by Mike Moscoe
“The mercs are that hard up for staff?” Grace asked.
“The Major was trying to hire my maid services.”
Grace scowled. Hanson hadn’t come across to her as the kind who couldn’t keep his hands off the help. Betsy shook her head. “What I really think he wanted was info from Allabad. Anyway, I turned down the job offer in a chatty letter that told him stuff that would have cost him a pile of stones if he was paying my usual fee. He came right back with another nice, friendly note, and we kept up the chat, me feeding him intel before he asked for it. But why would Santorini send a cook?”
“He knifed the Governor and Legate,” Grace pointed out.
“And if he declared the mission accomplished and called for a victory dinner, there might be few survivors if his cook had orders to poison them,” Betsy said as if she were practiced at that.
“That wouldn’t get every merc,” Grace pointed out.
“No, but it would get so many that even his Black and Reds could sweep up the leavings.”
“The mercs would take bloody revenge,” Ben growled.
“Not if Santorini shot the cook and told everyone he was one of the terrorists the mercs had been fighting,” Betsy said slowly.
“A profit-and-loss sheet that turns the mercs’ equipment into a source of annual income for Santorini and that letter makes for pretty damning evidence,” Grace said.
“Now all you have to do is tell that to Hanson. Good luck,” Betsy said.
A specialist manning the long-range radio in the corner sat up, took the earphone off one ear, and stood. “Grace, Ben: The mercs are pulling out of Dublin Town, heading this way.”
“How long till they get here?” Betsy asked.
“Tomorrow,” Grace said, looking back at her map table.
“Uh, ma’am, a Black and Red column, battalion-sized or larger, is skirting Lothran,” the specialist added.
“Looks like Santorini has everything headed north,” Ben said.
Grace tapped Dublin Town on the map. “The mercs are coming out. I’d have expected them to wait until early morning, but this will put them here around noon tomorrow or, if they push all night, just after first light.”
“Count on them pushing,” Ben said.
“It’s the Black and Reds that are the question. They can take the road to Amarillo through Dublin Town, following the mercs, or go due north until the road forks just short of Nazareth and heads east along the Colorado River to Amarillo.” Grace shook her head. “This doesn’t fit together for me.”
Betsy traced the road lines with her long fingers. “Santorini would never put his Special Police under the mercs. He knows Hanson won’t string up civilians.”
“A separate approach march would keep them out of each other’s hair for a while,” Ben said. With one hand he traced the route between Dublin Town and Amarillo. With the other, he covered the dogleg route between Lothran and Amarillo.
“Could the Black and Reds try a push into the valley along the west side?” Betsy asked.
“Not after our fight at Nazareth,” Ben said. “I am not saying they all are bad. But the ones sent out so far have not demonstrated much skill against armed resistance.”
“Santorini has some good MechWarriors he picked up drunk or deep in gambling debts,” Betsy said. “The head of his shock troops was a captain in a ’Mech unit—don’t remember the name. He got off-planet one jump ahead of a firing squad for rape. I think he’s found his calling with Santorini,” Betsy said, this time massaging her left breast.
Grace started to say something, then swallowed it. Betsy would talk about what happened to her in Allabad when she wanted to and not before. We’ll get all those bastards, Grace promised herself.
“I have an idea,” Ben said.
“You haven’t been dreaming while I’ve been standing here,” Betsy snapped.
“Only about you, my fine, raven-haired beauty.”
“Nova Cats don’t take a vow of chastity, do they?”
“I certainly didn’t,” the albino said.
“So this isn’t just a waste of air. Good, keep it up. The girl likes it. Somebody show me where I can get a bath. I have a sudden need to be clean.”
As Betsy left with a guide, Grace leaned across the table. “Now can I talk to Hanson. Tell him what I know. Certainly he can break a contract with a client who isn’t going to pay him. A client who is planning to kill him and his mercs at the victory party.”
“That is certainly good cause to break a contract. However, Grace, you cannot talk to him just now.”
“And why not?”
“You are his enemy. He is now under orders to attack you. He cannot talk to you, and he will not talk to you until your conversation consists only of you negotiating your surrender.”
“You’re crazy!”
“No, Grace. We are at war. We fight now. When one of us is prepared to surrender, we talk about surrender—and maybe contracts. But first, we must do something about those Black and Reds. It will be much easier to arrange things with Hanson if the Black and Reds are not turned loose in Amarillo.”
“But that would mean a sortie outside the valley. Won’t Hanson have us bottled up pretty well in the next day or so?”
“Yes, but what if you hold here stubbornly? Put up more of a fight, and, say, Syn and Wilson fold quickly and fall back. Hanson knows how to fight. He will reinforce success.”
“And if his right is successful, where will he pull reinforcements from to send there?” Grace asked.
“That, my commander, is what we help him decide.”
Grace eyed the map. She pulled up a chair and studied it from her vantage point, then moved the chair around to study it from Hanson’s side. While she sat, Ben moved a few pieces of paper and wood around the map.
Santorini was running with his plan. Should she change hers? “Ben, I see what you’re up to. Now, what if Wilson and Syn . . .”
“How bad is it?” Major Hanson asked Captain Graf, CO of C Company and Hanson’s point on the drive for Amarillo.
“Not good, sir. Your best view is from the upstairs porch of this old house.” The house was deserted but undisturbed. L. J. followed the captain out a window and stood on the porch roof. The land had looked flat from his command van. Now he saw what he’d missed. The land was rolling, and ahead was a slight but significant rise. The two lead platoons of C Company were deployed to either side of the road. A Joust tank had rolled out of its treads on the road. The infantry had gone to ground.
“What happened, Captain?”
“A mine damaged the tank, sir. There’re so many potholes it’s impossible to tell which are just potholes and which have mines under them. I ordered my sappers forward to clean the road, but they came under very accurate sniper fire, which I couldn’t locate. I deployed my infantry. Snipers dropped four including a lieutenant and a sergeant, and I still can’t identify where the fire’s coming from. When they dropped a second sapper, I quit, sir.”
“How far is it to that deep gully on the map?” That was where L. J. had expected resistance.
“Almost two kilometers, sir.”
“So somewhere in those two klicks are a couple of guys with rifles. Can’t your sensors find them?”
“No, sir. We’ve got the magscan gear up, but it’s gone crazy. The dirt around here is red—rich in iron—and somebody spread a lot of tacks out there.” The captain pulled a small carpet tack from his pocket. “Between the iron in the dirt and these damn things, my sensors say there’re a thousand rifles out there. Do we have enough artillery to flatten a half-klick around the road for the next two klicks, sir?”
L. J. scanned the ground. Rocks, brush, a few trees—mostly dead—more rocks, and more brush. “No; we’re light on artillery this contract,” he said as Captain Fisk of B Company joined them on the roof. “C, form to the right of that road. B, form a line to the left. Let’s see just how far out those snipers go.”
L. J. remembered his own recent experienc
e with Grace’s resistance. “Watch for woven mats—the grass around here matches the dirt. Get the infantry moving. Put them in the lead to check for holes. Have ’Mechs and tanks cover them.”
“Yes, sir,” came back at him. Grace O’Malley was a terrorist and too damn smart for either of their good—her and the six MechWarriors she’d hired. “Get your teams out. Find their flank. Let’s get behind them, come up their asses and put them down. We’ve got to secure this road.”
An hour later a hundred men, plus tanks, gun trucks and eight ’Mechs had beat the bushes. A small rise that seemed the source of their trouble had gone quiet as a church when they reached it. Now the next ridge over put fire on them.
Casualties came in dribs and drabs, but they kept coming. Men whose ceramic armor had shattered under a hit were sent to the rear to draw new armor. L. J. checked with Supply; there wasn’t a lot more armor to issue.
A sniper was finally flushed and brought in. “We dug him out of a hole under some brush,” the sergeant told his commander.
“Yes I was, under that brush and unarmed. They told me to bust my firing pin when you guys got close, so I busted it and I was unarmed and you guys treated me right nice,” the fellow in jeans and a plaid shirt said without taking a breath.
“How many of you are there?” L. J. asked.
“They told me you’d ask that, and they told me I didn’t need to know so I honestly don’t know. But there’s a lot of us, and we’re out there with our water jugs and our rifles, and if I was the first one you got, there’s a lot more of us still there.”
L. J. got in the guy’s face. “How many are out there?”
The guy bent his head back. “I told you, they didn’t tell me and I don’t know.”
“What were you, a platoon? A company?” L. J. roared. The man looked back as if L. J. was speaking some strange language. The guard took the prisoner away and Mallary stepped forward.
“Sir, if what he said is right, they’re behind us as well as in front of us. We’ve got a mess on our hands. I just got a report from A Company outside Bliven. They met resistance where they expected it and brushed it aside. They are advancing unopposed into the Gleann Mor Valley.”
L. J. followed her to the map table on the porch below. In the shade with a cold glass of water, it was pleasant. Strange, the refrigerator was still running. “Where’s D Company?”
“Sir. They haven’t gone far since they broke away from our route three hours back. Seems the locals have been out digging the potholes deeper. With water in them, trucks and ’Mechs don’t know if it’s just your garden-variety hole or a bottomless pit. Makes for slow going.”
“Company A report anything like that?”
“No, sir. I get the feeling the defense kind of fell apart on our right.”
“And the gang to our left is the bunch that swallowed a pretty good slug of Black and Reds,” L. J. muttered. Two good roads came out of Bliven that a flanking company could use to hit Amarillo. He faced an opposed crossing here, as would D on his left. Why fight for more crossings when he already had one?
“Order B and C Companies to fall back. Have B Company get on the road to Bliven. Tell D to have a platoon task force set up a roadblock on good ground and the rest fall back on us.”
“Yes, sir,” Mallary said, and went to execute her orders.
L. J. studied the map. Grace, you’re good, but I’m better. You’ve put together an army in damn fast time, but I brought an army trained and equipped to this fight. “Training will tell,” he thought, quoting his uncle. He frowned. On his left somewhere was a mess of Black and Reds. They’d be road-marching across the front of whatever was holding the west entrance to this valley. So far the enemy had dug in and fought where they stood or run as they had at Bliven. True, the west group had gone out to find the fugitives. The satellite had caught the end of that battle. The Black and Reds had been taken by surprise on their flank. One amateur fighting another, and the Special Police had shown they weren’t all that special.
Should he have that platoon from D Company search forward to make contact with the Black and Reds? L. J. weighed the problem and found that he had a solid basis for assuming the B and Rs could hold their own, and that if he extended his platoon he risked his flank. No, the Special Police should be able to handle any problem that came their way.
L. J. turned back to the situation on his right. That would make or break his attack.
Outside Bliven, Alkalurops
25 August 3134
Captain Yonni Brassenbird, commander of A Company, realized he might have misled Hanson a bit as he heard the new orders come over the static of the long-range radio. He hadn’t actually forced a crossing of the river up ahead. What he had done was flush out six snipers and they had fled in their pickups for the river. Minor difference.
Yonni urged his first platoon forward—a task force with two tanks and two squads of infantry mounted in Giggins armored personnel carriers. “Keep those trucks under fire, but don’t hit them. If they got the need to flee, let ’em go, and anyone they talk to.”
That was Major Hanson’s idea. If a bunch ran, encourage them. Send enough fire their way so they don’t forget why they’re pedal to the metal. Prisoners were to be passed through to the Black and Reds. Yonni didn’t need that blood on his conscience.
First Platoon reached the last bluff this side of the river. Yonni halted them on overwatch and ordered Second Platoon to pass through. Second had two hovertanks well suited for the riverbed. Its infantry were in trucks. They dismounted and began the river crossing on foot. Third and Fourth Platoons, ’ Mech-infantry task forces, would come up on each flank, provide cover fire, and be ready to exploit forward. The ’Mechs should have no trouble climbing down the riverbank and crossing a river barely two centimeters deep.
Yonni led his headquarters section forward in his newly assigned Legionnaire. This big ’Mech was one of the best in the battalion, and Yonni intended to show he knew how to lead from the front. Chasing a running bunch of civilians wouldn’t be much of a test, but the Major expected this push wouldn’t stop until they took Falkirk. Yonni intended his Legionnaire to be the first Roughrider into that burg.
Leaving his command van with First Platoon, Yonni joined Second Platoon as it made its way gingerly down the riverbank. There were plenty of paths worn by the local cows, but only the bridge offered an easy crossing. One squad of infantry moved across it under desultory and inaccurate long-range rifle fire.
“Bridge is rigged for demolition. We’re yanking wires,” the corporal leading that squad reported.
Well away from the bridge, the hovertanks sped down the bank, bouncing right and left as they nosed over. A Condor landed hard on its bow at the bottom and ended up stalled sideways. Yonni took his Legionnaire down a cow path, then patrolled back and forth in front of the stalled tank. Stopped dead, the tank was a perfect target for a antitank rocket, but all the hostiles got off were a few rifle shots.
“We got a tank stopped dead on our front and a Legionnaire just prancing back and forth,” Syn Bakai reported on radio.
“Hold your fire,” Wilson reminded her. He could spot her ’Mech MOD, as well as Jobe’s, under cover behind an iron grain elevator. “I’m coming up. Remember the plan.”
Syn snorted. “You won’t let me forget it.”
Wilson’s son gunned the jeep forward. Two pickups passed them, headed north out of Bliven. The good old boys in the back waved, rifles in hand. They’d done their jobs. Wilson shook his head. Sometimes herding dumb cows was easier than getting ’Mech pilots to do what they were told.
There was no cover the last hundred meters to the elevator. They took some fire, but nothing came close. Yep, there was nothing wrong with Syn’s eyes. A hovertank and a huge ’Mech with one nasty-looking rotary autocannon marched back and forth in front of a parked hovertank. Across the gulch came the sound of a starter grinding. That would be the dead tank.
A Navajo trotted out from the eleva
tor’s office, grinning. “We’ve got everything in place,” he said, climbing in the back of the jeep. “Those mercs are going to love dancing with Coyote.”
Wilson pointed for his son to park at the foot of Syn’s MiningMech MOD, and reached for the large wrench he kept under his seat for just such occasions. Shouldn’t be long now.
The stalled motor caught, and the tank got under way slowly. “I think we bent a blade,” the driver reported. Infantry were halfway across the trickle that the locals called a river. Yonni waded in behind them. Here and there, rocks created eddies in the water. He avoided the potential deep spots behind them as consciously as he negotiated the questionable footing of the rocks.
Suddenly, on his left, two gray ’Mech MODs stepped out from behind a tall metal building. They fired missiles, as well as a long stream of slugs. He snapped off a quick burst of fifty-millimeter rounds and sidestepped right, positioning himself at an angle that would complicate their firing solution. He adjusted his pace to avoid a rock as he tried to sight in on the lead ’Mech for an aimed burst.
Then he felt his left footpad sink into the muddy water. He bent his right knee quickly, taking the pressure off his ’Mech’s hips and hardly felt the explosion that sent water geysering up around his left leg. He pulled that leg up as a spray of enemy fire splashed a line of mud and water to his right. His footpad dangled uselessly.
“Damn.”
Yonni tried to fire off a burst even as he set his left leg down gingerly. Standing on one leg and shooting was not something ’Mechs did. Gyros screamed, and he jammed down his damaged leg to keep his ’Mech from toppling over.
To his right, infantry fire reached out for the gray ’Mechs from the perimeter on the north side of the bridge. That squad had cut all visible demolition wires. A Demon medium tank from First Platoon slowly nosed onto the bridge, its turret rotating to take the hostile ’Mechs under fire.
Then all hell broke loose.
An explosion shattered the middle bridge span, sending chunks of deck and girders skyward. Then charges sheared off the two spans on either side of the middle one. Two final explosions dropped the last spans, intact, so they now led down to the dry riverbed at totally unusable thirty-degree angles.
