Authors: Mark Kalina
"Keep
scanning," she ordered the sensors operator. "Driver, keep us going
backwards, slowly."
There
were no more prepared fighting positions to fall back to, now, just a few rocky
outcroppings that she'd designated as the final fallback position. And after
that, there was nowhere; the anti-air laser installation was only a few more
kilometers behind them. If they lost it, the UEN forces would be able to send
aircraft north, or long range strategic skimmer missiles. Or anything they felt
like sending, Tara thought. She was running out of room, and tanks, and lives
to spend to stop them.
An
enemy round struck the War-Hammer, ricocheting off the sloped hull armor with a
vast, hollow clang.
"Shit,"
Tara hissed as the shock of the deflected hit slammed her back into her seat,
hard enough to bruise despite the padding.
She
desperately tried to pick out the enemy's signature through the smoke. There he
was, she saw, A T-66, about 700 meters away, just a few degrees off of her
tank's 12 o'clock, with his gun laid right on them.
She
had no idea why the pisser gunner had fired only a single round. Maybe he'd
just though he'd had her tank dead to rights and didn't want to waste extra
ammo. But he'd fire again in a second, she knew.
"Tank!
12 o'clock! Driver, evade!" she screamed.
But
she knew there was no time to evade at such close range. Desperately she locked
the auto-smartguns on the enemy tank and opened fire with all four, holding
down the engagement button to override the burst-length limiter, hosing the
pisser tank with heavy bullets.
Bullets
struck and sparked off armor all over the enemy tank. They had not the
slightest chance of getting through the armor, but there was nothing else she
could do.
The
War-Hammer lurched into reverse, turning as the driver desperately backed up,
and just then the pisser tank fired again.
Maybe
one of the bullets took out a sensor or something, she thought, because the
pisser tank's next burst gouged out a line of craters in the ground right past
the side of her tank, missing by less than a meter. The turret rang with debris
bouncing off the armor.
In
the same instant, her gunner returned fire, a short three-round burst that
tracked across the pisser tank where the turret met the hull. One round
deflected in a shower of sparks, but the other two punched in. A second later,
the UEN driver and one of the turret crew ejected from the stricken tank,
leaving it unmoving and smoldering.
"Holy
shit, that was close!" Corporal Malan, the sensors operator, exclaimed.
Tara
could only manage a shaky nod.
The
surviving UEN tanks had pulled back, out of the chaos of the point blank ranged
melee, taking cover on the far side of rocky outcroppings that had been the
Arcadian tanks' forward fighting positions.
But
the few remaining drones showed that they weren't falling back any further.
Instead, they were reorganizing, forming up for another attack. Whatever
organization the two enemy battalions had once had, it had been smashed. But
they looked like they were going to try one more push even so. In a few
minutes, they would be level with her remaining tanks' cover, and the point
blank killing would start again.
Too
many of them, she judged, and too few of her own tanks, for a point blank melee
to finish.
"All
units," Tara called. "Stand by to fall back to the final line of
fighting positions. Let's get them to drive into our fire one more time and see
how they like it."
"Got
it," came the response from Younger. "My people are on the way. Just
one more time, though. Nowhere to fall back to after this."
"Got
that right, Younger. Nothing left behind us but the aid station and the laser
emplacement," Tara replied.
"All
units," she added on the all-units battalion push, "this is the last
fallback. After this we hold where we are! Nothing gets past us! Nothing!"
"Driver,
reverse us back to our final fighting position," she ordered.
***
The
pisser tanks kept coming. Tara had no idea how many of her tanks were left, but
there was nowhere left to fall back to, and the pisser tanks were still coming.
"All
units," she ordered one last time, "unmask and engage!"
The
surviving tanks of the 8th Armored Battalion of the Armored Corps of the
Arcadian Defense Force rolled forward into the fire.
Another
four UEN tanks died in the final organized salvo from the battalion's tanks.
Return fire lashed out, striking home against War-Hammers' armor, glancing or
punching through to send blow-torch-hot sprays of fragments and burning metal
through turrets and hulls. Tanks burned, and people burned with them.
There
was no more room, now, for tanks to retreat into cover. Instead, the swirled
about each other, like biplanes in some ancient dogfight, dodging and firing at
point blank range.
A
point-blank burst of three 47 megajoule rounds ploughed into Younger's tank,
punching through armor and filling the tank with an incandescent spray of
burning depleted uranium alloy. Ammunition and fuel-cells cooked off, shooting
blow-torches of fire from every hatch and cracked-open seam. The driver's
survival pod ejected, but it was burning as it left the tank, hitting the
ground as a rolling, smoking fireball. None of the turret crew ejected.
A
second later, a scarred War-Hammer came out of the smoke, almost ramming the
UEN tank, firing a burst of 41 megajoule fire into its flank at point blank
range. The UEN tank died the same way as its victim just had.
Some
part of Tara felt a spike of white-hot pain; sorrow and horror as intense as
the pain when she'd lost her legs. But the rest of her, the part in control,
didn't blink. There was still a battle to fight.
"Target
tank 2 o'clock! Gunner, engage!" she shouted, almost screaming.
"Driver, reverse!"
The
War-Hammer's turret seemed to be traversing in slow motion. The UEN K19 tank
was within a hundred yards, but somehow it hadn't seen them in the smoke, and
its turret started traversing a fraction of a second later than theirs.
The
War-Hammer's forty-one thundered out a long burst. Even at point blank range,
some rounds were deflected by the K19's superb armor. But some were not. The
UEN tank's turret stopped with its gun just a few degrees away from bearing on
Tara's War-Hammer. Two of the UEN tank's crew managed to eject before their
tank began to spew sprays of sparks and fire from its hatches and cooling
exhaust ports.
Somewhere
a UEN T-66 managed to lay its gun on them, and Tara felt the War-Hammer rock
and heard the huge
clang
of a 44
megajoule round as it glanced from the turret armor, shearing away one of the
auto-smartguns and a cluster of sensors.
The
driver jerked the tank into an evasive turn before Tara could order it. Several
more 44 megajoule rounds smashed into the ground near them, showering the
War-Hammer in cascades of pulverized rock and dirt.
Tara
triggered another salvo of smoke grenades.
"Driver!
Tara shouted, "Put us behind that burned out pisser tank!"
"Gunner, engage the one shooting at us!"
The
turret shifted and the gunner triggered another long burst of forty-one fire,
walking the shots into the now-retreating pisser T-66. Tara saw three shots
hit. One bounced, but two went in at the base of the T-66's turret, and the
enemy tank shuddered and stopped; the UEN driver punched out as it began to
burn.
Tara
breathed a half-sigh of relief as her War-Hammer managed to get behind the dead
UEN K19 tank. Almost instantly, a burst of tank-gun fire slammed into the
burning wreck. Fragments of shattered armor pinged off the War-Hammer's hull
and turret.
"Gunner,"
Tara called, guessing at the angle of the inbound fire, "there's a pisser
tank at about our 4 o'clock. We can't see him and he can't see us past this the
dead pisser tank we're behind. Swing the turret around so we can engage him as
soon as we back out from behind cover. Got it?"
"Got
it! But we're down to 22 rounds for the forty-one."
"Fuck
it. Long bursts anyway. These fuckers are too well armored," Tara ordered.
"Ready?"
"Yup."
"Driver,
hard reverse!" she shouted. "Gunner!"
The
War-Hammer backed out from behind the burning UEN tank.
The
UEN tank, half-a-kilometer distant, saw them emerge, saw their gun coming to
bear. The UEN gunner opened fire just as the UEN driver threw the T-66 into a
violent evasive maneuver. The T-66's 44 megajoule gun could compensate for
movement, but not quite instantly. Not quite fast enough.
A
44 megajoule shot creased the top of the War-Hammer's turret, drawing a
white-hot line across the armor. Another one ploughed into the ground just
short, throwing up a geyser of rocks and debris.
The
War-Hammer's 41 megajoule gun returned fire, hammering out a seven-round burst.
Some of the rounds missed. One 41 megajoule round hit the T-66's turret a
glancing blow and bounced off. Another round slammed into the T-66's
left-forward track module, blasting the track apart. And then another round dug
into the gun tube of the T-66's long 44 megajoule gun.
A
fraction of a second later, the T-66 fired its next 44 megajoule round. The gun
tube exploded like a bomb, obscuring the T-66 in a cloud of dust and debris.
When it cleared, the T-66's gun looked as if it had been peeled open, like a
twisted flower of blackened alloy.
The
gunner carefully laid the forty-one onto the now-stationary UEN tank and fired
one more round. The T-66 rocked slightly with the hit. A few seconds passed,
and then white-hot fire began to spew from the tank's cooling exhausts.
"Got
him," the gunner said.
Distantly,
another War-Hammer let loose a long burst of 41 megajoule fire, raking a rock
formation five kilometers away.
And
then, abruptly, there were no guns firing.
A
handful, perhaps a dozen, enemy tanks were pulling back, popping smoke, ducking
back behind the cover of rocky outcroppings, but not pausing there. Instead
they turned and, launching more smoke, began to race back to the south. None of
them fired as they retreated. None of the remaining Arcadian tanks fired after
them.
There
was a voice coming in on Tara's radio, on the Defense Force Command push.
"Calling 8th Battalion commander, this is Colonel Reed, with 2nd
Battalion. Is Colonel O'Connor there? We are inbound at this time,
approximately 20 kilometers north of your position. Calling Commander, 8th
Battalion. 8th Battalion, can anyone there hear me?"
Tara
said nothing.
"Ma'am,"
said the sensors operator, "are you going to answer?"
"Maybe
later. They made it. We held. What else is there to say?"
***
Bernie
and Aran walked slowly amid the burning tanks. It might have been dangerous,
Bernie supposed. A round's propellant might cook off and cause a further
explosion. But she was too tired to care.
Ahead
she saw a deflated survival pod, walked up to it. The tanker inside the pod was
on his back, open eyes staring at the darkening early evening sky. Blood was
pooled around a hole the size of a dinner plate that had been punched through
the man's torso. The face was that of the boy who'd asked her out a few hours
ago.
Bernie
found herself on her knees without any memory of falling. Suddenly she was
weeping; racking, bitter sobs that barely let her draw a breath.
Aran's
hand went to her shoulder, barely felt though the armor, but infinitely
welcome.
"A
friend?" he asked, softly.
"No..."
Bernie said, gasping through her sobs. "I... I only met him today."
***
Tara
walked across the battlefield, seeing with relief that bordered on desperation
the faces of those who survived, and accepting the dull punches of pain when
she found out who hadn't.
Both
Younger and Feldman were dead, Tara confirmed. Both of them gone. The feeling
was like a double punch, somewhere under the ribs. The pain was still muted,
though, somehow, and she found herself smiling to keep it from breaking out.
Seven
of her tanks were still combat-ready, though all had been hit at least once and
none was perfectly intact. Some of the knocked-out tanks would be repairable,
she knew, and some of the dead tanks' crews had survived, some unhurt, others
injured and being worked on at the improvised aid station set up next to the
laser installation. And there were medevacs on the way; tilt-rotor aircraft
didn't dare fly over an active battlefield, but they were perfectly effective
for quick pick-up and delivery of the wounded.
Some
of her people were still manning their tanks. A few looked almost drugged with
the exhilaration of survival and victory. Others looked drugged with fatigue
and shock.