by Tom Kratman
The door to the plane swung open to allow a man in FSA-style desert camouflage to climb down. It was too far to see the man's rank clearly, but Lamprey, who had an instinct for general officers- indeed his entire life's ambition was to join that exclusive club-was reasonably certain that the just-arrived officer was not one. Perhaps he was a colonel like Lamprey himself, perhaps some lesser being.
Suppressing his rage and putting on an utterly false smile, Lamprey walked halfway to the Cricket to meet his visitor. He saw that the man was, like himself, a colonel and, upon closer inspection of the embroidered tape over his right breast pocket, that his name was Ridenhour.
Ridenhour didn't waste time on trivialities. "You want into the fight?" he asked.
"Damn straight. And if that son of a bitch on the other side-"
"Which other side?" Ridenhour asked with a wintery smile. "I have direct access to Dux Parilla and Legate Carrera. But if you want to talk to the enemy commander, Amid Sada, you're on your own… though you could probably funnel a message through the legion." Ridenhour smiled, "The relationship is quite close and rather cordial, considering."
"You know damned well who I mean, Ridenhour." Lamprey's frustration and anger threatened to leak out.
"Ah. Well, Carrera is willing to negotiate."
"Negotiate, hell, that motherf-"
"Ah, ah, ah," Ridenhour wagged a finger. "Temper, temper. Carrera had sound reasons for keeping you out, initially, just as he has sound reasons for letting you in now… in a limited fashion."
"In a limited… arrrghgh!"
"That's right. He is willing to let your brigade take some buildings. It's an important set of targets. They'll be plenty of medals and commendations to go around. If you're a) interested and b) willing to fall under his-rather, Dux Parilla's-command."
"Details?" Lamprey asked, forcing his temper down.
Ridenhour nodded; this was easier than he'd thought it would be. He pulled a map out of his left leg cargo pocket and began to speak, while pointing. "In about four hours there will be six helicopters, Volgan-built IM-71s, landing four kilometers south of your positions. At the moment they land there will be an aerial attack on the objective I mentioned. That will be followed by a mortar bombardment on and around the objective. When the helicopters land here, and this is assuming you agree, of course, you will board the first echelon of one battalion-call it one reinforced company of one hundred and forty-four men, maximum-or one reinforced platoon of each of three companies of one battalion; your call. The helicopters will make a total of three sorties each, so the most you are getting over there is a single battalion, plus maybe a little reinforcement."
Ridenhour looked up to see if Lamprey was still with him. Seeing that he was, he continued. "The helicopters will follow this route. They will halt, briefly, at a range of five hundred meters and blast the living shit out of the targets, which are five apartment buildings of five to seven stories, each. Then they'll move in by pairs. As pairs, they will fly in your men and drop them on top of the buildings. Your job is to clear them to ground level, then pass through a… well… call it a 'battalion' from the legion. The cohort concerned-their commander is Xavier Jimenez, good man-will fall under your command until they pass through, just as you will fall under legion command as soon as you board."
Lamprey's eyes lit up slightly. Ridenhour was morally certain that what he was thinking about was a comment on his next Officer Evaluation Report Support Form to the effect of, Commanded a foreign battalion during combat operations in Sumer in 461, just above the comment that said, Cooperated fully with allied forces during combat operations in severe city fighting in Sumer in 461.
"If-and it's a big if, I know-you do this and it works out," Ridenhour continued, "Carrera will use his assets to ferry over your entire brigade and subdivide the city into two sectors for operational purposes. You will still be under legion command, however. Do you accept?"
Before Lamprey could answer, Ridenhour laughed. "If you don't, he will take the city on his own, damn the cost, and you will look like the Grand Old Duke of York, except that the air transport that got you here so that you could sit around jerking off is much more expensive than the shoe leather the duke wore out marching his men up a hill and down again."
"I could simply ignore the bastard and cross on my own," Lamprey insisted. "I've got my people back in the rear working on getting me rubber boats even now."
Ridenhour sighed deeply. How to explain to one arrogant worldclass asshole that there was a much bigger, and infinitely more ruthless, asshole nearby.
"Have you ever stopped to consider that dropped bridge, Jeff?" Ridenhour asked. "Do you really think it was just a mistake? I've gotten to know the man and he doesn't make or permit that kind of mistake. Now what do you suppose he might be willing to do if you try to force a river crossing against his wishes? What do you think it will do to your career if there's a massive friendly fire incident here between you and the legion and you end up losing over half the total of men killed in this campaign? You did want to see stars someday, didn't you?"
Forward Command Post, 4th Cohort
Xavier Jimenez heard the IM-71s whop-whopping behind him as they moved from the captured airfield to cross the river to where the gringo Airborne troops waited. Truth be told, Jimenez had doubted the FS Army commander on the other side of the river would roll for it. It had been an awfully dirty trick, he thought, Patricio dropping the sole useable bridge right under the paratroopers' noses.
The helicopters' sound rose, then began to drop again. Almost immediately, four Turbo-Finches appeared overhead. Singly they began to dive on the apartment buildings, firing machine guns and rockets down to clear the rooftops of any enemy who might be waiting there. Jimenez didn't know how effective the attack would be, though he did see one enemy soldier running along a roof be driven over the side by a blast to fall, screaming and arms flailing, to the ground.
That attack went on for several minutes while the helicopters got farther away. Just as Jimenez lost track of them completely, the aerial attack stopped, the birds winging it out of the area on full throttle.
Even as the last Turbo-Finch emptied its rocket pods, there came a massive roar from the legion's heavy mortars, in firing position somewhere to Jimenez's rear. He'd seen and heard so much mortar fire of late that he didn't even bother to try to count the seconds until impact. Instead, at about the right time, he ordered his command party to, "Duck!"
The mortar rounds that came in were almost all airbursts, set off by variable time fuses as they neared the vertical walls of the apartment building or the ground below. Their shards sometimes landed near Jimenez and his men. More often, the shards crashed against the apartment buildings' walls or entered the rooms through open or smashed doors and windows. The firing stayed steady, at about thirty heavy rounds a minute, for several minutes.
Sometime after the heavy mortars had begun firing, Jimenez heard the sound of the helicopters coming from behind and growing. They held up and hovered at a holding position several hundred meters behind Jimenez. That was his signal.
"Patricio, this is Xavier. Cut the heavies."
"Roger, out."
The muzzle blasts from behind stopped, though the shells continued detonating for half a minute. The last four shells were smoke. These exploded and sent burning bits of phosphorus down to the ground trailing tails of white smoke. Jimenez counted them off, carefully, before ordering, "Fourth Cohort! Support the assault by fire!"
Rifle and machine gun fire erupted from Jimenez's side of the children's park.
Assault Position Ramadan
Sada was most pleased to wake up and discover he was not dead, as he had half-expected to become when he'd closed his eyes to sleep the night before. Around him, his men were also awakening, shaken rather than shouted at by their sergeants and lieutenants. The sun was just beginning to seep through the basement assembly area's few slits and crevices.
"Qabaash, check the troops to the r
ight," Sada ordered. "I'll go left."
The two then split up, walking where possible and crawling where not, to inspect the soldiers Sada was about to send into an attack that was, on its face, hopeless. They returned after several minutes, meeting with the commander of the battalion about to assault.
"Let me go with them, Amid," Qabaash begged. The major just quivered with excitement at the pending assault.
"No," Sada answered, firmly. "You have other things to do." He turned to face the new battalion commander. "You know your orders?"
"Yes, Amid, " the captain commanding the assault battalion answered. "They're simple: attack, do damage, break through and go hunting through the rear for the support areas. Then become such a pain in the ass in the enemy's rear that he has to stop his attack to the northeast." The battalion commander-he was the sixth officer to hold the post in as many days-looked like a man who has resigned himself to death, as indeed he had.
"Allah's blessing upon you then," Sada said, placing one encouraging hand on the naquib 's shoulder. He looked at a firing slit, and then at his watch. Judging the time about right, Sada said, " Allahu akbar, my friend. Attack."
Ordering "Fixed bayonets" and taking up the cry, " Allahu akbar! " the battalion commander led his men out of their sheltering cellar and into the light.
" Allahu akbar! " came from three hundred throats as the storming party, pleasantly surprised not to be shot to bits as they emerged from the basements, charged across the street in full battle fury.
As they stormed, six blocks away a barrage was unleashed on another Sumeri position.
Command Post, Rocaberti's Century
Timely provisioning was something Rocaberti had always prided himself on, even back in the old days of the Balboan Defense Corps. He also saw much benefit in an orderly dispensing of rations. His acting centurion, still the sergeant who had previously led the century, had had other ideas. The sergeant had demanded to maintain fifty percent security rather than lining up three sections out of four to make chow go more smoothly and efficiently. The sergeant had demanded and Rocaberti had overruled him. All the sergeant could do now was get the men through the line and back to the front as quickly as possible. This he tried to do. He was still trying, when the heavy mortars to the rear had opened up on some apartment buildings well off to the right front. The men had shuddered, as nervous and tired men will, when the first shell bursts had gone off.
"Ignore it," the sergeant insisted. "Get your goddamned food and get back to the line."
The last time Manuel Rocaberti had heard massed artillery so close it had been at the commencement of the invasion of his country by the FSC. It had set him to trembling then. It did no less now.
Then, though, it had not been the artillery that frightened him so much as the prospect of a ground attack. That had convinced him to desert his command and run for it. So, when over the shock waves of the big guns he heard, louder and much closer, the massed cry of " Allahu akbar, " and looked up to see a mass of armed Sumeris boiling up seemingly from the earth, Rocaberti did three things: he dropped his jaw, he dropped his breakfast and he dropped the pretense of courage.
While his sergeant shouted, "Action front," and tried to push, pull and prod the legionaries into some semblance of a position they might hope to defend, Manuel Rocaberti, son of the Federated States Military Academy at River Watch, Class of 438, former major in the Republic of Balboa's Defense Corps, tribune in the Legio del Cid, bolted.
Daugher straight-armed the bolting, panic-stricken legionary, dropping him flat on his back. Carrera and his party had headed toward the sound of firing as soon as they'd heard it. When it had grown into a cacophony they'd broken into a run to get there. They'd slowed when they saw the soldier fleeing without his rifle.
Carrera bent down and, grabbing the soldier with one arm, backhanded him across the face with the hand of the other. "What the fuck is going on, trooper?"
The kid just shook his head back and forth saying, "I don't know, I don't know, I don't know-"
"Mitchell, this soldier is under arrest. Follow. The rest of you, either side of the street. Let's go see."
Carefully, the headquarters party advanced, Carrera just behind Bowman on one side, Daugher taking point on the other. Mitchell, taking up the rear, prodded the arrested soldier forward at muzzle point. They saw no more fleeing troops. On the other hand, they did see small groups of Sumeris advancing across an intersection without any obvious opposition.
Carrera took the radio microphone from Soult. He called Parilla first, to tell him what he thought had happened and to warn the Dux to be prepared to defend the CP and the airfield. Parilla was already shouting instructions before he released the microphone on his end.
Confident that at least the Command Post wouldn't be taken unawares, Carrera next called the Cazador Cohort.
"Tribune," he'd said, "I don't care if your men are tired. I don't care if they're dragging their guts behind them. Meet me at…" he stopped to look at his map… "Meet me at Checkpoint Alpha Seventeen. Now… yes, your whole fucking cohort."
"What now, Boss?" Bowman asked, eagerness and excitement in his voice.
"Now? Now we go seal off that intersection and try to buy some time."
Daugher and Bowman said, together, "Yeehaw!"
Carrera's only responses were a smile, the word, "Lunatics," and the order, "Let's go."
Jimenez had to admire the elegance of the thing. While his men fired up the lower stories of the apartment buildings across the park, the choppers pulled pitch and lifted up above Jimenez's own positions. They advanced above the park blazing away, lacing the fronts of the enemy-held buildings with fire. As they crossed from overhead to his high front, Xavier saw that even the crew chiefs were leaning out the side doors and windows to add their machine guns to the din.
With no significant return fire coming, the center two IM-71s arose, then swooped down, one falling in behind the other, to the center-and tallest-of the apartment buildings. The first disgorged its troops there, then moved forward to give room to the helicopter following.
When it did, the far side of the building-the side where there was no suppressive fire and which had not been touched by the mortar barrage-erupted with machine guns and RGLs. The helicopter tried to get away, but its own downdraft corrected at least one grenade in flight, straightening it out by the wind on the fins and causing it to surge upwards. This struck it on the tail, wrecking the tail rotor and causing the helicopter to tilt half over to one side and go into an uncontrolled spin. Spinning still, it spiraled to the ground behind the apartments and crashed in smoke and flames. Pinned tight by centrifugal force, none of the crew escaped.
Jimenez didn't see the crash. He caught a single glimpse of the spinning tail boom and then heard the fiery explosion. "Shit," he said quietly, nausea gripping at his stomach.
Lamprey and his RTOs landed even as the previous bird was beginning its death spiral. The pilot of the IM-71 that disgorged this second group saw what had happened to his predecessor and had no intention of following. Fortunately, he didn't have to. The first bird had taken the dangerous route out to clear the rooftop as quickly as possible for the second. Since only two were scheduled to carry troops to the tallest of the buildings, the second chopper didn't have to get out of anyone's way and could take the time to lift and do a fairly leisurely turn.
Once it had cleared the rooftop, the third and fourth helicopters eased in to the lower buildings flanking the center one. Before they touched down, forty of the forty-eight paratroopers of the 731st that had already landed had burst through the rooftop and were clearing out the Sumeris hiding below in vicious, no quarter, room-to-room and hall-to-hall fighting.
Lamprey, staying on the roof, led from the rear.
Rocaberti stopped running only after having sprinted half a mile and zigzagged several times to make sure he was out of the line of fire. It was a not unimpressive performance from a man in his early forties. Gagging with exhaustio
n, he leaned against a wall to catch his breath. Behind him, he heard enough firing to suggest that his entire command had not been exterminated.
This was a problem.
When Rocaberti heard the roar of a big gun-a tank, he thought- he knew he had a really big problem. If the century somehow held out there would be witnesses, dozens of them, against him at his future court-martial. He considered the way Carrera had treated enemies who had broken the rules. What would he do to nominal friends who had? Thinking of ropes and short drops, the tribune automatically felt around his neck.
Not that Rocaberti considered Carrera a friend; the legate had always been a bit distant. In fact, the sinking feeling in the deserter's stomach might not have been quite so deep if Carrera had been a friend.
"What difference does it make though?" he wondered aloud. "Jimenez is his best friend and Carrera would even have him shot if he'd run as I did. Fuck; fuck; fuck! Why did I ever let my uncle force me back into uniform?"
Though it did not answer the question, another blast from a tank's muzzle half a mile behind him did punctuate it.
Mendoza had to admit, the food was a bit better this morning than it had been. He sat in his driver's compartment, surrounded by the dials and controls of his tank, eating breakfast, fried sausage and some yellow-greenish stuff that probably had egg in its ancestry somewhere. Del Rio had gone and fetched it for all three men; the infantry century they supported still hadn't quite figured out what to do with them.
Between bites Mendoza watched the legion's attack aircraft swoop in on some targets blocked by the buildings to either side. Between those attacks, his mind wandered to a pretty girl in a yellow dress…
The cry of " Allahu akbar " echoed down the street. Mendoza heard Sergeant Perez shout, "Oh, shit!" He looked up from his food and saw a part of the Sumeri wave washing down the street. Without orders, Mendoza pushed the starter button to bring the tank's engine to life. With only the slightest hesitation he tossed the food up and out of the driver's compartment, then pulled on his combat vehicle crewman's helmet in time to hear Perez ordering, "… HE, Infantry."