by Cain Hopwood
“Thank you admiral, I will concentrate on getting my soldiers out via other means then.”
Admiral Katona gave a little head nod, the Ka-Li gesture for thanks and goodbye. He then turned and left.
“Operator, get a connection to lieutenant Moss,” the colonel said.
He would have to give Moss the news he was on his own for now. That would be a fun conversation; still, it wasn’t the first time he had to do it, and it wouldn’t be the last.
But he’d be damned if he was just going to sit idly by and let Moss and Gritz freeze out in the wilderness. He summoned his remaining lieutenants. Someone would come up with a way to help them, they always did.
— 28 —
“Understood sir, Moss out.” Jon terminated the connection to operations, his face stony.
“What’s up lieutenant?” asked Skip. “Where’s our ride?”
“We’re stuck here. It looks like our attempt to take out that Yogi, has triggered some kind of flap. They swarmed out of the redoubt Gritz was observing, took him out, then declared this whole region a no go zone. They have serious hardware backing them up too; it’s like they were setup, waiting for something like this to occur.”
“Shit, do they know if Gritz is okay?”
“Gritz might be alive, he’s been taken captive. But most of his squad weren’t as lucky.”
This prompted a few seconds of silence. It was Murdoch who spoke first. “Where does that leave us lieutenant?”
Jon screwed up his face. “On our own for the moment. Let’s see where we are.”
He brought up a 3D map of the continent, shared it with both of them, then zoomed in. It didn’t look good. They were deep in the mountains, five hundred kilometers of deep snow and rocky peaks were between them, and the border of the no fly zone. It would take them at least ten days to ski and hike that distance, assuming they didn’t have to skirt around any settlements.
The problem was they’d only dropped with ten days of supplies, and that was five days ago.
Murdoch tapped a spot to one side of the most direct route to the border. “That’s the redoubt Gritz was observing right?”
Jon nodded. “What are you thinking?”
“Well, there’s a chance his supply cache is untouched.”
Skip chimed in. “There’s also a chance Gritz is still alive.”
Jon held up a hand. “Let’s hold that thought. I don’t like the concept of going anywhere near that stronghold. Even the Galactics are cautious of it. So I can’t see us mounting a rescue. But I also don’t like the idea of freezing and starving halfway to the border. Are there any other options?”
“We could take on one of the smaller settlements, steal a flyer,” Murdoch said.
“Can either of you fly one?” Jon asked. Their silence answered his question. “No, neither can I. But, we’ll keep that as an option of last resort. Until then, we leg it. We’ll get as close as we can to the redoubt and see if we can ping Gritz’s supply cache.”
“So are we going to leave him there?” Said Skip in a small voice.
“We’re covert, so we’ll do what we do best,” Jon said in a commanding tone. “We’ll surveil; we’ll find out everything we can, and the colonel will make the call.”
Skip gave a little nod. “Okay, so what’s next?”
“We move out,” Jon said. He consulted the map, then pointed over the ridge. “That way. We can’t risk overwatch, so Skip I want you to station obs-drones on the nearby peaks. Have them looking out for aircraft. We’ll stay up as high as we can and avoid the settlements. Murdoch, keep the shelter handy. The active camouflage will mask our IR signatures.”
Without even checking they were following, Jon worked his way to the top of the ridge. Once there, he scoped out the other side. The valley wasn’t far below, and it was empty of any settlements. But, skiing straight down into the valley was a waste of good vertical, so he angled his skis across the slope in a traverse, pushed over the edge and started heading south.
— 29 —
Jon slid to a stop. “I never thought I’d say it, but I’m getting sick of the snow.”
It was the fourth day of the cold snowy trek through the mountains. They’d only encountered a few Marbelite settlements, and they’d all been down in the valleys. Staying up high on the ridges had made the trip harder, but it had kept them out of trouble. Despite the rough terrain, they’d made good time.
“Imagine how we feel,” Murdoch said. “At least you do this for fun on vacation.”
Jon grunted. “Sure, but at the end of a day’s skiing on vacation, I’m drinking rum in a nice warm cabin. Crouching under a camouflage shelter with you two isn’t quite the same.”
Skip had taken responsibility for navigating them through the mountains. He’d stopped just ahead of Jon and Murdoch. “We should be able to see the redoubt from that knoll,” he said, pointing up at a rocky outcrop on the ridge line ahead.
They clicked out of their skis, and climbed up to the ridge.
“Be careful,” Skip said. “According to the map there’s a large settlement in this valley.”
Jon poked his head around the rocks. They were in a saddle at the head of a long straight valley; it stretched away in the distance for over ten kilometers. At the far end, perched on a shelf half way up a sheer, rocky, snow covered slope, was the redoubt Gritz had been observing.
“The valley of the five clans,” muttered Skip.
“What?” Jon and Murdoch asked together.
“That’s what the locals call it. The valley of the five clans. It sounds better in their own language.”
“Why is it called that?” Asked Jon. “And, how did you find out?”
“I got talking to one of the locals at that bar we’ve been going to.”
Jon had heard about the bar. The colonel had encouraged the men to explore the camp and connect with the Galactic soldiers and pilots in residence. It was inevitable that they’d find a bar, or if there wasn’t one, they’d put one together.
“This local was a transport pilot, one of those four armed monkey guys,” said Skip.
“A Pakmai,” said Jon.
“That’s them. So this Pakmai is bored one day and hears about a place with native trees.”
Jon was watching the valley getting the lie of the land, but at this comment he turned towards Skip. “But Marbel is completely treeless. What was he looking for, ice trees?”
“I guess Pakmai aren’t that smart. Or maybe they fall asleep at briefings too. Either way, he goes off for a fly and ends up here.” Skip shrugged as if to say that was that.
“So where is here?” asked Jon.
“The valley of the five clans. It’s a Yogi holy site, hence the big castle Gritz had under observation.” Skip cocked his head. “Say lieutenant, did the colonel ever explain just why Gritz was watching that place.”
“No.” Jon turned back to survey the redoubt off in the distance. “But that wasn’t his original target. The Galactics gave us two out of the way places as possible locations for a high level meet. Gritz was re-tasked by the admiral when we were in the air.”
“And ours was the meeting they were expecting?”
Jon shook his head. “I don’t think so. That Marbelite seemed like a target of opportunity to me.”
“I should have had the Barrett ready,” Murdoch said. “He wouldn’t have walked away then.”
“Exactly,” Jon said. “The colonel would have had us better prepared for that kind of action, if he’d known it was on the cards. It must have been a last minute decision.”
Jon surveyed the valley, paying close attention to the buildings. There were a lot. Most Marbelite settlements were no bigger than a half dozen buildings, enough to house several families. While this wasn’t a city by human standards, buildings were scattered the full length of the valley, and the place teemed with activity.
“I wonder why that Pakmai thought there would be trees here,” Jon muttered to himself.
Murdoch, who’d joined him, grunted. “Beats me, there’s none anywhere else.”
Jon nodded, then brought up the map. “So Skip, what are our options?”
“Well sir, we can stay high, on the left side of the valley. It’s easy going, there’s plenty of cover, and it’ll take us directly opposite the redoubt.”
“Isn’t Gritz’s supply cache on the same side of the valley as the redoubt?”
“Yes, so we’d have to find a way through the settlements to reach it.”
Jon frowned. “And the right side? That will take us above the redoubt, right?”
“The problem with the right side is that it’s a lot longer, a lot rougher, and there’s another valley that comes in. It goes miles into the mountains. If we can’t cross it, we’ll be another day at least.”
“What are our supplies like?”
“Rations are low, but we can manage that. The problem will be water. The only reason we’ve made it this far is because I haven’t been flying the drones. That’s left more power for melting snow.”
“How long?”
A pained expression flitted across Skip’s face. “Two days. We need that cache.”
Jon thought carefully. Once they started dehydrating, their ability to function, or fight, would diminish. He was tempted to risk the quick and easy left route, but given what the Marbelites had done to Gritz’s squad, getting captured wasn’t really an option. At least not until they were almost dead anyway.
“We’ll go right,” he said. “I’d rather take more time than get caught.”
“And if we don’t find the cache before out supplies run out?” asked Skip.
“We’ll work that out when it happens. Once we’re desperate, we can always ski down to the valley and play dumb; they might not kill us.”
Like the good soldiers they were, Skip and Murdoch both nodded, locked in the heels on their skis and skied back down to the saddle. Jon raised his spotting scope, took a good long look at the redoubt, then swung the viewfinder up the steep slope above it.
“Where are you?” he muttered. Gritz would probably have placed his cache up high on the ridge. Typically he favored an easily defensible position over convenience. Nothing stood out as obvious to Jon, so he’d just have to wait until they were closer, and they could ping the equipment’s transponder beacons.
— 30 —
For the first time in days, Jon was having fun. He was cruising down a gentle slope and making good time in the right direction. It was a stark contrast to earlier in the day, when they’d climbed up out of the saddle, picking their way through rockfalls and having to backtrack each time they came up against a sheer face.
But they’d made their way up eventually, and were rewarded for their efforts with a plateau where the skiing was easy. The only downside was the visibility. With everything covered in snow, and no easy way to distinguish sky from ground, it was easy to lose your balance.
Jon was leading, and he carved out a couple of wide turns to slow down. He was having fun, and the tracks he left helped Murdoch and Skip distinguish the pitch of the terrain in the flat light.
“Lieutenant, don’t get too far ahead, there’s a canyon somewhere in front of us.”
“We should be okay, the map shows there’s still a couple of hundred meters to go,” Jon said. He cranked out another sweet turn. “I’ll stop…”
Before he could finish what he was saying he heard a rumble and his legs trembled as the snowpack moved under his feet. A moment later he was in free-fall.
Without a thought his training kicked in; he slapped a hand to his chest and pulled the avalanche ripcord. His jacket inflated in an instant, ballooning out around him. With a crack, a small drone shot out from the top of his pack, spooling mono-filament out as it hurtled skywards.
Before he’d fallen more than a couple of meters, it was buried fifty meters back and had anchored it self deep in the snowpack. The line tightened with a jerk, and he swung back to slam hard against the canyon wall. Even with the avalanche airbag deployed, the hit knocked the wind out of him.
“Lieutenant, are you okay?”
“Just winded, what happened?”
“The map hasn’t been all that reliable. There’s been a lot of changes in the snow pack since the last satellite pass.” Skip looked down at Jon from the edge and whistled. “But this is big, It looks like a rock fall has dumped half the cliff into that canyon.”
That’s what I get for having a little fun, thought Jon.
“I should have been more careful,” he said. “Can you guys haul me up? I’d reel in the anchor, but we need the power.”
Skip and Murdoch dug a set of mono-filament grips out of their packs and started pulling him slowly back up towards the edge of the canyon. While being hauled up, he saw what had happened. Far below his feet, he could see the remains of a huge rockfall. It must have occurred sometime in the last couple of days, because the rocks had blocked the narrow canyon, but hadn’t been covered in snow.
Once Skip and Murdoch got him to the top, he surveyed the situation. The canyon he’d come close to swan diving into, ran at right angles to the valley of the five clans. It was straight across their path.
“Let’s see how far this will put us out of our way,” he said.
He climbed up onto a knoll to get a better look along the length of the canyon. It went for ages, snaking its way high into the mountains. It would be a slow uphill slog to follow it until they could find a place to climb down the wall, and then back up the far side. They might even have to go all the way to its head to find a crossing point.
“It’s a shame we don’t have one of those Ka-Li harnesses,” Murdoch said. “We could just fly across the other side.”
“And we’d probably show up like a flare on their sensors,” Skip said.
“We don’t know that for sure.”
“That was the whole point of this mission remember,” snapped Skip.
“Just saying, this whole trip back would be a lot easier if we had a few Galactic toys with us.”
“Well, the only reason we’re doing this trek is because you missed a shot.”
Jon listened to the familiar exchange. The two had been arguing more and more; the trek was taking its toll on them. Skip blamed Murdoch for hitting the Marbelite in the head, instead of its torso, where the brain was. Murdoch claimed the rifle’s automation let him down, which was true.
“Can it you two. I won’t have you arguing. We’ve got a long way to go still, and we can’t afford to get distracted.” He gave them each a good solid look. “Save it for when we’re back safe at base.”
He got a grunt out of each of them that he took as a grudging agreement. Then turned back to look across the canyon. “Murdoch has a point though. Between us we have one hundred and fifty meters of mono-filament rescue line. Skip, could we rig an observation drone to run a line across?”
“Sure.” Skip pulled out his spotting scope and looked at the far wall. “There’s a few rocks we could use as an anchor. But it’s two thirty meters to the far wall.”
Jon shouldered his pack. “Let’s work our way along the canyon, hopefully there’s a place where the walls converge.”
It only took twenty minutes before they found a spot where the canyon’s walls came closer together. And not only that, but there were large rocks they could use as anchors.
“Looks like our luck is changing,” Jon said.
They each unspooled the rescue line from their packs, unclipping it from the single purpose deployment drones. The drones were only good for reeling out a line and anchoring it quickly. Fortunately, the lines themselves had loops in the end, so they could connect them with carabiners.
“It’s a shame we don’t have a zip line reel,” Murdoch said, looking across at the other side.
“Even if we did it wouldn’t help.” Jon held up the carabiner joining two of the lines. “You’d run into this half way over. We’ll be monkeying it across.”
Murdoch pulled a
face. “With full packs? That’s bloody impossible.”
Jon grinned. “Actually the pack will help.” He clipped a carabiner to the top of the pack. “If you get tired, just let go and have a rest. I’ll go first, you keep an eye out for locals.”
“And if I see any?”
“I don’t know, we don’t have any clear rules of engagement, so fire a shot over their heads if they look hostile.”
The lanky sniper nodded and unslung his Barrett; he’d refused to use anything else since the ARX-70 had let him down. He sighted up and down the canyon. “Coast is clear.”
Jon gave Skip a nod. The spotter pulled a drone from his pack, hooked it to the line and dropped it off the edge of the canyon. Moments later it popped back up, and he flew it to the other side, looped it around a rock and secured it.
Jon did the same with the line on this side, making sure the carabiner would be easy for the drone’s manipulator to open so they could retrieve the line. He hooked his pack on, then tightened the shoulder and belt straps. It wasn’t a perfect harness, but it would have to do.
Half way across he realized he had a problem. While the carabiner was sliding nicely, and easing a lot of weight off his arms, it would jam where the lines were joined. Once he arrived at the first join he stopped.
“What’s the matter?” asked Skip over the tac-link. “You’re not exactly hidden over there.”
“Can’t get over the join, hang on I’ve got an idea.”
Jon reached up and felt the carabiner attaching him to the line. There was no way it would slide over the join, but it was attached to his pack by its handle. He slid the carabiner to one side of the handle and then twisted so it ran parallel with the line.
It was fortunate he’d clipped a spare carabiner to his belt when setting up. He unclipped that, then reached behind his head and attached it to the other side of the join. With a stretch that nearly dislocated his shoulder, he was just able to clip it to the other end of the handle.