Authors: William R. Forstchen
Riding an ironclad was different. It bounced the guts out of him as they rumbled up and down over the vast undulating plains, but at the moment he didn’t care … he was back in action, and that’s what counted.
Cresting a low bluff the driver down below halted their machine. To Vincent’s left, sprawled on the ground, were half a dozen Bantag, torn apart by Gatling fire, their mounts dead as well. The Hornet that had done the job came sweeping back from the east, wagging its wings as it passed overhead, most likely returning back to base, its ammunition spent.
Moving stiffly, Vincent turned, holding the side of the turret, letting his legs dangle over the side of the machine, and he dropped clumsily to the ground. It was good to be out of the machine. The open hatch atop the turret tended to act as a chimney, drawing heat up from the main deck below, where the boiler was. The dry sage crackled beneath his feet, the pungent smell clearing away the stench of hot oil and kerosene.
He raised his field glasses. Far ahead, several miles away, he could see them, six umens identified so far, sixty thousand mounted warriors of the Horde … and all of them confused as hell.
The breakout had started at dawn. A rocket barrage of five hundred rounds had preceded the attack, and then fifty-two ironclads led the way. They’d lost six in that opening assault, but within minutes their firepower, combined with the support of twenty Hornets, had torn a gaping hole in the Bantag lines a mile wide, the enemy fleeing in disorganized panic.
Following them had come the entire 3rd Corps, moving by regiments in a huge block formation, the same system Hans had used the year before during the withdrawal from the Green Mountains. But this time they had additional artillery with them, wagons for supplies, in addition to the Gatlings aboard the ironclads and in the air.
It was a different kind of warfare for a different age, Vincent realized. Varinna had grasped that, and it was beginning to crystallize in his own mind. This was more like ships maneuvering at sea than the old style of battles on land. Keep the ironclads together except for a dozen scattered around the square of 3rd Corps to provide fire support and to act as rally points.
An ironclad ground up the slope beside him and came to a stop, steam hissing from the safety valve, the top door open, a head sticking out.
“Bastards don’t know what to do!” Timokin grinned, sitting up in the turret of his machine and wiping his face with a sweat-stained rag. He climbed out and dropped to the ground next to Vincent. Other machines were climbing the slope behind them, moving in a giant V formation a half mile wide. It was a grand sight, smoke billowing, cleated wheels cutting into the dry turf, gun ports open, three-inch rifles and Gatlings protruding and ready for action.
Behind them all of 3rd Corps was marching in open block formation. Just inside the giant square six batteries moved at an easy pace, ready to swing out and deploy if needed, while in the center of the vast square were the wagons loaded down with extra fuel, ammunition, and medical supplies. The lone regiment of mounted troopers weaved back and forth outside the square along the flanks and rear, troopers occasionally reining in to trade a couple of shots with Bantag riders who ventured too close to the formation. Overhead four Hornets circled lazily, ready to swoop down if the Bantag should try to venture a charge.
He could sense the exhilaration in the ranks. Third Corps had stayed in Tyre throughout the winter, avoiding the gutting of the army at Roum and the disaster at Capua. If anything, the men had felt abandoned, forgotten on a secondary front, and after nine months in the siege lines were glorying in a chance to prove something.
Gregory offered Vincent his canteen, and he gladly took it. He had drained his own canteen hours ago and pride had kept him from asking for more water from his crew below, who were suffering in far worse heat. Too many months behind a desk he realized.
The water was hot, but he didn’t care, rinsing the oily taste out of his mouth and then taking a long gulp.
“This is a damn sight better than Capua,” Gregory said, wincing slightly when Vincent tossed the canteen back. “Type of country these machines were made for. not the tangle of trenches and traps up north.”
Vincent nodded in agreement.
He continued to scan the enemy. Plumes of dust were rising from the west several miles behind the column.
They are most likely detaching more troops away from Tyre to follow, he thought. Maybe even abandoning the siege completely except for a small covering force, figure to pin us out here with everything they have and wipe us out.
In spite of Gregory’s enthusiasm and the fact that he had planned this operation himself, Vincent did feel a shiver of nervousness. It was one thing to calculate all this out on paper and maps; it was another thing to be out here now. Hans had been right, it was different down here. North, in Roum, the land was settled: There were roads, villas, towns, the typical orderliness of the Roum, everything squared off and proper. This was vast unsettled land, undulating prairie as far as the eye could see, like what he imagined Kansas or the Nebraska Territory to be. A place for the ironclads, but not for a column of infantry on foot.
It was a strange balance. The Bantag did not have a single ironclad on this front. The few rocket launchers they had were expended, and none of their artillery could stand in the open against the attack. Yet once mounted they could ride rings around the machines and the marching column of 3rd Corps. He looked back to the west, where 3rd Corps, nearly eleven thousand men, were moving through the dry knee-high grass, looking like an undulating blue wave traversing a green-brown sea.
Neither side could now come to grips with the other.
The Bantags did have one serious advantage, though—they could chose the place to stand and fight. He could not. They had mobility both tactically and strategically, his side had the firepower. If they could bring up firepower as well, it could turn deadly. And that was part of the plan as well.
He walked in front of his machine, surveying the ground, remembering the maps he had studied so intently that they were' etched clearly in his mind. They were just under twenty miles out from Tyre, a damn good march for the first day. A shallow stream was directly ahead, several hundred yards down the slope, its water dark and muddied by the passing of the Horde riders.
“We camp here,” Vincent announced.
“We’ve still got four hours or more of daylight, we could make another eight to ten miles.”
Vincent shook his head.
“No. This is far enough. Besides, I want the men dug in, stockade with sod walls, and we’ve got water down there for the night. The next stream is six miles farther on, and if the Bantags have any sense, they’ll fight us for it.”
“Grand, and we chew them apart.”
“There’s time for that, plenty of time,” Vincent said absently. “Let the pressure build some more first. Besides, we’re not the main show, that’s Hans’s job. Remember, we’re the diversion, the bait. We bed down early tonight, do a hard march tomorrow, and should nearly reach the head of the rail line they’re driving west from the Great Sea. Jurak has undoubtedly figured by now that we are attacking here. He might already have dispatched troops and ironclads from Xi’an and Fort Hancock to converge and meet us in defense of that rail line. Let’s give him time to get there and make the show easier for Hans.”
Hans
. He pulled out his watch.
He should be hitting just about now, he thought. God help him
.
* * *
It wasn’t the time to vomit but the last two hours had been pure hell. Leaning over weakly, he retched, but there was nothing left to give. The ship bucked and surged, rising up on another thermal of hot air, then plunging back down.
“Is that Xi’an?” Jack shouted.
“What?”
“Damn it, Hans, pull yourself together.”
He nodded bleakly, looking forward. They’d been over land for the last hour, bisecting the arcing curve of the river up to Xi’an. The cloud cover had been building since early afternoon, forcing them to drop lower, Jack expressing increasing anxiety about the prospect of a thunderstorm. If a storm did come up, it could wipe out the entire mission.
Hans raised his field glasses, bracing his elbows on the forward panel, trying to compensate for the unceasing motion of the airship, which was bobbing like a cork on a windswept sea.
It had to be it. In spite of the surging motion of the ship he caught glimpses of a vast walled compound, ships anchored, and for a brief instant a place that looked all too chillingly familiar, the small fortress village half a dozen miles below Xi’an, where he had holed up after escaping from the slave camps. The aerosteamer steadied for a moment, and the world beneath him seemed to come into sharp focus. The city was spread out along the east bank of the river, ancient brick walls glowing red in the late-afternoon sun.
Dozens of ships lined the docks below the bluffs, most of them galleys, several steamers, the rest traditional Chin junks. A dark seething mass swarmed the docks, looking like a stirred-up nest of ants … Chin slaves. From the air the city had a fairy-tale quality to it, a towering pagoda in the center, buildings with steeply pitched red-tile roofs, dozens of small temples dotting the skyline. Yet as he steadied his field glasses he could sense, more than actually see, that a fair part of the city was abandoned, derelict homes, weed-choked streets, collapsed roofs. Even as they labored for their masters the pathetic residents of Xi’an were dying, chosen for the moon feast, transported to work on the railroads, factories, and supply lines, or simply worked to death.
Checking again on the village where he had fought off the Bantag till help arrived, he gauged the distance up the river. There was no doubt about it: They were approaching Xi’an, main supply base for the Bantag Horde, the transition point for supplies coming from the heart' of the Chin realm.
Two hundred miles eastward was that black heart of the Bantag Empire, the vast prison camps and factories where millions of Chin slaves labored to support the war. That heart was his ultimate goal, but first he had to seize this city. Everything the Bantag made to support their war effort had to come through here, off-loading from the trains to be loaded on ships that would transport it across the Great Sea, five hundred miles northward to be off-loaded yet again for the final run to Capua. This was the weak link in that vast chain.
This was the linchpin of Varinna’s plan. A raid deep into the realm of the Bantag to seize the docks, sink the ships, burn the supplies—to cut the precious lifeline. Vincent was the diversion, to present Jurak with two threats, the prospect of their seizing a base on the Great Sea and with luck draw off some forces before his own raid struck. If Vincent was successful, all the better.
“Where do we land?” Jack cried.
“Damned if I know,” Hans replied. “Can’t you remember?”
“I only flew over the damned place once, and that was a year ago. The second time I flew to where you were, then got the hell out. Damn it, Hans, we should have sent in at least one reconnaissance flight before doing this.”
Hans shook his head. One such flight might have tipped their hand. This one was going to be blind.
“Think they’re on to us?” Jack asked.
“Have to be by now; they must have coast watchers reporting us coming in.”
The city was just several miles out. Hans anxiously scanned the riverbanks, looking for a place to touch down that was close enough that they could directly storm the harbor area.
Nothing.
“We’re losing another ship.”
It was their top gunner calling in.
“She’s going down. Damn, it’s a Bantag flyer!”
His voice was drowned out by the staccato roar of a Gatling, the vibration of the topside gun firing shaking the cabin.
Jack held the ship steady, still aimed straight at the city, while anxiously scanning the sky above, looking for the enemy ship.
“There, north of the city wall, looks like an airfield!” Hans cried.
“That’s it then! We’re going in!” Jack shouted. He nosed the ship down, picking up speed.
“Got him! He’s breaking to starboard. He’s burning!”
Hans leaned forward, looking out the side window and caught a glimpse of a twin-engine airship, trailing fire, going down.
“Topside, how many still with us?”
“Somewhere around thirty-five I think.”
Hans said nothing. Better than he hoped but still only 350 men.
They dropped through two thousand feet, the wires on the wings singing.
Hans cleared the speaker tube to the cargo department.
“Ketswana, get ready!”
“About time.”
Engines howling, the airship leveled out a hundred feet above the marshy western shore, then turned as they reached the river just south of the city and started to race straight in. Straight ahead he could see startled faces looking up, Chin slaves on the docks and around the warehouses, hands raised, pointing at the incoming assault. A scattering of Bantag were running along the walls. A stream of tracers snapped past the open window, startling Hans, it was one of the gunners flying behind them sweeping the walls.
“Fly us over the ships, then bank around into the airfield,” Hans shouted.
“Why?”
“I want the Chin on the docks to see our insignia so they know what the hell is happening.”
Jack banked the ship, turning more easterly, heading straight in toward the city, then banked over sharply, port-side wing dropping down. They were directly above the docks lining the river below the city walls, white stars of the Republic exposed on the bottom side of the wings, an insignia clearly different than the human skulls of the Bantag. In spite of the howling of the engines and the shriek of the wind, he distinctly heard thousands of voices rising up, excited cries of hope.
The nausea was gone, he hung on, watching as land, river, city, and sky wheeled in front of him. A bullet snapped through the cabin, shattering a window, glass flying.
They leveled out, heading straight toward a row of galleys berthed side by side, each of them loaded down with two land ironclads. A steamer, looking vaguely like an old-style Mississippi riverboat, towing two barges was out in the middle of the river, barges loaded down with crates behind it, heading downstream. Again the staccato roar of the Gatling from above; tracers tore into the first barge. It ignited in a towering fireball, debris soaring hundreds of feet heavenward.