Fateful Lightning

by William R. Forstchen

  “Dimitri!”

  The old man came up to him, limping badly, blood trickling from his thigh, the wooden end of a broken-off shaft sticking out.

  “Get to the tracks. Stop any trains, any of them, I don’t give a fuck if they’ve got wounded, take some men, and stop them and keep them there, directly behind us.”

  Dimitri saluted and hobbled off.

  The arc of fire continued to slash out from his line, four-pound guns leaping up, their four-man crews working feverishly. A soldier staggered out of the line in front of him, clutching his stomach, turning to look back at Vincent, and went to the ground, twisting and gasping. Vincent picked up his musket and stepped over the wounded soldier, two arrows in his leg. He was sitting numbly, watching the blood spurt out.

  “You can load, dammit, load for someone who can shoot!”

  It all started to seem surreal as thoughts, images, and memories mixed. A Roum boy stood rigid before him, mechanically beating his drum, tears streaming down his face. An old man, cursing, finished loading, jammed his ramrod into the ground, leaned forward, aiming carefully, firing, and then pulled his cartridge box open for another round, the curses never stopping. A captain, bandage covering his blood-soaked eyes, continued to stand, leaning against the flag bearer of the regiment, shouting encouragement. Two young soldiers, both wounded, crawled along the line dragging an ammunition box between them, pulling out ten-round packages, passing them up, then continuing on, one dragging, one pushing. A young soldier jammed a round into a barrel that was filled to the muzzle with unexpended rounds, raised his gun, and squeezed, completely forgetting to put on a percussion cap, and then started to load again, oblivious to the fact that he was not even shooting.

  Vincent heard a whistle shrieking, and he looked back to see several of his men standing on the track, Dimitri alongside the engine, pistol raised as if threatening to shoot the engineer, two more trains behind him, flatcars heading south to pick up the wounded of the Seventh. The hell with them—there was more important work.

  From out of the smoke he saw the Merki coming. An angry hoarse shout of rage rose up from the men as the line came on at a run, scimitars and lances flashing.

  The men staggered up from out of the shallow trench, bayonets gleaming. Vincent unholstered his pistol, checking the load. The charge bore in, a last flurry of shots dropping many at point-blank range, the men still armed with smoothbores doing the worst damage with loads of buckshot.

  They sagged backward from the weight of the impact, men jabbing upward to strike their taller foes, scimitars coming down with such strength that bodies were split from shoulder to sternum, arms cut off, heads severed or crushed.

  Vincent found himself looking straight up at a warrior who seemed to be moving far too slowly, his panting breath washing over him with a fetid stench, eyes bulging. He put a round into the Merki’s face and turned, backing up. A flash to his left and he fell back, feeling the icy slice of the scimitar as the tip of the blade laid his arm open. Hitting the ground, he raised his pistol, pressing it into the Merki’s groin and firing. The Merki tumbled backward, shrieking in agony.

  The line was buckling, losing the crest of the hill. But the Merki were coming on too slowly, their line too thin, many of them staggering forward, moving barely faster than a slow walk. None fell back, however; they pressed forward, dying, trading life for life. And then there were none left standing.

  Gasping, Vincent looked around.

  There were hardly any of his own left standing either. The men pushed their way back to the forward edge of the ridge, bayonets rising and falling as they killed the Merki wounded.

  A breeze was stirring up, smoke clearing momentarily. To the north the sound of battle was like a hurricane, a perpetual thunder as if the world were being ripped apart, flashes lighting the ridge, what he assumed to be Third and Fourth Corps pressing in on the flank of the breakthrough in a desperate bid to close it off.

  He heard something else, this time forward, and it reminded him suddenly of long ago when with the 7th Suzdal he had held the pass while the army retreated. It was the sound of cavalry advancing.

  Through shifts in the smoke he saw a dark wall of Merki cavalry deploying out directly in front of his position a thousand yards away. His entire front was gone, not one man in four still left standing.

  He looked to his rear. Dimitri had done his job. It was a last chance.

  “Fall back behind the trains!” he shouted, his voice cracking, and he pointed toward the three trains that were backed up on the track behind him, their flatcars and boxcars forming a wall several hundred yards long. The regiment to his left, responding to the command, started to the rear, picking up their wounded as they pulled out. He looked up at the young Rus major now commanding the grand battery, who was watching with growing alarm as the infantry to his right turned and started to run.

  Vincent pointed to the train, and the officer suddenly understood, ordering that some of the Napoleons were to be deployed to the right. From the grand battery north the line started to the rear.

  “Now, now in and after them!” Tamuka shouted, swinging his mount around, his ka at last taking possession. With scimitar drawn, he fell in with the umen of the black horse and started into the charge.

  Andrew turned and saw the heavy block formation starting forward, the front of Vincent’s line giving way, heading to the rear.

  “What the hell is he doing?” Andrew screamed, unable to see the line of trains to the rear.

  He felt, with a sickening certainty, that the war had just been lost.

  “He must have a reason. That madman would die rather than retreat.”

  Andrew turned and saw Marcus coming up beside him, nearly a full division of reserve troops emerging from the smoke on the double.

  “Let’s go,” Andrew gasped, certain that by the time they arrived, the entire front of his line would be gone.

  “Behind the railroad cars, get behind and under the cars!”

  The thin line of soldiers climbed over the trains, still dragging their wounded, pulling on the men even as they screamed in agony. Vincent climbed up into the cab of the middle train, the engineer looking over at him.

  “This plays hell with the schedule,” the engineer growled, and Vincent started to explode until he realized that the man was grinning, reaching for a revolver, and then putting his hand to an icon of Saint Malady to say a quick prayer. The thunder of hooves grew louder and yet louder.

  Forward on the edge of the ridge the grand battery continued its work, the first gun on the flank opening up, firing across the slope.

  The first rider appeared over the crest of the hill, and then a wall of riders, moving forward at the gallop. Another gun in the battery fired, slicing down an entire line at nearly point-blank range, but the charge continued forward.

  Vincent leaned out of the engine cab. His men were standing ready.

  The charge closed in, and as the first of the Merki riders reached the side of the train the men opened fire. A mad seething explosion of noise rose up, horses screaming, Merki and humans roaring their anger and defiance. The forward line went down, more piling up behind them.

  But there was no place to go forward, the three- hundred-yard front of trains blocking them. The rear ranks still pressed up the slope, believing that they were riding to victory. The press forward increased, riders jamming up against the side of the train, infantry standing behind the cars, shooting up. Merki started to leap off their horses, running across the width of the cars, men shooting them, pitchforking them with bayonets. The entire train started to shake beneath Vincent’s feet as if it could somehow be upended.

  The engineer, screaming madly, leaned out of the cabin window, shooting, and then reached up and yanked the steam vent cord. Hot steam sliced out, and wild shrieks rose up.

  Vincent, standing in the cab doorway, emptied his revolver into the press and then drew back, drawing his sword, suddenly and very painfully aware of a cut to his arm.


  The engineer staggered backward, a lance buried in his chest, and collapsed. He reached up to grab hold of his icon, pulled it down, and died.

  A roar of a musket exploded behind Vincent, and he turned to see a Merki who was trying to climb through the cab window tumble backward, his face gone, the fireman crouching low beside his engineer, a sawed-off musket braced against his side. Throwing the weapon away, the fireman picked up a shovel, tore open the door into the firebox, pulled out a load of gleaming coals, and threw them out the doorway, laughing maniacally.

  He went down, an arrow in his chest.

  A Merki rode up next to the door and jumped from his mount, filling the world before Vincent. Vincent leaped forward and drove his sword into the Merki’s stomach. The Merki looked at him wide-eyed, dropping his own blade, hands feebly grasping around Vincent’s blade.

  Vincent tried to pull the sword out; it was stuck.

  The Merki continued to look straight into his eyes.

  Vincent backed up, pulling hard, screaming hysterically, and the sword slid out, the Merki falling to his side. The Merki continued to look at him and slowly grinned.

  “A good fight, human. You have ka,” he gasped in broken Rus.

  Vincent stared at him, speechless, and then in the distance he heard the bugles.

  Tamuka, screaming with rage, pushed himself out of the charge.

  He needed infantry, infantry and guns. He could see other units down in the valley, broken formations, shattered guns, thousands of disorganized warriors staggering toward the rear, some struggling with each other for possession of water skins taken from the dead. Forward, the press was impossible, Merki jammed up against the side of the trains. The warriors to the rear had nothing to fire upon and were unable to advance or retreat. The guns to his flank were tearing the charge to shreds, the warriors unable to ride up into the bastion.

  A thunderous volley rose up on his right, and he saw the thin line of cattle infantry advancing.

  And yet forward, forward and to the left. He could see it all so clearly as darkness began to settle. Except for the thin line here behind the train, there was nothing left, nothing at all, not a single cattle left in reserve. If it had not been for this final trick, even now his warriors would be far to the rear, victory complete.

  He turned, and for a brief instant he saw him, riding along the line, his one hand up, pointing. He could sense the panic, the fear, all his thoughts at this second so clear, the dreadful certainty that he had already lost and was riding to die, a final redemption for himself, and then he was lost to view.

  “I have you, damn you, I have you!” Tamuka screamed, even as the charge around him started to break. “One more charge and I have you!”

  He turned his mount and started to the rear.

  Reaching the edge of the battery, Andrew reined in, stunned. Before him the Merki riders were jammed up in confusion, hundreds of them down around the guns, horses screaming, the charge at a complete halt, pressed up around the trains.

  A wild shout rose up around him, the infantry, staggering from exhaustion, from the forced march and the final run, coming up, all formation lost, leaping past Andrew and going in.

  Andrew turned to see Marcus riding up, the old Roum standing up tall in his stirrups, short sword pointed forward, shouting with a fierce exultation.

  The flanking charge hit with a mad fury, the men wading in, shooting down Merki at point-blank range, horses kicking, riderless mounts dashing through the line, heading into the rear.

  “By the gods, that boy did it again,” Marcus shouted.

  Andrew slumped forward in his saddle, numbed.

  He had thought it already finished, felt a cold sense of release almost taking over, as if nothing remained but die. And yet it was still going on, another staving-off at the very last moment. He felt completely used up. The strain of the last two days of desperation had gone deep into his soul, deeper than he had ever known before. He sat watching, and yet not seeing, as Marcus’s soldiers broke the Merki charge and sent it streaming to the rear.

  Vincent sat slumped in the comer of the engine cab, the dead engineer and fireman beside him. Outside he could hear hoarse triumphal shouts, the screams of wounded animals, guttural shouts of pain, the roar of battle starting to drift away.

  “Thought we had won,” the Merki said, between gasps of pain. Blood was now flowing freely from his mouth, dripping onto the iron floor of the engine cab.

  “You speak Rus,” Vincent whispered.

  “Rus pet when child, loyal, good.”

  The Merki coughed, doubling up in a spasm.

  “Kill me, end this.”

  A dark flash of memory filled him, the Merki hanging on the cross, dying. He looked down at the revolver in the corner of the cab. It was empty. Still clutching his sword, he came to his knees, and the Merki nodded.

  “Wait.” He started to cough again. “Fathers, see me now, accept my spirit, forgive me my sins, let me ride beside you through the everlasting sky, and grant to me the power to protect my wife, my sons, though I am gone.”

  Stunned, Vincent looked at the Merki.

  “Those are our words at death.” The Merki grinned, seeing the shock on Vincent’s face. “Now kill me, cattle.”

  “We are not cattle,” Vincent hissed. “We are men.”

  “Perhaps you are right, but I die hating you nevertheless for what you’ve done to us.”

  “And what you have done to me!” Vincent shrieked, and he leaned forward, driving his sword into the Merki’s throat.

  A spasm went through the Merki’s body, and blood sprayed out across Vincent’s face.

  The Merki continued to look at him, almost smiling. The breathing stopped, the blood in a vast pool around him, eyes still open.

  Vincent Hawthorne fell back against the far side of the cab, still looking at the Merki.

  And what we have done to each other, he thought.

  Protect my wife, my sons, though I am gone.

  Tanya, little Andrew, the twins. What are we doing to each other?

  All of it flooded over him, the tiny cab now his entire universe, the engineer dead, icon of a old friend clutched to his chest, the fireman beside him, the dead Merki by the door, the blood of all three flowing together, outside the sound of battle drifting away, the world becoming dark, and over all the smell of death heavy in the air.

  He leaned forward, shoulders shaking.

  Oh my God, what have I become? What am I doing? Am I truly like them now?

  God help me.

  Sobs started to rack his body, sobs he had not known since he was a child, a time that inside his heart he knew was not so long ago.

  He heard someone approach, but he no longer cared. Face buried in his hands, he cried, the fresh tears mingling with the blood, washing it away.

  He felt an arm go around his shoulder.“It’s all right, son. Let it out, cry it out.”

  It was Marcus.

  Leaning into the old soldier’s shoulder, he cried, his friend holding him tightly.

  If this is field command, Chuck thought grimly, they can keep it. Crawling forward, he stuck his head into a small pool of muddy water, and drank deeply. He heard a twig snap.

  He jerked up and rolled, raising his carbine, and pulled the trigger.

  The chamber was empty.

  A rifle cracked behind him, and the Merki crumpled up, crashing into the water. He looked at the body, still twitching, realizing that the lone Merki had approached the muddy pond with the same intent as he had.

  He looked back over his shoulder. An old woman crouched down behind a tree, hands shaking.

  “Good shot, mother,” he said, and crawled back to her.

  Still shaking, she clicked the breech of the Sharps carbine open and chambered another round. This time he remembered to do the same.

  A slow but steady crackle of gunfire boomed through the forest. It was hard to tell exactly what was going on. The fight was a mad confusion of small grou
ps hunting and being hunted. To his right, down by the river, he could hear a more steady thunder, a straggler having told him that First Corps was sealing the breech.

  That was all well and good, but there could still be hundreds, perhaps thousands, of the bastards in the woods.

  He looked over at the only soldier in his entire unit he was now in touch with.

  “Olga, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, your excellency.”

  “I’m not your excellency, dammit.”

  “No, your excellency,” and she smiled weakly.

  “That was a good shot. Thank you.”

  “It was an honor to kill him,” she said, showing him a toothless grin.

  “Well, let’s go get another.”

  “You’ve got other work to do,” she said. “We’ll hold things here. Now get the hell back and get that train moving, before it's too late.”

  Andrew walked through the hospital ward, trying to project a sense of calm, a sense that somehow it was still under control and victory was possible.

  The world was a nightmare. He knew that something like thirty thousand had been wounded. Another ten thousand were already dead, and thousands more were missing.

  The army as a fighting unit was finished. Third and Fourth Corps together wouldn’t make a strong brigade between them. Vincent’s Sixth was not much better, Schneid’s Second had lost half its men, Marcus’s Seventh almost as many. It was a shambles and here was the aftermath, the mangled wreckage chewed out and left behind. In the lantern light it looked as if the etching of a Dürer nightmare had come to life. Limbless men were stretched out in row after row. He passed through a ward of stomach wounds, men whom Emil, Kathleen, or two or three other doctors might have saved if given the time, but who were now left to die, so many were the casualties.