He sat in one of the exploration half-tracks in the middle of the column. The window at his right was open; he had his elbow out, casually. He held a microphone in his left hand. In the beetle that led the column, another man held a similar microphone.
“Proceeding,” the receiver told him. “No resistance.”
“It will come,” Monteyiller said. “Watch out.”
He breathed deeply, savoring the taste of the violent, ancient spring. In the glades, blood-red flowers opened their cups in the warmth of the morning sun, and birds sang. Monteyiller observed it with something akin to awe; his own home planet was never like this. There, the seasons blended unnoticeably into each other, winter turning into summer like a tired whisper under a pale and motionless sky. Here the spring was like an explosion, a sudden scream of irresistible Life, glowing in the chill of the morning air, blossoming and growing in a thousand shapes and smells from the eternal rich soil. It was wonder and magic, the never-ending triumph of Earth, deserted, cherished and wistfully remembered.
The column moved on.
On the roofs of the vehicles, the soldiers were swapping jokes. Overhead, the scoutships hovered, watching the column eat its way through the forest. Right in its path, the shimmering structure soared challenging toward the sky, shrouded in the whirling mists that only offered tantalizing glimpses of its crystalline beauty.
Monteyiller gazed up at the ships, squinting against the sun.
“Objective In sight,” the receiver said. “Request further orders. We are now—”
The first wave of attackers swooped down from the blinding light of the sun. They fell like birds of prey, silent, swift and deadly. There were winged dragons, fire erupting from their jaws; there were flying horses, mounted by fair-haired women with the sun flashing in harnesses and shields and unsheathed swords; there was a drake, sailing the sky, its striped sail filled with wind as it bore down on the scoutships; there were chariots drawn by horses and dragons and goats; there were flying horses and flying men and giant birds. They came in thousands, a sky-full of improbabilities, so silently and swiftly that they were upon the ships before even the ships’ cybernetic brains had time to react. Monteyiller watched in horror as a giant dragon fell down on one of the ships, clutched tight on its sleek hull and started to tear at the hull-plates. It disappeared in a ball of fire at a direct hit from one of the other ships, but within seconds another dragon rode on the ship. Beams of raw energy streamed out from the ships, slashing through the ranks of the attackers, almost casually reducing them to ash. The small ships darted to and fro among the creatures, spewing out death in all directions. They held their positions, but only just.
“Thorein!” Monteyiller whispered. “I never thought—”
He was interrupted by a blinding flash, followed by a deep drawn-out roar. The half-track lurched violently and stopped. In the sudden silence, the sound of gunfire was plainly heard, coming nearer. The receiver crackled alive.
“Captain Monteyiller, sir?”
Monteyiller was staring out through the hastily closed window. The forest was alive with moving forms. “Yes.”
“We are under fire, sir—massive bullets, it looks like. There’s an army around us!”
The moving forms could be seen plainly now. They were men, dressed in uniforms. They swarmed out from the forest, shooting as they ran. The bullets ricocheted harmlessly from the vehicles.
Monteyiller said, “What about our men?”
There was a short silence. Then, “All accounted for, sir. They jumped into the trucks when the air attack started.” The voice paused. “What are your orders, sir?” The voice came through over an increasing background noise of dull explosions and pattering gunfire. Monteyiller balled his fists, staring out through the window. Disrupter beams were raking over the oncoming mass of attackers. Men were running around, screaming, their clothes burning. Trees caught fire and cast a flickering light into the shadows where more attackers waited behind primitive weapons, spitting out death against the column. The ground shook under the impact of bombs and grenades.
The loudspeaker said, “They are bringing in artillery, sir.”
Monteyiller closed his eyes momentarily. “I see.”
“Your orders, sir?”
Monteyiller looked down at his hands, flexing them, un-flexing them.
“Sir…?” the voice was insistent.
Monteyiller looked up. “Retreat,” he muttered.
“Sir!”
“I said retreat! But well be back, don’t worry!” He switched off the microphone and turned to Cat. “A slight miscalculation on my part,” he said tightly. “I never thought we’d run into anything like this. I have a lot to learn, it seems.” He glanced up at the sky, where the scoutships still were engaged in their dogfight against the airborne attackers. “To think that one of the cruisers could have burned out everything in this bloody place before we went in…but I learn. I learn quick as hell when I have to.”
The front of the column was turning around, rumbling down alongside its tail of gleaming exploration half-tracks. At the same time, the violent attacks subsided, the steady hammering of artillery fire became more distant, and the attacking soldiers began slipping away into the shadows of the forest. When the first of the beetles passed Monteyiller’s half-track, the forest was as quiet and peaceful as if the sudden murderous attack never had taken place. Only the scars left by the disrupters and the spreading fires were left to attest to the fighting. The two scoutships descended silently from the miraculously empty sky to pick up the defeated commander and the crew from his ruined vehicle.
Monteyiller halted in the airlock of the rescuing ship to cast a glance at the half-track. Its rear section was crushed as if by a giant’s fist. If whatever had struck it had hit a couple of feet nearer the front, Monteyiller wouldn’t have lived to see the result. A near miss—or perhaps a warning: Next time will be final.
He looked up. Beyond the reach of his vehicles and guns, the shimmering towers soared gracefully up toward the sky, shrouded in pale luminescent mists. They seemed to mock him.
21
In the afternoon, the cruiser Maedina circled over the forest, at a respectful distance from the iridescent towers. In its wake, the forest shriveled and died. At the base, Monteyiller watched the changes that took place on the newly created wasteland.
Trenches appeared, winding over the smoldering land. One line, two lines, three. Mist descended to the ground and solidified into miles of barbed wire. In the low scarred hills, gray bunkers squatted, surrounded by field-pieces of an incredibly archaic design. Men appeared, their uniforms gray, their helmets gray, their faces gray. They stood in groups, staring up at the circling cruiser. There were officers in bright blue uniforms, golden epaulets and swords. Some of them were mounted on horses, while men toiled, digging out entrenchments and shelters. Waves of heat rolled toward them from the burning forest. They mopped perspiration from their brows with gossamer handkerchiefs. They were cold, aloof—knights on a chessboard, waiting for the game to start.
In his command room aboard the flagship, the challenger looked up at the visor screen that covered the whole wall before him. The screen showed him the battlefield from above, in depth and full color. The enemy troops moved around like ants on a scarred bit of ground. They were strengthening their positions, awaiting his first move.
Monteyiller leaned back in his chair. He spoke into a microphone, watching the screen. At the edge of the wasteland, ten low-slung beetles rumbled forward from their hiding places in the shadows. Other vehicles followed, and soldiers. They were older than the ones who had gone on the first unsuccessful expedition; they walked crouched, with their weapons already aimed. Monteyiller had learned. This was no expedition. This was war. The pawns advanced on the chessboard.
The night was alive with fire and the sounds of distant death. On the scarred plain, the chesspieces were locked in a war of positions, dug down into trenches facing each other’s over a wide str
etch of no-man’s land. There was barbed wire between them, and the smoking wrecks of armed vehicles. There were bodies of dead men, still clasping their weapons. They had been heroes, some of them, and cowards. In death, nothing told them apart.
Far beyond the lines, the challenger waited among his swarming soldiers, his machines and his plans; the shimmering towers scornfully soared up against the darkening sky.
Stalemate.
Monteyiller watched the screen in his command room. The chesspieces didn’t move. There were occasional flashes of blinding white light, followed by a low distant rumble that could be heard through the hull of the ship. On smaller screens under the large one, there were images of soldiers gazing over the wasteland toward the enemy’s trenches; waiting, watching, wondering. They all looked alike to Monteyiller. Soldiers always did. The loudspeakers spewed out the sounds of machine guns, artillery, disrupters, of men dying. Beneath the explosions and the screams of the disrupters was a low, steady droning, rising and falling.
“They’ve got aircraft,” Cat said.
She was reclining in a chair behind him, gazing with tired eyes at the large screen. Monteyiller shrugged indifferently.
“Toys. We could blast them out of the sky anytime.” He almost smiled. “They’re propeller-driven, can you imagine that? Old as hell; they’re scraping the bottom of their resources.” He searched among the computer feed-outs that littered the table before him. “The library identified some of them. Museum pieces, every one of them. Here.…” He smiled absently. “Fokkers, Messerschmitts, Spitfires, Dorniers. They’re so ancient the central computer had to dig in the files for a couple of hours before it found even a passing reference to them. It’s beautiful.”
One of the cameras picked up a low-flying aircraft that thundered over the treetops. Written in large, elaborate letters on the engine hood was: Spirit of St. Louis.
“Why don’t you just go in and get it over with,” Cat said. “You could do it anytime you wanted to.”
“In time,” Monteyiller said. “I’m doing this my own way, taking it easy on them. They can’t keep this up forever. I’m wearing them down. I have lots of time—they don’t.”
“You’re playing war,” Cat said. “You always wanted to do this. It’s nothing but a game to you.”
“I made a mistake at first,” Monteyiller said. “I’m learning now. I’ll get them down on their knees!”
“There are men dying out there.”
“I didn’t start this, did I? I just want Martha and a settlement, that’s all. They just have to stop fighting, and there won’t be any war.”
“You could end this any time you wanted to,” Cat said. “You just don’t want to, because if they get crushed you won’t be the big commander-in-chief any longer.”
“Spare me the psychoanalysis!” Monteyiller snapped. “I’m doing this my way, you hear?”
Cat rose from her chair. “I hear,” she said.
She walked out slowly from the command room, without looking back. Behind her, the loudspeakers spewed out the sounds of the battle. Monteyiller was talking into the microphone, ordering down another of the cruisers that circled around the planet. The enemy was bringing in reinforcements: long-range artillery, tanks, and a never-ending stream of soldiers in drab gray uniforms. Sleek fighters swooped down onto the hovering scoutships, spitting out fire.
The shimmering towers rose up from a small island of trees, surrounded by a rapidly widening wasteland where the machines of war rumbled toward each other. The ground heaved and shook, fireballs blossomed and died. All the time, more men, more machines poured out from the towers, an impossible, inexhaustible mass radiating out into the screaming inferno of the battlefield.
If Martha hadn’t been in those towers, Monteyiller thought, I would have blasted them away long ago. But they know I can’t take that risk. I’ll go on like this forever, if I have to. They can’t go on, but I can. I have six cruisers waiting up there with reinforcements. I’ll wear them down to dust before I’m finished. I wont even need the cruisers.
But if I should and needed more—I can get reinforcements from the Confederation. This world is ours. We keep what is ours. They could be here in a couple of weeks, if I needed them. I could ask for a thousand men, ten thousand, fifty thousand. We’ll grind them down to nothing. I’ll grind them down to nothing.
He stared at the screen, his lips drawn back in an almost painful grimace.
I’ll never give up.
He spoke into the microphone. Cruisers landed and spewed out more supplies, more men, more machines. The night was alive with white, dazzling death. In the trenches, men died and were replaced. They all looked alike. They always did.
The challenger made a new move. The challenged counter-moved. Pawns moved out, according to the rules of the game.
Monteyiller looked up at the screen, contemplating a new move. The battle was spreading; perhaps he would have to move the base back a mile or so. A perfectly reasonable move, in all respects.
Castling.
22
The battle went on, slowing down sometimes to a sporadic exchange of fire over the no-man’s land, then suddenly flaring up violent, continuous bombardment. The countryside was slashed and torn for miles around the shimmering towers that still rose mockingly from their surrounding island of unscathed trees. Men and equipment continued to pour out from the towers. The battlefield widened in concentric circles, like the ripples on water where a stone has been dropped. The roads were filled with fugitives. They passed the base in a never-ending column, pale and silent, carrying their meager belongings with them. Some of the guards at the perimeter of the base insisted they recognized some of the fugitives, that they were the same people walking by day after day, night after night. They were laughed at. All fugitives look alike. The uniform of fear and starvation is as de-individualizing as the uniform of the soldier.
There were also prisoners-of-war, sullen, bearded men who would say nothing except their rank and number. They were put together behind force-beams and did nothing but plot to escape. One group built a wooden horse for exercise, and used it to cover the opening of a subterranean passage that ended outside the prison compound. One prisoner escaped with the help of a female technician who had fallen in love with him. They were a constant source of trouble. Monteyiller delegated the headache to a subordinate, and forgot about it.
There were also allies.
They came for money or for glory or for hate, for the chance of looting or for reasons of their own. They came dressed in strange uniforms, carrying strange weapons or no weapons at all. They fought like devils and died as heroes in a war that they didn’t even try to understand. They were mad, but useful. Heracles came.
Monteyiller happened to be down at the gate of the base when he arrived at the head of an unlikely band of mercenaries. There were four men dressed in gaily colored, loose-fitting uniforms, knee-high boots, plumed hats and billowing cloaks, who called themselves the Three Musketeers. There was an old fat man who sat in a wheelchair and told everyone in sight that he was the good soldier Schweik and the enemy would be sorry if he ever got his hands on them. There was also a tall, brooding savage clad in a loincloth who spoke in grunts and coughs, and a black-clad masked man on a white horse who said nothing at all. And there was, of course, Heracles.
“Ho, little man!” he shouted, pushing the guards aside with a shove of his hand and walking up to Monteyiller, who had been gazing at the mercenaries with quiet resignation. “I heard that you are going to start some little war or other, so I came to help you finish it!” He pounded Monteyiller on the back, laughing thunderously. “Don’t look so downcast, little man! Heracles is here, is he not? What do you want me to do, little man?”
Monteyiller waved away the guards. He said, “Didn’t you have a labor to do for that king of yours?”
“Aye.” Heracles grinned. “I have done that one—and one extra besides, one that the king didn’t like! That’s why I had to leave you so
sudden; he sent his jackal after me to remind me of the hell-hound Cerberus that I was supposed to fetch for him. Now it’s done and over with, and here I am. Now, what do you want me to do?”
“One of us is imprisoned in those towers over there,” Monteyiller said. “A woman. We want her out.”
“You are taking too much trouble for a woman,” Heracles said. “No woman is worth fighting for, believe me. Anyway”—he grinned—“Heracles has seen wars before; he knows a pretext when he sees one. Did I tell you about Helen of Troy and the accursed war they started for her sake? ‘Just to liberate her, nothing else,’ they said. The liars! Never has an army so much as lifted a foot for a fair maiden’s sake unless she’s been sitting on a mountain of gold. Ill help you, little man!” He laughed joyously, slapping his thigh with an enormous hand.
They walked up toward the flagship. Monteyiller said, “We want what is ours, nothing else. If they refuse to give it to us, well take it. That’s all there is to it.”
“That’s all there is to any war.” Heracles grinned. “Same humility, same unselfishness, same liberation, same corpses, same looting, same raping, same death. I know about wars.” He glanced at Monteyiller. “And this will be a long and beautiful one. They won’t give her up, I know them.”
“I have time,” Monteyiller said.
“And I will help you!” Heracles shouted. “By Zeus, I will! I’m a man of peace at heart, anyone knows that, but never has Heracles been known to skulk away from a fight! You are a man of my taste, little man,” he roared, slapping Monteyiller’s back. “Well show them, the swine! Well cut them to pieces! I know this place, little man; with me beside you there’ll be sweet grapes of victory waiting for us, you can be sure of that!” He grinned happily down at Monteyiller. “Now, what I would suggest at the moment would be to send some of your soldiers down to a small town not far from here—it’s hardly more than a village, actually—and seize it. Won’t be any trouble at all, you’d know how to do it. The people in that town are friends of Alice, see? And you wouldn’t want to have her friends that close to you, would you? It would only cause you trouble in the future, it would. When you have that, I have a wonderful plan for you, a magnificent plan, a plan that only Heracles could make.”
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