by Chris Hechtl
The sergeant snorted. “What happened to the shuttle?”
“Ah, man, if I'd been flyin that bird she'd of landed just fine,” Baloo said. “She came down and hit somethin in the snow. Nasty,” he said, shaking his head as he motioned the landing with his hand paws.
“We need to see it,” the sergeant insisted.
“Be my guest,” the bear replied magnanimously, waving them on.
“Ah man, that's gotta suck,” the sergeant said when he saw the wreckage four kilometers away. Baloo grunted. “But any landing you can walk away from I suppose,” he said, shaking his head.
“Yeah,” the bear replied. “Tell that to the crew and most of my squad. The lot of them are buried nearby. I'll show you the graves,” he said, shaking his head. Sergeant Winthrop nodded as he took images with his camera. “I still think I woulda put her down in one piece better,” the bear grumbled.
“Hope there ain't a weight limit on the helo,” a private murmured to the corporal. The corporal snorted.
<>V<>
Word spread that the first invasion force was on the ground. There were no numbers and little facts to go by. But the HAM radio network carried the news far and wide as a sign of hope that the long night was showing signs of lifting.
Colonel Weaver got the news and snorted. “Well, it's about damn time. Now when are they coming here?”
“We're on our own. Probably for a long time,” Tom said. The colonel grunted. “The mechs have pushed us south and west. Wintering in the Appalachian ski lodge last year was a good idea. But we're going to need another place like that soon. This winter's getting bad.”
“Winter all year round, how can you tell the difference?” the colonel drawled. He wiped at his mouth and then nodded. “We've got a lot of mouths to feed. Leaving some of the civilians behind at the lodge and the cabins nearby was a good idea. But if we head back that way, we might lead the mechs to them. I bet the other ski resorts are all booked up by now,” he said.
“Then we'll have to find someplace else,” Tom said, consulting an ancient map. As a historian he'd preserved such archaic things even in the days of GPS and auto navigational aids. Now he was glad he had. He just wished he'd had the damn thing laminated to preserve it instead of keeping it raw to maintain its “cultural heritage.” “We're just outside West Virginia. If we head south, we could maybe find Greenbrier. I've always wanted to check that place out.”
The colonel frowned thoughtfully. “Greenbrier?”
“Big old hotel. Lot of history there,” the history professor replied with a grin. The colonel snorted. He knew Tom and his hobby horses. “Golf course, loads of stuff around it, which was why it's been the way it is for so long; it's been a retreat for the powerful.” The colonel nodded. “At one time it was a backup nuclear fallout shelter for Congress.”
That tidbit made the colonel sit up and pay more attention. There was a reason he kept the historian close. “So it may or may not be occupied. You're not making a good case, Tom,” the colonel said, forcing himself to dampen his enthusiasm carefully.
Tom spread his hands apart in appeal. “Ah, but if it isn't occupied, we're set. If it is and they won't share, we can find some place near if we have to. And if it's in enemy hands, well, we'll just take it away from them, right?” He hefted his rifle.
“Right,” the colonel growled softly.
<>V<>
Attila heard the news over the ham radio. His team was still hunkered down in the base. He was rather regretting the death of the women. They'd fought, and he'd gone in guns blazing because they hadn't known what to expect. Now the men were getting wrestles. A woman or two would calm things down. Keep the place clean, keep them, well, not focused, but relaxed.
“There have been radio calls for us,” Vladek reported.
“And you know we're not talking, right?” Attila asked mildly. “We don't want them to know we're alive. We're going to hold up and let them do the fighting and dying.”
“We've got to come out sometime, boss. I mean, we've got plenty of food and water, but there is only so many times we can play cards. And only so much of four walls and the same faces a guy can take,” Bravos said.
Attila eyed him. Bravos, Lever, and Posey had been talking a lot at the outside guard shifts as of late. He was aware that all three men had been talking about walking. He was of two minds about letting them go or doing something about the talk.
“Can we do a raid?” Wladislaw asked. “Scout the nearby area,” he said as Attila turned to him. “Then pick off any stragglers? With that orbital bombardment, the A.I. might be reeling here. Possibly knocked out and out of juice. If we go in, smash them in the area, we'll be clear for a while. Possibly a long while.”
“And we just might run into a couple of refugees along the way. Someone to play with,” Posey said.
“Girls,” Gilpin drawled, eyes bright and eager.
Attila thought hard. He'd convince them, convinced himself that the best thing to do was to set themselves up as warlords and live high off the hog. He'd modified that plan when they'd gotten to the ground and saw how bad it was. Now he had to modify the plan again. He saw the way the mood of the men were going and decided to change tactics. He had to get ahead of it instead of stomping all over their enthusiasm. Otherwise, he'd lose complete control.
“What the hell. It's Saturday night. Let's go paint the town red,” he said.
That earned a cheer and wahoo from the group.
“Just as long as it's in someone else's blood,” Attila said under his breath.
<>V<>
“Do they know that shuttles don't grow on trees? The equipment lost so far! My word what are they doing, just throwing it away?” Senator Akins snarled. “Why don't we just open an airlock and shovel the money out that way? It'd be quicker,” he growled in disgust.
The president of Mars hid a wince. “Such is war,” she murmured. Losing the fully loaded Skywhale had sucked. She wasn't certain who had proposed the idea, but she wished she could rip them a new one. Each Skywhale shuttle had cost six times as much as a normal shuttle. Sure they could drop three times as much of a load in one landing, but only if they got down in one piece! The accident review board was having kittens over the crash. Not to mention the shuttles that had been shot up or shot down prior.
“What was that Madam President?” the senator demanded.
She looked up to him. “I said, such is war. War is about waste. It's about expending things, including people unfortunately. The enemy wants to win just as badly as we do. More so, since it's programmed to win and won't surrender or quit.”
“That's fine and dandy, but the robots aren't paying the bills here. We are. My constituents are.”
“They are paying for this material and the blood of their loved ones lost to save Earth, the cradle of the human race and all of our species, to make certain that the robots don't spread here,” the president said, eyes flashing as her temper flared.
“We'll … have to discuss this,” the senator replied, looking at the others on his appropriations committee. The taxes are high enough already. With the economy in the tank due to the war …”
“I understand. But you have to understand, the money has to come from somewhere. The corporations are building at cost. They are donating a lot, including personnel and equipment. They are buying up war bonds or taking them instead of credits. We need to do the same.”
“The money spent …”
“Is for goods and vehicles, material things. You know they will go to pay for the materials, power, and for the people involved in the making of them.”
“Then why...”
“I wasn't finished, Senator,” the president said, holding up a restraining hand. She saw his expression work before it smoothed out but rolled on. “Many of those workers are working at minimum wage to help out with the war effort. That is a heavy cut in pay they have taken. Some are donating their time. They are doing their part. That money that they do get goes right back i
nto our economy. Paying for the food they eat, the utilities, and so on and so forth.”
The senator stared at her then heaved a sigh. He picked up a glass of water and took a drink then set it down again. “You seemed to have taken the wind out of my sails, Madam President,” he admitted wryly.
“That was my intent. Sorry, but we've waited long enough. We've debated long enough. The thousands of sick, starving, hopeless people on Earth have certainly waited long enough. Now is the time to act,” she said succulently, putting as much emphasis on the last word as she could.
“We can't delay long. The troops need the materials. They need the means to get them. We don't want them fighting and dying while we refuse to send them what they need,” she insisted. That got a murmur from the room.
“I see. Well, we'll discuss that,” he said.
She exhaled slowly as her temper frayed. Apparently that part of her message wasn't going to get through. He was ignoring the threat of being held accountable there, which was typical. He obviously wanted something, of that she was sure of. He probably resented the money being spent in Kai Ling's district, the training base. Damn it, she thought, sitting back as the senator started to pull out charts of current expenditures.
He might be pulling this stunt to grandstand, though she knew that was only a part of his goal. The other might be to stall long enough for someone else to step in and ante in more. That could be it, but that wouldn't work often. It would also piss some people off.
“What was that famous line about being able to win wars or count nails not both?” she murmured under her breath. She pulled out her tablet and did a quick search. “Wellington. Right.” She saw her aide looking nervously at him. She smiled slightly then tapped out a note to him, then started making notes to herself.
From the way the committee was shaping up, it was going to be a long damn day.
<>V<>
“Okay, we need more shuttles, specifically ascraft.” Ascraft was short for AeroSpace Craft. They were shuttles that could fly in and out of an atmosphere, unlike the strictly space shuttles that moved people around in orbit or landers, which landed them vertically on the moon or other planetary bodies with no atmosphere.
“There aren't any in the immediate pipeline,” Lieutenant Takai reported. He shook his head. “From the sound of the committee meetings on Mars, it might be a while before we get more too.”
“Well, the powers that be better scare some up quick. Loosing that Skywhale sucked. It proved the point that too many eggs in one basket are a bad thing,” Colonel Sinclair stated flatly. She had been scheduled to go down on the next flight until the latest mishap. This one had been some sort of engineering one, not a loss due to enemy action.
Maintenance had been whining for a while that they had been pushing the hardware too hard. Obviously they were right. It just sucked that it had taken the loss to prove it. She was fairly certain none of the engineering crews were happy about being able to say I told you so either.
Fifty thousand pounds of cargo gone in an instant. Fortunately, it had been cargo, though the loss of the flight crew of three sucked. She was fairly certain the gunship and helicopter squadron on the ground weren't too thrilled about losing most of their spares and machinery either. That would make them very cautious about usage and potential losses until the lost cargo could be made up. Which was going to take a month or more with everything else already in the pipeline.
That was something she needed to talk to, the lack of slack in the pipeline. The lack of spares in case an unfortunate accident like this happened. They needed an express lane to make up the difference. Unfortunately, they were going all out, with every bird tasked for several weeks of runs into the future and with no end in sight either.
“There aren't any shuttles in the Lagrange points. The closest shipment will be shipped out in two months for the next invasion.”
“Which doesn't help us a whole hell of a lot now,” the colonel said caustically.
“I know. Checking,” Tao-ling stated. “General Caesar reports none of the shuttles in his area are suited for atmospheric use. Thinking outside the box here, what about those already on the ground?”
“Um … not following,” the colonel responded slowly, brows knit in confusion. “Didn't they all crash? And why would we trust a civilian trash hauler?”
“Not those. I'm speaking of the six that made it to the ground,” the Chinese commander said.
“Oooh, those,” the Aussie colonel said, eyes wide. She turned to Commander Mizu.
“Checking,” the commander replied, accessing his notes on his tablet. “The European, Russian, and Chinese craft were all destroyed. Several crashed on landing. We just got confirmation of the European bird a few days ago.”
“Bollix,” the colonel murmured.
“The African bird fell into the wrong hands. She was destroyed by Captain McGillicuty,” the commander continued. So, the only bird left with a flight crew is Romeo Delta. And she is in … South America.”
“Um …”
“Lieutenant Collins' unit. They've held together with minimum casualties. The bird is nearly repaired.”
“Nearly,” the Aussie echoed dubiously.
“Yeah, I'm a little leery about flying a dinged-up, field-repaired bird myself. But they'd had her in a hangar for a year now. They've been doing their best to make repairs, but it's an aerospace craft. You can't machine parts with hand tools, not out of the materials they need to be made out of.”
“Right. So, we ship them in parts?”
“Right. We can risk another shuttle, or we can drop them a care package. They already received some parts that way,” Commander Mizu stated.
“But obviously not enough?”
“No.”
“Well, something is better than nothing and getting that bird up here and back in use is important. Find out what they need and get it in the pipeline pronto,” the colonel ordered.
“Yes, ma'am.”
<>V<>
“What's going on?” Harper asked as Percy came out of the radio shack. “And why'd they call you in there instead of me?”
“I...”
Percy was interrupted as Fiben, Kelsy, and the two pilots arrived on the scene. “You rang?” Magnus drawled. He'd lost weight worrying about being stuck on the ground. He'd been depressed for a while before he'd finally given up feeling sorry for himself and started to pitch in.
Apparently he'd started and ended a relationship with his copilot Sammy “Sam I am” Siam. The mind boggled about her name. She was cute though, and once she'd gotten over her grief at losing her sister and being trapped on the ground, she'd blossomed a bit. At least the two pilots had parted on good terms or so he'd heard.
“You asked for them too?” Harper asked, crossing his arms.
“I was called. Them too, but they were out,” Percy replied with a diffident shrug. “The powers that be are sending down another resupply. This one is another drop. They won't risk a shuttle of course,” he said. “But it's mainly stuff so we can fix the bent-up bird and get her flying again.”
“Sure. Now they want to talk to us. Only it's because they want the damn shuttle,” Fiben groused.
“Fiben, don't look a gift horse in the mouth. Some movement in the right direction is better than none,” Kelsy stated.
“Sure, fine, whatever.” Fiben eyed her. “You going up too I take it?”
She seemed to squirm a bit under his intense gaze before she finally sighed. “No.”
“Uh huh,” he drawled, crossing his arms.
“It's not because I don't trust the ship or Percy,” she said hastily, hands out to the indignant flight engineer, “or Pat for that matter. You've all done wonders. But I think …,” she squirmed a bit. “I think I can be of more use here,” she finally said.
“Okay,” Fiben said with a smirk.
“Don't rub it in,” she growled, eyes flashing.
He put his hands up. “Wouldn't dream of it baby cakes,” he
said.
She rolled her eyes and shook a mock fist at him. He smirked again. “I know; you'd miss me too much,” he mocked sweetly to her.
“You are so riding for a fall here, furball,” she growled, visibly looking around for a club. That got a soft laugh from the rest of the group.
<>V<>
Attila tried to shutter his ears to the soft crying and weeping from the other room. The occasional smack didn't help; it actually put him in a different mood—a mixed one, one of anger and yet sexual interest.
He was a little bit of a student of history; he was aware Russian troops centuries ago had been little more than barbarians during the time of the Soviet Union. Rape, loot, pillage, it had been the norm for years in occupied territory, hell, even in mother Russia from time to time. It was a way for the men to get their jollies and for some to get rich.
The girls should have known that as much as the men did, he mused. Their father hadn't put up much of a fight; he'd practically handed them over to the group. It hadn't helped him survive long anyway, but it had been a shattering blow to the teenagers. Tough for them. They shouldn't be complaining about putting it out. They had a roof over their heads and decent food. He shook his head.
“You want a turn, boss?” Wladislaw asked, coming out of the room with his belt folded up in one hand.
“No,” Attila said, waving a hand. “Let them recover. There are a lot of us and only the two of them,” he said. “And if we don't let them recover, then we'll have to find someone else to do the cooking and cleaning. And I'm not thrilled about letting Posey do it,” he said.
His second-in-command grunted then nodded as he shut the door. “True,” he said, waving Gilpin off. “We'll have to take turns or something I suppose.”
“Something like that,” Attila replied dryly.
“Or go find more,” Gilpin suggested with a grin.