No Regrets

by Jan Stryvant

  "We called in a lot of favors from the dwarves, the faerie, the elves, all of whom came to help us, along with your armies. Our commander in the area is one of the First's own sons, by the name of Raban. I've discussed the situation at length with him, and here is what he wanted me to tell you."

  Smacking the map with the end of the pointer and trying not to smile as more than a few of them flinched, Steve briefed them all thoroughly on the situation. Raban had given Steve a lot of information last night. Apparently the French had been sharing their intelligence assets—namely their spy satellite data—with the lions, and Raban had told Steve that he also had a lot of people on the ground scouting for him.

  When Steve finished, he was impressed that he didn't get a single stupid question. They had a lot of questions, but they were all good ones. He answered them to the best of his ability, and on several he admitted that he didn't have the answer, so he'd look into it.

  "Before I sit back down," Steve said when the questions had finished, "Raban's general approach to this is that it may very well take a hundred years to insure that all of the djevels have been eliminated. He has proposed that we start off with a simple containment, to make sure they are all inside the borders I've laid out, and can be kept inside there. We don't want to take any chances of any large, or even small, groups getting out and rampaging over any of your countries' populace, correct?"

  Steve smiled as they all quickly agreed with that.

  "And the next step?" The president of Poland asked.

  "The next step will depend on who is willing to contribute soldiers, weapons, munitions, support, and how much. We understand this isn't going to be easy for you; no one saw this coming, or expected it.

  "So let's just concentrate on securing those borders and protecting your people today. Once we have achieved that goal, I think it will be safe to talk about reclaiming what was lost and resettling those lands."

  Steve nodded to them and went back to his seat to sit down.

  "We're going to need Raban to write up his plan for the first phase and email it to me so I can go over it and forward it to everyone," Steve whispered into Tisha's ear.

  "I'll tell him," she whispered back.

  "Now comes the fun part." Steve sighed.

  "I thought that was the fun part?"

  "No, now comes the jockeying for power, position, and prestige. Get your pencil ready because we're about to get a hundred requests and a thousand suggestions."

  "I'm surprised they haven't started to demand we do things their way, or submit to their leadership."

  "Oh, that's coming, but I have a fiendish plan."

  "Not a clever one?"

  "No, this one is better."

  "And that is?"

  "We're not coming back after lunch," Steve whispered with a smile.

  "They're not going to like that," Tisha warned.

  "I know, that's the idea!"

  The Third Battle for Reno

  "Here they come," Chad said, looking at the monitors in his forward command post. "I gotta tell you," he said to Max, who was starting to look pregnant, "the United States military has some neat tools. All this real-time surveillance equipment is definitely spoiling me."

  "Just remember, what took months for them to give us could go away tomorrow."

  Chad nodded. "I've got Cenna leading up a team of techs to work on our own version of this using those advanced drones John developed for us."

  "Do you think that's wise?" Max asked.

  Chad nodded as he watched the enemy coming down out of the hills to the north of Reno. "Yeah, it was his life's work, and I think it helps her to know she's carrying on in his footsteps. Other than their son, it's all she really has left of him, their business."

  "Guess that does make a certain amount of sense…"

  "What the hell?" Chad swore suddenly.

  "What's wrong?" Max said and immediately looked over his shoulder at the displays.

  "They're making a push to the east of Reno."

  "And?"

  "And they've never once been interested in pushing around to the east. They're not original thinkers; they always stick to the same pattern. Estrella's observations made that clear. They should be attacking those two weak spots in our wall. They've been hammering them in the previous fights, and now they're just abandoning them and heading around to the east?"

  "They're not exactly abandoning them," Max said and pointed out the groups that were moving to engage their McCarran line defenses.

  "That's just a token force," Chad growled. "We're weak on the east because I let Jack take his entire damn army and set up a barrier to help protect Salt Lake." Chad keyed his radio. "Maitland! They're coming around to the east in force!"

  "I see it, Chad," Maitland called back. "I can hold them for a little while, but I'm pretty thin up here."

  "Let me move some troops up behind you, then you can fall back into their positions and link up. Roloff!"

  "Yes, Chad?" Roloff commed back.

  "Pull everyone off the Northern McCarran line. I want them out of there as fast as they can move! Drop half behind the I-80 line; send the other half to Sparks Marina Park."

  "We're just gonna give them that area?" Roloff asked, concerned.

  "We never intended to keep it, and if we don't do something to back Maitland's people up, and do it now, we're not going to be able to retreat south to Carson City. Ryan!"

  "Yes, Chad?"

  "Get your ass over to Sparks Marina Park! I need you to take command of the people Roloff is sending you! Move to deploy them along I-80 and see if you and Maitland can hold them there."

  "On my way!"

  Chad turned to his radioman, which was his interface with the Army, Marines, and Air Force. "Chet! Get McGuire on the line and have him send all his reserves to the south of the river at Sparks Marina. Make sure he has his commanding officer hook up with Ryan, and that he understands Ryan and Maitland are calling the shots. Got it?"

  "Yes, Sir!"

  "Adam!" Chad got back on his radio as he had a sudden idea.

  "What d'ya need me to do?"

  "Take your people out past the McCarran line and see if you can hit those demons attacking Maitland on their left flank."

  "You know that's gonna leave our ass hanging out in the open."

  "I know, I know. Can't be helped! Do what you need to do. I'm not looking for heroics, just trying to buy some time."

  "I think I can do that—but if you get me killed, you get to tell Ryla why I won't be at dinner for a week."

  "If you die on purpose, we will be having words! Go!"

  "You know she'll beat you into tomorrow," Max growled.

  "I'll worry about that when it comes. Now let me figure out what this is going to do to our plans. If we can't hold them at I-80, our next fallback point is the Truckee. If they get past that, our defenses along South McCarran down there aren't the best."

  "Should I call the mayor and tell her to evacuate?"

  "No, not yet. If they make it past the river and we've got refugees heading south, they'll get slaughtered. We may have to send everyone west on I-80. I need you to get to the airport and tell them I'm ordering an immediate evacuation of all our assets there to our base at Minden. Take a squad with you. I need that to get underway ASAP."

  Max gave him a hug and a kiss, then went out the door.

  "Chet!" Chad turned to his radioman again. "Tell the Air Force gunships I'm ordering them into the air, now. Tell the Marines I want them to start their attack run as soon as their designators can find targets east of the city. Make sure they understand anything north of Baring Blvd. is fair game, but warn them there will be infiltrators in the area trying to slow the enemy down."

  "Got it, Sir!"

  Blowing out a breath, Chad looked at the map, then re-examined the enemy forces. His only hope right now was that by dropping all his defenses along the north, he'd sucker enough of them in there that the army trying to circle around to the east would b
e slowed.

  But he found it rather curious that they were only going around him to the east and not at all to the west. A more traditional method would be to encircle the city so no one escaped, and considering how much 'food' was in Reno, he would have expected them to do that if they were going to change tactics, rather than to just miraculously concentrate on the one place he was weakest.

  The only way to explain that was to acknowledge that the enemy was getting good intel on his force deployment. And if they were getting good intelligence on everything he was planning, that meant he had to prepare for the worst, not be hoping for the best. Making a decision, he picked up the phone and called the mayor.

  "Yes, Chad?" Mayor Schiere said, answering her phone.

  "Start the evacuation. Split it between I-80 to the west and 580 to the south. Tell them to light a fire under it; we may have to close off the southern route in a few hours if things go bad."

  "Now?" Mayor Schiere asked, shocked.

  "Yes, now. The enemy is making their move, and it's not safe to wait any longer. If they surround the city, it'll be a death sentence for anyone left inside. Send updates to Bill. Get to work!" Chad hung up the phone and turned back to study his forces again. He'd need to do something to try and force the enemy back on the path he wanted them to go, and he had an idea…

  Adam set his radio to the channel that broadcast to only his soldiers as he stood up, starting to consider his options.

  "Alright, everybody, we've got new orders! Apparently our friends out there aren't taking the bait, and instead are raising quite the ruckus to the east of us. So our friendly commander has asked me if we'd ever so kindly waltz on down and have a little chat with the bastards."

  "Adam! What in the hell does that mean?" Marcus, one of the older lions, called back over the radio.

  "It means we're going over the wall, turning east, grouping up, slamming into the side of the army trying to cut around the city's east flank, and killing the shit out of them!" Adam growled.

  "Och! Why dinna ya' say so!" Shamus, another lion who'd spent way too much time in Ireland, came back.

  Adam sighed as he shifted into lion form, happy that the radio still worked when he did things like that. "Yeah, yeah, I know, 'you kids' and all that stuff. Now, everyone shift and get a move on!"

  "Won't they see us if we shift?" Marcus asked. Which was a good question, Adam knew, because the original intent of this operation had been for two thousand lions and another two thousand lycans to hide in the rubble and the buildings and pick off the djevel attackers as the northern McCarran line 'collapsed'.

  "That's the idea," Adam growled. "They're not coming."

  "Sounds like some dirty kern done ratted us out!" Shamus replied.

  "Perish the thought." Adam sighed. It didn't take him long to make it to the now abandoned defensive line; he passed many of its former defenders as they rushed off to follow Chad's orders. Coming over the top of the wall, he was followed by a score of other lions and lycans who had been in the same area, and noticed a lot more coming over the wall to either side of him for some distance.

  The effect on the djevels moving to attack was surprising. They turned and ran. Adam didn't know if this was an attempt to pull him and his men out of position, or just the result of coming face to face with a large number of lions. In either case, he turned east and started off at a fast lope, ordering those in front of him to slow until he caught up with them. He'd give the rearmost a few minutes to catch up, but most of them would just have to join the battle when they got there.

  It wasn't long before he could see the main body of the djevel army up ahead. It was hard to miss it; the last estimates he'd heard placed it far over a million strong.

  "That doesn't look like fun, does it?" Jenna, a lioness who'd pretty much avoided Adam up until recently, said while trotting alongside him.

  "This is gonna hurt," Adam grumbled.

  "Probably," Jenna agreed with a nod.

  Slowing to a walk, Adam shifted and pulled his rifle off his back, where a bungee cord had been holding it in place. Fey armor didn't really allow for much of anything else to be held in your collar when you shifted, but they'd all figured out ways to make do.

  "Everyone, form a wedge twenty wide on me, front lines shoot until you're out of ammo, then fall back and draw swords. Listen for my call to retreat! When I call it, we go!"

  Adam ignored the various assents that came back over the radio as everyone fell in beside and behind him, and he opened fire as they approached the enemy. It might not be optimal range, but he was here to annoy, harass, and delay.

  "Once more into the breach, hey?" Jenna laughed.

  "I'm not that kind of lion," Adam growled, and they continued firing as they advanced.

  "And yet here you are doing exactly that!"

  "Yeah, well, some things you gotta fight for."

  "I know," Jenna said with a hint of a purr that almost made Adam trip. "How about you and me after the fighting is done?"

  "Ummm, I have a wife now, you know…"

  "But just one," Jenna said and giggled a moment as she changed magazines. "Besides, I thought I'd beat the rush!"

  Adam blinked, and then smiled. He'd never had a pride before. Hell, he'd never had a wife before! And Jenna was all sorts of cute and sexy. Probably why she'd avoided him before this.

  "Tell you what, you sell Ryla on it, and you've got a deal!"

  Adam missed Jenna's reply, remembering he was in the middle of combat, as things started to blow up way up in front of him. Undoubtedly somebody had started their bombing runs. Running through the last of his ammunition, he fell back and let the next group burn through theirs as he secured his rifle and drew his sword, while Jenna, who was doing the same, managed to rub up against him the entire time.

  Adam decided to reward her dedication. Pulling her close for a moment and giving her a kiss, he smiled at her, then got back to the business at hand. Who knew leading an army and killing djevels would get him a pride? Maybe he should have listened to Mom and Dad a little more when he'd been growing up.

  "Where the hell are McGuire's troops?" Chad swore for the second time.

  "I don't know, Sir," the radioman told him. "They're not responding to anything I've been sending."

  Chad was fuming. Ryan had pulled his force together and had actually advanced them up to where Maitland was. Adam's unexpected flanking action had bought Maitland's forces enough time and space that they'd fallen back and dug in. But without McGuire's forces coming up to fight, the whole encounter was in jeopardy. He was moving troops from the western edge of the I-80 line to the southern portion of the McCarran line as fast as he could. But it would be at least a half hour, probably more like an hour, before he'd have enough to hold the eastern wall against that many demons.

  He had one more trick up his sleeve, and he'd hoped he wouldn't have to pull it, but he no longer had any choice. But first he needed somebody to track down that asshole and put things right! Pulling out his phone, he hit speed-dial.

  "Ain't you gotta war to run?" Daelyn grumbled.

  "Yeah, and one of my players isn't responding. I need you to go wake the asshole up!" Chad growled. "Where are you?"

  "Down at the motor pool checking on some supplies. Who's the asshole, and where can I find him?"

  "General McGuire. He should be bivouacked with his troops up in Pleasant Valley."

  "Got it. What do you need me to do?"

  "Get him and his troops into the fight! Get their asses up to Cottonwood Park as fast as they can go, and have them talk to Maitland!"

  "I'm on it!" Daelyn growled and hung up.

  Chad put his phone in his pocket and turned to his radioman. "Call the arty guys and tell them to execute the plan I just sent them—Plan Joker. Then call the Air Force and tell them they got air traffic coming in and to head east!"

  "Yes, Sir!"

  "Adam!" Chad called on the radio.

  "Kinda busy here, Boss!"

 
"I got artillery that's about to land on your position, and it's gonna walk west and blow the hell out of the Baring Boulevard defenses."

  "What!"

  "Yeah, I'm hoping to draw enough of them into our old plan to take the pressure off Maitland. So move your ass the hell away from there, see if you can't draw them in!"

  "On the way!" the radioman called.

  "You got thirty seconds, Adam! MOVE!"

  "Everyone!" Adam screamed into the radio. "Run west! West! INCOMING!"

  Turning around, Adam took off, grabbing Jenna, who growled loudly at him, as he ran for all he was worth.

  "Twenty seconds to impact!" he yelled again and redoubled his efforts as the rest of the lions and lycans who were still fighting turned and ran. It wasn't long before he heard the sounds of descending artillery shells as the remaining gunship broke away in a hard turn.

  The explosions threw him and everyone else to the ground from the shockwave of the blasts. The ground itself seemed to be jumping from the force of the impacting shells and the detonations. Shifting into his lion form, he gave Jenna a swat on the ass, as well as Shamus, picked himself back up, and ran as fast as he could across the quaking earth.

  "It's like running on a trampoline!" he growled to himself. Everyone had shifted into their animal forms and were scrambling for all they were worth over the unstable ground. When he got to the Baring Boulevard section of the wall, he skirted around it to the north. Thankfully those to the south of him followed, while those to the north charged on.

  Looking over his shoulder, he could see the line of shells shifting westward, chasing them, while the djevels stopped and looked on in surprise as the artillery left them alone and chased the defenders. When it hit the defensive wall and blew it apart, it was no longer in Adam's view, as he was running as hard as he could.