by Vance Huxley
“Mahaan here. Trying to open the door. It might need a push.” Fifteen could hear gunshots in the background so he knew Mahaan still had ammunition. That had been a real worry.
“Don’t worry, we’ve brought a big push.” Koos hung onto a seat as the driver called out a warning, just before slewing the bus around ninety degrees to head down the last leg. He pushed his way to the front, peering through a loophole for a first glimpse of their destination. Nobody needed a radio to hear the gunshots now.
Further along in the direction the convoy had been heading, armed men screamed curses and piled into vehicles. They abandoned their half-built barricade because the bloody lunatics weren’t trying to reach the dual carriageway after all. One after another the gangsters roared off to try and catch up or intercept.
Ahead of the bus, two big concrete blocks, a van and two cars without wheels blocked the road, with men shooting at something beyond. “Brace yourselves, lads, one last barricade.” Fifteen clicked his radio. “Mahaan. Coming in hot. Cease fire and get out of the way.” He turned to the men in the bus. “Cease fire. Strap in and brace yourselves.” Suiting actions to his words the sergeant crammed himself down between two seats, with his back towards the direction of travel and his rucksack behind his head.
“Ten, nine, eight, seven.” As the driver counted down, a few last men hurried to brace themselves properly. Bullets hit the front, then shouting sounded from ahead. “Four, three, shit!” A resounding clang echoed. The bus seemed to almost stop as the front leapt into the air, crashing down again to lurch into another impact. A pistol and a rifle clattered along the floor as two men were flipped over their seats and flew down the bus, one crying out as he struck another seat. The one who struck a metal pole didn’t move again. The bus picked up speed again, shoving an overturned van along the road with a scream of tortured metal. Rubble spewing from inside the van explained the harder impact.
“Get up, get up. Return fire!” The sergeant wasn’t hopeful, because half the men were winded or tangled in their gear. With luck the vans behind would deal with the gangsters. Some men staggered to the loopholes, but few fired because the bus kept shuddering and bouncing up and down. With a resounding crack something at the front broke. The bus swerved viciously, throwing men off their feet as it bounced a few more times before juddering to a halt.
“Steering’s gone!” The driver stopped the engine. Despite the gunshots outside it felt almost peaceful when the din finally died down.
A man at the back looked out of a loophole. “We’re through, right across no-man’s land and so are the vans. They’re coming past.” He raised his rifle, aimed and fired. “Those idiots are still shooting at the vans, but I think we ought to get the hell out, Fifteen.”
“I hear you, two-two-nine. Everyone out of the driver’s door where the bus will cover you.”
“What about one-oh-four?” The medic had a hand on the man’s neck. “No pulse. Do we take him?” Two men were picking up a groaning fighter, helping him towards the door, while others were limping or holding themselves in obvious pain.
“He’s single, and we all agreed our bodies aren’t worth someone dying. Bring his number. We’ll be burning the bus so nobody will get at the body.” Fifteen waited as the other men filed past, three of them pausing to strip weapons and equipment from the body while one carefully removed the badges showing his police number. Most men laid a hand on the dead man as they passed, while a few made the sign of the cross. The exodus sped up as more bullets struck the steel plating, a couple punching right through. The gangsters had at least one rifle with decent ammo.
As the last man left the vehicle, ex-police ex-sergeant Koos pulled up a hatch in the bus floor, using a machete to punch holes in the thin metal top of the diesel tank until he had a rough hole. He chopped off some seat padding, dropping it into and onto the tank before standing a container full of old petrol, paraffin and oil at the front of the hatch. He lit the rag tied round the top, ducking when a bullet punched through the steel, whining overhead. As he left the bus Fifteen fired one shot at the container, splashing burning liquid on the ripped padding and the punctured tank.
* * *
A voice shouted from a nearby building. “Here.” Fifteen turned, seeing a turbaned man beckoning from a doorway. He hesitated, then dashed across the gap to more or less fall through the doorway. “Your men said you would be the last.” The bearded man held out a hand. “Mahaan.”
“Fift…. Sergeant Koos, or Koos. The men call me Fifteen.” Koos shook hands. “Are you ready to leave?”
“Not all of us. There must be a spy who can see us making preparations. The Barbarians still aren’t ready to mount a full attack, but they’re keeping our men engaged.” Despite the imminent rescue, Mahaan looked resigned. “Some of us will stay, a sacrificial rearguard while the rest get clear. Otherwise the Barbarians will swarm all over us and pick off the rear vehicles one at a time.” He looked over at the bus and the thickening smoke coming out of the loopholes. “Just as well. There isn’t enough transport for everyone now.”
“Maybe not wheeled transport, but there’s an alternative. Can we talk someplace?” Koos turned as shots rang out. “Will you be able to pull back from here without them following?”
“They will be rebuilding the barricade, in case we try to break out. There’ll be no attack.” A tired smile crossed the bearded face. “They know we have to run before Conan gets around to finishing us, so there’s no need to attack us. Conan is paying them to block the way.” Mahaan headed towards the back of the house before turning through a hole in a wall into the next house. “Follow me. We’ll be under cover all the way.” He continued talking as he led the sergeant through a succession of holes punched through house walls, moving away from the occasional shots. “We’ve still got enough diesel to reach your zoo. There’s a hundred and seventy-six with the refugees who came in, less than fifty fit for serious fighting. Half your men will need transport now that you’ve lost the bus.”
“Don’t worry about us, we have plenty of room. As long as you’ve still got a way to break a barricade, the plating on the vans should be enough protection once they’re on the dual carriageway. You can stick a few extra vehicles in the middle to carry the rest of your fighters, if necessary.” Koos looked back the way he had just come. “Though we’d hoped to have the bus to help with that. If the worst comes to the worst and the dual carriageway is blocked, we’ve paid for a clear route home.”
“How did you manage that? Your message was a bit vague.” Before Koos could answer, Mahaan led him into a small room obviously used for eating and, from the drawings and maps on the wall, planning. One of Mahaan’s men came in. Koos couldn’t follow the report, but Mahaan translated. “Everyone who’ll be going is waiting, ready to load up the vans. We will leave twenty men to slow the Barbarians, it is the least we can do.” He shrugged, with a wry smile. “And we don’t have enough transport for them anyway.”
“But you don’t need transport for most people.” Koos pulled out his own map, spreading it on the table before pointing to a blue line. “This is a canal that cuts across one corner of what I was told is your territory. Since I haven’t had a frantic radio signal, that’s your exit. You can use flat-bed trailers or bicycles to cart people that far because they won’t be shot at.” A big smile spread over the sergeant’s face. “We’ve brought these so the rearguard doesn’t need a lot of men.” He opened his coat to show the stubby automatic rifle. His smile widened even further. “What do you know about canal boats? The first part of our convoy arrived last night.”
A little later Mahaan knew a lot more about canal boats, especially the ones lurking completely unsuspected in a tunnel nearby. “I must send some fighters with the refugees in case the boats have to fight on the way back. Though there shouldn’t be anyone waiting, not if they got there unseen.” He shook his head, still thrown by finding out he’d left a hole in his defences. “Steel hulls? They’d punch right through the timbe
rs we put across the tunnel entrance. I never thought about anything that big.”
“It’s a pity we don’t have more, or we wouldn’t have needed the roads at all. I’ll put my wounded and a few others onto the boats as well, with a couple of automatics. They’ll be enough to get your people to their new home. The extra fighters will be handy here if the Barbarians catch us before we get clear.” Koos pointed at the odd-looking sword and the knives with the strange handles that were on Mahaan’s belt. “We’re not much good with that sort of thing. To be honest, I’ve never even seen anything like those.”
“You will, though we will start with Kirphan, the dagger.” Mahaan tapped the curved knife that all the Sikhs carried. “Your message said you wanted full training, so you’ll probably end up wishing you’d never seen Katari.” The Sikh stood, picking up a crude bow. “We are a little short on ammunition but arrows are easy to make.” Koos tried to stifle his disappointment as he followed. When the messenger had told him about Dealer, he’d hoped Mahaan could buy ammunition.
Looking at the weaponry carried by Mahaan’s fighters as he made his way to the front line, Koos could see these men were exactly what Precinct 19, and the Zookeepers, needed. The men, mostly Sikhs, carried a wide selection of well-used knives, swords and axes, as well as more of the crude bows. Despite them being no more than a strip of bent steel, with a wooden block for a grip, Koos reassessed crude when he saw the first man actually use one. The long uprights at each end of the bent centre strip were recurves, opening out as the man drew it to launch an arrow right across no-man’s land.
* * *
Now he’d seen their weapons, and how they handled them, Koos felt more confident that Mahaan’s idea would work. He called his squad leaders, explaining the change of plan. Instead of a fighting withdrawal, chased by gangsters, the rearguard would try for something more decisive. Koos’s six steel-plated vans, as well as any similarly protected vehicles Mahaan had, were brought up behind the first ruined buildings out of sight of the Barbarians. Koos soon saw what Mahaan meant about a spy. Across the rubble, he could see men forming up while the incoming fire increased. “That was quick. They know you’re leaving.”
“We can stop these. The problem will be whoever Conan sends to reinforce them once he gets the message. He’ll have heard your radio messages, then been told their spy has signalled. Extra men will already be on the way.” Mahaan glanced down at Koos’s jacket, where it covered his automatic. “I hope you’ve got plenty of ammunition for that.”
Koos glanced down, frowning because he wasn’t totally sure. A lot depended on how many men Conan had nearby. “Enough, I hope. I thought you’d have plenty. Your messenger mentioned a guy called Dealer?”
“One of the refugees told us about Dealer but I’ve never seen him. Once we get clear, we’ll try and work out why.” Behind them raised voices came from several of Mahaan’s men and four of Koos’s wounded.
“All our non-combatants, the women and children, will need their food and household goods if we are making a new life elsewhere.” A young, turbaned man gestured towards where the rest of the enclave were loading vans and cars. “More of us should stay and fight, to give the rest space to load everything and a better chance to get clear.”
“This is Fauja. He is fifteen, but has been training to fight ever since the Crash. He doesn’t understand how big the canal boats are, under the deck.” The ex-policeman listened as a torrent of some language flowed back and forth. The Sikh, Fauja, still looked unsure but in the end he accepted whatever Mahaan told him and left.
“He’s a bit young for this.” Though Koos wondered because the lad was well-armed.
“They all want to fight. We have trained for this, for Conan coming, and now Fauja has missed his chance. I’ve told him his job is just as important, getting the women and children out as fast as possible. They must take food that is expensive from the Marts, but are finding it hard to accept that doesn’t matter if we leave some vegetables because our new home has fields.” Mahaan turned back to look across at the Barbarians. “I have tried to encourage Fauja’s fighting spirit, because we will need it, but perhaps I succeeded a little too well.” He pointed at a small group of heads that kept looking at them and then ducking. “We must tempt them to attack soon, before the reinforcements get here.”
The sound of engines dying away meant the last of the refugees were on the way to the boats, so Koos shrugged. “No time like the present. I’ve told the men to keep the automatics hidden unless this goes wrong.” He clicked his radio. “Time to go, boys.” The men knew what that meant. The policemen all rose from their positions, racing for the vans now driving into view. As they did, shouts rang out across the rubble as the Barbarians broke cover.
* * *
“Here they come.” The anonymous comment was superfluous, but true. Seventy or eighty gangsters charged over no-man’s land, shooting as they came, some falling as single aimed shots and arrows replied. Not too many dropped, because the sheer volume of fire the Barbarians were throwing out kept heads down. Mahaan propped his bow against the house wall, peeked around the corner, then drew a sword and one of the weird knives. “They always do that to keep everyone’s heads down, even though they arrive with empty weapons. Conan’s fighters are numerous, strong, and well-armed, so once they get to close quarters they overwhelm their opponents.” A quick smile flashed across his face as he braced, waiting for the first man to reach the corner. “Usually.”
The first Barbarian coming around the corner killed himself, as Mahaan’s knife appeared exactly where his throat was going. He spun away, blood arcing as the next man came around the corner with his shield up to stop a repeat. Mahaan’s sword gutted him, then the main body arrived and sheer chaos ensued. Not complete chaos, Koos discovered, because the Sikhs really were serious about only wanting the policemen to watch their backs. He only needed his machete twice, once to stop a blow while he shot the gangster. The second time the sergeant’s pistol was empty, but as the Barbarian pulled back for another blow, his shield up to block Koos, the gangster spun away sideways.
Koos stared for just a second at the ring of bright steel embedded in the man’s neck, then shot a quick look as he realised exactly why Mahaan carried half a dozen metal hoops hung from his back. The sergeant slammed another clip into his pistol, waiting for the next opponent. He felt pretty sure the rest of the Sikhs couldn’t be up to Mahaan’s standards, or they’d have nipped over and cut the Barbarians to ribbons. Even so, they were a lot better with steel than any gangster Koos had met up to now. The odd snatches of fighting he saw showed his men struggling with hand-to-hand, as usual, but not dying. The ex-policemen weren’t doing much hand-to-hand fighting, as promised, because the locals were wielding combinations of knife, axe, sword or long-handled club with real expertise.
After a brief bloody battle the Barbarians died, the last few with arrows in their backs as they ran. Sheer numbers and the Barbarians’ armour and experience meant it wasn’t a massacre, but since any wounded gangsters were quickly finished off it looked like one. Seventy-one dead Barbarians had cost nine defenders, though at least five more might not survive without the zoo vet. Several of the remaining defenders were wounded, but most were still able to fight. Despite only being backup, Koos lost four to Mahaan’s five, and half the wounded climbing or being carried into the vans because they couldn’t fight on. The drivers and ten of the men climbing into the backs of vans, Koos included, weren’t injured. Twenty-seven uninjured fighters, mainly Sikhs with a few refugees and ex-policemen, returned to their forward positions.
Mahaan waited by the van to speak to Koos. “The spy’s reporting can’t be precise or they’d have known we had seventy men waiting. That’s more than Conan will have thought possible. Now the numbers out front are genuine, so I hope you have plenty of bullets. The men can hear a lot of vehicles arriving.”
“We’ll do our best. It’s still a better bet than running for it with all those vehicles chasing.”
Koos checked his clips. “I hope there aren’t too many armoured vehicles, because we haven’t got much original AP ammo left and the reloads are only lead.”
“Stop the first one or two so they block the road. We caught two vehicles with a trench hidden by rubble, just in front of our lines, so the rest won’t risk coming off the tarmac.” As the roar of engines grew, Mahaan turned to rejoin his men. “Will one rifleman be enough?”
“Oh, yes, five-one-eight won’t even need to pierce the steel plate. He’ll shoot straight through the viewing slits under three hundred yards.” Koos rechecked his clips as Mahaan left, because there really might not be enough if the Barbarians didn’t break.
* * *
The leading Barbarian, Garth, swerved off the road and screeched to a halt. He jumped out and dashed into a building, keeping low but nobody fired. One glance across no-man’s land spotted the bright green cloth, hung back inside a bedroom window where the Sikhs wouldn’t see it. That was all he needed. Garth raised the radio to his mouth. “Go straight over, armoured vans in front. Our blokes are dead but they must have thinned the Pakis out. Hit them now and we’ll trample over them and scoop up the runners, the women and kids. Try to club the fuckers so they can fight for us after we’ve got their kids.” Several vans and cars pulled aside for two vans covered in steel plate to lumber past. “All the men out of the first four vehicles, get upstairs in the nearest houses. I want lots of shooting to keep the defenders ducking. The rest of you, follow the armour.”
He stopped speaking as a single shot rang out. The left-hand van slewed sideways before ramming the rubble at the side of the road. Seconds later another shot had no effect on the remaining van. Garth started to smile. The driver had ducked below his viewing slit, trusting to luck to keep going straight, and the hardened steel would stop any bullets. The gangster had never come up against ammunition actually designed to punch through armour. Ex-police officer five-one-eight knew he’d shot through the slit, so his next bullet punched through the steel about an inch above the bonnet. Garth’s smile died as the second van ran up onto the rubble and stalled.
