Diane Duane - X-COM - UFO Defense

“Gosh, Boss, you gonna let us fight when we get there, or will we be stuck standing around and cheering?”

“Don’t get cute,” Ari said, but he was grinning. “My first interest is catching a Battleship just sitting there on the ground. I don’t intend to let them just waltz off with that thing. Get on the horn—tell the captain and the sergeants I want them up here for a fast briefing.”

“Yes, sir.”

Within five minutes, they were assembled in the cramped cabin, and those who couldn’t fit inside were at least standing within earshot. They looked at him somberly. “Is it true,” one of them said when Ari called them to order, “that we’re going to be the only craft responding to this call?”

Ari nodded. “Until the commander back at Irhil manages to free us up some backup. So I’m going to have to drop you people sequentially, and you’re going to have to work your way in from the perimeters. I know this is not our preferred method of working, but we’re short of options at the moment.”

He brought the city map up on the screen. “OK, here’s the scoop. We are, I believe, fully loaded.”

Captain Hecht nodded. “Four heavy weapons platforms are loaded,” he said, “and we’re carrying twelve soldiers. Six in armor.”

“OK. Take a good look at this. Here’s the central part of the city—it runs down either side of the main river, the Limmat. The river veers east just above the railway station. Farther down, there are a lot of bridges over that river. Now at the moment, all the aliens are still on the east bank, as far as we know. So I’m going to have Rosie take us through town in two passes. The first one is to take out that Battleship, if God smiles on us and the big ugly thing is still sitting where it was reported. I’m not likely to get more than one shot without it knowing exactly where I am, so that one’s got to count. I’m hoping that will be enough.” The hope was fervent. The Avenger was carrying a fusion-ball launcher, and he had heard that one “good one” correctly placed was enough to take down a Battleship. But this was not a weapon he had worked with frequently, and there were so many variables. The worst one was that the ship was on the ground. A miss, if that ship decided to move at the wrong moment, could destroy buildings all around the strike site and kill a lot of civilians, while possibly not doing what had been intended. And then there would be six long seconds before he could reload and come about again. During which time, God only knew how many directions the Battleship would have splattered him and his people in.

He put that thought forcefully aside. “Then we have to drop you folks to best advantage. Now, the biggest concentration of civilians is going to be south of the train station. I’m sure the aliens know that perfectly well, and are concentrating on it, rather than the industrial area full of factories and train tracks that’s a little farther north, or the Zurichberg and the Uetliberg, the two hills just past it. Not worth their time, and any of them that go that way will be very exposed and easy to pick off. My guess is that our cuddly friends’ll be heading south, first down the left side of the river and then the right, if we let them. But if we seal off those bridges first, that’ll be a big help right there. It’ll confine everything but the Floaters and Cyberdiscs to this side of the water—and those guys we can hunt down later if we have to.”

“What about the train station itself, Boss?” said one of the sergeants.

“That’s a problem. A lot of the aliens will probably be down there right now, since at any given moment there are usually about five thousand people in it. They’ll be having a field day. But they’re going to have to get the people up out of there and get them into that Terror Ship. That won’t be easy, or quick, especially since they’ve trashed the upper levels. It’s a good thing that they won’t have had time to get too many into the Battleship…which makes me feel not completely like a bastard for blowing it up. Once it’s done, there won’t be any more captives taken from the train station, anyway, which is probably going to be the aliens’ best source.”

There was a mutter from the sergeants. No one liked the idea of killing civilians they were meant to save, but all of them realized the occasional necessity. “Don’t blow it completely to shit, Boss,” the captain said. “Her Nibs won’t like it. All that Elerium scattered all over town….”

“I’ll try not to,” Ari said, and fervently hoped he would somehow be able to confine the damage. But if it was a choice between utterly destroying the Battleship and attempting to keep the ship partially intact and then having it get up and go elsewhere, he much preferred the former. It would be much easier to shamefacedly say to Jonelle, “Sorry, it went off while I was cleaning it,” and to take the blame for losing a lot of potential funds, rather than let the aliens have back a Battleship that they would certainly use against X-COM again.

“So,” he said. “I’m assuming they haven’t made it all the way down to the bottom of the Bahnhofstrasse, where it hits the lake. We can only hope. But when we make our second pass, I’m going to drop you people in the neighborhood of these bridges, on the far side.” He showed them the six main bridges connecting the left and right banks of the Limmat, like sutures over a long, straggly scar. “Cross them, and secure them.”

“Any preferred method, Boss?” said another of the sergeants. “There are only twelve of us.”

“I know that. How do you think I meant? Just blow ‘em up. The one by the station is the main priority, and the two really big ones, two-thirds of the way down, and the one by the lake. Take the others out any way you like. A few good hits with a rocket launcher will probably do it—they’re not very big. Once over, I want two teams to cross the Bahnhofstrasse and start working their way up it, and through the main street paralleling it on the left side. The other teams, come at it from the right side. The middle bridge there is about on a level with where we think the Terror Ship is. It’s the only place where there’s really room for the thing to put down, anyway.”

He pointed at Paradeplatz on the map. “The right side of the Bahnhofstrasse is part of the Old Town. It’s partially residential. A lot of twisty little streets, a lot of them go uphill or downhill kind of steeply, especially over by this church with the big clock, St. Peter’s.”

“Residential, huh?” Captain Hecht looked thoughtful. “We’ve been monitoring police band. They say there’s a lot of fire coming from over there—not police.”

Ari chuckled grimly. “It’s the Swiss army.”

“Huh?”

“Just about every man in this country has his gun and ammo at home in case there’s need for a sudden call-up,” Ari said. “I have a feeling some of the locals have decided this constitutes a call-up. Good for them. Just watch your backs and make sure they don’t shoot you in an excess of enthusiasm.”

The team leaders nodded. “OK. The southern teams push north, up the Bahnhofstrasse. We try to get them concentrated in one place, to make it a little easier for the reinforcements when they show up. And for us, of course.”

“When are the reinforcements going to show up, Boss?”

Ari looked at them. “Before we’re finished, I hope,” he said, and let them take the pun as they pleased. “We may just have to handle this ourselves—no telling.”

The sergeants looked at one another. “Just passing Basel, Boss,” said Rosie.

“Very good. Let me know when we hit Colmar.” To the team leaders, he said, “Are we all clear on the order of battle? Blow those bridges. Then come up around the bottom of the Bahnhofstrasse and start pushing upwards.”