by J. F. Holmes
“Um, excuse me, sir, but what the hell is the First Brooklyn Volunteers?” I think I had a good idea, but I was scared to know.
He smiled and said, “You’ll find out. Hold for twelve hours, Major, more if you can. Use whatever civilian assets you can get your hands on.” As he said it someone else handed him a piece of paper. He read it, then said, “Scratch the intel brief. You need to move now. Dismissed.”
I had ten thousand questions and felt completely lost. Fortunately a goddamned archangel appeared in the form of a gruff Command Sergeant Major who said simply, “Please follow me, sir. Your platoon is about to roll out, and I’ve detailed a Humvee for you and a liaison with the local government authorities.”
“Something I have to take care of first, Sergeant Major.” I said and looked around for Tor and O'Neill. Neither were in evidence. “Where are the people who came in with me?”
“Ah, the cop said that she would see you later, and the little guy, um, I guess he took off. Weirdo, if you ask me.”
“Dammit,” I sighed. We needed Tor and his information. “If you see him, take him into custody, but gently. He’s a potential friend.” Fat chance of that; ex-slaves have a way of hiding, especially in war zones.
“I need access to email, ASAP, gotta check in with my unit,” I told him, and he grimaced. “Yeah, I know, but this is a priority. Doesn’t matter if it’s SIPR or NIPR. Gmail is fine.”
“OK,” he said, “we got wifi set up in the TOC. Follow me.” We ducked into a subway car that had been rigged as an operations center, with a generator running and a landline connection. I stepped inside into controlled chaos and the SGM kicked someone off a terminal. “Leave your CAC card in!” he growled and the kid unassed the seat.
I logged into, of course totally unsecure, but sometimes hiding in plain sight was the best. We went a lot of places in the world where access to a CAC card reader wasn’t exactly around the corner. Amidst all the spam there was one message, from a randomly generated email in the NSA servers. It was dated at 04:32 this morning, and simply said:
ROMULUS AUGUSTUS BLACK
A chill ran down my spine. Romulus Augustus was the last emperor of the Western Roman Empire, being deposed in 476 AD. It meant that my chain of command thought that we were facing an enemy that would defeat us. I felt a fear that I had never known in all my years of combat, and thought of my family, my brothers and sister living around the country and my parents in Florida.
“You OK, sir? You look like you’ve seen a ghost. Bad news?” The Sergeant Major looked at me, but I could tell he was anxious to get moving.
I shook my head and stood up, resisting the urge to bring up a news site, making sure the browser history was deleted and I was logged out of Gmail. Old habits die hard. “I’m alright. Just, well, interesting times we’re living in.”
“The ancient curse. Come on, sir, your guys are ready to roll.”
While we walked, I thought about the second part of the message. Go Black. Disappear. Don’t return to base. Go underground. It didn’t necessarily mean that I was alone; instead I was to operate as I saw fit until things could be sorted out.
We stepped into the rising sunlight into a world of quiet. The dawn had brought a stillness to the fight, and I wondered if the opposition fought better at night. Maybe, but there seemed to be some differences between them and “historical” Fae. Iron didn’t seem to bother them; the orc and Elf weapons and armor I had seen had been good quality steel. Tor would have been great for this, but then again, Big Army Intel might have grabbed him up and waterboarded him. Scratch might, insert probably. I put that problem aside for now. Right now I had to plan a defense of an urban center against a highly mobile, determined and heavily armored force. Oh, and don’t forget the local air superiority thing.
2nd Platoon, Bravo Company, 1 Battalion 69th Infantry Regiment consisted of four up armored Humvees crammed with probably twenty five troops. They were busy, doing last minute pre-combat checks and inspections overseen by their NCO’s. I wasn’t worried about the quality of the guys and girls in the platoon. Most of the sergeants, and quite a few of the enlisted, wore combat patches. On top of that they were fighting for their homes, so I fully expected them to stand fast in the traditions of the Irish Brigade.
“Platoon Sergeant! Platoon leader! On me!” I shouted as I jogged over, the sergeant major pointing them out. There was little time to screw around, and he had gone to get the two guys from the volunteers.
A baby-faced kid and a Staff Sergeant detached themselves from the group and met me before I got to the trucks. The LT started to salute, even though I wasn’t wearing a uniform, just my plate carrier with some rank stuck on it, and the NCO slapped his hand down. “Jesus, Billy, this is combat, not drill weekend.”
“Sorry, sir,” the officer apologized to me. “I’m actually just an ROTC cadet. Captain Gertz told me I’m an LT now and gave me this rank.”
Jesus Christ. OK, well, lemons and lemonade. “Good, Third Lieutenant Wells, then you don’t have any bad habits yet. Staff Sergeant Kolowski, he IS an officer, so no abuse in front of the troops.” He had on jump wings and a highly unauthorized 1st Marine Division combat patch. “Fallujah?” I asked him.
“That and much more,” he grinned. “Ooh rah!”
“OK, well, take all that bullshit you went through and multiply it by five thousand. I want you to come up with the dirtiest shit you can to stop a combined arms force for as long as possible. How are your squad leaders?”
“It’s the Guard, sir. The best and the worst, but they’ll do,” he answered, which pretty much summed up everything.
“Give me your two smartest NCO’s Staff Sergeant, they’re going to act as liaisons with the volunteers. I also want the two fastest runners who will be glued to me, and your best driver. The platoon is going to be my QRF, and I expect a heavy weapons squad. Your NCOs are going to set the volunteers in static positions. We have very little time.”
The LT, geez, he looked about twelve years old, asked, “Can they be beat, major? We got hit on our way in, and we lost half our strength to one, uh, one dragon, crisped two five tons on the Belt Parkway.”
“Yes,” I said, with a confidence that I didn’t feel. “I killed a big assed dragon with an AT-4.”
“No shit!” they both said simultaneously.
“Shit!” I answered back, and grinned. “We’re probably all going to die, but they’ll write songs about us, and if you live, every piece of ass from here to Montauk will be yours forever.”
Chapter 17
The heavy weapons guys showed up a few minutes later, two M-240B machine guns and an M-2 on a tripod mount. Better than nothing. We also have half a dozen AT-4’s and one MK-19 with maybe forty grenades. About five of the guys had M-203 grenade launchers, but I didn’t expect them to really get in the fight. Not a single stinger surface to air missile in sight, and I didn’t know then how effective they were anyway. It was five guys piled into a civilian pickup truck, and I told them to get in the back of the convoy.
Then our volunteers showed up, or their reps anyway. Two men approached me, one in civilian clothes with old Vietnam style load bearing equipment and an M16-A1 slung over his shoulder. He introduced himself as Rabbi Friedman, and although he had more than a few grey hairs, his grip was solid. “My people are ready; the woman and children have been evacuated to our relatives upstate.”
“I’m assuming that there’s no need to ask about your combat experience?” I asked.
The rabbi grinned and said, “No, we’re well prepared. Never again! I have seventy three effectives, as well as some heavy weaponry. Older, yes, but an RPG is an RPG, yes?”
I felt a huge weight fall off my shoulders, and not so alone anymore. “Where did you get a permit for all that stuff in New York State, never mind the city?” I laughed.
“I sold it to him,” said the other man in a gravelly voice. He had an AK-109, the most up to date version of the venerable AK-47 and urban camo, a bald hea
d and a scared face. “Cheap used shit, but then what do you expect me to sell to Jews.”
I recognized the accent: Serbian. I had done a few ops in that area. I narrowed my eyes and looked at him. “Is there going to be a problem?”
He laughed and said, “No, the Jews are great at slaughtering Muslims. I love them.”
Sighing, I said, “We don’t have time for crap like that, Mister ...”
With a cruel grin he said, “Major Sasha Zivcovic, Serbian Parachute Regiment. No problem, this is America, we all love each other. I bring forty two of my men. We are well armed.”
“With what?” I asked. I felt like Roosevelt getting in bed with Stalin.
“Barrett rifles, Javelin Anti-tank missiles, RPG-32 system, anti-tank mines. I have much more in my warehouse but there is not much time.”
“Holy shit. I … I’m not going to ask.” I knew guys like this, arms dealers who dealt in death and didn’t care who they sold to. Hell, I had done my fair share of business with them. “I’m assigning one NCO to each of your companies. This is going to be straight up urban fighting, but my objective is to hold them from crossing the bridge for as long as possible. There are civilians that are still evacuating.”
“Sheep,” muttered Zivcovic. I knew guys like this. War was their life, and he was probably fairly high up with the Russian mob over at Brighton Beach. Whatever, I would take what I could get.
“You both understand what we’re dealing with, right? Magic, Elves, orcs, trolls, dragons, plenty more weird shit that I don’t know. This is going to be a tough fight, and I expect to eventually lose. We only have to hold for twelve hours, and then we can pull back. A lot of your guys are going to die, and victory will only be a delay. Maybe the regular army can put a stop to them when they get going, but the tactical situation here in the City is pretty damn grim. Too much to do and not enough to do it with.”
Friedman nodded and said, “It doesn’t matter who we fight. God is on our side and evil is evil. Maybe it will be the thing that finally brings humanity together, eh?”
The Serb laughed and said, “People are shit, and if the Elves win, I’ll deal with them. But I love a good fight, and America has been good to me.” I wasn’t sure I actually liked this guy, but if he fought, that was all I gave a shit about. The weapons were going to be a great help, and for them I’d put up with him.
“Can your guys operate those systems?” I asked him, and he made a dismissing motion. OK then, jerk. “I wish we had more time, and all I’m going to do is ask your people to hold the buildings on either side of the off ramps. My NCO’s will show you where, and I’ll give you whatever support I can.”
“Why aren’t you blowing the bridge?” asked Zivcovic.
“The engineers have tried, and every time anyone gets close, something sets off the explosives. We’ve lost a lot of good men that way, but I think we’ll get the tunnels.” As if to punctuate my words there was a vibration in the ground and seconds later a cloud of dust shot out of the train tunnels.
“Damn, there goes billions of dollars down the drain,” laughed Zivcovic. He seemed almost gleeful. Yeah, he was a war addict. Fine, I could use that.
“Let’s roll, then. I’ll have two Humvees, then your people, Zivcovic. You will be Foxtrot Company, Rabbi, you’re Golf company, I don’t want to get you confused with the 69th people. I’ll mix our Humvees into the convoy to provide some air cover, and the assembly area will be Cadman Park. Charlie Company of the 69th will be covering the Manhattan Bridge to our right, and we’re the end of the line on the left. Refugees are being evaced across the Verrazano, so expect a shitload of traffic behind us. If someone gets in our way, push them off the road.”
Zivcovic smirked again, and I banged my hand on the hood of the truck. “I know what you’re thinking, and if I find out that you killed any civilians, I’ll shoot you myself. Is that clear?”
He looked at me for a long moment, and then nodded. “You’re like me, Major. A killer. We understand each other.”
“Enough of the bullshit, let’s go while the enemy is resting,” said Friedman. I agreed and we each left for our separate commands.
*****
The convoy to the park was only about three miles, and the first two were pretty easy. The streets were empty except for the occasional military vehicle and cars fleeing eastward, packed to the gills with belongings. Our first snag was when we hit a line of empty, stalled cars three blocks from a gas station. When I reached the station in the lead Humvee, I saw a half dozen men in ski masks, heavily armed with assault rifles, emptying the underground tanks with hand pumps. There wasn’t a civilian to be seen. I slapped the gunner on the leg and yelled up at him to fire some .50 over their heads, into the building. One burst and they scattered, taking off down the block. Lt. Wells, in the seat behind me, asked me why, and I told him. “If the Mafia or Jews see them doing that, they would have just lit them up.” He nodded in agreement, and I didn’t have the heart to tell him that I just wanted to avoid having a firefight and an inferno blazing at our backs.
Refugees started appearing after that. People pushing shopping carts and dragging luggage. The road was completely blocked to them, a line of stalled cars leading to the approaches of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. The people were going east, ones who had ignored yesterdays’ evacuation order. I had seen it before, columns of refugees fleeing from war, but goddammit, this was MY county, and MY City. Yeah, a lot of New Yorkers were obnoxious assholes, but there were plenty of good, decent ones too. The majority, in fact. I had fought half my life fighting to keep something like this from happening here. I had been home on leave on 9-11, and the smoke rising over the buildings to the west brought me back there. My anger grew and grew as we moved up the ramp, guided by several soldiers manning a checkpoint and looking scared shitless.
As we passed by the last of the civilians one old woman stood, eyes brimming with tears and a look of sorrow on her face. Beside her stood a child, maybe her grandkid, and he stood there, ramrod straight. When he saw my truck he saluted and yelled, “GO KICK THEIR ASS!”
I saluted back and vowed to do so. If we could, but we’d make them pay. Hell yes we would. My eyes watched the sky, looking for more dragons, or even our own air cover, but nothing was to be seen. There was still gunfire coming from the west, across the river, but it was desultory, not like any coordinated resistance. Had Manhattan completely fallen? I hoped not; every minute they could give me would make a difference.
Chapter 18
From the war journals of Lord Thar Tavan, Head of House Tavor, Commander of the Third Legion.
I go to meet with their commander. Perhaps the humans will come to their senses and yield. Some do, and we already have several “officials” who have offered their services, including the leader of the city, their “Mayor”. In any case, the assault on the bridges is ready, Ellarissa has her troops keyed up to a fever pitch, and I am proud of her. She hates the job she does, I know this, but deep inside her, as in all our people, is the spirit of revenge.
They crowded the barricade on the western approach to the Brooklyn Bridge, small entities against the backdrop of the skyscrapers around them. Cop cars and fire trucks, two army Humvees, piled together, a handful of defenders wielding everything from service pistols to M-4’s to makeshift clubs.
Ellarissa Tavor stood on the roof of Pace University and watched them for a while, then looked at the bridge they guarded. She marveled at the engineering work and wondered if there might be a better way. A partnership, without all the killing. Then she thought about the reports the scouts had brought back. They were concerned with the strength of the human’s military, their “technology” and how to defeat it, but she had read other scrolls and asked for other impressions. The humans were raping this world, this beautiful green blue gift, so welcoming compared to the Elves’ place of exile. The thought of it drove away any sympathy she may have had, though she still had no taste for war.
She veiled herself and lea
ned over the edge, being conscious of their “sniper rifles’, which had come as a nasty surprise. With a flick of her wrist, she aimed her wand at the barricade and concentrated. The stone spell was hard and not her forte, but it was her father’s favorite and she wanted to impress him. If anyone had sat her down and done a psych eval, there would be “Daddy issues” scrawled all over the report, but the Elves didn’t really go for a lot of introspection. Since her mother had died she had stepped into her role as advisor and put her own pursuits aside in preparation for this war.
The spell, sent by her will and concentrated through her war wand, lanced out and then spread as it got close to the barrier. It washed over the defenders as a gentle wave, her will a reflection of her personality.
It didn’t matter to the men and women below. They tried to flee but couldn’t move, felt their flesh harden and pain screamed through nerves that slowly shut down, tried to turn their eyes and their view locked on one thing. Maybe the water, maybe a building, maybe a piece of road. Some managed to close their eyes to only see blackness before the spell finished, and they were cut off from all sensory input. Those were the ones who went insane first.
Chapter 19
First Brooklyn Volunteers
Eastern Approaches to the Brooklyn Bridge
As we unassed the trucks at the park I gathered the leadership, every sergeant, and the civilians that Friedman and Zivcovic brought with them. Standing on the hood of the uparmored I got their attention and explained my plan.
“Listen up. My intent is to bring the lead elements into an ambush on the eastern deck of the bridge. We have two problems; first, that the superstructure provides cover from direct fire all the way past the east tower. Second, the middle walkway and subway tracks are somewhat lower in places than the roadbed, giving the enemy a direct path down the bridge. While this lull lasts, we’ve going to block the bridge as best we can, including multiple barricades dropping down to the off ramps. Master Sergeant Haskell from the engineers will direct that. Does anyone here know how to hot-wire a car?”