John Ringo - Hell's Faire

Orostan looked over at the Kenellai that was running the resupply effort. “How is the work progressing?”

“The tunnels will be completed soon, oolt’ondai. After that perhaps twelve hours to complete the basic factory.”

“Too long,” he growled, looking around at the massed oolt’os and Kessentai. “We’ll be out of ammunition and thresh by then.”

“It can progress no faster, oolt’ondai. But I will see what I can do.”

“Oolt’ondai, the SheVa approaches.” The operations officer gestured to the north. “And the forces with it. The force at Windy Gap…”

“Is gone, I know,” the warleader growled. “Well, they cannot attack us the same way. Send two oolt’ondar out to engage the tracks around it and have the others spread out on this ridge; we will not allow it to reach its firing point.”

“As you command, oolt’ondai.”

The warleader looked to the north then keyed his communicator, waiting as it hunted for the distinct address of Tulo’stenaloor.

“Orostan, here,” he said when it pinged acceptance.

“Orostan, how goes there?” Tulo’stenaloor asked.

“Like the Sky Demons were driving the war,” the oolt’ondai said with a flap of his crest. “When I arrange forces to attack the SheVa from the side, it comes in on their flank. When I arrange them in front of it, it turns to the side. For something so large it is being infernally hard to pin down.”

“Will it reach Franklin?” the estanaar replied.

The warleader thought for a moment then rippled his skin in a sigh. “Perhaps, estanaar. Perhaps. It is… difficult to stop. No… I will stop it before it reaches Franklin. But I don’t know at what cost.”

“The cost is no matter,” Tulo’stenaloor said after a moment. “If you have to take it in a tenaral charge of the last of your forces, stop it. We will have the Gap back shortly. Then I can pour forces through. But you must stop it; we cannot take the Gap in the face of nuclear fire.”

“I shall, estanaar,” Orostan said. “I’ll stop it.”

“Do so,” Tulo’stenaloor replied. “And then, we will own this world. Good luck.”

“I will stop you,” Orostan growled. “By the bones of the Alld’nt I will stop you.”

“No can do,” Pruitt said, shaking his head.

“Why?” Mitchell asked, glancing at the map.

“The other shot, the hill was pretty steep; there was a real target. This one, the hill is a long, winding slope on our side. Not a steep one, either. I can’t put a round in unless I’ve got something like a bluff in the immediate area.”

“That’s a hell of a lot of Posleen,” Mitchell said, pointing at the map. “And they’re not just going to sit on their hands.”

“I know, sir,” the specialist replied. “But we don’t have a shot. If we were on the south side we would, but I don’t think you want to swing around to there, do you?”

“Not with the force structure in the area,” the colonel replied. “Suggestions?”

“Hmm,” Pruitt looked at his display and made some adjustments then did some measuring. “If we back up to our last FP…”

“Minimum distances of four thousand meters,” the colonel said with a glance at the map. “We can make it, barely. What about drift?”

“That… will be a problem,” the gunner admitted. “In general the winds aloft are from northwest to southeast. Who knows, we might have to fire twice!”

“We’ll be firing practically straight up; if the damned round comes back on us we won’t be firing ever again!”

“Quebec Eight-Six, pull your advanced units back. We’re going to have to back all the way up to damned near our starting point. Please detach a sub-unit to cover us.”

LeBlanc thought about the combination for a moment and shivered despite the heat pouring up from the interior of the tank.

“Am I to assume that your answer to this problem involves something that is danger close at four thousand meters.”

“Roger, over.”

“Even at our starting point, if we don’t cross the river we’ll be less than four thousand meters from the target, over.”

“Roger. Recommend we back up and hunker down.”

“This ain’t gonna be good.”

“No, it’s not.”

“You know the problem with the SheVa gun?” Utori said. “No damned finesse.”

“What do you mean?” Bazzett replied, cutting open an MRE as the track lurched from side to side. If they were going to be stopped for a few minutes, might as well eat.

The battalion had rapidly backed up, retreating over ground they had captured at cost. Only a single Abrams had been left behind, hull down in a revetment, with all its electronics shut down and turned away from the blast. All of the troops had been pulled into their vehicles as well; if a Posleen force came through they were probably toast.

But it beat being out in the cold with a nuke going off over the next hill.

“Look at this thing. It’s got a choice of nuclear annihilation or nothing.” The Squad Automatic Weapon gunner had broken down his SAW and was brushing at the breech with a worn, green toothbrush.

“It’s got the MetalStorms,” Bazzett argued. Both of them were ignoring the fact that at any moment an antimatter round could land on their heads. Part of the reason for the four thousand meters minimum range of the SheVa area effect round was that it was notoriously inaccurate at short ranges. Because it was designed for a fifty-plus kilometer range, firing at short ranges meant firing practically straight up in the air. At that angle, it was practically a matter of luck where it would land.

“Sure, but they’re just forty millimeters.” Utori snapped his weapon back together and took a drink from his camelbak. “It needs some 105s with some small antimatter rounds. Like… I dunno a ten KT round, maybe. That would be enough to clear a hilltop. Not a fucking hundred KT, which requires clearing out the whole damned county .”

“Maybe, but it wasn’t designed for direct assault like this.” Bazzett set his spoon down as the TC stuck his head into the crew compartment.

“The SheVa just fired.”

“Shit, what’s the time of flight?” Utori asked, grabbing his helmet and pulling on it as if he wanted to crawl up inside.

“Must be nearly a minute,” the TC answered, crawling back up into his chair. “Hang the fuck on,” he added, shutting down his radios and throwing all the breakers; the blast would have an unpleasant electromagnetic pulse that could damage the electronics of the track.

Bazzett raised the plastic and metal pouch to his mouth and squeezed out the last of the entree, beef and beans, then tossed the packet into the ammo can they used as a trash can. He washed it down with a swallow of water then put his fingers in his ears, bending over and opening his mouth. “This is gonna suck.”

“Damn,” Pruitt muttered, watching the shifting reticle of the estimated impact. The SheVa tracked the round on its upward flight and predicted its probable point of impact based on observed flight. “Not good.”

“Where’s it going?” Mitchell asked.

“Looks like it’s veering northeast,” the gunner replied. “If it doesn’t veer back it’ll land as close to LeBlanc’s unit as it does to the Posleen. The only good point is that I set it for proximity impact. So as long as it lands on the Franklin side of the valley, they should be in the blast-shadow.”

Mitchell just grunted; there was nothing anyone could do at this point.

Tulo’stenaloor looked at the report of a high ballistic fire and flapped his crest in agitation.