Toth

by James C. Glass

  “Gull’s there, and twenty-five fresh marines,” said Floyd. “He’ll be in for a bad surprise unless he goes in with a big force.”

  “Not likely, not with us here and close to him. He’ll only need a small force to take the village, and keep the rest to greet us. I’d feel better if Gull Two kept an eye out, but close to the water. If Toth’s lasers can reach targets over our heads here they can get near the village and all they need is a target high enough to see at that range.”

  “You want it right now, Mike?”

  “I’d like that, sir.”

  Mootry smiled. “You’ve got it, sir.” He got on the radio again, and gave the order: sorties along the mainland every four hours, staying right on the water, no radio noise. “Now, you got anything to eat around here?”

  “Please, come with me,” said Derald, and they followed him from the beach. Behind them, Krisha barked orders at the new additions to her force. Osen tagged along behind, and Floyd looked over a shoulder to smile at him. “How’s the boy doing for you, Mike?” he said quietly.

  “Sticks to me like glue. You didn’t tell me he was a seasoned professional.”

  “What?”

  “A professional, with combat experience. Where’d a kid his age get that? On Brown’s Planet? Or am I being followed around by someone who has a lot of deep-sleep time?” He told Floyd about the firefights, the night on the beach, the knife in the boot. “Who is he?”

  They’d reached the Agbayekhai house and Sabine stood in the doorway, waiting to be introduced. “Later, Mike,” said Floyd, and he held out his hand to the woman.

  Derald was silent but attentive throughout the meal, and listened to Floyd’s full story of the attack on Belsus, the dramatic rescue of two marines who had sealed themselves in a shuttle tube when the storage pod was blown away, and the long wait while they wondered if members of the planet fall crew were still alive. Osen sat next to Michael on one side of the table, Floyd on the other, and Michael couldn’t help but feel much of the conversation was being directed at the boy and not the rest of them. There was a strong bond between the two of them, something beyond that of a Colonel and his orderly, a mystery Michael found disturbing. They reviewed the attack plan again. Floyd inserted the use of Gull Two coming in low from the northwest once the boats had drawn laser fire. The ship would take out the laser cannons, then hover at the island to drop a load of marines as a first wave of ground attack after taking out the door on the east side of Toth’s stronghold. He reminded them of the risk; Gull Two was the last of the flyers, it was all they had to get back to Belsus and the skeleton crew now manning it.

  “The risk can be reduced,” said Derald, breaking his long silence. “It can even be eliminated if you use the ship that was shot down.”

  Floyd laughed. “How? It’s an airship, not a boat.”

  “It could be used as a boat,” said Derald. He got up from the table and returned quickly with a sheet of bark and crayon in his hand, pushing aside empty dishes to make room for the bark and then drawing on it. “You say the engine is operational, and there is some control over the direction of thrust.”

  “Yes.”

  “It can float, but is not designed to move on a water surface.”

  “Of course not, Derald, it’s an aircraft.”

  “Pontoons?” said Michael, suddenly catching on.

  “More than that,” said Derald, scribbling furiously. “We mount the airship on a boat and use the engine at low power to propel it. I have such a boat.” He held up the bark so they could see the picture he’d drawn, the picture of a Gull mounted on an enormous framework of iron sitting on torpedo-shaped pontoons.

  Michael touched the bark, tapped it. “The boat you’ve hidden on the south side of the island,” he said softly.

  “Yes. It is nearly as broad as your aircraft.

  “But it was meant to be a sailing vessel, Derald.”

  “True, but it is very strong and designed for rough seas. You’ve seen Toth’s boats, how they skim the waves at high speed. This boat could do that, and more.”

  “A floating weapons platform,” said Floyd. “You say this thing exists?”

  “Yes. We can bring it here in a few hours, use the lifters on your aircraft to mount it. The problem is to make the mounting secure.”

  “It’s an iron structure,” said Michael, “fairly soft iron, mostly thick cable, and flexible. Is there a welding unit on the Gull?”

  “A small one, but certainly enough for soft metal. Good Lord, it might work. Wire the Gull to this structure and make a speedboat out of it! We could let the sailboats draw fire, then come in with this thing and target the laser batteries!”

  Derald jumped from the table. “I will have the boat brought over,” he said, and rushed from the room as they sat staring at the picture he’d drawn.

  “This will take time, sir,” said Osen. “Do we have it?”

  “I wanted to make our move early tomorrow,” explained Michael. “If we wait, Toth could hit us here with everything he has, and I don’t know what that is. That small force he sent had to be a token thing, because he wasn’t expecting any resistance, and I’m worried about Kari. She’s already been on that island for days.”

  “If she’s alive now she’ll be alive a day from now,” said Floyd. “Her real danger will come when we attack, and the faster we move at that time the safer she’ll be. I like this idea, so let’s do it. We go in full-bore with what we can muster, and keep Gull Two in reserve. Use Gull One to take out the laser batteries and discharge a landing force by boat. And what about the boat Toth sent that’s floating out there? Is it useable?”

  “It’s shot up pretty good. We haven’t checked it out yet,” said Michael.

  “Let’s do that now,” said Floyd. “It could be used for a first landing. We’ll need speed to get in under those lasers.”

  They excused themselves and went down to the beach. Derald stood watching two sailboats headed towards the west end of the island. He pointed at them and said; “it will be a few hours before they return. The load will be heavy.”

  “Plenty to do before then,” said Mootry.

  The next few hours saw a flurry of activity on the beach, Krisha’s marines loaded packs and cleaned weapons, and a flotilla of skiffs moved back and forth between Gull One, the damaged boat from Toth, and the beach. The engine of the boat was pronounced sound, but the controls and one steering cable had been shot away. The boat was towed alongside Gull One and the flight crew set to work on the controls. Iron cable was brought down from the canyon and welded in place while the flight crew returned to the Gull to check out the weapons system and replace several blown relays. Islanders swarmed over the boat, patching holes with pitch and small squares of pressed bark, bringing down glass amphorae filled with alcohol that they emptied into the fuel tank. Near dusk the boat’s engine coughed, sputtered, coughed again, and then roared into life as the people on the beach cheered. Derald himself took the controls and drove the boat in a tight circle beyond the Gull, making a sprint west, then back again. As he returned, they spotted the sails in the west, two small boats ponderously moving towards them and behind them the low silhouette of iron latticework floating on four enormous glass pontoons. People waved and shouted, and suddenly were silent.

  A loud booming sound came from the mainland, a flash appearing at the northern horizon, then another boom. They looked out to sea, saw streams of light coming up from it, sweeping the sky as if searching for a target and ceasing at the sound of a third explosion. The horizon lit up in orange and red. Osen was on the radio with Nik again.

  “Sir! Two speedboats attacking the mainland from the east! Gull Two is on it!” A moment later he smiled, looked at Michael and drew a finger across his own throat. “Got ’em, sir! Missiles at five hundred meters as the boats were coming in towards shore! Blew them to pieces, sir, not even scrap left. Gull Two requests permission to make an island flyby and look for a place to land.”

  “Denied!�
�� yelled Mootry. “Tell them to get back to the plateau and stay ready to fly! Mike says there’s no landing place for them out here. Get home and I’ll call for them when we’re ready.”

  Osen relayed the message. Out on the northern horizon, two puffs of black cloud rose from the sea. Two more boats gone, that plus two made four, filled with Toth’s troops, perhaps eighty men. Marines cheered at the news; at least eighty people would not be shooting at them in the hours to come.

  The two sailboats came in slowly, towing the huge flatboat behind them. They anchored it a few meters north of the Gull as Derald called for a skiff and rowed over to clamber aboard his creation. It was a boat meant to cross the great sea to the lands in the south, but now destined to become a weapon of war. He walked it from one end to the other, comparing its size with the Gull, pausing to doodle on a piece of bark, walking again, and balancing delicately on the multi-layered mesh of iron cable making up the structure. In a few minutes he was back on shore, handing out lists of materials to be brought down the canyon: sheets, angle iron, thirty-millimeter cable and clamps. Islanders scattered to their tasks while Michael and Mootry stood there, looking befuddled. Derald came up to them, enthusiastic.

  “The breaks in the wings must be covered and iron eyehooks welded here, here, and here on the aircraft.” He showed them the points on his drawing, an accurate rendition of the Gull.

  “Iron to titanium alloy?” said Michael. “I don’t think so.”

  “I’ll get Sergeant Auk on this,” said Mootry. “Maybe it can be brazed.”

  For the moment Michael felt useless, while around him the islanders and flight crewmembers were running in every direction. He went up to the edge of the beach and sat in the sand to watch. It was getting dark, and alcohol lanterns were brought down to illuminate the beach and Toth’s attack boat. The Gull was lit up by a dozen hand lamps brought from its interior. Krisha came up to him an hour later, a bulky pack slung over her shoulder, and an M-34 in one hand. “Excuse me, Major, but are you going in with us?”

  “What?”

  “The attack on Toth’s island, are you going in with the rest of us?”

  The question made him angry. “You’re damned right I am! Did you think I was going to sit here and wait for it to be over?”

  “No, sir. You’ll need these.” She dropped the pack at his feet and laid the assault rifle across it.

  Michael grabbed the rifle. “I’m still a marine, Captain,” he mumbled.

  “Yes, sir. Colonel said that about himself, too. Begging your pardon, Major, and no offence intended, but I think the high-ranking officers should go in with the second wave. We don’t know what to expect out there.”

  “That includes you, Krisha? You’re third in command here.”

  Krisha’s eyes narrowed. “No, sir, I’m going in first. Do I have to explain why?”

  Michael softened. “No, you don’t. I want her safe and alive as much as you do, Krish. When you’re looking for her, just keep an eye behind you. I don’t want to lose you, either.”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” she said, then walked away, leaving him there fondling a weapon he hadn’t fired in over fifteen years. I was a marine—once. Now I’m a military diplomat about to be mustered out. What then? Be a fisherman?

  It suddenly occurred to him that was not such a bad idea.

  The work went on throughout the night. Michael hauled sheet metal for lining the cutouts in the flatboat frame spaced to fit the landing feet of the Gull. There were three circular plates, each a meter in diameter. For three hours he met with Floyd and Krisha in the Agbayekhai house, going over alternate plans for the attack: one with boats only, the second using the floating Gull, the third with Gull Two providing air cover. In each case the maximum danger was to those few brave men who would provide a diversion by piloting their little sailboats in from the west, and almost certainly drawing heavy laser fire from Toth’s island. In seconds their boats could be smoking ruins and they could be in the water only tens of meters from the barrier and its den of Charni. The thought chilled them all, yet it was these men who had first volunteered, both villagers and islanders, to do the job. They did it to be rid of Toth.

  The meeting broke up near midnight and Krisha returned to her troops, Michael and Mootry walked outside to sit in the amphitheatre, away from the lights and the noise near the beach. They sat close together, and Mootry laid back, hands behind his head, to look at the stars. “Not so pretty here,” he said. “A lot of rock, and smelly air.”

  “It’s beautiful on the mainland,” said Michael. “Trees, flowers, as far as you can see, pretty much untouched. Even the seawater is crystal clear. When I see this, the idea of going back to Brown’s Planet doesn’t appeal to me at all.”

  “Doesn’t seem we have any choice, Mike, and that assumes we come out of this alive. God, I never thought I’d be ending a career with a firefight, but here I am and here you are, two old marines with one more battle between the pasture and us. Now Krisha, the little snip, she doesn’t think that’s such a good idea. I’m too important, she says, and shouldn’t go in until they’re mopping up.”

  Michael laughed. “She tried the same thing with me. Hell, she’s right. My wind is gone, my knees are gone, and I’d be in the way trying to go in first. I settled for second wave, and Krish seems to go along with that.”

  “Pissed me off,” said Floyd. “I had two major wars behind me before she was out of diapers. How’d she do over there—with Toth’s people?”

  “Professional—a little brutal, maybe. She shot an unarmed prisoner in the leg when he didn’t talk fast enough for her. Her marines are young and she’s got them through their first and second firefights without a casualty. You won’t hear any girly jokes about her; she’s Captain Elg, and that’s it.”

  “Think she’s exec material?”

  “Definitely.”

  “Not that I want to dwell on it, but if something happens to me you might want to use her as your number one on the way back to Brown’s Planet when we’re done here.” Mootry didn’t look at him, just stared up at the stars.

  Michael’s face flushed hot at his response, for it came from deep inside him, the articulation of a decision he’d made subconsciously sometime during the past two days. “There’s only one problem with that idea, Floyd. I’m not going back to Brown’s Planet. One way or another, I’m staying right here.”

  Mootry propped himself up on an elbow, looked at Michael closely. “I thought about that before the trouble started, but not anymore. You sure?”

  “Yes,” said Michael, stunned by his own words. “It’s the first time I’ve said it aloud to myself or anyone else.”

  “What happened, you fall in love with the trees and flowers?”

  Michael smiled. “Not just that. There’s—something else.”

  Now Mootry was grinning. “Does it wear a skirt?”

  “Yes.”

  “A villager?”

  “Yes, a widow. She has a little boy who hasn’t said more than two words to me. I think his father was murdered by Jezrul for questioning Toth’s laws.”

  “My God,” said Mootry, lying down again, “an old marine like you—trapped by a woman.”

  “Feels okay to me,” said Michael.

  “Yeah, I know. I know how it feels. Had a woman myself, once.”

  “You? When did that happen?”

  “Oh, you were on the team, then. We were together about six months, and then it was time to ship out and I didn’t look back, just left her there.”

  “Where?” said Michael.

  Mootry sat up, turned to face Michael, very close. “Brown’s Planet. You were in deep sleep when we finally went back, and I looked her up. Shouldn’t have, but I did, and now I’m glad I did. I had a kid, Mike, born only months after I’d left her. A son. Good kid, smart, too smart for his own good. He’d got himself involved in the revolution, underground stuff, bombings, assassinations, and the works. Ran with the Torres gang, and even the Federation couldn
’t forgive some of the things they did. He was declared an outlaw after Arkon got rid of the Maester regime that had brought about the revolution in the first place. On the run, hiding out, but his mom knew where to find him. Tia, his mom, lost most of her farm to reparation, was barely making it by the time I got back. She’d given up, wouldn’t eat, even when she saw me. I was holding her hand when she died.”

  “What happened to the boy?”

  Mootry hesitated, looked down. “I took him on, called him a marine. God knows he had the training for it. He’s an illegal, no papers, no records, nothing.” He looked up as the dawn of realization hit Michael’s eyes.

  “Osen,” said Michael.

  “Yeah. You wanted to know about him, and there it is.”

  “Does he know? Does he know you’re his father?”

  “Yes. He’s a good kid, Mike, no bitterness about the past, accepts things as they come, but I can’t take him back with me, and he knows that too. I brought him on after the last crew audit, and he has to be gone before the next one. We talked earlier this evening; he’s staying here too, like you say, one way or another. We had some time together, and it’s best for both of us. I don’t want to spend old age in a military prison. The house and what’s left of the farm will keep me busy. My name’s on the papers, and Harve Osen, well, he’ll just disappear.”

  Michael shook his head. “All these years I’ve known you, and I never would have guessed this.”

  “You were asleep most of the time, Mike.” Both of them laughed at that. “Anyway, it looks like Krisha is number one on the way back, and if something happens to me she’s running the show. You still sure, Mike?”

  “Yes.”

  They stood up, faced each other, Mootry putting a hand on Michael’s shoulder. “One more firefight to go, Mike. Let’s get at it.”

  They walked back down to the lights, and the noise on the beach.

  * * * * * * *

  It was early afternoon when Muesl rowed alone out to the Gull and powered it up. Derald and several other islanders stood at the corners of the barge, and the beach was crowded with onlookers. The boat captured from Toth had made several sprints back and forth along the shore earlier, running smoothly on alcohol fuel and pronounced ready by Derald. Now it sat meters from the barge, two men in it to help guide Muesl in placing the Gull’s landing plates precisely in the receptacles made for them. Lifters whined and the Gull lifted two meters above the water as everyone held their breath. Fire shot from the main thruster, a short burst, and then another. The Gull rotated slowly, drifted over the barge, and descended a meter, the men on Toth’s boat gesturing frantically. What seemed an eternity was five minutes of trial and error, lifters screaming, thruster spitting as Muesl maneuvered the Gull into position and finally plopped it one meter down onto the barge with a resounding clang. The onlookers cheered as Muesl appeared at the open hatch and bowed grandly to them. Workers swarmed over the aircraft, threading cable through eyehooks to secure it in place, winching and welding. The bizarre vessel bobbed on the waves, half-plane, half-boat, stubby remnants of wings sealed with iron sheet. The maw of the Gull opened, and above it the Gatling appeared from its recess, swiveling ominously as Muesl played with the controls.