by James Rouch
“What do you want me to take out next?” Dooley snapped the first reload round into place and panned along the convoy.
Using the last of a clip on a command car that was trying to manoeuvre around the pyre the Zil had become, Hyde took in the effect of the squad's fire. It was frustrating, there were so many juicy targets and they hadn't the weight of ordnance to do a thorough job.
“Hit another of the tractors. If we can't smash them all, we'll bottle up as many as we can.”
About to turn his attention back to the command car, Hyde saw it rock on its suspension as a rifle grenade detonated immediately above it. Peppered by the storm of fragments, it shot backward out of control, a bloodied head lolling from a side window. Without check to its gathering speed it veered on an erratic course, cannoning off a gutted radio truck and hurtling over the edge of the Autobahn. A wall of discoloured water hid its roll into the ditch, to be instantly replaced by spurting steam.
The foul fumes from the launcher's first stage ignition percolated through the filters of Dooley's respirator. He held his breath against them as he kept all his attention on his selected victim.
Its main motor failed to fire correctly and the Milan swooped toward the ground trailing a dangerous telltale stream of thin white exhaust. Barely skimming the surface of the field there was no chance of the projectile reaching its intended target and Dooley shifted to the closest available. A towering six-wheeled Kraz mounting a squat hydraulic crane —even that proved too far.
Pancaking onto the Autobahn, the missile broke up and threw a sheet of burning warhead material and rocket propellant in a broad fan over the scarred concrete.
An erratic scattering of automatic fire was being returned now, much of it converging on the aiming point offered by the Milan's betraying plume of smoke. In the still air it hung like a faintly accusing pointer to its source.
Tracer walked up the field toward Sergeant Hyde, and he had time to claw into the earth before the last few rounds of the burst punched deep holes in the lengths of bough heaped up before him. Splinters of wood and chunks of bark flew over his head.
Then he heard a more ominous noise. A loud distinctive punching crackle sound he knew all too well. From the rear of the convoy soared fat orange gobs of tracer. Faster and faster they came until they slashed at lightning speed through the dead timber around him.
Those first rounds came the closest, but Hyde knew that with a 23mm flak cannon joining in from somewhere among the smoke-shrouded rump of the column, the odds had suddenly changed.
It was too late now to wish there'd been more time to select the ambush site. Their transport's turret-mounted Rarden cannon would have been more than a match for the enemy weapon, but placing it among the jagged woodland would have been impossible. The spears of flayed timber would have ripped the hover- craft's tough ride-skirt to shreds and disabled it more effectively than a direct hit.
Despite the casualties and damage they had inflicted, the Russian unit was largely intact and there was little more they could do. Bitterly Hyde blasted off two full magazines in quick succession toward the mobile crane, but the massive truck appeared to soak up the beads of tracer without harm.
“Use the last round. Any target. Just make sure of a hit.” Dooley had already reloaded, and as he fired could only hope that another malfunction would not signal their precise position. “No go. It's dead.”
“So are we if we hang around until that cross-eyed Red gets better on that 23mm. Is that thing safe to cart away?”
“Can't swear to it.” Machine gun bullets punched two holes in a log beside Dooley. “They have been known to go off after a hang fire.”
“Leave it, then. Pass the word to move out.” Unclipping a phosphorus grenade, Hyde waited until he could see the others were clear before moving back into deeper cover and lobbing the chunky cylinder beside the Milan launcher.
He didn't wait to see it ignite, but ran crouched low to catch up to the others. A seemingly solid stream of cannon tracer slashed through the woods to their right. Several of the rounds found still standing trunks and split them with giant cleaver force, and sending scabs of bark high into the air.
Almost up with the others, Hyde saw a man go down ahead of him. He recognized Thome's distinctive Tiger-stripe helmet cover.
“I'm OK, just tripped. Oh shit, oh bloody shit.” There was a long tear in the leg of Thome's protective suit. The material under it had also been ripped and speckles of dark blood were already forming on a long graze.
“You'll be OK.” Unclipping the sling from his rifle, Hyde bound it about the man's thigh to pull the fabric together. “You've taken all your shots and pills?” It was a question he hardly need ask. They were all too well aware of the likely consequences of not doing so to overlook the regular dosing with nerve-gas antidotes. “Keep moving. We'll scrub you down as soon as we get back.”
Behind them, despite the obscuring smokescreen, the Russian fire was growing in volume. Spent bullets fell about them. When they started down a steep reverse slope to the fold in the terrain where their transport waited, the sounds of the blind retaliation were suddenly reduced. Only a rare stray blob of ricocheting cannon tracer served to show that the Russians were maintaining their profligate expenditure of ammunition.
The air-cushion armoured personnel carrier sat low on its collapsed ride skirt. Its camouflage paint blended in perfectly with the dead birch trees among which it was parked. As they approached, its raked bow door lowered and they entered by the ramp it formed.
Last to board, Thorne collapsed in the opening. Gloved hands grabbed at his webbing to drag him in, but were pushed aside by the sergeant.
“He's gone. We'll have to leave him here. The body's contaminated.” “I'm not fucking leaving him to rot.” Dooley stepped over the still figure. “Someone give me a hand.”
Ripper dived out past the NCO and helped the anti-tank man to lift Thorne onto the starboard engine pod where they wedged him among the spare ride-skirt panels. A few turns of loose rope around the legs and waist of the corpse made sure of its staying there.
“You're bloody ghouls.” Hyde plugged into the intercom circuit as he took his place at the command position across from their driver.
The door silently closed and then there was only the pale illumination from the instrument panels and that reflected through the periscopes down each side and from the vision blocks in the command cupola.
“What's the heading, Sarge?” Burke only asked as a matter of form. He'd already taken the turbofan engines to full thrust and was setting a course back for their base.
“How are we for time?”
In the turret Clarence heard the sergeant ask, and withdrawing the clip of proximity fused anti-aircraft shells from the compact breech of the Rarden, substi- tuted three armour-piercing instead.
“I make it ten before ... why?” A suspicion jumped into Burke's mind. “If you're thinking what I think you are, Sarge ...”
“Don't think, do. Take a right, circle the woods, all the speed you've got.”
Dipping under the surge of acceleration the HAPC skidded through a tight turn with its nose down and a shower of dirt thrown high to mark its progress.
“I want a maximum effort.” Though it made no difference, Hyde turned to look back down the interior as he said it. “There'll only be time for the one pass. I don't expect us to be taking any ammunition home with us.”
Ripper thought of Thome's body, flopping and bumping against the hull, arms and legs outstretched, as though crucified. That's what they'd all be if somebody's watch was slow. “We're gonna be ever so deep in the shit if the brass find out about this, Sarge.”
“Well, the only way they'll find out is if the Ruskies kick up a stink and fix it on us. Let's make sure there aren't too many witnesses.”
Moving at top speed the hovercraft rolled and swayed in a sickening ship-like manner. The automatic ride height sensors failed to respond fast enough to the rapid changes in terrain a
s they crossed patches of bomb cratered landscape.
Like the others, Dooley had turned to man a ball-mounted machine-pistol. He almost lost his balance as the craft lurched and canted over on another violent change of heading.
Above him the Rarden opened up with an ear-splitting crack that was hardly lessened by the respirator, or the continual hiss of static over the intercom. Bracing himself against the jolting of the wild ride, he waited for a target.
There was a series of tremendously loud bangs and the craft shuddered as it took several impacts. All Dooley could see through his periscope was giant orange tracer skimming past so close he didn't think it possible they could miss. Then three more struck the turret, and their gun went silent.
FOUR
“What's the problem?” Hyde had only a second or two in which to decide whether or not to abort the attack. They were still racing straight at the rear of the convoy. The brief respite from the surprisingly accurate Russian cannon fire could only be because they were reloading.
“I've fixed it.”
As proof of their gunner's word, Hyde heard the Rarden punch a measured trio of shots toward the trailer mounted flak-gun. The first shot went wild, the second was closer, seeming to strike the tow-bar joining the trailer to a light truck. The third impacted immediately below the 23mm barrel at the moment it began to reply.
There was a flash, unaccompanied by smoke and then the enemy weapon elevated skyward and loosed a long burst into the air.
Knowing he must have got the gunner and probably the elevation mechanism, Clarence took his time over the next shot. Waiting for a smooth patch of ground where the range was point blank, he put two shells into the mount from the flank.
A feed belt or magazine ignited and hid the cannon and the remains of its crew inside a sparkling cascade of brilliant white and blue flame.
One or two of the convoy's machine guns chased the hovercraft with long bursts, but their attempts to bring their weapons to bear failed as they underestimated the attacker's speed. Several others were still firing at the tree line and made no move to switch their fire to the real danger.
If they even recognized it, they left it too late. Crossing the ditch where it was nearly filled by rubble from craters, the dashing hovercraft seemed almost to take off as it leapt onto the Autobahn behind-the last vehicle in the convoy.
A captured Land Rover with slapped-on Warpac markings, it was actually reversing to get away when the HAPC sideswiped it. The impact spun the Rover through 360 degrees, hurling its driver onto the road. Before he could scramble to safety a ripple of machine gun fire from a side mounted weapon aboard the hover- craft virtually cut him in two. Another burst riddled his late transport and started a blaze among cans of grease and oil in the back.
“Look at them run.” Dooley had all the targets he could hope for, or cope with. A hundred meters on the far side of the road Burke put his machine through a right angle turn to bring it on course parallel with the stationary transport. With speed reduced to jogging pace they travelled slowly the full length of the convoy.
Suddenly aware they were caught on what they had thought was the safer blind side of the road, the Russian soldiers panicked, some dying as they collided with each other in their rush to find new places of safety. With steady precision, shells from the Rarden 30mm cannon were pumped into the motors and fuel tanks of every vehicle and piece of plant and machinery. Under the ferocious impacts, cylinder blocks were cracked open and fuel, cooling and electrical systems smashed and shredded. Fire sprouted instantly and tractors, trailers and loads alike were engulfed by infernos of flame.
A group of Russian field engineers had taken shelter beneath the bed of a large compressor. Oil poured over them as a solid shot ripped open the motor's sump. They became torches as an incendiary shell burst and ignited the spillage.
Other human targets were sought out by the armoured hovercraft's infantry passengers, and brought down by swirling cones of automatic fire as flames flushed them from hiding.
Using the roof-mounted grenade launcher, Hyde sent salvos of anti-personnel and smoke bombs at the road. Scything fragments and eruptions of white phosphorus added to the death and destruction.
“That's it, job's done.” Hyde shouted to their driver. “Get us out of here fast!”
As they raced from the scene, Hyde set the bomb thrower to lob decoy devices in their wake. Noise generators tumbled into strident life on the ground. A screening pall of hot smoke was created by the sequential detonation of a mass of sub-munitions. Bursting in the air, each short lived fiery-centred cloud could draw off any missiles homing by infra-red emission detection, while masking them from observation by any thermal imaging sight.
Traversing the turret, Clarence took a last look at the convoy before the smoke concealed it from view. From a rapidly increasing distance it appeared as if a full half kilometre of Autobahn was a continuous sheet of red and yellow flame. An impenetrable curtain of black smoke rose high above it, blotting out the pale sun.
“The Reds will create a stink over this.” Through the thick, clouded prisms of the command cupola, Hyde took in the scene. He heard their gunner's words, but made no reply. It was done, irreversible. Only now did he remember to look at the time. He couldn't be certain whether or not they had continued the one sided engagement beyond the cease-fire deadline. Well if they had, he'd be hearing all about it soon enough.
“We must have copped a bit of damage.” Burke was having increasing trouble keeping the craft on course. “I think the ride skirt's taken a hit. We're spilling air.”
“There's a railroad overpass two kilometres dead ahead.” Hyde checked his map, though he had hardly any need. They had fought over this area, to the east of Hanover, many times before. “Take us down into it. Turn south, there's a road bridge, we'll tuck in underneath it. No point in advertising where we are.”
As the hovercraft nosed over the edge of the embankment and slewed sideways down to the track bed, they became aware of a steady leathery drumming against the left-front of the hull. The machine had taken on a definite and uncorrectable list to that side.
“Must be that Land Rover that got in the way.” Burke examined the chunk of aluminium. “Looks like a part of his wheel arch.”
“I don't give a damn if it's a part of the driver's crotch.” Hyde surveyed the ride- skirt. “How long to replace those panels?”
Burke shrugged. “Maybe thirty minutes. Quicker to do both than mess about patching the one that's still hanging on.”
“I want it done in twenty.” Hyde reached into the craft and pulled a Stinger missile from under the driver's seat. “Give me a whistle when you're ready. And for Christ's sake do something about him.” He indicated the body entangled with the components Ripper and Garrett were trying to free. “Cover him over.”
Looking from the Stinger the sergeant held nonchalantly, Burke found himself involuntarily scanning the sky. “No chance of us being pounced on, is there? The truce is in force now, isn't it?”
“Why take chances? I’ll be up on the bridge. Remember, twenty minutes.” The bank was steep and with his awkwardly bulky load Hyde was sweating profusely by the time he reached the top. He threaded his way through the rusted remains of a wire fence and walked to the centre of the bridge.
A wrecked West German civilian ambulance and a couple of well bleached skeletons stood at the far end. The vehicle's front was crushed flat where it had been bulldozed aside by a tank. He hoped that the knocked out T72 in the distance was the one that had done it. Both tableaus dated from the first days of the war.
Then the Warpac forces had rampaged across this part of West Germany. It had seemed like nothing could stop them. On the first day, heedless of losses, they had made forty miles in places. Hyde remembered being at a HQ, the first evening, seeing the red flags sprouting on the situation map as Russian reconnaissance elements and Spetsnaz units turned up in places they had no right to be, far behind the NATO front line.
But as the markers of NATO units had been steadily moved farther and farther west and grown steadily fewer in number, although they weren't to know it, the Warpac advance was already in deep trouble.
It had been a totally unexpected factor that had first dislocated and then stopped the pell-mell assault. Soviet satellite troops, mostly Polish and Hungarian but with a few East German also, had mutinied.
Months later, when NATO forces had begun to re-capture odd pockets of territory, they had come across mass graves. In one Hyde had counted over a thousand bodies in the top layer alone. The stench had driven him off from completing even that crude estimate. But not before he had recognized the uniforms.
The pit had contained the rotting remains of a whole East German infantry battalion. Slaughtered to a man, with no pretence of selection or discrimination. Officers, drivers, medics, all had been mowed down and dumped like so many bags of garbage.
Since then they'd seen countless other examples of the Communist way of instilling loyalty and discipline. What an ugly farce it made of all the disarmament talk of the 1980s. All of Gorbachev's “glasnost” had counted for nothing when the Russian military chiefs judged it had gone too far and taken over the reins.
There was no real danger of their coming under air attack. Hyde had used that as an excuse to get away on his own for a few minutes. He could hardly believe that this truce meant the end of the war. There had been five others before it, none had lasted more than a couple of weeks. The average was six days.
But if it was, what then? When the war had started he'd dreaded a disabling wound. Well, he'd got a disfiguring one, and now because of it, he dreaded the peace.
The chemical level indicator was registering a low reading, he took off his helmet and lifted his respirator. Flakes of graft tissue came with it, adhering to the straps.