmare. Thrown about the compartment, more wounds were inflicted as the occupants were tossed against fittings and each other, while Samson tried to wipe away blood to determine the extent of injuries and secure dressings.

  Of them all only the Russians chest wound seemed life threatening. There was blood coming from the side of his moth and breathing, especially coughing, was agony for him.

  “Hell, they’ve got it again.” It was Thorne who noticed the smoke coming from the pack containing the bomb. A wide and spreading section of the marker pen embellished canvas was burning around a chunk of mortar casing that rested on top of it.

  Carson reached over and dabbed out the small flames with his palm, flicking the hot fragment on to the floor. “This thing is starting to look real tatty. Think we’ll get our deposit back?”

  Lieutenant Andy ruffled the thick material where trails of sparks still made beads of fire along the ragged edges. “So long as they want to take it back I just don’t care.”

  * * *

  Lieutenant General Gregori felt exultant. An hour of threatening, promising, bribing and sheer brutality had obtained for him the information he wanted. He didn’t have the whole picture, there was much fine detail still to be filled in but he knew enough to bury Zucharnin. In fact bury his commanding officer and rival so deep and so fast that there was no chance he would ever resurface. The only thing left to do was decide on the precise manner in which he would do it. To keep his own nose clean it would be best to go up through channels, stick to the book. But if he did that there were others above them both who would not scruple at siphoning off some, or all, of the credit for themselves.

  The Kremlin had been more paranoid that usual of late, they were seeing plots in everything, the most trivial and harmless of activities. If he chose he could go to them direct. He knew they frequently accepted intelligence in its raw state, straight from its source with no filtering by the agencies who specialised in grading such material.

  To tell them direct that a favoured general had built a private army, was even now using it for some purpose of his own, that would come as a shock to them and reinforce their belief that every one plotted against them. He could offer them a scalp for which he ought to be well rewarded. He had already turned over many times in his mind how he should do it. A coded signal, a ‘phone call? If a call then he would have to be ready to be interrogated, possibly passed to a senior politburo member. Would his nerve hold under snap questioning from such an analytical, politically motivated mind. The signal was the better option, safer and just as powerful in its impact. Better perhaps, a signal can be passed about. His revelations might be diluted in the retelling after a telephone conversation. And then, again, even those in the highest level positions were not averse to slanting things so that they gained credit with the Chairman, especially for uncovering plots in the Army. They always distrusted the army. Even after the millions of lives that had been laid down for their ambition, they still suspected the army of plotting counter- revolution.

  He looked back to the pad he had been using. Only a few of the fifty-odd pages remained. The rest had gone into his waste bin and been burned. There could never be enough precautions taken in circumstances like these.

  It was important for the sake of impact that he get all the salient facts on to one page. In any event as yet he didn’t have that many. The pressure he had brought to bear on others had provided the bare bones and there would soon be more that would flesh them out, but it could not wait.

  He knew General Zucharnin had formed a phantom Division out of various units he had been able to siphon off without them being noticed. Staff officers and specialists had been drawn from the punishment battalions. Grigori looked at the names he had so far, he only knew a few but among them were some of the best strategic and tactical thinkers in the Army. It was their cleverness that had made the Kremlin suspicious of them and reduced them from exalted ranks down to privates and NCOs. One of them had been a general, top of his class at Staff College; others had been colonels and staff majors. Brilliant men whose original thinking had jarred with the small minds of the Army Council. At least four engineering works and a small car plant had been redirected to produce the larger and more sophisticated equipment an assault required. Bridging sections, radio- jamming devices, conversion mounts for anti-tank missiles, to fit them to scout cars. If the information was to be believed Zucharnin had intercepted two convoys of brand new trucks and had them fitted with rocket launchers. It was an incredible achievement. His admiration though was dangerously misplaced, Grigori knew that condemnation, not congratulation was what was called for unless he wanted to be tarred with the same brush.

  But still, to equip and train thousands of men, keep them secret and to prepare them for a major attack! It was not something he could have done himself, he was forced to admit that. He would never have had the nerve to do such a thing.

  The clock struck six. Its musical chimes and chunky mahogany case made it out of place. It had been Grigoris’ mothers and he trusted its time keeping more than the utilitarian wall clocks beside the map. One hour to go if his informant had told him the truth. The methods he had allowed his thuggish HQ military police section to employ would certainly have extracted that. The matter of the time puzzled him. It would be light, or almost so, when Zucharnins troops crossed the start line and commenced the assault. He was sure they had virtually no armour. Odd infantry units could disappear without trace in the vast behemoth that was the Warsaw Pact Armies but not tanks, not in meaningful numbers. Without armour to lead the assault they should have needed the cover of darkness for their approach. It was almost as if they wanted to be seen. But then much of the information coming in did not make sense.

  Sitting at his desk he prepared to write the final draft of his signal. He found his hands were shaking, and he had to grip the pen with bo
th to stop it. Until now he had always had a senior officer above him to deal with the Marshals and politicians. If he did this and moved up to command of a whole sector then that burden would fall on him. The shaking slowed, almost stopped. Sweat stung as it dripped in to his eyes.

  A rap at the door and a signaller came in, handing over a sheaf of messages at arms length, as though he feared contamination from them.

  Going through them carefully Grigori noted that most duplicated information he had obtained from other sources and by other means. The last two lines were the most important. Zucharnins assault force had failed to reach its start line on time. The attack had been put back one hour. It was what he could have hoped for; things were already starting to go wrong for the General.

  * * *

  “Sorry about that. Our gunners have never seen one of these things before. You were lucky you were travelling fast and they had time to get off only one.” The Lieutenant Colonel watched while Dooley tried to hammer out the shell that had struck, partially penetrated and fused to the sloped front of the hovercrafts turret.

  “What about my report Sir.”

  “That the Ruskies are going to attack? This morning? I don’t think so Major Revell. This has been a quiet sector for a long time. Apart from a little more refugee activity than usual there is nothing going on over the other side.”

  Revell had done all he could. The colonel had been surprisingly reasonable about being woken so early but resolutely refused to countenance the possibility of the Russians crossing no mans land.

  “We’ve got the measure of them. Lord knows we’ve had long enough to get to know them. The colonel waved at his map. The Russian territory opposite the NATO line showed a sparse sprinkling of pins. “Look at that. We could walk over them with two cooks and the sanitary corporal. But why bother, it’s a quiet sector and I am happy to see it stay that way.”