The 18th Race: Book 02 - In All Directions

by David Sherman

  She didn’t notice that some of the Dusters looked up and pointed as she passed over them.

  “Six Actual, Troub. I have made visual confirmation. They are Dusters. Over.”

  “Troubadour, Six, how are they armed? Over.”

  “Wait one, Actual. I’ll swing over them again.” She goosed her Echo to quickly circle back around to the mob of Dusters, checking her instruments as she went. “Six, Troub. I’m not picking up any electro-mag radiation. Going in for visual.” After a moment she said in a low voice that probably wasn’t meant for the Marines on the ground, “Ain’t that cute. They see me.” More loudly, she said, “Actual, Troub. I see small arms and some crew-served weapons including artillery pieces—maybe similar to pocket howitzers.” She let out a short, delighted laugh. “It looks like they’re aiming at me! No sweat. My jammers will send their missiles anyplace but at me. It’s odd, though. I’m still not picking up any electro-mag. How the hell are they aiming?”

  Puffs of black smoke appeared in the sky in front of her, and the AV 16 (E) shuddered as it ran into shrapnel thrown out by bursting aerial artillery—the dumb kind that humans hadn’t used in centuries. Throw a bomb up in the air without guidance and let it explode. Maybe it’ll hit something. The first one hit, peppering the skin of the Echo. That was really little more than cosmetic damage. What hurt the aircraft was the chunks of jagged metal that got sucked into its engines and tore them apart, screaming like lost souls.

  First Lieutenant Christine F. Schilt would have screamed in the few seconds of her life that remained, but she couldn’t believe that she was really being shot down.

  The AV 16 (E) flown by Troubadour exploded in a fireball when it impacted with the ground. The impact was far enough away from the Dusters that none of them were injured by the flames or flying debris.

  At their current speed, the Dusters were now little more than an hour away from MCAF Jordan. They picked up their pace. They had India Company outnumbered by four to one, if not more.

  Chapter 16

  Observation post, three kilometers west of MCAF Jordan

  “Shit, shit, shit, I don’t like this,” PFC Harry Orndoff muttered.

  “None of us do, Harry,” Corporal John Mackie said. “But this is what we’re doing. Now shut up before you scare the new guy.”

  Mackie didn’t have to worryabout scaring the new guy, PFC Bill Horton was already scared. And with good reason. The fire team was in a four-man observation post in thin forest three kilometers away from the defenses at the air facility. They’d gotten there by way of a narrow farm road that hadn’t been used in long enough that the forest was beginning to reclaim it. Their job was to provide early warning of the approach of the Dusters.

  “Anyway, we’ve got a bug-out buggy,” Mackie added.

  The Major Mite they were given wasn’t much of a bug-out buggy: a quarter-ton truck that strained when called on to carry four fully combat-loaded Marines. But it was a lot faster than running, and had a much better chance of letting the four Marines out-distance approaching Dusters.

  Lance Corporal Cafferata leaned toward Horton and said sotto voce, “Ignore Orndoff, he’s a chronic worrier. Don’t mean nothing.” He kept his eyes on the display of the motion detector console the fire team had been supplied with. Four individual detectors planted ahead swept the area to the OP’s front, covering a width of half a kilometer. Cafferata had to watch the display carefully, as it was filled with static caused by leaves fluttering in the light breeze that wafted through the trees. Cafferata thought that, with a little bit of luck, they’d hear the Dusters before they were close enough for the detector display to pick up their motion.

  “Luck is the final determinant in combat,” Mackie had said when Cafferata earlier voiced his hope. “In the final analysis luck is more important than skill. But any Marine who relies on luck to accomplish his mission is a dead Marine.”

  Cafferata had sighed. He knew that, he just didn’t like being reminded. He was on a mission that didn’t require a tremendous amount of skill, and figured that made luck all that much more important.

  Horton gave his fire team leader a worried look. He’d also heard what Mackie had said about luck. It didn’t reassure him. He was entirely too conscious of the fact that there might be hundreds of Dusters closer to him than other Marines were. He’d also heard that the Dusters held a significant numerical advantage over the Marines at the MCAF, which also did nothing to reassure him.

  Avians flittered and darted about in the trees, snapping up flying insectoids just like forest birds on Earth did. Somewhere a bark-boring avian rat-a-tat-tat-ed a tree, digging out insectoids that burrowed into tree trunks.

  “That sounds just like the woodpeckers I saw back home when I was growing up,” Mackie said. “How about you, Horton? Did you ever see woodpeckers?” He spoke softly, but kept his eyes front in case a Duster scout managed to slip past the motion detectors, and listened to the forest more than to Horton’s answer.

  “I—I don’t know,” Horton replied. He was too nervous to think about Earthly birds.

  They sat quietly for a few minutes, Cafferata watching the display, the others looking into the forest, Mackie listening as well as looking.

  Time drags when all you’re doing is waiting. But wait was all they had to do—that and watch. The mind will drift after awhile. So it wasn’t until the rat-a-tat-tat suddenly stopped that Mackie abruptly noticed the faint drumming of feet he’d been hearing for several minutes.

  “Heads up,” he called out, just loudly enough for his men to hear.

  At the same time, Cafferata snapped, “Movement.”

  Mackie jumped up and ran to the movement detector monitor and studied the screen.

  “They’re coming,” he said. He studied the display for a moment, read the numbers scrawling down one side of the screen, and said, “Two hundred meters and closing. Time for us to get out of here.”

  Mackie helped Cafferata close the control station and run with it to the Major Mite. The other two were all ready in it. Orndoff was at the controls, ready to go. As soon as Mackie and Cafferata were in, Orndoff gunned it. The Major Mite took off with a muted roar.

  They’d barely started when wild caws and skrees echoed through the trees, and a few shots whizzed past, some thunking into tree trunks.

  “Go!” Mackie shouted.

  “I’m going, I’m going!” Orndoff shouted back. The smallish vehicle slowly picked up speed.

  Mackie twisted around to look back and saw Dusters darting through the trees little more than a hundred meters to the rear. He took the most stable position he could in the moving, jouncing vehicle and raised his rifle to his shoulder. If any Duster got close, Mackie would attempt to shoot it. But his position wasn’t steady enough to take the kind of shots he had when he’d faced them before.

  More Dusters became visible, some running on the faint track the Major Mite followed. The vehicle hit a relatively smooth stretch of road and Mackie fired a three-round burst. A Duster tumbled, spraying red.

  Cafferata was looking back and whooped. “Way to go, honcho! Got that bastard.”

  “Lucky shot,” Mackie said back. “Just dumb luck.”

  Cafferata said dryly, “Right. I forgot. You only qualified as Expert.” Expert, the Marines’ highest level of marksmanship.

  Belatedly, Mackie remembered he was supposed to notify the company when he saw the Dusters. He got on his comm and reported.

  Defensive works, Marine Corps Air Facility, Jordan

  “They’re about two minutes behind us,” Corporal Mackie shouted as PFC Orndoff skidded the Major Mite through an opening in the wire.

  Corporal Vittori came up and grabbed Mackie’s arm. “Get your men into the trench there.” He pointed in the direction he was pulling Mackie.

  Second Lieutenant Commiskey pounded to them. “How many are there?”he demanded.

  Mackie didn’t look at his platoon commander when he answered, but kept looking at the treeline wh
ere he expected to see Dusters bursting into the open at any second. “Sorry, sir. They were shooting at us, I didn’t get a head count.”

  “But you shot one of ‘em in the head,” Lance Corporal Cafferata said from his position a couple of meters away.

  “You killed one?” Commiskey asked.

  Mackie nodded. “He was getting too close.”

  “One burst, Lieutenant,” Cafferata said. “Right in the head. You should a seen it, that head burst like a melon, spraying blood all over the damn place.”

  “Did any get on you?” Commiskey asked, looking at Mackie’s uniform.

  Mackie shot a glare at Cafferata. “He wasn’t that close, sir.”

  “Sixty, seventy meters,” Cafferata said.

  Commiskey glanced at the Major Mite. He’d ridden in them and knew how much they could bounce. “Damn good shooting at that range,” he commented.

  Mackie shrugged. “That was just one. There are hundreds more on their way. How much ammo do we have?”

  Before Commiskey could answer, a siren sounded. A line of Dusters had appeared at the edge of the trees, five hundred meters distant. They jittered side to side, fore and back, but didn’t advance.

  “Lock and load!” the platoon sergeants called. “Lock and load!” It was an unnecessary command, as all the Marines on the line already had their rifles loaded and most were pointing them at the distant treeline. The better command at the moment was one taken up by some of the squad leaders, and repeated by many fire team leaders: “Hold your fire, wait for the command!”

  “Get ready,” Commiskey said to Mackie and slapped his shoulder. He stood and shouted out the same command to the rest of the platoon as he trotted back to his position. “Everybody, get ready.” His voice didn’t crack when he saw the number of Dusters appearing on the far side of the cleared area. But his throat tightened.

  “Third fire team, take aim but hold your fire!” Mackie shouted. First platoon was on the company’s right flank. Mackie couldn’t see it from where he was, but the twenty Marines of the combat engineer platoon had also picked up their rifles and took positions on the trench’s left flank, ready to fight off the attackers.

  Captain Sitter came up on the all-hands freq. “Guns, strafe that line. Mortars, lob some into the trees behind the line. One gun on each flank, crossfire at the Dusters’ flank. Everybody else, hold your fire until I say otherwise. Do it now.”

  From points along the defensive line, the M5-C machine guns of the company opened fire. Their tracers flew on a flat arc and danced side to side along the ends of the Dusters’ line. Behind the Marines line came the distinctive cough of mortars firing. Arching high overhead, there was a noticeable time lag before the mortar bombs burst in the trees.

  “Why aren’t they charging?” Horton asked. “Why are they just standing there?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe they’re dumb?” Orndoff said.

  “They’re sacrificing some soldiers to see what kind of weapons we have,” Mackie said.

  “Say what?” Horton squawked. “What kind of crazy man would do that?”

  “First off, they aren’t men,” Orndoff said.

  “There have been human armies that did that,” Mackie explained, “as you’d know if you’d studied military history like I have.”

  “But that’s crazy,” Horton objected.

  “I didn’t say it wasn’t.”

  “They aren’t learning what kind of weapons we have, the Scatterers aren’t firing. Why not?” Horton could see that the distant Dusters were taking casualties.

  “Maybe the Skipper doesn’t want them to know we’ve got Scatterers.”

  That was when the aliens charged.

  “Hold your fire,” Sitter again ordered on the all-hands freq. “Wait for my command.”

  The Dusters ran fast, but they jinked and dodged, running more side to side than forward, so they weren’t closing the distance much faster than running men would. They fired as they ran, but nearly all of their shots were wild and went high or hit the dirt between them and the barrier wire—few struck near the fighting trench the Marines were in. The width of the charging mass was double the width of the Marines’ defensive line.

  Mackie picked a spot in the mass and aimed at it, gently caressing the trigger of his rifle while waiting for the command to fire. “Damn,” he said. “That looks like a lot more than the eight hundred that jet jockey estimated.”

  “What’s he waiting for?” Horton nervously asked.

  “Be patient,” Mackie said. “He wants more of them to come out of the trees so we’ve got a denser mass to shoot at.

  When the leading Dusters were four hundred meters distant, Sitter called on the all hands, “Fire!” and everyone opened up. The two Scatterers threw their two thousand rounds per minute at the Dusters. Aliens started dropping in increasing numbers. Some of the fallen stayed down, others began crawling back toward the cover of the trees. A few rose and staggered after the charging mass.

  Horton shook his head. “They’re getting slaughtered!” he shouted. “How can they charge like that?”

  While reloading, Mackie said, “There have been human armies that did that. They called it ‘human wave’ attacks.”

  “There’s a difference,” Cafferata added. “The first lines in human wave attacks often carried dummy weapons. These guys are all armed.”

  The leading line of Dusters reached three hundred meters from the wire barrier and dropped into prone positions to put aimed fire at the Marines. Bullets started striking the dirt close to the trench; some audibly whizzed past. The rest of the mass charged past them, still flipping backward or falling to the side when they were hit. Some flopped forward when their jinking carried them into the path of bullets from their comrades.

  The first cry of, “Corpsman up!” was shouted.

  At two hundred meters the leading aliens dropped to put aimed fire at the Marines. The first shooters leapt to their feet and rejoined the charge. The mass of attacking Dusters was thinner than it had been, and the Marines’ fire wasn’t knocking down as many.

  Next to him, Mackie heard Cafferata yelp, and turned to the sound. Cafferata was slumped against the front wall of the trench. Pain made a rictus of his face, and he clutched his right arm above the elbow. Blood flowed from around it.

  “Corpsman up! How bad is it?” Mackie asked Cafferata.

  “Hurts like hell,” Cafferata said through gritted teeth.

  “Doc’s on his way, he’ll take care of that.” Mackie pulled the field dressing from Cafferata’s first aid pouch and ripped it open.

  “Gimme that,” Cafferata gasped, and let go of his wound to grab the dressing. “I’ll hold it on until Doc gets here. Get back to killing Dusters.”

  Mackie gave him a searching look. The other’s face was beading with sweat, but his complexion wasn’t turning waxy. He pressed the dressing on Cafferata’s wound and withdrew his hand so the lance corporal could hold it in place. He turned back to see the Dusters were closer.

  “What do you have here?” Hayden asked as he dropped into the trench. His eyes took in the blood-stained bandage Cafferata pressed to his arm. “Let me put another one on that.” He got another dressing out of his medkit to tie around the one Cafferata was holding. “Does it hurt?”

  “No shit.”

  “I’ve got something for that.” Hayden dipped back into his medkit for a pain killer and injected it into Cafferata’s shoulder. “That’ll hold you until I can get you to the med station.”

  The Duster leaders at one hundred meters dropped in turn and the others got up to resume their charge. There were still fewer of them, and fewer were falling to Marine bullets.

  Then the leaders leaped onto the wire and the following Dusters clambered up them to pin themselves higher up on the wire.

  Captain Sitter shouted on the all-hands freq, “Fix bayonets!” All along the line, rifles stopped firing for the seconds it took to attach the blades around the muzzles of the rifles, turning t
hem into clumsy spears.

  The third Dusters flung themselves onto the top of the wire, bending over it. The rest of the mass clambered over their bodies to the top and jumped to the ground. They’d been warned about the spikes in the bottom of the shallow trench inside the defensive wire, and didn’t jump blindly into it. Most of them stepped around the spikes, although a few weren’t as agile and shrieked when a foot was pierced. Some of them fell onto more spikes, and the Dusters who came behind used them as stepping stones.

  “Remember, their necks are a weak spot!” Mackie shouted at his men.

  Mackie fired three more bursts and saw a Duster tumble from one of them. Then they were in bayonet range. One ran straight at him. He stood and jabbed forward with his rifle, under the reaching claws of the alien, which had dropped its rifle in favor of using its talons and toothed beak on Earthly flesh. The man’s arms were longer, and the bayonet impaled the Duster in its shoulder near where its long neck stuck out. The blade went deep, and Mackie rolled back, using the alien’s momentum to swing it up and over. The Duster flew off the bayonet and fell to the ground behind the trench, with a bone-snapping thud.

  Another Duster was almost on him, and he slammed the butt of his rifle into its beak, shattering it. The Duster fell back, shrieking in pain and clutching at its face.

  Next to him, he heard the banging of Doc Hayden’s handgun. A quick glance showed him Cafferata firing his rifle one-handed. Another Duster came at Mackie, too close for him to use his rifle. He used the same advice he’d shouted to his men—he used his rifle to bat away the Duster’s reaching hands and grabbed its neck behind its head with his free hand. Again, he used the alien’s momentum to swing it around, dropping his rifle in the process. He slammed the Duster to the ground, where its legs landed on the corpse of the one he’d bayoneted, leaped out of the trench to straddle it and gripped its neck with both hands. He wrenched the neck and twisted it, feeling bones snap. The Duster bucked with its head flopping on the end of its broken neck. He spun back to the trench and surged to his feet just as a speeding Duster reached him, aiming low with outstretched talons, expecting him to still be down. They collided, and Mackie was thrown back. He rolled to the side and jumped to his feet. The Duster was staggering backward and fell into the trench. Mackie jumped in after him and landed one foot on the Duster’s chest, the other on its neck. The snapping of bones was clearly audible. Then the Marine had to toss the writhing alien aside to get to his rifle.