“You believe in me, gentlemen, and I believe in you. Now please take a seat and I will show you your coming objectives…”
Darkness settled as Syracuse burned and the battle raged. A blazing tower sent flames into the night five hundred feet high. It illuminated bent over Americans, retreating to a new defensive line. Most of them lugged heavy machine guns.
In the distance, enemy artillery thundered with flashes on the horizon. Tank cannons roared, spewing flames and shells. Machine guns hammered and grenades went off everywhere like sparks. The great moment had arrived where Germans, Americans and Canadians fought in a death clutch.
XI Airmobile Corps led the defense in the city streets and in the flat land to the north and in the hillier region to the south. The corps had allies this pregnant night. A US division had come from the north along Interstate 81 to add weight to the defense, while three Manitoba brigades had arrived in time and dug in on the southern hills. Perhaps as importantly, several key battalions of specialty troops entrained from Southwestern Ontario had set up their equipment. Roughly fifty thousand American-allied troops desperately stood their ground against one hundred and thirty thousand amped GD soldiers determined to break through and end the campaign with a race to Albany and then to New York City.
Paul Kavanagh and Romo waited among a company of Rangers. They were one of the last reaction forces left in the corps reserves in Syracuse. If they could hold on long enough, another Canadian division was on its way up from Albany to add to the defense. Behind them by half a day was yet another Canadian division. The flow had finally started. All they had to do was hold on for another day, maybe two. Yeah, that was all, to stand their ground against a relentless assault.
As the sounds of battle approached the last holdout position, Romo shook Paul’s shoulder and pointed at the night sky. An enemy missile streaked upward.
At the sight, Paul shook his head. Another US helo pouring chain-gun fire at the enemy went down in a blaze of an explosion. It was murder tonight, a toe-to-toe slugfest. In a place like this, what a soldier saw, he could destroy…as long as the missiles, ammunition and grenades lasted, and as long as the Kaisers and heavier GD tanks stayed out of it. So far, those monsters hadn’t entered the fray here in any real numbers. Maybe they had been too big to safely ferry across the Great Lake with the shipping at hand.
While waiting with the Rangers earlier, stacking sandbags, Paul had learned a little-known fact about the city. Twenty-seven percent of Syracuse’s area was made up of trees. That was a much greater percentage of trees than Buffalo, Rochester or even Albany had. Trees helped the defender, as it made for better defensive terrain. That was something for their side, at least.
“It never ends,” Romo said.
They waited behind sandbags in the middle of the street. With a squeal of brakes, two jeeps pulled up loaded with sticky mines. Farther back, strange machines packed inside Humvees looked as if they could have come from a Monday Night Football sideline somewhere. On top of the selected Humvees were aimed dishes. Techs worked on those, while inside the Humvee others fiddled on banks of panels.
“Someday this war will end,” Paul said. “Eventually, they all do.”
“Si. This war will end long after you and are dead.” Romo gave him a bleak look. “Do you ever think if what we do matters?”
Paul raised his eyebrows. “How can you ask that now, here?”
“Why does that surprise you?” Romo asked.
Paul snorted.
“Did I say something stupid?” Romo asked.
“Weren’t you listening earlier?” Paul asked.
Romo gave him a blank look.
“Don’t you know what those are?” Paul asked, jerking his thumb at the tech gear on the nearby Humvees.
“No.”
“It’s the latest jamming equipment from Southern Ontario,” Paul said. “It’s the Heidegger thingamajig.”
“I must have been sleeping when you learned about it,” Romo said.
“Are you kidding me?” Paul asked. “That’s stolen German tech, or stolen GD principles.”
“Why would I care about that?”
Paul grinned at this blood brother. He couldn’t believe it. A moment later, he laughed and slapped Romo on the shoulder.
Several of the Rangers glanced at them.
Romo scowled. “What is the joke?”
“No joke,” Paul said. “It’s just that the jamming equipment came to the US Army thanks to two LRSU men.”
It took Romo a moment. He asked, “Do you mean us?”
“Don’t you remember the German we hauled across Lake Ontario?”
“Si, the remote-controlling cocksucker,” Romo said. “I remember him. What about it?”
“He spilled his guts to intelligence,” Paul said. “They used his intel to build those and they used the stolen equipment we brought over with him.”
Romo stared at the techs working feverishly on top of the Humvees. “What do the dishes do that’s so special?”
Before Paul could answer, the Ranger captain jogged near and shouted for the men to gather around. Paul and Romo joined them, and listened to the instructions. According to division, a squadron of Sigrid drones had broken through and even now raced up the streets toward them. The drones spearheaded a GD thrust through Syracuse.
Rangers worked fast, taking the sticky mines out of the two jeeps and dividing them among theirs. Soon, Paul and Romo climbed into their jeep with two other Rangers.
“Looks like the Germans want to smash through the center and halt our reinforcements if they can,” Paul said.
He wore body armor and held on tight as the jeep bounced wildly. The front tire hit a pothole and Paul felt himself lift, with his grip slipping off the side. He managed to hang on even as the back tire hit the same hole. This was a crazy night. The captain had told them they were going to meet the Sigrids head on and halt the breakthrough. Behind the jeeps followed the special Humvees.
“You we’re telling me about the Heidegger jammers,” Romo said.
“They don’t always work,” said a Ranger sergeant in the jeep with them. “But when they do work, they’re magic.”
Romo gave Paul a significant glance.
“Down!” the captain shouted out of a loudspeaker in a jeep ahead of them.
The jeeps squealed to a halt. Seconds later, enemy artillery shells howled down at them. Everyone jumped, hitting the paving and enduring the exploding ordnance. Fortunately, buildings got in the way, and chunks of masonry exploded outward as glass shattered. Afterward, GD Razorbacks appeared, skimming low over the buildings. The UAVs opened fire with a roar of shells and machine guns. A jeep exploded and flipped. Rangers died. A hose of bullets tore up the street and rained dust and blacktop pellets onto Paul’s helmet. As he debated getting up and seeking better shelter, Blowdarts roared out of Avenger Humvees. Two of the Razorbacks blew up. The third climbed and banked away. A US tac-laser must have been waiting for that. The ground-attack plane began to disintegrate, sliced by the invisible ray.
As Paul climbed to his feet, the sound of clanking, treads came down the streets. Rubble and buildings blocked the view.
“Get back into the jeeps!” the Ranger captain shouted. “It’s game time.”
Paul climbed into his jeep.
Romo slid near, whispering, “This is ridiculous, my friend. We’re led by amateurs.”
Like the deadly toy soldiers they were, the first Sigrids clanked around the rubble and into view. The jeeps swerved, almost leaping behind shattered buildings. Paul’s driver took them through a jagged, artillery-made opening before slamming on the brakes. They boiled out.
Paul slid to a glassless window, peering outside. More Sigrids followed the first ones. The deadly machines began to fan out, and their tri-barrels spun, spewing bullets at stalled jeeps and exposed Rangers. Other Rangers set up .50 calibers and aimed RPGs. With brutal efficiency, the drones shredded some of them, too, killing a quarter of the company in seconds. One shaped-charge grenade made it, and exploded a GD drone.