War To The Knife

by Grant, Peter

  Those standing nearby chortled, but their laughter was brittle, strained. Jake knew their minds were on the morning, and what would almost certainly be the last day of life for many of them. He was having the same difficulty himself. The tension was a red-hot wire threaded through his guts, tugging, pulling, burning. Their target was right slap bang in the middle of Banka’s security zone. Getting away after the attack would be very difficult. What will death be like?, he found himself wondering for the umpteenth time. Will it hurt? Will I be able to control myself and die like a man? Or will I scream helplessly, like I’ve seen too many good people do when they were driven beyond self-control by roaring red agony?

  He thrust the memories from his mind by turning his thoughts to his son. He knew Dave would be preparing to brief the force about to assault the Caristo garrison, just as he was about to speak to the rest of Niven’s Regiment. Would the boy live through the night’s assault and tomorrow morning’s desperate fight in orbit? Would he escape to start a new life somewhere else? I’ll probably never know, Jake thought sadly to himself; then cursed softly and again tried to drive the dark shadows out of his mind. There was too much still to be done.

  He sipped coffee as he walked to the store-room against the rear wall and checked his combat gear yet again. His last clean uniform was laid out, complete with underwear and a brand-new pair of socks – a rare treat. His electromagnetic rifle was cleaned and ready, along with a dozen hundred-round chargers of ammunition and two spare power packs. He grinned wryly. The Bactrians actually made a decent infantry weapon, accurate and reliable, with which the entire Resistance was now equipped thanks to plentiful captures and a shortage of ammunition for their original carbines. As for heavy weapons, they hadn’t been able to smuggle them through the security perimeter around Banka, but their shuttle-borne comrades would bring some with them and they’d capture more from the defenders if they needed them. They’d done so often enough in the past, after all.

  He checked for the umpteenth time that his earpiece and microphone were securely clipped to his helmet and the encrypted radio on his battle belt was set to the right frequency. His visor displayed all its six modes correctly as he ran through them. The power pack on his belt was fully charged, to provide a day and night of power to his battle tools. Finally he took a miniature Bible from his pack and tucked it into his shirt pocket.

  He swallowed the last of his coffee and walked to the door of the storeroom. In the half-wrecked upper-level office space outside, part of its roof missing since the explosion that had destroyed nearby Banka, the troops were also checking their gear.

  “All right, everyone, gather round!”

  Jake waited as his forty soldiers filed to the front of the room, sitting down on boxes and crates in a rough semi-circle before him. He switched on a portable projection unit and checked its display against the wall, then asked one of the men to hang a white sheet against the partition so it could be seen more clearly. He’d finished by the time the last person sat down.

  “I know all of you have been curious during the past couple of weeks,” he began. “You’ve trained to attack targets with a specific layout and configuration, but without knowing what or where they were. You were told that this is a volunteer mission with little chance of survival, but not why it was so important as to be worth your lives. I can only thank you all for accepting the challenge. Tonight I’m going to tell you more about our part in this mission. Strike teams from our other three regiments are waiting in the ruins of Banka just as we are, standing by to attack as soon as we open the way for them. Four more teams of our comrades are preparing to assault distant garrisons tonight. They’ll kill every Bactrian there and take control of their assault shuttles. They’ll arm them, then bring the shuttles here to help us tomorrow.”

  The soldiers grinned their approval, exchanging comments in quiet tones so as not to alert any passing Bactrians. Jake waited for silence, then pointed out, “We in this room are the key to this entire operation. We have to succeed if our comrades are to succeed. If we fail, they can’t achieve their objectives – but we won’t fail. In fact, through their laziness and stupidity, the Bactrians have made our job possible. You see, two years before the invasion Laredo invested a lot of money in new traffic control systems. We bought a supercomputer and ground- and aerostat-based planetary radars, and upgraded our space station equipment too. When the Bactrians took over they didn’t see any point in replacing perfectly good equipment; so they kept it, merely adding their own interface to bring it into conformity with their standard operating procedures.”

  He grinned ferally. “They made two crucial mistakes. The first was combining spaceborne and airborne traffic control in a single new facility down here, instead of keeping them separate. That’s great for centralized control, but it’s a lot easier for an enemy to disrupt things, because he only has to take out the central node for the entire network to disintegrate. Second, our radar and comm feeds all went to the basement of the old traffic control center. The above-ground portion was severely damaged during the destruction of Banka, but the basement levels, including the computer center, were left intact. When the Bactrians built their new TrafCon they saved a lot of time and money by making it simply an operations center. They left the computer and the radar and comm feeds in the basement at the old center and laid new connections to them, instead of moving them all to the new building.

  “They included both buildings in their high-security zone, but their contractors decided to take a short-cut to save time and make a bit of extra profit. Instead of cutting a new secure cable tunnel between the two buildings, they dug a short connecting tunnel to the main service tunnel beneath the street. They then ran their conduit along the roof of that tunnel until it passed the new center, where they dug another connecting tunnel into its basement. Unfortunately for their security – but luckily from our perspective – that service tunnel passes through a four-way intersection with another tunnel halfway between the buildings. The cross-tunnel passes out of the high-security zone with only a heavy gate to bar access to it, and runs beneath the road outside. It even connects to this warehouse to allow tie-ins to city utilities.

  “We’re going to use those tunnels to sneak beneath the enemy’s defenses and take over the old traffic control center tomorrow morning. We’ll hold off the Bactrians while our technicians,” and he nodded to several people at the rear of the group, “use emergency consoles in the basement to make some creative adjustments. Some of them worked on this system before the war, so they know exactly what to do. They’ll clear the way for our shuttles to move in on the Satrap’s parade, to kill him and as many enemy troops as they can. While they’re doing that, we’ll cut the links to the new TrafCon to cause as much confusion as possible, then rig the supercomputer for demolition.

  “The attack on the arena will trigger a massive knee-jerk response from other Bactrian forces in the city. They’ll rush to rescue their Satrap, but to do that they’ll have to pull defenders from other important targets. That’ll be the cue for our raiding parties to come out of hiding and attack the civil and military headquarters compounds and the central stores depot. They’ll wreck the planetary administration from end to end. Furthermore, while all that’s going down, another team under the command of my son Dave will be taking out the space station and dealing with the warships in orbit before putting all our evidence aboard a waiting freighter whose visit was set up by our Government-in-Exile. It’ll take it to our Vice-President, who’ll use it to demand action against Bactria by the United Planets for its crimes against humanity.”

  There was a moment’s awed, shocked silence, then suddenly everyone was on their feet. They didn’t forget the need for relative quiet, but even so, hardened troopers fist-bumped and hugged each other in excitement, their eyes sparkling. Jake let the muted hubbub go on for a few moments before he called for order. “Come on, people! We’ve still got a lot to do. Settle down!”

  He waited for the celeb
rations to subside, then said solemnly, “General Allred has assigned to Niven’s Regiment the most important task in this entire operation – taking over the traffic control network. If the network is operational the Bactrians will detect our shuttles coming in and shoot them down, and be able to co-ordinate the response of their own assault shuttles to our attacks in the city. They’ll also warn their forces in orbit about our attack here, putting them on alert. If we take over the network they can’t do any of those things. More to the point, they’ve slaved all their defenses against airborne attack to the TrafCon supercomputer. If we control it, we can do all sorts of interesting things with their defenses – and we will!

  “As soon as all our attacks are under way across the city, we’ll destroy the computer center and set up booby-traps for enemy responders. We’ll then try to make our way out of the city in small groups, using captured vehicles and if necessary hiding in the wreckage of Banka that the Bactrians haven’t cleared yet. That’s going to be difficult, because we’re right in the heart of their defenses and they’ll be sending in troops from their outer perimeter to assist those under fire inside the city. Frankly, I don’t think most of us will make it out, but we’ll sell our lives dearly and take as many Bactrians with us as we can. Even if we die, we’ll hurt the enemy worse than he’s ever been hurt before – and he’ll still have to answer to the United Planets. Killing us will be a Pyrrhic victory.”

  He paused for a moment as he looked around the gathering, gathering his thoughts. “This is probably our last stand as an organized Resistance. We stand foursquare in the tradition of Horatius and his companions at the Sublicius Bridge; of Leonidas and his three hundred Spartans at Thermopylae; of Roland and his companions at Roncevaux Pass; of Travis, Bowie, Crockett and the volunteers at the Alamo; of the Jewish resisters in the Warsaw Ghetto who freely chose to fight, even knowing they had no chance of survival, rather than meekly submit to genocide. We stand with the thousands upon thousands of others throughout history who’ve followed the example of such heroes. There must have been far, far more of them than the few whose names are known – and they’re all here in spirit with us tonight.

  “I couldn’t ask for better friends and comrades than you. That’s what we all are to each other – friends and comrades, not just fellow soldiers. We’ve lived together as best we can while so many of our comrades died around us. Now it’s time for us to honor their memory in our last fight.

  “I’m going to run through our briefing for the last time in one hour from now. Until then you’re free to prepare yourselves in your own way for what lies ahead.” He took the Bible from his pocket and held it up. “I’m going to be doing that according to my Christian tradition. Those of you who share it are welcome to join me, as well as any others who are interested.” He indicated the store-room he was using as his office and bedroom.

  “No matter what your faith or philosophy, remember the ancient words of Judas Maccabeus: ‘Arm yourselves, and be ye men of valor, and be in readiness for the conflict; for it is better for us to perish in battle than to look upon the outrage of our nation and our altar.’ That’s the way I see it, too.”

  ~ ~ ~

  CARISTO

  Dave laid down the pointer he’d been using to indicate important features of the garrison layout. “Sergeant Dixon will jigger their security systems for us one last time, so there should be no alarm as we penetrate. The critical thing is that we’ve got to assault every building simultaneously and take out everybody at once, before anyone has a chance to sound the alarm or radio their headquarters. If any warning gets out this entire operation will be over before it’s begun, and we’ll all be screwed. That’s why it’s even more important than usual to make sure that none of the enemy survives. Put them down fast, hard and permanently. Make sure they’re dead, so we don’t have to worry about what they’re doing when our backs are turned.”

  He looked around the room. “As soon as you call your area clear, summon the corpsman to treat any friendly casualties, then double-check the enemy to make sure they’re all dead. Your senior NCO’s and myself will verify that there’s no further threat, then we’ll tell you to move to your assigned positions to prepare the assault shuttles. The pilots and Weapons System Operators are in charge of that. They’re the experts, so don’t try to anticipate or second-guess them! We’ve got to get the garrison’s two birds ready as quickly as possible, but they should already be fully fueled, so that’ll help. Our other three shuttles will be flying in. We need to get these shuttles out of the hangar by the time they arrive, so we can take the new arrivals inside to refuel, rearm and prepare them in their turn. We’ve got to finish that job for all the shuttles by not later than zero-three-thirty. At that point the support team will return to their homes and prepare for whatever may follow our attack – including a disappearing act with their families if necessary – and the shuttles will depart for Banka. After they’ve gone I’ll give the final briefing to the orbital team. Any questions?”

  A soldier raised his hand. “Sir, what about the people in town? Won’t some of them call in an alarm when they hear the shooting?”

  “Perhaps, but they’ll have to call it in through the garrison. All the comm lines and circuits go there – they were re-routed that way when the Bactrians built it. Sergeant Dixon will shut down all external circuits so they can’t call through to any other center. He’ll tell them everything’s under control, it’s just an exercise, and they can go back to sleep.”

  “But, Sir, what about when assault shuttles start flying low over their heads?”

  “All part of the exercise, of course.”

  “Oh. OK… I guess, Sir.”

  “If they complain, we can always invite them to come down to the garrison and do so in person. That should shut them up.” The troops laughed. They all knew that complaining about such frivolities to a Bactrian garrison was likely to land the complainant in very hot water.

  “Any further questions?” No-one raised a hand. “All right, people. You’re free for the next hour. We’ll reassemble here at ten to kit up and check each other. We hit the garrison just after midnight.”

  Dave looked at each soldier as he spoke slowly and carefully. “We know this is probably our last mission as an organized Resistance. I advise you to prepare yourselves for that in whatever way suits you. As Shakespeare put it, ‘Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood’. I’ve already warned the other half of the team, those coming in on the shuttles, to do the same before leaving base.

  “I want to leave you with a thought from Marek Edelman, the last commander of the Jewish resistance fighters against the Nazis in the Warsaw Ghetto during Old Home Earth’s Second Global War. You know we’ve taken inspiration from their fight because we face a similar enemy in the Bactrians, who are determined to exterminate us or reduce us to the status of slaves. Edelman said many years after the war that it was easier to die fighting than in a gas chamber. It’s going to be easier for us to die fighting the Bactrians than it will for our fellow Laredans, the men, women and children being worked to death right now in Bactrian slave labor camps. We mustn’t feel that we’re heroes and they’re just poor saps who wouldn’t fight or couldn’t get out of the way in time. Their deaths will take longer and be harder than ours. We’re fighting, and a lot of us have died and will die, so that their sacrifice, their suffering, will be known and remembered. Let’s not fail them.”

  As the troops filed out, some silent, others talking among themselves in low voices, Sergeant-Major Deacon came over to Dave with two soldiers. “Can I have a word, please, Sir?”

  “Sure, Sergeant-Major, what is it?”

  “Sir, General Allred spoke with me and a couple of others before we left the base. He told us that above all else, we’re to ensure your safety during the assault on the garrison. He asked me to make sure you didn’t join in the fighting yourself, but stayed back until the danger was past. I know in space we’ll all take our chances, Sir, but we can’t afford to
lose you up front. Will you please stay out of the line of fire until then?”

  “He said something similar to me, Sergeant-Major. It just goes against the grain to ask my soldiers to expose themselves to risks when I don’t.”

  “That’s why they give you that exalted title and pay you so much, Sir.” The other two sniggered, although Dave was in no mood to be amused. “Seriously, Sir… please? I don’t want to have to tell Sergeant Hein and Corporal Bujold to sit on your chest and hold you down while the rest of us take care of business.”

  “Don’t worry, Sergeant-Major, I’ll be good. You’re a bunch of spoilsports, you know that?”

  “That’s a senior NCO’s job, Sir. Didn’t I teach you that during basic training?”

  He heard a soft laugh from behind him. Tamsin said, “You certainly taught me! I don’t think I forgave you for years!”

  The Sergeant-Major tried without much success to look hurt. “After all I’ve done for you, this is the thanks I get?”

  “What do you expect, a kiss? Those I save for my Captain.”

  “Huh! Well, they do say rank has its privileges.”

  “You bet it does – and right now I’m going to spend our last hour of peace and quiet with him, so the three of you can run along and leave us alone.”

  The three broke into broad smiles. “Have fun, Sir,” Hein said as he turned away with the others.

  Tamsin put her arm around Dave. “That was well done, lover,” she murmured. “You said what needed to be said.”

  “Thanks.”

  “And having said everything, there’s one thing more. If this is going to be our last hurrah, I want us to go out with a bang – in more ways than one.”

  “Is this one of those privileges of rank the Sergeant-Major was talking about?”

  “Rank, hell! It’s a privilege of lovers!”

  He laughed. “Well, whatever it is, you don’t hear me complaining.”