by Rick Shelley
Captain Roo Vernon found management frustrating. He liked working with his hands, and he claimed–with more than a little justification–that he knew the workings of the Wasp better than the people who had designed and built it. After returning to the fleet from the first phase of the campaign to neutralize Tamkailo, Roo wanted very much to get inside one of “his” Wasps, to see what the extreme temperature conditions had done to the birds. Only thirteen of the wing’s twenty-four Wasps had survived the day’s fighting. Thirteen planes, sixteen pilots. That was a better ratio than usual, but it didn’t ease Roo’s concerns.
“How can we make the Wasps safer for the lads?” he asked his mechanics as they prepared to do quick maintenance inspections back aboard ship. “Any time a pilot dies because we haven’t done everything possible to protect him, it’s as bad as if we shot the lad ourselves.”
It was not the most tactful thing to say to the crew chiefs and mechanics, even if most of them had known Roo for ages. Most “ground” crews developed close relationships with their pilots. Those who had lost pilots–in the last twenty-four hours or in earlier campaigns–felt bad enough about their losses without having Roo harp on it.
“We’ve never run our birds in a place like Tamkailo,” Roo said. He pronounced the world’s name Tam-ky-lo rather than the proper Tam-kay-lo. “We don’t know what that kind of heat can do to a Wasp, despite what the computers say. The programmers who wrote that program never experienced a world like this either. Don’t just look at parts when you do your inspection, touch ’em, smell ’em. That’ll give you a better idea than looking or even electronic scanning, I’m thinking. You know what the cables and connections are supposed to feel Iike. Anything feels not one hundred percent, or you get any kind of burnt smell, pull the part and replace it. Myself, I’m going to be working with two crews to completely disassemble Yellow Three. It’s not going back into action. It received too much battle damage.”
There were a half dozen spare Wasps aboard the fleet carrier, and enough repair parts to–conceivably–build another six fighters. Although the technical manuals made a point of saying that a maintenance crew could not, repeat not, build a functional fighter from repair parts without the specialized construction facilities of a factory. Roo knew better. He had already done it once, in a maintenance hangar on Albion–mostly our of boredom.
“Let’s get to work,” Roo said, softening his voice. “If we can get the birds ready to fly again in six hours, that’ll give us another three hours to catch some sleep before we go dirtside again.” Obviously, the planes had to come first.
* * *
Zel Paitcher’s Blue Flight had been cut in half by the day’s fighting. Two of his pilots were dead. Ewell Marmon had gone early. Ewell’s wingman, Tod Corbel, had gone in the final assault on the main base. Frank Verannen and Will Tarkel had both had their Wasps shot out from under them. Verannen had been trapped in his escape pod for hours before he had been rescued and taken to the field hospital. It was uncertain whether or not he would be ready to fly again when Blue Flight returned to the surface. There were new planes ready for both Frank and Will. Besides the direct battle casualties, Ilsen Kwillen had nearly put himself out of action by pushing his Wasp at too high a gee-load. He had needed two hours in a trauma tube to repair internal injuries and might not be certified for duty in time for the second phase of the campaign.
Zel might have consoled himself by thinking that of the three pilots in the l3th who had survived the destruction of their Wasps, two had come from his flight. But he didn’t. It wouldn’t have helped.
“Decimated means you’ve lost ten percent,” he muttered to himself as he walked back to his quarters from the mess hall. “I lost fifty percent. In one day.” Marmon and Corbel had worked well together. “Almost like Reston and Paitcher,” Zel whispered. He had flown as wingman to Slee Reston for more than a year before Slee was killed on Jordan.
It still hurt to think about Slee.
* * *
KIeffer Dacik refused to let himself think about the men he had lost taking Site Alpha on Tamkailo, or the men still being lost at Site Charley half a world away. He knew the numbers. But he would not let himself dwell on them, not now. If he did. . .
“The first operation was a fiasco, gentlemen,” Dacik said, addressing his staff and subordinate commanders from the three ground units that had taken part. “It started with low comedy and ended with too much tragedy.” He shrugged. “A lot of it we couldn’t help. Some we should have.”
He did not waste much time rehashing the mistakes of the first day. Brief mention of a couple of the worst preventable errors sufficed.
“We can’t afford any screw-ups at Site Bravo,” he said after he had finished his recapitulation. “There is absolutely no allowance for error. We’ll have only the one night to complete that operation. In just after local sunset, we absolutely must be off the ground by dawn tomorrow morning. We can’t protect our men against the daytime heat at Site Bravo. Jorgen, you have the latest intelligence update?”
This conference was taking place in the Combat Intelligence Center on Capricorn, the flagship. All of the commanders were physically present–to the annoyance of those quartered on other ships in the fleet. The transit time came out of what little time they would have had for sleep.
“It looks better than it did twenty-four hours ago,” Olsen started. “Sure, the Heggies have had extra time to prepare for us, but that preparation does not seem to have been designed to strengthen the defenses at Site Bravo. Quite the opposite. Our estimate is that nearly half of the forces that were there have been transferred to Site Charley on the northern continent. Site Bravo was always the smallest of the three Schlinal facilities on Tamkailo. Conditions there are . . . simply impossible for large numbers of men. Our current estimate is that there might be seven hundred civilians there–prisoners, penal exiles, and their descendants. Individuals of no military value to the Hegemony–and quite possibly a security threat to them. As far as military assets, no more than one very short regiment, light infantry, perhaps fewer than one thousand men. Those soldiers are, moreover–as far as we can deduce–strictly garrison troops, not part of the force that the Hegemony was marshaling on Tamkailo for its next offensive against the Accord. Garrison troops who were, according to every intelligence estimate I’ve seen, chosen for this duty either as a result of, or in lieu of, disciplinary action. But they are acclimated to local conditions, insofar as that is possible.” Jorgen looked up from his monitor and glanced around at the others. All of them were watching him.
“We’re not absolutely certain why the Heggies even bother with such an impossible location. They’ve made what accommodation they can with the climate. What work has to be done is done at night, local routine completely switched about, but even so . . .” He shook his head. “There is evidence of mining. Since there is also mining done around the other two sites, we have to assume that Site Bravo offers some metal or mineral that isn’t available at the other places. What that, or those, might be, we can’t say. The suggestion is that the Heggies might be mining radioactive elements at Site Bravo.”
“Is there a storage depot, like at Alpha?” Colonel Foss asked.
“A much smaller facility than either Alpha or Charley,” Olsen said. “Much smaller. We feel that ninety percent of the storage is for the use of the garrison and inmates–civilian residents.” “Inmates” was as good a word as any for the civilian population of Tamkailo. “There seems to be one building that is particularly well isolated and circled with its own defensive measures. Whatever is in that building must be the key to the operation.”
“Okay, Jorgen, that’ll do for now,” Dacik said. “You can key the rest of it for them.” Olsen nodded and Dacik turned his attention to the others.
“We’re going to deviate significantly from the earlier plan for Site Bravo,” the general said. He looked at each of the commanders in turn, ending u
p with Van Stossen. He stared without blinking at the commander of the 13th.
“I’m going to lay primary responsibility for Site Bravo on you, Van.”
Stossen barely had time to think, It doesn’t surprise me. The 13th always draws the short straw, before Dacik continued.
“We’re going to try to take Site Bravo with just the 13th. Your lads have the new Corey belts. They’ll land right on top of the enemy. The infantry, at least. The Wasps will go in to provide cover. Use half of your recon platoons to establish an LZ for the Havocs and the support crews for air and artillery, within gun range for the howitzers. With a little bit of luck, though, you won’t even have to use the artillery.
“The 8th and 97th will stand by up here,” Dacik continued. “If you get into a bind, I’ll send them in as reinforcements, or as a rescue party. But if the 13th can handle Site Bravo alone, the 8th and 97th will be diverted straight to Site Charley. Things are getting a little too sticky there. The 5th and 34th are in trouble.”
“We’ll do what we can, sir,” Stossen said.
Dacik nodded. “The belts are our edge, Van. Make it count. You get done at Bravo, the 13th will be lifted directly to Site Charley. The Wasps will boost back up here and get dropped again right away. We need everything we can get for Site Charley.”
And hope that it’s enough, Dacik thought.
AFTER TWO full meals and, for those who could manage it, as much as six hours of sleep, the troops aboard the fleet transports prepared for another combat landing. While the men of the 13th knew that they were destined for Site Bravo, the men of the 8th and 97th could not be sure where they would be landing. Shuttles were ready for the reserve units. The men were dressed and ready to go, though still in their barracks bays aboard ship. They would move to the hangars and landers once the 13th was away.
Thirty minutes before their scheduled departure, the men of the 13th filed through the ship toward the shuttle hangars. For the most part, the men were silent, almost sullen. It wasn’t simply the prospect of more combat that affected them. It was more the knowledge that they were jumping back into the most oppressive climate that any of them had ever experienced. They had been warned that Site Bravo would be even worse than Site Alpha, that they absolutely had to be finished before sunrise brought impossible temperatures.
There was not a man in the 13th who had not successfully faced the usual fears of combat before, if only during the one day that they had already spent on Tamkailo. Human enemies could be fought, and beat. The heat of the tropics of this world could not be fought effectively, could not be beat–except by retreat, by going underground or into well-insulated buildings during the hours when the sun was above the horizon. Long before midday, the heat at Site Bravo would be literally enough to fry a brain, to kill.
This time, none of the troop shuttles were crowded. Normally, going into a campaign, a single SAT line company filled two shuttles, with the men crammed against one another, side by side with scarcely room to fall over. Two of the 13th’s companies had lost so many men in the conquest of Site Alpha that each fit into a single shuttle. Other companies managed to squeeze two companies into three shuttles. Only three of the eight line companies still came anywhere near to filling two shuttles with their men.
“Squad leaders, one more check of your men,” Joe Baerclau ordered as Echo Company waited to board its shuttles. Echo still needed two, but it would not crowd either one.
The platoon’s three squad leaders moved among their men, looking at power settings on antigrav belts and Armanoc carbines, testing helmet circuits, talking to their men. When that was done, the squad leaders checked one another, and Sauv Degtree checked the platoon sergeant. The routine was more to occupy minds than because of any real need. Keep everyone busy thinking about immediate–and manageable–tasks. Don’t give them idle time to worry about things beyond their control. Keep them thinking as soldiers.
First squad, second squad, fourth squad. As Joe received the expected positive reports, he had to think again about the third squad, wiped out except for its sergeant, who now had first squad. A fourth of the platoon gone right there, in addition to its other losses.
Joe checked his own gear again, for at least the tenth time. Then he looked toward the door at the head of the passageway. It was time for Echo to be moving into the hangar to board their shuttles. While he stared, the door opened and a naval rating gestured the soldiers through. Four platoons into the shuttle on the left, four into the shuttle on the right. Once the two lines started moving, it didn’t take long for the company to board the shuttles, for the men to strap themselves in place along the bench seats in the troop bay.
Then it was time to wait again, but not for long.
The hatches were sealed. Many of the men felt a momentary pressure on their ears as the shuttle was put through its own checks, Two minutes later, the green lights over each hatch were replaced by red lights. That meant that the hangar was being depressurized. The air was being pumped out of the hangar so that the huge outer doors could be opened safely. When the interior air pressure was down to less than a tenth of “normal,” the doors would be opened and the two shuttles ejected with the rest of the air and by small catapults. The shuttles had to be clear of the hangars before they could turn on their own antigrav drives.
“Prepare for separation,” the shuttle pilot warned, giving his passengers the customary thirty seconds’ notice.
Joe took a deep breath and held it for a count of ten. He could not have recalled what had started the ritual, or when it had begun. Somehow, it had become part of his personal routine. Another deep breath was held to a count of five. He looked around at the men of his platoon. The faces were hidden behind visors now, the tinted surface a mask for the expression beneath.
“Five seconds,” the pilot warned.
Joe blinked a couple of times, then looked up at the bulkhead across from him. There were monitors spaced around the troop bay. At the moment, the cameras feeding those monitors were divided between a view of the exterior door and the opposite side of the hangar.
The outer door opened. It always seemed to “pop” open to Joe, who had never been able to suppress his amazement that anything so large could be moved so quickly. Or so silently. He knew that sound could not travel through a vacuum, but the outer doors were connected to the hull of the ship, and when the doors opened, the shuttle was sitting on the hangar deck. There was a solid connection. But there was no sound, no physical rumble of vibration.
There were several minutes of weightlessness once the shuttle was clear of the ship, while the fleet of shuttles formed up for the assault. Although the shuttles were powered by antigravity drives, no specific provision had been made for providing artificial gravity for the people inside. But all of the troops were strapped in, and they knew how to deal with zero gravity. It took some of the pressure off where straps and gear confined the men. And added different, Iesser pressures where their harnesses held them in place.
Once the shuttle was under acceleration, they would know the feeling of weight again.
Joe closed his eyes. He had actually come to enjoy the sensation of losing track of up and down–as long as it didn’t Iast for long. The shuttle pilot was short on commentary. Some pilots kept up a running account of what they were doing in these early moments. Not this one. After announcing separation, the pilot didn’t speak again until it was time to warn the troops that the power descent was about to begin.
An attack descent was like nothing any civilian passenger was ever likely to experience. Civilian shuttles providing service between passenger liners or spaceport satellites and the ground would merely use enough power to set them in a fuel-efficient glide, using engines minimally to adjust course and cushion the landing. Troop shuttles carrying men into a combat landing, or a drop, were more profligate with fuel. Instead of trusting to a planet’s gravity to bring them down pilots accelerated towa
rd the surface. The surfaces of military landers were designed to take the extreme heat that was generated pushing down through the atmosphere, and the entire structure was able to withstand far more stress during braking maneuvers than any of the humans who rode it were.
The weight of acceleration moved above two gees for most of the ride in and topped out over three. The men in the troop bay could judge their approach as easily by which way seemed to be “down” as by watching the monitors on the bulkheads. Some stared at the screens. Others kept their eyes shut throughout the descent.
On most previous descents, Mort had been one of the watchers, keeping up a running commentary–on almost anything but the coming fight. This time, he remained silent. He glanced at the monitors only rarely. He spent much more time staring at the piece of deck immediately in front of his feet. He stared and concentrated on that small area of metal, using it as a focus to try to keep his mind blank. He did not want to think, not about the coming fight or the fight of the day before, not about anything. The only time he snapped out of his near trance was when Sauv Degtree or Joe Baerclau spoke to him for the necessary squad checks. He was still the leader of a fire team. He had duties.