Unknown - The_Growing_589064

Not that that should be a problem. A grenade sails overhead to land just behind the wall, spraying asphalt and metal fragments upward toward the snipers’ perches. One of the men above her yells “Fuckhead!” and opens up with his own launcher, firing grenade after grenade as a thin wet trickle drips down the wall past Maggie, black in the sheen of her night scope. From both flanks comes the rattle of small arms fire, troops on the flanks making a distraction or picking off humans among the enemy troops. They are few, uniformed no differently than the droids. They give themselves away, though, as they break ranks and split for the edge of the highway, one throwing away his weapon as Maggie watches, and tumbling headlong into the ditch under sniper fire.

No sympathy from you own kind, now, you bastard. Tell your sad story to the Jackal-god. Maggie pulls her handgun from its holster and pots a second would-be deserter as he slithers low along the highway shoulder. The droids advance steadily, stand and fire, march forward, stand and fire. The muzzle flashes of their rifles light the tendrils of fog that curl about them, their crack lost in the thunder of the bigger guns, the unremitting cacophony of the two heavy machine guns. It will not be long now before they step into the field of claymores and Bouncing Betties, and the easy part will be over. She squints into the fog and fires twice more. Another of the enemy slumps down to be trodden underfoot by his mechanical brothers. She begins to back her way down the wall. Time for com check.

She is almost to the pavement when she the scream of the howitzer shell streaks over her, its tracer light streaming behind it like a comet’s tail. It slams into the highway just in front of the second wall, sending a wall of flame licking up its metal bulk, setting fire to the paint and traces of gasoline and oil that linger on the wrecked cars. The impact shudders through the ground, tossing soldiers at random ahead of the concussion wave, rocking the command truck on its wheels. For an instant it tilts, poises, and falls with a crash onto its side. A grenade arcs overhead to gouge out a crater, the rear tire of the upended truck spinning in the swirling smoke. Two soldiers flap at the last of the flames with their jackets. The vibration of Maggie’s com unit ceases abruptly as it loses contact with Kirsten’s laptop.

“Goddam!” She half falls, half jumps the rest of the way to the tarmac, feeling her knee give under her again but ignoring it, hurtling across the fifty feet that separate her from the vehicle. At least the gas tank hadn’t blown.

Just as she swings around the corner of the roof, the door opens horizontally, like the hatch of a Normandy Beach landing craft. Manny crawls out, clutching his M-16 and a string of grenades. Kirsten follows, a darker wet streak cutting through the yellow spider traced on her face. A spot of blood beads on her lower lip, probably bitten when she went over with truck and equipment. Her M-16 slants across her back. “GODDAM MOTHRFUCKERS GOT MY COMPUTER!!” she bellows at Maggie.

“Are you hurt?”

“WHERE DO YOU WANT ME TO GO?”

“Just a minute. Are you okay?” Maggie yells back as machine gun fire breaks out behind her.

“I CAN’T HEAR YOU!”

“Manny, is she hurt?”

“Just banged up a bit when the table tipped over,” he shouts back. “Computer hit the wall and bounced!”

Kirsten’s eyes dart between them, a frown wrinkling her forehead. She puts a hand to the bone under one ear, then, presses and repeats the gesture on the other side. The frown relaxes. “My implants! Must have gone when I hit my head.”

“How bad?”

For answer, Kirsten shrugs. “We’re going to have to make do with messengers if we need to talk to the others.”

“Where’s Tacoma? Did you hear anything before the rocket hit?”

“Headed back down the highway, with the droid tanks in hot pursuit.”

“Koda?”

“Still waiting.”

“All right then. Manny, take her back behind the second wall. See if you can get the computer back up.”

Kirsten’s face sets. “I. Will. Not. Go. Back,” she says, biting each word off. “Tell me where you can use me, or I’ll make my own choice.”

Manny shrugs, the rise of his eyebrows visible only in the dim light’s reflection off his facepaint. No help there. She shouts, “Take the right flank. They’ll try to get past us at some point—make sure they don’t!”

With a nod, Kirsten turns to jog over to the group crouched at the south end of the metal wall, Manny on her heels. He glances back briefly, a grin splitting the shadows of his face, fingers snapping to his forehead. “Nice try, General!”

She returns his salute with the one-finger variation. Pausing only to pull one soldier off the line at the wall for a courier, she scrambles back up, aims along the sight of her gun, and resumes shooting.

*

The battle rolls like thunder down the road, lit by occasional flashes of the big guns. The fog obscures all but the general movement, the enemy advancing, the Ellsworth forces holding. She can feel the tension in the men and women behind her, straining to hear, willing their sight to pierce through the shroud of the fog. She feels it, too, in the taut muscles of her own body, her hands clenched around her binoculars as if they gripped an enemy’s throat.

Deliberately, she allows her grip to slacken, forces the strained tendons in arms and legs to relax. Learn the lesson of the cat. Patience.

Koda raises her optics again, trying to pick out recognizable shapes along the enemy front. Far from dissipating, the mist begins to thicken, the air taking on a distinct chill through the layers of her shirt and camo jacket. It is perhaps an hour to dawn. Her force will need to move soon.

Beside her, Sergeant Beaufort echoes her thought. “If we’re gonna surprise those bastards, we better get about it. Sun comes up, we might as well send out announcements.”

Koda nods. “Form the line. Be ready.”

“Ma’am.”

Behind her, she hears the clatter of gear shifted into place, slides pumping rounds into the chambers of sidearms, magazines snapped into the grips of the M-16’s. She can feel the frustration dissipate, replaced with the more subtle tension that is half excitement, half fear. She keys her com, but before she can speak the shriek of a howitzer shell splits the night, its arc etched crimson against the darkness. The earth trembles with the explosion, a rippling pulse that spreads through rock and fog and flesh. It booms, too, through the speaker in her hand, punctuated by a muffled shout, then a distinct “Shit!” Kirsten’s voice.

Then silence.

Koda’s heart clenches in her chest. She stabs at the transmit button repeatedly. “HQ. Come in. Come in. Kirsten! Answer!”

Nothing.

She is not dead. I would know.

It is what she does not know that frightens her. “All right!” she shouts, stepping up to the crest of the ridge. “Move out!”

*

Kirsten crouches among the snipers strung out in a line from the south end of the wall to the drainage ditch beside the road. The tramping of mechanical feet, marching in inhumanly perfect unison, comes to her as a steady drumbeat, a vibration through her bones. Grenades rain down on them from behind the barricade, but do not slow them. They are not programmed to tend their fallen companions; their survival overrides, designed to remove them from a hopeless situation, will not kick in until they are trapped between competing priorities. Walking into a minefield or getting picked off by snipers, for instance.

Underneath their steady cadence, perhaps audible to no one else, the steady grinding of treads comes to her. Not so heavy as the tanks, nor even Bradleys; the next wave to break against their defenses will be the heavy-duty military droids.