Arc Riders

by David Drake

  The men in the mechanized company could hear the Command-and-Control helicopter circling above them, but they couldn’t sec the bird through the jungle’s triple canopies. The ten vehicles below were ACAVs—armored personnel carriers converted from transport to combat duties by the addition of M60 machine guns behind gunshields on the right and left flanks, and a steel cupola around the .50-caliber machine gun mounted forward. At Table of Organization strength, there would have been seven more tracks.

  The captain in the fourth vehicle finished giving his orders. He took his commo helmet off to rub his forehead. His platoon leaders were a lieutenant, a platoon sergeant, and a staff sergeant. Personnel were as short as equipment. Both had been tight even before the Tet Offensive.

  “We’ll be lucky if we get a hundred yards into that shit,” said the soldier manning the cal fifty. The vehicle lurched beneath them as the driver began to back ten meters to the closest thing the company had found to a trail on this heading. “If he wants us to break trail, he ought to give us Rome Plows, not ACAVs.”

  The captain put his helmet back on. The man in the cupola had been his track commander when he was a lieutenant leading a platoon. With promotion and company command, he’d brought the man along. They went back seven months together; a lifetime in Southeast Asia, and much longer than some lives lasted in the theater.

  “The colonel says there’s a blue line”—stream—“half a klick north,” the captain explained. “He says there’s a major trail along it—if it’s the right blue line. Ours is not to reason why.”

  The driver was an experienced man. He turned the vehicle cautiously, clutching partial reverse power to the right track while braking the left track lightly.

  “When we find more fucking empty jungle,” the TC said, shouting over the engine noise, “what do we do? Laager here for the night? Intelligence couldn’t find their ass with both hands.”

  The captain shrugged.

  By applying full reverse power to one track and full forward power to the other, an ACAV could spin on its central axis—until it threw one or both tracks. As worn as the equipment was, and as badly overloaded as they were on running gear designed for the weight of an APC without the additional weapons and ammo, both tracks would slide off the road wheels in a matter of seconds.

  The captain didn’t want to be riding a thirteen-ton aluminum box down a trail that was probably worn by pigs. He wanted even less to be standing on that vehicle while the crew tried to make it mobile again. He wished he was in the CnC bird and the colonel was down here in the bush.

  That wasn’t fair. The colonel was being pushed by people who had no idea of conditions. Going after sanctuaries was well and good, but you don’t order an invasion off the top of your head, which was what had been done this time. Everybody was still bleeding from Tet, and if intelligence had a clue as to where these wonderful sanctuaries were, it sure hadn’t filtered down to the line companies.

  The ACAV rocked slowly along the trail, its engine howling in low gear. Branches grabbed at the barrel of the right-side wing gun and spun it back. The gunner lost his steel pot as he tried to realign the gun with his sector of responsibility. The captain tried to catch the helmet, but it went over the side.

  He thought of calling the driver to stop, but if the dinks were in the neighborhood that’d be handing it to them on a plate. He shook his head at the gunner, who shrugged and nodded.

  Normally the company commander wouldn’t be on point, but trying to reorder the line of march in this jungle would make things a worse ratfuck than they were already. Even now the three vehicles that had been in the lead would need to reverse as much as a hundred meters. The captain was waiting to hear that one or more of them had thrown a track.

  The commo helmet crackled, the preliminary to the colonel putting his oar in again. The captain grimaced, composing his situation report—“Proceeding north as ordered, sir”—when the first B-40 rocket laid a smokey trail out of the bush and struck the ACAV’s bow.

  The anti-tank warhead burst with a sharp crack. The splash-board and the two duffle bags secured behind it blew apart. The vehicle itself was undamaged, but the startled driver stalled the engine. The cal fifty and the right-side M60 began slashing the jungle forward. There were no targets, only green and black and the rocket’s gray exhaust trail.

  The captain leaned forward to aim his M16 between the cupola and the right gunshield. The second B-40 hit the cupola. The track commander screamed as gaseous metal disemboweled him. Smoke grenades hung on a wire inside the cupola. Six of them went off simultaneously, pluming their varied colors in the still jungle air. AK-47s opened fire from both sides of the trail.

  This time intelligence had been right about the presence of the enemy.

  TROOP STRENGTH IN SOUTHEAST ASIA

  TO RISE BY 250,000

  Student, Other Deferments Canceled

  Cleveland Plain Dealer

  Timeline B: September 24, 1968

  Durham, North Carolina

  Timeline B: September 25, 1968

  There were over three thousand people in the Quadrangle framed on three sides by pseudo-Gothic buildings constructed when the university expanded in the 1930s. The fourth side was Chapel Boulevard, stone-railed and level on a causeway above the sloping ground. A few cars, trapped in the Quadrangle parking area by the start of the demonstration, provided seating for scores of students.

  The leaders were on the steps of the chapel, a cathedral-styled building with tall spires and a rose window. The banner drooping across the triple archways read END THE WAR!, the legend framed by peace signs.

  An extension cord into the chapel powered a portable PA system. The amp was cranked up so high that electronic howls punctuated the phrases of anyone using the microphone.

  One of the student leaders, wearing a denim jacket over a checked shirt, had a bullhorn and knew how to use it. When he saw the four olive-drab trucks pass through the police cordon at the head of Chapel Boulevard, he pointed with his right arm and hand and began the chant: “Hell no! We won’t go! Hell no! We won’t go!”

  The trucks stopped some fifty yards from the back of the crowd. Troops got out, wearing steel helmets and carrying World War II–vintage Garand rifles. They were National Guardsmen, nearly 150 of them. One of the trucks wouldn’t start at the armory where the unit assembled, so the men were packed into the remaining vehicles.

  The demonstators turned by stages. Those in the back and—guided by the pointing arm—the front of the crowd were aware of the presence of the troops sooner than those in the middle.

  “Hell no! We won’t go!”

  Campus administrative buildings were locked. Banners and a Viet Cong flag hung from windows of the dormitories farther from the Quadrangle. Some of the professors who had been supporting the demonstration discreetly from the sidelines drifted away as the Guardsmen deployed.

  People standing at what had been the back of the crowd were the less committed. Many of them were sightseers rather than real demonstrators. Some edged to the side and started to walk away by their only practical route—up the sidewalks flanking Chapel Boulevard.

  A young student pushed out of the center of the crowd and screamed “Kill the pigs!” as he hurled an empty beer bottle at the troops almost eighty yards away from him.

  Two Guardsmen fired simultaneously. A woman screamed, though no one had been hurt by the shots.

  At least a dozen more Guardsmen fired in a ripping volley. Demonstrators surged away as if flung by the muzzle blasts of the powerful rifles.

  There was a score of bodies on the ground. A lieutenant ran forward and turned, trying to shout something to his troops. A Guardsman shot him from fifteen feet away. The lieutenant slammed to the pavement with a look of agony on his face. Blood pooled beneath him as his body thrashed.

  “Fucking Commies!” screamed one of the Guardsmen as he raised his reloaded Garand to his shoulder again. “Fucking Commies!”

  He shot off the eight-roun
d magazine as quickly as he could pull the trigger. His eyes were closed in terror. Two of his bullets blasted stone from the chapel tower, forty feet in the air.

  New York City

  Timeline B: July 12, 1969

  The usual anchorman was not at his desk when the CBS logo dissolved. The presenter who replaced him had been an assistant producer until a few hours earlier. He looked nervous, perhaps because he had very little experience in front of a camera.

  “Good evening,” he said. He cleared his throat. “The following report is made in accordance with the Emergency Censorship Regulations as issued by the White House this afternoon.”

  The presenter cleared his throat again. He continued, reading the words off a TelePrompTer, “By authority of the Constitution, the President has today assumed full responsibility for the administration of the country during the present emergency. The President has authorized the call-up of military reserves in all categories. National Guard units in all states have been transferred to federal control. All National Guard personnel are ordered to report to their normal—”

  The presenter began to cough. He tried to drink from a glass of water that had been out of line with the camera. Another cough sprayed part of it across his shirt front.

  He gripped his desk with both hands for a moment, wincing. When the spasm passed, he continued, “That is, to their normal assembly points, where they will receive further orders.”

  The wall behind the presenter had been showing a view of the Earth from space since the beginning of the broadcast. Now it shifted momentarily to the words FBI RAIDS in red block letters against a white background; went blank; and returned to the image of the cloud-swept planet, all within ten seconds.

  “I am instructed to inform you,” the presenter continued, “that although the rumors that congressional leaders are under house arrest are untrue, the new emergency regulations give the President sweeping powers to detain persons acting against the interests of the United States and the safety of American personnel serving in Southeast Asia. The President will not hesitate to use these powers if the cause of freedom demands it.”

  For a moment the presenter was silent. His eyes were open but focused a thousand yards away. Then he smiled as brightly as a plaster mannequin and continued, “In other news today…”

  Boston, Massachusetts

  Timeline B: December 13, 1969

  After the third knock, the brunette girl called “Who is it?” from beside the hall door. Her blond apartment mate stood in the curtained doorway of her separate bedroom. Both girls wore knee-length white nightgowns.

  “Jane Marie LaBrett?” a male voice called from the hallway.

  “I’m Jane LaBrett,” the blond girl said, stepping gingerly into the living/dining room. The illuminated display of the clock beside the television read 3:12. “What is this, please?”

  She was trying to keep her tone cool and superior, but there was a quaver in her voice as it reached the “please.”

  Voices murmured in the hall. The door bulged inward and split with a loud crash. The sliding bolt at the top of the panel still held, though the latch had sprung when one of the men outside kicked the doorknob.

  A Boston policeman slammed his shoulder through the broken door and entered the apartment. Another policeman, two soldiers, and a man in civilian clothes followed him. The soldiers carried rifles. They grabbed the brunette with their free hands.

  The civilian held a flashlight in one hand and a sheaf of 8 × 10 photos in the other. He shined the flashlight in the face of the brunette, then down to the top photograph. It was a grainy blowup of the blond girl’s head. The lower edge of the sign she’d been carrying was visible at the top of the frame. Her mouth was open as she shouted.

  “No,” said the civilian, pointing his flashlight at the blonde. “The other one.”

  The blonde clutched at the doorjamb and began to scream. The policemen moved to her. The curtain tore away in her hands as they dragged her out into the front room.

  The brunette shouted, “What are you doing? What are you—”

  She tried to grab the photographs out of the civilian’s hand. He fended her off with his elbow. A soldier raised the butt of his rifle to strike her. She cringed. The soldier wiped his face with his left sleeve. He looked sick.

  “Jane Marie LaBrett,” the civilian said. “By authority of Section 3, Part 79(b) of the Federal Emergency Regulations, you are hereby inducted into a penal company of the armed forces of the United States, to serve at the pleasure of the government for the duration of the emergency.”

  The civilian stepped out of the doorway so that the policemen could pass with the blond girl. She was weeping uncontrollably. Though she did not resist, her feet hung limp as the men dragged her.

  The civilian started to follow them. The brunette shrieked, “Who do you think you are, you bastard? What do you think you are?”

  The civilian turned and looked at her. He was in his late twenties. Seven years before, CIA had recruited him from the same Ivy League university the girls attended.

  “Take this one, too,” he ordered the soldiers. The brunette tried to lunge away, but one of them caught the nightgown. It held long enough before tearing that both men got good grips on her arms.

  “So far as you’re concerned, miss,” the civilian said in a voice like a snake sliding on stones, “I’m the Lord God incarnate!”

  DRAFT EXTENDED TO WOMEN

  Measures Proposed in 1944

  Now Put Into Effect

  New Orleans Times-Picayune

  Timeline B: February 13, 1973

  Tasman Sea: Aboard the

  USS Bonhomme Richard

  Timeline B: July 19, 1976

  The two turbine engines of the CH-46 helicopter were mounted on the tail, just above the boarding ramp. The twin rotors were still motionless, but even at idle the jets sounded like all the demons of hell.

  Three of the Marines in the corporal’s fire team were new-bies who’d never boarded a Sea Knight before. Two of them strode blank-eyed up the ramp, but one hesitated midway. The corporal had been expecting something like that. He put an arm around the kid’s pack and walked him up as if they were best buddies.

  The lieutenant commanding the platoon didn’t have any experience, either. Besides a rifle, the lieutenant carried a .45 in a shoulder holster, two long-bladed knives, and enough ammo for a squad. The corporal didn’t know which scared him worse: the newbies he commanded or the macho dick-head who commanded him.

  The whop of blades faintly audible over the engine noise indicated the helicopters farther forward on the Bonnie Dick’s flight deck were preparing to lift. It was a fuck of a long way, over water and over land, to Canberra. The corporal hoped to hell that if the birds got separated, his wouldn’t arrive first to land on the grounds of the Australian parliament building.

  The newbie put his mouth close to the corporal’s ear and shouted, “Will they be shooting at us, Corporal?”

  Who the fuck knows? “Hell, no, kid,” the corporal shouted. “You’ll have to wait for Nam for that. And with a little luck we’ll get some time in Sydney. Best R&R city in the world, if you like round-eyed pussy!”

  LEFT-WING COUP FOILED IN AUSTRALIA

  US VESSELS STEAM TO AID GOVERNMENT

  Plotters Would Have Withdrawn Australia From War

  New York Times

  Timeline B: July 20, 1976

  South of Ha Trung,

  North Vietnam

  Timeline B: October 2, 1983

  The seventeen bodies were laid out in a row between the firebase berm and the pad where the civilian’s black-painted helicopter waited, its turbine at idle. The battalion commander, a twenty-eight-year old lieutenant colonel, nodded to the civilian and said, “We killed more, but they dragged the bodies off. There’s at least a hundred blood trails.”

  The civilian bent, reached into the breast pocket of one of the corpses, and pulled out a letter that the soldiers had missed. He glanced at it
and smiled wryly.

  “Sir?” the colonel asked.

  The civilian turned his head. He carried a well-worn M45 submachine gun, a “Swedish K,” slung from his right shoulder. The barrel looked unusually fat because an integral silencer replaced the normal heat shield. “His mother hopes he’s keeping well,” he said. “He’s not going to keep at all in this heat, is he?”

  He crumpled the letter in his fist and threw it back down on the body. “They’re Chinese,” he said in a conversational tone. “I suppose you knew that? First time we’ve seen them in formed units.”

  “We thought they might be,” the young colonel said. “We didn’t know for sure.”

  The civilian resumed his walk down the line. If you squinted, you could imagine the bodies were so many empty sacks.

  “That’s why they came straight on the way they did,” the civilian said. He was a man of fifty. His clean fatigue uniform was without any markings or identification. The round-brimmed boonie hat he wore was so old that the sun had bleached it nearly white. “They haven’t learned what our firepower does when they try to pull that.”

  The soldier nodded. The battalion’s own six artillery pieces hadn’t been able to fire because the attackers were too close, but neighboring units had brought a barrage down to within fifty meters of the berm. The shells fell like the wrath of God on the massed communist troops.

  “They will learn, though,” the civilian continued. “The VC did, and the NVA did. I wonder if the Russians will be next?”

  The soldier looked at the civilian. He assumed the man was joking, but…

  “Do you think they can hold out much longer, sir?” he asked. “We’re killing, we’ve killed—” He spread his hands. “And the air strikes.”

  “I don’t know how much longer it’ll go on, Colonel,” the civilian said, answering a question different from the one the soldier had asked. “It’s already gone on longer than I dreamed it could. Well, analysis was never my job.”