Never Sound Retreat

by William R. Forstchen

  Andrew started for the door, pausing to pat Jack on the shoulder.

  "Glad to have you back, Petracci. You're heading home to Rus for some leave, you can take the train with us tomorrow morning."

  "Well, sir, I'd rather stay out here."

  "There's nothing for you to do until we get those new airships. Take some leave, work with Ferguson on the designs and start training our new pilots."

  Andrew walked out of the room and into the cool night air. From the front porch of his clapboard headquarters he looked out over the rail yard that was the main supply head serving Port Lincoln and the eastern front. Nearly a dozen trains were in the yard, off-loading supplies, the last one in for the night bringing with it a new battery and the Forty-third Roum Infantry.

  The troops were filing off, moving through the night, passing in front of his headquarters, not aware that he was standing in the shadows. Stepping to the end of the porch, he watched them head down into the town built along the bluffs above the harbor. The sound of their passing carried with it the old familiar haunting rhythm, the tramping of boots, the banging of tin-cups and canteens, the soft-spoken conversations, snatches of songs, the whispering, swirling, pulsing beat of an army moving in the night, the same rhythm that he had heard on the road to Antietam, Gettysburg, Cold Harbor and later at the Ford, Roum, and, finally, Hispania.

  Wagons rumbled past, piled high with boxes of hardtack, moving toward the warehouses, followed by others bearing artillery ammunition, shoes, uniforms, barrels of salted pork, and the thousand other items that now made up his modern army in the field.

  He looked overhead, the Great Wheel hovering in the sky above. Yet again it filled him with wonder. Which star, of the myriad spread out above him, was home?

  How many nights had he wondered that? He smiled, remembering after the end of the Merki War, when he and Kathleen had taken a brief vacation, spending a week in an abandoned villa offered to them by Proconsul Marcus of Roum. It had only been the two of them, the children, and a few servants. At night they would walk up to a high meadow, where the grass was nearly waist high, lie down, and watch the stars. They had made a game of trying to pick out which one was the sun of earth. He could remember one night all so well, the stars coming out, Kathleen wrapped in his embrace, breathing softly and then whispering that this was home, this was their Earth, the place that was theirs forever.

  And yet... he wondered about Maine. The oceans here were different, freshwater and warm, they lacked the delicious chill of an autumn breeze coming in off the sea, the icy fog of winter, the crystal blue days of summer that were so achingly beautiful. Funny, all that he now was he would not change, not Kathleen, the children, even the dream of the Republic he had struggled so hard to create on this nightmare world. Yet as he looked at the stars above he wished that somehow he could recapture and hold what once was, the lazy summer nights of Maine, the youthful innocence, the belief that such hopes would indeed be true.

  "Thinking of Maine?"

  He turned to see Hans by his side, looking up at the stars as well.

  "How did you know?"

  "Could tell somehow. I feel the same. A wish for peace, a place for my wife, my son to be safe. Remember that meadow we hiked to north of Augusta, back when you were a fresh young lieutenant and we marched your company for the first time?"

  Andrew smiled wistfully. "Snow Pond above Augusta. Remember it well."

  "It was peaceful there that day, so peaceful, the breeze rippling the water, the white clouds drifting in, the blue sky, the air cool, fresh like it was the day the Earth was born. I've dreamed of it ever since. When I was back there"—he nodded toward the south—"at night I'd dream that I could close my eyes and the years would peel back and we'd be there again and all that would happen to us was then a dream yet to be."

  Andrew said nothing for a long moment. The Hans who had come back to him from the hell of the Ban-tag prisons was changed. He was still the same old grizzled sergeant major, that was eternal, yet now there was a tragic longing, a looking for something he feared they would never find in this world.

  "We're in trouble, Hans," he finally said, and as he spoke, he continued to gaze at the sky. "When the last war ended I dreamed it was over, but it never will be, at least as long as we are alive. Maybe for our children, but not for us. It will just keep going on, and on."

  Hans nodded as he reached into his pocket, fished out a plug of tobacco, and bit off a chew. He absently offered the plug to Andrew, who took a bite, then looked over at Hans and smiled. It was a ritual they had developed so many years back when they were still on Earth. In the years when Hans was a prisoner, the memory of this simple gesture could move him to tears.

  "Why us, Hans?" Andrew sighed.

  "Because we're here, lad, because we're here."

  Chapter Two

  "My Qar Qarth."

  Ha'ark, grinning with delight, accepted the bow and salute of his lieutenants, Jurak and Bakkth, two of his companions who had traveled through the Tunnel of Light with him. Ha'ark Qar Qarth the Redeemer looked around at the assembled umen leaders and clan Qarths who were gathered in his golden yurt and felt a cold chill of delight. Hard to believe, even to imagine, that five years past he was but a frightened draftee, forced to join the imperial forces in the war of the False Pretender back on his home world.

  Was that even me, he wondered? More a scholar than a soldier, wanting nothing of the war, driven to it because of an unfortunate encounter with the daughter of a petty judge who, to defend her honor, had later claimed that his attentions were forced rather than gladly accepted. The thought was amusing now; at least he had claimed that they were not forced and, with a wry smile, realized that the truth fell somewhere in the middle.

  By the time he had been forced into the army the glorious early days of victory for the imperial side were long past, and when he had left for the depot his family offered the traditional services for the dead. It was no longer a war of honor or quarter, and the imperial armies were in retreat. Cities still loyal were under constant bombardment, and the great palace had disappeared under a rain of atomic rockets.

  When he and the rest of his unit had fallen through the Tunnel of Light to this world he had thought it was the end . . . and now he was Qar Qarth.

  The memory of it all caused him to laugh softly, and those around him, his clan leaders, his umen commanders and tribal Qarths started to laugh as well. They knew not why they were laughing, simply that some thought had amused their Redeemer and, therefore, was worth laughing about as well.

  It was so pathetically simple to convince the barbarians of this world that he was the Redeemer of prophecy; all he needed to do was draw on some of the ancient mythology, for it was obvious that those of this world were of the clans lost when the great empire had collapsed, eons ago. The ancestors had created the portals to leap between worlds, but the knowledge of how such things functioned was lost in the wreckage of empire.

  For that he was grateful—the portals were now simply a threat through which rivals might appear. In his old world he was nothing but an unwilling soldier in an unwinnable war, but here he was the Redeemer, the Qar Qarth of the Bantag Horde, and here he would forge an empire of his own making.

  He was grateful, as well, for the presence of the humans, for without them as the common enemy he might never have risen to power, and without them now there would be no war to enshrine his name in glory. His thoughts lingered for a moment on Schuder. There were times when he could still reach out and touch into his soul, to feel the fear, the torment that still lingered there. Strange, he almost missed him at times. For a cattle, a human, Schuder was remarkably civilized, a good soldier, and he wished he could have bent him to his will. As Schuder had been the force behind the creation of the human armies, so he might have served here. He was certain there would be a day when he would meet Schuder once again. It would be a pleasure to share a talk with him one more time, before he was led to the feast where his brains would be
devoured.

  Schuder's escape had the potential of being a humiliation, but the blame had been shifted, and more than one who had opposed him had been forced to fall upon his sword in atonement for fault, real or conjured.

  If Schuder had created a problem, it was that he was now forced to launch his war too soon.

  He motioned for Jurak and Bakkth to join him, and together they left the yurt. As they stepped out into the evening air he took a deep breath, glad to be free of the noise and the stench of the moon feast. To try and carry on any rational conversation, while humans were slowly being roasted alive, was all but impossible.

  He could see the look of displeasure on Jurak's face.

  "Barbaric," Jurak growled. "I wouldn't mind it so much if they simply cut their throats first."

  Ha'ark chuckled and shook his head.

  "But then the shamans could not divine the future."

  "Seeing the future by interpreting the howls of a creature as he's slowly cooked and his brains devoured while he's still alive is beyond belief."

  "It's their way, and it serves our purpose."

  Even as Jurak voiced his protest a wild piercing scream erupted from the yurt, the hysterical screams greeted seconds later by roars of approval as the shaman undoubtedly declared some favorable sign from the insane howls of the human whose legs were being plunged repeatedly into a caldron of boiling water until the flesh and muscle finally sloughed off the bones.

  The night of the moon feast was young, yet from the thousands of yurts spread across the steppe, from that of the most lowly caste to the golden yurt of the Redeemer, the ritual was being repeated so that the air was alive with shrieks of agony, the cries for mercy, the anguished gasping out of life. It was considered a bad omen if the subject of the feast died too quickly, and those who could make the torment linger till the coming of dawn believed that their luck would be good for the coming month.

  It was always a strange sight, in the early-morning light, when the flaps of the yurts were pulled back so that the rising light of dawn would fill the tent. The human cattle who had survived would then be brought out and those still strong enough made to stand while their skulls were cracked open and their brains devoured. The auguries were held to be especially good if the last sight of the human had was of the rising sun, for as his world went dark his spirit, primitive as it was, would wing to the everlasting sky, where he would serve forever as a slave of the departed ancestors.

  And even as he died, they would tear the boiled and roasted flesh from his limbs in a frenzy of feeding, their passions aroused by the long night of ritual. A hundred thousand humans would die this night to feed the belly of his Horde. He was told that the Chin were numberless, but after four years encamped in this one region such feasting was taking its toll on their numbers. It was good that the war had started; otherwise, his subjects would have grown restless.

  "You saw the destruction of the airship?" Ha'ark asked, his icy gaze fixed on Bakkth.

  "Yes."

  Ha'ark growled angrily.

  "Part of the reason I allowed you to command the airships was so that discipline would be instilled. The pilots should all be taken out and impaled for their stupidity. The orders were to prevent it from flying too low, to attack if necessary but ensure that it escaped."

  Bakkth nervously shook his head.

  "If I execute the pilots, who will we get to fly, Ha'ark? It takes months to train these primitives. I was there, and I tell you that the one who placed the shot that hit the human airship was shot down as well."

  "A likely story. You're protecting someone, perhaps even yourself."

  "Let is rest, Ha'ark," Jurak interjected. "Anyhow, I think we can all agree that it was remarkable luck that they had parachutes. Letting them see the maneuver, then shooting them down afterward will convince Keane that the report is true and not just a feigned movement."

  Ha'ark waved aside Jurak's defense of his friend even though it was true. The elaborate deception he had conceived did have that one flaw—Keane might see it as nothing but a trick. The shooting down might be the final factor that convinced Keane to believe the report of the redeployment as true and thus set him up for the trap. If so, then the gods were yet again showing their favor. Tomorrow his own airships would push across the sea to ensure that the Yankees had no new ships ready to fly, for already the trains had been turned about, the tens of thousands of troops were returning to their barracks in Xi'an.

  "Are you certain you saw them picked up?" he asked.

  "I flew down personally."

  Bakkth did not add that he had actually felt admiration for the human pilot who had so masterfully fought them for nearly two hours. His orders had been to direct the attack on the ship, but to do it in such a manner as to let them escape, but he could not blame his pilots too much for wanting to close with their new flying machines and test them against the human ship which had flown for months, with impunity, above them. Nor would he ever admit to the friendly wave he had offered to a skillful foe.

  "And the trains?"

  "As we planned. The human would have had to be blind not to see them moving east. He flew above the rail line leading back here, even dipping beneath the cloud cover for a closer look before finally turning back."

  "And the concealment in Xi'an?"

  "The camouflage was in place. The umens well hidden, the monitors concealed in sheds as were the land cruisers and special craft for moving them."

  Ha'ark nodded as he absently fished in the pouch by his hip, pulled out a plug of tobacco, and took a chew. It reminded him yet again of Hans. What would the old sergeant say of his plan, he wondered. There would have to be, at the very least, a certain professional admiration for it all.

  Hans . . . would Hans see through the elaborate deception? The trick was to convince them that the main thrust was coming to the north and east, out of the territory of the Nippon. In truth, that could very well be the place where victory would be won anyhow; twenty-five of his umens were committed to this opening move which Jurak would lead. But it had to be done slowly, to draw more and yet more of their troops into the vulnerable forward position. At the same time he wanted them to maintain a presence on the western shore of the ocean. To ensure that, eighteen umens had made the long march around the sea, crossing at the narrows hundreds of leagues to the south, and were just now moving into position to hold the Second Army of the humans between the two seas.

  He could picture the two fronts as two points on the base of a triangle. All that was left was to strike the blow at the point of the triangle, thus cutting the two fronts off. That was the purpose of the strike force assembling in Xi'an, to close the trap. There, at the point of decision, would be the best of his modern weapons, his assault troops armed with breechloaders, and the precious land cruisers.

  He turned away from his companions and began to pace the wooden deck in front of his yurt. Yet it was too soon, far too soon. There were only enough ships to transport three umens, thirty batteries of artillery, and twenty land cruisers. His plan had been to shatter the Yankee fleet in one surprise blow, then spring out and strike the land forces. He had toyed with the idea of delaying everything till next spring, but his fear was that in that time the Yankees could match, and perhaps even exceed, what he had already created.

  With the limited transport only half his force could be moved in the first strike, and then it would be at least ten days before the second wave could be brought up. The timing of it all was so crucial. He looked back over his shoulder at Jurak. Attacking now was something Jurak had not approved of, urging that they wait till spring, when fifteen more umens could be fully armed with modern weapons, the additional transports readied, and the rail line run all the way up past Nippon so that the eastern army could be fully supplied.

  Jurak could not see that audacity was needed. If they could cut off the two wings of Keane's army, the campaign might press as far as Roum before the autumn rains stopped them. Then, no matter how much the
Yankees produced, come spring it would be over.

  He stopped in his pacing, tormented yet again by the one key question.

  "Bakkth, are you certain they landed alive and were picked up?"

  "I saw their ironclad come alongside them and haul them aboard."

  Ha'ark nodded and spit a stream of tobacco juice.

  "Perhaps for the best then, we won't have to worry about the ship coming back, but regardless of that, I want a constant air patrol. Especially at dawn, that's usually when they came in."

  "I've already ordered it, Ha'ark."

  Ha'ark nodded. Of late he was becoming uncomfortable with the fact that his companions, those who had crossed through the Tunnel with him, still addressed him by his name rather than as Qar Qarth or the Redeemer. It was a familiarity that he would have to put an end to.

  "Surprising they thought up the idea of parachutes," Jurak said. "Perhaps we should consider the same."

  Ha'ark shook his head.

  "A waste of precious silk and weight. Our machines still do not have enough power or lift, and two parachutes mean on less bomb. Besides, it is good for the pilots to realize that they either return victorious or not at all."

  "A waste of good training."

  "There are a thousand more volunteers waiting to replace them. Finding more pilots is not my worry, making more machines is."

  That was something Jurak still did not seem to grasp fully, and that was the core of his problem. More than half a million Chin slaves labored in his mines, factories, armories. A hundred thousand worked just on the rail line he was pushing north into the territory of the Nippon, so that his supply head would be close to the front. It was the wringing of this transformation out of a barbarian world that was the real challenge. The lives of the cattle, or for that matter his own warriors, were secondary if it meant that one more airship could be created, or one more artillery piece or land cruiser, or the locomotive or ship to haul them to the place of battle.