More smoke rose in the distance from his squadrons of protected cruisers. They were lovely if somewhat disappointing ships, designed to destroy the powerful American frigates, but sadly vulnerable to air attack. He had no idea how many of those he’d lost to the strafing P-40s. P-40s! His mind still reeled over that.
“My lord!” came a cry. It was his Grik aide again, breathing hard after running all the way from the palace.
“What are you doing here?” Kurokawa roared. “I want my fleet underway this instant! Do you want every ship destroyed at anchor?”
The aide gestured at the sky. “But the flying predator has gone, Lord!”
“They will be back, fool! Can you really be such an imbecile?” He paused, listening. “You see? They are back already!” He pointed. A large flight of planes was approaching from the sea, out of the still-rising sun.
“They are just more water planes!” the aide objected. “They cannot harm the Grand Fleet!”
“Idiot!” Kurokawa shrieked. “They couldn’t before, and they knew it. But would they send them now if they thought that still? Regardless, they’re dangerous to all our other ships, and the harbor facilities as well!” He squinted. “And look, fool. Those are not the patchwork planes from the lake! They’re new, brightly painted—from an enemy carrier, no doubt! The enemy is here. His fleet is here!” He gasped to control the fit threatening to overwhelm him. “Everything he has is here!” He straightened, his hand straying to his sword. He was so tempted to slay this hideous, ridiculous creature! “Get word to General Halik immediately! I don’t care how you do it or what it costs. Run the messengers to death! Tell him to attack General Alden’s perimeter at once with everything he has! I want no survivors from that place. Kill everyone!”
“Lord,” the aide said nervously, as though finally realizing his danger. “A runner arrived from General Halik just moments ago! He is being carried here now to report! Another runner just told me, while I was on my way to join you, and I ordered the creature fetched here as well. It is nearly destroyed,” he added.
The flying boats began swooping at the ships, and bombs fell on and around them. Real bombs, Kurokawa thought sickly. Amid the booming on the water and the buzzing of small engines, Commodore Fuji arrived, trailing some of his staff. He looked just as stunned as Kurokawa felt.
“Fuji! Good! You must get the Grand Fleet underway immediately! I will board Kongo as quickly as I can, but do not wait for me!”
“A-at once, General of the Sea . . . but what is our objective?”
“To save the fleet, of course! And destroy the enemy!” Kurokawa pointed east. “He is out there now, Commodore, and I assure you he’s coming this way!” He turned at the arrival of several Grik bearing a litter. “Is this the runner from Halik?” he demanded.
“It is, Lord.”
Kurokawa looked at the wasted creature. It had clearly run its life out. “Ask its message.”
The aide spoke, and the runner gabbled weakly in reply. Kurokawa understood most of what it said, and his face went hard.
“It says Alden is attacking all around his perimeter and has made significant gains. General Halik is trying to contain him now—or was a few hours ago.”
“I heard him,” Kurokawa seethed. He looked at Fuji. “You have your orders.” The harbor had become a maelstrom of explosions, smoke, and flitting aircraft. “All signals are now acceptable. I’ll have my communications officer transmit the sortie command. All ships will engage the enemy as closely as they can and leave nothing alive upon the sea!” A plane roared by, low, like nothing he’d seen before. It was painted like the floatplanes, but smaller, with a radial engine and fixed landing gear! For just an instant, he thought Muriname had returned with one of the planes his people were working on back at Zanzibar—it did look similar—but the American roundel and single small bomb tumbling from its belly quickly convinced him otherwise. Muriname promised me an advantage, but already the apes have real fighters! Besides the ones they showed us earlier! The bomb exploded in a storehouse by the dock, and a massive secondary detonation obliterated it and nearly knocked Kurokawa flat. Dusting debris from his uniform—his new white one—he jumped back in the rickshaw and glared back at his aide. “Destroy yourself!” he commanded, “this instant! And be glad I do not give you the traitor’s death for your stupidity!” Without another glance, he ordered those shackled to the vehicle to take him back to the palace.
At a distance from the devastation still roiling in the harbor, he shouted for Lieutenant Fukui as soon as he left the rickshaw. He ordered every single Grik he met, regardless of purpose, to destroy itself, and had to admit, amid all the turmoil, it was amusing watching them instantly slash their own throats.
“Fukui! There you are at last!” he cried, seeing the radioman peek from his alcove, where no Grik was ever allowed. Fukui looked beyond Kurokawa at the abattoir the palace was becoming and gulped.
“Yes, Lord?” he asked shakily.
“Send this at once: ‘Lieutenant Iguri is to launch every airship he has. The enemy fleet is to the east. Find it and destroy it!’”
“But, Lord! The enemy has new planes with machine guns!”
“Yes, but not many! They can’t have many of those P-Forties!”
“Not them, sir!” Fukui pleaded. “The smaller ones have machine guns too! They have strafed the palace!”
“Indeed? I had not seen them use guns . . .” He shook his head. “It is no matter.” He paused, thinking. “Tell Iguri he must send everything—except his personal craft, of course. But tell him to wait until sunset. I want as much confusion as possible among the enemy just after dark. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Lord. Lord? We are leaving?”
Kurokawa barked a bitter laugh. “We have no choice! The enemy is coming here. Don’t you understand? We were preparing to go after him, but he is here! Don’t you know what that means?”
“Forgive me, Lord, but I thought you hoped the enemy would come to us?”
Kurokawa sputtered, but though his face went dark, he didn’t explode. “Of course! But not like this!” He waved vaguely at the sky. That’s when Fukui realized how badly the enemy aircraft—and how effortlessly they’d savaged his fleet—had rattled his lord. Kurokawa came from the old school of big guns over aircraft, and though he appreciated air power when it was on his side, this was the first time he’d been on the receiving end of decisive, effective air superiority. He couldn’t fight it and couldn’t endure it, so he had to get away from it.
“He, their Captain Reddy, no doubt, knows exactly what we have at this place,” Kurokawa continued. “His creatures have been counting each ship they did not sink as it steamed up the east coast of Ceylon! He wouldn’t be coming now if he wasn’t sure he could beat me. . . .” Kurokawa wiped his brow with shaking fingers. “By all my ancestors, I do despise that man, and I will kill him someday.” He raised his round chin. “Perhaps today. But this attack was too well planned—did you know Halik has been pushed back? No? He has, which means everything is part of a bigger scheme—a scheme to destroy me!” He stared hard at Fukui. “That will not happen. Reddy thinks he can destroy me and is resourceful enough that, this once, I will trust his judgment. But I will beat him, Fuqui! We will beat him by making sure he doesn’t get me!”
If Kurokawa was trying to encourage Fuqui, it didn’t work. All he managed was to finally convince the young radioman that he was utterly, wildly insane.
“Now send to all fleet elements in the port of Madras: ‘Sortie immediately and destroy the enemy! The battleships Kongo, Akagi, and Kuso’—I want no ships with revolting Grik names!—‘will remain until I can join the fleet, along with six cruisers!’” His face hardened when Fukui just stood there, confused.
“Send it!”
CHAPTER
32
////// The Corral north of Lake Flynn
T he fog was beginning to burn away at last, but the visibility in the smoke-choked forest hadn’t much improved.
General Pete Alden and his cavalry escort were pounding down a convoluted pathway, constantly halted by confused clots of Lemurian troops separated from their divisions, regiments, companies, even platoons, and there was no way Pete could sort them out. Some he told to follow behind him, and others he simply ordered toward the sound of the guns. He vaguely remembered a story he’d read about the Civil War Battle of the Wilderness and thought it must’ve been a lot like this. The damp woods wouldn’t catch fire, thank God, so at least the wounded wouldn’t burn alive. He had to ensure they wouldn’t be eaten, though, and the only way to do that was to win. A volley of rifle fire suddenly slashed into them from a gap ahead, and two of his 3rd Maa-ni-la Cav pitched from their mounts. Pete urged his me-naak forward, before the cluster of Lemurian infantry—their volley identifying them easily enough—could reload.
“What the hell’s the matter with you?” he roared. “You hit some of our own guys!” He yanked back on the reins of his savage animal, delivering its own volley of snot at the suddenly chastened troops. “Who’s in command here?”
A skinny, dark-furred ’Cat stepped forward. “I teenk I am,” he said nervously, “Lieuten-aant Taalat, Comp’ny Dee, Nint’ Aryaal, Third Division . . . sir. I sorry. We tought you was Griks!”
Alden yanked his reins again. “Do the goddamn Grik ride meanies?” He shook his head, his anger fading. Taalat was just a kid, maybe in his very first battle, and what a mess it was. Mistakes were inevitable. He had more than thirty scared troops with him, and they’d need all they could get. Further shouting would only torture their souls even more than they were already starting to do themselves. “You’re part of Second Corps. Why are you lollygaggin’ in the woods?”
“We get lost in dark fog!” Taalat almost wailed. “I can’t see sky! Don’t know which way to go!”
“Son,” Pete said, almost gently, “we’re bound for Second Corps HQ now. Where it was, anyway. You guys can follow us.” He took a breath, staring around at the dense wall of trees. “If you get lost again, just remember one thing: most of the shooting you hear is ours—at least until the air dries out. Any map o’ this fight’ll probably look like a damn amoeba germ, so you can’t go far wrong just heading toward the guns and killing any Grik you meet. I’ll guarantee that’s the best the enemy can do today!” With that, he plunged forward down the pathway, with his escort hurrying to catch up.
“General Queen Maraan!” he cried, when his squadron of cavalry and the near regiment of stragglers he’d picked up emerged into the clearing south of the Grik corral. He’d seen the distinctive silver-washed helmet and black cape surrounded by officers standing on a little rise facing north. Two batteries of twelve-pounders were nearby, silent at the moment, but the fighting across the unusually wide clearing was growing to a roar. Safir turned to face him as Pete dismounted. A trooper immediately took his reins.
“Gener-aal Aalden,” Safir greeted. “I’m glad you found us!” She gestured around. “A most confusing battlefield. Is it not?”
“You can say that again!”
“Consider it repeated. Orderly! Send a message that Gener-aal Aalden has joined us at last!” She looked at Pete. “Some were growing concerned for you.”
“Yeah. Look, we picked up some stragglers. You better detail somebody to sort ’em out—and maybe send scouts back along your lines of advance and see what else they can scare up. God knows how many guys are lost out there—and Grik too. There might be dozens of little battles going on in that damn forest!”
Safir turned to another ’Cat. “See to it,” she commanded, then looked back at Pete. “We have our own ‘little’ battle here, as you can see.” She paused. “As you might also hear, this Grik commander has continued blowing his rally call all morning, and I suspect he’s drawing more and more warriors to him from across the battlefield! Quite a large number have already assumed a defensive position on the far side of this clearing. Defensive, mind you,” she stressed. “Hij-Geerki said all the defense-trained Grik were west of the Gap.” Her tone was accusatory.
“Yeah, well he also said some other Grik were starting to get wise, and this Splook or Sklook, whatever the hell, is one of Halik’s and his pet Jap’s golden boys. Face it. Even a goat couldn’t send as many warriors against our trenches as these creeps have over the last weeks without getting some clue how to hold a position.”
Safir gestured at the growing fight to the front. “More than a clue, I’m afraid. This is our third assault, and Gener-aal Daanis has committed much of his division! The Third Baalkpan, Third B’mbaado, and Tenth Aryaal are engaged just now, and I am about to send the Black Battalion of the Six Hundred and the Fifth Sular to join them. The Six Hundred has a more innovative mix of weapons, as you know, and I hope to . . . confuse the enemy directly.” She bobbed impatiently on her toes, trying to see across the field. “Oh, I wish I knew how we fare!”
“No eyes in the sky?”
“Leedom’s squadrons have finally taken flight, and punish them between attacks, but most of the enemy masses in the trees beyond the clearing and cannot be seen. We have sent many mortar bombs in there, but I honestly don’t know what I face beyond what the enemy chooses to show me.”
“But it must’ve been air that told you more is coming.”
“That much our planes have confirmed,” Safir agreed. “The Grik come in groups and clumps from all directions.”
“Where’s Saachic and his . . .” He’d started to say “division,” but didn’t want to start thinking of 140 troops in those terms. “His special force,” he finished.
“They probe forward on the right flank, together with the Silver Battalion of the Six Hundred.” She blinked at Pete, guessing his thoughts, “So though perhaps not a division, Saachic has a formidable regiment at his disposal.” She turned east-northeast and pointed. “When he reaches the end of the enemy line he will pounce with nearly five hundred of our most vengeful troops and their new weapons. They are few,” she added wistfully, “but with the enemy focused on Daanis, they should prove a rude surprise, and their fire will be our signal to advance the rest of our modern weapons.” She waved at the Black Battalion of the 600.
“Daanis knows a good chunk of his division’s getting chopped up out there as a diversion?” Pete demanded.
Safir blinked at him. “Not a mere diversion. They fight to kill Grik—and gain his attention. But they will also cover our greater advance.”
“Shit.” Pete turned back to watch the fighting. He was a lot taller than Safir and was tempted to offer to hold her up so she could see better, but decided that might not make the most dignified impression on the troops around them. About four hundred yards away, across a lattice of scattered deadfall, was the closest thing he’d seen to linear combat since Ceylon. Daanis’s engaged regiments were scattered, using cover as best they could, but were right on top of the enemy line, pouring in fire with rifle muskets as fast as they could ram the hollow-based bullets down their barrels. Alden’s army had many more breechloaders now, the Allin-Silva conversions to.50-80 caliber, flown in or smuggled up the river before the Grik shut it down, and over a thousand Blitzer Bugs were in the hands of more specialized troops, but those currently engaged still had only muzzleloaders. Even those were better than what the Grik had; about half used crossbows and half the unwieldy, unreliable matchlock smoothbores, but Daanis was in a terribly unequal fight and even the primitive Grik weapons were taking a ghastly toll. Some of their heavy lead balls were even reaching the troops arrayed on this side of the field, and though they were nearly spent, they caused a steady trickle of cries of pain and wounded ’Cats being carried or escorted to the rear. Worse, as the morning wore on, the air was drying out and a lot more Grik matchlocks were joining the fight.
Pete removed his helmet and scratched his head thoughtfully. “Just so we’re clear, your whole plan is to slug it out, nose to nose with what’s growing into the whole Grik army on this side of the lake, then blitz his flank with Saachic’s . . . regiment.
As soon as that hits, you’ll punch ’em in the nose again with everything you’ve got left?”
Safir blinked hesitantly. “Essentially, yes.”
“What about his right flank—our left?”
“As I reported, it is blocked—and anchored—by ravines that cannot be quickly developed by us or the enemy. He is safe from us there, but so are we safe from him. You forget, however, and hopefully the Grik have not discovered, the approach of my Lord Rolak toward their right rear!”
“I hadn’t forgotten Rolak,” Pete assured. He didn’t say he wasn’t as sure as Safir that the old warrior’s I Corps would just serendipitously be in the right spot at the right time to exploit the opportunity Safir described. Rolak had a lot of jungle to slam through, even if the Grik kept ignoring him as they’d been at last report. Safir seemed certain, though, and the two former enemies were so in tune with each other now, it was almost spooky. He sighed. Ultimately, if the Grik truly were massing everything in front of them, there wasn’t much else they could do—and if anyone could sense the right time and place to jump in the fight, it was Rolak.
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