David Drake: The Complete Hammer's Slammers, Vol. 3

He switched the unit from standby to operations and waited a moment for it to warm up. When the light went from amber to green, Coke keyed the address of the heavy battery of the artillery battalion attached to the fortress defenses. The clerk responsible for the communications bay watched Coke in concern from across the room, but she didn’t attempt to interfere.

Marquis Bradkopf began hectoring a subordinate outside the door of the TOC. Drink and anger slurred his words so that Coke couldn’t make them out. A woman’s voice wove a descant around Bradkopf’s.

“Battery Seven,” a man said. “Yeah?”

“This is Fortress Command,” Coke said crisply. “I have an immediate fire mission for you.” As he spoke, his left hand addressed a target information packet on the Frisian console. “This will require seeker shells, so I’m authorizing you to release them from locked storage.”

“What!” said the soldier on the other end of the line. “What? Look, I’ll get Chief Edson.”

Theoretically, the Frisians were in advisory capacity without direct control of National Army forces. As with other large organizations, somebody who was willing to claim authority was more than likely to be granted it.

The mortar fired again, lofting a second flare into the night sky. There was static on the land line, masking a half-audible conversation at the battery end.

National Army heavy equipment was generally of off-planet manufacture, ranging from good to very good in design. The local personnel were of low quality, however, and virtually untrained. Coke didn’t dare call an ordinary fire mission to support units within half a klick of the intended impact area. Battery 7’s 200-mm guns were capable of nail-driving accuracy at thirty kilometers, but the crews were as apt as not to drop their heavy shells directly on The Facts of Life.

Technology could eliminate the problem. The battery was issued four Frisian-manufactured seeker rounds, one per tube. These self-steering warheads were designed for use against ill-defined or moving targets, and combined with satellite photos of Parcotch Hamlet 2 they would obviate the friendly-fire risk.

“Chief Edson,” a businesslike voice said. “Who is this?”

“Major Matthew Coke,” Coke said, “acting Fortress Command. Where’s your battery commander?”

“Who the fuck knows?” said the chief, the battery’s ranking enlisted man. “Look, Major, I don’t care about your authorization— I flat don’t have the codes to open the special locker. Maybe Captain Wilcken does, maybe the Marquis does—maybe nobody. Forget the seeker warheads, they’re just for show.”

“Prepare the battery,” Coke snapped. “I’m on my way.”

He dropped the handset onto its cradle and rose. More figures drifted through the shadows of the split screen. Lennox and Dubose held their silence, as Coke had directed them at last transmission.

Coke settled his commo helmet, slung the sub-machine gun over his shoulder, and started for the door. General Bradkopf and his entourage burst through from outside.

“Coke!” the Marquis roared. “Where’s—there you are!” He pointed an index finger at Coke’s face. “What’s happened to my tanks?”

Bradkopf was in his mid-fifties. His body was fleshy but powerful, since swimming and exercise machines controlled the grosser results of the dissipation nonetheless evident on his face.

“Sir, you and I discussed using the combat cars for an ambush patrol,” Coke half-lied. His mouth was dry, and his palm was sweating on the grip of his sub-machine gun.

This could get him reprimanded. If Bradkopf was angry enough, he could even have Coke recalled to Friesland.

The group oozing into the TOC behind the Marquis included most of the higher male officers of Fortress Auerstadt’s complement. Among them was Captain Wilcken, a twenty-year-old of excellent family and the titular commander of Battery 7.

Each of the men had a woman in train. The redhead on the Marquis’ arm was approximately a third of his age.

“You said you wanted to send out one of the tanks with a patrol,” Bradkopf said, his memory unfortunately quite accurate. “For communications.”

For stiffening, actually, but the lie was a harmless one. When he’d gotten down to serious planning, he realized that he didn’t dare saddle Frisians—his troops—with any of the National Army units in the fortress. The locals lacked noise discipline, fire discipline, and target identification skills. A Frisian combat car was the largest thing around and therefore the most likely target for the National troops who did manage to shoot.

Furthermore, the locals lacked guts.

“I said I’d think about it,” Bradkopf said, “and now I find you’ve stripped me of all my protection! Are you a traitor?”

“No sir,” Coke said, “I’m not a traitor. I—”

I screwed up badly, but Bradkopf wasn’t the man to admit that to. Coke had taken the chance that the Marquis wouldn’t notice the two combat cars—not tanks—normally parked near his quarters were missing. If Bradkopf hadn’t decided to shoot off flares for his party, Coke would have gotten away with it.

If.

Coke couldn’t quarrel with Bradkopf’s assumption that the commander of an 8,000-troop base was unprotected if two foreign combat vehicles left his presence. It was just that protecting this commander was in no sense a military priority for Coke.

“Six, this is Four-four,” Sergeant Dubose reported tensely through Coke’s commo helmet. “The troops are moving out of Three in civilian trucks and wagons. Over.”

“General Bradkopf!” Coke said. “Association forces are maneuvering to attack this base tonight.”

Not in a few days: in a few hours.

Fear of a bad rating in his personnel file had turned Coke’s skin hot and prickly. The prospect of imminent combat washed him cool again. Major Matthew Coke was a professional and an employee; but first of all he was a soldier.

“What?” blurted the Marquis, sounding amazingly like the gunner on phone watch at Battery 7. “An attack where? Have you gone mad?”

“Six, this is Four-Two,” Sergeant Lennox reported. There was a lilt, almost a caress in her voice despite the flattening of spread-band radio communication. “The rocket pod’s moved out of Two. It’s being pulled by a tractor, now. I’d say it was time, boss. Over.”

The partygoers gaped without understanding at the multidirectional byplay. Most of them were drunk or nearly drunk. Captain Wilcken was white-faced but sober. The glance he exchanged with Colonel Jaffe, equally well-born and head of the garrison’s supply department, held more terror than confusion.

Coke keyed his helmet. “Six to Four elements,” he said. “Take th—”

He didn’t get the last word, “them,” out of his mouth before the split display behind him ignited with gunfire and explosions.

“I’m sounding the general alarm,” Coke said calmly as he turned his back on the Marquis. He uncaged and pressed one of the special-use switches at the side of his console’s keyboard. The artificial intelligence sent an alert signal to every node on Fortress Auerstadt’s communications network. The siren on the roof of the TOC began to wind.

The holographic display shimmered with the cyan hell engulfing Parcotch.

A Frisian combat car mounted three tribarrels in its open fighting compartment. Each weapon fired 2-cm powergun ammunition at a cyclic rate of about 500 rounds per minute. Because the barrels rotated through the firing position and had time to cool between shots, a tribarrel could fire sustainably for several minutes before burning out. In that time, the powerful bolts of ionized copper atoms could peck halfway through the side of a mountain.