When the Devil Dances

by John Ringo

  "Well, think of it this way," Ryan said, gesturing at the torn slope to the west. "You made some dandy ski slopes!"

  Mitchell let out a belly laugh and keyed his throat mike. "Okay, Schmoo, try it nice and slow."

  * * *

  Reeves carefully ran the motors up to ten percent and then engaged the transmission. The SheVa had originally been designed without the latter system, but it was added late in the game in recognition that sometimes "throwing it into gear" was the best way to handle a situation.

  * * *

  In this case the SheVa rocked up on its ersatz traction enhancers then rolled backwards. There was a massive metallic sound from the six Abrams chassis and the loud, sharp sprong of a fracturing torsion bar.

  Captain Chan gave out a whimper and grabbed her helmet with both hands. "I just started thinking about what this loss report is going to look like." Behind them the officers could hear the crews of the MetalStorm guns cheering. "My career is toast."

  Mitchell tried not to laugh as he turned to the side and keyed his mike. "Okay, Schmoo . . ." He paused for a moment and snorted before keying the mike again. "Gun it!"

  * * *

  "Are you sure, sir?" the driver asked.

  "Oh, yeah," the major replied. Behind him the driver could faintly hear cheering. "The nature of the mission dictates that whatever means necessary are used to get the SheVa out; that looks like it means gunning it. Whatever the cost in materials."

  "Yes, sir!" Reeves answered, turning the power to thirty percent. "Here we go!"

  * * *

  The treads of the SheVa began thrashing against the rear decks of the Abrams chassis, tossing them up and down to the screams of torn and abused metal. The gun rocked forward, partially up on the smaller tanks, then back down as treads and road-wheels began to spring off of the smaller vehicles.

  "It looks like your tanks' treads are humping mine," Chan said unhappily. "I wish the crews would stop cheering; that's not a very good testimony to my leadership."

  "I think it's a great testimony," Mitchell said as the SheVa rolled back down then acclerated forward and up. "They kept getting in them."

  With a final surge the SheVa pulled up out of its entrapment and, to the sound of tortured and stressed metal from the abused tanks, it pulled out of the gully and up onto reasonably solid ground.

  "Now as long as we don't have to dig ourselves out again," Mitchell said grumpily, "or run into any more of those flying tanks, everything should be fine."

  "Well, I don't think I have to worry about getting back in that tank again," Chan said; the rear deck had crumpled on hers and the power pack was in pieces on the ground. "I guess we're walking from here on out."

  "Only if you want to," Mitchell said. "Your turrets are on our top deck; you can ride in those."

  "That's an . . . interesting idea," Chang said.

  "You might have a little vertigo and motion sickness problem," he admitted. "It's high. And you can tag along as well, Major," Mitchell continued, turning to Ryan. "Although I guarantee I can take a bridge down faster than you."

  "Sure," Ryan said. "But can you do it from out of sight of the Posleen?"

  CHAPTER 36

  Dillsboro, NC, United States, Sol III

  1514 EDT Sunday September 27, 2009 ad

  Major Ryan stepped off the SheVa as it began the complicated process of crossing the Tuckasegee River without killing anyone.

  They had run into the rear ranks of stragglers near Dills Gap and many of them had latched on to the SheVa. The gun had four "loading points" and each of them was now covered with soldiers.

  The good news was that they seemed to have gotten there ahead of the Posleen and, for a wonder, there was a gap between the rear of the stragglers and their pursuers. The word was that some snipers were slowing the Posleen advance, but they were working from the ridges and wouldn't be crossing at Dillsboro. That meant he probably wouldn't have to blow the bridge with people on it.

  About a platoon of soldiers with a captain leading them was headed for the cautiously maneuvering SheVa and Ryan touched the dismount communicator Major Mitchell had loaned him.

  "I think we've got a welcoming committee, Mitchell."

  "I see them on the external," the SheVa commander replied. "We'll hold up until we find out what they want."

  "Captain," Ryan said. "Major William Ryan, Corps of Engineers. And you are?"

  "Captain Paul Anderson," the officer replied. "I'm in charge of the crossing, sir, and I'm afraid the personnel riding on the SheVa will have to dismount and be processed."

  He had the crossed flags of a Signal Officer which, strangely enough, made him a line officer. In a situation such as this he could give orders to even a colonel of, say, the medical corps. However, engineers were line officers as well.

  "I'll give you the guys hanging on the outside," the major said with a faint, cold smile. "But I'm taking my guys over to make sure the bridge is properly prepared to blow."

  "Ah, that would be good, sir," the captain said with a relieved smile. "I . . . didn't mean to come on so strong, but I've been holding down this crossing for the last eighteen hours and trying to keep the groups crossing organized; it hasn't been fun."

  "Been there, done that," the major smiled back. "How, exactly, were you going to classify the SheVa?"

  "I'm going to treat it like the proverbial eight hundred pound gorilla, sir," the captain said. "Sergeant Rice," he continued, gesturing at the staff sergeant who was with him. "Get the rest of them across the bridge and sorted out."

  "Yes, sir," the sergeant said, waving the platoon after him.

  "We've got ammo trucks parked north of town," the captain said. "Widely dispersed. We also had two groups of SheVa reload trucks, accompanied by some MetalStorm reloads, come in. I sent them up the road to Sylva; there just wasn't anywhere around here to put them."

  "Those would be Major Mitchell and Captain Chan's," Ryan said, touching his communicator. "Mitch, good news. The reload group is just up the road, over."

  "Good," the SheVa commander replied. "With only eight shots, you get nervous when you're down to four. Now, how do we get there without killing anyone? There's only about three routes and it looks like there are people on all of them."

  "How does the SheVa get there?" Ryan asked.

  "That's going to be tough, sir," Anderson admitted. "We're reconstituting units on both flanks of the town. The probably means running it straight through. We've mostly cleared it because it's too hard keeping units in control in there."

  "There won't be a town if we do that," Ryan pointed out. "Or any roads."

  "We're running most of the traffic through on the bypass 23," the captain said, pulling out a map-board. "If he crosses the Tuckasegee east of 23, then turn . . . well on the town, he can head up 107. We're running tanks down that anyway, to keep from tearing up the main road; it's already trashed. His reload group is just to the south of Sylva, off of 107."

  "Gotcha," Ryan said, conveying the message to Mitchell. "And could you have my boys unload at the same time?"

  * * *

  "Roger," Mitchell replied. "Could I keep Kittekut, though?"

  "I suppose," Ryan replied, nonplussed.

  "I've installed her in the commander's chair. Which means I've finally got a commo person."

  "Feel free," the major said. "I'm going to go check out the bridge."

  "Are you going to be reboarding, Major?" Mitchell asked.

  "I doubt it," the engineer replied. "I've got other things to do. I might call you back to knock down a bridge depending on how much demo I have."

  "Well, we'll be seeing you," Mitchell said as the SheVa whined back to life. "Keep the dismount commo; I somehow think we'll be seeing you again."

  "Good luck."

  "Thanks, you too."

  * * *

  Ryan turned back to the captain and shook his head as the SheVa slowly trundled off to the east. "We met up in the mountains; they took that thing over one of
the smaller gaps."

  "That?" the captain asked waving them towards the bridge. "How?"

  "Not very well on the way down," Ryan replied with a smile. "They got it stuck as shit. Of course, that was while they were taking out two landers at point blank range. It's a long story."

  "I can believe it. How did they get out?"

  "You see those things all the way up top?" Ryan grinned.

  "Yeah, they looked like MetalStorm turrets, but I never heard of those on a SheVa."

  "They're not attached; they're just chained down," Ryan said with another, wider, grin. "We got it unstuck by driving it over the chassis."

  "Holy shit," Anderson said in turn. "That was one expensive goddamn fix! I assume the chassis didn't survive."

  "Nope, busted 'em bigger than shit," Ryan replied, stopping and looking off the bridge at the water below. He was suddenly struck by an intense sense of déjà vu, but he couldn't place where it was from.

  "So how did you get stuck with this shit detail?" Ryan said with a smile, gesturing at the bridge as they reached the far side. "Not to be nasty. But playing rearguard on a bridge is right up there with antimatter injector cleaner."

  "Oh, it's a shit detail, I agree," the captain said, shaking his head. "The answer is General Keeton."

  "Eastern Commander?" the major asked. "How in the hell did that happen?"

  "I was laying in cable when the word came that the Posleen had taken the Gap," the captain replied. "I took a look at the map and figured out where the chokepoint would be for most of the corps. I headed over here to try to . . . I dunno, help out or something since the headquarters I was laying the wire to was gone. But there wasn't anybody in charge and there were already problems getting the groups straightened out. So I grabbed the more stable looking units and started to get organized. Then, about the time I had to order around a major, I realized I didn't have authority for any of it. The cable was laid back to Eastern. I called up there and got ahold of a friend of mine in Operations. He apparently busted in on the meeting when they were trying to figure out what to do and who to send. The next thing I know I'm talking to General Keeton and he's telling me to do whatever I have to do; I've got full authority."

  "Go to your head?" Ryan asked.

  "More like hit me with a douse of cold water," the captain said. He gestured to one side where a group of privates and sergeants were clustered around a mass of tactical radios. "I suddenly realized I was Horatius. And I had to coordinate about a division's worth of personnel, materials and vehicles."

  "Hah!" Ryan laughed. "That was me in Occoquan, except the coordination part. Don't let that go to your head, either. It won't be the last time, hopefully."

  He stopped and looked around. The town was run-down—it was apparent that the economic downturn of the war had hit it hard—but it still was fairly antique looking and, the term that came to mind was "quaint." Most of the houses seemed to date to the early twentieth century or the late nineteenth. Many of them needed a coat of paint, but obviously before the war the place had been a rather prosperous tourist center. That was when it hit him.

  "Damn," Ryan said, shaking his head. "It looks just like Occoquan."

  And it did. The town was very similar to the site of his first battle. It was clustered around the river on a major highway and had the exact same look. He would bet a month's pay that before the war the town had been packed with antique shops and little cafes.

  Now though, it looked as if it had been mostly abandoned before the arrival of the retreating corps. Hopefully it would get fully cleared out before the SheVa drove over it.

  "About Bun-Bun," Ryan commented to the captain.

  "I've got a platoon making sure the town is cleared," Anderson replied. "And they'll pass on to Sylva and do the same."

  "You know who Bun-Bun is?" the major said with a quizzical smile.

  "Well, Bun-Bun is a homicidal rabbit with a switch-blade and a bad attitude," the captain replied with a grin. "But I assumed you meant the SheVa with the great big Bun-Bun painted on it."

  "You're a fan," Ryan said. It was not a question.

  "Oh, a huge one," the signal officer replied with a grin. "But the first guy to call in the sighting was confused as shit."

  "Sighting?" the engineer asked. He looked up at the precipitous hills around the valley. "Of course you've got scouts out."

  "There's a local militia," the captain replied. "They were actually at the bridge before I was. I sent them out to spot for us; by now they're all over the hills on four-wheelers."

  "So you'd already figured on clearing the town," Ryan said, shaking his head. "You're on the ball."

  "Why thank you," the captain said with a grin. "I may look like Torg, but I'm Zoe inside."

  "So, what about the bridge, Zoe?"

  "I'd appreciate you handling it, sir," the captain said. "I turned it over to a sergeant who had experience working with demo, but he admitted he'd never rigged something like this to blow. And Eastern is pretty adamant that they want it down. In the meantime, I've really got to get back to what I was doing."

  "I've got it, Captain, good luck."

  Ryan made sure that what he had mentally termed his "eight pack"—he hadn't even figured out what most of their names were—had dismounted from the SheVa. The group had moved over by the bridge guards and he was pretty sure would soon be racked out; sleeping on the metal floor of a pitching SheVa was not particularly easy. Fairly certain that they were okay and he knew where they would be if he needed them, he started really inspecting the explosives laced on the bridge.

  The bridge was a heavily constructed concrete and steel structure, rising on four pilings about a hundred feet off the river. The river was both deep and swift so it would be impassable to the Posleen once the bridge was down. And bridging it would be difficult for the Indowy; this obstacle would severely hamper the movement of the force. That presumed that the bridge would actually come down.

  He wandered down a side road and under the bridge, looking up at the explosives laid on the pilings. After a moment he shook his head. He could see what the captain had attempted, the explosives were laid—as you often saw in movies—at the juncture of the bridge and the pilings. However, they were insufficient in quantity to separate the bridge at that point. The junctures were actually fairly strong and flexible; breaking a bridge at them was tough.

  The pilings themselves, however, were round concrete "x"s, about four feet in cross section. If they had taken the explosives they had emplaced up above and simply wrapped the pilings in them, the bridge would come down for a treat. Relaying the explosives was going to take a while. Time they might not have.

  But, if worse came to worse, they could always have Bun-Bun knock it down.

  * * *

  "Okay, Schmoo," Major Mitchell called. "The nice people who are running the bridge have cleared out the town. I want you to cross the river to the east of the bridge then turn into the town and turn again up 107. Our reload team is out there someplace."

  "Got it, sir," the private replied. "Say goodbye to Dillsboro."

  The driver gunned the SheVa, carefully lowering the front into the river. The stream, which at that point was about six feet deep with a ten-knot current, would have been impassable to most tanks. But the SheVa didn't even notice; its rearmost treads had barely had time to enter the water before the front treads were climbing out on the far side.

  There was a steep ridge on the far side. Before the attack it would have looked like a real obstacle, but after crossing Betty Gap it wasn't even worth commenting on; Bun-Bun just went straight up, crushing a few houses, and down the other side. It was fortunate in one way that the famous "Home Defense Scorched Earth" policy had only held for the coastal plains; otherwise each of the houses would have been a potential anti-tank mine.

  "Sir," said Kitteket. "I've got a group that says they are our escorts. They have Dillsboro completely clear, but they're having some trouble getting everyone out of Sylva."

&
nbsp; CHAPTER 37

  Dillsboro, NC, United States, Sol III

  1623 EDT Sunday September 27, 2009 ad

  Ryan set the demolition team, augmented by his own people, to work rearranging the demolitions, then walked back over to Captain Anderson's command post. When he arrived there he could tell something had gone wrong; the captain had a set look on his face and the collection of RTOs was almost silent instead of communicating and chattering as they had been when he came by the first time.

  "What?" Ryan asked.

  "The Posleen airmobiled again," Anderson answered, looking off into the distance in thought. "A C-Dec force just took Balsam Gap. They landed on the Blue Ridge Parkway and assaulted the force that was holding it. They're, the force, it's gone."

  "Oh hell," Ryan said, thinking about the map of the area. There were only three routes over the line of ridges between them and Asheville or Knoxville. U.S. 23 went over Balsam Gap and straight to Asheville. U.S. 19, which crossed 441 in Cherokee, more or less paralleled it, crossing the ridges at Soco Gap. And 441 crossed the ridges at Newfound Gap, then descended into the Cumberland Valley. The forces could head for 19, but that route, and 441, were narrower and thus slower. And pushing all the gathered groups through that single road would be, in his professional opinion, impossible. And there was no way for vehicles to "filter" out as they had from the Gap; the ridges in this region were so steep and high that there were no other roads crossing the mountains.

  "What's responding?" he asked.

  "There's a division moving up from Asheville," Anderson said. "But they're having a bit of trouble getting their act together; they're pretty green and they had to pull out of the line around Asheville to head this way. They might be able to force them out of the Gap. But the reports are that these Posleen were last seen digging in. And the C-Dec was giving them covering fire during their assault. I . . . don't think they're going to be able to force the pass in any short time."

  "Damn, damn, damn," Ryan said. "Do you know what you're going to do?"

  "More or less," Anderson said. "I've had a few minutes to think about it. I'm going to take all the really nonessential personnel and equipment and push them up 441; that's the worst route and it won't help us when they're in friggin' Pigeon Forge, but they'll be out of the way."