by Swanson, Jay
“They're on their way, sir. We promise, the first unit is only twenty minutes out from you now. The rest will be hot on their heels.”
“We don't have twenty minutes!” He shouted. “We don't have twenty–oh what's the goddamn use?!”
He threw the receiver down again and turned on his heel, spying the worthless lieutenant in the process. “You! God damn your ugly eyes, get over here!”
“Sir!” The lieutenant ran over to meet Phelts as he stormed back towards the bunkers.
“You're going to have to defend the harbor with what we have.”
“Sir?” The bleak look of terror on the lieutenant's blood-drained face almost threw Phelts into a new fury, but he needed his calm. They all needed his calm right now. If this was the best he had, he would have to take control and hope his grasp of tactics was enough.
“You've got how many soldiers and engineers left at your command?”
“Forty and eleven, respectively sir.”
“Good.” Phelts let out a deep breath and then turned back to the lieutenant. “I figure you've got fifteen minutes before you've gotta start firing at those ships. Seventeen if you're lucky.”
“How do you know that, sir?”
“Math, damnit, listen to what I'm saying. Divide what you've got evenly, two teams of twenty and five or six. Load those trucks up with what ammo you've got left, and send everyone to the bunkers on the end. You!” He shouted at the girl engineer from before. “Come here!”
She ran over. “Sir!”
Phelts began walking towards the trucks as he kept talking, maintaining his calm to keep their panic at bay. “I want you to divide everything you've got evenly. Ammo, parts, everything. Take two trucks north and two trucks south.” He pointed along the defenses as if they wouldn't figure it out on their own, then hammered on the horn of the nearest truck three times. “Put soldiers in the farthest bunkers of both sides and prep them to start firing, then send your engineers to work on the next guns down the line. Move from bunker to bunker, keeping them active as the ships pull into the harbor, and unload everything we have on them.”
“Sir,” she said. “We don't have enough rounds to keep the guns firing beyond the first ten or twenty bunkers at most.”
“That's fine. Reinforcements are on their way.” The look of relief on the lieutenant's face almost led Phelts to punch him squarely in the mouth. We need my calm. “Go, now.”
She turned and ran to the nearest soldier, sending him to gather troops from the south as she turned north. Most of the nearby soldiers and engineers were already appearing from bunkers in response to the horn.
“What about me, sir?” The lieutenant stood there dumbly as Phelts watched her go.
“You...” He did a little twirl on his feet to keep his fist from flying. “You drive a truck, carry a shell, throw yourself over the cliffs and try to sink a boat with your dense skull for all I care! Just do something to help!”
Within minutes the trucks were loaded with most of the troops and what gear they could grab quickly. Phelts jumped in the truck with the girl and was soon grateful that the area behind the bunkers had been cleared and leveled. The trucks could speed off to the bunkers without much difficulty. He wished he'd had more time, had more troops, had anything more at his disposal right now than he did. But he'd have to come up with something if his office were to last for more than a day.
The ships were so close now he could make out their hulls, long black things that looked like jagged daggers jutting from the sea. Each layer stuck out in front of the next like overlapping plates of armor on a joint, and though the sails looked tattered they held the wind perfectly. He swallowed in spite of the dryness of his mouth.
They unloaded their gear into the farthest two bunkers. The soldiers worked to prep the guns that were already assembled as the engineers went to work on the ones that were not. Phelts busied himself moving the truck, getting it ready to move down the line as soon as the enemy advanced into the harbor.
He parked, parts and shells sliding and rolling around the back as he came to a stop. As he hopped out he took one last look from the roof of the farthest bunker. They're so massive... and as they grew so did his dread. Good god, they're terrifying.
He ran down the stairs, hoping to find the guns ready, hoping in vain they wouldn't even be necessary. “We need a miracle,” he muttered to no one as he looked back out at the sea. These two bunkers were the only ones that were angled out to face the ocean, and he hoped that their four guns would somehow be enough to stem the rising black tide.
It didn't take a mathematician to know the hope was utterly hollow. He knew their rate of fire, their range, everything his guide had told him earlier, and none of it was enough. These guns were too old.
“How close do they have to be before we can begin firing?” a soldier at the next gun over asked the girl engineer as she packed up her gear to move to the next bunkers.
“A lot closer than that,” she said. “They don't have to be right under us, but they've gotta be uncomfortably close.”
“They're already uncomfortably close,” the soldier said as she left.
The next few minutes passed in agony, the sea breeze rushing past and creating the only distraction from the inbound horrors. He wished that breeze would die, wished that their sails would fall empty or somehow be forced back. And then, as if in response to his hopes, they began to slow. More than that, they began to stop.
“Do you see that?” One of the soldiers leaned over the ledge as if to see better. “What are they doing?”
“They're stopping...” Phelts dared to say it.
“They're stopping!” One of the soldiers cheered as if the invasion had been canceled.
But it was then that Phelts knew no such thing were possible. Each and every ship in the front row of seventy ships raised their bows on hinges, and from their gaping hulls hundreds of small boats slid silently into the water to make their advance on the harbor.
“Oh God...” The soldier at the window backed away.
“There are hundreds,” the soldier next to Phelts said quietly.
And there were hundreds. Each ship in the front row dropped between seven and ten of the small vessels, and if there were any more to come in the following rows of ships, they could number well into the thousands.
“What are they?”
“The landing party,” Phelts said, and a brilliant landing party at that. Even if the guns were fully operational, it would be impossible to sink every one of those little boats. They were barely the size of small fishing vessels and would take up all of their collective energy while the rest of the fleet advanced behind them. The water was as still as one could hope the ocean to be as well, which meant they couldn't hope for much chaos to unfold in their short trip to shore.
“Can we even hit those things?” The soldier at the window whipped around. “I've never so much as fired one of these ancient cannons!”
“It's not that hard,” Phelts said as he walked forward to get a better view. “Just pull the chain.”
His mind was already working rapidly to account for what he was seeing. He had no idea what was in each of those boats, but even if they only carried ten soldiers, they were facing a landing party comprised of upwards of six thousand soldiers. That was just the conservative estimate for the first wave of the landing party.
Who knew how many were on each of the larger ships, and what kinds of monsters those black hulls contained? Oars slid out into the water from each of the small transports as they cleared the hulls of their mother ships, which came as a small relief to Phelts to see. At least they'll be slow.
But as the oars began to pump in unison, the little boats began to pick up speed, and they didn't seem to be slowing in their acceleration. As he watched, they gathered so much momentum that all sense of relief from the moment before evaporated.
“Draw out the guns,” he said quietly.
“We'll never hit them.” The soldier beside him was
visibly shaking from fear. “There are too many... they're too small...”
Phelts turned to the soldier with an utter calm that ran to the very center of his soul. “Then you'd better get good at aiming these things, and do it fast.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
THE BOATS THAT HAD DROPPED INTO THE WATER FROM THE LARGER SHIPS WERE A DEEP GRAY, accented in dark streaks by the tar that held them together. As they drew closer, Phelts realized they were covered. Only one creature could be seen standing at the back of each, their hunched muscular figures a gray that nearly matched the boats they seemed to steer. Simple iron helms reached down to cover their nose and cheekbones, but their gaping jaws were left half-open like a dog on a hot day.
They must have been men once. Phelts had never seen anything like them. It was almost as exhilarating as it was frightening. What are they?
There were ten soldiers between these two bunkers, the others having gone on to prep the next set of guns. The flurry of activity was lost on Phelts, completely mesmerized by the rhythm of the oars before him. The boats weren't terribly long. They almost looked fat to him, their tops covered in layers of shielding that combined with their oars made them look like giant insects slipping through the water.
“Sir.” The soldier behind him motioned to step aside. “They're almost in range.”
“Fine.” Phelts moved aside to where he could still see and covered his ears.
The other member of the two-man team rushed to the front, making one final adjustment to their aim before jumping back with his ears covered and yelling fire.
The gun looked like it might jump through the back of the room as the concussion of its discharge took Phelts back a step. There wasn't a ton of smoke, not so much as to obscure his view, so when the shell struck the water between the boats he had nothing to shield him from the disappointment.
“Reloading!”
The soldier near him adjusted the aim of the gun with a newfound confidence of his own, mumbling angrily about needing to lead the ships more. The other guns next to them began firing as well.
“Check!”
“Clear! Fire!”
Another concussion rocked the bunker as its metal payload sped towards the sea. This time it struck one of the boats, sending up a burst of broken wood before it faltered and began to sink. Phelts couldn't help but clap at the sight, elated that perhaps they could do some damage. But the blood-red creatures in the boat were jumping out and swimming towards their neighbors. It looked like the wounded boats were spilling their entrails into the sea.
He realized in that moment just how much distance the boats had managed to cover in the span of time it had taken to sink one. He kept track of the number of ships sunk and divided it by the rounds fired by both the north and now the south cliff. There would be no stopping this landing party, not before they entered the harbor, certainly, and probably not even after they had entered it. Especially with how few guns they could man at once.
“Give it three more minutes,” he shouted to the soldier nearest him, “then head for the next bunkers down!”
“Sir,” the soldier had to shout over the booms of the guns as well. “We couldn't get 'em all in ten minutes!”
“No, but they'll be into the harbor by then.”
He turned and left the bunker, running up the stairs to the outside and making for the first southern-facing bunker in the line. When he got there he discovered the guns already manned. “Where are the engineers?”
“They're in the next bunker over.” The soldier tasked with firing and reloading looked pale. Phelts couldn't blame him.
“Be sure to lead them well; they're moving pretty fast.” Almost in time with his instruction, the scattered line of small boats appeared in the distance near the southern cliffs. “They'll be here soon,” Phelts said as he made for the trench to the next bunker. “Sink the first one that comes in range!”
He ran down the line to the next bunker, where the engineers worked frantically to finish assembling a hinge that had rusted out since its last check. The girl with her hair tied back was leading the process; she had a dark streak of grease on her cheek now and a fire in her eyes. Phelts suddenly found her very attractive in the midst of the unfolding chaos.
“How's it coming?”
“We only have enough gear to get us through three, maybe four more bunkers. A lot of the guns this far out haven't been touched.”
“Which means the rest will go quickly though, right?”
“Those things are moving so fast, having the men to man them is going to be a bigger problem, and soon.” She dropped down to support the hinge as its freshly-greased pin was dropped back in, and then stood to wipe her hands on her coveralls. “We're going as fast as we can, but it's not nearly fast enough.”
“I'm on it.” Phelts turned to run up the stairs in the back corner of the bunker. He didn't even want to know how close the boats were now, but he could hear guns in the next bunker down begin to fire. He raced to the truck, jumping in through the passenger's side and reaching for the receiver before he saw trucks approaching on the road in the distance.
“Finally! Some good news!” He moved to the driver's side, pulled the ignition lever, and put it into gear so quickly that the rear tires kicked up a spurt of dirt as he took off. He raced as fast as the truck could handle, bouncing and rattling over hidden bumps and grooves in the grass as he went. The trucks were almost at the central bunker. This was the best news he had been given yet.
He grabbed the wireless receiver, “Who's approaching in the trucks? You on wireless?”
“Yeah, what's goin– oh my God...” He must have finally caught sight of the incoming invasion.
“Precisely. I need you to divide your troops and man the guns in the bunkers starting with the farthest out and working your way back to the center. Some of the guns aren't yet operational, but we need them all manned.”
“Aye sir. It is 'sir,' isn't it? We heard Merodach is down.”
“I'm in charge,” Phelts said with a grin he couldn't help. “I'll meet you back in the center when your men are in place.”
“You heard the man,” the voice came over the wireless, but not for him. “Lead truck's headed north, second you head south, alternate directions and fill those bunkers! Drivers turn your trucks around after you've unloaded and prep 'em to haul back to the choke point if things go bad.” Each peeled off in alternating directions until all twenty trucks had gone off to find a bunker.
Phelts parked his truck next to the car he had ridden in with Merodach that morning. It was unbelievable how much things had changed in the span of a couple of hours, both for the better and for the far, far worse. There had been rumors of the Relequim's return, but there were always rumors, that was nothing new; he had never thought that their old enemy would actually show up here. He had certainly never thought the Relequim would make an attempt at his original landing point; the ancient had already been defeated here once, why would he risk a second attempt?
And then it struck him. This is why. This is why he can make such a brazen attempt at taking our Continent from the same spot he was once defeated. We've been fighting ourselves and can barely man our defenses, our overgrown and dilapidated defenses.
He grabbed a set of field glasses from the glove compartment and walked over to stand on a bunker that was just right of the pit left by Merodach's assassination. He would have to turn that into some sort of memorial, he realized. Something to commemorate where the city's great leader had met his unfortunate end, something small and easily corroded, but he didn't have time to dwell on it.
He scanned the line of small boats before him as the guns along the cliffs came to new life. The first row was already a quarter of a mile into the harbor, but was slowly being torn to shreds. The sight gave him hope; perhaps things could go their way after all.
Then he saw new boats being lowered into the water behind the oncoming wave. These were much more slender, black, and fast. They came speeding up so q
uickly that he realized they would be in the midst of the incoming fleet by the time the first boats were reaching the ruined pillar.
What on earth are those for?
More guns were coming to life, unloading as low as their trajectory would allow, each side blasting towards the foot of the other. The crossfire turned into a deafening roar, yet still the boats continued forward. Phelts saw another boat ripped apart, and focused his field glasses on it in hopes of seeing what it carried.
The inside of the boat was a sickly red, like fatty meat torn fresh from the bone, and was writhing as the wood splintered and separated. It looks like... tentacles. Whatever the things in the boats were, those that survived the shot squirmed and slithered out of the ruined boat and made their way towards the nearest that remained afloat.
But instead of climbing on board, they seemed to attach themselves under the hull and do their best to propel the boats even faster.
What are you? And then it came to him. Fodder.
He looked back up in time to see a new wave of boats finish being unloaded into the water as the bows of the ships began to close and their crews set their sails to advance. They're just the fodder.
The black boats careened forward, traveling almost at twice the speed of their gray counterparts. They spread thin, moving towards the outside of the formation until they were up against the cliffs, and then they unloaded their passengers.
Phelts' stomach lurched in horror as he realized what was happening. Spindly, black, wolf-looking monsters poured out of the black boats as they began to crack and splinter against the cliffs. Some were so far as halfway into the harbor by now, the monsters leaping out before the boats were destroyed and scrambling up the sides of the cliffs. They were having a hard go of it, the rock face intentionally left unstable by the designs of the Magi, but the monsters were making headway. They climbed like some wretched lizards, and for every one that lost its footing to fall, another moved past and took its place.
Phelts ran back to the truck and grabbed the wireless receiver. “The walls! Shoot the walls!” He waited a moment, but there was no response. He cursed and whipped around as the first of the black monsters reached the window of a bunker.
