Louis Shalako
Having lost the enemy machine, camouflaged and flying low over the terrain, Trooper Noya had reacquired it. He held it centred up for a moment, the system automatically recording everything that could be seen. His own radar was still turned off—he didn’t need it and the enemy machine would have detectors plastered all over it.
“Trooper Noya. Please break off and proceed to the
patrol area.”
“Right. Anyhow, our trajectories are similar. I mean,
coming and going. He must have launched at dawn, some time, maybe twenty
minutes or half an hour after we did. I’m about a thousand metres behind and
five hundred above in altitude. I don’t think they can see me. Logging all
data-points. Coming about, Colonel. Sorry about that.” He tore his eyes away
from the display to engage the camera pickup. “What’s interesting is that they
went straight across country. They really should have followed the road,
shouldn’t they?”
It might have implied haste, it might have implied
some sense of insecurity. The Unfriendlies would like to know more about her
own force, and that was for sure. They also knew exactly where to look, which
was interesting in that their intel was accurate enough—insofar as it went,
which could also be said of her own intelligence set-up.
They would have a lot of gaps in the data. They knew
about the recent Confederation landing, or would very quickly. It had been
reported on all the news sites, just as had the original small Unfriendly
landing.
They knew all about her, and that was interesting.
“Hmn. Interesting observation. We are assuming they
have a satellite, but. It is an
assumption. Anyways, that was good
thinking, Trooper. Welcome to the team.”
“Roger. Two minutes out at full throttle. All cameras
and sensors on.” His active radar was still switched off.
His reasoning seemed good.
There was no need to respond, and there were people
monitoring the cameras besides Noya.
“Colonel.”
“Yes, Captain?”
“Force Two has arrived in Walzbruch and rendezvoused
with our forces there. They’re setting up a few boobies and then they want to
establish a blocking position.” His stylus indicated a point on Highway Three
leading from Walzbruch to Deneb City. “When we get a minute, we’ll set up a few
ambush points on Highway Two.”
Highway Two led from Walzbruch to Roussef.
In the immediate area of Walzbruch, there was the
typical web of secondary roads, unimproved in most cases. The weather had been
dry. They had local knowledge, and they would be able to withdraw under some
cover and by a number of different tracks. Sooner or later, they had to pop out
onto the highway in order to make any time.
Boobies were just that, booby-traps of varying
complexity and lethality.
“Very well. Ask them to set up a couple of fallback
positions on the way into Walzbruch, and one or two on the way out again.”
“Right.”
Captain Aaron stood there looking at the terrain, with
the highways cut by numerous streams falling down from the highlands and a
couple of vital bridges. Blow the right bridge, and the enemy would be held up
for hours. If they went the wrong way around and took the wrong trail, or
especially if the muddy season hit at just the right time…they could be stuck
in the hills for days.
“Yes. I think that will be best—”
Looking around, it seemed the Colonel was busy
elsewhere.
***
The Combat Command had come to the end of their
window.
Holing up on high ground, on both sides of Highway 17,
the heavier vehicles were five hundred metres or so further back, under the
cover of trees and terrain. The fallback position was just over the brow of the
hill using the reverse slope to keep plenty of dirt and rock between them and
any enemy.
The Colonel was on the line, but she cut off abruptly.
They had their instructions. She was confident enough
in them, and the plan. The only question was the cost.
With modern battlefield communications, now secure in
their private fibre network, distributed by low-power radio at point of use,
any unit or individual trooper could see everything that the people in the
command centre saw. With nothing much going on where they were, it was an
interesting insight into the battle.
“Proctor One. Proctor One. Missile launch—” This from
Fire-Team Three to Trooper Noya on the drone.
“Thank you. Maneuvering.”
The horizon tipped over and then the machine was
apparently spinning.
“What?”
“Sorry, Colonel. I saw the flash—wasn’t too sure what
it was.”
With the feed from the Mark Seventeen Satellite
overhead, plus the report from Fire Team Three in the city, the missile tracked
across the map, a small red bogey arrowing towards the green caret that was now
Proctor One. Noya had been fine-tuning his display and controls and seemed
fairly confident. Rapid confirmations came in from the other fire-teams,
removing all doubts.
She’d have to ask Noya about all that ability—but he
clearly had some.
“Trooper Noya.” In the camera view, the horizon spun
wildly.
“Hopefully we don’t pull the wings off this thing.”
“Proctor One. Proctor One.”
“Go ahead, over.”
“Missile impact in three, two, one.”
“Nope.”
“What? Say again. Say again, Proctor One.”
“Not if I can help it. I’m right on the treetops. I
just saw something, a quick flash in the corner of the view-field.”
“Proctor One. Proctor One, come in please.”
“Proctor One here. Go ahead.”
“Status of Proctor One.”
“We’re still flying. That was nowhere near us.”
“Proctor One. Report.”
“I did a snap-roll and then threw her into a flat
spin. Otherwise you get going too fast, and we’re only a thousand metres up. We
got lucky. Over.”
She could look up flat
spin later—
“Roger that, Proctor One. They’ll have a few more of
those, over.”
“Absolutely. Colonel. I’ve got an idea. I’d like to
get closer, over.”
“What’s your plan, Proctor One?”
“We go semi-autonomous, nap-of-the-dirt, down low
where they can’t see us. We get close. Pop up, take a look, and then drop down
before they can hit us. Over.”
“Can you program that, Proctor One?” Or fly it.
“Yes. If I can get one of the girls to fly this thing
for a couple of minutes, I should be able to figure it out. Manual flight with
stability-control and terrain collision warning and avoidance. It’s all high-G
stuff. If we weren’t in so much of a hurry this morning—”
“Roger. Permission to proceed. Do you need a break?
Can you set the thing to circle for a couple of minutes?”
“Marissa’s here, she thinks she can handle it. Some of
them have been taking turns on the game, uh, I mean the simulator.”
“Very well. Carry on, and good work.”
“Thank you Colonel. Likewise, I’m sure.”
Gunnery Sergeant Kelly was in the front seat of a
Hellion, with the board down low in front of him, watching and listening in
fascination.
“Wait! Colonel.”
“Go ahead, Proctor One.”
“How many of those things do they got?”
“At least three launchers in a typical battery, three
missiles per launcher. They have pretty good range for their size. Thirty to
fifty kilometres, depending on altitude, distance and angle.” Straight up, it
was all boost, on lower angles the small, pop-out winglets helped support it
and extended the range. “We can assume quite a number of reloads, copy?”
“Right. Uh—”
“Yes, Proctor One?” There was a patient note in the
Colonel’s voice.
She must be having a hell of a long day, thought
Kelly.
“If you don’t mind—I’m going to pull a few more
teeth.”
The sergeant grinned a feral grin.
I
don’t know who the hell that guy is, but I like him—
“Very well. And thank you, Trooper.”
“Yes, ma’am. My pleasure.”
Kelly sat there grinning.
Yeah, she’d been having that effect on a lot of
them—the males, anyways.
In the back of the Hellion, Captain Herzon groaned
softly in his sleep.
Apparently, back home, his youngest kid was sick and
the marriage wasn’t doing too well either.
Captain Herzon had all kinds of worries.
Kelly only had the one.
Get in, get the job done. Get paid, and go home.
It was as simple as that.
He’d also read the Colonel’s book and she really knew
her business.
Otherwise, he wouldn’t have bothered to come along.
***
“Okay. Here we go. Brigadier-General McMurdo was a
full Colonel. Only recently promoted, he was a colonel for fourteen years. This
looks like a big opportunity for him. Was second in command at the siege of
Roget Four. Implicated in war crimes, but never indicted. His family owns a few
hundred-million hectares on Shiloh, as well as being involved in big
agri-business there.” Many of his troops, raised on his own manor by the
regiment, would also be tenants and clients, some of them personally known to
him.
Like the manor itself, the regiments raised this way
would be passed down within the family tree.
The troops might be traditional military retainers. At
least some undoubtedly would be.
They would be the sons of his nearest neighbours—more
food for thought. The other thing was that Guards units were of very high
status. The regiment had been constituted by his great-grandfather, with a
patent from the government of Shiloh. Guards status had been earned in a
particularly vicious little siege fifty years ago. The McMurdo name was all
over the place, not just historically, but presently, as a captain and a
lieutenant of that name were also serving.
Hmn. Very interesting—
“Sirs.”
Holding up a hand, Dona answered the trooper, his face
tense as he pulled off his VR set.
“Yes?”
“We’ve got trucks coming out of Deneb City. They’re
not on the main road…”
“Ah.” With a nod to Lieutenant Wheeler, interrupted in
her briefing on McMurdo, Dona got up from the hot-seat in the command centre.
Going over to the trooper’s station, the two of them
put on the goggs and had a look.
In the background, phones were buzzing and there was a
dull hum of activity as data came in and orders, instructions, clarifications,
went out.
“Ah.” License numbers flashed across the screen,
captured and analyzed by the drone aircraft as it popped up once again from
behind the hilltops. “Nothing to worry about. Those trucks belong to us.
They’re full of grain. Flour, cereals, all kinds of staple and prepared foods.”
The trucks had transponders, all of them pinging away
in routine fashion. They all matched up with a list of numbers provided by a
civilian, known only as Dav13. Dav13 was risking a lot if they got caught—man,
woman, child, whatever.
The trooper zoomed out to a larger picture of the
battle zone.
“The Unfriendlies have a roadblock on Highway
Seventeen…fifteen kilometres out. Nothing on the secondary roads north of
town.” He bit his lip. “They’ll figure it out soon enough. But they’ve been
unloading and billeting their troops. They have a command post, they’ve
commandeered truck garages and repair shops. They’ve put out a couple of
proclamations—”
She nodded.
“They know where we are, all right. Mostly. They’ve
got a lot to think about. With numerical superiority, they may be a bit lax.
Keep an eye on those trucks…”
“Colonel.”
Taking off the goggles, another trooper was signalling
from a nearby station.
“Thank you. Keep on it—and watch them. Our people have
been in communication. Dav13 seems legit, but there is always the possibility
of a trick.” She patted him on the shoulder and went to the next trooper.
“What’s up, Trooper Kubili?”
“Ah. Seems to be some rioting in the town square.”
Absently nibbling her lip, she nodded.
Paul had been busy
while she was asleep…and that was what money was for, after all.
Right on schedule. All her junior officers had to do
was to follow their various time-lines, much like a big engineering or
construction project. Some of those time-lines started or stopped at different
times, some were of different lengths. Various units had been assigned to
various tasks, although they had scrambled to revise the plan somewhat once on
the actual ground.
Hopefully the enemy would play along—and they probably
would, if presented with exactly the right case at any given moment.
“Very well.” The camera, set up earlier by Fire Team
Three, was on a tall building a couple of blocks from Deneb City Hall and the
built-up downtown area.
They had a half a dozen cameras in the downtown area.
Slaved to the Confederation satellite, this one was running on pure laser.
“Right on time. This is a diversion—and it proves
something. The people are on our side, or at least enough of them…”
“Won’t the Unfriendlies just fire into the crowd,
Colonel?”
She sighed.
“Yes, probably. But not right away. They’ll try
bellowing through a megaphone first. Water-cannons and tear-gas. They’ll form a
line of shields and try and push them out. Right? Hopefully, our friends will
follow advice.”
“Advice? Which was what, exactly, Colonel. If you
don’t mind me asking?”
“Not to push their luck too far. Draw as many enemy
troops into the city centre in as short a time as possible, and then disperse
as quickly as possible…” She watched, fascinated, as protesters rolled a police
vehicle onto its side.
One had to wonder if they’d done it before.
People were milling around, shouting, waving fists and
signs, showing signs of some organization as they confronted the Unfriendly
position on the edge of a large square.
The Unfriendlies were assembling at the end of a
couple of side-streets.
There was no sound, not at that range. Whether this
was a blessing or a curse was a question for another day. The usual leadership
types would be right in the Unfriendly faces, hollering abuse and baiting them
to fight. There was a semi-circle, a gaggle of the uncommitted, all along the
periphery.
The first puffs of white gas exploded over the heads
of the crowd. There were a few civilians down there with gas-masks of a sort
used in industry. Pretty much all of them had some sort of masks or bandannas
across their faces. Someone had been using their heads…that also went for the
enemy, clearly somewhat prepared for civil unrest. The possibility of civil
unrest would commit a sizable force just to hold Deneb City and keep order. She
wanted the mob to underline that point. A city of that size would nail down at
least a thousand troops and possibly more, just to keep positive control.
“More trucks coming out.” A voice from nearby. “They
match our list.”
She lifted the goggles, giving the trooper a wave.
“Thank you.”
He nodded, as people’s eyes were glued wordlessly to
their screens, while others typed messages and listened intently to calls and
signals coming in from all over the zone.
“You’re welcome, Colonel Graham.”
(End of part twelve.)
Images.
Image One. Confederation Public Communications Office.
Image Two. Walzbruch Public Library.
Image Three. Denebola-Seven Defence Force.
Image Four. CPCO.
Image Five. CPCO.
Image Six. Denebola-Seven Chamber of Commerce.
Image Seven. Collection the author.
Previous
Episodes.
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
Part Five
Part Six.
Part Seven.
Part Eight.
Part Nine.
Part Ten.
Part Eleven.
Louis
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