Knox's Irregulars

by J. Wesley Bush

  Recoiling, he stared down at her, not even trying to hide his shock. "What?"

  "Maybe you've convinced yourself it's true. But I'm not holding you together. Honestly, Randal, you won't let me hold you at all. I'm always at arm's length with you. As soon as I get a glimpse of what's behind your eyes, you slam shut on me again."

  His eyes dropped to the floor, staying here. There was nothing for him to say.

  "As for your faith, when was the last time you really prayed? I mean, you believe all the right things, but you aren't living it. You don't trust in God, or rely on grace - I think they're just words to you. It's all just Randal against the world as stoic and hard as he needs to be." She paused for breath, and then spoke again, emotion making her voice rise in pitch. "Were you relying on God when you were about to murder those scientists? It looked more like you were playing God. On a practical level, tell me how you're any different than my father?"

  Her words tumbled out, as if she were afraid of losing her nerve if she paused. "And you're not holding it together. I think you're about one crisis from cracking up."

  Eyes closed, Randal ground his teeth. She sounded like Van Loon. But contrary to what she thought, he'd let her in more than he had anyone else. She stung him in a way Van Loon never could.

  Her voice softened. "I'm not going anywhere. When you get your head on straight I'll be here waiting for you."

  For a long moment they looked at one another. There was so much he felt, so much he wanted to tell her, but there was a block, a disconnect between heart and mind. Everything that came to him sounded either trite or as if he were just trying to mollify her.

  In frustration he slammed the meat of his fist against the wall, storming out of the room.

  ***

  The three-kilometer trek to the surface was interminable. Interminable was a word that played often in Randal's mind those days, almost always in relation to the winter. There seemed to be no end to it — the slate gray skies, the bitter cold which reached even into the belly of the world where they hid.

  The exhilaration following their twin victories at the factory and university had long since worn off. In its place had descended a bleakness. The movement had lost its innocence. There was no glory to be won any more, only bare survival to cling to. It was hard to get excited about the wounds they inflicted on the Abkhenazi when they only rebounded on defenseless civilians in grisly transference. Pieter's scouts reported mass graves outside the city. Each looked large enough for hundreds upon hundreds of victims.

  Trudging toward the surface, Randal did his best to ignore the rumbling in his stomach. Hunger was now a constant companion for all of them. The ancient Greeks had believed hunger taught many lessons, but he wasn't sure what he'd learned so far, other than that he hated it. It was even worse for the civilians — out of necessity the Irregulars kept more of the scarce food they captured than they passed on to others. Some of the elderly and weak were already succumbing to malnutrition.

  Always the handmaiden of famine, disease was everywhere. Immune systems weakened by starvation fell prey to illnesses long thought to be eradicated in New Geneva. Ariane's people were surreptitiously making the rounds, but if the situation didn't improve soon the outbreaks would become pandemic. Ethnic cleansing would be unnecessary for the Abkhenazi — the Horsemen of pestilence and famine would do the work for them.

  The military situation looked just as dark. In the aftermath of the factory raid the enemy had doubled the number of troops stationed in Providence. Granted, they were pulled from the front lines which helped the war effort, but Randal found that was minimal comfort when they were shooting at him.

  Worse, as Onegin had warned, the Fist of the Mogdukh had arrived. The Abkhenazi special forces were everything rumor and trideo made them out to be.

  For the first time in the war the enemy was using Randal's own tactics against him. Each night he still sent teams topside to hunt and demoralize the enemy. Each night, the Fist hunted them in turn. Their commander, Colonel Tsepashin, seemed to have an intuitive knack for locating his teams. The bodies were always left to be found, every one bearing the Fist's calling card — a black flyer emblazoned with a grinning silver death's head. Not content to play cat and mouse, Tsepashin was also hunting down the guerrillas in their dens. An entire cell of Irregulars had been wiped out on the east side of Providence. With no new recruits available in the city, each death brought the Irregular's a step closer to extinction.

  Losses to the Fist's depredations were high, but they weren't worst of it. What was truly harmful was the toll it took on morale. The Irregulars no longer owned the night. Every raid was a run through a gauntlet that might have near-invulnerable armored monsters waiting at the end.

  Twice Randal set ambushes for them, dangling his men like live bait. Both times Tsepashin sniffed out the trap, pulling his men before it could be sprung, once even managing to snatch the bait while doing it. Three more deaths for Randal's conscience.

  The only bright spot was the sporadic news which filtered in from the south. It was said that Abkhenazi morale was awful and desertions were a growing problem. Word had it that the battle lines were stalemated, the crawling advance finally ground to a halt.

  He wanted to believe it. It might all be true. Or it might be a way for New Genevan Psy Ops to buck up partisan morale. Who could tell?

  Either way, events in the south wouldn't bring him one more bullet for the guns or one more mouthful of food for his hungry troops. Duty kept his field of vision shrunken to the here and now. The war down south might as well have been on one of the moons.

  Complicating things, the Abkhenazi were now flying in transports. Despite constant harassment by the Irregulars, they'd succeeded in hacking out an airfield outside Providence and cobbling together the needed ground controls. Fortunately, the low-altitude transports they used were obsolete and there weren't many in their arsenal. Things could be worse.

  However, now they seemed poised to turn worse. The wife of one of Randal's men worked in a processing center for the occupation forces. Early that morning the woman had smuggled word to the Irregulars — one of the recent flights from Abkhenazia had brought tower components for a suborbital pad.

  If true, it had the potential to break the stalemate at the Front. With ready supplies the Abkhenazi could launch an early offensive. In spite of heavy losses, their numerical advantage was still crushing.

  The suborbitals would be harder to destroy this time. If they were bringing them in, the problem of the reactor cut-outs was obviously solved. Also, new defensive counter-measures were appearing on even the low-altitude transports: multi-directional pulsing lasers to blind incoming missiles; shrapnel packs to destroy them in-close; and canisters which sprayed a cloud of dense chemical mist to block laser-guidance systems. Randal expected to see all of these on the suborbitals.

  Their spy knew only that the tower components were stored in a warehouse on the outskirts of the Abbey District, the cultural center of Providence. Luckily there was little commercial zoning in that area and Pieter believed his scouts had the structure pinpointed.

  The group reached the main sewer lines about a half kilometer from their target. As they passed through the Abbey District, Randal caught occasional glimpses through the sewer drains — here the Handel Conservatory, there the Terrarium. Abruptly, the man in front of him halted and Randal pulled up short. He had to be careful. Two-point-three meters of armored suit could crush a man's foot without trying.

  They were going in heavy for the raid, with Pyatt, Ariane, Nabil and himself all in their LANCER armor. In addition, a squad of Irregulars was included in the op. One of these had enough technical knowledge to differentiate suborbital controls from an automated salad maker, which was more than Randal could do. There wouldn't be any second chances; they needed to destroy the components on the first pass. Once installed, they'd be shielded in a ferrocrete bunker and then even Lebedev's railgun would not be able to touch them.

 
; Nabil was point man for the op. He climbed the metal rungs to the surface, disappearing for several minutes and then sending an all-clear. "Come up. Something around here is interfering with my sensor suite, but that happens a lot in the city. Visual checks clear."

  The team formed up in sight of the warehouse, skulking in an alleyway. The building itself was settled on a wide concrete pad cluttered with crates and palletizing equipment which would shield their advance. In front of the building sat two dormant loader 'bots and a group of wheeled delivery transports.

  "Two guards out front, two at the back door," Nabil whispered as they circled around to listen. "Low security. They must be relying on secrecy."

  "Or else it's a trap," Pyatt said, voicing a concern everyone shared.

  Randal scowled. "That's a chance we have to take. There's no option – we have to proceed as if the threat is real. We can't let them reopen their supply lines."

  "Maybe we should take a moment to pray for guidance?"

  Randal turned his back on the suggestion. "You can pray if you want, Ariane. The rest of you get moving before we're spotted."

  Randal and the other armored troopers provided overwatch as the straight-leg Irregulars moved noiselessly toward the warehouse. Each carried a silenced autopistol.

  Ten pistols coughed bullets and the guards dropped to the ground.

  The armored troops moved in. Without the need for further orders everyone went to their pre-assigned places. Pyatt and a quartet of Irregulars shifted to cover the back, while Ariane and Nabil anchored the defense at the front.

  Randal and his technical adviser, Zimmerman, went to the large sliding doors. When planning for the raid they had enhanced the visuals from Pieter's scouts, so they knew what to expect. Holding the door in place was a biometric lock with a retinal scanner. Those stymied even Lebedev, so the plan called for non-technical means. Seizing the lock in an armored fist, Randal then wrenched it right and left, twisting it to scrap. No bells erupted, but undoubtedly silent alarms were being received somewhere. Speed was essential now.

  Randal pushed the doors apart and stepped inside, his LMG tracking for enemy troops. No one took a shot at him. Everywhere sat pallet after pallet of ration boxes. His heart sank a moment. Was the intel bad?

  "Over there. Those crates by themselves."

  He looked to where Zimmerman pointed. "Good eyes. Let's check them."

  Extending a climbing spike, he pried the lid from the first crate. Some larger ones say nearby. "I.D. this stuff quick so I can blast it. We have to move." Both peered into the crate as he pulled away the lid.

  At the bottom rested a single leaf of paper. It was utterly black. In its center, a silver death's head caught the light.

  "It's a trap!" Randal screamed into the comset, making for the exit. "Split to binary teams — Go E and E!"

  Escape and Evasion was their only hope. Whatever the ambush entailed, staying and fighting was suicidal.

  He half-turned. Zimmerman was still staring into the empty crate, stunned. Beyond him, Randal watched as three of the larger crates smoothly fell open. There was only a second to register the hunched forms that emerged, their matte-black carapaces giving them the look of predatory insects. He was temporarily frozen by the gray death's head emblazoned on each helmet.

  A rain of autocannon shells tore into Zimmerman. Engaging jets, Randal leaped behind a tall stack of rations, buying time.

  Pyatt's voice rang loud in his ears. "My God! The Fist! We're taking..." The message was lost to static. Jamming, Randal realized bleakly, searching about frantically for a way out.

  He switched to his active sensor suite, no longer worried about being detected. The motion sensor showed three wispy readings, all advancing cautiously. Randal gave thanks. Though only marginally, his sensors could overcome the electronic counter-measures of the Fist suits.

  Sidestepping, he hunched as incoming fire ripped open the rations above him. He had to act fast, divide and conquer. Soon they would be on him and together they would pull him down like wolves.

  CHAPTER 17

  All combat takes place. . .in a kind of twilight,

  which like a fog or moonlight, often tends to make things

  seem grotesque and larger than they really are.

  —Carl von Clausewitz

  Don't let it end like this. Tell them I said something.

  —last words of Pancho Villa

  Ariane watched Randal and Zimmerman disappear into the warehouse. She and the other half of her binary team moved over to a stationary loader 'bot. Her teammate was a man with the improbable name of Hiranyagarbha Calvin. Since coming to New Geneva, she had met many who had taken on the surname of one of the great men of the Reformation. His was certainly one of the more curious combinations she had encountered.

  Stretching out prone behind the 'bot's thick metal loading mandibles, she propped her flechette rifle in place. Nearby, Hiranyagarbha took cover behind one of its manipulator arms.

  Across the front lot sat three delivery vehicles. The other Irregulars squatted down behind them. As long as everything went smoothly, Randal should have the components destroyed in no time and they could slip safely away.

  A solitary pigeon landed on the loading 'bot and bobbed its way toward Ariane. She eyed it ravenously.

  "It's a trap! Go to binary teams, go E and E!" yelled a voice over her comset.

  Randal's words froze her heart. Worse was his tone. He sounded frantic. She'd never heard him like that before and whatever could panic him would certainly terrify her. Ariane looked to Hiranyagarbha. He looked at her. It dawned on her that neither of them knew what to do.

  That was when the shooting started.

  Cannon fire reverberated through the plastic walls of the warehouse. She had the impulse to run inside to Randal, but too much was happening at once. Firing erupted from Pyatt's side of the building. "My God, the Fist! We're taking..." The transmission cut off. Was Pyatt dead?

  Wait. The Fist.

  Ahead of her, shadows began to move, take shape, and solidify themselves into nightmares. As they crept from the dark places where they hid, Ariane could see them clearly with low-light enhancement. They looked like every fairy-tale monster she had ever been afraid of amalgamated together and put on two legs. They were hulking monsters with chitinous black bodies, oversized arms tipped with claws and an eerie, scuttling walk.

  With a whoosh, Hiranyagarbha's anti-armor launcher fired, the laser-guided missilette blasting one of the Fists. The remaining ones opened fire. Ariane yelped, stretching flat behind the loader 'bot. The multi-ton machine shook violently as depleted-uranium rounds riddled it.

  Pyatt and two Irregulars hustled around the corner, exchanging fire with pursuers out of her line of sight. Nabil was moving in her direction, zigzagging nimbly and firing on the advancing Fists.

  Fighting off the terror threatening to paralyze her, Ariane raised up and shot the flechette rifle almost blindly. It didn't seem likely she had hit anything. She dropped back down.

  The sound of tortured metal drew her attention to the rear — just in time to watch the lift gates of the three delivery vehicles being ripped open from within. The two nearby Irregulars barely registered the emerging Fists before they were cut down.

  Pyatt turned, letting off an extended burst from his shoulder-mounted autocannon. Two of the Fists dropped.

  Her brain freezing in denial, Ariane watched as Pyatt took a stutter-step, his fast-moving gait turning awkward. The armored suit rocked as a second shell punctured it and then a third.

  And then the suit froze, still resolutely upright.

  "No!" Ariane screamed, raising her rifle. She knew Pyatt was dead already, that the virtual gyroscope of the suit's travel-by-wire system was keeping it upright in spite of its lifeless occupant. The Abkhenazi blasted Pyatt's suit once more, knocking it to the ground.

  Ariane fired on full-auto. Sparks flashed from the Fist suit as the flechettes deflected uselessly from its tough hide. She n
early shot Nabil in surprise as he dashed into her field of vision.

  "Girl, let's go. I'll cover for you." True to his word, he took a knee, driving back Pyatt's murderer with well-placed bursts.

  The net was closing in on them. Ariane, Hiranyagarbha and Nabil sprinted toward the Abbey District. The others tried to evade to the south.

  As they tore down a narrow alleyway, Ariane was tormented with images of the black-suited demons pursuing them. The tall buildings looming to either side only reinforced the feeling of entrapment. She knew that Hiranyagarbha was slowing them down, unsuited as he was and lugging the rocket launcher. But she couldn't leave him to those things.

  "Keep running, don't look back," she heard Nabil say as he dropped behind. His tone brooked no protest. She half-obeyed, watching over a shoulder while continuing to run.

  Five or six Fists entered the far side of the alleyway. She watched in awe as Nabil charged them.

  ***

  The three blips on Randal's motion sensor split up, looking to box him in.

  Body checking the tall stack of rations in front of him, Randal sent the mass tumbling on a luckless Fist. Wasting no time in celebration, he dashed to meet the trooper flanking him on the left.

  Though imperfectly, his sensors were able to get a lock despite the ground clutter and electronic countermeasures. He fired the autocannon without a visual, trusting his equipment.

  It didn't let him down. Dehydrated rations were little impediment to his cannon shells as they flew true, punching into the Abkhenazi. An anguished scream came over the Fist's speakers and he went down.

  Facing about, Randal watched in surprise as bullet impacts traveled the wall of boxes behind him - seemingly in slow motion, they walked a line in his direction.

  The inertia of the chain gun round spun him as it struck the brassard of his arm. Ceramic armor crumbled, blood, flesh and fragments flying. Acting on instinct he ran, scrambling away from his attacker, hoping to lose him in the labyrinth of crates.