Paladin of Shadows 4 - Unto the Breach

by John Ringo

  The military value of white phosphorus lies mostly in its smoke. The burning metal releases clouds of the stuff. It's not inherently harmful; once it is cooled it can be breathed without serious short or long-term damage. And created faster smoke than conventional smoke rounds with the added benefit of being, well, horrific.

  It was for these dual purposes that most mortar "obscurement" rounds were made of white phosphorus. The ladies of the Keldara had not intended to kill Kamas, they just wanted to blind the unit in a cloud of white.

  Of course, burning a fucking Chechen was always a good thing. Blinding one, in truth, was even better. Burning off balls would be happy making.

  The Keldara mortar women loved white phosphorus.

  Haza looked down the zigzag trench as more of the Chechens began screaming in pain. Many were already dead or severely wounded from the terribly accurate mortar fire; most of the fire had been dropping right in the trenchline. He could hear the fuckers; they were close. But the way that sound echoed in this damned pass, he couldn't place where the fire was coming from. It could be anywhere.

  But he knew what the white phosphorus meant.

  "Get up!" he screamed, lifting himself to the lip of the trench. "Get up! They are coming!"

  He didn't know who was coming, he wasn't sure what direction they were coming from. But smoke only meant one thing. The infantry would be right behind.

  * * *

  Mahmud fired at the shape of a helmet behind a pile of bodies then darted forward as the group ahead of him went to ground to provide covering fire.

  There wasn't much in the way of cover on this slope. He could see where rocks had been pried out of the ground and even the remnant of sticks that had been range markers. The defenses were well prepared which just made this assault that much more idiotic.

  Sho'ad was running beside him, as he'd been instructed, yelling as much as the thin air would permit and firing his AK in long, unaimed bursts. Mahmud considered telling the young idiot to conserve his ammunition then decided he didn't have the air or the care. He'd started the same way, screaming and running at the enemy, firing bullets everywhere but at the enemy. If he lived, the young idiot would learn.

  Mahmud sensed rather than saw the rounds and dropped to his face, lying behind a convenient body, as bullets, sharp sounding, probably 5.56 from the enemy's squad automatic weapons, ripped overhead. He heard the thud of the bullets hitting something and then the thud of a body hitting beside him.

  Looking to his right he shrugged. Sho'ad wasn't going to be learning anything.

  He reached over and took one of the dead idiot's magazines. He was going to need the ammo and Sho'ad sure as hell didn't.

  * * *

  Kiril fired a burst at one of the Chechens but the guy dropped before he could have hit him. However, his partner was still on his feet, screaming at the Keldara lines and spraying and praying. Kiril fired a burst into his chest and sent him to Allah as he wished.

  He tracked right and continued to fire at the charging fedayeen. They were getting close. On the other hand, they were starting to bunch up and the careful fire and maneuver that they'd used on the lower slopes was breaking up as the assault dissolved into a human wave charge.

  That was fine by Kiril. More Islamic fuckers to send to Allah. More souls for his Death Guard. Souls to share with his love...

  * * *

  Mahmud could hear the SAW even over the rest of the firing. It was firing in precise bursts. These Keldara might be ghosts to the local kids, but they were also good.

  However, he could also tell, by the sound, when the machine-gun tracked away from him. The note of the firing changed, became more muted, when it wasn't pointed directly at him.

  He rolled up to one elbow and pointed towards the sound. He saw the SAW gunner immediately, just the shape of a helmet and an arm behind the weapon. But he was less than fifty yards away. Easy shot...

  * * *

  Kiril couldn't understand how he'd gotten into the bottom of the position. He could see his SAW above him, still hanging onto the edge of the position by its bipod feet. It was hanging down, though, not being fired. It had to be fired. It should be served.

  Above him he could see birds. Ravens. Circling above the battlefield. The eyes of the Father in a red sky.

  "Gretchen...?"

  * * *

  Mike was firing, now, hunkered down against the right-hand side of the opening to the bunker. They were individual, aimed shots at the Chechens that were at the fucking trenchline. Some of them were jumping it, heading for the bunker.

  He saw one of the fedayeen jump the trenchline, a young guy, screaming at the top of his lungs and pulling frantically on the trigger of an empty weapon. The image was there but it was filed away in some corner that wasn't in the present reality. The only present was the two rounds he put right into the screaming mouth and the automatic part that told him the tango was serviced, sir, you can move on.

  Another part of his brain was waiting for something. He couldn't describe it but it was like art: he would know it when it happened. Battles don't just go to the best or the most numerous. Most battles in history had gone to the side that just held out the longest. The side that just refused to quit. The side that you could wipe out but would refuse to fucking quit. The side that committed its reserve the last. Who dares, wins.

  Mike felt it, even as his earphone crackled.

  "Kildar. They have committed their reserve."

  "Adams! 60s!"

  * * *

  Sawn looked up and around. Kiril's SAW had stopped firing. They needed that firepower if they were going to hold on.

  He stepped back and turned to run down the trench, M4 pointed down in a tactical carry. He could damned well run a SAW if he had to.

  * * *

  Mahmud darted forward and jumped into the empty SAW position. They would have to clear the trenchline and from where he was it made most sense to move to his right.

  He ignored the weapon - it would be picked up after the battle - and turned right, holding his AK forward and ready to strike. He had fought in trenches before and knew that an enemy could appear at any time. The thing to do was to move forward, fast. Strike with the barrel or the butt. Fire when sight-lines made it possible but most of all move forward fast. Take the positions still trying to defend from behind.

  The direct line on this trench was about four meters to a turn. He hurried that way and, at the turn, almost ran smack into one of the Keldara who was running down the trench. He had probably noticed the SAW was out of action and was going to see why.

  Mahmud clutched at his trigger and fired three rounds, point blank, into the man's chest.

  * * *

  Sawn grunted in surprise as the rounds hit him then struck out, a trained and reflexive reaction, the barrel of his M4 striking the AK upwards and to the right. He followed in with the butt of the weapon, smashing the fedayeen in the chest and knocking him backwards. The M4 was bent by the combined blows so he dropped it as his hand dropped to his belt, ripping out his axe as he darted forward.

  The Islamic raised the AK, either in defense or to fire, but Sawn's axe cut down in a lightning strike, sliding along the barrel and taking the man's fingers off his left hand. A second blow laid open his head.

  Sawn fell to his knees, suddenly feeling weak. Just combat reaction, he was sure. He had been trained in this, had read the book on it. The sympathetic nervous system, the part that controlled direct action in the human body, went into full overdrive during intense moments of combat. When they passed, the parasympathetic nervous system, the part that was in charge during sleep and ran all the automatic systems, came back with a vengeance. You felt weak and nauseous. Your hands shook. You wanted to sleep.

  The briefing had never covered being cold...though. And he couldn't understand where the flood of bright red pouring out of the bottom of his body armor had come from...

  * * *

  Adams slammed the butt of his M4 into the back of
one of the fedayeen's head and watched it buckle. The head and the butt. Fucking M-16 series weapons were lousy for close combat!

  "Adams! 60s!"

  Fuck! They were down to hand to hand in the fucking trenches. How in the fuck did Mike expect him to get the fucking machine-gun into action.

  Oleg, though, had heard the call. He left his axe in the face of the Chechen he had just killed and picked up the 60 off the ground where it had been hidden. Another Chechen tumbled into the pit but he ignored the fedayeen as he cocked the weapon.

  Adams wasn't about to let Oleg outdo him. Stopping only to kick the Chechen so hard his mother was gonna bleed, he picked up his own and dropped the bipod into the firing position.

  The target view was pure Chechens. So, taking Mike's advice against his better judgment, he pulled back the trigger and started firing continuous.

  The M-60 series of weapons was first developed in the 1950s as a replacement for the WWI era .30 caliber machine gun. Air cooled, the series had suffered throughout its existence with many problems. It tended to jam, it overheated quickly and when overheated would tend to "cook off", fire continuously despite releasing the trigger as rounds were heated hot enough to "explode" when they touched the smoking breach. The barrels also tended to heat quickly to the point that they would "droop" and cause an explosion that destroyed the gun. Mixing "cook-off" with "droop" was a sure recipe for disaster.

  The Army had eventually replaced the venerable M-60 with the M240 series manufactured by the Belgian firm of Fabrique Nationale. Machine-gunners throughout the Army and various other users had breathed a sigh of relief because while the M240 had its problems, it was head and shoulders above the 60.

  The M-60E4 was the manufacturers attempt to regain that vast market it had lost. Besides various improvements to make the gun more reliable, overall, they had paid tremendous attention to barrel and breach design, using a series of new materials to improve barrel life, barrel strength and cooling.

  Adams knew, from too much experience, the sound, the smell, the feel of an M-60 that had been overworked. And he knew right when that feel should start. He knew he should be firing in short, controlled, bursts. But...damn there were just too many of the fuckers. The 7.62 rounds were dropping them in windrows, but there were still more! He knew he had to let up on the trigger, that the fucking 60 was going to overheat, cook-off, jam, fucking blow the fuck up at any moment. But if he stopped firing the fucking Chechens were going to overrun them. As it was, his 60, Oleg's and the two with Vil and Sawn had stopped them, butt cold. To even fire in bursts would mean they could move forward, maneuver, something. He had to keep firing, just holding the fucking trigger down. It was the only way to stop the assault!

  And the funny thing was... the fucker was still rocking! He could feel it. Like driving a car, you can feel when the car is at its maximum, when you'd pushed it too far. He had that same sense with a weapon, especially the 60 which he'd had to fuck with for far too long in the teams. And this fucker, this bad boy, it wasn't having any trouble with continuous fucking fire! The screaming Islamics were being ripped to fucking dogmeat by this beautiful fucking weapon and it wasn't even giving a God-damned hiccup!

  "YEAH!" he screamed. This motherfucker was ROCKING AND ROLLING! "EAT HOT LEAD THINLY COATED WITH COPPER YOU ISLAMIC MOTHERFUCKERS!"

  * * *

  The Kildar called it "the money shot."

  Sniping is, essentially, just a normal form of infantry combat. The sniper fired at the enemy with a rifle. That was the essence of infantry combat. Oh, he might fire further than normal, he might use more camouflage. But he was, really, just an infantryman with a few more tricks in his bag.

  The big difference with the sniper over the regular infantryman was in how he chose his targets. The infantryman tended to concentrate on the men in front of him, similar in interests and actions, the riflemen and machine gunners that were trying to kill him by direct fire.

  Snipers, though, had another duty. Their purpose was to find and eliminate priority targets. Snipers were the reason that infantry platoon leaders had one of the shortest life expectancies of any position in combat. The enemy sniper sought out the leaders to disrupt the management of the battlefield.

  With the Chechens this was especially important. Their leadership was very personality based and extremely hierarchical. Take out the leaders and the followers tended to not only lose morale but have no fucking clue what they should be doing. The Chechens, also, derived their mimetic combat background from societies that specialized in hit and run. If the first rush didn't work, they tended to retreat. Especially if they didn't have anyone behind them driving them on.

  Finding the leaders, therefore, was the primary job of the Keldara snipers. And getting the big leaders, the senior commanders, ah, that was the money shot.

  Pavel had been scanning the battlefield, keeping an eye on how things were going, for the entire battle. And he knew that the Chechens were at the trenchline, that they'd committed their reserve. He'd called both in. But he also knew that somewhere down there was the man driving them on. The main leader. The man the large brigade had gathered around for a thousand personal reasons but all related to his personality, his ability, his command skills. His charisma.

  He finally found it. A cluster of people behind the lines. Radio antennas.

  One man was in the center of that. Oh, not the precise center but a sort of psychological center of gravity that was felt more than analyzed. The man that people were looking at. A big man, graying hair, very serene expression.

  Pavel hadn't even realized he'd fired until he saw that expression change as the round hit the center of the man's white mustache which suddenly became crimson as brains splashed onto the ground behind him.

  * * *

  Again, Mike felt it, like a shock rippling through the enemy. It was time.

  He keyed his throat mike and strode out of the bunker, ignoring the rounds that cracked around him.

  "ARISE KELDARA!" he shouted, firing one handed at a Chechen that had, somehow, made it through the fire and was about to jump into Adams' position. The Chechen flew back in a spray of blood. "UP YOSIF! UP OLEG! FORWARD VIL! UNTO THE BREACH, TIGERS OF THE MOUNTAINS! FORWARD THE AXE AND THE FLAME! KILL ALL OF THESE MOTHERFUCKERS! LET NOT ONE ESCAPE!"

  * * *

  Shota was very unhappy. He had this beautiful rocket launcher and he hadn't been allowed to use it. One Chechen had even gotten to his position, which was just forward of the command bunker and to the right. Shota had picked him up by the leg and beaten him on the side of the position until he stopped squealing. They were all over the place and still he hadn't been allowed to shoot.

  But when the Kildar called, he scrambled to his feet, grabbing the launcher and jumping out of the hole in the ground.

  There were Chechens everywhere. He couldn't figure out where to fire.

  "Target! Guy in the red shirt!" Yakov shouted, grabbing him by the shoulders and turning him. "Fire!"

  Oh, that was easy. The guy was barely fifty meters in front of the trenches.

  Shota didn't even bother to use the sights.

  * * *

  Adams ducked as a massive explosion went off to the front of his position then picked up the M-60, cradling the remaining links in his arm.

  "Oleg, see you in a bit," he said, frowning.

  "I'll give you cover, yes?" Oleg said, hopping up one-legged onto a firing stoop so that he could see over the palisades of the position. He began firing, sweeping the M-60 back and forth, still going continuously. The position was filling up with brass and links. They both must have fired over a thousand rounds each and the weapons still weren't giving a hiccup. "Take some of my ammo."

  "Okay," Adams said, clambering out of the position he had occupied for so many hours. The Chechens were still trying to move forward but they were looking...weak. They were hardly firing; apparently most of them had expended their ammo and weren't in any mental condition to reload or scrounge if necessary.
The explosion had shaken them and another to the left that almost knocked Adams into the trench again was worse.

  Eamon Ferani, loaded down with ammo boxes, clambered up beside him and grinned.

  "The Kildar wishes us to advance, Master Chief," the boy said. He drew an axe and waved it. "I will cover your sides, yes?"

  "Oh, fuck yeah," Adams said, lifting the belt up a bit more and raising the machine-gun to his shoulder. He clamped down on the trigger and started striding forward, sweeping the weapon from side to side. It was like shooting a God-damned fire hose. "OH, FUCK YEAH! I GOT ME ONE OF THESE YOU ISLAMIC BASTARDS!"

  Over his screaming, and the continuous clatter of the gun, he thought he heard wings beating. It sounded like a giant bird, bigger than any bird, ever...

  "THE DRAGON IS ON YOU, YOU BASTARDS!"