The Eternal War tr-4

by Alex Scarrow

  As he spoke a single shot whistled close by. Maddy scrambled down into the trench. ‘Oh my God! Was that …?’

  ‘Aimed at you?’ Devereau nodded sternly. ‘Yes.’

  Becks dropped down beside her.

  Maddy looked around at the bodies splayed along the bottom of the trench, some still stirring, moaning. She glimpsed ragged wounds, puckered pink flesh, dark blood leaking, spurting. She could smell the burn of cordite in the air, but, beneath that, the other smells of battle: sweat, vomit. And the murmur of pitiful voices of dying men.

  She felt ill: light-headed and queasy.

  Wainwright noticed. ‘How quickly we forget what war actually looks like.’

  Maddy swallowed, pale-faced, choking back her own urge to vomit. ‘I … uh … I came to find you.’ She took a few deep breaths. ‘I sent another message through. To make the rendezvous sooner.’

  ‘How soon?’

  ‘I can’t say, but we have a way of knowing when they’re there. And the moment they arrive, we can pick them up.’

  ‘When?’ asked Devereau.

  ‘It could be any time,’ she replied.

  A grin flashed across his face. Wainwright shared it. ‘Then the longer the British fool about down there on the beach, the better it is for us.’

  ‘Indeed.’ Devereau turned to Maddy. He lowered his voice. ‘And the moment you send your colleagues back to … What year was it?’

  ‘1831.’

  ‘1831 … this world will change?’

  ‘Pretty soon after, yeah. Sometimes immediately. Sometimes a few hours.’

  ‘It is impossible to accurately predict the arrival time of a reality wave after a timeline event alteration,’ added Becks.

  ‘But it would be soon,’ Maddy reassured them. She glanced around quickly at the shifting carpet of bodies. ‘Soon enough that, you know, you could stop this fighting as soon as I’ve sent them back.’

  ‘You mean surrender?’ Wainwright and Devereau shared a look. ‘I wonder … would this time wave arrive soon enough for us to both escape the firing squad?’

  Maddy shook her head. ‘I … I can’t say when. It might even be a day or so — ’

  ‘Then I think we are in agreement, Colonel Wainwright, that we would rather fight on until the moment this wave arrives?’

  Wainwright nodded. ‘Complete agreement, Colonel Devereau.’

  Maddy puffed air. ‘All right, but …’ She turned and pointed up the slope towards the horseshoe trench and beyond that to the very top of the hump of bricks in the shadow of the overhanging ruins of Williamsburg Bridge. ‘The antennae array … that has got to be protected whatever happens. Do you understand? If it gets damaged, then this is all over.’

  ‘Then we shall keep the fight down there for as long as we can,’ said Wainwright. ‘What of my tank? Is its engine still running?’

  ‘Yeah, it’s running; we’ve got power. And the displacement machine is charged up and ready to use. So that’s good.’

  ‘So our business is waiting, then,’ said Devereau.

  Maddy nodded. ‘I find I do a lot of that in this business … you know? Waiting.’ She half smiled. ‘Kinda sucks.’

  CHAPTER 81

  2001, New York

  Captain Ewan McManus looked up at the sky. The low combed-out clouds above New York were a beautiful salmon pink from the late-afternoon sun. Another couple of hours and it was going to be dark.

  Colonel Donohue had his officers gathered around him: company captains, lieutenants, sergeants. ‘We’re up next, gentlemen. Word is the Lancashire Rifles have wet their toes and got a firm foothold for us over there. As you can see — ’ he turned round and gestured, past the sappers putting the final pieces of their landing rafts together, to the far side of the East River — ‘the … uh, mutineers … have two lines of defence. A trench works running parallel to the river, from those factory buildings there on the left, all the way along to the remnants of that bridge on the right. Behind that, they have a bow-shaped trench, which seems to curve beneath the bridge. I imagine they will be treating that as a secondary defence position.’

  McManus craned his neck along with all the other officers to get a better look.

  ‘Beyond those two defence lines … we’re into the old Northern defence line. As I’m sure you’re already aware, a Confederate regiment, Virginians I believe, the chaps that up until recently were holding the ground we’re standing on right now, have mutinied along with a Northern regiment. So … we find ourselves in the rather unusual position of having a temporary understanding with the French High Command.’

  ‘Understanding, sir?’

  Colonel Donohue nodded. ‘Neither side really wants this nonsense to spread. So the French are prepared to let us go in on their behalf and sterilize the wound, so to speak.’

  ‘That’s very trusting of them!’ called out someone. A ripple of good-natured laughter spread among them.

  ‘Quite so.’ He smiled. ‘And more fool them.’

  Heads nodded. Although it was still officially supposed to be top secret, every officer in every participating regiment was well aware this little uprising was a convenient opportunity for the British to launch their final push against the North. In fact, this futile act of rebellion couldn’t have come at a better time for them. The French were prepared to hold back while the British stepped in and crushed it, not knowing their intention was to continue pushing on, punching through their North’s front line and rolling up their east-coast flank.

  ‘Captain McManus?’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘I think this might just be a splendid opportunity to field-test our Dreadnoughts before the proper fighting begins … don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Take your company ashore as support for them … but I’d really like to see how well our experimentals perform on their own, all right?’

  ‘Support only, yes, sir.’

  ‘Rest of you can follow in the second flotilla. Best not have too many of our chaps nearby when those monsters get a sniff of the enemy.’

  Colonel Donohue turned round again to look at the landing area on the far side of the river. A low mist of gunsmoke hung above it like a membrane, and every now and then a distant crackle of gunfire was accompanied by another faint plume of blue-grey smoke winking into existence.

  ‘And God help those poor souls when that happens.’

  CHAPTER 82

  2001, near New Chelmsford

  ‘Bob? How much further now?’

  Bob eased back on the throttle sticks as the tractor’s big ridged wheels rolled down into a shallow river and splashed arcs of spray either side of them.

  ‘Information: two miles, one hundred and seven yards from this location.’

  The tractor emerged from the river on the far side, leaving two deep ridges carved in the wet mud of the riverbank.

  ‘Two miles?’

  ‘Affirmative.’

  ‘Then stop right here.’

  Bob did as instructed, easing the throttles down to an idle, disengaging the gears and pulling a braking lever. He looked at Liam. ‘Why?’

  Sal nodded. ‘Yeah … we’re nearly there!’

  ‘That’s exactly why,’ said Liam. He turned and pointed out of the mud-spattered rear window of the cabin. ‘We’ve left a trail a blind man could follow. If there were any policemen or militia called to find this tractor … it won’t be difficult for them.’

  It was approaching dusk. The sun was casting a rose-hued glow and long cool shadows across the pastoral landscape around them. Far away to the right, a small village nestled among sycamore trees, and chimneys leaked threads of smoke into a peach sky.

  ‘If we drive all the way to the rendezvous point,’ he continued, ‘we could be leading a posse of coppers or soldiers right to the window. It’s two miles from here … if we get running, we could be there in what … twenty minutes or so?’

  Bob nodded. ‘This is a sensible tactical decision.’

&
nbsp; Lincoln groaned and pointed at his old boots — one of them was flapping open at the front where a seam in the leather had split. Long hairy toes waggled through a threadbare sock. ‘My feet are as spent as a pauper’s purse.’

  ‘Oh shadd-yah! You lazy-bones.’

  Liam opened the cabin door and jumped out on to the riverbank. ‘Come on! It’s not far now!’

  Bob dropped down heavily beside him. ‘Correct, not far.’

  Sal pushed Lincoln out in front of her. ‘We’ll be there soon enough.’

  CHAPTER 83

  2001, New York

  Maddy looked at the monitor in front of her. Another fuzzy, low-resolution, blocky image of what appeared to be a muddy field full of long wooden sheds. She could see a few trees, and a sky growing dark.

  Computer-Bob was sending a narrow-thread signal to the rendezvous location, briefly checking every ten minutes for any density fluctuations and grabbing a pinhole image of the location at the same time. It was slowly eating into the full charge they’d had on the displacement machine; of the twelve green charge-LEDs, three of them were dark now.

  Another dozen glimpses and they were going to be eating into stored energy they’d need to get Liam and the others back to 1831 and bring them home.

  Come on, Liam! Where the hell are you?

  He could make out six more landing rafts slowly chugging their way across the river. Devereau watched with growing unease as the soldiers still holding a position on the shingle behind their panel-barriers began to edge away from the middle of the landing area — where the six boats seemed to be heading towards.

  ‘James …’ he said in the gathering gloom. Wainwright was somewhere nearby. ‘Wainwright!’

  He heard Wainwright make his way along the trench, a hasty word of encouragement and a pat on the shoulder for each man he passed. Presently he was beside Devereau.

  ‘What is it?’

  Devereau pointed and handed him his field glasses. ‘Reinforcements coming.’

  Wainwright squinted into the lenses, adjusting the focus as he panned up along the box-like hull of one of them. The protective panels were up, hiding whatever troops were inside. He thought he caught the bobbing of a head over the top — some sort of movement from within. He adjusted the binoculars on the flag fluttering lifelessly at the back of the craft, beside the helmsman’s position.

  ‘If I could just see the regimental banner … I can tell …’ His words faded.

  ‘What? What is it?’

  Wainwright lowered the glasses. ‘Black Watch.’

  Devereau knew them: one of the British army’s very best regiments. He puffed his cheeks and forced a smile. ‘Well then, we shall have a more even-handed fight this time round.’

  Wainwright shook his head warily. ‘No … William,’ his voice a whisper for Devereau’s ears alone. ‘This isn’t good. The Black Watch are the regiment they have been trialling experimental units with.’

  ‘Experimental units?’

  The haunted look on Wainwright’s face told him more than he wanted to hear. ‘Good God … you don’t mean …?’

  ‘Eugenics … yes.’

  Devereau turned to look back at the river. The six high-panel-sided rafts were nearly all the way across, the sound of their motors chugging and spitting in the stillness that had settled over this contested patch of cratered and weed-strewn wasteland.

  He stroked his beard absently, insistently. ‘Then … we must be sure to concentrate all our fire on those rafts. On whatever monsters are inside.’

  Wainwright nodded.

  Because whatever creatures are in there … if they get into the trench …

  ‘The men should know this,’ he added.

  ‘Agreed.’

  Devereau cupped hands round his mouth. ‘Listen … men!’

  The soft murmur of voices along the trench, a hundred different whispered conversations, ceased.

  ‘The rafts approaching … those vessels out there contain eugenic units!’

  He’d expected a roar of panic, perhaps even the clatter of weapons dropping and the first of his men clambering out of the trench and making a run for it. Instead he was met with absolute silence and several hundred grime-encrusted faces along the line of the trench turned his way, faces absorbing the meaning of what he’d just said.

  ‘Understand, we CANNOT afford to let these monsters reach us! Is this clear?’

  Frozen faces, frozen expressions, mouths hanging open … yet silence still.

  ‘Is this CLEAR?’

  Sergeant Freeman took the lead. ‘Aye, sir.’

  ‘Whatever creatures step down from those rafts, we will kill every last one of them! We will gun them down before they even step foot on the shingle!’

  Some of the men cheered unconvincingly.

  ‘Check your weapons, check your ammo! And make ready!’ He turned to look back down at the river.

  Of the six landing rafts he’d spotted approaching, the two on the left and two on the right had pulled slightly ahead, beaching themselves in the spaces between the first wave of vessels. The middle two were holding back.

  What are they up to?

  The panels dropped on the four flanking rafts, and British troops wasted no time spilling down the ramps into the water. Some of his men began firing. An uncertain ripple of gunfire.

  The middle two … whatever monsters they have for us are in those.

  ‘HOLD YOUR FIRE!’

  Freeman and several other NCOs carried the order up the line and the firing ceased. The last thing they needed to be doing as the panels dropped on the last two rafts was swapping out empty cartridges.

  The Black Watch waded quickly ashore and found the covered positions on the shingle vacated by the first wave of men. Devereau found himself getting impatient, cursing at the panels to drop, anxious to see what horrors the eugenologists back in Britain had conjured out of the coded chemistry of nature.

  He heard a British officer barking an order. And then a moment later saw several dozen small round grenades tossed on to the shingle. They began to hiss as they spewed thick mustard-coloured columns of smoke. His first thought was that it was a poisoned gas, but then the men down there were not wearing masks and surely they would have tossed their grenades up the slope towards the trench.

  Wainwright cursed. ‘Another wretched smokescreen.’

  ‘HOLD YOUR AIM!’ shouted Devereau.

  We’ll hear the splash.

  ‘FIRE ON MY COMMAND!’

  Several moments passed in a prolonged, agonizing silence as the yellow mist thickened and spread along the shingle, effectively shrouding the middle two rafts, beginning to hide the other rafts as well.

  Then he heard it, the clank of latches being released in unison somewhere in the smoke and the first splash of a ramp landing in the water.

  ‘FIRE!’

  The entire length of the trench was fringed with a ribbon of grey-blue cordite smoke, carbines firing rapidly one shot after another, several machine guns spitting muzzle flash and stuttering a steady stream of bullets, all of them into the yellow mist.

  Above the cacophany of gunfire he could hear the rattle and clang of rounds impacting on metal and something heavy splashing into the water.

  Something big.

  The yellow mist was slowly thinning and spreading, drifting up the slope towards them, hiding what was in there for longer than was fair.

  He squinted into the yellow, managing to just about pick out the stump of the brick smokestack. The head and shoulders of a soldier holding aloft a regimental flag, too foolishly confident to keep down while the volley fire was still going on. The edge of the left-most raft … and looming above the battlefield the ghostly outline of the bridge.

  Then something, darker, much closer than anything else … more defined as it scrambled uphill towards them.

  ‘God help us,’ he whispered as it emerged out of the last curling skeins of mist rolling uphill.

  CHAPTER 84

  20
01, New York

  Human-like, in that it had two arms and two legs, but that was the end of any anthropomorphous resemblance. It towered over them, almost as tall as a double-decker tram, almost as wide as a house. As it emerged from the smoke, Devereau noted that it seemed to have no head; however, where a ridge of muscle and bone linked one shoulder to the other, there seemed to be nothing but the slightest bump with pinhole dots for eyes and a tube where a mouth might have been.

  Closer, as it charged up the last dozen yards of the gentle slope, the creature looked more like some sort of machine, a mechanical automaton covered in linking plates of thick metal that clanked together noisily as it lumbered forward.

  He realized his men had stopped firing, like him. They were frozen in a state of horrified fascination.

  ‘FIRE!’ he screamed.

  The sparks of impacting bullets showered the ground around it; the giant’s loping run faltered and finally ceased. Its enormous arms flailed angrily, and Devereau saw, beneath the overlapping plates of metal, glimpses of pale grey flesh spattered with dark droplets of blood.

  The leviathan stumbled one final step forward before finally flopping heavily down on to its knees, and then, still shedding a shower of sparks from the gunfire concentrated on it, it slowly keeled over like a felled tree lying across the trench, one thick arm flopping down into the trench and crushing a man.

  My God … it took our entire regiment to bring it down.

  Out of the smoke emerged eleven more. This time only half the men managed to concentrate fire on them; the other half were already having to eject and replace empty cartridges. The giants were on them in mere seconds, standing over the borderline trench, one or two of them even standing astride it, swinging their huge metal-plated arms down into the trench works.

  Their fists — the size of beer kegs — were enclosed in a variety of different experimental attachments. Some of them had iron cages from which foot-long spikes protruded. A couple of them had blades that looked like Devereau’s sabre, welded to iron bands round their three fingers, like impossibly long claws. One of them even had a rotating saw blade powered by a chugging engine strapped to the creature’s upper arm.