came.
The radio in the command vehicle suddenly jumped to life. The right moment had come.
B-52H “Emma Peel” 28,000 feet over the Phlegethon River.
“That makes life a bit better.” The red-and-gray camouflaged B-52s had burst out of the murk at 28,000 feet and Colonel Haymen had pulled back on the lever that operated the engine filters. They’d rotated though 90 degrees, so they were now parallel to the air flow through the engines and the pick-up in power was immediate. The Gray Lady was back to performing the way she should and the old adage held true again. Never underestimate the Gray Lady.
“Hammer Control, this is Storm flight, we’ve broken out of the clag at 28,000 feet. Air is clean up here. Light still red, but visibility good. Tell the Bones to get up here if they want a long, fast cruise.”
“We’ll do that Hammer Flight. Be advised, a pair of B-29s did test drops for you. Computed ballistic corrections hold true, no need to correct programming for bomb drops.”
“Thanks Control. And thank the guys in the Superforts for us too.” Haymen sighed slightly in relief. That was one of the problems of fighting in non-Euclidean hell, there had been no guarantee that the bombs stuffed into Emma’s belly and hanging under her wings would drop true. The only way that anybody could find out was to try and that was what the B-29s had been doing. Drop bombs, compare impact points with those projected and calculate corrections. It had been a long, arduous job, constantly dropping and recalculating, it was lucky the old Superforts had been available to do it. Otherwise more valuable aircraft would have had to be taken out of the line.
“Take everybody up to 32,000. We can expect the drop order soon.”
“Hey, wait for me.” The plaintive voice came from Major Hennessy at the back of the formation. His “Vengeance Is Mine” was the only B-52D in the group of 72 B-52s that were lining up ready for their strike. A museum recovery, it just didn’t have the engine power of the Gs and Hs.”
“Come, on, hurry up old-timer. We haven’t got all day.”
“Hurry up? Hurry up!! I’ll have you know that at least our wings are level back here.”
Haymen snorted. The B-52s had all been through a very hurried “Big Belly” modification that had seen provision for 750 pound bombs increased from 51 to 80. The problem was that the G and H models had a lighter wing structure than earlier marks and now those wings were bent in a graceful curve from tip to root. Only the solitary D-model had wings that were still uncurved. It still carried more bombs as well, 88 instead of 80.
“OK, OK. All Storm birds. The Superforts have confirmed the corrections, we can use the programmed bomb drop. Waiting for word now.”
Command HQ, Camp Hell-Alpha, Hell
“How goes the day Tovarish General?” General David Petraeus stood in front of his view screen, looking at the Russian commander at the other end
General Ivan Semenovich Dorokhov was a harassed-looking man, already tired from the volume of fighting that was going on. “It is a bloody day Bratishka. We are holding them in the North at great cost but the force in the south has bitten deep into the defenses. The North too will start to collapse soon, we are already getting requests from the front line to bring down fire on our own positions. The harpies in the north are pinning our men down, our artillery is hammering the follow-on forces but soon they will have crossed the river and then our positions will fall fast. Still, we have some tricks to play yet and your bombers are ready I think.”
“On your word Tovarish General, just give us the word. Good news, the air is clear up where they are, they can hold up there for longer than we thought. And in the South?”
“Bad. The enemy there are half way through our defense zone. They are paying a terrible price but they have naga carried by Rhinolobsters that are very effective and the Wyverns have done us some harm. But our artillery hit the nagas with white phosphorus and the Wyverns are no match for fighters. The advance there will run out of power soon. But we might need to counter-attack them before they can break through. It will be a finely-judged thing, whether their advance runs out of energy before we stop them.”
“The German and Israeli armored divisions are well placed for that. Order them to make the attack.” Petraeus hesitated for a brief second. “Make sure the Israeli unit has plenty of space around it.”
Dorokhov frowned. “You expect treachery? Surely not.”
“Not treachery, stupidity. The Israelis are too trigger-happy for their own good. They will not shoot up one of our own units deliberately but they are all too likely to do so by accident. We know that to our cost. It would be best to give them an end-run so they are well clear of the rest of your forces. Get them over the Phlegethon so the rest of us are safe.”
The Russian General laughed. “Good advice Tovarish David. You heard the enemy used burning brimstone on our troops? Well, know we will show them what we can do when we wish.”
“Weapons Are Free General. And give us the word when you want the Gray Lady to come calling.”
Over the Northern Front, Phlegethon River
It had many names. Some called it 2-( Fluoro-methylphosphoryl)oxypropane, others preferred O-isopropyl methylphosphonofluoridate. The military eschewed such long-winded nomenclatures and just called it GB. The world at large knew it as Sarin.
The great black rockets with their gaudy yellow markings had been launched all down the line. This is what they had been waiting for, when their ability to saturate an area with fire could be turned to best advantage. As the rockets had started to descend, the outer casing had been discarded and the ranks of sub-munitions had been exposed. Further down, those sub-munitions had started to be launched and they had formed a spreading pattern that resembled a great shotgun blast. It was the same mechanism that the Americans had used to bring down the hideous steel rain that had destroyed Abigor’s Army. Only this time, when the sub-munitions detonated they didn’t bring down a curtain of steel fragments or blast from shaped-charge munitions. First they started to spin and the action mixed the charges of methylphosphonyl difluoride and a mixture of isopropyl alcohol and isopropyl amine. They reacted to form the Sarin and then the sub-munitions burst to release a fine gentle rain, one that none of the screaming hordes of harpies below even noticed for the liquid was colorless and odorless. The only thing that Beelzebub and his Army did notice was that the human mage-fire that was pounding the bank of the Phlegethon furthest from the Russian positions had ceased.
Every so often, in a battle, for no apparent reason, the noise stops. The gunfire, the roar of the artillery, the growls, whines and snarls of engines, the demented shriek of depleted uranium bolts hitting steel armor, the crackling grumble of fires, the screams of dying men stop and there is an eerie silence. So it was as the Sarin descended on the positions under harpy attack. The Russian guns stopped firing so that the passage of their shells through the air would not disturb the blanket of chemical warfare agent that had been so carefully calculated. Beneath, the Russian motor rifle units were sealing down, hoping that the overpressure systems on their vehicles had survived the harpies and that their chemical warfare suits were proof against the gas. In case it wasn’t they had their atropine injectors ready but the truth was that even if they used them the gas would wreck their bodies. With atropine they would survive but they would never again be the men they had been once.
Uxaligantivaris concentrated on the Iron Chariot that was under her claws. She and her companions were ripping at it with their claws and breathing fire over it as fast as their bodies could recharge their gas sacks. They had used so much of the fire-gas that they had lost the ability to fly but it didn’t matter that much. All that mattered was to keep the Iron Chariots under attack so that the foot soldiers following them could destroy the defenses. Then she shook her head slightly, Hell was a dim place, its light levels low and subdued but suddenly she could see everything was becoming bright and clear to her. So bright that the light was hurting her eyes in a way that she had never experienced before. She looked at another harpy that had stopped ripping at the iron projections on the chariot and saw that her flight-mate’s eyes were strange, the slitted black pupil had contracted to a fine line, almost invisible in the yellow of her eyes. Her nose was running, mucus streaming out of it and coating her chest. Uxaligantivaris touched her own nose and realized that she too was streaming fluids from her nose and that there was a strange tightness in her chest, as if she was having problems breathing. In fact, she realized, that was exactly it, she was having problems getting her ribs to suck air into her lungs. The effort was making her feel sick and she could feel herself drooling uncontrollably. She couldn’t help herself, she vomited helplessly and felt her body loosing strength. Across from her, the other harpies were collapsing as well, vomiting on to the Iron chariot that was now forgotten as the agony took hold of them. Her flight-mates were defecating and urinating like helpless kidling, their bodies twitching and jerking as they tried to escape the unseen thing that was inflicting this terrible end on them. Uxaligantivaris felt her muscles become paralyzed and she slipped down the side of the Iron chariot to
