Then, Belial looked down and realized the full scale of the shattering blow the human aircraft had delivered. The whole of the promontory that had served as a base for Satan’s palace was crumbling, subsiding into the caldera below. He watched it falling, the ground slowly shifting downwards as it settled, spreading sideways as the weight of rocks above compressed those underneath. Somehow, without thinking it through, Belial knew that the settling would continue for days. There was no hope for those under the ruins, they were either being choked by the dust or crushed by the constantly-settling rock. With another flash of insight, Belial realized that the demon’s superb resistance to wounds and infection was going to be a terrible curse here, death was inevitable but the process of having life crushed out of them was going to take much longer.
Of Satan’s palace there was no sign. Then he looked closer, and realized he was wrong. There were signs of it in the settling debris below. Sheets of bronze from the roof, shattered pieces of statuary, blocks of dressed and polished stone. That was all. Satan’s palace had taken millennia to build and work on it had never really finished. Always there had been extra stones to add, extra rooms, crueler and deeper dungeons. Well, it was all over now, the palace had been destroyed and its monstrous occupant with it. Belial felt like screaming with despair, all that work, all that planning and scheming, the stunning success of Sheffield, the lesser success of Dee-Troyt, all had been aimed at restoring him to Satan’s favor. Now, Satan was dead, or dying of slow suffocation in the ruins below. It had all been for nothing. Standing on the crater rim, looking down at the devastation, Belial wept with despair.
Free Hell, Banks of the Styx, Fifth Circle of Hell
The explosions had echoed and re-echoed around the great caldera of hell, stunning the demons and suffering humans alike. Lieutenant (deceased) Jade Kim saw the shining bronze palace on its rock high above and far away, start to crumble. In painfully slow motion, the whole great structure collapsed, the very rock it was based on falling into the caldera underneath. Kim realized that at least some of the debris was landing on humans, killing them (again) before they could be liberated. A sacrifice, but one merited by the majesty of the sight that was unfolding above her. ‘Shock and Awe’ she thought to herself, an overused and much-discredited phrase but one that was curiously appropriate to the sight.
“Way to go fly-boys.” Her voice seemed to blend in with the rumble of the collapsing rock. “That’s the Air Farce, go straight for the top with the biggest bombs they can carry. B-2s I guess, or B-1s.”
“You’re saying things we don’t understand again.” Titus Pullo couldn’t restrain himself from the half-joke, even in the face of the incredible sight before them.
“Sorry, Titus. We have big aircraft, bombers, to carry very large bombs. I guess the B-52s are being used elsewhere and the other types we have are B-1s and B-2s. They must have used bombs that penetrate deep into rock and ruptured the very foundations of that place. There’s nobody left alive in there, that’s for certain.”
“Good, very good.” Lucius Vorenus was looking at the subsiding ruins with quiet satisfaction. “Then he’s dead.”
Kim was about to respond when she heard another sound, the sky-tearing noise of jet fighters moving fast. The six aircraft erupted out of the dusty sky, arching over Free hell and orbiting around. They were loaded for air-to-air, she could see the batteries of missiles hanging under their wings.
“British, Typhoons.” Then there was another wound, one that she found achingly familiar, the rhythmic whoop-whoop noise of helicopter rotors. She’d never realized how much she had missed that noise before. They were helicopters all right, big ones. Single rotor amidships, that meant either Marine CH-53s, Russian Mi-171s or British Merlins. Some were carrying slung loads, others were clean and one of them was coming straight in. She saw it touch down only a few dozen yards from her and figures started to pour out. Camouflaged figures wearing red berets. British paratroopers. One of the figures detached from the rest and came over to her.
“Lieutenant Jade Kim?” There was a heavy accent on her rank and she guessed what was coming next.
“Present Sir.”
“I’m Colonel Andy Jackson, commanding officer Two-Para. As senior officer here, I’ll be taking over command. Could you bring me up to date on your defenses please? I understand there’s some nausea coming this way.”
“Certainly Sir, I’ve got our maps at hand I’ll….”
“Welcome to Hell Colonel.” Jackson looked surprised, a man had just arrived, one with a vaguely familiar face. “Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Gaius Julius Caesar. You say you are a Colonel? That makes you the commander of a cohort?”
“Err, I think so.” Jackson thought quickly, his 700 men were about a cohort.
“But not the First Cohort though.” Caesar’s lips twitched slightly. “I am First Consul and commander of two legions in this area. That makes me a General I think. And Jade Kim is the Second Consul of the forces in Free Hell, which includes one of my Legions. So, that makes me at least, the ranking officer here.”
“But you have no idea of what modern forces are capable of.” Jackson was caught completely off guard.
“I have some idea, Second Consul Kim is a good teacher. But, you are right so I must ask that you remain in your position, commanding your Para. Perhaps we can get together and work out how best we can deploy your men.”
“Sir, with all due respect, I must insist…”
“That’s very good then, After all, the principles of strategy doesn’t change much although weapons have obviously done so. Have you read my book on Strategic Principles.”
“It’s been lost I’m afraid.” Kim was trying to stop laughing. The sight of the British officer trying to think of reasons why this shouldn’t be happening was hilarious.
“Not any more. With nothing else to do for 2,000 years, I’ve re-written all my books from memory. By the way Jade, your translation of the Civil War is very incomplete, allow me to give you a full copy. I’ve signed it for you. Anyway, Colonel Jackson, what forces did you bring with you.”
“Err, my battalion, a battery of 105mm field guns, Land-Rovers with machine guns and grenade launchers. Lot of grenade machine guns. And we have a forward air observer group. We can pull in a lot of air power if we need it.” Jackson shook his head, he’d been outmaneuvered and he know it. But then, it was no shame to be embarrassed by losing to Gaius Julius Caesar. Now he’d lost, the next priority was to do the best job humanly possible for his new commander. Honor demanded no less.
Beside him, Jade Kim felt a mixture of sadness and relief. Her little state had suddenly become a Roman province but at least she was out of the hot seat at last. Away from the dreadful nagging fear that her next more would be the mistake that brought everything crashing down around her ears.
Chapter Sixty Seven
Chiknathragothem’s Command Post, Southern Front, Phlegethon River
The harpy landed, its wings shaking with exhaustion. “Sire, I bring much terrible news.”
“Speak.” Chiknathragothem didn’t have time to worry about the usual genuflections.
“My Lord, the humans have unleashed magery of unimaginable power. Beelzebub’s Army is stalled, its casualties are beyond counting. He has forced a crossing of the Phlegethon but is unable to make headway into the human defenses. The human mages breathed death over his forces, their spells robbing his harpies of the breath from their bodies, of the very air from their lungs. His harpies died as one, nothing like it has every been seen before.”
“That could well describe our whole war with these humans.” Chiknathragothem was impatient, he had better things to do than listen to a litany of disaster, even if opportunities lay in them. “Tell me something I have not heard before.”
The harpy gulped but he had been tasked to deliver a message and deliver it he would. “The humans also delivered a huge number of mage-bolts, so many that they blended together into one huge cloud of death that drank Beelzebub’s army. Together, barely one demon in four survives of his force. He has abandoned his attack and is pulling back in defense to block the road to Dis. He charges you with penetrating the human defenses and crushing them against that defense.”
“Is that all.” Chiknathragothem’s voice clearly indicated that he was contemplating a quick meal.
“No Sire, the worst is still to come. The humans hit the city of Dis itself. They have destroyed His Infernal Majesty’s palace, crumbled in and the rock it stood on so that only a pile of sand and ruins remains.”
