The United Federation Marine Corps' Lysander Twins: The Complete Series: Books 1-5

by Jonathan P. Brazee

  “Fuck that shit. You’ve got time for another hand,” Chili said. “Sit.”

  “As much as I’d love to do that, I must be off, duty and all that, doncha know,” he answered with a dramatic flourish.

  He stepped back from the ammo container that had been serving as a card table, barely noticing the twinge in his leg. He’d been taken off the brace since the day before, and it frankly amazed him that only a week ago, he’d had a hole punched right through his leg, and now, he could go on a ten-klick forced march if he had to.

  Battle was a four-hand game, no more, so as soon as he stood up, Myra-Jean Sassoon jumped off her cot and took his place. Chili was already dealing the next hand before Noah was out of the tent.

  The E-4 tent was two steps away, and Noah stuck his head in the portal.

  “You get the word?” he asked Knight.

  “You heading out already?” Knight asked, checking the time.

  “No reason to delay. She’s probably going to tell us the Anvil’s new name, so we might as well get it over with.”

  Lewis shrugged and pulled up his overalls. He’d been in the Ba-Boom, not the Anvil, so that name meant nothing to him. He joined Noah as they started towards the ramp, which had been expanded to hold not only the twenty-two tanks, but now six Aardvarks and the retriever. Two Aardvarks and a Davis were on sentry duty, but still, twenty-seven armored vehicles took up a lot of space.

  The two crewmates headed for Bay 1, the expeditionary maintenance bay where the Anvil was being repaired. Noah could see the gunny on top, deep in conversation with Pure Dick.

  “Gunny, you wanted to see us?”

  She looked around, then checked the time.

  “You’re a little early, but that’s OK. I think we’re about there. Charlie-One-Three is combat ready, right, Casper?”

  “As ready as she’s ever going to be out here. Which is a freaking miracle, if you ask me, that we got as much done as we did. Not every team would have bothered, you know.”

  And she did look pretty good, Noah acknowledged. Maybe a little rough, but she looked ready for war. His eyes strayed to the front of the tank where the name was normally painted, and it was blank, covered over during the repairs.

  In older versions of armor, a tank or APC’s name was painted onto the main gun, but with a Davis and its interchangeable MGS, the name had been shifted to the prow of the tank, just where the frontal armor started sloping to the back.

  He felt a degree of loss, which was stupid, he knew. A name was just a name, nothing more. A tank was her crew, not a label. And “Anvil” wasn’t even his choice. Staff Sergeant Cremineli had named her, and he’d never even told the others his reasoning behind the name. But Noah had never known another tank other than his training platform, and it hurt a little to let that go.

  “Tomorrow, we’ll put her through her paces in a mini-shake-down, but there’s one more thing we have to do,” she said as Pop walked up, a small can of gold paint in his hand.

  “I can’t keep calling her Charlie-One-Three,” the gunny said.

  Right on that point, he agreed.

  It had simply sounded wrong for her to be using the platoon designation. Crews didn’t do that for their own tanks.

  “So, we come to the name. My first tank as a commander was the Boudicca.”

  Noah kept his face neutral. “Boudicca” was not a name that inspired anyone, he thought. It wasn’t bad, but an ancient warrior queen didn’t convey the power of a tank. The first sergeant’s Night Witch, which Chili had told him was in honor of a squadron of female pilots back in WWII on Earth, was better if going the historical route, in his opinion. But he guessed it wasn’t that bad of a name. He whispered it as if trying it out.

  “And I intend to keep that, with Boudicca II. But not yet.”

  Not yet?

  “I’m only with you two until we get back to Archuleta. You’ll get a new TC, and I’ll be in the platoon sergeant’s position with a new Davis. So, I don’t think it’s right for me to impose. This is your tank, and you’ll be serving in her. So, what do you think?”

  Noah was surprised at the lift that simple statement gave him.

  “I think it’s up to the sergeant, Gunny,” Lewis said.

  The gunny looked at Noah and asked, “Well, Sergeant?”

  Noah hadn’t been prepared for this. Like any tanker, he’d poured over names to have just the right one for when he’d become a commander, but this was too quick. Not that there really was a choice. Only one name would do.

  “Anvil, Gunny. I think we should keep her as the Anvil.”

  Chapter 24

  “Hug the left,” the gunny told Lewis. “That scree on the right can make the tracks slip.”

  Noah hadn’t even considered that, but the gunny was right. There wasn’t much in the way of scree from the hillside, but even the small patch ahead could affect the Anvil if Corporal Lewis had to apply the power while they were on it. And if the Peters were going to ambush them, the spot would be perfect for that very reason.

  Riding with the gunny was a 180 from riding with Staff Sergeant Cremineli. Where the staff sergeant was aloof and uncommunicative, the gunny kept up a constant dialogue, giving directions and offering observations. It might have been annoying to have a commander getting into the weeds like that, but her tone was neither critical nor condescending; it had more of a teacher-student feel. Already, Noah thought he’d learned more over the last four weeks with her than he had in almost two years now as a tanker. If he’d slightly resented her for taking over the Anvil before, that had long-since vanished. Every thing she taught Lewis and him was going to make him a better commander once he got his own tank.

  It had helped that things had been fairly quiet since the fight. When Pure Dick had declared the Anvil battle ready, that hadn’t been quite the case, as they’d found out during the initial shake-down. There had been some issues with the weapons turret. They’d gone back to the ramp where the gunny had taken Pure Dick aside, and Noah and Lewis had wagered how long it would be before the head tech erupted. To their surprise, he seemed to take it in stride, and when he jumped inside while Noah demonstrated the traversing problems, he’d simply nodded and told him his team would get right on it.

  Even that was a lesson for Noah. There tended to be a bit of mutual disdain between the Marines and the civilian tech teams, but they were all in this together, and it didn’t make sense to be at odds with the very people who kept their tanks up and running. He still thought Pure Dick could be an arrogant asshole, but that didn’t mean they had to be antagonists with each other.

  And now the Anvil purred. She could have been right out of the factory on Trappist 115. Noah wasn’t sure how the gunny managed to be on a first-name basis with Pure Dick, but he was pretty sure that relationship had been good for the Anvil.

  That was pretty important right at the moment. A slipped track, a problem with the motor now, and they could be in deep shit.

  The Anvil was the lead in a two-tank patrol, and Noah felt the eyes of a thousand Peters on them. The day before, the Kiss of Death and the Ball Shot had gone out on a similar patrol. Today, it was the Anvil and the Evangeline from Second Platoon. The lieutenant hadn’t encountered anything, but to Noah, all that meant was that the Peters had been alerted to the patrols.

  Most of the Marines thought that the Pytor Velikiy forces had been spanked pretty badly and that they would lick their wounds and let the negotiations progress as they willed, but Intel was picking up signs that they were angling for another confrontation, one of which they could take advantage. No one thought they’d assault the combined task force, but they couldn’t hit the Novyy Ural militia without going through the Marines. But a quick strike against a target of opportunity might be in the cards.

  And what was two tanks off on a patrol but a target of opportunity?

  “Hold up, Knight,” the gunny ordered. “Noah, keep your attention here.”

  Noah looked at his display at the swash of co
lor she’d splashed over a cut in the hills to the right. He wiped the color off, then focused 40% of his scans to the area.

  The tanker in him didn’t like sitting still. Tanks were made to move—they were not simply pill boxes that could be transported from position to position.

  His scanners picked up some noise, but it could be anything. There was certainly no confirmation that the Peters were up there ready to pounce. But this had been a war of cloaking and spoofing on both sides. Their patrol was running cloaked, although not to the full employment of their capabilities. They’d be invisible to low-tech surveillance, but not to visuals nor to some of the more advanced scanners known to be in the Pytor Velikiy T/E.[28]

  Noah’s display flashed amber, and he grimaced. Gunny had just gone active, pinging the shallow valley in front of them. That ping could be picked up by almost anything. If there were Peters searching for them, that had probably given their position away. Instinctively, Noah hunched down in order to look into the sky, as if he could see the Pytor Velikiy version of the Marines’ hummingbird and dragonfly drones.

  “OK, I think that’s long enough. Let’s move on,” the gunny told the corporal.

  Lewis drove the Anvil down the slight decline, keeping off the trail itself and onto the grass on the shoulder. The Evangeline followed in trace. If the Anvil didn’t hit a mine, neither would she.

  Unless it’s command detonated, and they want to block our retreat, Noah thought, then mentally kicked himself for bringing up yet one more thing that could go wrong.

  He’d been less stressed during the last battle, if that made sense. There, he’d known what faced them. Now, he didn’t know, and his imagination was running rampant. For all any of them knew, the entire Pytor Velikiy force was waiting in ambush for them, eager to take out two lone tanks.

  As if she could sense his stress, the gunny said, “Nice and easy. We’re just on a routine patrol between camp and the Peters, right?”

  Noah focused on the area the gunny had highlighted, trying to occupy his mind. If they were hit, he was determined to strike back, and strike back hard.

  But nothing happened as the two tanks slowly traversed the valley. In another time and place, he’d be happy with the hatches open, just taking in the sunny day. This area had been untouched since being revegetated with Earth trees and plants, and the wilderness was beautiful. It was hard to believe that the platoon had been in combat only 40 or so klicks to the east just four weeks ago.

  “Looks like this is coming up dry,” Lewis said as they reached the edge of the valley—which was also the limit of their patrol.

  “I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” the gunny said. “Let’s turn her around and start back, but I want to see if we can make our way a little closer to the west, along the base of the hills.”

  “Off the trail?” Lewis asked.

  “Affirmative. If it gets too congested, we can bring it back.”

  “Roger that.”

  Drivers generally loved to go cross-country. Noah certainly had while he was a driver. As a gunner, however, he was more concerned with his fields of fire. And if the gunny had been right about the high ground, then by driving the Anvil along the base of the hills, he’d be far more limited as to what he could engage if the need arose. There was also another problem—even if he was able to engage, a tank bucking up and down over rough terrain made keeping his gun on target all the more difficult.

  “Yee-haw!” Lewis shouted as he smashed through the low foliage as if he were back on Quintero Crag and not in a potential combat situation.

  Noah struggled to keep his butt in the seat as he was bounced around. He was getting beat up despite jamming his feet against the console frame in an attempt to lock his body into place.

  At least we’re not going to hit a mine, he thought. They can’t have enough to mine the entire wilderness.

  “Heads up,” Gunny passed to both tank crews. “Be ready to bug out.”

  Noah looked at his display, wondering why her caution. He was still receiving some of the same noise, but nothing reached the level of an alert. He wasn’t against caution—sometimes it was the best course of action. But he wasn’t sure why she’d said it now.

  He pulled up an overhead view, trying to figure it out when an energy bloom appeared, right at the cleft in the hills.

  “Incoming!” he shouted.

  “Hard right to the trail,” Gunny said in a calm voice.

  Lewis almost slung the Anvil around, dashing to the trail some 300 meters now to the east. Alongside them, 50 meters away, the Evangeline followed.

  Noah rotated the turret until it was pointing to the rear. He ran a back trace on the missile just as the Evangeline’s IA fired, knocking the missile out of the air. Noah ignored that, firing two of his 90mm HE rounds. His display started flashing with data points. Mortars were firing from beyond the cleft on the reverse slope, protected from retaliatory fire from either of the Davises, but Noah didn’t think they had a round that would be too much of a threat to either one of them.

  Noah didn’t like riding facing the rear of the Anvil—it made him queasy—but he was part and parcel of the turret, and the known enemy was up on the high ground. But his display was beginning to show more forces, and as he expected, others were closing in on them, trying to cut off their retreat. He looked to his left and caught a glimpse of the Evangeline as she bounced along, her turret to the rear as well, so Noah rotated to his right to be able to react quicker as soon as he had a target. He wouldn’t have been able to do that with the railgun. The barrel was long enough to protrude well past the side of the tank, and with them plowing through the vegetation, it could get caught on something sturdy and become damaged. The 90mm, however, was much shorter, and not nearly so vulnerable.

  Explosions started to land around them as they reached the trail and Lewis started accelerating up the incline. The same tiny rockets that had knocked out the Federation tanks’ Hashers in the first battle flew at the two tanks in waves, but with them at close to 70 KPH, none of the rockets hit their mark, instead flying past or impacting on the polycero armor without effect.

  The Anvil’s IA deployed twice, but Noah barely noticed as he started putting out rounds, simply aiming them as area weapons.

  “Back off ten KPH,” the gunny told Lewis.

  Shit! Noah thought as he fired off another shot, his instincts screaming to speed up, not slow down.

  He’d used 12 rounds without a confirmed kill, so he switched to the M104 and sprayed the hillside. A tank was not the best weapon of war against disbursed troops, so he thought his 104 might be a little more effective.

  “Start the smoke,” she passed to Staff Sergeant Patel, the Evangeline’s TC.

  Noah couldn’t help but to glance back where a cloud of smoke started streaming from the back end of the tank.

  Something hit the Anvil with a clang, but she never faltered. Along their entire left flank, the forest was swarming with what had to be at least a hundred soldiers, all converging on the two tanks to cut off their route of escape.

  And two M249s opened up, raking the hills with 20mm rounds. Lewis spun the Anvil to a stop, facing the hillside as two PICS Marines rushed past them and on into the trees. Noah could see the smaller figures of straight-leg infantry as they advanced to meet the Peters.

  Noah finally let out a huge breath of air. Their job was done. They’d suckered the Peters into an ambush. Tanks were not the best choice against a disbursed infantry force, but nothing was better against a foreign infantry than a company of infantry Marines. Or at least a company minus. One platoon of Kilo was over the line of hills and would now be converging on the weapons systems at the cleft. Here, in the valley, a platoon of PICS infantry, the remaining straight-leg rifle platoon, and the weapons platoon were taking it to the numerically larger, but far less capable Pytor Velikiy unit.

  “You can turn off your smoke now,” the gunny passed as the little generator on the back of the Evangeline kept spewing out the sm
oke that Pure Dick had rigged up to simulate a damaged tank, one that the Peters could kill if they just pushed a little harder.

  The smoke was now settling around them, blocking visibility. Their role as bait was over, but they were supposed to be in support of Kilo now.

  Not that it mattered, in the end. Noah never fired again. The Peters, intent on catching the fleeing Davises, must have been shocked by the sudden appearance of the infantry. Noah would have been, too. Who would have thought that the infantry would have infiltrated in three days prior to take positions, dug into spider holes and covered with tarnkappes? Who would have thought that a platoon of PICS Marines could get their combat suits into position, and then lay flat, for three days, not moving?

  Well, the Marines would have thought it, but evidently not the Peters.

  The plan was that the ambush would have been sprung the day before, but the Peters hadn’t cooperated. They had today, though.

  Noah almost felt sorry for the Peters. If he’d had to sit in a spiderhole for three days, if he’d had to lay down inside a PICS for three days, he’d have been ready to unleash holy hell on the reason for that.

  Noah had popped open his hatch when the first of the prisoners, nine of them, were escorted back to the trail. Several glared up at him as if this was all his fault, which he easily shrugged off. He kept his 90mm pointed at them, but that was mostly for show. They’d surrendered, and the Peters had kept to the Harbin Accords so far, so the Marines owed them the same.

  All told, 31 prisoners were taken, eight of them wounded and being treated by the corpsmen. Another 40 or so Peters had been killed, while the rest had managed to escape into the hills. Another 12 had been captured up in the cleft with 3 KIA. All at a cost of three Marine WIA.

  Those numbers were astounding, to Noah. They’d had three KIA alone from the platoon in the first fight while only achieving about the same kill numbers against the Peters. Noah was proud of being a tanker, and he was a firm believer in a Davis’ capabilities, but this only cemented his deep-set belief that the right weapon had to be used against a specific enemy. A tank might have problems against a well-trained, disbursed infantry, but it could take out a fighting position with ease that might hold up an infantry platoon for a day.