‘Well, why didn’t the Loyalists just destroy them?’
The sergeant major held up a hand, silencing him with a furious glare. ‘He doesn’t fucking know. I don’t fucking know! We can sit here all day discussing what’s going on, Corporal Abdi, or we can do our jobs, get back out there, and observe. We’re the eyes and ears of brigade, not their mobile think-tank!’ He jutted an arm out at Mr Barkley angrily. ‘Boss, let’s get on with it.’
Mr Barkley appeared taken aback by the sergeant major’s outburst, but quickly recovered and moved on, explaining, ‘The Guard are now establishing their defensive position upon Hill Kilo, whilst the FEA are occupying the warrens and the village itself. An additional Guard company has now moved down into the village in an apparent attempt to control the population - although I should stress that we haven’t as yet seen any Dakar-style massacres. They appear to be a little disturbed by the appearance - and prompt disappearance - of a large number of well-armed civilians who effectively won the battle for the village before the FEA even arrived. Did you notice their equipment?’ He looked at me.
I nodded. ‘It was Union kit. Fresh off the kit shelf.’
‘That’s correct. I’d suggest that the equipment those civilians were using was the same equipment we supplied to the FEA to assist them in the war effort. Frankly, I don’t know who they are - perhaps some form of local resistance movement. EJOC haven’t informed me of any other sizable forces operating in this area, certainly not an organisation who wear civilian clothing for uniform, but they appear to be on our side, or at least the side of the FEA. I’m not concerned about them at present, but just be aware that they are out there somewhere.
‘Our mission now is to observe and assist the Guard and the FEA where possible, as well as gather information on Cellini and the surrounding area. In order to achieve this, we will split the platoon back into two multiples and occupy positions on the hill and within the village. We will then send out regular patrols in order to gain as much information as we can on the surrounding area. The two sections in the village will provide the patrols - one section resting in one of the buildings, whilst the other goes out. They will alternate between patrolling the village as well as the forest. I want to gain as much information as I can about Cellini and its inhabitants.
‘The two sections on the hill will maintain a permanent overwatch, taking advantage of the elevation, as well as providing a section on permanent standby which can crash out if the patrolling section comes under attack.’
The platoon commander went on to allocate sections to tasks and describe the plan in greater detail. Essentially we were breaking into two multiples - as we often did when the area we were tasked to cover was too great. The sergeant major would take Three and Four Section and hold the village, establishing a secure location somewhere to the north, whilst keeping close to one of the warren entrances. They would then spend the rest of the day and night patrolling, gathering information on the population within the village, and sweeping through the forest to the north in search of marauding Militia. Meanwhile, Abs and I would be under the control of Mr Barkley, trying to keep as warm and dry as we could on the bleak plateau of Hill Kilo. There we would remain until the following morning, at which time we would swap around with the other two sections so that each task was given a fresh set of eyes. It was a pretty bleak end to our otherwise hectic operation, and I wasn’t sure which task was worse - patrolling through the night or struggling to keep warm on the hill.
Mr Barkley then handed over to the sergeant major, who ranted over the meagre resupply he had finally received. The Guard had given us all of the food, water and supplies we had asked for, including a crate of small one-man atmospheric tents to make our stay a little less unpleasant, but none of our requested grenades or missiles had turned up. Supposedly they had been offloaded along with the rest of the Guard’s final resupply, but had then simply “disappeared”. This wasn’t necessarily a serious problem, but it meant that in the unlikely event of another counterattack we would be forced to be more conservative with our smart missiles and guided grenades. I could see now why the sergeant major was more irritable than usual - ammunition resupply was his responsibility and it was being hampered by the Guard, just like everything else.
There had to be something going on behind the scenes, I decided. There had been far too many mistakes, mishaps and “disappearances” for it all to be coincidence. The Guard battalion and its commanding officer clearly wanted the operation to succeed, otherwise they wouldn’t have carried it out in the first place, but somebody was trying to stop them, somebody within their headquarters. And if somebody really was trying to ruin the operation, they appeared to know that reducing the capability of our platoon was key to achieving that aim. Either that or they simply didn’t like us …
Something didn’t add up. There were so many questions spinning through my mind. Why did the Loyalists hide their missiles rather than destroy them? Surely they knew that they would be found eventually? How did anybody - the Guard or us - know the missiles were there in the first place, and who were the strange band of heavily-armed civilians that had saved the day for the FEA?
I studied both the platoon commander and sergeant major carefully whilst they finished their brief. The hard, lined expressions on their faces weren’t merely the result of fatigue, there was a hint of wariness, as if they were trying not to give away too much. They were keeping something from us - but what?
I led my section back to the top of Hill Kilo, marching up the steep eastern rock face until we reached the plateau and dropped back into the trench system that we had helped to clear only hours ago.
The Guard battalion had clearly been busy setting up their position atop the hill. All around me I could see Guardsmen digging, and the tops of atmospheric tents being erected amongst the ruined bunkers, spiked with communication antennas. Stacks of ammunition and equipment were dotted across the trench system, presumably offloaded by the dropships before they departed, and Guardsmen scurried around the piles of supplies, ferrying it down into the warrens below like ants collecting food for their nest.
They certainly appear to be in it for the long haul, I reassured myself, as I watched the supplies being carried away. If somebody wanted the mission to fail, then he clearly wasn’t with the majority. I could see enough supplies to keep the hill secure for days.
Mr Barkley had sited us to the north of the hill, close to the same ruined trenches where we had repelled the Militia and their LSV’s. The Guard had set up a defensive line there, overlooking the forest to the north, and the platoon commander wanted us to take up a position that shared the same vantage point, but wasn’t too close for comfort.
We stayed out of the trenches as we searched for a suitable position, avoiding the tens of Guardsmen who moved slowly through the muddy water, carrying out the sorry task of removing the bodies of their comrades. I found it strange to look down into the trenches, somehow detached from the suffering I saw below. None of the Guardsmen looked up at us as we passed them; they were too absorbed by the horrible task of dragging their friends away. For a moment I remembered doing the same for my old friend Climo back on New Earth, and my gut wrenched. I shook off the thought.
Eventually I found a section of trench that hadn’t been occupied by the Guard. The nearest position was that of an automated gun, perched within a crater twenty metres away - I figured it would be handy to be near one of them, since they would automatically shoot down any Loyalist smart missile that came near it.
The trench ran parallel to the hill’s edge, right where the ground sloped away. It offered a perfect view toward the north. I saw that a thin strip of farmland separated the foot of the hill with the forest beyond - which meant that any would-be attacker would need to cross the open ground, hammered by our weapons, before he even began his climb to the top. Attacking the hill was suicide, I concluded, not without support from either artillery or aircraft. Unlike us, the Militia had neither.
&nbs
p; ‘This’ll do nicely,’ I decided, indicating an area where the trench was relatively dry.
I wasted no time, jumping down into the trench and waving for the rest of the section to follow me in. I knew that the longer we spent out in the open the greater the risk of being shot by a sniper, and the greater the risk of us having our dry section of trench stolen by the Guard.
We wandered up and down the trench, testing the ground beneath our feet; the soil was moist, but pretty solid.
‘Better than nothing, I guess,’ Griffiths remarked gloomily.
Skelton flicked his head toward the east. ‘I’d rather be up here than down in that village, mate. There’s some fucked up shit going on down there …’
‘Fair one.’
‘The good news is that we’re on standby patrol,’ I reminded them, ‘so at least you’ll get some sleep.’
The two troopers nodded. A “standby patrol” was essentially a quick reaction force to the Recce patrols being mounted by the two sections staying in the village; they didn’t go anywhere, not unless something happened. It was the easiest task - presuming nobody was attacked - and it provided an excellent opportunity for my troopers to rest before we eventually swapped tasks the following morning.
I allowed my section to busy themselves setting up their new atmospheric tents, creating somewhere where they could administrate themselves without having to wear their respirators. The tents were wide enough to make movement along the trench difficult, though not impossible, and I managed to squeeze through to Puppy.
‘Who are these people, then?’ Puppy wondered aloud as I approached, gesturing down toward the forest.
We both zoomed our visors to study a pack of civilians emerging from the forest. There must have been fifty, perhaps more of them, all dressed in an assortment of colours and carrying various bits of luggage.
‘Civilians,’ Puppy observed. ‘They must have been hiding out in the forest somewhere.’
As we watched, a platoon of Guardsmen ran out from the village to greet them. Though I couldn’t hear what was being said, it looked as though the two parties were happy to meet each other, smiling and embracing each other warmly.
I found it strange that the civilians had returned to the captured village, despite the presence of the Guard. The last time I had seen a population centre captured by the Guard, civilians had fled in terror.
‘I guess word gets around pretty quick out here,’ Puppy said.
‘Yeah, it does,’ I agreed. Changing the subject, I pointed toward a cluster of blue crosshairs a hundred metres to our right. ‘Corporal Abdi’s section are on overwatch just off to the east. We’ll still need to provide our own sentry, though.’
Puppy raised an eyebrow. ‘To protect us from the Militia - or the Guard?’
‘Both.’
The 2ic opened his mouth to ask something, and then his eyes flicked to the rest of the section and he thought better of it. He knew that now was not the right time to be asking questions; we had a position to set up.
I went to post our first sentry, whilst Puppy put together a sentry rotation and made sure that everybody was correctly administrated before they went to sleep.
It made sense for the sentry to work along the section line to save confusion over who to wake up next. Being first in the section order of march, Myers and Skelton started off on sentry, and I found them a part of the trench where the wall had collapsed slightly, creating a slope upon which two men could lie down comfortably whilst observing toward the north.
I crawled into the sentry position first, and used my outstretched hand to mark the furthest extremities of my field of view with a pair of blue crosshairs. It was important that I inspected any sentry position myself whenever possible, since only then would I know exactly what my sentries would be able to see. With only my head visible above ground level, I could still see the strip of farmland below and the vast expanse of forest stretching away to the north, rolling away like waves in a dark green sea. Somewhere out there was the border with Europa … and the retreating Loyalist army. I wondered whether our seizure of the hill had altered their withdrawal in any way.
I sent the arcs of my sentry position through to Mr Barkley, who was establishing himself close to the Guard HQ at the centre of the hill. The platoon commander could then see the areas covered by both my section and Two Section, and adjust our arcs if he wasn’t happy. I doubted that would happen, though - our viewpoint was perfect.
Once I was finished, I slipped back down into the trench and gestured for Myers and Skelton to take my place. The troopers obeyed, wriggling their bodies against the mud of the slope in order to get comfortable. They kept their heads low, instead placing out an assortment of sensors so that they could see down to the farmland below without exposing themselves to potential snipers. Myers connected the sensors to his datapad by optical cable, and then he withdrew his scanner from his daysack and laid the device beside him. It would now stay in place, along with the sensors, to be used by the rest of the section as they rotated through sentry.
‘Can you see both crosshairs?’ I asked them, once they had finished.
Myers tapped his datapad, accessing the sensors, and nodded. ‘Yeah. I can see everything apart from the slope itself.’
‘That’s good,’ I replied. ‘We’re only here to observe. If the Loyalists come up the hill again then we’re not gonna stay here.’
He nodded, almost sulkily. ‘OK.’
‘Puppy will be over in a minute to start building up the position,’ I carried on. ‘We’ll get a thermal sheet over you so you’re out of the rain. Just make sure that you stay alert and don’t just focus on the arcs in front of you - one of you should keep an eye out for people sneaking around behind us. Remember the threat from within. I don’t trust the Guard any more than you do, believe me.’
‘We’re good,’ Skelton said sarcastically. ‘If anyone cuts our throats, we’ll scream.’
I smiled at his dark humour. ‘Hopefully it won’t come to that …’
Myers caught my eye just as I turned to leave. ‘Sorry about earlier, Andy.’
I nodded, accepting the apology. ‘Don’t worry about it. I was probably too quick to snap, but I get worked up in the heat of battle … you know?’
Skelton smiled knowingly. ‘Yeah, we know you go a bit funny when you get mad! If you feel like knocking off a few more of these Guard scumbags, then just let us know. I’m in.’
‘I just hate these fucking bastards,’ Myers said, shaking his head in frustration.
I sighed. ‘I know. We all do. Just remember we’re a team. Look after each other, and I swear I’ll do everything I can to get us through this.’
I left the two troopers to their duty, and wandered around the trench to familiarise myself with our surroundings. Thankfully the sergeant major had made Three and Four Section map the entire trench system whilst we had been in the village, so I didn’t need to go in search of an extraction route. We wouldn’t need one anyway, since the chances of the Loyalist Militia attempting to recapture the hill were slim to none. They would be spread all over the forest by now, split into small groups tasked with delaying any further advance toward the border with Europa whilst the last remnants of their army made their escape.
The remainder of the section had been tasked by Puppy to help assemble the sentry position, and as I walked away they began to stretch a thermal sheet over Myers and Skelton’s heads. Sentry positions always took priority over everything else, and so the section worked quickly to ensure it was correctly camouflaged as well as protected from the elements. After all, they would all end up on sentry themselves at some point.
Whilst they worked, I found a spot further along the trench where the ground looked solid enough to accommodate my atmospheric tent. I couldn’t start setting myself up until I knew all work was finished, so instead I busied myself checking that our net was deactivated and that all of my own equipment was powered down. We were reverting back to silent mode, since there
was no longer a need for net traffic. Corporal Abdi’s section were no longer live either, but they had marked their location with a single blue crosshair before they did so, so that I could still find them when it turned dark.
I gave a tired sigh as I checked the time on my visor clock. It was well past midday. We had been fighting for much of the morning, and then exploring the village for several hours after that. Soon it would be dark, and the first recce patrol would be launched from the village, joining the numerous Guard and FEA patrols that were screening the forest to the north. I found myself looking forward to the first sleep I would have had in ages. I was as tired as my men - I just wasn’t allowed to express it.
‘We’ll be set in a minute,’ Puppy said, having arrived at my side.
I looked over his shoulder to survey the sentry position. It was almost complete, with troopers ripping up grass and chunks of mud to finish camouflaging the sheet that had been tightly pegged down to form a roof across the trench. Myers and Skelton looked relatively cosy underneath it, huddled close together like animals striving for warmth; in the cold, wet weather of Eden, personal space was no longer important.
‘The lads need to get their heads down as soon as they’re done assembling that sentry position,’ I said.
Puppy chuckled knowingly. ‘I doubt they’ll have any arguments with you there, mate! I’ll make sure they get out of their wet kit.’
I nodded. Despite the respite from the rain, our kit was still damp. The evaporating water would slowly suck the heat out of our bodies, threatening us with hypothermia.
Puppy checked over his shoulder and lowered his voice to a whisper. ‘What’s going on, mate?’
I shrugged. ‘How should I know?’
‘Come on, mate,’ he said, unconvinced. ‘Something’s going on.’
I looked at my 2ic, and sighed. We were both the same rank, separated only by a course that he would undoubtedly be sent to once our tour of Eden was over. If I was privy to the politics hidden beneath the seizure of Hill Kilo, then why shouldn’t he be? Besides, Puppy was the only member of my section I could really talk to openly. If I hid secrets from him, then that mutual trust would be broken forever.
RECCE (The Union Series Book 4) Page 20