B00BPJL400 EBOK (6 page)

Niwa sat on a bench beside the table and steepled his fingers. “Do not forget the
other
information we gleaned from the prisoners: our enemy has another enemy besides us! These ‘Doms.’ Their efforts have been divided between two distinct fronts. Just imagine what that means. Without that distraction, they might have sent
twice
what they did against us, and our war—in India at least—would already be lost. As it is, whoever or whatever these Doms are—sadly, I could learn little about them, particularly where they are beyond ‘in the east’—they do us a great service whether they know it or not. Still, the fact that our enemies are fighting two wars at once says much about their industrial capacity and reserves. Unless that other enemy has recently beaten them more soundly than we have, I would expect an increased focus on
us
.”

“And yet it may be the reverse,” Halik speculated. “If these Doms even now drive our enemy on another front, he may be hard-pressed to make good his losses, much less intensify his efforts here.”

“Perhaps,” agreed Niwa, “but that is only a hope—and a double-edged hope at that.”

“In what way?”

“Our current enemy is quite enough to satisfy me. I do not relish facing anyone who could defeat him.”

Halik was silent, contemplative, and Niwa finally took a deep breath.

“Ultimately, my friend,” Niwa said softly, “between us, whatever plans the enemy has may not be our greatest concern. Do not place too much faith in our new regent, General of the Sea Kurokawa. He has plans of his own that do not include you or me, the Grik, or anyone but himself.” He paused. “He is mad, you know. Do you understand what that means?”

Halik looked troubled. “Not angry, in the context you use. He is . . . mind sick?”

“That is close. He should have followed his naval victory with an immediate advance on the enemy, as soon as more ships arrived. Complete victory might have been possible then, but I’m no longer sure that’s what he wants—or that he wants it
yet
. I know he has a scheme, but I have no idea what it is or what he hopes to achieve.”

“So . . . he is a traitor to the Celestial Mother?”

Niwa actually burst out laughing. He couldn’t help it. He suddenly sobered when he saw Halik’s crest rise in anger—and when he realized he couldn’t remember the last time he’d laughed. “I don’t know if he’s a traitor,” he said at last, “but I know the man, and he’s truly
loyal
only to himself.”

Halik considered. “We should have attacked this Alden immediately also, with everything, before he had a chance to improve his position. Still, without reinforcement and major supply, time is not on
his
side.” He looked at the rifle once more. “I believe he has few more of
those
, and his ammunition will be short for everything. I think we will use this time of delay to make him use as much of it as we can.” He looked at Niwa, and his crest flattened. “That, we are already doing, as you know. As you say, we have supply issues of our own and cannot keep an army this size in the field forever in a land so barren of food beasts . . . without feeding upon our own, and doing our enemy’s work for him! General Ugla’s Hatchling Host west of the gap has all the supplies it could want, carried overland from ports in the west. They also have the large creatures of the plains to consume at need. But the gap was to be the principal path of supply for
us
! Few of the food beasts we gathered in the lowlands remain, and the enemy is actually better off in that regard than we. They discovered many of the kraals and captured a considerable herd.” Halik gazed out at the rain. “So you are right after all, in every way. We simply cannot wait much longer for whatever Regent General of the Sea Kurokawa has in mind.” He paused, considering. “And regarding him, I will think on what you said. We must discuss it again—and discover how we can destroy the enemy entirely before he destroys us.”

Niwa was silent.

“Come,” Halik said in an ironic tone, ringing a bell for his attendants. “It is time to demonstrate against the enemy again, to provoke him to use more precious ammunition!” He snorted angrily. “And help us ease our own supply problems once more,” he added with heavy sarcasm. His attendant appeared. “Fetch my armor!” he ordered. “And bring something for General Niwa as well!” He looked at Niwa. “I know we decided not to put ourselves together on the field of battle anymore. We are co-commanders, after all. But this will not be a
real
battle; merely a harvest of provisions. Still, you might observe something of interest. Would you care to join me?”

“Of course, General Halik.”

4

//////
Alden’s Perimeter
Lake Flynn, West of Madr
as
Grik India

T
hunder muttered in the thick night sky, and accompanying strobes of lightning competed with the desultory flashing pulse and rumble of artillery. Brief torrents of rain seemed physically shaken from the trembling, pregnant clouds of sodden air, to bulge the swollen lake and flood its muddy, miserable environs. Around Lake Flynn and the upper reaches of the river that fed it through the high, craggy, Rocky Gap, the remnants of Alden’s Allied Expeditionary Force (AEF) had dug in tighter than a tick.

A network of defensive trenches, protected by a blanket of the new barbed wire, zigzagged around the perimeter several lines deep in places. The reliable and deadly twelve-pounder “Napoleons”—as General Alden called them—were placed in thoughtfully situated redoubts where they could lay heavy fire support down long sections of the line. The lighter, more numerous six-pounders strengthened the line itself at frequent intervals. Alden’s own beloved 1st Marines, of General Muln-Rolak’s I Corps, formed a mobile reserve with their breech-loading Baalkpan Arsenal “Allin-Silva” conversion rifles that fired a potent.50-80 cartridge. The rest of Rolak’s I Corps held the stopper in the Rocky Gap. Rolak remained a little exposed to a Grik thrust to cut him off from the rest of I Corps and the beefed-up, reinforced remnant of General Queen Safir Maraan’s II Corps in the main west-east-south defensive line, but a grand battery placed in a veritable fortress had bloodily repulsed such attempts so far. True, many of II Corps’s “reinforcements” were actually support troops, auxiliaries, and even sailors, but all were veterans now. The heaps of festering Grik corpses, packed so thick that even the rain couldn’t subdue the stench, lapped against every part of the line and grimly testified to that. General Rolak felt secure.

Somehow, General Pete Alden, onetime Marine sergeant aboard the lost USS
Houston
on another, different earth, and now General of the Armies and Marines of the Grand Alliance, had managed to wring order from the chaos of disaster. He—and Keje, Alden supposed—had lost the port city of Madras, and his northern component of the Allied Expeditionary Force had been cut off from most lines of convenient support. In the confusion of that month-old battle, III Corps, under General Faan-Ma-Mar, had slashed its way up from the south against scattered, surprised resistance, and his force was much appreciated, but it had been a costly move. Now Alden’s
three
savaged corps were as effectively surrounded as Colonel Billy Flynn’s scratch division beyond the Rocky Gap had been, and Flynn’s force had ultimately been all but annihilated. But Pete had more defensible terrain; secure internal lines of communication; and more troops, artillery, and mortars than Flynn enjoyed on his crummy, rocky hill. There was an elasticity of depth, and the Grik had difficulty moving through the dense forest to mass against the formidable defenses he’d established, defenses Flynn never had the time, troops, or equipment to emplace. The lake in the center of the perimeter also meant Pete had a ready “airfield” for almost seventy PB-1B Nancy floatplanes that could provide air support. Perhaps most important, he’d secured most of the baggage intended to support an extended campaign. The AEF was in . . . decent shape.

For now,
Pete Alden reminded himself darkly, checking his water-beaded watch in the lamplight of the CP tent. He was amazed the thing still worked. The case was badly corroded and the wristband had been replaced twice now when the leather rotted off his wrist.
For now,
he almost sighed. Only forty of his plucky Nancys were actually airworthy, and all had seen a lot of action with limited maintenance. Most came from the shattered carrier
Salissa
, and had been through a lot before they ever arrived, unable to return to their badly damaged ship. Fuel, spare parts, bombs—everything heavy that took up space aboard the meager but gradually more frequent supply flights was in short supply. All fresh supplies came from Ceylon—still in Allied hands—or via TF
Arracca
, which lurked offshore, from Andaman Island. It was a vital but rickety logistics train, stretched to the absolute limit.

The planes and their pilots were just as exhausted as the rest of Pete’s army after months of almost constant combat, and there was no end in sight. Still, in the Lemurians that made up his army, from such diverse places and even cultures, he had the best troops he could want, and a good position to defend. But the swarming—unnervingly more professional—Grik host he faced was too numerous, and frankly too damn good, for Pete to consider any unsupported offensive action, and it galled his soul. Worse, for right or wrong, Pete still thought the whole situation was mostly his fault.

“It’s almost time,” he told his staff, also waiting in the shelter of the tent. “Anything from the lookouts?”

“No Gen-er-aal Aal-den,” replied a stocky ’Cat hunched over the wireless receiver, an assistant methodically turning a hand generator.

“If we can’t fly in this muck, Grik zeppelins sure can’t,” the young, blond Lieutenant Mark Leedom said, nodding at the sky. Leedom had been a torpedoman, but had become one of the hottest pilots they had.

“But we
do
fly in it, Lieutenant,” Pete disagreed. “We have to.” He shrugged. “Maybe not combat missions, but without the supply runs, we won’t last long—and we’re losing a lot of planes and pilots just bringing in the beans and bullets.”

“Stuff wears out,” Leedom pointed out in a low tone. “So do people. At least we’re starting to get stuff up the Tacos River from the coast,” he added. The river had been named for Leedom’s Lemurian backseater, who’d been killed in action.

“We are,” Alden agreed, “but the Grik’ll figure that out eventually and start sniping at the boats and barges all the way in and out. They’ll line the river with heavy guns—or, God help us, put a floating battery in it.”

“At least they can’t get one of their baattle-ships upstream,” said the Lemurian General Daanis of General Maraan’s Silver Battalion of her famous “600.” He was tall for a ’Cat and had the same black fur as his Aryaalan queen.

“The water is too shallow, even with this unending rain,” agreed Captain Jis-Tikkar. The sable-furred Tikker, as he was better known, was COFO (Commander of Flight Operations) aboard
Salissa
, or
Big Sal
, before the Battle of Madras. He was Leedom’s boss and had brought what remained of
Salissa
’s 1st Naval Air Wing to join Leedom’s pickup squadrons of Nancys after his ship was badly damaged by suicide glider bombs dropped by zeppelins, of all things. Some of the weapons had even made attacks within the perimeter, but most crashed harmlessly in the lake or surrounding jungle, and their carrier zeps had been shot down. “And there is the ford just east of the lake. Even we must transfer supplies to other barges to bring them here. No baatle-ship can pass the ford.”

“They might think of something,” Leedom warned. “We can’t ever take for granted just because we can’t do something, they can’t. Not again. If one of their battlewagons—or anything with big guns—ever
does
make it to the lake, we’ll be in big trouble.” Nobody replied. It was obvious such a thing could be catastrophic.

“There’s way too many worst-case scenarios for me, the way things stand,” Pete said at last. “We’re holding our own, barely, but the Grik keep growing stronger. We’re standing on the end of an awful thin twig, supply wise, and Keje’s got to figure some way to retake Madras!”

“Keje will come,” Tikker said with conviction. “
Salissa
is under repair, and newer, better ships swell his fleet. Colonel Maallory is on Ceylon with his P-Forties, and they await only more powerful weapons.”

“I’m sure you’re right,” Pete said, wishing he was. The Grik fleet in Madras was also swelling. He looked at his watch again. “Come on. The Clipper’ll be here shortly. I want to see what they brought.”

General Alden ducked out into the slackening drizzle, followed by half a dozen men and ’Cats. The lake wasn’t far, its banks bordering the navigable portion lit by fires. There were a lot of fires in the damp forest: watch fires, campfires, places where wet troops could gather and dry their feet for a while and also clear beacons for the planes that came by night. From the sky, the lake would appear as an inky darkness surrounded by bright dots. Then, of course, there were the flashes of lightning and the seemingly endless battle that flared periodically. Even as Pete watched, the rumbling flashes quickened in the south, across the water, and he tensed.
It’s so strange,
he thought,
how I’ve learned to gain a feel for the “life” of the battle by the surrealistic display that pulses in the night
. “The Second and Ninth Aryaal are catching it,” he observed.

“Yes, sir,” Daanis agreed. “That’s the second thrust there tonight. This Gener-aal Haalik tests us everywhere.”

“Him or his pet Jap,” Pete grumbled, referring to the general, Niwa, whom Rolak’s personal Grik interpreter, Hij-Geerki, had identified for them. Pete wasn’t sure how “Geeky” got his information, since few Grik prisoners could ever be secured and those that were usually just . . . died. It was possible he went among the wounded after a fight and spoke to them as one of their own, but Rolak wouldn’t confirm that. Pete shook his head. It was hard to imagine that canny old warrior, Lord Muln-Rolak, trusting the weird little Grik so. “They’re not content to just keep us cornered here; they want us gone—or that damn Kurokawa does.” They’d also learned that General of the Sea Hisashi Kurokawa himself was in personal charge of this enemy campaign.

“We still block the Rocky Gap; the most direct route to Madraas,” Major Daanis said. “His fleet is there, but he cannot feel secure as long as we are at his back. . . . There! I think I hear the large plane. It sounds different from the others.”

Daanis was right. A crackling rumble of multiple engines throttling back reached their ears, and they saw the blue exhaust flares slide across the darkness, dropping toward the darker water. Torches flared to life in little boats on the lake so the pilot would have some reference for where the slick surface was, and the engines roared as the pilot advanced his throttles to check his descent. A moment later, a yellow-gray splash reflected the firelight and the glare of lightning and war as the big PB-5 “Clipper” slammed down on the lake. One of the powerboats raced to lead it in to the hasty docks. Pete and his companions strode out on the rough-hewn planks and edged away from the busy stevedores unloading a long train of barges recently arrived from the transfer point at the ford. Crates of ammunition, weapons, food, equipment, and medical supplies were piling high, waiting to be dispersed to the scattered, improvised supply sheds, or whisked away to needy troops.

“They’re weird-lookin’ ducks,” Pete said as the shape of the PB-5 resolved itself, drawing near.

“I think they’re swell,” Leedom said. “They look kind of like a Sikorsky S-40—with a proper tail.”

“I do not care what they look like, only what they can do,” Tikker said. “They can carry a ton of supplies—or maybe bombs—and more people than anything else we have. Once they are equipped with Colonel Maallory’s rad-iaals, we will have true, long-range reconnaissance such as we haven’t enjoyed since we lost the old PBY.”

“And a relatively heavy bomber,” Pete added. “I sure would like a heavy bomber!” He paused, looking at Leedom. “Anything else on those . . . mounted folks you and Captain Saachic reported when you broke out of the trap west of the Rocky Gap?” Pete immediately regretted asking. Leedom or Tikker would’ve reported if their pilots saw anything. Besides, what happened to Colonel Flynn and several thousand troops was still a very sore subject, and Leedom, shot down in the action, and the few others who made it out were amazingly lucky. Still puzzling, however, was that the survivors reported meeting some very oddly mounted . . . strangers, apparently led by some Czech guy. The mystery was driving Pete nuts.

“Ah, no, sir,” Leedom said. “The guys are keeping their eyes peeled.”

The big seaplane approached the dock and was fended off and secured while Pete and his staff waited expectantly. Finally, a hatch opened in the wood-and-fabric fuselage aft of the port wing, and a Lemurian face appeared.

“Watcha got?” Pete cried out.

“Mortar bombs, mostly,” the ’Cat replied. “An’ dispatches for you, Gener-aal.”

“How many wounded can you take out this time?” Daanis asked.

“Only ten, they say, which means I take fifteen, anyway,” the pilot grinned. “’Cats don’t weigh so much as hu-maans! I ordered to pick up passengers this time too. Don’t know who. They names in the dispatch.” He tossed a wrapped packet to Major Daanis, who’d jumped down on a floating gangway being pushed up to the hatch. Daanis nodded and blinked his thanks, then brought the packet to Pete.

“It says COTGA, Gener-aal,” Daanis said. COTGA stood for “Chairman of the Grand Alliance,” which meant the dispatch was from Adar himself. A dispatch from Adar was akin to receiving direct orders from President Roosevelt on another world.

Alden started to untie the string around the wrapping but hesitated. Despite weeks of assurances via wireless, he half expected the dispatch to carry orders for his relief, and he wasn’t sure he didn’t deserve it. He’d even offered to resign, but the wireless replies continued to express Adar’s trust.
Of course, under the circumstances, he wouldn’t just blow “You’re fired” all over the sky, would he?
He untied the string and unwrapped the waxy paper around the pages. “Gimme a light, wilya?” he asked, and someone raised a lantern.

The rain had eased for the moment and just a few drops fell on the pages he quickly read. To his mixed relief, there was only a brief preface regarding his offer to step aside, consisting of a statement of full and unreserved confidence. The rest was mostly concerned with an appraisal of what was being done to sustain his position and the assets on their way to him or Keje. They were the commanders on the scene, and Adar wouldn’t tell them their business. Pete smiled at that. He and Keje had already discussed some possibilities via coded wireless, and the assets Adar was committing would be a big help. Finally, the pages described the overall strategic stance of the Grand Alliance. Adar’s careful scrawl confirmed that Second Fleet and their Imperial Allies had secured the Enchanted Isles as a base to prepare operations directly against the Dominion, and reiterated that Captain Reddy and USS
Walker
continued to recover in Maa-ni-la. Finally, he expressed his view that Alden’s situation was a temporary setback that would soon be put to rights.