Sword and Scepter

Part 2
VI

Hillyer Gap was a six-kilometer-wide hilly notch in the high mountain chain. The Aldine Mountains ran roughly northwest to southeast, and were joined at their midpoint by the southward-stretching Temblors. Just at the join was the Gap, which connected the capital city plain to the east with the Columbia Valley to the west.

Major Jeremy Savage regarded his position with satisfaction. He not only had the twenty-six guns taken from the Friedlanders at Astoria, but another dozen captured in scattered outposts along the lower Columbia, and all were securely dug in behind hills overlooking the Gap. Forward of the guns were six companies of infantry, Second Battalion and half of Third, with a thousand ranchers behind in reserve.

"We won't be outflanked, anyway," Centurion Bryant observed. "Ought to hold just fine, sir."

"We've a chance," Major Savage agreed. "Thanks to Miss Horton. You must have driven your men right along."

Glenda Ruth shrugged. Her irregulars had run low on fuel a hundred and eighty kilometers west of the Gap, and she'd brought them on foot in one forced march of thirty hours after sending her ammunition supplies ahead with the last drops of gasoline. "I just came on myself, Major. Wasn't a question of driving them, the men followed right enough."

Jeremy Savage looked at her quickly but there was no trace of laughter. The slender girl was not very pretty at the moment, with her coveralls streaked with mud and grease, her hair falling in strings from under her cap, but he'd rather have seen her than the current Miss Universe. With her troops and ammunition supplies he had a chance to hold this position. "I suppose they did at that." Centurion Bryant turned away quickly with something caught in his throat.

"Can we hold until Colonel Falkenberg gets here?" Glenda Ruth asked. "I expect them to send everything they've got."

"We sincerely hope they do," Jeremy,Savage answered. "It's our only chance, you know. If that armor gets onto open ground…"

"There's no other way onto the plains, Major," she replied. "The Temblors go right on down to the Matson swamplands, and nobody's fool enough to risk armor there. Great Bend's Patriot country. Between the swamps and the Patriot irregulars it'd take a week to cross the Matson. If they're comin' by land, they're comin' through here."

"And they'll be coming," Savage finished for her. "They'll want to relieve the Doak's Ferry fortress before we can get it under close siege. At least that was John Christian's plan, and he's usually right." Glenda Ruth used her binoculars to examine the road. There was nothing out there-yet.

"This colonel of yours. What's in this for him? Nobody gets rich on what we can pay."

"I should think you'd be glad enough we're here," Jeremy said.

"Oh, I'm glad all right. In two hundred and forty hours Falkenberg's isolated every Confederate garrison west of the Temblors. The capital city forces are the only army left to fight-you've almost liberated the planet in one campaign."

"Luck," Jeremy Savage murmured. "Lots of it, all good."

"Heh." Glenda Ruth was contemptuous. "I don't believe that, no more do you. Sure, with the Confederates scattered out on occupation duty anybody who could get troops to move fast enough could cut the Feddies up before they got into big enough formations to resist. The fact is, Major, nobody believed that could be done except on maps. Not with real troops-and he did it. That's genius, not luck."

Savage shrugged. "I wouldn't dispute that."

"No more would I. Now answer this. Just what is a real military genius doing commanding mercenaries on a jerkwater agricultural planet? A man like that should be Lieutenant General of the CoDominium."

"The CD isn't interested in military genius, Miss Horton. The Grand Senate wants obedience, not competence."

"Maybe. I hadn't heard Lermontov was a fool and they made him Grand Admiral. O.K., the CoDominium had no use for Falkenberg. But why Washington, Major? With that Regiment you could take nearly anyplace but Sparta, and give the Brotherhoods a run for it there." She swept the horizon with the binoculars, and Savage could not see her eyes.

The girl disturbed him. No other Free State official questioned the good fortune of hiring Falkenberg. "The Regimental council voted to come here because we were sick of Tanith, Miss Horton."

"Yeah. Look, I better get some rest if we've got a fight coming-and we do. Look just at the horizon on the left side of the road." As she turned away Centurion Bryant's communicator buzzed. The outposts had spotted the scout elements of an armored force.

Glenda Ruth walked carefully to her bunker. Born on New Washington, she was used to the planet's forty-hour rotation period, and the forced march hadn't been as hard on her as some others, but lack of sleep made her almost intoxicated even so. She acknowledged the greeting of her bunker guards-her ranchers didn't use military formalities like salutes-and stumbled in side to wrap herself in a thin blanket without undressing.

Falkenberg. Bannister had no right to offer a regiment of mercenaries permanent settlement. There was no way to control a military force like that without keeping a large standing army, and that cure was worse than the disease. Without Falkenberg the revolution was doomed, but what could they do with him?

There was no one to consult. Her father was the only man she'd ever respected. Before he was killed he'd tried to tell her that winning the war was only a thin part of the problem. There were countries on Earth that had gone through fifty revolutions before they were lucky enough to have a tyrant gain control and stop them.

As she fell asleep the thought she'd tried to avoid poured past her guard. What if we can't get better than what we had? In her dreams Falkenberg's hard features formed in swirling mist. He was wearing military uniform and sat at a desk, Sergeant Major Calvin at his side. "These can live. Kill those. Send these to the mines," Falkenberg ordered.

The big sergeant moved tiny figures which looked like model soldiers, but they weren't all troops. One was her father. Another was a group of ranchers. And they weren't models at all. They were real people reduced to miniatures whose screams could barely be heard as the _.toneless voice continued to pronounce their dooms…

Brigadier Wilfred von Mellenthin waited impatiently for his scouts to report. He had insisted that the Confederacy immediately send his armor west on the report that Astoria had fallen, but the General Staff waited for more information. It was, they said, too big a risk to send the Confederacy's best forces blindly into what might be a trap.

Now the General Staff was convinced that they faced only one regiment of mercenaries, and that must have taken heavy casualties in storming Astoria. Von Mellenthin shrugged. Someone was holding the Gap, and he had plenty of respect for the New Washington ranchers. Give them rugged terrain and they could put up a good fight.

The scouts reported well-dug-in infantry, far more of it than von Mellenthin had expected. That damned Falkenberg-the man had an uncanny ability to move troops. He turned to the chief of staff. "Horst, do you think he has heavy guns here already?"

Oberst Carnap shrugged. "Weiss nicht, Brigadier. Every hour gives Falkenberg time to dig in at the Gap, and we have lost many hours."

"Not Falkenberg," Mellenthin corrected. "He is now investing the fortress at Doak's Ferry. We have reports from the Commandant there." He studied the displays on the command table of his caravan. They changed constantly as the scouts sent in reports and staff officers interpreted them.

"We go through," he said in sudden decision, "with everything. Boot them, don't spatter them."

"Jawohl." Carnap spoke quietly into his communicator. "It is my duty to point out the risk, Brigadier. We will take heavy losses if they have brought up artillery."

"I know." Mellenthin regarded the maps again. "But if we fail to get through now, we may never relieve the fortress. Half the war is lost if Doak's Ferry is taken. Better casualties immediately than a long war."

He led the attack himself. His armor brushed aside the infantry screens, his tanks and their supporting infantry cooperating perfectly to pin down and root out the opposition. They moved swiftly forward to cut the enemy into disconnected fragments for the following Covenanters to mop up. Mellenthin was chewing up the blocking force piecemeal as his brigade rushed deeper into the Gap.

The sweating tankers approached the irregular ridge at the very top of the pass. Suddenly a fury of small arms and mortar fire swept across them. The tanks moved on, but the infantry scrambled for cover. Armor and infantry became separated-and at that moment his tanks reached the minefields. Brigadier von Mellenthin began to get a case of nerves.

Logic told him the minefields couldn't be either wide or dense, and if he punched through he would reach the soft headquarters areas of his enemy. Once there his tanks would make short work of the headquarters and depots, the Covenanter infantry would secure the pass, and his Brigade could charge across the open fields beyond.

But-if the defenders had better transport than the General Staff believed, and thus had thousands of mines, he was dooming his armor. Meanwhile his, supporting infantry was pinned and taking casualties.

"Send scouting forces," Oberst Carnap urged.

Mellenthin considered it for a moment. Compromises in war are often worse than either course of action, inviting defeat in detail. He had only moments to reach a decision. "We go forward."

They reached the narrowest part of the Gap. His force bunched together and his drivers, up to now avoiding terrain features which might be registered by artillery, had to approach conspicuous landmarks. Von Mellenthin gritted his teeth.

The artillery was perfectly delivered. The Brigade had less than a quarter minute warning as their radars picked up the incoming projectiles, then the shells exploded among his tanks, brushing away the last of the covering infantry.

As the barrage lifted, hundreds of men appeared from the ground itself. A near perfect volley of infantry-carried antitank rockets slammed into his tanks. Then the radars showed more incoming artillery-and swam in confusion.

"Ja, that too," von Mellenthin muttered. His counterbattery screens showed a shower of gunk. The defenders were firing chaff, hundreds of thousands of tiny metal chips which drifted slowly to ground. Neither side could now use radar to aim indirect fire-but Mellenthin's armor was under visual observation, while the enemy guns had never been precisely located.

The Brigade was being torn apart on this killing ground. The lead elements ran into more minefields.

Defending infantry crouched in holes and ditches, tiny little groups which his covering infantry could sweep aside in a moment if it could get forward, but the infantry was cut off by the barrages falling behind and around the tanks.

There was no room to maneuver and no infantry support, the classic nightmare of an armor commander. The already rough ground was strewn with pits and ditches. High explosive antitank shells fell all around his force. There were not many hits yet, but any disabled tanks could be pounded to pieces and there was nothing to shoot back at. The lead tanks were under steady fire, and the assault slowed.

The enemy expended shells at a prodigal rate. Could they keep it up? If they ran out of shells it was all over. Von Mellenthin hesitated. Every moment kept his armor in hell.

Doubts undermined his determination. Only the Confederate General Staff told him he faced no more than Falkenberg's Legion, and the Staff was wrong before. Whatever was out there had taken Astoria before the commandant could send a single message. At almost the same moment the observation satellite was killed over Allansport. Every fortress along the Columbia was invested within hours. Surely not even Falkenberg could do that with no more than one regiment!

What was he fighting? If he faced a well-supplied force with transport enough to continue this bombardment for hours, not minutes, the Brigade was lost. His Brigade, the finest armor in the worlds, lost to the faulty intelligence of these damned colonials!

"Recall the force. Consolidate at Station Hildebrand." The orders flashed out, and the tanks fell back, rescuing the pinned infantry and covering their withdrawal. When the Brigade assembled east of the Gap Mellenthin had lost an eighth of his tanks, and he doubted if he would recover any of them.