humans in the open had been destroyed. Would they have any better luck fighting from behind stone walls? She was so absorbed with her worries and the sight of the human bombers flying effortlessly overhead that she never saw the wooden pole being pushed out from behind a cart. It was beautifully timed, going between her legs and catching her feet, sending her sprawling to the ground.
For a second she lay there, on the cobblestones, stunned by her fall. When she had collected her wits, she started to get up again but a violent blow to the back of her head sent her back to the ground. Half-stunned, she looked around and saw greenish, scaly legs surrounding her. Bewildered, she looked more and realized she was surrounded by a group of orcs, almost a dozen of them, all carrying heavy clubs. They were jabbering at each other, rattling away in a language she couldn’t understand. Orcs never spoke in the presence of a demon, to do so was to invite death and so few demons understood orcish. Whatever the argument was about, one of the orcs solved it by taking his club and swinging down, hitting Yellithanakstra on the back.
She screamed in rage and tried to summon up magic to drive them away but the rest had been encouraged by the success of the attack and they joined in, swinging their clubs down on her with all the force they could manage. Yellithanakstra felt the bones in her body breaking with the impacts, felt the ones to her head driving away her ability to concentrate for the generation of magic or even to think. She tried to crawl away but the orcs followed her, still battering her with their clubs. Eventually, she collapsed, her body shaking as the street faded away from her sight.
The orcs looked down on the body of their victim, a few still taking a few last swings although the demon was obviously dead. Then, they heard other demons running towards them and they scattered, running through the narrow alleyways and into the drains. Soon, they would gather and try and set up another ambush for an unwary demon.
Al Sahra Airfield, Iraq
”What a show, what a fight, we really hit our target for tonight, though with one engine gone we will still carry on coming in on a wing but with flair.
The chorus of the old song reverberated around the beams of the mess. Al Sahra had been one of Saddam Hussein’s based, now it was the home of the B-1Bs of the 128th Bomb Squadron, Georgia Air National Guard. Major Curtis Trafford gave out a cheer as the song ended and he finished off his drink. Coca Cola as it happened since he was on alert, waiting for the word to come that the beacon was up and the strike waiting in the dispersal areas could head off for Beelzebub’s fortress. Six B-1s, two of them were carrying the massive EBU-5(1) Mod. 1 bombs intended to close off the portals showering lava onto Sheffield and Detroit. The other four ware loaded down with conventional bombs, some unitary penetrators designed to knock down fortifications, others anti-personnel bomblets to slaughter any baldricks caught in the open.
“Attention, your attention please.” General Graydon was standing on a chair at the end of the room. A dangerous thing to do in a mess full of rowdy pilots. “We have just heard from the Brits, a Vulcan they have up has picked up the beacon from Tartarus. The raid is on. All assigned crews, report to your aircraft. The tankers are already taking off. You have already had your briefings, be ready to follow them. Thank you.” Graydon stood down and left the room.
Across the mess, the 24 crewmen assigned to the strike quietly got up and left, collecting back-slaps and salutes as they went. Trafford followed them, out to where Dragon Slayer was waiting. The mission was a complex one, already tankers would be converging on the strike route, some to refuel the B-1s, others to refuel the tankers. It took 14 tankers to get each of the B-1s to their target and back and more than a few of those tankers would be flying two missions. It was a 22,000 mile flight in total, making this the longest-range bombing mission that had ever been attempted. It was one for the history books, and it was one to avenge Detroit.
Trafford started to climb in to his aircraft then stopped half way in, reaching out to pat the airframe. “Well, honey-bunny, we’re on our way at last.”
Chapter Seventy Four
USS Turner Joy, On Trials Before Leaving For The AUTEC Transition Point
'Kind friends and companions, come join me in rhyme….Come lift up your voices in chorus with mine. Come drink and be merry, from grief we'll refrain.. For we know not when we will all meet again. So here's a health to our company and one to my lass, We'll drink and be merry all out of one glass, We'll drink and be merry, from grief we'll refrain, For we know not when we'll all meet again!'
'But we WILL meet again!' Rochelle Emerson added with a dark laugh as the chorus faded off, their voices hoarse from shouting over the noise of the turbines and various gear. 'Even if it be in the burning lakes of Hell!'
'Does the ship actually have alcohol on board?' Lieutenant Travis frowned for a moment and then looked rather hopeful.
Chief Robert 'Bob' Gaussington, who was effectively heading the revitalization efforts that culminated today, seemed like he had just spat. 'I hope they find Josephus Daniels last, with respect, Lieutenant.'
He'd lost his right leg in a car accident in '96, and that was why he wasn't called back to the colors himself, blast it all. Particularly since the car accident had cost him his wife; as far as he was concerned, the war was an intensely personal thing. His course in virtually delivering their proud ship to the Navy single-handed had been the best he could contribute not merely to revenge but liberation for the woman he had loved. He masked his dedication with an incredible sense of humor which had carried through all the engineering students he had recruited.
And why not? It's better than never seeing someone ever again. Sophia Metaxas thought to herself as she listened to the banter, in particular, the Chief's ability as a civilian to explain to a lieutenant precisely why Josephus Daniels deserved to burn in Hell longer than any other person so condemned. Also he could hide the location of the liquor store which would just happen to all have to be consumed before tomorrow. Then, if all went well, USS Turner Joy DD-951, would gain her commissioning pennant once more and become one of the last operational steam warships in the navy.
Decommissioned on November 11th, 1982, she was handed over to a preservation society in Bremerton, Washington, in the year 1990 after being struck from the reserves, and the Turner Joy's new owners had found themselves with a luckily well-preserved ship, and enough money to make her last. Almost two years of extensive reconstruction and preservation efforts had followed, and the ship that came out looked almost exactly as she did in 1982 when still in regular service, and might have even been in better condition. And they'd kept her that way: Her hull and her interior and engines bore no sign of rust, her 5in rifles had never been demilitarized, nor her torpedo tubes, and her masts had not been cut nor most of her electronics fully stripped.
Bob Gaussington had been one of the half a dozen or so men who had committed themselves to spending a great chunk of their retirement maintaining the ship. When the general mobilization could not, of course, include him, he went back to work at the shipyards from which he'd only recently retired. But then he'd heard that the steam warships still preserved would not be considered for restoration to active service. And it had irritated him, severely. He'd gotten the rest of the volunteers together, mostly also workers at the shipyard, and they'd spread the word at the 'yards.
Then he'd talked to Dr. Brown, the head of the engineering department at Olympic College, and obtained permission for his students-exempted from the draft due to their needed profession-to abandon their free time with the promise that 'we can damn well make her sail again, Doctor.' And so more and more men had started pouring in from the shipyards, volunteering their time off to the effort-and with a benevolent ‘official’ eye turned, borrowing equipment not needed for anything else at the moment.
Several weeks later the Navy had got wind of it, and been goaded into sending a survey party. Two days later, everything had kicked into high gear; the poor USS Barry at the Washington Navy Yard and the Forrest Sherman and Edson, both retained for future donation as museums, were ripped apart at the docks where they lay by navy teams for any spare parts that could possibly be redeemed for use, in the same way the few surviving Charlie Adams' had been stripped to support the Germans in recommissioning the Molders. The work teams had been made official, and additional weapons and electronics started arriving for the ship.
And now under a short crew with most of her civilian workers onboard, monitoring the ship's machinery and running final tests, she was making ten knots through the shipping channel of Rich Passage out to Puget Sound for
