The Fall of Night

by Christopher Nuttall

  Aliyev looked hopeful. “Ostend?”

  Shalenko smiled. Had the news spread that rapidly? “No,” he said. “Ostend may have to be handled by the air force alone, although we will be looking for places where we can insert paratroopers if we can; the British have had two days to dig in and the Royal Marines are experts in such combat. It’s not a pleasant thought – that’s what Hitler did wrong as well – but there may be no choice unless the units probing into the Netherlands can reach Ostend in time to slam the door firmly shut.”

  He rolled his eyes. “And there are other problems as well,” he admitted. It was important that Aliyev understood what was at stake. “Wear and tear on the equipment as well, for one. If we can smash the French force in the north, we’ve won in France; the FSB can finish the task of securing France. It’s butcher’s work; the bastards will enjoy it. Once we can take a breath, we can prepare for the next part of the operation - Operation Morskoi Lev.”

  Aliyev lifted an eyebrow. “Sir?”

  “You’ll be briefed later,” Shalenko assured him. The sound of jets rapidly rose and fell in the distance as they raced west, or perhaps east; the Russian Air Force was slowly expanding its control over all of Germany and had even skirmished with the remains of the RAF. “Just believe me when I tell you this; it will be the greatest mission of your career.”

  He watched as Aliyev saluted him and departed. Aliyev had had a nasty fight in Poland; a Polish infantry unit had managed to respond to the capture of the airport and had attacked brutally, almost forcing the Russians out of the airport to certain death. The paratroopers had been banged up by the time Russian aircraft had arrived in time to save them from defeat; hundreds of their civilian prisoners had been killed in the exchange of fire.

  The reports Shalenko had read had made grim reading. Aliyev had taken the failure to protect the civilians personally; he had intended to keep his word to the civilians and had failed. A small boy, whose enthusiasm about aircraft had been a joy to his harassed father, had lost his life to one of the bursts of fire. No one knew who had killed him, even though Russian propaganda would claim that it had been the fault of the Poles. He hadn’t deserved that…

  Shalenko could only hope that Steiner would behave himself. The FSB security units were a law unto themselves under any other commanding officer; only his close friendship with the President gave him additional authority over them. If the Germans started to act up, the FSB would give them hell; FSB General Vasiliy Alekseyevich Rybak had made that clear. Bastard.

  “General, the air force is sending more jets into the Belgium area,” Anna said, coming up behind him. Her face was concerned; she knew, as well as he did, that the process of conquest was still hanging in the balance. If the French managed to stop them…then…then Shalenko would have to bring up additional firepower and keep digging at them until they were broken. He had enough firepower to reduce a city to rubble; he could afford to take the time to ensure that it was all ready to be deployed against the targets. “They’re confident that they’ll close the sea-lanes.”

  “Hah,” Shalenko commented. “Contact the Navy; I want them to recall Admiral Daniel Sulkin and his aircraft from Algeria, so they can start hacking away at the British ships. If I can’t get at the bastards on the land, I want to close their only line of escape.”

  “Yes, sir,” Anna said. She paused. “The President would like you to know that Austria and Slovakia have both prepared themselves to accept our terms, Austria with a little more reluctance, but with the chaos in Italy spreading out of control, they’re likely to accept our security guarantee and the price that goes with it. Occupation forces had reported that we have secured most of the targets in Germany; once we have a breathing space, we can start bringing them all back online.”

  “I’m not worried about that at the moment, Anna,” Shalenko said. He stared up into the sky, seeing the trails of Russian aircraft high overhead. “I’m worried about the logistics of the war effort. Our supply lines are still pretty weak, even if we have press-ganged Germans and Poles into driving lorries for us, with the promise of payment afterwards.”

  And their hands handcuffed to the wheels, just in case they have any clever ideas, he added silently. The FSB was full of nasty tricks like that. “If we lose our supply lines, we will be in serious trouble.”

  “The FSB is confident that it can keep the supply lines open,” Anna said. She was trying to cheer him up; he appreciated it even as he found it cloying. “It won’t be much longer before we can advance into France and finish the war.”

  “That won’t be the end,” Shalenko said tartly. He allowed his voice to darken as he gazed in the direction of Hanover. There were thousands of Germans in the city and not all of them would be reconciled to the new world order for a very long time to come. “It will merely be the end of one campaign. The occupation and integration will come next and that is going to be very difficult indeed.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight: Dunkirk, Round Two

  We were all flying around up and down the coast near Dunkirk looking for enemy aircraft which seemed also to be milling around with no particular cohesion.

  Douglas Bader

  Ostend, Belgium

  “Sir, look out!”

  Captain Stuart Robinson didn’t hesitate. He took one look into the air, saw the shape closing in on them, and threw himself out of the truck, rolling as he hit the ground hard enough to hurt badly. The deafening noise as the Russian aircraft opened fire stunned him; he covered his ears and fought to keep low as the lorries exploded and the Russian aircraft banked away, mercifully not bothering to attempt to strafe the British soldiers on the ground.

  “Fuck,” Robinson hissed, as he checked himself out. Nothing was broken, thankfully, but his body ached. He hadn’t felt so bad since his first day at the training camp. “Anyone hurt?”

  Sergeant Ronald Inglehart was looking down at one of the soldiers. “He’s dead, sir,” he said, as he checked the body and removed the tags from the soldier’s body. Robinson took one look at the body and knew there was no point in hunting for a pulse; the man’s chest had been literally punched through by a bullet. “Chris came all this way with us and…”

  Robinson forced down his own feelings. They had been lucky, driving mainly at night to avoid Russian aircraft, but they’d had to move faster to pick up their ride home and the Russians had caught them. It was a bloody miracle that they hadn’t lost more men; the handful of tiny injuries and two broken bones looked a small price to pay for getting home…if they managed to make it home without losing any more men. The once-proud EUROFOR had been reduced to hundreds of bands of stragglers, trying to make their way back home; he wondered what had happened to Generalmajor Günter Mühlenkampf and the remains of his force. Had they made the Russians pay for their attack on Europe?

  “We have to start walking,” he said. They had passed several bunches of refugees, people fleeing into the countryside and trying to escape, others heading towards the coast in hopes that the Royal Marines would pick them up as well as the British and European soldiers. “We can’t stay here.”

  “Sir,” one of the soldiers protested, “can’t we bury him?”

  Robinson knew what cold logic dictated they should do. The body should be abandoned. But he couldn't bring himself to do that, not now and not ever.

  “Quickly,” he said, hunting for a spot where the body could be buried quickly. Inglehart and Mathews organised a digging party; seven soldiers worked rapidly to bury their fallen comrade, before they started the long march to the west again. “I don’t think that we have much time.”

  “No,” Mathews muttered, as they started walking. “Have you been listening to the aircraft?”

  Robinson thought about it. “I think I understand,” he said finally. “There are air battles going on as well, aren’t there?”

  Mathews nodded. “Back in 1940, the Germans threw a lot of air power at Dunkirk, but failed to close the door on the escaping forces,” he said
. “The Russians will be coming after us with everything they can bring to bear on us, and you know that the handful of Germans we passed won’t be able to slow them down for long. They have weapons the Germans could only dream about, as well; all they have to do is sink a few larger ships and…we’re fucked.”

  A nightmarish hour passed as they walked onwards. The temperature was rising quickly, becoming almost tropical; the noise of unseen battles in the sky echoing around them, the occasional sight of an aircraft flying east or west forcing them to duck for cover. Robinson hoped, from the noise, that the RAF was beating the shit out of the Russians, but he knew something about the balance of power in the air. The RAF was likely to be doing the best they could, but the Russians would have more aircraft and more resources. It would be a nasty confrontation…

  “Halt,” a voice bellowed, in English. The accent was pure cockney. “Identify yourselves!”

  “Captain Stuart Robinson,” Robinson called back. “Identify yourself.”

  “Captain Roberto Grey, Royal Marines, 3 Commando,” the voice called back. “Remain where you are; we must check your identity before we can proceed.”

  “Oh, joy,” Sergeant Ronald Inglehart muttered. “It’s the Royal Latrines.”

  “They’re the best we have at the moment,” Robinson reminded him dryly. The Royal Marines came out of hiding and revealed themselves; there was no mistaking their uniforms or their attitude. If they were Russians, they were doing a very good job of pretending to be British soldiers; they carried themselves with a mixture of competence and confidence. His mouth fell into a smile. He recognised one. “Bob!”

  Sergeant Bob Patterson stared at him, and grinned. “Captain Robinson, as I live and breathe,” he shouted. The tension drained away; Robinson had felt his men preparing for a desperate last stand. It would have been typical of the unexpected war for his men to die in a brief battle with friendly forces. “We kicked your arse at Salisbury Plain!”

  “And we kicked yours in the Highlands,” Robinson shouted back, remembering a mock war game that had ended up with everyone falling into a bog. A lot of friendships had been forged that day. “How do we get home?”

  “We check your biometrics first, and then we send you back,” Grey said firmly. He was a dour-faced man; Robinson pressed his fingertips to the scanner he held and sighed in relief when it cleared his identity. He had had no doubt that the Marines would have opened fire if there had been a single mistake. “The British soldiers can pass, but the non-British have to go unarmed.”

  Robinson opened his mouth to protest. “Sorry,” Grey said quickly, “but we have already had one case of an infiltrator – we think he was a Russian in Dutch clothing – and we dare not risk another. This operation is working on the margins as it is…”

  “I see,” Robinson said. “Jean, everyone…”

  The foreigners surrendered their weapons reluctantly; Robinson motioned to his men to take them. Grey saw and decided not to argue. “Now,” Robinson said, as an aircraft flew overhead. “What do we do now?”

  “Follow the road to the west, around the towns and city, and head to the coast,” Grey said. “One of the other Marines will show you where to go to board one of the ships; the Russian bastards managed to fuck up the port and so we have had to improvise. Once we get you back to England, you’ll be debriefed and given new orders.”

  Good thing we didn’t keep the CADS, Robinson thought, thinking about Hazel. She had to have been worried sick about him in Edinburgh; how much did the citizens know about the war? They started the long walk towards the west feeling much better than they had in weeks; one of the soldiers even began to sing a long and filthy song. Others called out equally obscene requests; Robinson didn’t bother to stop them as they encountered a second Marine patrol, which pointed them down onto a breach that had been torn apart by tanks and other heavy vehicles. He could see two more CADS positioned to provide air cover; as he watched, one of them launched a missile towards a low-flying aircraft that had appeared out of nowhere, sending it crashing into the city.

  Inglehart sounded stunned. “What about the civilians?”

  Robinson said nothing. The civilians had paid the price for their government’s failure. A handful of Marine medics gave basic medical treatment to his injured men; they had walked all the way to the beach without complaining, or needing to be carried…not that he would have abandoned them, of course. They were too important to be abandoned by their fellows.

  “The boat will carry you to the larger ship,” a harassed looking Marine Colonel said. Robinson hadn’t realised how few soldiers had made it out of Poland, let alone Germany; he couldn’t see more than a few hundred soldiers at most being prepared for the trip across the Channel. “Once you’re onboard, find somewhere to sit and keep out of the fucking way, understand?”

  Robinson nodded. “Yes, sir,” he said. They were almost home. “We won’t cause trouble.”

  ***

  “Charlie-one, you have four enemy fighters, closing in,” the controller reported. “Suggest that you engage.”

  “I would never have thought of that,” Flying Officer Cindy Jackson sneered, as she pulled the Eurofighter Tempest into an attack vector. Four other Typhoons followed her; the remnants of the RAF seemed to consider her a pretty good flying officer, even if they didn’t share her high opinion of herself. The Russian fighters were approaching at high speed, forcing her to turn to engage them; if they had a chance to commit themselves to a bombing run, they could wreak havoc. “Charlie flight, take your targets and dance!”

  She fired a single ASRAAM, all-too-aware that the RAF was running short of advanced weapons, at the lead Russian aircraft. The Russian tried to evade, failed, and was blown out of the air by the missile; two more fell before the final aircraft could launch its own missiles towards one of the Typhoons. They were still having problems tracking the Tempest; their Mainstay aircraft were holding well back, terrified of the CADS on the ground and the SAS officers that had scattered through the countryside, armed with Stingers and other SAM missiles. Other Russian aircraft appeared, launched their missiles from long range, and then retreated, forcing her to hold back her fliers to prevent them from giving chase. The Russians not only had a massive SAM belt established to protect their own forces, but they had also far more aircraft and missiles; every time she fired a missile, she dug into a rapidly-dwindling stockpile. Worst of all, the Russians had pulled a surprise out of their bag; their countermeasures against BVRAAM missiles had been improved to the point where guaranteeing a kill was much harder.

  “Several more Russian bombers approaching on attack vector,” the controller injected, interrupting her private thoughts. She cursed as one of her pilots was blown out of the sky by the final Russian aircraft before it fled the battlezone; the Russians didn’t have to stay and fight. The RAF was badly overstretched; the Russians could keep dancing in, forcing her to burn vital fuel and missiles to react, and then duck back under their SAM belt. Heavy Russian bombers had been trying to raid the Royal Marine positions on the ground; only the Dutch damage to their own dikes had prevented heavy Russian armoured units from reaching Ostend. “Engagement vectors…”

  “I know,” Cindy snapped. She yanked the Tempest around and raced for the bombers, hoping that they wouldn’t sense her presence until it was too late; there was so much radar energy boiling around that she had no idea just how well the Tempest’s stealth systems were holding up under the pressure. They might see her coming, or they might not react in time to prevent her; the ageing Bears wouldn’t have the best equipment if the Russians were using them to draw out British fire. “Closing in…”

  The lead Bear launched a spread of missiles; some targeted on the Royal Navy ships and transports, some targeted on the beach defences. Cindy cursed and activated her cannon; the Russians wanted her to spend her missiles on the Bears, but she had only one missile left and she didn’t dare waste it. The Bears seemed unaware of her presence, then she saw the tail-gunne
r swinging up to target her; she cursed again and fired a long burst into the rear of the Russian aircraft, sending it crashing down towards the sea. The others were scattering now, their deadly cargo launched; she took down two more before twisting away and allowing the others to escape. She was down to only a few rounds left and she would need them later. Other Russian fighters were closing in on her position. If they hadn’t know where she was before, they certainly knew now…

  She hit the afterburners and the Tempest flashed away from the Russian aircraft. They didn’t bother to give pursuit; they were watching as the Russian missiles lashed down on the ships, some of the warships successfully covering themselves with their CIWS, others being hit and sunk; Cindy had heard that the Russian submarines had been chased everywhere around Britain, perhaps in preparation for another coordinated missile strike. The Royal Navy had deployed almost all of its remaining ASW units to the evacuation effort; the Russians seemed to have picked up on the hint and kept their own submarines away.

  The sky lit up as a massive liner, pressed into service, exploded. Cindy had wondered if she would ever have the chance to sail on the MS Queen Victoria; she would never have the chance now as the explosion tore the ship apart, along with the people who had been packed onto her decks. The slaughter would be awesome, she knew; the Royal Marines would have lost dozens of their people on the lost ship. The Russians had something else to answer for…