Fateful Lightning

by William R. Forstchen

  “He’s looking for me,” Andrew whispered.

  “Who?”

  “Him. I’m not sure. It’s as if he were inside my head, trying to probe my thoughts, to make me afraid of him. Yuri told me about him, the shield-bearer.”

  “Superstition.”

  “I’m not sure,” Andrew whispered.

  The sounds from Gregory’s room died away, a gentle laugh replacing the passion, and then a moment later there were tears as well.

  Andrew smiled sadly.

  “All we wanted was to live in peace,” he whispered. “Just to be left alone. Was that too much to ask for?”

  “Maybe someday.”

  A door creaked open, and he looked out. Up the street a man appeared, white tunic of a Rus, sword of an officer at his side, blanket roll over his shoulder. He stopped, and a woman came out, hugging him fiercely, a small child grabbing hold of his leg. He gently pulled himself away, and the child started to cry. He bent down, picked the child up, and hugged him, then gave the crying boy back to his mother, who held him tightly. The man walked down the street, passing under Andrew’s window, not even knowing that he was being watched. He continued on, not looking back, yet Andrew could sense the man was in tears, now letting them fall where he felt no one would see him. The woman and child stood in the street, watching, both crying, and then disappeared back into the house.

  “I hope he makes it,” Kathleen said, her words choked.

  How many won’t? he thought. By the end of this day, how many will be left, and how many will be silent, unclosed eyes looking straight up to the heavens, waiting with luck for the burial, or for the pits of the Merki? He tried to imagine it over with, the unknown man he had just seen running back up the street to a waiting embrace; tried not to imagine the other.

  “I have to get ready,” Andrew whispered.

  “Come back to bed.”

  He knew what she was thinking, what she wanted.

  “I can’t,” he sighed, embarrassed suddenly, knowing that he couldn’t make love, not now. It would have too much of a sense of finality to it, something he couldn’t bear.

  “No, not that,” she whispered, and led him away from the window, lying down atop the sheets, gently pulling him down alongside.

  “Just hold me,” she whispered. “Please hold me.”

  She grabbed hold of him fiercely, and the tears came, sobs bursting out, the sound muffled against his chest.

  He put his single arm around her, holding her, kissing the top of her head, the smell of her hair pleasant, so familiar. Ashamed, he tried to hold back his own tears, which were wetting her hair.

  “It’s all right, love, it’s all right,” she whispered.

  The crying drifted away into a gentle quiet, both remembering so much, all that they had been together. He realized that never had he felt such love for her as he did now, and that if he should die today, if it should all be lost, he at least had this moment. He felt the tears coming again, finding it impossible to imagine that it might be ending now, today, that when he rose up and went out the door, it was finished forever.

  It all came down to the simplest of things, a child in your arms, lying awake in the early morning with your lover, a walk through the woods on a snowy day, a warm fire waiting at home. All of it so simple, yet so precious, living all so precious when it was on the edge of being lost. Funny, he mused, we never think about this while alive, the wonder of it all, only when it is lost, or going away into the night.

  “If something should happen to me…” he whispered.

  “Please, no, don’t.”

  “Hush.”

  She started to cry again.

  “If something should happen to me, I want you to know how much I love you, how much I’ll always love you, even after I’m gone. I’ll wait for you, I’ll wait forever for you.”

  “Don’t die, please don’t die, I couldn’t live without you.”

  “There’ll always be Maddie.”

  She nodded.

  He held her tight, pulling her in as if he could somehow press her soul into his own. In the distance a bell tolled twice.

  “I’ve got to go,” he whispered. “It’s time.”

  She nodded, her tears soaking his chest, but wouldn’t let go.

  He waited another minute and then two, unwilling to leave, praying that if there was a way to stop all time it would be now, freezing them at the edge of the abyss, holding back the day to come forever.

  She took a deep breath, sighed, and let go, looking back up into his face.

  “I love you.”

  “I love you,” he whispered and gently pulled away.

  He stood up, not looking back at her, lit a candle, and started to dress. She slipped on a robe and came over to help him, buttoning his shirt, taking down his field jacket from its hanger, helping him to pull it on. She opened a dresser drawer and brought out his red sash, wrapped it around his waist, tying the ends together, and then helped to buckle on his sword belt and revolver.

  He had never grown used to needing help with getting dressed, but this morning he was grateful for the sharing. She went to the dresser and came back with a small box and opened it. Inside was his Congressional Medal of Honor won at Gettysburg.

  “Wear it today.”

  He nodded, knowing that for her it was some sort of talisman. She pinned the medal to his breast.

  She picked up the candle and went to the door.

  “Let me get breakfast for you.” Her voice was hopeful, as if a few additional moments could thus be stolen.

  “I’ll grab something down at headquarters.”

  She nodded and went down the stairs, and he followed her, the tip of his sword scabbard banging on the steps behind him. She opened the door and put the candle on the side table. In the dim light her long flowing red hair seemed to shine, her pale skin and green eyes iridescent in the light.

  They stood looking at each other, and he stepped forward, grabbing hold of her, lifting her off the ground, hugging, kissing her on the neck, the lips, and then ever so slowly let her slip to the ground.

  She started to speak, and he put a finger to her lips.

  “I love you,” he whispered, and turning, he stepped out into the street, shoulders back, and started down to the city gate. He knew she was watching, crying, but he wouldn’t look back.

  Again there was a flash moment, the image formed, the Merki standing before him, scimitar drawn, the world about him in ruins and he the last to die after witnessing the final horror.

  He struggled and pushed the thought away, focusing on the memory of her standing in the doorway, the taste of the last kiss still on his lips. He continued on, and from other doorways, one after another, other men emerged, saying their goodbyes, and started to fall in around him, moving to the city gate and the fate that waited on the other side.

  “Bringer of life, bringer of day, sun of the heavens, we bow in greeting to thy presence.”

  As Sarg intoned the chant the cry was picked up, hundreds of thousands of the Merki thundered the words, the steppes reverberating with their cry, the serried ranks going down to their knees, bowing low, taking a ritual handful of dust and pressing it to their foreheads to remind them of what they came from and to what they would return. The great nargas of the Qar Qarth sounded, the brazen cry picked up by the nargas of the clan chiefs, the commanders of five umens, the umen commanders, and finally the commanders of a thousand.

  Tamuka came back up to his feet, turning to bow to the west, to the last fleeing of night, the ride of the ancestors, and the hundreds of thousands of warriors followed his lead, armor creaking, accouterments rattling, scimitars flashing up in salute, hundreds of thousands of blades flickering in the first light of dawn.

  The great cry died away, and they turned, facing back to the east, to where the cattle waited.

  A mild breeze stirred from the steppe behind them, harbinger of a day of heat. From his vantage point he looked to the south. Along the ridge four ume
ns were arrayed on foot, standing in rank in the checkerboard pattern, the regiment of a thousand a hundred across and ten deep, five regiments to the front rank, five to the rear, two umens to a league of front. Behind them on the reverse slope stood six more umens, and deployed behind them were ten more, and stretching in a great arc yet fourteen more on a front that ran from north to south for twenty miles. Far to the north in the forest were two umens on foot, the fighting there now in its second day. And behind them all were yet four more umens on horse, waiting to ride when the breakthrough had been achieved.

  All was ready.

  He turned to the pennant holder.

  “Let it begin.”

  The red flag was raised from the ground and held aloft. Far forward, on the low bluff near the river, a single puff of smoke snapped out, long seconds later the dull thunderclap boom echoing back. And then from one end to the other, three hundred cannons of the Merki fired, the first round of the opening barrage.

  “For that which we are about to receive…” Andrew whispered, as the first gun of the Tugar line fired. Suddenly the entire west bank of the river, eight hundred yards away, disappeared.

  “… we thank you kindly, Lord,” and he ducked low as the first shot screamed overhead. A hail of artillery rounds passed over, plumes of dirt geysering up in front of the bastion, the earth-and-log walls of the fortress shaking from the impact, dirt flying up over the walls.

  “Let her go!” an excited Rus artillery commander shouted, and stepping up to the three-inch rifle, which he had aimed with care, he grabbed hold of the lanyard and stepped back.

  “Stand clear!”

  He jerked the lanyard back, the gun kicking with a high piercing crack, the round screaming downrange. He peered through the smoke, field glasses raised, and saw the flash of light.

  “By damn, right over ’em! Now pour it on!”

  The other thirty guns of the northern grand battery, all of them Napoleons or one of the precious three-inch rifles, opened up, the four surviving guns of the old 44th New York firing a salvo that cracked out like a single shot.

  Andrew watched the opening rounds slam into the Merki artillery line, hitting the rough earthworks they had thrown up to protect the battery. A Merki gun rose up, flipping over, a second later a caisson detonating, the thunderclap of the explosion washing back over the lines, men standing up down in the trenches and cheering defiantly. These would be the best shots we’ll make, Andrew realized, the smoke from the first volley already obscuring the view.

  He looked south. Along the four miles of entrenchments across the valley floor, half a dozen batteries opened up, their return fire capped by the grand battery to the far south, that position again a mix of Napoleons and three-inch pieces. Strict orders had already been issued that return fire was to be slow and measured, ammunition conserved and only used when a target was clearly visible. Counterbattery fire was of secondary importance when compared to the task of smashing the charges once they started.

  He looked down at his watch, going through the ritual of turning the time back to match the station clock behind him. It was four-thirty in the morning.

  Jack Petracci wheeled his ship around. The air smelled sulfurous; the intense barrage below had been going on for nearly two hours. He could see that the fire was slackening from his own side, some of the guns completely silent, others firing not more than once every two or three minutes. The Merki line continued to fire away, and as he looked back to the east he saw a caisson go up near the center of the line. He watched the explosion soar up and then come back down, several bodies tumbling.

  Directly below, the Merki artillery line was impossible to observe, so thick was the smoke which now eddied down over the riverbed in great sheets like a spreading fog.

  He leaned back in his cab and stretched. Except for the climactic battle below, the morning was actually uneventful, the air still, even though it was approaching midmorning. Yesterday three Merki ships had been up in an attempt to go over the line for a recon, but the sight of his own squadron of three had caused them to turn back. Maybe the fight was out of the bastards and he could have the air to himself. He looked off to the north. Far to the horizon he saw China Seas, a distant speck of white, hovering over the woods, observing if the Merki were attempting to shift north, the battle in the forest at a standstill along the banks of the river. A skirmish was brewing up a dozen miles north, the Merki already attempting to cross the river at a place where the eastern bank was low, but the river was chest-deep for a human and at least hip-deep for them. They’d be sitting ducks for the men of First Corps. Parties of Merki had been attempting to infiltrate for three days previous, several succeeding, one getting right up to the powder factory before being detected and destroyed. Now it was flaring up to a full-pitch battle at last.

  “That red banner is fluttering again,” Feyodor shouted, and pointed straight down to what they assumed had to be the Merki command post.

  Jack leaned over to watch, noticing that other flags were now waving in front of the enemy ranks. Above the roar of the artillery he heard a low steady chanting, growing louder.

  “I think they’re gearing up for the charge.”

  The first line started forward at a walk, a three-mile-wide advance of Merki, forty thousand strong.

  “Here it comes! Cut power and send the signal! Four umens coming straight in.”

  Feyodor cut loose the red pennant coiled up under the basket, the flag unrolling, Jack turning his ship to point straight back toward headquarters so that the flag was visible full on. Next he tied four green flags for the umens and one orange flag to signify the center of the line between two ropes, which were spread apart by wooden dowels so that the flags would not flutter astern but rather be clearly visible to the front. He lowered them down in front of the red flag so that they would show up clearly.

  “All right, let’s head for home,” Jack shouted. “We need to top off the hydrogen—it’s still leaking from those new patches.”

  Feyodor lowered a second flag of yellow, to signal they were returning to base, and then suddenly cut the power back.

  Jack looked back anxiously, frightened at first that the new engine had seized up. Forward speed dropped, and Feyodor leaned over the side of the ship, looking straight down. He struck a friction-head match mounted into the neck of a ten-gallon jug of benzene, let it drop, and then started the power back up again.

  Jack leaned over to watch as it plummeted a half mile down. For a second he thought it was going to hit the enemy command post straight on, but instead it impacted fifty or more yards away, at least catching several of the Merki standing to one side. They twisted and writhed on the ground, and Jack howled with delight.

  He pointed the ship north and headed back in to the air station.

  “We’ve got company,” Feyodor shouted, and Jack looked astern to see three Merki ships coming up out of the west. He quickly judged the distance, fifteen miles or more. He had two harpoons and was tempted to swing back out for a fight. But already the elevator was too far back; there must be a major leak opening up. China Sea and Republic could run interfere for right now. He shouted for Feyodor to open up the throttle full-bore as he turned north-northeast.

  Pat looked over excitedly at the telegrapher hunched over his machine down in the command dugout.

  The boy looked up.

  “Report from headquarters. Aerosteamer reports Merki have begun advance, four umens coming our way.”

  Pat nodded, a sardonic grin lighting his face.

  “Sound the alarm. Get the boys up and ready.”

  He ran up out of the bunker. The air was thick with smoke. An artillery round screamed overhead, plowing into a torn-up vineyard a hundred yards to the rear, vines and their frames hurtling up into the air.

  If the barrage was designed for killing, it was doing precious little. He’d lost four guns and a caisson, maybe a couple of dozen infantry, but to think they could be shaken loose by a bombardment while hunkered dow
n in the trenches was absurd. He looked up at a mortar round hissing down, striking the ground near where the last round had hit, the fuse failing.

  He climbed up on the firing step and looked through the firing slot, his staff standing around him anxiously, ducking low as another shot screamed past.

  “The Merki couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn,” he laughed and turned back, remembering with a sudden superstitious dread that old Uncle John Sedgwick had said the same thing at Spotsylvania and was dead before the words were out of his mouth.

  The view forward was nothing but smoke. At least the barrage was providing that.

  The sound of the bombardment from the far side of the river died away. They must be crossing through the guns. Bugles sounded along the line, drums rolled, and men stepped up to the firing line, muskets poked through the firing slits, loaders standing down in the trench, ready to grab empty guns and pass up reloads. The excitement was electric. No more running withdrawals, abandoning positions; this was going to be a stand-up knock-down, and they were ready. An angry defiant cheering started, swelling, racing down the line, a high rising scream of rage that sent a corkscrew chill down his back.

  Officers were walking the line, shouting, chanting the same refrains over and over.

  “Wait for the order, wait for the order.”

  “Aim low, boys, aim low.”

  A spattering of rifle fire sounded forward in the smoke.

  He turned his head, his good ear cocked toward the enemy line. He could hear them now, even above the yelling of his own men. A steadily rising chant, growing louder.

  From out of the smoke a thin line of men appeared, running low, skirmishers coming in, weaving their way along the marked paths through the deadfalls and abatis.

  “They’re coming, millions of them, in the river!”

  A man wiggled through the firing slit into the trench next to him, panting hard.

  “Got one of the bastards,” he said proudly between gasps.

  The damn river was too low, calf-deep for most of them, easily passable along its rocky bottom. He wished he could have held it there, but the heights on the other side would have given the Merki a plunging fire that would have been killing.