Killing Ground

by James Rouch

  It was exhausting, punishing work. The wild shadows thrown by the burning truck played constant tricks with their eyes. Sometimes it smoothed deceptively a series of jagged crags, then would threaten them with a bottomless black gulf where none existed.

  The way grew steeper and at times Ripper had to be dragged or lifted. Two of the girls were also in difficulty, but their companions helped them, urging them on with earnest words of encouragement.

  None of them dared look up. The point they aimed for seemed as far away as ever. And if they looked back all there was to see was the burning Scammel, now alight from end to end as its diesel fuel boiled and ignited the wooden load bed and the cab.

  Andrea felt herself to be climbing like an automaton, handgrip following handgrip, instinct taking over from reasoned thought. Her arms and shoulders ached but she pushed from her mind the urge to stop and rest. She suppressed the thought that not all of the thickly sown mines might have been triggered or neutralized by the great mass of falling stone and tiles.

  She slipped, and felt the hard rock pummelling her body before her kicking feet and scrabbling fingers found holds to check her slide. Gulping air, she steadied herself, then began cautiously to edge to the left in search of an alternative route.

  Looking back, Andrea saw the others, more strung out than they had been at the start, and working in small groups for mutual support. It was not just to avoid unwanted advances that had prompted her to be a loner; it had always been her way to avoid dependence on others or responsibility for anyone. But as now, that could work against her, force her onto her own resources, to near breaking-point.

  They were halfway, almost to the top of the fallen rubble. Beyond that was bare rock for nearly a hundred meters before they might find some footing among the broken remains of the outwork.

  A stone her foot dislodged tumbled away to miss their prisoner narrowly. She saw his upturned face mouthing obscenities at her, and purposely dislodged another.

  Hyde could taste the paste of mortar and ground granite. It clung to him in amounts sufficient to triple the weight of his combat fatigues and drag him down. He felt as though he had been climbing forever. Concentrating only on the next hold and not dwelling on how many more there were to go, he was surprised when he caught up to Andrea. She had stopped in a patch of deep shadow between two huge blocks.

  ‘This is no time to be taking a breather. Keep moving.’

  ‘How?’ The light from the burning truck was diminishing but it served to display what lay ahead. Andrea slumped against the debris. ‘I had thought the falling material, besides covering the mines, would have shattered the cliff face. It has not. Instead it has swept it bare of any ledge or hold.’

  It was the first time Hyde had ever heard her defeatist, and by that he knew she was too exhausted to go on. Her iron will and rigid self-discipline, her determination never to be bettered was finally evaporating, beaten from her by the gruelling climb.

  ‘Right. We’ll rest here a while. Wait for the others to catch up.’ Scanning the rock wall, Hyde could see only confirmation of her words. ‘There’s got to be an alternative route. We’ll find it. We bloody well got to, we haven’t a choice.’

  Ripper hauled himself into the small space, and put his hand to the dressing on his leg. It felt freshly damp. He was bleeding again.

  ‘Sarge, what we’ve ‘done so far was tough, but not even a mountain goat is going higher. I got to tell you, Fm not feeling at my best, but I sure as hell don’t want to be left here. Come daybreak it’ll be a sitting target for the first commie that wanders down that road.’

  ‘Listen.’

  Shepherding the girls to join the group, and dragging the deserter with him, Burke shushed them to silence. It was hardly necessary.

  From the direction of the mill, growing louder every moment, came the rumble of tank tracks. They were travelling fast, as attested by the thrashing and squealing of linked cast-metal over sprockets and return rollers.

  ‘You know,’—tampering with the field dressing made Ripper wince with pain as the soft absorbent wadding moved across the ragged edge of the wound— ‘I think we are well and truly in the shit.’

  They watched the lead tank of the Warpac column slew to a violent halt on the apex of the bend before the roadblock. Its long cannon barrel swept back and forth as its turret oscillated to cover each side of the road in turn.

  ‘Please, just don’t look up here, boys.’ Ripper felt mesmerized, like a deer in the beam of a hunter’s flashlight. ‘I bet he’s getting his ears chewed off for stopping.’

  ‘Maybe.’ Hyde examined the T72 through his glasses. Every hatch was dogged down tight. While they remained like that there wasn’t much chance of their spotting a small group high above them and trying hard to make themselves inconspicuous. ‘But maybe that jamming is a two-edged weapon. It’s being pumped out at such a power it could be screwing up their radio links as well.’ He turned to Andrea. ‘Did you say that Spetsnaz creep you hit had a microwave dish?’

  ‘Yes, and from the look of it I would say it had seen considerable use.’

  ‘So.’ Hyde looked at the long whip-aerial above the turret. ‘If their communications are buggered we should have confirmation any second.’

  The tank recoiled on its suspension as its cannon spat a 125mm high-explosive shell into the obstructing avalanche of stone at point-blank range.

  The blast of impact and the sharp crack of firing blended in one, and when the smoke cleared the ragged stack of material appeared undisturbed.

  Tentatively the gunner’s hatch opened and a figure, grotesquely distorted by the erratic light, lifted itself out and slid warily onto the rear deck. There came the tinny ‘clang’ of a track-guard-mounted locker being opened. Unrecognizable pieces of equipment were taken out, and then a shallow metal dish that was handled carefully.

  ‘Take him out, Andrea, fast.’ It was a terrible gamble, might have the fatal consequence of drawing attention to them, but for Hyde that was one consideration among many.

  There was a perceptible delay, not long, but sufficient to be proof of just how tired Andrea was, and then she fired. The grenade’s accuracy, or lack of it, was further demonstration.

  As the grenade impacted on the road under the rear of the T72, the hull protected the gunner from the fragmentation effect but it was close enough to send the Russian scuttling head-first back inside the turret.

  Reloading quickly, Andrea took aim for a second attempt before the hatch was pulled shut.

  ‘Forget him. Smash that gear on the rear deck.’

  Hyde’s instruction came in time and the second 40mm round arced down to the road to detonate on the tank’s engine deck close to the open locker. The litter of unassembled equipment was instantly mangled and swept away, along with bedding rolls on the back of the turret.

  Even as that second grenade did its work of destruction, the T72 and other unseen armoured vehicles on the road behind it opened up with their main and secondary armaments and fired a protective screen of smoke bombs.

  Long bursts from co-axial machine guns were dwarfed by the massive concussion of heavy cannon and the rapid crackle of lighter weapons aboard APCs.

  Unaimed, unleashed as a wild, blind, suppressive fire, the gun flashes hit the scene in a stroboscopic nightmare effect through which only the flashing blurs of orange and green tracer could be discerned.

  Ricochets soared from the lower slopes and flew past the huddling party, and then a single 30mm armour -piercing round found them, tumbling deformed after its first contact with a boulder.

  A piercing scream, and blood showered over them all. The body of a girl fell forward and flopped from projection to projection until it was lost amid the jumble of stone. Two more of the girls whimpered in pain, struck by shards of bone from the shell’s unwitting victim. They slowly collapsed and their heads lolled as they went into shock.

  The rest of them crouched lower, those on the outside questing with their fingertips fo
r anything that might be dragged across in front of them to form a barricade.

  ‘I told you all.’ Ripper got no satisfaction from the mass of young warm female flesh pressing against him. ‘We are deep in the shit.’

  SIXTEEN

  Step by laboured step Revell had watched the painfully slow ascent of what he had become certain was Hyde’s group. There were men, volunteers, who could be spared from other tasks to go out and assist them. It was the lack of suitable equipment that had delayed the attempt.

  One of the few cellars to be completely caved in beneath the crushing weight of the falling walls had been that containing the pioneers’ specialized stores. Among the items buried were all the coils of rope and wire cable, the hand winches and the blocks and pulleys.

  It had taken an hour’s hard work and a measure of luck to salvage sufficient rope for them to entertain the hope of reaching the stranded party.

  Voke entered the MG pit and looked down into the darkness. ‘We have spliced the lengths together. I think with what we have we could reach them from the outwork.’

  ‘That means opening the postern door.’ The information posed Revell a dilemma.

  ‘What with the generator and all the activity down there, the moment we open up it’ll stand out like a beacon on every Warpac IR-scope in range.’ ‘We could erect a sandbag wall immediately inside.

  With all power off while we bring them up, the risk would be much reduced.’

  It was the straw Revell had been searching for and he grabbed it. ‘Get to work. Put as many on the job as there’s room for down there.’

  From the road far below came the faint but distinctive grind and rattle of tank tracks. A moment after came the short sharp crack of a rifle grenade, quickly followed by a second.

  At only a few paces Voke could hardly see the major’s face. He hesitated, waiting to see if the order would be countermanded.

  ‘Carry on.’ As Revell made his way to the courtyard he heard the storm of wild retaliatory fire, and hurried to join Thorne and the waiting mortar crews.

  They stood ready, the absurdly long Merlin rounds held poised above the gaping tubes. The barrels were almost vertical, in anticipation of engaging close-range targets.

  ‘I want two rounds dropped right under the wall, then four more walked back along the road, fifty-meter intervals. Fast as you ...’

  His last words were drowned and his ears punished by the blast as the first armour -seeking round was sent on its way. The second blast came only a fraction of a second later.

  Revell was tempted to grab the pocket-sized fire-control computer and calculate the time of flight, but knew that in his unpractised hands it would take too long. He tried to read the pale green glow of the display ticking away the time on target in Thome’s hand.

  ‘…three …two …one.’ For an instant, doubt flashed through Thome’s mind, then he heard the vicious screech of the warhead’s detonation on a hard target. It was followed by a more powerful explosion. ‘Set the bastards’ ammo off. Must have impacted beside the driver’s position to do that. Second was either a dud or couldn’t find a tank of its own.’

  At short intervals more rounds were slipped down the dull-painted tubes and each time the blast seemed little attenuated by the bell-shaped muzzle-tops.

  The transit times of those rounds was fractionally longer, but there were three more audible indicators of successful hits.

  ‘Right, move, you lot. Time to get our heads down.’ Unfastening a barrel from its bipod, Thorne led his men and Revell in a dash for the cover of a doorway. A makeshift dogleg barricade had been erected in front of it.

  ‘They’re slow off the mark.’ Thorne checked his watch. ‘The commies have counter battery fire down to a fine art. I’m amazed we got that many away without getting one back in our lap, let alone had time to bolt.’

  ‘Maybe they weren’t looking our way.’ Revell propped the hefty circular casting of a base plate against an ammunition box. ‘I expect they will be the next time.

  There’s some telephone gear down below. Rig up a line from here to a good observation post on top. Once the fight starts in earnest there’ll be no point in trying to hide. Until then restrict yourself to anti-armour shots at identified targets.’

  Far above the ruins, its bursting lost among the rain clouds, a giant star shell crackled into spitting magnesium light. The immediate effect was an unearthly glow that increased in intensity as the parachute-suspended ball of iridescence dropped lower.

  ‘That’s 155mm.’ Thorne looked at the slim 81mm mortar barrel he held. ‘Hardly fighting fair, is it? They must have some heavy self-propelled artillery supporting the column.’

  As the illuminating round continued its slow, gyrating descent, Revell headed for the cellar entrance. He took the stairs three at a time and quickly reached the spot where Voke was directing and assisting in the erection of the sandbag wall.

  ‘No time for that now. Kill the generator. Get the door open.’ A bolt stuck and Revell grabbed a hammer from a pioneer and smashed at the rusted metal, breaking it with his third blow.

  The door was pulled open not to the jet emptiness of an overcast night, but a flood of silver light that made them throw up their arms to shield the eyes. Some- where behind them the generator died. Had it not been for the cessation of its almost subliminal humming they would not have noticed. The few lights paled to total insignificance against the glare.

  Burning vehicles on the road, their flames fed by hundreds of litres of fuel, the bodies of their crews and all their ammunition could not compete.

  Making the most of it, a young Dutchman started down the steep ramp of the outwork. The path was narrower than previously, and lacked its protecting wall, all smashed and swept away. Twice he had to stop to clear through mounds of broken brick. He reached the second tower, paused to examine the way ahead, then turned to wave for others to follow.

  Three more followed, carrying the untidy coil between them. They wedged a pickaxe into a crevice and secured the rope by several turns around it, then began to feed the loose end over the side. As they did the light from the star shell was suddenly lost.

  Hyde felt the frayed end of rope brush against his shoulder. His first grab missed and almost sent him over the edge. Regaining his balance, he waited for it to swing back and this time caught it just before it would have hit him in the face.

  He accepted the blond girl Burke thrust forward to be the first, and began to fasten it under her arms.

  ‘I will stay behind with this one.’ Andrea indicated their prisoner. ‘And will come up last.’

  ‘The fuck you will.’

  The little blond girl began to shake as he fastened the rope, and Hyde began to expect trouble from her, but some quiet words from Burke in his appalling German and she was still and made no fuss as she was hauled up. Small pieces of rock rained down. Absently he noticed the sparkle of quartz inclusions as they reflected the light from the fires below.

  ‘You are not staying here on your own with this crud, because we’d never see him again.’ Hyde knew Andrea’s reputation and had seen in action what it was based on. ‘Eventually this bastard might get shot, or maybe hung, but sure as hell he’s not going to be diced.’

  ‘You tell her, Sarge, prisoners’ rights. You tell her.’

  Hyde’s left hook to the deserter’s face would have sent him to his death if the same fist had not grabbed a wad of his clothing and pulled him back from the brink. ‘Any more out of you and I might let her change my mind.’

  His facial wound reopened by the blow, and still dazed by it, the man squeezed himself back into a niche. Slowly he slid to a sitting position and tried to stanch the renewed bleeding by pressing his face against his drawn-up knees.

  Twice more the sergeant had to employ the same punch, the last time because he’d instinctively ‘pulled’ the first go at quieting a girl who’d not responded to gentler methods to quell her hysterics when her turn came.

  It was Rippe
r’s turn. He was cracking weak jokes as he started up, but then had to turn all his attention to preventing his wounded limb from making hard and frequent contact with the rock.

  A steady cascade of chippings marked the progress of those already on the path, as they cautiously shuffled their way to the sanctuary of the castle cellars.

  ‘You’re next.’ Pushing the rope toward Andrea, Hyde waited for the inevitable argument, but there was none. His offer of assistance securing the lifeline was brusquely rejected.

  ‘Me next?’ Even craning his neck right back until it clicked, and squinting in the poor light, Burke couldn’t see if all the girls were now safely within the shelter of the massive walls, but he knew the first of them would be.

  ‘What is this placer

  Ignoring the deserter, Hyde watched their driver safely on his way, before turning and roughly hauling the man to his feet.

  ‘Is it some kind of blockhouse, a command post? What is it? I’ve got a right to know what I’m getting into. I’m a prisoner, right? Well, prisoners have to be removed from the battle zone, don’t they?’

  Not responding, the NCO waited for the rope to reappear, then threaded it through the man’s pinioned arms.

  ‘Here, no. Come on, play fair, Sarge. You got at least to untie me. I’ll get broken to pieces being dragged up there ...’

  ‘Much the same will happen to you down here if you keep on whining. Be grateful I haven’t tied it round your ankles instead.’

  ‘Hang on. I’m only a bloody deserter. Hundreds of blokes do it every month.’

  ‘But not all of them team with the scum of the Zone and start up in the slavery line.’

  His anger would have led him to say more but the men on the path, sensing the weight on the line, began to haul. Hyde had to content himself with giving the man a hard twist that was certain to make his ascent all the more uncomfortable.