Straits of Hell

by Taylor Anderson

  “Shields!” she coughed, hoping she was heard, but other voices carried the command.

  “Up an’ at ’em!” sergeants bellowed. “In their faces! Meet ’em at the top!”

  Shields, fearful weapons themselves, slammed against the unsteady men, throwing them back. Those that stood were shot or bayonetted by ’Cats behind those banging their shields forward. The distant ranks of Doms stopped firing, already hitting too many of their own with their inaccurate weapons, so most of what little shooting remained came from Blas’s Marines—and the cannon in their protected embrasures.

  Blas fired past a shield, its holder crouching low behind it, grunting with the effort to stem the tide of men. Muskets pounded or slammed down on it, trying to knock it away, and Blas caught glimpses of desperate faces, mouths open in silent or unheard roars. Some sprayed spittle as they gasped; others managed short, defiant cries she couldn’t understand. She shot as many of those faces as she could, and her ammunition was dwindling fast, but most of her attention was devoted to stabbing with the long, triangular bayonet on the end of her rifle. She stabbed at eyes, throats, arms, anything that appeared before her. She didn’t always connect, but when she did, she drove in hard and twisted savagely before pulling her weapon back.

  A huge man, swinging a pair of muskets by their barrels, flailed at the tiring ’Cat in front of her. He absorbed the blows on his shield with loud grunts of pain as the muskets shattered, but a Marine beside Blas drove his bayonet into the man’s upraised armpit. He shrieked and tried to knock the shield ’Cat over with his dying bulk, but already sliding backward, he merely grabbed the shield and took it with him. For an instant, the brave ’Cat had no defense, and a pair of the wicked, swordlike Dom bayonets found him before he could scrabble back. Blas stabbed at his killers, and the shields closed up over his corpse. A pair of colonials flanked her now, laying into the Doms with their long swords, like axes, and slinging blood in all directions. They didn’t have the reach of bayonets, but at such close quarters, they could hack the enemy with flesh-cleaving, bone-smashing strokes. She wondered briefly why they’d chosen to fight at her side; colonials could be cliquish. But ever since Saint Francis, they’d shown a fondness for Lemurians in general, calling them “kitties,” to mixed annoyance and amusement, and she was grateful for them.

  The fighting raged like that for at least an hour, maybe more. It was impossible to tell. And the bayonet work was the most prolonged and grueling Blas had ever endured. The new rifles made a huge difference since they could be loaded much more quickly and she doubted she’d have held if not for them, but her Marines were exhausted, the grenades were gone, and their ammunition was spent when the pressure on the faltering shield wall suddenly just . . . ended. Her hearing was destroyed, but she did perceive the sound of trumpets braying beyond the second massed ranks of Doms that had never advanced. Those opened fire again as their comrades melted back, scurrying over the heaped bodies and through the corpse-choked entanglements.

  “Back!” Blas shouted, not recognizing her own voice. “Get down, back behind the wall!” She needn’t have exerted her voice. Her Marines were already dropping down to the firing steps.

  “Thanks, guys,” she managed to the two blood-smeared colonials.

  “Our pleasure!” One of them grinned. “An’ a rare fightin’ kitty, ye are!”

  She contemplated a retort, but then just grinned back. The small cats that had spread across the Empire of the New Britain Isles, arrivals with the same ancient “passage” that brought its people to this world, did look a little like Mi-Anakka, and she wasn’t offended by the diminutive, considering the present source.

  “It was the shields,” First Sergeant Spook declared as he joined her, handing her his water bottle again. She drank greedily. He was just as bloody as the two men, and his beloved BAR hung from his shoulder with an empty magazine well. She suddenly realized she’d never even heard him fire, but apparently he’d shot everything he had. He tugged on his sling, noticing her gaze. “I’m not completely dry,” he said, blinking irony. “Savin’ a couple maag-a-zeens back for if it gets really bad.”

  Blas barked a laugh, and Spook peered carefully over the wall, watching the retreating Doms near the next ranks, still firing over their heads. It was scant protection. Mortar bombs and canister still clawed at the enemy, and Blas didn’t know how they could just stand there and take it. The smoke and lingering fog beyond made the world invisible past the ongoing slaughter.

  Spook’s tail flicked annoyance. “I was hopin’ those others’d kill the ones that ran, but I guess the Doms ain’t Griks after all.”

  “No,” Blas managed, handing the bottle back. Her throat was better, and she also felt a growing sense of triumph. Not that they’d won; she didn’t really believe that, and suspected the fight was far from over. Just that she was still alive. “And they didn’t just quit. They were called back. But why?”

  “They were gettin’ wasted.” Spook shrugged. “We’d have killed ever’ daamn one.” Blas wasn’t so sure, but she said nothing. The sun had risen above the distant mountains, and she could see it up there, amid bright blue gaps in the streaming white haze. It would be a clear day once the last of the fog burned away. But the smoke remained dense down low, still being generated as fighting raged on at other points along the wall. She expected the Doms to come back, but she’d enjoy the respite no matter how brief.

  “The shields did it. Again,” Spook declared. “So maybe the guys an’ gals’ll quit bellyachin’ about waggin’ the heavy daamn thing around.”

  Blas nodded. Decisive or not, the shields had been a help. Undeterred by cannon, accurate rifle fire, and even grenades, the Doms had finally driven through every obstacle to reach the shields at the top of the parapet. But difficult as all those other obstacles had been, the final one couldn’t be avoided or climbed, and it battered at them mercilessly even as the bayonets and bullets still slew them from behind it.

  “Yeah,” Blas agreed at last. “But just like the war in the West, one of these days this war’ll move too fast for shields, and we’ll have to quit ’em. I hope that’s soon,” she added bitterly.

  “Well, maybe,” Spook allowed, but paused. There was a growing commotion among the Marines around them, and together, he and Blas peeked up over the earthen wall.

  “What the hell’s that?” Spook muttered.

  Beyond the Dom ranks, straight out of the ground haze and the overhead glare of the sun, something was moving toward them. Something huge, and more than one.

  “I don’t know . . . ,” Blas murmured, but then she thought she did. Everyone had heard the tales Fred Reynolds brought back of the momentous beasts to the north, and Suares, the “vice alcalde” of Guayak, had confirmed there were many horrible monsters, “great dragons,” on the other side of the mountains where the land was wild and choked with impenetrable jungles. Some of the monsters were mythical things, Blas was sure, but she was equally convinced not all of them were. Certainly not the ones Fred and Kari described. And as these things drew closer, she knew they must be similar creatures. Spook apparently thought the same.

  “How’d they train them?” he suddenly muttered in awe.

  The Dom ranks were peeling back, doubling at a trot and leaving a large gap for the monsters to pass through as they approached. Blas could see them fairly clearly now; enormous cousins to the aal-o-saur-like creatures Dennis Silva had dubbed “super lizards” that haunted the interior of Borno. Super lizards were bad, measuring up to twenty tails in length and able to reach as high as the main yard on a ship, but these, with the same terrible jaws, were possibly twice as big. They seemed to be all head and tail, perched atop long, powerfully made legs. It struck her as odd that they didn’t have any forelegs at all that she could see, like humongous skuggiks, which were common carrion eaters in the West. She shook her head, and for an instant she railed to herself that the air corps should’ve w
arned them. But there weren’t many planes left, and she hadn’t heard any over the battle today. And even if they’d been present, they might not have seen them. Colored like dark tree bark, the monsters might’ve approached invisibly in the dark, then the shadow of the mountains, finally to come closer under cover of the smoke and fog.

  Blas suddenly realized the method the Doms used to control them was almost as amazing as the creatures themselves. Their jaws were chained shut at present, and more chains spiderwebbed away from great iron collars fastened around their necks. The chains were secured to a dozen of the big, fat, armored creatures the Doms used to move their heavy artillery, that strained against the chains at the urging of hundreds of men in bright red and black hooded robes. The Dom infantry, still under fire, shuffled more tightly together to make the gap wider as the “super-duper lizards” (Fred’s name for the things reemerged in her mind) were led nearer by their bizarre handlers. As the first monster passed them, the Dom infantry advanced. Near panic had erupted, even among Blas’s Marines, because it was obvious what the Doms meant to do with the things.

  “Stand fast!” she bellowed with all she had left, her shout carrying in that peculiar way only Lemurians’ voices could, as far away as the two lunettes on either side of her Marines and the Maa-ni-la ’Cats to her right. “Runners! Take to all stations, and personally ensure that Col-nol Blair and Gener-aal Shinyaa are aware that the Doms’ve led Fred and Kari’s monsters against us! Tell ’em we need ammo now, and probably the reserve! Go! Aar-tillery, commence firing!” She paced a few steps, heart pounding, even as the first load of canister sprayed the closest beast. Hooded figures went down all around it, but it shook itself and trudged on, apparently unconcerned. “Solid shot!” she screamed. “Solid shot only at the monsters! Save your canister for the Doms!” They’d need every bit, she realized, because all the Doms were coming now, including those that had retreated. And in the distance, beyond the monsters, she could just make out more infantry with red-faced uniforms. . . .

  Hooded figures pulled cables leading to the terrible jaws, and the confining chains slackened and fell away. Awarded partial freedom, the first great beast opened its mouth and roared its triumph, a sort of thunderous gobbling sound, before stooping to snatch one of its handlers. At the same time, the other chains attached to the iron collar dropped to the ground. The big armored creatures that kept it confined rolled in the dust when the tension left, but quickly rose and lumbered to the side, dragging their chains and flailing their tails to discourage pursuit. The giant lizard took a couple experimental steps, seeming tempted to chase them, but rifle fire was peppering it now and it didn’t like that a bit. Has to sting, Blas snorted to herself, but the sarcastic thought was edged with a creeping terror. Even the big guns of the colonials were apparently not penetrating sufficiently to do serious harm. But they did make it mad—and Blas suddenly realized that was what the Doms had counted on. It lunged forward, past its scattering handlers, toward the source of its torment. Several guns fired at once but missed. The thing was amazingly fast for its size, moving like a two-legged serpent, its head and tail swaying from side to side as it quickly negotiated the entanglements, tearing barbed wire as if it were rotten vines and scattering stakes like twigs. In just a few more steps, it started up the slope, meeting a hail of bullets, and churned directly at Blas.

  In that moment, as had happened long before, and for the first time since that dreadful night in Mahan’s steering engine room, Blas was silenced and immobilized by panic. She’d been a youngling then, in every sense of the word, and there’d been nothing she could do. But her powerlessness in the face of such an unimaginable violation still haunted her, as did an obsessive determination never to experience such a feeling again. That’s why she became a Marine, even reveling in the risks that entailed, because she could confront them with friends at her side and a weapon in her hands, and each time she did so, the memory of that terrible night faded a bit more from her mind. But in the face of the monstrous juggernaut of flesh stalking toward her, she felt like a helpless youngling again. She didn’t run, as all her senses demanded, but she didn’t do anything else. She just stood there, stunned, as the great jaws opened toward her.

  A twelve-pounder in a covered embrasure just below her feet fired directly into the monster, and it staggered back. The concussion of the report struck her like a slap and she shook her head, clearing the unnerving trance that had engulfed her. A great bloody hole had bloomed on the monster’s belly, smoke and black blood coursing out, but Blas gathered with amazement that the shot didn’t exit! Comparably speaking, shooting the thing with a twelve-pounder was probably like shooting a rhino pig with a.45. Chances were it would die—eventually—but the wound only enraged it further. Like a striking snake, it chomped down on the protruding muzzle of the gun and dragged the whole two-ton weapon through its embrasure, shattering its wheels and casting it away like a toy. Another gun, atop the parapet, hit it in its narrow chest from the side, and that shot did exit, blowing a gaping, jagged-ribbed hole, and warbling off into the distance. The beast fell then. Perhaps its spine was broken? Its body slid down and lay still over the embrasure it had opened. Blas, still recovering from the shame and terror of what she considered a flare of cowardice, had no time to appreciate that small favor because there were more monsters coming. Just as bad, the Doms were sweeping forward in their deep ranks, followed by hordes of Blood Drinkers.

  “Quit shootin’ at the daamn lizards! We just pissin’ ’em off! Fire at the Doms!” she screamed at her Marines. “All aar-tillery between the lunettes will target the big lizards!” She coughed. “Runner!” she managed.

  “Col-nol Blair is here!” First Sergeant Spook declared, pointing and breathing hard. He’d been shooting at the monster too and now returned to her side. Blair and a small staff were still mounted, just below her, amid men carrying crates of ammunition up the slope to the ’Cats above. She shouted down at him, “It’s here! All is coming here! We must have our reserves!” She could see nothing of the battle elsewhere around the fort, but couldn’t imagine the Doms had the resources to make such an effort in more than one, maybe two places at once.

  “Are you sure of that?” Blair demanded.

  “Sure I’m sure. The monsters and Blood Drinkers had to have come last night!” she explained desperately. “They would’ve been seen from the air or by the spies still reportin’ if they’d been assemblin’ long enough to build a bigger force than that!” She waved at the monsters and men coming for her. “An’ this is the closest point of contact! They came in last night, and Nerino’s thrown ’em straight at the closest ‘weak’ point we showed him! It’s here!”

  Blair finally nodded, seeing the sense of that and trusting her instincts. But then, to her surprise, he hesitated. “I’m sorry, Captain Blas, but my new orders from General Shinya are that no reserves be committed to the outer wall for any reason.” He waved helplessly up at one of the observation towers behind the inner wall. “I suppose he has his reasons, or sees—and hears by wireless—what we do not.” He looked at her earnestly. “That said, I will find some reinforcement for you, from an unengaged portion of the outer wall if I must. Can you hold long enough for troops to come from the west side of the fort?”

  Blas turned, feeling violated again in a different way. She’d been promised the Guayakans as a reserve, and they were ready and waiting less than a hundred yards away, atop the wall behind her. They could get here in time, but could anyone else? A furious fire was stripping men from the advancing Dom ranks, and a cheer announced that another of the monsters had been struck by a gun, its head becoming a ragged, bloody mass of shattered bone and teeth, and it fell in the path of another huge beast. But she reckoned it had taken ten or twenty shots to hit it, and those behind—she counted ten more at a glance—had all been released and were charging forward as if confident that a huge feast lay beyond her wall. She suspected they’d been conditioned to that belief
somehow; to race toward shooting, expecting to feed. Cannon were very difficult to aim at moving targets. Even with the instantaneous ignition of the new friction primers, one had to point the gun where one hoped the target would be when it was fired—after its crew had a moment to get out of the way. The monster behind the dead one simply leaped the corpse and hurried on, its long strides devouring ground.

  “No,” she answered bitterly. “We can’t hold ’em that long, and any disorganized reserves dribblin’ in will only block our path of retreat.”

  Blair nodded again, as if that was what he’d expected her to say. “Then hold as long as you can. Fall back to the second wall when you must. The Guayakans will provide covering fire. I’ll join you there after I spread the word—and see the situation elsewhere for myself.” With that, he spurred his horse southward, followed by his staff.

  And just like that, In Blas’s mind, and entirely without warning, General Tomatsu Shinya had sacrificed the 2nd of the 2nd Marines, the 3rd Saint Francis, and the entire 8th Maa-ni-la. Three more monsters quickly died in a barrage of cannon fire, crushing dozens of screaming men when they fell. And not all the monsters were content to delay their feast until they breached the fort. A couple, at least, strolled through the enemy ranks, leisurely eating men packed too closely to flee. The screams that rose above the roar of battle were terrible to hear. But when the first wave of Dom regulars, many returning for a second time, slammed into her Marines’ battered shields, Blas finally realized that trying to fall back now would likely prove just as difficult as holding her position. With the artillery largely devoted to firing at the monsters, only the Imperial guns in the lunettes could sweep the Doms. Those were big guns, but even more impossible to aim at moving monsters. They laid a terribly destructive, enfilading fire into the enemy’s flanks, but it simply wasn’t enough given the weakness on the ramparts and the greater weight of the new attack. Granted, most of the Dom infantry was just as exhausted and terrified as the defenders, but they had the Blood Drinkers pushing them on. There’d be no lull, no momentary respite she could use to disengage and pull back to the inner wall. Maybe her Marines and the Maa-ni-los to her right were making time for some other plan to unfold, but that went increasingly beyond their concern. They fought for their lives, and when any hope for survival faded, they fought to take another breath. Everyone knew that as soon as the first Doms broke through, they’d be overwhelmed.