by Vance Huxley
Right now, between the MiB shooters, Julius’s men on the rocket launchers, and a few Bloods keeping Julius honest, he’d got maybe a hundred fit men. Another hundred had stayed back home, minding the store, mainly the weaker MiBs who were only fit for garrisons, stiffened with Julius’s wounded men and some injured Bloods and Children of Cain. The last reports reckoned about sixty wounded made it out of the fields, so if everyone recovered he’d still have more men than most gangs. With the rockets and automatics, it would be enough.
Eventually the General dozed because no matter how he played the numbers, without a good number of survivors from inside Orchard Close the whole attack would be a disaster. He had too many enclaves to hold them with only two hundred fit men, especially with the Bloods nearly wiped out. Bugnuts would be pissed off, and might even come looking for payback, though at least he didn’t have as many men left either. Apart from four men on watch, the force inside the farm settled down to get some sleep.
* * *
Less than a mile away from the farm, a small group of very heavily-armed men and women crouched, drinking water, patching wounds or just resting. Ru carefully parted the brambles, slithering through a gap in a wall to lay next to Charger. “There’s too many. We counted sixty or seventy guards and operators around the launchers, which we might manage if we blow the rockets first, but there’s as many wounded. They aren’t really mobile, but they’re all armed.”
“Wounded? Easy meat once we’re among them.” Charger felt downright bloody-minded, not at all his usual self. He’d always admired how Soldier Boy ran his enclave and defied Caddi. Now Harold and his defenders were all dead, because the artillery stopped Patty’s counter-attack to rescue them. At least the bloody General’s men had been carved up good and proper.
“No, because they’ve got pistols at least, or most of them have.” Ru picked up her rifle, stroking the barrel. “I could kill them all but not quickly enough, then we’d be knee deep in whatever reserve there is and any other wounded.”
“The Army tanks aren’t here. Patty might still attack, relying on us to silence the rockets.” Charger glanced back at the rest of the group, all seventeen of them, spread out among the brambles trying to rest. About a third were already wounded so they’d not be any good for an assault, while most of the rest were barely trained.
Ru shrugged, passing him the rifle. “If Patty attacks, the rockets won’t be a problem. I know a couple of others who’ll come with me. We only need to get near enough to throw the bombs, then shoot anyone who tries to kick them away.” She fell silent, while Charger tried to find a way to dissuade her. Unfortunately, she made too much sense. Ru patted his arm. “Tell Wamil she’s a mummy now. Ask her to bring Gulab up in the countryside where she never sees another ruined building or scroat.”
“I’ll help her, and watch out for them both. I like the idea of Cherie getting her pony, and growing up like that. We’ll sneak round the launchers to the other side, where you’ll be closer. That way we might be able to cover you.” Charger watched Ru crawl away to find her suicide bombers, knowing he couldn’t do that. Die in battle, yes, but not in cold blood. He turned to the rest, stressing they had plenty of time so move slowly and quietly.
All across the battlefield people dozed, unless they were on duty, were in too much pain, or were too worried about their loved ones.
10 – Payback
Five hours later, up on the bypass, a low, urgent voice woke the sergeant. “Sarge!”
“What?” Sarge had managed to doze but not for long. He checked his watch. “Ah, oh-five-forty. Dawn coming. Stand to.”
The corporal’s voice sounded strained and he kept it low. “No. I mean yes, but it’s not that. They’re down below us. Armed men.”
“What? How many?”
“A lot from the sound of it, under the bypass where there’s no cameras. They’re trying to keep quiet, but metal on metal sounds fairly distinctive at night and there’s too many. The lads are getting ready.” The corporal looked embarrassed, briefly. “I can’t look because I pulled the wires on the surveillance, so none of the lads perved if the women were down there overnight. I needn’t have bothered because they all went off into the countryside.”
“Shit.” The sergeant glanced at the extra soldiers near the guard post and the lorry across the access road. “Tell the lads to keep away from the lorry. It’ll be a bullet magnet.”
“What about reinforcements?” The corporal sounded just a little desperate because there’d been hundreds of attackers, and the artillery couldn’t have killed them all.
“I finally got through to the captain on his way back from some bloody meeting. The cavalry is on the way, but it’ll be daylight before they arrive. Before you ask, the RAF and artillery are no good. If the animals are under the bypass, the incoming would kill us as well.” The sergeant waved the corporal away. “Go on, get the men sorted out, and make sure they’ve all got grenades. You aren’t supposed to hear sergeants panicking on the radio.”
“Sarge!” That was one of the squaddies with a scope.
“What now?”
“It’s a woman!”
“What!” Sergeant Stokes headed over to the man beckoning in the faint pre-dawn light.
“Here. Use my scope. Almost straight down.” The man handed over his rifle.
Sergeant Stokes swore under his breath. “That’s not a woman. That’s the Demon.”
“What?”
“Patty the Demon Knitter. The gangs have shortened it.” Sarge looked carefully, seeing that Patty had dressed for war. No sign of a rifle or shotgun, thank God, but anyone patting her would cut themselves. What the hell was she doing there? Sarge knew that Demon led some of the women fighters, the Riot Squad, so she should have been in the compound last night, defending the walls.
He heard a rustle of movement below, and a couple of faint clinks, before more shapes appeared either side of the lone woman. Patty turned, looked up and waved, then made the pistol sign with a thumb and finger, pointed at Orchard Close. Sarge half raised his hand, then realised she probably couldn’t see him. Even so, Demon had faith in the Army being on the ball and expected covering fire. In which case……. Sarge looked towards the faint shapes of houses, houses full of unsuspecting gangsters.
Sarge looked down again, running his eyes along the lengthening and thickening line of armed and armoured shapes. The smile would have made a wolf envious. All that movement last night, just after dark, with people going under the bypass and then coming back. Back and forth, again and again while two more cameras stopped working. He’d ignored the whole thing, assuming Harold had sent all the wounded, women and children to safety, and possibly some supplies. Sarge had even told his men to ignore any movement overnight. Instead, the bastard had moved his army under there. So who the hell had been fighting last night?
He turned to the marksman. “Put your sights on the houses. If any man points a weapon at those women, you shoot him.”
The squaddie took his rifle back. “Any weapon?”
Even though he could feel a laugh bubbling up, Sarge kept his voice very serious. “Rifle, pistol, crossbow or catapult. If he looks like he might spit this way, shoot him.”
The sharpshooters had broken the rules in the darkness, but now everyone would be able to see the targets. “The Rules of Engagement say firearms and only when they threaten us.” Though to be fair, the squaddie didn’t sound as if he liked that idea.
“If it’s pointed this way it’s easy to mistake a crossbow for a rifle in this light, or a finger for a pistol barrel.” Sarge paused for a moment to keep his face straight. “Unless you want those bastards to shoot the women?”
The soldier chuckled, his teeth showing briefly in the faint light. “That’s why they gave me this fancy rifle. Poor eyesight.”
At least that meant Sergeant Stokes could finally smile in return. “Good lad. Don’t shoot before the alarm goes up.”
The soldier glanced towards the enclave. �
�What are they going to do?”
“Have you ever wondered what Rorke’s Drift would have looked like, if the Zulus had got inside before the soldiers were ready?” He chuckled and two sets of teeth showed briefly as they smiled in mutual anticipation. Sarge called off the artillery, then headed down the line to talk to the other marksmen, and then the squaddies.
Only one man seemed worried, but not about actually killing any of the men inside Orchard Close. The duty corporal didn’t fancy getting a new hardcore sergeant or being posted somewhere very unpleasant. “We’ll do it Sarge, but they’ll have your stripes for sure.”
“Stop worrying Corp, because I’m giving you direct orders. My stripes are history anyway, as soon as the brass see the film of those women coming out of the exclusion zone. They’ll give me them back eventually or the Army will collapse, because sergeants are indispensable. Your job is to make sure nobody gets creative. Our lads aren’t marksmen, so keep their fire high. Shoot at either the bedrooms on this perimeter or the houses further back. Make sure the bloody idiots cease fire when Patty’s girls get over the wall.”
The corporal didn’t think ‘obeying orders’ would get him off the hook, but that wouldn’t stop him shooting every gangster he could. He just wasn’t as sure the women could win. “You reckon they can do it, kill that lot?”
“Yeah. I’m sure of it. Soldier Boy kept back experienced fighters, so they won’t hesitate and they’ll want revenge.” So did Sarge. A little bit of glee kept trying to break through. It had bugged him all night. The defence had failed too fast, their fire had slackened too soon. They’d never have stopped all that lot, not in the dark, but Orchard Close should have lasted longer. Sarge glanced upwards and then down. “Wherever you ended up, you smartarsed bastard, enjoy the show.”
He moved back to the sandbags and now, through the lessening gloom, the soldiers could make out the darker blobs as the tight groups of armed figures moved slowly and quietly towards Orchard Close. The blocks of fighters were probably still impossible to see from inside the enclave wall, with the pitch blackness beneath the overpass behind them. The lighter sky above the roadway, and the angular shapes of the guard post and lorry outlined against it, would draw the eye away. Someone had started cursing slowly and quietly. “Shut it Percy. Just keep your sights up or you’ll shoot her in the arse.”
“Sorry Corp.”
As long minutes passed, Sarge glanced along the bypass. The cavalry were late as bloody usual. He couldn’t see any sign of vehicles, and surely the captain would have all the lights blazing? Though right now Sarge was torn. Those lasses, and hopefully some lads, needed the animals fast asleep for just a bit longer.
A cry of alarm from Orchard Close ended in the crack of an Army rifle. More calls drifted up but they were confused and sleepy. “Sorry Sarge. Thought he was armed.” Sarge relaxed a bit. The lads were on it.
* * *
Patty froze for a moment when the man called out, but instead of gunfire from the dark shapes ahead a single shot rang out from behind. “Faster, but keep quiet.” As the quiet instruction went down the lines the pace picked up, but not much because those on crutches couldn’t go much faster. Even so, Patty was now less than a hundred yards from the wall, much less. Her sabre came out, the blade dulled with dirt.
She took another twenty paces, thirty, while a couple of confused voices behind the wall asked if the bloody guns had finally quit. Harold had been right! There wasn’t a drop to drink in Orchard Close, not even the watered beer, and the stop taps were off. That was so the gangsters only had what they carried so they’d be dehydrated, with vicious hangovers or withdrawal when the booze and drugs wore off. After the fight, and winning, and then the artillery, their adrenaline would be spent and the survivors would hit a low. As Harold predicted, most of the assholes hidden in the houses and ruins had gone to sleep.
At least the screams had died out after the shooting and shelling stopped, so none of her girls had been caught alive. Not many girls could have been, because Harold insisted on mostly blokes for just that reason. Except for Ru’s Annex squad he hadn’t taken any of the new recruits, the lasses who had only just escaped one lot of scroats. Now the gangsters could pay, for both the men and the women. Patty’s eyes stung briefly. Harold had only taken half of the best shooters, and refused to take Shooters Two, Three or Five. He wanted Patty to lead her Demons and Emmy her Gnomes when they came for payback, with Ru as an ace in the hole. Payback, that steadied her.
There were more shouts of alarm and three shots from behind, up on the bypass, then Patty flinched as rifles volleyed. A familiar voice rang out from further down the line, Emmy. “It’s covering fire! Charge!” From below the bypass a bugle began to play a series of sharp notes, a real bugle. Jilli had found a sheet of cavalry calls so that really was the charge. The gangsters were rousing now, a few of them shouting to each other behind the wall only yards ahead.
Patty pulled the pin, tossing her bomb up and forward before shrugging her shield forward onto her arm. To either side arms came up and forward, sending four more small dark shapes arcing up and over the wall. Harold had sneaked two full boxes of the precious clockwork grenades across with the other weapons.
Flame lanced from an upstairs window. One of her girls went down, but then a line of fire tore the window and frame apart before moving on to the next window. Sarge must be using the machine gun! Even as Patty raised her foot onto the first of the wide shallow steps, ideal for injured fighters to climb, a ripple of explosions thundered behind the brickwork.
Ten shields wide the remnants of the Demons and Lovers came over the wall, their swords cutting down the surviving defenders. More armoured figures followed, struggling over the wall. Those with an arm in a sling or using a crutch or stick didn’t carry shields, they used their free hand to fire a pistol. The surviving gangsters near the firing step or staggering out of nearby houses were either wounded, reeling from the explosions, or just confused. Army rifles cracked, dropping some before the Riot Squad cut the rest down. None had the time to raise their weapons. The first rank came off the inside steps to finish the wounded, splitting into two squads. A few of the stragglers stooped briefly to collect pistols from dead gangsters.
Doll and her Gunslingers swept up and over the next set of steps ahead of Mercedes with the newer recruits, mostly ex-Hot Rods, followed by bandaged figures carrying a pistol or a bomb. Emmy stormed over the last set of steps with the remaining Gnomes, Elves and Boyfriends. A hundred and thirty-two men and women flooded into Orchard Close, quickly splitting into six kill squads. Only six, because there weren’t enough fully fit fighters to lead more attacks. Five fit, experienced fighters fronted between fourteen and eighteen half-trained amateurs, non-combatant loaders and throwers, and wounded fighters who could still hobble and shoot. The Riot Squad struck for their first six targets.
* * *
The soldiers up on the bypass had a perfect view as the light began to strengthen, and the ranks of silent fighters with helmets, shields and sharp steel burst into action. As the bugle rang out, again and again, the first few attackers broke into a dead run. A few of the rest dropped as firing began from some houses, but the pistols in the squads concentrated on any resistance. Those too badly injured to move off the wall provided covering fire, blazing away as fast as they could change clips.
The three wide stretches of brick steps up onto the perimeter wall, steps that had been built four days ago, at night, had been puzzling Sarge ever since. The chip girls hadn’t seemed to know either, just that it was an instruction from Harold to help the evacuation so possibly he hadn’t told them. The steps meant Soldier Boy had been planning this for days, planning to suck the attack in and call down artillery on them. Planning for his main force to have a clear route, up and over the perimeter and into the heart of Orchard Close. “Cease fire.” There were a few comments about shooting more bastards, but Sarge daren’t risk it. “Cease fire before you hit the women. They’re in among them now.”
One of the men with the scopes glanced back, but Sarge pointed towards the fighting. “Not you five. Keep shooting any gangster with a firearm, loosely speaking. Just be careful because there are men in among the friendlies.” Not many, but some of the bareheaded civvies and a few of the helmeted figures were definitely blokes.
The duty corporal interrupted. “Cavalry’s here, Sarge.”
Sergeant Stokes looked along the bypass at the three armoured cars, two Land Rovers and three lorries racing towards him. Perfect timing, just when they were no bloody use anymore, bloody typical these days. “All right Corporal. Keep an eye on that lot down there. Don’t let any of them run off with the Army rifles, or any firearm.”
“Run, Sarge? Who?”
Sergeant Stokes looked down at Orchard Close, at the six squads working from house to house. There weren’t many fit fighters but they were supported by plenty of friends with pistols, shooters with plenty of ammo. A ripple of explosions proved they’d got some sort of grenade as well. “Those bloody animals, when those women keep coming.” He turned to the corporal, raising his voice. “Corp, if any gangster makes a break for it, tell our lads to shoot at them once they’re well out into the fields. Hell, one of you might even hit them, especially if the idiot comes out of the gate.” Sarge braced as the first Land Rover screeched to a halt, waiting for the abuse coming out of the lead vehicle and bearing down on him.
* * *
“Sergeant, why didn’t you report this sooner? Is it because…?” The captain stopped dead, staring down at the battle below. “What the hell is going on?”
“I called at nine-eleven, nine-twenty, and nine-thirty, reporting a heavy build-up of hostiles, sir. The officer refused, er, told me that I was to ignore what happened inside the city. I reported the rockets at ten-forty-two, then called in every ten minutes until eleven-oh-seven, when twelve reinforcements arrived. They were just in time for me to call in artillery because there are at least two automatics down there. I called off the barrage after fifteen minutes, but asked the officer to throw the occasional shell, to pin the automatics in place. I stopped those at oh-five-thirty-four, sir.” Sarge was a veteran so he didn’t close his eyes or flinch as the captain wheeled back towards him, but the officer looked puzzled rather than angry.