Never Sound Retreat (28 page)

"Same as we did," Andrew replied.

"What's coming from behind us?" Schneid asked.

"At least six mounted moving up."

"The only ammunition we have is what we're carrying, Andrew. This is going to get tough."

Andrew nodded, saying nothing, judging the range, as half a dozen Bantag batteries darted forward at the gallop. The battery commander by the rocky outcropping ordered his four guns to cease fire on the advancing infantry and wait until the Bantag guns started to deploy.

The Bantag batteries continued forward, caissons and pieces bouncing over the rough terrain.

"Damn they're coming in close," Rick whispered.

Behind Andrew a regiment, moving in columns of four, ran past at the double, men gasping, staggering as they moved to the northeast side of the hill. Another regiment moved in behind the battery deployed to Andrew's right. In spite of their exhaustion the troops started to dig in, pile up rocks, drag dead tree limbs into the line. The few still with packs or blanket rolls threw them onto the barricade.

The enemy batteries below continued to advance, swinging around the burning village. The first of the Bantag batteries slowed, lead horses turning, guns swinging about.

"Case shot, six-second fuses! Range, thirteen hundred yards!" the battery commander to Andrew's left roared. "Remember, we're shooting downhill. Don't aim too high!"

Loaders sprinted down from the caissons, shells were slammed into breeches. The commander paced his line of four guns, stopping behind each to check on how the gun was laid.

Down below the first of the Bantag batteries was already unlimbered, crews swarming around their pieces, swinging them into position while the caissons were moved back.

"Battery . . . fire!"

The first gun next to Andrew kicked back, the other three firing less than a second later.

The first shell, an air burst, ignited just forward of one of the guns, knocking down the crew; the other three shells detonated behind the firing line. A caisson blew, the dozens of shells and more than two hundred pounds of powder inside exploding in a brilliant flash, the explosion causing a second caisson to go up an instant later. As the thump of the detonations washed up the hill, a cheer erupted from the weary defenders, the men coming to their feet, shouting their defiance.

Andrew looked over and nodded at the commander, who stood in front of his pieces, a childlike grin on his face, as if he had just accomplished something he hadn't been quite sure he could do. Seeing that he was under the eyes of the army commander, he immediately struck a pose of professional indifference, turning back to shout at one of the crews for firing too long.

The surviving crews of the enemy battery struggled back to their feet, and within seconds were at work once again, loaders running from the still-intact caissons. More and yet more batteries deployed into line, while the twenty guns Schneid had positioned along the northern slope of the hill opened up. Half a dozen of the Bantag guns never even fired a shot before they were smashed by the concentrated blows, but the surviving guns now came into play. The first shots ranged high overhead, plowing into the forest above and behind Andrew, treetops bursting, limbs raining down.

The Bantag gunners set to work, firing almost as rapidly as their human opponents, concentrating their fire on the battery on the rocky outcropping to Andrew's left. The air around Andrew seemed almost alive, quivering, shaking, as shells screamed in, explosions bursting in the trees, geysers of dirt fountaining upward.

"Think we better move," Rick shouted. "No sense getting killed when the game's just starting."

Andrew followed his corps commander up the slope and into the trees, feeling guilty that he was leaving the gunners behind. Kneeling behind a fallen tree, he watched the uneven contest, as the guns seemed to be enveloped in a tornado of fire and slashing iron. The second gun in the line crashed on its side as a shot tore its left wheel off, while in the woods a caisson exploded, several trees toppling from the explosions.

A battery suddenly opened up to Andrew's right and, surprised, he stood up as the four guns cut loose, their position concealed in the woods.

"Brought the guns over the top of the hill."

Andrew looked up in surprise to see Pat coming through the trees from above.

"Two more batteries on the way over from Ninth Corps. Seemed like this is where Ha'ark was going to hit first," Pat announced.

"How's it back on the other side?" Andrew shouted, trying to be heard above the cannonade.

"Half hour or so the first of the buggers on horse will be up."

"Emil?"

"Last of the wagons are into the trees. Got two divisions of Ninth Corps digging in on the south slope, the other division and the boys left from Fifth Corps moving in to cover the east slope. What's left of Eleventh Corps is in reserve on top of the hill. Some Bantag with rifles are popping at us from long range, but all the action's up here. So I thought I'd come up for the show."

Andrew nodded in agreement and realized, that in many ways, he was almost superfluous to this fight. Schneid had done a masterful job of deploying on the north and western slopes, Pat, as usual, had han-dled the rear guard, and Emil had managed to get his wounded safely in.

Pat stood and started down the slope to where the beleaguered battery continued to fight, the commander pulling the men from his number two gun off to strengthen the ranks of his remaining three pieces.

"Pat, get the hell back here!" Andrew shouted.

"Now, Andrew me darlin', this is an artilleryman's fight, it is!" Pat roared, and, going over to the number one gun pitched in, shoving the gun sergeant aside to aim the piece himself.

Feeling as if some sort of challenge had been offered, Andrew stood and looked down the line. The infantry was deployed, men pressed low, enduring the bombardment. Motioning for his guidon bearer to follow, Andrew started to walk the length of the line, Rick falling in by his side.

"Sir, aren't these kinds of displays a little ridiculous in a modern war?" Rick asked, ducking low and pulling Andrew down with him as a shell burst directly overhead, clipping the top of a tree in half and sending the branches and severed trunk showering down around them.

Andrew forced a grin.

"The men expect it." Andrew could see the troops looking up at him. "And besides, there are times when an army commander's life no longer counts."

"Damn it, sir, you stole that line," Schneid said in English, laughing. "Hancock said that just before he got shot at Gettysburg."

Andrew, slightly embarrassed that his theft of a damn good line had been found out, was tempted to order Schneid to leave him alone.

A high-pitched shriek echoed up from the smoke, which now obscured the valley where the Bantag were deploying. Andrew turned, gazing intently, and finally saw it. The first of the land cruisers was advancing, passing through the line of guns, swarms of Bantag infantry following.

"Press it in!" Ha'ark shouted.

"My Qar Qarth, their land cruisers are moving down on us from behind." One of his staff pointed to the swirling columns of black coal smoke.

Ha'ark turned about to look toward the northwest. The enemy relief column was clearly in view, a dozen land cruisers moving in line abreast, only a light screen of his troops falling back before their advance.

His own cruisers were deployed, nearly thirty machines. More than one was already falling behind. Looking back to the south, he could see the machines which had broken down in the advance, one of them exploding. If he turned about now, to face the threat, it would mean withdrawing, moving the machines yet again. How many more would break down?

"Pull five regiments of the Fourth Umen, three batteries of artillery," Ha'ark ordered. "Send them back to slow the advance. In two hours we can finish off Keane and his men trapped on the hill, then we shall turn and deal with the other threat."

Cursing, Marcus walked around the ironclad, the driver standing on top of the machine oblivious to the sniper rounds whipping past.

"Sir, the cylinder head's cracked. We have to shut it down, get a new cylinder from supply. I'm sorry."

"That's two machines down, and we haven't even gotten into the fight yet," Marcus roared.

The driver leapt down from the top of the machine and took off his helmet and chain-mail face guard which protected him from any flying splinters that would shard off on the inside of the machine when it was hit.

The driver watched with obvious envy as the ironclad commanded by Timokin crept past, the exuberant major piloting the machine with the top hatch open. Timokin snapped off a smart salute to Marcus and joyfully pointed toward the battle ahead.

Marcus returned the boy's salute, then fixed his attention back toward Rocky Hill, which was now shrouded in smoke and a near-continual rain of bursting shells. Through breaks in the smoke he could see the first wave of Bantag land cruisers creeping up the slope, guns firing.

"God help Andrew now."

"I tell you this is going to be bad," Feyodor shouted.

"Just do the drop right. We're only going to get one pass."

Looking down from ten thousand feet, Jack Petracci watched as the line of Bantag land cruisers deployed in open line for the attack up the hill.

"Hang on and keep an eye open for their airships."

Pushing the stick forward, he started the airship into a dive, cutting throttles back and pulling the release valve to drain off a couple of hundred cubic feet of hydrogen.

Within seconds the airspeed climbed up to sixty, then seventy miles an hour. The stick felt taut in his hands, and a shudder ran through the airship as they were buffeted by the warm midday thermals rising from the open prairie.

Watching the smoke, he tried to gauge the wind speed near the surface, running calculations in his mind for drift, then nosed over even steeper. The height-indicator gauge continued to spin lower, dropping through five thousand feet, then four.

The enemy line was directly below; he could see the upturned faces of the Bantag, a quick glimpse of a rider on a white horse. A spray of splinters kicked up next to his feet, the rifle bullet passing between his legs and crashing through the top of the cockpit.

"Damn, they're hitting us!" Feyodor cried.

"Just hang on and get ready."

The smoke-wreathed hill was directly ahead, and he continued the dive, crossing through three thousand, then two, trying to remember that the hill most likely stood five hundred feet high.

"Get ready, get ready . . . now!"

He felt the weight drop away, and an instant later he yanked the stick back hard into his stomach. The nose of his ship started to rise, splinters kicking around him as first one, then half a dozen bullets crashed through the cab. Skimming low over the trees, the airship raced over the top of the hill, the ground finally dropping away as he pulled up and away. Focusing at last on the ground southwest of Rocky Hill, he saw where block formations of Bantag riders, tens of thousands of them, were steadily moving up, and a sense of futility tore into his soul, that all that he had risked to drop the three packages would be meaningless when the assault finally came in.

Andrew stepped out from the protection of the rough breastworks to watch as Petracci pulled up, skimming low over the top of the hill, while, behind him, three multicolored umbrellas opened, a red-lacquered box swinging under each of them.

The breeze carried the umbrellas across the face of the hill, both sides pausing in their desperate struggle to watch as the packages floated to earth, landing in a line two hundred yards in front of the humans' position.

Schneid was already past Andrew, shouting, pointing at the boxes, screaming for several companies to get up and rush forward to retrieve the drop. More than a hundred men spread out, racing down the hill, and within seconds the advancing Bantag resumed their fire, men dropping as they raced toward the boxes. As the first men reached a package a cheer went up as the rope attaching the box to the umbrella was cut loose. Four men grabbed the box and started back up the hill. A shell detonated above them, sweeping all four down. Others leapt forward, grabbed the box, and continued up the slope while a surge of Bantag skirmishers charged forward, racing for the third box, which had landed closest to their lines. A desperate battle flared around the red-painted crate as half a dozen Bantag reached the container and a vicious hand-to-hand struggle ensued. Humans and Bantag slashed at each other with bayonets; an officer leapt atop the crate and fired his revolver straight into the face of a Horde warrior, dropping him before being bayoneted in the back.

Another company dashed forward, charging through the high grass, the flag of the Third Suzdal in the lead. The flag bearer raced to the box and planted the colors next to it while his comrades swarmed around the container, hoisted it, and started to run back up the slope. A charge of Bantag leapt out of the grass, this time going for the colors, the flag bearer crumpling when struck by half a dozen bullets. A groan went up from the line, and the men of the Third Suzdal turned about, charging down the slope to retrieve their precious colors.

Schneid, screaming encouragement, started after them. Andrew found himself caught up in the passion of the moment as well. Drawing his revolver, he pressed down the hill toward the fight. A Bantag hoisted the colors high in triumph, just as a color guard sergeant leapt upon the Bantag's back and, grabbing his head, bared his opponent's throat and cut it.