- Professor Leo Caesius. War in a time of ‘Peace:’ The Empire’s Forgotten Military History.
Thomas ducked as a bullet cracked through the air above his head, then unhooked a grenade from his belt and tossed it towards where he estimated the shooter to be lurking. There was an explosion; he jumped up and ran down the corridor, weapon in hand, looking for the enemy combatant. But there was nothing left of him, apart from bloody stains on the wall.
He sighed as he caught his breath. Four days of hard fighting had allowed them to penetrate the next set of fortifications within the Zone, which the insurgents were fighting desperately to hold at all costs. Each building had been turned into a fortress, with multiple firing positions and reinforced walls, linked into a series of interlocking defence posts. Clearing them out cost time and lives, while the enemy fell back, then counterattacked with increasing force. They’d even dug a warren of tunnels under the Zone, allowing them to slip their people past the front line and pop up in the rear. One attack had nearly wiped out an entire local formation that wasn't watching its back carefully enough.
“Got a hatch there, sir,” one of his men said. Thomas didn't know him personally; he was a CROW, a Combat Replacement Of War, sent into the unit to replace a man he'd lost days ago. Normally, Thomas knew, it would be hard for a newcomer to be accepted until he’d proven himself. Now, the fires of war made it easier for the newcomer to join a unit. “Want me to do something about it?”
Thomas shrugged as he eyed the tunnel, lying temptingly open. Going down was almost certainly a mistake, though. The tunnel would be difficult to explore while the enemy, who would know it very well, would be lurking in ambush. Or maybe they would simply have rigged the tunnel to fall in when the CEF troops advanced into the darkness.
“Drop a couple of grenades down there,” he ordered, instead. “I want you to collapse it, if possible.”
There was a dull roar as the grenades exploded, followed by a series of crashing sounds that suggested the tunnel had caved in on itself. Thomas dropped a motion sensor down into the darkness anyway, just in case, then keyed his HUD for updates. The advance had slowed almost to a halt as the soldiers had encountered the new defence zone, but higher command seemed to believe the rebels couldn't hold out for long. Thomas had his doubts; so far, the rebels had fought savagely and very well.
He motioned to his unit to follow him as they swept the rest of the makeshift fortress. For once, the remaining enemy seemed to have fallen back, either out of fear of being cut off from their fellows or because they were planning a counterattack as soon as the invaders relaxed. Thomas had to admire their determination, no matter how irritating it was to him personally. The remainder of the house was empty, so he called for reinforcements so it could be converted into a makeshift FOB. Not a perfect arrangement, he knew, but it would provide some shelter to advancing troops before they returned to the fight.
“Incoming!”
He cursed as another wave of mortar shells echoed through the air and came down on the other side of the front line, explosions shaking the entire area. Moments later, he heard a series of more distant explosions as the counter-battery fire went to work, trying to kill the mortar teams before they rushed their weapon to a new firing location. Either the enemy teams were very good, Thomas had decided long ago, or the insurgents had thousands of the weapons. No matter how many shells the invaders fired, the enemy still launched mortar shells towards the advancing troops. And they were extracting a price from the CEF ...
A dull rumble caught his attention and he turned to stare through a gap in the wall, just in time to see one of the massive apartment blocks in the distance collapse into a pile of rubble. For a long moment, silence seemed to fall over the battlefield, as if both sides were stunned by the sudden collapse, then shooting resumed, greater than ever before. Gritting his teeth, shaking off the tiredness that seemed to pervade his bones, Thomas motioned for his troops to follow him. Surely, sooner or later, the rebels would run out of men to throw at the CEF.
But it didn't seem likely, he admitted, in the privacy of his own mind. The discipline the rebels were showing, even under extreme pressure would do credit to any military unit, even the Marines. And they were brave too, he knew; brave ... and dreadfully misguided.
Poor bastards, he thought.
A quick check of his HUD revealed that a local infantry unit was moving into position as backstop, ready to support his unit if necessary. Sighing, hoping it was one of the good units, he turned and led his men onwards, back into the fight.
***
“They took down the Rosetta,” Stone said.
“It took them a while,” Pete said. So far, the advancing force had hesitated to fire on the largest buildings, even though their snipers had been quite effective at clearing his snipers from the building. “I think it might have been an accident.”
Stone eyed him, dubiously. She hadn't hesitated to tell the troops that the advancing forces had looting, raping and burning on their minds, in that order. With so many families, including wives and daughters, within the Zone, it had proved hellishly effective at preventing the fighters from surrendering. But it was also giving rise to a worrying amount of savagery. Despite his strict orders, a Commonwealth soldier who’d been captured had been beaten to death rather than handed over to him and his enforcers. But how could he blame his men after what they’d been told.
“An accident,” Stone repeated. “And how do you know that?”
Pete shrugged. “You know how accurate their guns are,” he said. The CEF had been alarmingly precise, precise enough to wipe out over two dozen mortar teams in the last few days of fighting. “If they’d wanted to bring down all the buildings, they would have done so by now.”
He looked down at the map, mentally collating the latest series of reports from his observers and placing them on the chart. There was no way to deny the simple fact that the Zone’s defences were starting to crumble, no matter how desperately his men fought to keep the invaders back. Logistics, once again, had proven the bane of a military operation. The high-intensity fighting was sapping his stockpiles of ammunition faster than they could hope to replace them. If the invaders ever realised that he’d run out of HVMs to fire at their aircraft ...
“I think it’s time to consider withdrawing the lighter units,” he said. “They can go through the tunnels and then fade away into the countryside.”
Stone’s head snapped up. “You propose to abandon the Zone?”
“I propose to withdraw some of our forces,” Pete countered. The operation had succeeded, in one sense; the Zone was absorbing more and more of the forces available to the government. Judging from how one regiment had come apart at the first hint of gunfire, they were even throwing completely untrained units into the maelstrom. But he knew there was no point in fighting till the bitter end. “They will go into position for the next phase of the war.”
Stone sneered. “You plan to join them?”
“No,” Pete lied. He had no shortage of bravery, but he knew, without false modesty, that he couldn't meet his death in the Zone. The movement needed him to help guide the war. “I will stay here until the bitter end.”
“See that you do,” Stone said, darkly.
Pete eyed her back as she turned and stamped out of the room. She was a fanatic, unsurprisingly; she’d executed cowards – or men she’d seen as cowards – with an enthusiasm that disturbed him. He had already decided that Stone wasn't going to survive the war, hopefully breathing her last as a martyr – although he was quite prepared to shoot her in the back if necessary. Any hope of rebuilding the planet along more peaceful lines would be lost if Stone took power. She would start by purging the government and civil service – and whatever remained of the military – then move on to eradiating all members of the movement who didn't live up to her standards. By the time she’d finished, her reign of terror would leave scars that wouldn't heal for years to come.
Shaking his head, he lifted
an eyebrow as a pretty blonde girl – one of the messengers – knocked on the open door. “Message for you, sir,” she said, her entire body trembling. “Will there be a reply.”
Pete took the message, wondering if she was shaking because she was scared of him or if she was more worried about the constant shooting that kept everyone awake. The children were having real problems ... indeed, he had seriously considered calling a ceasefire long enough to get them into a DP camp. But Stone and the others would never have agreed, either out of fear of what would befall their women and children or simple reluctance to let go of even a shred of their power.
He scanned the letter quickly, then nodded. “Tell them to take no action,” he said, sticking the piece of paper in his pocket. One piece of the defences had crumbled – and a number of fighters had surrendered. The gunners wanted to drop a mortar shell on the defenceless POWs before they were taken out of range. “Pass on those words – and nothing else.”
The blonde girl nodded, still trembling. She was pretty enough, Pete noted, the type of girl who should be attending college or university rather than being trapped in a warzone. Guilt tore at him as he realised she was the type of person the Terran Marines existed to defend, even if they weren't always grateful for the military’s mere existence. Hell, the girl was old enough to be his daughter, if his daughter had lived. She shouldn’t have been in a warzone. But the war on Thule had been brewing long before he'd joined the movement ...
He smiled at her. “What is your name?”
“Gudrun,” the girl said.
Pete sighed as she looked down at the ground, perhaps expecting him to make an indecent suggestion. Some of the smaller resistance groups had had too many footsoldiers who’d done just that, trading on their position to talk girls into bed. But Gudrun was really too young to be interesting. She should be innocent.
But she probably isn’t, Pete thought. It was astonishing just how quickly reluctance to open one’s legs vanished when one was confronted by starvation. Or worse; one of the reasons he’d joined the movement was to prevent exploitation far worse than simple prostitution. In the end, he knew he hadn't entirely succeeded. It was quite possible that Gudrun had already traded her body for food and protection before joining the movement. Or ...
And she wasn't really his daughter.
“Take the message back, quickly now,” he said. He didn't miss the brief expression of relief crossing her face, an expression that horrified him more than he cared to say. “And then take a break. You need it.”
Gudrun turned and practically ran out of the chamber. Pete shook his head. In a sense, the movement had become parasites, no matter the rightness of their cause. They had complete power over the Zone, power to do whatever they wanted with its inhabitants, with the only thing holding them in check being an awareness of their own weaknesses. After all, if everyone who wasn't part of the movement rose up against them, the movement would be doomed.
Poor girl, he thought. His daughter ... would his daughter have been like Gudrun, if she had lived? Or would his daughter have wanted to stay out of the fighting? Or would she have been intimately involved with the fighting? Or ... what?
He shook his head, again. There was nothing he could do for Gudrun, not now. All he could do was pray that she survived the fighting without harm.
***
Gudrun had believed, the moment she set eyes on the movement’s leader, that he would know just how badly she’d been compromised. She’d lowered her eyes, unable to stop her entire body shaking with fear ... and he'd sent her away with kindly words. It was odd, but there was no time to wonder about what he’d been thinking. All she could do was use the communicator to tell Marcy where the leader was hiding ... and hope like hell it was enough to win her freedom. She didn't want to be a spy any longer.
She sent the message, then hurried over to where the gunners were waiting under a protective awning. They didn't seem pleased with her words, but they accepted them without demur. As soon as they banished her, Gudrun left and sneaked back towards the hospital. Maybe, if she was lucky, she would be able to keep her head down until the fighting came to an end.
Her shoulder itched. No, she knew, that wouldn't be a possibility.
***
“They flew two helicopters over the Zone,” Michael said. “Neither of them were engaged with anything other than rifle fire.”
“Interesting,” Jasmine mused. Could it be that the Zone’s defenders had run out of HVMs? The last one they’d fired, at a drone she’d sent in a day ago, had missed its target and exploded harmlessly in midair. “How low were they flying?”
“Low enough to be hit within seconds,” Michael confirmed. “They couldn't have hoped to escape.”
Jasmine nodded. HVMs – High-Velocity Missiles – had been developed to give ground forces a chance to keep enemy aircraft away from them, which they did very well. A helicopter flying near an HVM launcher was almost certainly doomed, with jet aircraft and drones faring only slightly better. Even a Marine Raptor would have difficulty surviving a direct hit from an HVM ... not that it mattered. The handful of Raptors they’d brought to Avalon were all out of service now, after being worked to death.
“It’s worth considering,” she agreed. Bringing up CAS aircraft would certainly speed up the fall of the Zone, but it would be giving the enemy easy targets if they were playing possum. After everything that had happened, she wasn't going to underestimate the rebels again. “Do we have any confirmation from intelligence?”
Michael shook his head. “Nothing,” he said. “Just ... indirect evidence.”
Jasmine looked up as the door opened, revealing Marcy. “We just received word of a High Value Target,” she said, shortly. She dropped a datachip on the desk, which Jasmine took and slotted into the projector. “Our former comrade himself.”
“Good,” Jasmine said. She looked down at the satellite images, thinking hard. The rebel HQ – if it was the rebel HQ – was a small building, completely inseparable from the others surrounding it. It was tempting, awfully tempting, to drop a shell on the building and blow it into dust. But if she did, they would never know what – if anything – they’d hit. “You want him alive?”
It was a silly question, she knew. She wanted the former Marine alive. She wanted to ask him what the fuck he was thinking, joining up with a rebel group of uncertain motives, working for an outside power that was almost certainly hostile. She wanted answers.
“Get me Lieutenant Buckley,” she ordered. She glanced down at her wristcom, then looked through the windows at the darkening sky. The raid would have to be launched very quickly or not at all. “I need to speak to him.”
If she’d stayed in command of the platoon, she would have agreed at once. But she knew it wasn't her choice to make, not really. It was Joe Buckley, the man with a talent for getting into trouble and then getting out of it, who would have to make the final call. She couldn't make it for him, or force him to act against his better judgement. Everything would depend on him.
“Brigadier,” Buckley said, as his face appeared on the screen. “What can I do for you?”
“I’m shooting you the details now,” Jasmine said. “We have an HVT that needs captured – or taken out.”
There was a long pause as Buckley reviewed the intelligence summery, then the raw data. “Chancy,” he said, finally. “What can we call upon?”
“Anything you need,” Jasmine said. Buckley would be the CO on the ground, after all. “If we have it, you can use it.”
“I’ll start planning now,” Buckley said. “Kick-off in an hour suit you?”
Jasmine nodded. It was unlikely they could launch the operation any quicker, no matter what happened. They’d done better on Han, towards the end of the war, but then they’d had QRFs scattered all over the planet.
“Have a good one, Joe,” she said.
“Thank you,” Buckley said. He touched his forehead in a mock salute. “Semper Fi!”
And, Jasmine t
hought, in the privacy of her own head, wasn't that more than a little ironic?
Chapter Thirty-Two
But, from Earth, such incidents looked relatively small. The death of a few hundred locals was minor – incidents had to kill hundreds of thousands to register on the Grand Senate’s collective radar – and easily dismissed on Earth. They simply could not comprehend that a few hundred deaths might easily encompass an entire tribe or extended family grouping, thus the deaths might be classed as genocide.
- Professor Leo Caesius. War in a time of ‘Peace:’ The Empire’s Forgotten Military History.
Joe Buckley knew his strengths and his weaknesses very well. After all, a succession of commanding officers had drummed them into his head from the moment he'd entered Boot Camp to the day he’d been given command of 1st Platoon. He was capable and flexible, very good at reacting to unexpected situations ... but also very good at getting into trouble. If he hadn't been good at getting out of trouble, he knew, he would probably be dead by now.
“You have a strange kind of luck,” the Commandant had said, years ago. “I seriously considered failing you, even though I couldn't point to a rational reason why I should fail you.”
He pushed the memory aside as he glided towards the Zone, followed by the other nine Marines who made up 1st Platoon. Sneaking their way into the Zone on the ground would be incredibly challenging, even for Marines; Joe knew, all too well, that they would almost certainly be detected and have to fight their way out of the urban zone. Coming in by air, however, would at least get them to their target before they were noticed. The gliders were silent, very hard to detect even with active sensors ... and almost invisible in the gathering darkness.
The Zone itself looked thoroughly weird from high overhead. There were flashes of light and explosions from the front lines, but the interior of the complex was almost completely dark. Joe’s helmet sensors reported a number of heat signatures on the ground, men and women moving from place to place under cover of darkness. A number of larger signatures were probably cooking fires, he guessed, or heating elements. It grew cold at night on Thule and, now they’d been cut off from the planet’s electric network, the inhabitants would be resorting to fires to warm themselves. But they still definitely had power.
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