the cav was probably the only Allied force in the west to retain the old smoothbores. His Marines had the Allin-Silva. 50–80 breechloaders and soon the whole army should, but the cav liked the ability to fire heavy loads of buckshot at close range.
The Rangers reached the summit of the low, broad hill and began digging in and throwing up breastworks around the perimeter. Axes thocked against the trees that stood fairly dense atop the hill, and the trunks and brush joined the defensive structure. Two batteries of artillery-a full dozen of the much-improved twelve-pounders-and carts of supplies loaded with food, ammunition, water butts, even the field transmitter/receiver joined them. The comm ’Cats in charge of the wireless set began to assemble the apparatus and prepared to string an aerial in the remaining trees. The 1st Battalion of the 2nd Marines maintained a rear guard back to the pass with their quick- firing breechloaders and another battery of guns, until the leading elements of the 1st Sular pushed out of the gap and headed toward their own position about seven hundred tails away. The Marines remained in place until the first Sularan companies began to establish themselves. Then they limbered their guns and pulled back toward the northern hill. By then, as the sun crept closer to the western horizon, two more companies of the 6th Cavalry had deployed in the mouth of the gap, screening the advance of the rest of the corps.
“That went very well,” a satisfied Bekiaa said to Flynn. “Though it has been a long day,” she amended. Everyone was tired, but Flynn had been limping slightly for most of the long march. In his forties, he’d spent most of his life in submarines. Those had been dangerous years, but they’d left him ill prepared for a return to infantry life and he ached from his back to his toes all the time, it seemed. Even his shoulder ached from carrying his ’03 Springfield. Sometimes in the past he rode a paalka to give his ankles a rest, but that day he’d refused.
“Mmm,” Flynn replied, listening. “Say, I think our long-range recon is coming back.”
The breeze was laying with the late afternoon, and soon the distinctive sound of Nancy engines was plain. “There they are!” someone cried as the planes grew against the evening sun. One plane banked toward the north hill, the other to the south, and streamers fluttered down. A rider fetched the closest one and brought it to Flynn. He unwrapped the note from the small rock it was tied around and spread the sheet to read it:
MANNY MANNY GRIK AT CROSROADS AROWND RIVER BRIJ ABOUT 80–90 MILES WEST YOR POSISHIN. MOST COMING FROM WEST OF THER, BUT SOM NORTH. SAW LOTS OF DINO COWS.
“Damn it, I knew it!” Flynn said, waving the sheet at the planes as they disappeared east over the crags. “I wish somebody would teach those airedales how to make a report, though. ‘Many’ is awful vague, and what were they doing? Were they crossing the river or just plopped there? And where were the dino-cows? Orderly!” he shouted.
“Here, sur,” came a voice directly behind him.
“Tell those comm ’Cats to get a move on. I need comm!”
In the distance, beyond South Hill, a rumbling, roaring horn suddenly sounded, and all conversation stopped. A second horn joined the first, then another. In seconds, the air was filled with the bone-chilling and utterly unmistakable bellows-powered calls that signaled a general Grik charge! The slopes beyond South Hill, so still and peaceful just moments before, erupted with movement as seemingly dozens of shapes burst from beneath every tree and joined the growing, howling swarm flowing down toward the narrow plain below the Sularan position.
“My God,” Flynn exclaimed. “That lizardy son of a skuggik really did it this time! He Custered us! Drummers, sound ‘Stand To’!”
“What does that mean, Colonel?” Bekiaa shouted over the thundering drums that suddenly competed with the horns. “What’s ‘Custered’? You said something like that in the highland pass on Ceylon, before the battle there.”
“General Halik, or whatever the hell his name is, figured out where we were going, how we were moving, then let us stick our necks through that damn, rocky noose! There were Grik all over those damn heights on our flanks all day, just waiting for this! He tried the same stunt in the highlands, but this time it worked-and I let it!”
“But their guns! The planes saw no artillery, and no way they could get any up there!”
“Don’t you get it? They don’t need artillery, not yet. They aren’t going after the whole corps right now, just us! They can keep General Maraan bottled up in the Rocky Gap while they eat us alive. Between us, the Marines, the Sularans, and the Cav, that’s around thirty-five hundred troops, and a fair-size chunk of Second Corps!”
A gun flashed on South Hill, downward and away, the vent jet stabbing at the sky. Then another fired. Both reports were drowned by the growing, snarling, hissing shriek of thousands of Grik charging down out of the hills, where they must have remained hidden to crossing aircraft.
“What have we got coming at us here?” Flynn demanded when a ’Cat lieutenant raced up from the west side of the hill.
“Nothing yet. They seem all go at First Sular, yonder. They lots still not to top of hill. No dig in.”
The sun had touched the horizon at last, and the long shadows would soon be replaced by a very long night. Musket flashes and more cannon firelit the distant hill.
“They mean to take us one at a time,” Flynn decided. “My guess is they’ve probably got a lot more out there than are even coming off the hills. Probably have some guns stashed too. If they wipe us out, or even if they don’t, they can keep Second Corps stopped up in that gap until that ‘many’ force gets here from the east. After that, it’s all attack, attack. Their kind of fight.”
“But even they get us, Second Corps get away!” the lieutenant said, blinking furiously.
“Boy, have you even been with us the last couple of days? Remember the dino-cows? They didn’t cook this up on the fly. I guarantee they’re hittin’ Second Corps from behind and in the flanks right damn now! They’ll cork General Maraan in that lousy gap from both sides!”
“But… well, what we do?” the young officer almost wailed.
“You’re relieved, Lieutenant,” Flynn said, almost gently. “At least until you pull yourself together.” He looked at those who’d gathered around him. “ All of us better do that right quick, or we’ve had it. Saachic!”
“Sur?”
“Take all the cav and scoop up both companies of the Sixth in the gap. Whoever’s behind ’em will have to take the load when it lands. After that, haul ass to South Hill. If it looks like they can hold off the first shove, help them do it, then tell them to run, not walk, the hell over here.”
“Yes, sur… but what if they not holding?”
Flynn took a breath. “Then spike what guns you can and get everybody out who can climb in the saddle with you. We’ll cover your run back here.”
“Meanies don’t like extra riders,” Saachic warned. “And even if we all get some, we can’t get all.”
“I know.”
The battle for South Hill intensified as darkness fell, flaring and slashing with fire. Every instinct Flynn had told him to march to the aid of the Sularans, but he knew that was probably exactly what the Grik wanted him to do. With the darkness, he had no way of knowing how the enemy deployment was developing. The cavalry was keeping a clear line of communication between the hills-the Grik seemed to respect their me-naaks-but he already had reports of Grik circling around South Hill to threaten that line. One way or the other, the Sularans had to pull back here soon.
In the meantime, his Rangers were digging like fiends and heaping the damp earth in front of their lines. Stakes were being cut, sharpened, and driven into the ground, and details were busy spooling out the new barbed wire they’d just recently received from Baalkpan. It was crummy, lightweight stuff compared to what Flynn had seen in France as a youngster, but this would be the first time the Grik ever ran into such an entanglement, and it was going to cost them. Other details were starting work on several bunkers to give them some overhead protection, and revetments were taking shape around the guns. The Marines maintained their position on the south side of the hill, throwing breastworks in front of their own forward battery, which was prepared to fire down the flanks of the gap held by the cavalry when the Sularans finally came out. When they were withdrawn into the fortifications, their guns would serve as a mobile reserve for any hot spots that might develop.
Flynn looked around. He’d done his best to prepare, he thought. There was little more he could do but make North Hill so costly to take that the Grik would choke on it.
“Col-nol Flynn! Col-nol Flynn!” he heard called in the deepening gloom.
“Here!”
One of the comm ’Cats hopped closer. “Col-nol, we got contact with Maa-draas HQ! Gener-aal Taa-leen
