The Lotus Eaters

'Roger. Stand by.' Carrera ran forward to Chapayev, Menshikov following close behind. The 14th Cazador Tercio bodyguards kept their position surrounding Carrera.

Through Menshikov, Carrera said to Chapayev, 'Tribune, I just heard from the gunship. They know we're here. We knew they might hear us coming in. It's your operation, but my suggestion is to drop the sneaky shit and move like hell onto the objective. I can have the gunship start pounding now.'

It took Chapayev perhaps all of five seconds to decide. 'Da. Thank you, Duque. We do that.'

Chapayev began to shout to his platoons to move out smartly, while his forward observer notified the mortar section to begin working over the villa. Carrera notified the gunship to engage.

'Si, Senor. Solo un' minuto.' It was seconds rather than minutes before the sky lit up with the muzzle flash and tracer burn of four .50 caliber heavy machine guns, water cooled, pouring down a stream of lead onto the villa compound. The eighteen hundred-plus rounds per minute were so close together that each shot blended into the next to create a sound like a zipper being pulled closed dangerously fast. Carrera's party joined 15th Company in sprinting through the widely spaced trees for the villa, the whole party guiding on the gunship's tracers.

* * *

The FNLS were hardly a professional force. The patrol ordered out by Victorio was just leaving the main gate to the compound as the point of Chapayev's company reached the edge of the forest surrounding the villa and nearest the gate. The Volgans tended to be literal and, often enough, excessively obedient to their orders. Rather than set up a hasty ambush to catch the patrol in the open, the point element of the 15th company opened fire immediately. They were rewarded with a couple of hits, but no more than that, before the rest of the patrol scurried back inside the compound, frantically closing the gate behind them. Inside, the survivors hid in the shadow of the surrounding wall, fearful of entering into the open where a storm of fire from something on high was drenching the place with a leaden sleet.

* * *

From the headquarters window Comandante Victorio took one look at the stream of tracers coming down from above, then another at the scared-shitless patrol being driven in through the gate, and said to himself, 'We're fucked. Those aren't police, less still some flight that got misoriented and landed at the wrong strip. Those are the goddamned gringos.'

But do we run or do we fight it out? He tried to envision how the gringos had gotten to him. Jumping? No, the Cienfuegans said you don't parachute onto mountain ranges, generally. They must have landed. Now how many planes could land on that strip at one time? Not that many. I think we're facing equal odds, give or take. Sure, they've got that fucking airplane overhead but that can't stick around forever. It could maybe follow us, though, if we try to get away through the jungle. That's an unsavory prospect. I think we fight it out here, maybe try to get away in the day after the gunship goes away. Or even if it stays, it will have a harder time finding us in the jungle heat. At least that's what the Cienfuegans said. Besides, we have some friends not so very far away.

So if we're going to fight it out . . .

A shell impacting near the headquarters reminded Victorio that he wasn't without some support of his own.

But where to use it. There's a good chance we could take out any planes on the airstrip. That, however, won't do a damned thing to help us here, now.

'Get hold of the mortar platoon on the radio,' he said. 'Tell them I want fire on the woods nearest the main gate.'

* * *

As the Volgan point man reached the edge of the forest that marked the cleared area around the villa, he went to one knee and took cover behind a tree. Chapayev took cover a few meters behind him, using his voice to direct his platoons into assault positions to right and left.

As those men were moving, each heard the odd screech of incoming fire. For many, it was a first. Still, enough of the praporschiki had served in Pashtia and on the borders during the breakup of the Volgan Empire to know. Chapayev and his men went to ground automatically as the first of several mortar shells exploded in the trees overhead. A Volgan screamed for a medic. As more shells landed the cry for help spread. The Santanderns' mortars were joined by increasing, and increasingly effective, rifle and machine gun fire, as the defenders fought back from their bunkers. Green tracers skipped among the trees.

The paratroopers returned the Santandern fire without noticeable effect. Volgan medics, oblivious to the incoming mortar rounds, ran from position to position, picking up the badly wounded and carrying or dragging them to the rear, where the company's senior medic had set up an ad hoc aid station. Many wounded men refused to be pulled back, shaking off the medics and continuing to return fire.

Chapayev's Forward Observer, or FO, called the 15th Company mortar section to order a cease fire. When, after about two minutes, the incoming rounds failed to stop he knew it wasn't Volgan mortar fire cutting into the company. He ordered a resumption of firing on the compound, then stuck his head around a tree to adjust it. A bullet, flying low, passed through the FO's head, spattering brains over his radio operator, just behind. The RTO pulled the FO's body back to cover, then took his place and continued observing.

Carrera shouted into his radio for the gunship to find and silence the FNLS mortars. Aerial support fire abruptly ceased, even as a more powerful whine from the sky told that the plane was moving off. With the gunship gone, the defender's fire increased.

* * *

Victorio felt his confidence in his chances surge with the first angry, orange-red blossoming of fire in the tree line. That confidence momentarily soared as the fire from overhead cut out.

'Right on,' congratulated the guerrilla leader, into the radio. 'Keep it up.'

Victorio stepped outside, still sheltering as much as possible from the incoming mortar fire, and began pushing his fighters to their positions.

After he had seen the last of his guerillas to the walls and bunkers, Victorio stepped over the inert form of a girl with a rifle. She lay on her back clothed with only a camouflage shirt, and that unbuttoned and in disarray. Her legs were bent at the knees, feet under her, and legs obscenely spread. Victorio closed her legs with a booted foot, but