The Lotus Eaters

gently. The girl's body was torn by two huge holes from which blood oozed. By the villa's lights, and the moons', he could see she was his partner of the night before. I will mourn you later, my little dear one. He ran to the southeastern bunker, to direct the fighting from there.

* * *

As the gunship flew, the crew for the 40mm, swaying on their feet from the maneuvering, frantically changed their ammunition mix to what the gunnery officer had called for, 'shake and bake.' This was mixed high explosive and white phosphorous, the former to break apart anything flammable and the latter to set it alight. It was exceptionally good for fuel, and not a bad mix for wood-packed ammunition.

'Gun up!' the chief of the forty announced into his microphone.

'Roger,' the gunner answered, while peering at his green screen.

'There they are,' he announced finally. 'I can see the mortar barrels glow in the thermal sight.'

Tracking by the glowing barrels became superfluous as the flash from the mortars' rapid fire gave away their position to the thermal imager. The pilot of the ANA-23 answered his gunnery officer with a, 'I'm lining up for a sweep. Take them out. We'll fire as she bears.'

'Roger.'

The gunner had one screen for target identification, linked to his main thermal sight. There was another, a linked computer touch-sensitive screen, for engagement. He tapped the latter screen for the target, then tapped the button to create a firing solution. The gunnery computer then took note of the target, analyzed its location, the aircraft location, the aircraft speed, altitude, and direction, and a mix of meteorological data, and automatically adjusted the 40mm gun's elevation, training it slightly forward at the same time. A caret appeared on the gunner's screen, as well as on the pilot's. In addition, the pilot's screen received instructions on orienting the aircraft. The target spot remained lit after the gunner had removed his finger. That glowing spot moved inexorably closer to the targeting caret.

* * *

KaWhoomfKaWhoomfKaWhoomfKaWhoomf! Though mounted at the ANA-23's center of gravity, the high velocity forty packed a massive wallop. The entire airframe shook with the recoil. As quickly as one four round magazine was expended, the gun crew slapped in another. In all, sixteen rounds were fired, twelve high explosive and four white phosphorous, before the aircraft had moved beyond the ability of the gun to train.

Fortunately, sometime between rounds nine and eleven, a fuel tank on the ground had been ruptured. Since round twelve was both right on target and white phosphorous . . .

* * *

The pilot looked out his left side window and grinned with satisfaction. 'I love my job,' he said.

The copilot, on the other hand, said nothing. Instead, he whistled as a very large explosion rent the jungle below. This explosion led to several more, even more spectacular than the first as whatever ammunition the mortar men below had unpacked went up with the fuel.

* * *

The series of explosions, so much louder than the distant crump, crump, crump of the mortars firing, told Victorio that his mortar support was no more and that his little command would soon again be under intense fire from above. Almost he gave in to despair. Perhaps, even, he would have, had not a radio call come in from an adjacent unit of the movement.

'We've been training in your area and can come to your aid in about half an hour,' the woman on the other end of the radio said.

That was tempting but . . . maybe there's a better way. I thought it best not to use the mortars on the aircraft. But the enemy to my front couldn't have responded to a mortar attack even if he'd wanted to. He can, on the other hand, respond to a ground attack and he just might.

'How far from our airstrip?' Victorio asked.

'Closer,' the woman answered. Victorio thought he recognized the voice as coming from Comandante Ingrid, a fiercely dedicated fighter that he knew slightly from meetings at infrequent conferences. 'Maybe fifteen minutes . . . no . . . ten. Ten if we accept some risk.'

'If you want to help, go for the airfield,' Victorio advised. 'The gringos have it. But be warned; there is some kind of aerial platform, a gunship, roaming overhead. It just took out my mortars.'

'We saw it,' Ingrid spat back, her voice full of fury at the imperialists. 'We can spread out to reduce its effectiveness. Unfortunately, we can't retake the airfield if we're spread out too much.'

'I don't need you to retake it,' Victorio said. 'It will be enough if you distract the gunship away from my base and cause them to break off the attack here.'

'Done.'

If I believed in God, Victorio thought, I'd thank Him for putting Ingrid's band near enough to help. Since I don't, despite Father Castano's sermonizing, I'll just be grateful to fate.

* * *

The gunner was just tapping in a new targeting command for the villa when the ANA-23 received a frantic call from the airfield, the call punctuated by single shots and longer bursts coming through clear across the airwaves.

'We've got a group of guerrillas,' the platoon commander below said. 'Strength unknown; they're hitting us from below. We think they're working their way around our flanks—'

The transmission was drowned out by a long burst of fire. The ground commander repeated, 'They're working their way around our flanks to get higher. I'm sending out half a section to each flank. Watch out for them. Right now the aircraft are safe enough, but if they get to the lip of the field or, worse still, above us, it's going to be a