Trouble stumbled and slid his own way back to his company. “Get ready for the last push,” he told Gunny, and The Word went down the line.
Ahead of them, the artillery maelstrom grew worse, if that was possible. Marines edged forward. They’d done this before. They knew the risks that came from holding back and the chances of friendly fire if they didn’t.
Most Marines drew close to their own fire, their bellies as low as the mud and muck would allow.
Then the firestorm ended with deafening quiet. “Grenadiers, lay it on them!” Trouble shouted.
Grenades arched up to the trenches. The grenadiers reloaded and fired again. That was good because heads and guns were coming up along the parapet.
Mother Nature seemed to pause, herself intent on the freezing, muddy tableau. The rain held back, though the lightning continued to provide strobe lighting to the night’s tragedies.
Marines ran for the trenches, pausing a moment to add their own suppressing fire, dropping one target above them before dashing on.
This time, there were no boots huddling at the bottom of the trench. Men fought, and men died. They died blown to a pulp by grenades. They died as a bullet to the face blew their brains into the back of their helmet. They died as they fought hand-to-hand with knives or were held down in the muddy water to drown.
Men fought, and men died. It wasn’t always the better man who lived. Luck played a fickle role in the freezing dark.
But skill and training were not to be ignored. Marines and Highlanders fought to save a buddy.
Few of the hostiles seemed to care about anyone but themselves.
Defeated, they turned from their acquaintances and fled. Marines and Highlanders shot them down. Or tried. Too often, armored backs held the rounds at bay.
But the force of hits knocked people off their feet to sprawl facedown in the mud.
So Marines shot them again until they gave up and rolled over, filthy hands in the air.
Some did make their escape, bringing the news of defeat to those below.
Four companies of trained Marines and Highlanders had defeated three brigades of Savannah’s best infantry. At least they’d defeated as many of the three brigades as were not in the drunk tank and were willing to dig themselves in and try their hand at stopping the just wrath of a vengeful people.
In the end, some fled, some surrendered, some wounded begged for aid, and others pulled a grenade, pistol, or knife and ended their own lives. The Marines held back until the locals could sort themselves out, then carefully took those willing to be prisoners into custody.
As if nature finally had had enough, the storm blew itself out, and a quarter moon cast dim light on the slaughter field. Trouble chose his better surviving troops to dig in on the side of the hill facing Camp Milassi but was content to rest there.
The Highlanders did the same. With their companies reduced to little more than reinforced platoons, there wasn’t a lot of choice in the matter.
The gun bunnies struggled up the hill, stringing landline that had been carefully kept out of the reach of the EMP blast, and then settled into holes, ready to call in artillery on Camp Milassi and its occupants.
Trouble cast a worried eye toward the dam but could see nothing.
Good or bad, news will come when it comes, he reminded himself, and made the rounds of his troops.
Dawn would bring its own set of problems.
Or not, as it proved.
Come sunrise, there was little activity in the camp. Tanks and infantry fighting vehicles were parked where they’d been before the pulse, but other than them, there wasn’t much to see.
“What all is that?” Gunny asked Trouble, pointing at litter strewn about the camp.
The Marine officer focused his binoculars on the camp and laughed. “Gunny, thems is uniforms. Uniforms, shed, no doubt, by people who think it’s better to be seen running in your skivvies than in uniform.”
“Do tell, sir. Do tell.”
Trouble meandered over to the 4th Highlanders’ CP. “When do you plan to stroll into that camp?”
“Someone has to do it sooner or later,” Colonel Stewart said with no suggestion which he’d chosen.
“I’m ready when you are,” Trouble allowed.
“Latest rumor I’ve caught is that the 2nd Highlanders have been awarded the honor of cleaning out that rats’ den. Don’t you miss the company of a good radio? Anyway, until I hear different, we can catch our breath up here.”
Trouble returned to his much-reduced company and kept overwatch as the 2nd Highlanders’ trucks delivered them to a thousand meters from the camp. The kilted laddies dismounted, fixed bayonets, and cautiously approached the camp in skirmish lines.
Fire was light. Most of it involved despondent men who had delayed their final leave-taking. A few chose suicide by light infantry. To show yourself under arms was a quick death sentence. Some men did straggle in, having reconsidered that it might be safer to surrender to soldiers than be caught by civilians.
The sun brought back the heat of the last few weeks. With all the mud and water, Black Mountain was soon a steaming swamp stinking of shit and death. The exhausted troops were grateful when Trouble ordered them to pack it in and head down the mountain.
They went down the same side they’d fought up. That joined them with the others who had been released earlier to treat the wounded and retrieve the dead.
At the foot of the mountain there was a line of ambulances from Petrograd, ready to rush any wounded off to local care. A fire-department helicopter even waited, rotors spinning slowly, to take those who warranted true speed.
“Kind of nice to see folks care about us,” Gunny observed.
“Yeah, nice,” Trouble said, catching eye of a line of ponchos, a good two dozen long, giving decent privacy to Marines who would never be rushed again.
Just as Trouble was getting back to the gun line, a gun truck with 2nd Highlander markings drove up.
Ruth shot from it into his muddy arms.
“You’re alive. You’re alive,” she shouted, and mumbled as she covered his muddy face with kisses.
When he managed to come up for air, he used it to ask, “What’s wrong with your arm?”
She made a dismissive face. “I got hit by a ricochet from a bastard I’d already killed,” she said.
“You got hit!”
“It’s not bad. You’d say it was just a flesh wound.”
“And I’d be lying through my teeth.”
Ruth giggled. “I’ll remind you of that next time you get banged up.”
“Woman, what am I going to do with you?”
“I’d love to have a baby,” she said, eyes gleaming.
“We’ll have to do something about that when there’s not so much of a crowd around,” Trouble said to laughter from all his troops in listening range.
SEVENTY-FIVE
ALL GENERAL RAY Longknife wanted to do was head for the door, for home and his wife and her growing belly. But you don’t walk out on a place like Savannah that easily.
There was a new president to swear in.
The president asked for an inauguration parade that sure looked more like a victory parade for the peacekeepers than any inauguration Ray had ever seen.
And the new president insisted General Ray Longknife share the place of honor in the reviewing stand with him.
The parade went off without a hitch. It included, along with those marching, a lot of walking wounded and other troopers in worse shape riding in cars and waving whatever they had that wasn’t bandaged.
At the head of the parade was a convertible with two soldiers: Color Sergeant McPherson and newly promoted Sergeant Halverson. They sported what had to be the ugliest medal in human history, the wine-colored ribbon and dull gunmetal gray of the Victoria Cross.
Another thing Lorna Do had borrowed, some said ripped off, from Old Earth.
The people turned out to cheer and, for once, or maybe as a start, there were no brawls
between the different nationalities that made up Savannah’s diverse and divisive population.
The professor took pains to mention that to General Ray Longknife. “I think you’ve helped us pull together. To see ourselves as one, not many. To turn us into a melting pot instead of piles of slag to be thrown at each other.”
“I hope so.”
Shanghaied himself onto the reviewing stand, Ray insisted that Ruth Tordon stand at his left hand. She and her Marines at the dam had stood solid and turned what could have been months of soggy cleanup into a wonderful day of celebration.
Ray was none too sure, but it looked like the Marines under her husband, Trouble, rendered their honors a bit early for the president but perfect for his wife.
Ah, to be young and in love. Which reminded Ray that he still qualified for both, assuming his pregnant wife had not given up on him.
He’d sent her an apologetic note and a full report of what he’d accomplished here. He was still waiting for an answer.
The embassy had orders to bring any message for him from Wardhaven right to him. Still, he was surprised to see Becky approach him with a flimsy.
And the alarmed look on her face.
“Is it my wife?”
“No, Ray, no. Rita’s fine. It’s that request you made for those kids from Santa Maria to come to Wardhaven. The second ship, the one with a kid named David and his grandfather, a priest. Their ship is overdue and presumed lost.”
“How could that happen?” Ray demanded.
“Rita doesn’t know. They sent a ship backtracking along the flight path to Santa Maria. All the way to Santa Maria. No ship. No wreckage. It’s just vanished.
“That’s impossible. Something’s wrong.”
“But what?” the diplomat asked.
Whatever it was, General Ray Longknife would get to the bottom of it.
SEVENTY-SIX
FATHER JOSEPH KNEW something was wrong. He just could not figure out how and why.
The skipper had insisted to all the passengers that there was no money to be made shipping cargo to Santa Maria and deadheading home with a few passengers. So he would make his money by doing a few side trips along the way.
There was a fortune to be had if he discovered a single Earth-type planet.
So, the trip back was taking sixteen jumps instead of eight.
David loved it. He got to see more stars and a whole lot of different planets.
They were making their eighth jump when matters went horribly wrong.
David had his eyes glued to the forward screen in the lounge. Joseph was reading his prayer book. Both were strapped into chairs that were snapped down solid to the deck so the zero gee would cause them as few problems as possible as they went softly through the jump.
“What’s that?” David asked.
Joseph looked up from his prayers.
There was a ship right under their nose.
“Grandda, I’ve been studying the new ships they make,” David said, “and none of them look like that.”
Joseph had to agree. The ship was a huge ball with what looked like four engine nacelles equally spaced around the circumference.
Humans always put their engines in the rear.
If there was any doubt as to the surprise here, the strange ship disappeared when the Prosperous Goose flipped ship as it would need to if the skipper wanted to go back through the jump he’s just come out of.
Suddenly, there was a loud racket, and the pressure in Joseph’s ears went wrong.
“Hull breach aft,” the PA system announced. “Hull breach aft.”
The ship continued its flip all the way around, giving them another look at the strange ship. They got several looks at it as their ship continued to flip over and over again.
They also got a good look at what was going on across space from them. Several launches drew away from the other ship. They had people strapped to their outside.
Only the people weren’t exactly people. Father Joseph tried to count the arms and legs of those strapped to the launches. He kept getting too many.
One flip, it looked like six. The next, eight. The next flip also came up eight.
“Grandda,” David piped up, “those people have too many arms and legs. Eight I think.”
“Yes, they may,” Joseph agreed like a good grandda should.
“And there’s something strange about their hands, Grandda.”
“Come, David,” his grandfather said. It wouldn’t do to explain to a twelve-year-old that the strange people with too many arms and legs also appeared to be carrying weapons.
No sooner were they out of their seats and drifting toward the door than the PA system blared again. “All passengers report to the mess deck. All hands report to the mess deck. Chief Master at Arms report to the weapons locker. All hands with weapons experience report to the weapons locker.”
“Oh dear,” Father Joseph said, and aimed himself up the main spindle toward command country and away from the mess deck. Normally, a priest and preteen would have been stopped well short of the weapons locker, but normal was long gone.
He spotted the captain as he entered the security area, and shoved himself off on a collision course for him.
“Father, what the hell are you doing here?” the captain demanded as the priest hit the center of his back.
“Keeping you from a horrible mistake. Have you counted the number of aliens headed for us?”
“No, and who told you they were aliens?” was a weak comeback.
“My grandson and I were watching them approach when you announced your impending folly. You are outnumbered, and very likely outgunned. If you resort to force, we will lose, and very likely all die for your folly.”
“I will not have a passenger, certainly not a priest, lecturing me,” the captain said, but his words were hollow of the usual arrogance of one in his position.
Around him, sailors were looking at their weapons with a lot less enthusiasm.
“How many of these aliens did you count?” the second officer asked.
“There were a dozen launches headed our way, each with six to eight aliens hanging on the outside and likely more inside,” the priest reported.
“Oh shit,” came from several of the dozen men crowded around the weapons locker.
The second officer twisted in place to face the captain. “Skipper, he may be a sky pilot, but he can count. We’re outnumbered on a ship that’s not going anywhere. Do we really want to piss them off?”
The captain whirled on Father Joseph, something he could only do because he rested a restraining hand on the weapons locker. “Be it on your head, priest,” he spat, but he seemed relieved to have the decision made and his hands washed of it.
“Chief Master at Arms, collect the guns and put them just inside the main hatch, then everyone muster on the mess deck,” the captain ordered, and was quickly obeyed.
Father Joseph followed three sailors with the twelve rifles and six revolvers down the main spindle and this time pushed himself off on the mess deck.
All hands were mustering in the officer’s wardroom, which also passed for the passenger lounge. Someone had broken out the spirits, and several of the passengers and crew were already well oiled.
The skipper announced that they were about to be boarded by creatures unknown, and they would not resist.
One passenger, a large, loud man, demanded a gun so he could fight “if the rest of you are yellow cowards.”
Three women tearfully begged him not to endanger all of them.
It didn’t matter. The captain had made the call. No one would offer resistance.
That done, more people adjourned to the bar, intent on drinking up the ship’s full supply of spirits.
Several gathered around Father Joseph and joined him in prayer.
They were still praying when two creatures in gray space suits drifted up the spindle. They paused to study the passengers and crew, keeping them covered with something they treated like a w
eapon. They talked, but with their helmets on, the sound was very muffled.
A few moments later, one in a gold-colored space suit arrived. He had a human rifle in his hand. In a moment, one in a green suit joined him. That one held a box with all kinds of figures dancing upon it. He, too, said something, then doffed his helmet.
Father Joseph would bet the first words out of his mouth were “Thank God, the air didn’t kill me,” or the equivalent.
The gold suit eyed the helmetless one for a long minute, which might count for even longer since he had four eyes and was able to almost see around to behind him. Then he took his helmet off, too.
And immediately said something. He seemed to grow angry when no answer was forthcoming.
With a fast act of contrition, Father Joseph pushed himself off from David and drifted toward the aliens. He held up one finger. “One.” A second finger. “Two.” And went from there to five.
The alien showed no reaction. Then he held up his hand. It looked like he had two opposing thumbs and only two fingers in between them. He held up one thumb. “Ow.” A finger. “Due.” A second finger. “Fin.” And the second thumb. “Tin.”
Clearly, language was not going to come easy.
The gold-suited one eyed Father Joseph for a moment longer, then said something to the one in green. He produced a rope and began tying the priest’s wrist. Quickly, he added David to the line, then the captain, then more. Before he was done, one of the grays took the line and began hauling them down the spindle.
“They move through zero gee as if they were born to it,” Father Joseph said.
“Who knows, maybe they are,” the skipper said.
And got cuffed on the mouth for it by a gray suit they were passing.
“Don’t talk,” Father Joseph whispered to his grandson.
The youth nodded back.
The priest closed his eyes and allowed himself to be tugged along.
Dear God, what door have you opened to me now?
Father Joseph tried to make it a prayer . . . and not a cry of despair.
COMING JULY 2014 FROM ACE BOOKS
To Do or Die (A Jump Universe Novel) Page 36