All Enemies Foreign and Domestic (Kelly Blake series) (39 page)

* * * * *

      Brad led a four-ship flight of the new AG-122Cs.
 
This upgrade replaced the thermal sights with multispectral sights incorporating infrared, visible light, ultraviolet, and thermal.
 
The system was capable of detecting whether vegetation was live or cut, which was why they were out today.
 
The T’Kab defense had reduced the ground forces’ advance to less than 100 kilometers per day.
 
Yes, they would get there at this rate, but not in time to stop the movement of a meat ranch and its Human occupants.

      Brad’s mission was to locate and destroy T’Kab ambush positions.
 
Co-pilot Sheila programmed the system for camouflage detection and ordered the others in the flight to space themselves 500 meters apart and scan for ambush fire positions along the corps’ avenue of approach.
 
They had gone less than five kilometers when Brad got his first alert.
 
A hilltop wood line gave strong indications of dead vegetation clumps evenly spaced apart.
 
Brad flew over the positions, passed the images to the other three ships, and turned wide.

      Brad keyed his communicator and said, “Follow me.
 
Sheila, put a burst in each of the clumps.”
 
He straightened up after the wide turn and lined up on the wood line.
 
Sheila rolled the controller wheel and switched to thermal.
 
As they got closer, the thermal view gave the ambush away.
 
Small field guns were camouflaged with cut branches, which showed up as cold in the viewer.
 
Sheila lined up the missile launcher and pressed fire.
 
Two missiles left their launch tube and flew into the first two emplacements, picking the gun up and flipping it and rolling the broken barrel and equilibrator assembly over on the crew.
 
He rolled away and had the next in line hit the next two targets and roll out as they were destroyed, and the next ship did the same.
 
After number four, the ambush team’s back had been broken.
 
Brad told the unit battle captain back at the airfield and she made sure the information got to 2nd Brigade.

       He opened up the formation again and patrolled further out along the corps’ route of march.
 
He flew out to where he could just see the objective city and used his onboard computer to record the terrain for later analysis.
 
Their orders said do not fly in sight of the city, so Brad dropped down and turned his flight around.
 
They retraced their path and looked for firing positions from this angle.
 
He flew about 150 kilometers before his screen highlighted four suspicious sites.
 
He passed three of the four to his flight mates and told them to engage at will.
 
He lined up on his target and was waiting for better target resolution when a clamshell of camouflage dropped open and a mixed gun and missile air defense system popped up on a telescoping tower.
 
Brad sent out a warning to break off the attack and Sheila tried to fire first, but her missile malfunctioned on the rail, letting the T’Kab launch first.
 
She cycled and fired another one and it homed in on the site while they dove at the ground and tried to get below the treetops.
 
Brad warned his flight to break off and get down in the bushes, but two had already taken hits and were climbing for altitude to give them the longest glide range back to the column before their engines failed.

      Brad was down below the treetops, but the missile stayed on his tail.
 
It was one of the new brilliant munitions, able to anticipate the target’s actions and probably purchased from one of the Human or K’Rang crews at the spaceport.
 
He tried every trick he knew, including rapid stop and land,
 
to no avail.
 
The missile kept coming on.
 
He decided to make as much distance towards the column while calling out his mayday.
 
When the corps came up on the net, he informed them of the location of the air defense site and requested some suppression.

      Brad’s monitor showed the relative location and range of the missile to him.
 
He could see it getting steadily closer, no matter how he jinked around in the sky.
 
He finally saw no alternative and turned hard to end up facing the missile.
 
He fired all his guns on wide mode and hoped he vaporized the missile before he would have to chicken out and turn away.

      The missile came on and accelerated.
 
One of his guns caught the edge of it and vaporized a good half of the missile, but the shrapnel ran into his starboard winglet and removed the tip, throwing him out of balance and into a spin.
 
The spin pushed him against the cockpit wall, but he got the ship stabilized, and balanced thrust with his ability to crab the ship at an angle to maintain his direction of movement.

      He wrestled the ship as long as he could and was 50 kilometers from the column when he had all his and Sheila’s muscles could take.
 
He called out his location with his final mayday and looked for a soft place to land.
 
Corps told him good luck, get as far from the wreckage as he could, and hunker down until they arrived, probably tomorrow.
 
He aimed his ship at a long clearing in the forest and hoped it wasn’t full of bugs.
 
He braced as he floated over the clearing, gently lowered the nose and floated into a powered landing.
 
As his wheels touched down he braced, but his wheels hit hard ground and his ship coasted to a stop near the wood line.
 
Brad and Sheila primed the self-destruct charges, grabbed their escape and evasion packs, and popped the canopy.
 
He turned the key on the charges as they turned and ran for the wood line.
 
He looked over to Sheila as they ran and said, “Now we’ll get a chance to put all that expensive escape and evasion training to the test.”

* * * * *

      The 1st Unified Force needed little support from Kelly and Ellie.
 
They landed their own supplies, for almost everything they used, from batteries to ammunition, was different than Human MilSpec items.
 
Kelly checked in with the senior ground force headquarters and enquired if they had enough K’Rang translators to serve as liaison to the K’Rang.
 
He found the response a tad icy, as he was thanked for his enquiry, but they had everything under control.
 
He was informed he was in violation of their general order on visitors and could return to G’Durin on the next available gate slot.
 
He fibbed slightly, saying he had to deliver a message from Elder J’Gon to Admiral Trokin before he could depart for G’Durin.

      Kelly met back up with Ellie and asked if she got as frosty a reception as he had.
 
She replied, “That was just the Brown effect.
 
General Brown is paranoid about visitors from on high.
 
He’s been that way since he was a brigade commander.
 
If you want to feel welcome, don’t come here.
 
He infects his staff with it, too.
 
If the staffer said they have enough liaison officers, he’s lying.
 
I met his liaison pool.
 
They couldn’t understand me speaking basic K’Rang.”

      He grabbed her arm and said, “Come on.
 
I need to get up to the fleet before I get charged with insubordination or violation of a general order.”

      Kelly used his special status as military attaché to bump the line and transport up to the flagship, then went looking for a friendly face.
 
He found that face in Rear Admiral Oliver Digg, commander of the 1st Assault Landing Group.
 
He saw Kelly first and walked up to him and shook Kelly’s hand.

      “Well, look what the cat drug in.
 
I didn’t think attachés were allowed camouflaged utilities.”

      Commander Digg had been Rear Admiral Minacci’s executive officer on the GRS Golden Eagle in the 3rd Assault Landing Group.

       Kelly introduced Lieutenant Colonel Johns.
 
“Ellie is one of my Deputy Attachés.
 
She handles ground force issues for me.
 
The K’Rang commander invited us to instruct his staff and commanders on our tactics and coordination measures.
 
I just tried to make a courtesy call at 6th Army Headquarters and was told, not in so many words, that my presence was neither required nor desired.”

      Rear Admiral Digg said, “We’ve heard.
 
They don‘t even like me going planetside to confer with my Marine counterpart.
 
I just ignore his staff wienies.
 
Admiral Trokin has already warned Brown that the Marines are only under his operational control and that can be changed with a thumbprint.

      “So, are you two sightseeing or just hanging around long enough to qualify for the campaign ribbon?”

      Kelly laughed, “No, thank you.
 
My dress uniform is already ripping at the seams from all the decorations I have to wear.
 
I look like a Schirra gambling house doorman as it is.”

      Admiral Digg laughed and asked, “When will you be rotating out of this assignment?”

      Kelly replied, “Probably in a year and a half, sir.
 
I don’t worry about that much.
 
Fleet will find me a new home.”

      Rear Admiral Digg excused himself when a staff officer came for him, but before he left, he asked, “Do you need to see Admiral Trokin?
 
I can get you a few minutes.”

      “No, sir, thank you, but we just came up here to use a gate to get us back to G’Durin.
 
If they got us manifested for the gate below we’d be trapped.”

      Rear Admiral Digg nodded said, “Okay, if that’s how you want it,” and left with the staff officer.

      Kelly and Ellie left for the GRS Montpelier’s ring and back to the embassy.

* * * * *

      Brad found a high, rocky spot in the forest and they rested.
 
Sheila was about done in.
 
It looked like a boreal forest found in the higher latitudes on Earth, at least that was what it reminded him of.
 
It smelled crisp and fresh.
 
The trees looked a bit like pine or fir trees, but taller.
 
The bark was flaked and peeled off easily.
 
There were no undergrowth trees or bushes unlike many forests on many worlds.
 
It almost looked picked or mowed.

      He took his Yestepkin carbine from his shoulder and set it on the rocks.
 
Checking his survival pack, he found ten carbine energy packs.
 

      He said, “We could have one hell of a firefight with that many charges.”

      Sheila caught her breath and countered with, “Let’s hope we don’t have to.”

      Brad consulted his tablet and plotted his position relative to the corps’ leading edge. It came out to be 37 kilometers from his position.
 
That was no distance at all.
 
He knew they were slowing their advance at night, so about mid-morning they could poke their faces out.

      He looked at his tablet again and determined their position in relation to the valley he saw to the north that looked like a natural avenue of approach.
 
He looked for any high ground overlooking the valley, then thought better of it.
 
The T’Kab would be looking for just those kinds of places, too.
 
Let them have them.

      Brad pulled out his thermal and night vision binoculars and swept the area.
 
There was nothing to be seen, but large birds could be heard in the treetops.
 
He thought about catching some sleep, but Sheila needed it more than he did.
 
He consulted his tablet and saw they had three hours before dawn.
 
He turned on his rescue communicator and activated the IFF function.
 
That should stop 5th Corps from shooting them in the chest.
 
All they had to worry about was the T’Kab shooting them in the back.

      He heard a branch snap somewhere south of him.
 
They laid down quietly in the rocks and saw ten T’Kab walking through the forest on almost their exact path.
 
He reached in his pack and got out two more energy packs for the carbine and put them in his belt pouches.
 
He started shaking as they got closer and he willed it to stop.
 
He would need a steady aim and a quick trigger if he were to drop or run off the others.

      Then it dawned on him as he heard another branch snap.
 
They were just marching through the forest on their way from one place to another.
 
He decided to follow them to see where they were headed.