What would I do if I were Bhasin? I wondered. I guessed that he wouldn’t choose to blow up the pipeline completely - not unless he knew for certain that he was being followed. To do so would only give away his position, and potentially attract the attention of our dropships and the company of troopers who held the hill. Would he even expect anyone to follow him at all?
The sergeant major drew up beside me, leaning over my shoulder and tapping his visor against mine so that he could whisper quietly.
‘We have a winner,’ he said, his gaze fixed onto the hole. ‘I’m guessing that wasn’t there before?’
‘No it was not,’ Yulia said.
The sergeant major paused reluctantly, as if he was struggling to decide whether or not to believe her. ‘OK . . .’
‘I think we’ll definitely need fire support getting out,’ I prompted.
He glanced at me, then gave a small nod. ‘I agree. The danger of us hitting friendly prisoners is probably outweighed by the threat of Bhasin leaving some form of rear-guard to slot us as we exit the pipeline. I’ll warn B Company beforehand, and then all you’ll need to do when you emerge from the tunnel is activate your net and start dropping crosshairs on targets.’
‘OK . . .’ I replied after a moment, feeling slightly less enthusiastic about my suggestion. If B Company agreed to support our attack - which they certainly would - then as the first commander to emerge from the pipeline, I would have the combined firepower of fourteen dropships and four gravtanks at my fingertips. If I dropped a crosshair in the wrong place, then I could easily kill the prisoners. It was a risk we had to take, though. We couldn’t jump out of the pipeline without some form of cover.
‘I’m going to break net silence now,’ the sergeant major warned. ‘I’d rather send the key information now, rather than right next to the enemy.’
‘Roger,’ I whispered.
He then began preparing the necessary information on his datapad. Rather than sending one long message, he would pre-record everything and send it all in a single compressed transmission. I couldn’t see what he was doing, but I knew that he would be marking the layout of the pipeline and the estimated location of the exit hole.
‘We need to hurry,’ Yulia urged from over my other shoulder.
‘This won’t take long,’ I assured her. ‘We’ll need all the help we can get.’
‘Zero-Alpha, this is Blackjack-One-Zero.’ The sergeant major recorded his message ready for the Officer Commanding B Company. ‘I am presently located along a water pipeline which is visible to your south. I intend to break out at the marked exit point, which is believed to be the site of enemy exfiltration. H-Hour for our break out will be at fourteen hundred hours.’
My eyes flicked down to the visor clock on the edge of my visor display. It would be fourteen hundred hours in a few minutes, so we needed to get a move on to hit that timing.
The sergeant major continued. ‘Request fire support - Vulcan cannon only - to be used on targets on my call. I will be danger close. Fire onto marked targets for five seconds only. I will provide further information once I am live on the net.’
With that, he tapped his datapad, sending the data out to B Company. Myers gasped, presumably frightened by the sudden spike of electronic activity picked up by his scanner.
We all held our breath. Not only were we worried that the message wouldn’t be received through the thick walls of the pipeline, but there was also the danger that Bhasin and his men would detect the transmission. They were clearly in possession of explosives, so would they have taken the time to rig the pipeline?
Nothing happened. At first I felt relief that the enemy hadn’t blown us all to smithereens, but that relief quickly turned to impatience and then concern as no response came back from the company. Perhaps we have been too ambitious in our pursuit, I wondered.
Finally, a familiar voice broke the silence, causing us all to breathe a unified sigh of relief. ‘Blackjack-One-Zero, this is Zero-Alpha. Message received and understood. I will have two dropships ready to provide fire support. Let me know if you need more.’
‘Good,’ the sergeant major said, to nobody in particular. He then turned to me. ‘Yulia can stay back with me. Let’s get going.’
Yulia’s grip instantly loosened from my daysack. Now that there was some light within the pipeline she didn’t need me to guide her, and without a weapon she would be useless once we stepped outside.
I waved to Weatherall to follow on. ‘Let’s go!’
Spurring Myers with another pat against his daysack, I stood again, water pouring from my equipment. We advanced along the pipeline with an increased sense of urgency, allowing the current to carry us toward the opening ahead.
‘All Blackjack call signs, this is Hammersmith-Zero-Alpha.’ B Company’s OC spoke again over the net. ‘We are presently observing the area you intend to break out from. It is approximately one hundred metres beyond the treeline, in an area that is particularly thick with vegetation. We have zero visibility into the area, as I suspect you are already aware. A high level of fire control will therefore be required to prevent any blue-on-blue incidents.
‘Update - Loyalist Militia continue to hold the majority of Cellini, however, their assault appears to have lost momentum. I would assess them to be at battalion strength, approximately five hundred men, with a similar number hidden in the forest to the north. At this stage their intention remains unclear, but I would guess that they will withdraw once they have what they came for. Expect the Militia’s main effort to be the extraction of the missiles from your location, and I urge you to exercise extreme caution.
‘The FEA battalion currently occupying the warren and Hill Kilo itself are re-grouping, with the advice and support of numerous Guardsmen still loyal to their cause. The battalion currently trapped within the village are attempting to link up with their brothers in arms at the foot of the hill so that they can mount a sturdier defence. They have encountered some pretty fierce resistance, however, I remain confident that they can achieve their aim so long as they remain calm and maintain communications. Hopefully they manage to consolidate themselves soon, so that they can function effectively once we are gone.’
We crept the last twenty metres up to the hole, weapons pointed toward the light outside the pipeline. A quick glance to my visor display clock confirmed there was still one more minute before H-Hour, giving us the time to get as close as physically possible. Usually our H-Hours were initiated by fire support, either from artillery, aircraft or other heavy weapons, giving us the ability to complete our last few bounds unnoticed. This time, however, it would be us who made the first move, followed afterward by the dropships and their Vulcan. Because of this we needed to be close enough so that the first news of our arrival would be our weapons firing.
My headset picked up something from outside the pipe, magnifying the sound for me to hear. It was somebody talking, although the words themselves were indistinguishable.
Having heard the noise as well, Myers held out a hand for me to see, turning his thumb downward. Enemy.
I repeated the gesture for those behind me and continued to advance.
The two of us stopped less than a metre from the hole, allowing for the remainder of the platoon to close up.
I scanned the opening whilst I waited for H-Hour. It was a ragged, circular hole surrounded by scorch marks, confirming our belief that it had been created by explosives. Although the angle I stood at prevented me from catching a full view of the world outside, I could see dense vegetation, indicating that we were now back in the forest. Water poured over the lip of the hole, but the curvature of the pipeline prevented all of it from escaping. Most of it continued to flow along the pipeline, presumably on its way out to the sea.
Neither one of us moved even a millimetre whilst we waited. Our rifle barrels remained centred onto the opening, as if we expected somebody to jump through it at any moment. I could still hear the sound of somebody talking outside, which reassured me that
they weren’t expecting us. That didn’t mean that they wouldn’t decide to check inside the pipeline, though, especially if they were some form of rear guard for Bhasin’s rogue Guard platoon. My finger pressed gently against the power-up button on my rifle.
The remaining seconds counted away on my visor display, until finally we reached H-Hour. We didn’t need anybody’s go ahead to launch - it was up to the sergeant major to speak out if he wanted us to wait, rather than the other way around. I reached out and gripped Myers by the shoulder, then gave it a gentle squeeze.
Myers didn’t explode into action, instead the young trooper slowly glided through the water as he covered the final metre without breaking his aim. I followed him, standing so close that my soaking wet combats pressed against his. We had no idea what threat we were facing outside the pipeline, so the more weapons we could bring to bear the better.
Once we reached the edge of the hole, Myers leant out of the shadows first, careful not to let the fast-flowing water send him tumbling down onto the forest floor. Moving just behind him, I caught my first proper glimpse of the forest since having returned into the warren. The clouds above had obviously broken, because shafts of sunlight broke through the magnificent green canopy, illuminating the undergrowth like spotlights on a stage. Only a trooper who had fought underground could truly appreciate a view like that, despite knowing that it was about to be the backdrop to more bloodshed.
The pair of us took one more step, until Myers was stood right inside the opening, and without warning he opened fire at something to his left.
‘Contact!’ he screamed.
I followed him out, and suddenly my visor display sprang to life, flashing red as it identified multiple targets amongst the thick undergrowth. No more than ten metres from the pipeline was a group of Militiamen, crowded together as though they were receiving a brief. They might have been guarding the pipeline, but they certainly weren’t expecting us, and though I couldn’t catch their expressions through the glare in their visors, the look of total surprise was evident.
Myers’ darts had struck one of the Militiamen closest to us, sending him sprawling backward amongst his comrades, but there were loads of them, and only two of us.
As the militiamen scrambled to return fire, it took less than a second to decide that there were no Union troopers amongst them. Rather than fire my rifle, I outstretched my finger like a gun, marking them with a blue crosshair, then snatched Myers back into cover. The pair of us fell backward into the water, narrowly avoiding a barrage of rounds that hammered against the pipeline.
‘Jesus!’ somebody exclaimed as we crashed into the water. Hands gripped us both, preventing the current from carrying us back into view.
I made no effort to stand, ignoring the cold water rushing over my body as I activated my net. 'Hammersmith-Zero-Alpha, fire on my mark!'
B Company’s OC must have been listening to our net intently. No sooner had I finished the sentence when there was a deafening roar outside the pipeline, as his dropships opened fire with their Vulcan cannon. Although the source of the noise was outside the pipeline, it reverberated along its length as if we were packed into the throat of a roaring beast.
Spurred by the thunderous sound of the dropship barrage, and aided by my comrades behind me, I scrambled to my feet, driving Myers forward. ‘Go, go, go!’ I shouted against the noise.
The two of us returned to the hole in a single bound, to find that the picturesque forest scene beyond was gone. It had been replaced by one of devastation as the Vulcan continued to hack at the earth where the Militia had once stood.
A Vulcan cannon was a defensive weapon, designed to engage and destroy incoming missiles with an impenetrable wall of darts, but it was devastating when employed against dismounted personnel. The entire pipeline shook beneath my feet with the sheer force of a thousand rounds beating at the earth beside it, taking huge chunks out of trees and causing wet soil and sawdust to fly through the air like confetti. Without my headset the terrifying sound would easily have ruptured my eardrums.
Ignoring the onslaught occurring just metres away, Myers braced a boot against the lip of the hole and took another shot at something within the churning undergrowth.
I saw nothing on my visor display to engage - not that I think I would have thought to fire anyway - instead I watched the mayhem occurring only metres in front of me, stupefied by the force of the Vulcan. Despite being an area-effect weapon, the dropship cannon was surprisingly accurate, creating a circular “beating zone” about five metres across. I could see the beating zone drifting around the forest floor as the gunner, somewhere high above, made sure he hadn’t left anyone behind. Then, as suddenly as it had started, the firing stopped, leaving the last few pieces of earth and wood to fall back to the ground.
I quickly peered over the edge of the hole, trusting Myers to cover me whilst I checked to see what the ground was like below. The cascading water had flooded the forest floor, running away in a newly formed river that snaked away in search of low ground. The surface of the water was no more than half a metre below me, though, and so I jumped through the hole. I crashed into the water, stumbling slightly as I failed to find a stable footing and narrowly avoiding falling over.
Myers landed with a splash beside me, and the pair of us waded away from the pipe, the rest of my section spilling out through the hole behind us.
‘Push out!’ I ordered, gesturing for Myers to move away from me. We needed to spread out as quickly as possible, to avoid presenting a juicy target to anyone nearby.
As I advanced I quickly held my arms out either side of me, ordering my section to fan out into extended line, then quickly took aim again, scanning the area where the Militia had stood.
Nobody had survived the Vulcan cannon. The Militiamen had been torn to pieces - literally. All that remained of them was a gory mess, pulped and spread across the forest floor.
‘Fucking hell, Andy!’ Myers exclaimed, forgetting himself. He pointed off to his right.
For a moment I thought that Myers had simply seen something that disgusted him, until I followed his outstretched arm and saw what had caused his alarm. My jaw fell open. Ten or so metres in front of us lay a pile of three surface-to-orbit missiles, wrapped in clear plastic packaging and stacked neatly on the ground just outside the edge of the Vulcan’s beating zone.
‘Shit . . .’ I breathed.
There they were. At long last, we had set eyes upon the true reason why everybody was so interested in the warren beneath Hill Kilo. The STORM missiles weren’t particularly interesting to look at. On the outside they just looked like oversized smart missiles, twice the length of a man and no wider than my upper thigh, but they had the ability to strike at anything in orbit. If they had been any closer, then our friends in the sky might have set them off. I was no weapons expert, but I guessed that would be bad.
Once we had cleared a short distance beyond the gory mess that remained of the Militiamen, I stopped and knelt amongst the undergrowth.
‘Go firm,’ I ordered over the section net.
There was no longer any need for us to avoid transmitting, and I took some comfort in the information that had returned to my visor display since having reactivated my net. I could now see where all of my men were, even without direct line of sight onto them. My section was now formed into an extended line facing eastward, with no eyes onto any further enemy.
I flicked over to the platoon net. ‘Position clear,’ I announced. ‘Multiple enemy dead. No sign of further activity. We’ve found some of the missiles as well.’
‘Roger.’ The sergeant major’s disembodied voice came in reply. ‘Push on for another two hundred metres and provide security whilst the platoon shakes out.’
My section swept onward as one, spreading our line further so that there was a ten-metre gap between every man. With our net activated and our newfound freedom to manoeuvre, we had suddenly gained the confidence to move away from one another, a confidence that filled me wi
th fresh resolve. In the warren we were unsure of our surroundings, with everything, including time, working against us. Now we were in our element, with fire support from our own private fleet of dropships. Catching up with Bhasin had become a real possibility.
‘All call signs,’ the sergeant major said over the net, ‘we’ve identified a trail leading away from the missiles left outside the pipeline. It looks like they were unloaded and stacked ready to be carried away by work party. My guess is that the Militia are now working hand in hand with Bhasin’s lot, and these men were protecting the remaining missiles whilst they waited for more manpower.’
So, I thought, my confidence suddenly waning, we’re no longer chasing Bhasin and his men, but a group of Militiamen of unknown size.
Our chase had become more dangerous now that the force we were pursuing was larger, with more resources at its disposal. The unlikely partnership between the two parties did give us a small advantage, though, in that they were now larger and easier to track.
A blue line suddenly materialised on my visor display, cutting through the trees to my right.
‘The line you now see leads south-east in the rough direction of the trail,’ the sergeant major explained. ‘We will advance to contact using the trail as our axis. Two Section will follow the trail, with the remaining sections bringing up the rear in one-up formation. All call signs acknowledge.’
One by one all of the commanders answered up with their call signs, including me, confirming that we understood the plan and the formation to be used.
An advance to contact was exactly as it sounded - an operation where a formed unit would advance aggressively until it met again with the enemy. As in our situation, the enemy dispositions were often unknown, and our foe were typically either in the process of withdrawing or in defence. One-up was a standard platoon formation used for an advance to contact where the enemy threat was perceived to be to the front, but the platoon commander didn’t want to commit too many troops if he was to come under contact. It simply meant that one section would lead, whilst the other two kept to the rear left and right respectively, creating an elongated triangular shape. It gave us good protection to the flanks, which were particularly vulnerable since we were on our own in a dense woodland environment.
RECCE II (The Union Series Book 5) Page 11