by John Ringo
“I’m still getting presents from Indowy clans over Diess. Most of them I pass on to the survivors or their families, but this I couldn’t resist.” In the box, cradled in a lustrous silken foam were a gilded pistol and two magazines.
“I’ve got a case of ammunition for this out in the truck. The powers-that-be still frown on grav-guns in civilian hands but this is a pulser gun. It fires pulse darts. Each of the darts has an electrical charge in it powerful enough to kill an elephant, much less a Posleen. There are twenty-four darts in a clip. It’s accurate to about a hundred yards with a good hand.” He pulled a clip out of his cargo pocket. “This is a clip of practice ammunition and you can reuse an expended dart as practice ammo. But to fire it in practice, you have to charge the onboard capacitor.” He turned to Mike Senior. “It charges on 220.”
“No sweat.”
“Thanks, Daddy,” said Cally, picking it up and feeling the heft. “It’s small.”
“It’s designed for Indowy, not that they would ever use it. It’s made out of lightweight boron polymers. The charge on a dart is adjustable, so it can be nonlethal. And it’ll take down a Posleen, unlike your Walther.” The small-frame pistol was notorious for jamming, but it was one of the few in the world that both fit her hand and had a decent-sized round. Since the Posleen were not going to be stopped by an itsy-bitsy little .380 low-velocity, Papa O’Neal had tapped and filled its bullets with mercury. The Posleen that caught one might not be killed but it was going to know it had been kissed.
“Umm,” she asked, carefully turning it so as not to point at either adult, “how do you clear it and where is the damn safety?”
Mike laughed and pulled out a computer disk. “Here’s the manual, read it on your laptop. For the time being you have to trust me that it is empty.”
“Thanks, Daddy.” She grinned, putting the pistol back in the case. “You’re swell.”
“Get some practice with it right away. I know you’re good with that James Bond gun, but this has more stopping power and is better suited for your hands. I’d prefer you get familiar with it in case you have to use it.”
“Okay.”
He tousled her hair, thinking that she looked a lot like her mother must have at the same age. “You stay safe, okay, pumpkin?”
“Okay.” She was tearing up again, the excitement of the gift giving way to the fear of the moment.
“And you listen to your Grandpa.”
“You already said that.”
“I’m sorry we didn’t get up to the base so you could see my unit.”
“It’s okay, we can after you kick their asses back into space.”
Mike Junior looked significantly at Mike Senior, who shrugged his shoulders, unrepentant. “What do you want, a little lady or a little warrior?”
Mike picked her up and hugged her gently. “G’bye, pumpkin.”
“Bye, Daddy.” She bucked a little in his arms, holding back the sobs.
He set her down, grabbed his bag and headed out the door.
They followed him downstairs and out the front door where he removed the case of pulser darts from the front of the Tahoe, handed it to his dad and threw in his bag. He took his daughter in his arms one last time.
“And if they land here, what do you do?”
“Shoot, scoot and hide.”
“Okay.”
“Don’t worry about us, Daddy, you’re going to be on the sharp end.”
“Are you worried about me, pumpkin?” asked Mike, honestly surprised.
“Uh-huh.” She started to cry.
“Oh, pumpkin,” he smiled, putting on his mission face, “don’t worry about me.” He slipped on his Milspecs, wrapped Shelly around his head as a hands-free communicator and smiled ferally. “I’ve finally got the Posleen right where I want them. They don’t know it, but they’re about to get the whole can of kick-ass.” He looked out at the fields he had grown up in and thought for a moment about what he had said. The company was trained and ready. He was trained and ready. They could do this. The company believed it. The battalion commander and staff believed it. Regiment was as sure as if it were a steel-hard certainty.
Now if he could only convince himself.
* * *
Mueller, meantime, was getting on a different kind of mission face, as were Mosovich, Ersin and Keene. Keene’s proposed plan for the defense of Richmond was not meeting with the approval of the mayor or the city engineer.
“We thought you were going to come up with a compromise plan, Mr. Keene, not a new plan to destroy the city,” snarled the mayor, banging the conference table.
“It is not intended to destroy the city, Mr. Mayor, only a small portion of it.”
“And it does not provide for the defense of the outskirts whatsoever,” noted the city engineer, poring over the detailed plan that Mueller’s AID had printed out on their arrival.
“Fortress Forward does not intend the defense of the majority of the city,” interjected the corps engineer, “as we have pointed out time and again.”
The corps commander motioned him subtly to back off, more than familiar with the old argument between the two. “This firesack of Schockoe Bottom actually looks like precisely what the Fortress Forward program is all about, but it only makes provisions for one outer fort,” he continued, “instead of the suggested multiple.”
“Yes, but it makes best use of the available terrain,” noted Keene. “This is really the only area where you have two useable terrain features to emplace on and catch the Posleen in a crossfire. And the outer fortress can provide fire support if the forces are forced to retreat towards Newport News.”
“What about the rest of the city? What about south Richmond? Our primary industrial area?”
Colonel Braggly was again waved down by the corps commander as Keene answered. “It is indefensible. Period. With the exception of a few gently rolling knolls, the James is the only noticeable terrain feature.
“There are four scenarios to work with here, gentlemen,” Keene said in an iron voice, “and we have to be very clear about what they are. Sergeant First Class Mueller, what is the best-case scenario for Richmond?”
“The Posleen land beyond masking terrain features, effectively out of range to cause us harm.”
“Right,” agreed Keene. “In which case, a few days later a portion of the corps rolls out to wherever they are needed.”
“What?” shouted the mayor. “Why the hell are you going to do that?” he snarled, turning to the corps commander.
“To support those in need, Mr. Mayor,” replied the corps commander, calmly. “I would hope that other corps would do the same for us. No, I know they would; it would be the right military decision and so ordered. Of course, if the Posleen land well away from here, other units would react. We’re not going anywhere if they land in California.”
“Yes, sir, but I was thinking if they landed south of the Broad River or north of the Potomac, for example,” noted Keene. “Now, Master Sergeant Ersin, what is the worst-case scenario?”
“They land directly on us,” he said to universal grimaces. His own scarred face remained stone-faced, eyes remote.
“And in that case,” Keene said, with an almost unnoticeable twinkle in his eyes for the moment of levity, “we activate our GOTH Plan.”
“Our what?” asked the city engineer.
“Our Go-To-Hell plan,” answered Mosovich, face as stony as Ersin’s.
“The plan you use when all your other plans have failed,” noted the corps commander, nodding his head at the clued-in civilian engineer.
“Your ‘On Deadly Ground Plan,’ as it is sometimes called,” interjected the otherwise silent corps chief of staff.
“Our ‘we are fucked’ plan,” Keene clarified, “will be to destroy the city, Mr. Mayor, because there will be no survivors anyway and we might as well leave the Posleen a smoking ruin. Mine every building, blow up every block as they come to it. Leave not one edible scrap of food including humans, destr
oy the bodies as we go. Kill as many Posleen as we can, but most of all, make it very plain that fighting humans is a losing proposition: All you get is sorry, hungry and sore.” He looked around the room and for once saw consensus.
“You might make that Virginians,” corrected the city engineer with a slight, sad smile.
“As you will. Ah, sir, am from the Great State of Juwjah, Ah will have you know.” It was good for a little laugh. “But that is the absolute worst-case scenario. There are two more, anyone care to take a stab?”
“They land either north or south of the James, but not right on us,” said the corps commander, “we’ve gotten that far.”
“Right. Now, if they have landed south of the James, my professional recommendation is to pull back across the James and wait for support. Maybe do some things with the bridges and the floodwall on that side, in the way of sucking them in, but basically the south side is open terrain and you’ll just have to sit on this side and pound them with artillery. On the other hand, if they land on the north side we probably have the time to implement the fire-trap plan. If we get started right away.”
“You already said it is pointless if they don’t land between the Potomac and the James. It might not even work if they land north of Fredericksburg,” argued the City Engineer. “In that case, I don’t think we could get the support of the owners of those facilities for the demolition work.”
“We don’t need it,” pointed out the corps engineer. “Necessary defensive works under the emergency war provisions. We have eminent domain.”
“That could be tied up in court for days,” bemoaned the mayor.
“They can apply for just reparations,” said the corps commander, “but that is all.”
“Yes,” said Keene, “that has all been covered in the PDC program. The private owner just does not have a leg to stand on if the property falls under the heading of necessary defensive structures as defined by the area commander, which is General Keeton,” he noted, gesturing at the Corps Commander at the head of the table. “He can order it with no debate now or in the future, if he, in his sole opinion, feels it militarily justified.”
“On the other hand,” noted General Keeton, with a frown, “we will absolutely require the help of the entire civilian populace. We cannot afford to antagonize the city and certainly not its leaders,” he concluded, gesturing at the mayor and the engineer. “We will need your complete and undivided support.”
“Do we really have to destroy Schockoe Bottom?” asked the mayor, plaintively. “It’s an eyesore and a crime zone, but there’s a lot of history there.”
“Mr. Mayor,” said Mueller gently, “whether today, or in the next year, a whole new book in the history of Richmond is about to be written. The only question is whether there will be anyone to write it.”
The mayor looked at the city engineer, who shook his head in resignation. “I still say we could have circumvalleted the entire city.”
“Maybe we could have,” nodded Keene, “but we’re out of time and it would have thrown away our best terrain features. There is no way, in Fortress Forward, to save the city as a functioning entity. Rather, the idea is to absolutely screw the Posleen while retaining the historic core.”
The corps commander nodded. “Correct. Mr. Mayor? Mr. City Engineer? I need your active support in this. Are you with us?”
The mayor nodded his head. “Yes, yes.” He looked at the engineer, who nodded his own head mutely. “Yes, we are.”
“All right,” said the corps commander turning to the corps engineer, “initiate Mr. Keene’s plan, modifying as you see fit while staying within the overall plan.”
“What do we call it?” asked the Chief of Staff.
“How ’bout Operation Abattoir?” joked Mueller.
“Actually,” said the corps commander, who had planned more than one antiarmor defense against aggressor cavalry forces, “I prefer ‘Operation Big Horn.’ ”
The military guys laughed while the civilians looked confused. “Why Big Horn?” asked the mayor.
“First you suck ’em in…” answered Mueller in explanation.
“Then you blow the shit out of ’em,” finished Ersin with eyes as dead as a shark’s.
* * *
“Gentlemen,” said Sergeant Folsom, poking his head in the room, “you might want to start a feed; the computers are about to give final projections on Posleen landings.”
For the past hour the newsmen had been giving almost continuous live reports but, except for the narrowing of the potential landing ovals, it had been much of the same. It amazed the CNN producer that anything could be so terrifying and boring at the same time.
Argent got up and stood in front of the American flag that had been procured from a nearby general’s office, preparing to say his piece as the technician checked the live feed from the defensive computers again. All of the ovals were discrete, now, and the Atlantic oval, with the exception of an attenuated end that made it look like a comma, had shifted almost completely away from the European continent. It appeared the Europeans were going to sit this one out.
“In three, two, one…”
“We have just been informed that the defensive system computers are about to determine the final Posleen objectives. As we have been telling you, until the Posleen globes definitively commit to a reentry trajectory, the landing areas remain only possibilities. Now, however, there are signs that the Posleen are about to commit to definite targets.
“They have had one orbit of the world, under fire from the available Fleet Fighters, as has been reported from Palo Alto, and by now they must have picked their targets.” At a call from the producer he hastily finished, “We now cut to the live feed from the defensive computers…”
* * *
And Colonel Robertson leaned towards the wardroom TV, taking a pull on his pipe…
* * *
And Little Tommy Sunday stopped packing his war bag and turned to the radio in his room…
* * *
And Lieutenant Young stopped compulsively reviewing demolition plans…
* * *
And General Keeton turned away from the mayor and towards the TV in his office…
* * *
And throughout the world, people stopped whatever they were doing, pulled over in their cars or set down their burdens and waited for the American Defense Command, or Russian Army Headquarters, or Japanese Defense Forces Headquarters or Chinese Red Army Headquarters, to place the seal on their fates, whether for good or ill.
“The ovals are shrinking rapidly now,” continued Argent coolly. “So we are going to zoom in on the American landing. I’ll keep you updated on the other zones and when the final points are determined we will zoom back out and note their particular areas.
“We can definitely say, at this time, that there is little or no chance of a landing in Australia, South America, Central America, Europe or Russia. There is very little chance of a landing in the Midwestern United States. It mainly looks like West Africa, India or Bangladesh, Coastal Northern China, the Eastern United States and somewhere around Uzbekistan or Turkmenistan.
“The ovals are shrinking. The American oval is centering on the eastern seaboard between Philadelphia and… somewhere in central South Carolina. Getting smaller…”
The oval abruptly collapsed and turned a complete malignant red. “The area is now centered on Washington, D.C…” he continued with a note of strain building in his voice as cold adrenaline jetted into his stomach…
And shifted south…
“Richmond, Virginia…”
North and smaller…
“Washington…”
And finally centered between the two, straddling a river. It began to pulse an evil crimson, the vague outline of a city on the computer-generated map in the center like a pupil. Argent just paused for a moment, shocked by the evil icon blazing out from the console.
“The target,” he paused for a moment to compose himself, “the target, ladies a
nd gentlemen, is Fredericksburg, Virginia.”
CHAPTER 32
Fredericksburg, VA, United States of America, Sol III
1950 EDT October 9th, 2004 ad
They send us in front with a fuse an’ a mine,
To blow up the gates that are rushed by the Line,
But bent by Her Majesty’s Engineers,
Her Majesty’s Royal Engineers
With the rank and the Pay of a Sapper!
Now the Line’s but a man with a gun in his hand,
An’ Cavalry’s only what horses can stand,
When helped by Her Majesty’s Engineers,
Her Majesty’s Royal Engineers
With the rank and the Pay of a Sapper!
Artillery moves by the leave o’ the ground,
But we are the men that do something all round,
For we are Her Majesty’s Engineers,
Her Majesty’s Royal Engineers
With the rank and the Pay of a Sapper!
— From “Sappers”
Rudyard Kipling, 1896
“Dependents are on their way in, Colonel,” said the supply officer, the S-4. The “Four” had taken over the job of Civil and Dependent Affairs; he was out of any other job. All the equipment and ammunition was issued and there wasn’t going to be a resupply.
“For all the good it will do,” noted the Charlie company commander. “They’re due to land in fifteen or twenty minutes.”