by John Ringo
* * *
Mitchell grimaced and looked over at Indy’s panels; half the systems were yellow and there were an increasing number of red lights. “Well, we were getting the shit shot out of us, but other than that…” He looked around and realized that fire had started to fall off. “Is it just me or… ?”
“Major, I personally don’t believe it, but it looks like we’re clearing this valley,” the battalion commander replied with a grin that could be heard over the radio.
Mitchell looked at his monitors and snorted. The largest remaining group of Posleen were those around the humans, which he intentionally had not engaged. And it was less than a company. Other than those, and a few leakers in the side valleys, the way was totally cleared. He snorted again and then began to laugh hysterically.
“Major?” Reeves called. They were alone in the compartment but Mitchell had shut off his radio and was rolling around in his chair laughing as if he couldn’t stop. “Sir?!”
“Oh!” The major gasped, getting some control over his laughter. “Oh! Oh, shit. Sorry, Reeves. Shit!”
“What’s so funny, sir?” the driver yelled. “I mean, we still have to get those guys out of there!”
“I know,” Mitchell said, wiping his eyes. “Oh. It’s just what went through my mind. I was looking around and all I could think…” He started laughing again until he was heaving.
“What?”
“I was just thinking: ‘Ka-CLICK!’ ”
* * *
Simosin’s driver had clearly taken him at his word. Either that or the boy was just insane. They hit the slope for Deere Creek so fast the Bradley was momentarily airborne and then slammed into the far slope.
The general pulled himself upright and waved at the TC. “Tell him he doesn’t have to go that fast!” he shouted, pulling himself around to look out one of the vision blocks. There wasn’t much that could be seen that way so he waved at the TC again and forced him out of his hatch.
When the general finally got up where he could see, it took him a moment to get his bearings. For just a second he was afraid that they had gotten out ahead of the SheVa or that the division was just gone. But he quickly noted the light fire going on to either side and the somewhat heavier fire, including the occasional blossom of a plasma gun, at the end of the valley. The problem to either side was the lack of fire. And the reason for the lack of fire was a lack of targets; the Bradley was lurching over a carpet of centauroid corpses.
He gestured for the TC to give up his crewman’s helmet and plugged it into the intercom. “Son, don’t worry about getting shot. Forget the SheVa for a second and get me up on a hill. I’ve got to get a look around.”
The Bradley obediently made a hard left and headed up the nearest slope. There was a house at the top, or had been — it was a shattered shell now — and the Bradley driver added insult to injury tearing up the driveway and into the yard. But it was a hell of a view.
Simosin had snuck up to the fighting positions during the battle and had seen the valley rippling with Posleen. What it was filled with now was… bodies. Human and Posleen, but mainly Posleen. Here and there a fighting vehicle smoked, but looking at the results by the light of the fires and the moon, he was convinced that they had charged across the entire valley at the cost of maybe a half a battalion of troops. And they had been taking that every few hours during the defense.
“Holy Mary Mother of God,” he muttered. “Holy…” He looked down at the TC and shook his head. “Get a squad out on security, get the RTO to contact headquarters and get me a relay to General Horner. Tell them to pass on that we’ve taken Savannah and are preparing to continue the advance.”
* * *
Angela shuddered as the giant tank rolled up the hill towards them. Other tanks, much smaller, were spreading out to either side and there were other vehicles underneath it.
The Posleen that had been guarding them weren’t firing; they seemed as shocked by the situation as the human captives. The hundreds of thousands of Posleen in the valley were just gone, with the last few survivors being hunted down ruthlessly. And now the tanks were driving up their hill and surrounding their position.
The giant tank, it must be one of the SheVa guns she had seen on TV, ground up to within a few dozen yards of the Posleen and then just stopped. It sat there for what seemed like forever and then a door opened in the base, flooding white light down onto the ground. An elevator dropped out of the door and all the way to the ground then opened and a single human stepped out. He was wearing a trenchcoat and sunglasses and had a plasma rifle cradled in his arms, muzzle down.
He put a hand in his pocket and walked up the slope, looking around at the humans and Posleen as a massive spotlight turned on at the top of the SheVa. The spotlight swung around for a moment and then bathed the group in white light, flooding out the sight of the massed tanks. But in the darkness the sound of opening doors, squeaking turrets and pounding feet made it clear what was going on.
The single human walked up to the group and looked around until he spotted the God King on his saucer. He walked over to the alien, looked him up and down and then said one word:
“Leave.”
Angela looked at the leader of their tormentors and wondered what would happen. If it came to fighting, she was going to hit the ground and hope for the best. She suspected that there were riflemen out there, now, but in a fight if one of the tanks opened fire it would be all over for the humans.
She wasn’t sure if the Posleen could understand English or not. She’d heard that some could. But they never spoke it, just gestured. Usually for a person to put their head down to be cut off.
Now the God King looked down at the human and slowly fluttered his crest. He had to know more or less what was being demanded of it. And what the penalty would be for refusal.
Finally he raised his crest to its full height, lifted his plasma cannon, slowly, and turned his saucer around. In seconds, all the Posleen had faded into the night.
Angela looked up at the giant tank, the SheVa, and wondered for a moment why there was a picture of a rabbit on the front. Then she passed out.
* * *
Mitchell lowered the stairs of the personnel door and waved a hand in the general direction of his head at General Simosin. The general, who was sitting on the troop ramp of a Bradley, just grunted and went back to spooning down MRE beef stew. He had taken off his helmet and LBE and all of it was piled on the tail of the track.
“I just talked to Keeton,” the general said after another bite. He wiped up a bit on hisll, n then wiped it off his hands onto his filthy BDUs. “He kept trying to get me to say that I was back at Green’s Creek. Especially when I told him my lead element was reporting from halfway to Rocky Knob.”
“I’m beginning to wish I still was, sir,” the colonel replied, looking up at the SheVa. It didn’t look too bad from the back, but he knew the sides looked like Swiss cheese. “There’s going to be one hell of a bill for this repair.”
“Oh, don’t be that way,” the general grunted. “You’re the hero of the piece. Do you know how rare it is to recover Posleen captives? If it wasn’t for me controlling the traffic, and, of course, the Posleen still being all over the place, why we’d be crawling with reporters.”
“Ah, fame.” Mitchell snorted and then sat down on the perforated metal stairs. They dug into his butt, but since he ached from head to toe it wasn’t really noticeable. “That and a few billion credits will get this SheVa running again. We’re not exactly dead in the water, General, but we’re going to need some repairs before we’re fully combat effective again. Among other things we lost the main power bus for the MetalStorms right at the end. And we need more MetalStorm packs; I don’t know if there are any more around.”
“Yep.” Simosin glanced up at the wall of metal and then shrugged. “Your repair battalion’s got priority of movement and there’s a full battalion of MetalStorm supply trucks headed down the road from Asheville. I’ll tell the divisi
on to map out a spot down valley for you guys to do your repairs. You’re still planning on going over Green’s Pass?”
“It’s easier to access on both sides, sir,” Mitchell said with a nod and a yawn.
“You’re going to be swinging in the breeze over in the Tennessee Valley,” the general noted. “I’ve got all I can handle pushing up this way. And I can’t move behind you to support you, not with a whole division. You do too much damage to the roads.”
“Breaks of the game, sir,” the colonel replied. “We can’t get across Rocky Knob, not and leave anything you can use as a road. And even going up to Betty will tear things up. More than they are, that is.”
“Hmm.” Simosin looked around and smiled as an Abrams pulled to a stop beside his Bradley. “I think this is about the right cue.”
Mitchell watched Captain LeBlanc hoist herself out of the turret and chuckled. “Big tank, little lady. I think there’s something Freudian there.”
“I know why you’re thinking of Freud,” the general replied with a snort. “And I think it’s Freudian. I was thinking ‘big gun, little lady.’ ”
“You sent for me, General?” the captain said, saluting. After the general returned the salute she nodded at Mitchell. “Colonel.”
“Captain,” Mitchell replied soberly. “I’d like to thank you for all your support. We wouldn’t be here without your unit.”
“True,” she said immodestly. “But it wasn’t just my battalion or we both would be dead. I remember reading somewhere, Keegan or On Killing, I don’t recall which, that the purpose of tanks is not, as it is generally believed, to break the lines by shock, but to get themselves so entrapped by the enemy that it triggers in the infantry a ‘rescue’ reaction. ‘Oh, look, those stupid tankers are way the hell over there and if we don’t go get them they’re going to get kilt.’ I thought about that, from both sides, while we were riding to Balaclava.”
Mitchell found himself giggling again and got it under control quickly. “There is probably some truth to that, Captain. ‘Onward, onward rode the six hundred…’ ”
“Major,” the general corrected. He reached into his cargo pocket and rummaged around until he found a pair of major’s leaves. “Before you know it you’ll have enough rank to actually be in command, Major.”
“But I’ll still be MI,” the major said, pinning on first one leaf and then the other. “And a female. Two strikes against commanding an infantry battalion.”
“That, my dear, is why there are waivers,” the general said loftily. “There will be orders and awards to go along with that later — I’ve told both the corps commander and General Keeton about your performance on this drive — but for now we’re not done. What was your damage?”
“I’m down about twenty percent,” the commander replied, abruptly sitting down on the ground. “But body count doesn’t cover all of that and I’m missing at least one company commander. Some of them might still be mixed in with other units but I think a few did the bug-out boogie.”
“If so the MPs will round them up.” Simosin pulled out a notebook and made a notation. “I’m going to give you two companies from the Second Brigade; one of ’em’s a mech team, the other is motorized. They were in the lead for the first assault and have done some reconsolidation since then so at least they’re not green. Consolidate what you have got into three companies. That will make you overstrength in each, but I’m sure that will take care of itself.”
“Yes, sir,” LeBlanc replied. “What then?”
“Get refueled and rearmed,” he continued with a sigh. “That may take some doing; my inherited staff has not yet grasped the basic concepts of maneuver warfare such as forward deploying logistics elements…” He looked at her face quizzically. “Why the smile?”
“Ah, well,” she laughed. “Refuel and rearm will not be that much of a problem, General. I sent one of my NCOs out to find our supply trucks. And he did.”
“Your fuel trucks?” the general asked.
“Close enough. Somebody’s. Might as well be mine. And when he pointed out that he had two fully armed Bradleys, with crews, and all they had were some dinky fifty calibers, they got amenable to reason. Alpha and HHC are all refueled and rearmed and the rest of the unit is pulling maintenance.”
The general shook his head and sighed again. “Maybe I should make you my chief of staff. No, forget I said that, I don’t want to explain to General Keeton why other divisions are out of fuel and supplies.”
“Speaking of other divisions,” Mitchell said, “isn’t this about the time that somebody else is supposed to pass through while you reconsolidate?”
“It would be, if there was anyone else to pass through.” Simosin grimaced. “There’s a division coming down from Knoxville but it’s green and short a brigade. I’ll probably get it, in which case I’m going to mix it in by battalions and use them carefully. So it’s just us.”
He looked over at LeBlanc and smiled grimly. “Which was why my operations officer thought I was nuts to send my main mechanized unit off on detached duty.”
“Oh?” the major queried then looked up at the SheVa. “I don’t think so!”
“Major LeBlanc, you and your reinforced battalion are detached to duty in support of SheVa Nine as it makes a flanking maneuver through the Tennessee Valley,” the general said formally.
“Oh, shit,” the major said, shaking her head. “We’re fucked.”
“I need you alive and at Franklin,” Simosin said to Mitchell’s raised eyebrow. “I don’t need a smoking wreck sitting in the lower Tennessee.”
“Yes, sir,” the colonel replied then shrugged. “What the hell, if we get stuck again Abrams are jim-dandy field-expedient unstickers.” He turned to the major and grinned. “We’re going where eagles get nosebleeds, you understand?”
“Oh, yeah,” the major replied bitterly. “But, what the hell, if that big old bastard can make it, so can we. I hope.”
“I’ll see you both in Franklin,” Simosin said, scooping up the last of his stew and climbing laboriously to his feet. “SheVa supported,” he said, licking the spoon and dropping it in his cargo pocket as he tossed the empty MRE packet to the side, “fuel getting to tanks, troops moving forward, now I have to go back and straighten out that cluster-fuck of a headquarters I inherited.”
“Drop a bomb on it, sir,” LeBlanc replied. “It’s the only way to be sure.”
“Nah, think of the paperwork. I’ve got enough headaches.”
* * *
“Move, move, move, move, MOVE!” O’Neal shouted, bouncing down the scorched side of Black Rock Mountain.
It was a race against time. Somewhere to the south there were undoubtedly Posleen racing to reach the Mountain City line before the ACS. But the suits needed to not just reach the gap before them, but to have enough time to get dug in and set. If they were caught in the open by the advancing Posleen, they might as well slit their own throats.
“Bastards,” Stewart muttered. “They filled in all our positions!”
The Posleen had driven a road through the former defenses of the battalion and all but the outermost holes had been filled in. In addition, all the laboriously constructed communications trenches were gone.
The spare ammunition and power packs had been distributed to the platoons of the battalion but they were with individual suits. If they didn’t get a way to move the ammo around it was going to be cut off as soon as the Posleen arrived and created a “no movement zone” above ground.
“Back to work,” O’Neal said. “Bravo, Charlie, start digging in. Reapers and tech suits, make yourself some holes then start digging trenches. Everyone get below ground level as fast as possible.”
* * *
Duncan looked at the area designated for his company and began detailing platoon sectors. “Marauders on the line, command suits to the rear,” he said, detailing individual zones for the platoons. “Move people!”
He reached a point halfway between the designated area for the b
attalion command team and dropped a digging charge on the ground, glancing down the defile as he did so. There was still no sign of the Posleen, and that bothered him.
“Stewie, scouts?” he asked on a discrete channel to the battalion S-2.
“I’ve only got two left,” Stewart said, irritably. “I was going to move them up the flanks.”
“Be nice to know when the boys were coming to tea,” the company commander said.
“Agreed,” Stewart replied.
* * *
Sunday waited until all his Reapers were dug in and then dropped three more digging charges, opening up the area and connecting a couple of the holes to the consternation of the occupants.
“That was a little close, sir!” Pickersgill called; the charge had blown the side of his hole in on him.
“I could have dropped it on you and it wouldn’t have mattered,” Sunday replied, dropping into the middle of the combined Reaper section. He had carried the disguised box down the hill and now opened it up, pulling out the weapon inside. It was in three pieces and he carefully assembled them below ground level, ensuring that none of the other suits saw what he had concealed in the oversized hole.
“Get started on the trenches,” he said when the suits had finished opening out and finishing their holes. “I’ll be here.”
“What are you fiddling with, sir?” McEvoy asked, looking up over the side of his hole.
“Don’t you worry about that,” Tommy said with an unseen grin. “I’ll show you when you get back.”
* * *
Stewart looked at the take from the scout that had just reached the top of Hogsback and frowned.
“Hey, boss, we’ve got zero additional fire support, right?” he asked, jokingly.
“Yep,” O’Neal replied. There was a pause as he was obviously checking the raw take as well. “Well, things are going to be interesting.”
