“Are General Timokin and Stan Bamberg here?” Vincent asked.
“Follow me, sirs; they’re waiting over at headquarters.”
Hans fell in with the group as they strode across the field. The passengers from the airships were out, nearly all of them a sorry-looking lot.
“Major, are copies of Gates’s Weekly making it down here?”
“Ah, yes sir, we just got the issue about what happened up at Capua. They came in on the transport carrying the ironclads.”
“Well detail off some men. I want every copy you can find rounded up. Then find some glue, if need be take some flour and mix it into a paste. Then paper it on the outside of those wicker troop carriers.”
The major looked at him confused, then called to a sergeant who had been tailing along and detailed him off.
“In all the rush we never thought of it,” Jack said. “Damn foolish mistake, type of thing that can lose a war.”
As they passed the line of Hornets Hans slowed to inspect the machines. More than one was holed, a couple had hydrogen bags that were completely deflated, a patching crew was working by feel since no lighting of any kind was allowed near a ship that could be leaking hydrogen.
Several of the Hornet pilots came up to Jack, saluting.
“We really grabbed their tails out there,” one of them announced excitedly. “I came over a low rise, must have caught a hundred of them camped out in the open, about fifty miles back from the front. Damn did I tear them up.”
“The landings, did they work?” Vincent asked.
The pilot was startled to see the chief of staff of the army standing in the shadows and snapped to attention and saluted.
“Ah, yes sir. The Hornet I was escorting, he landed three times along a ten-mile stretch of the wire and tore out a good long piece at each.” The pilot nodded to a slight boy standing beside him.
“Tell him, Nicholas.”
“Like he said, sir. We took down wire between two poles at three different places.”
Hans could see that the boy was shaken, left hand clasping his right arm in the evening twilight, the black stain on the arm obviously blood.
“Your crewman?” Jack asked.
The boy shook his head.
“I lost him on the third landing. Some of them bastards were hiding in a gully, no horses. They shot Petra as he was up on a pole, then came rushing out. I got hit, too, but managed to get off.”
He lowered his head.
“I think Petra was still alive when I left him,” the boy whispered.
Jack patted him lightly on his left shoulder.
“You did the right thing. You had to save your Hornet.”
“No sir, I was scared. I might have been able to get him in.”
“No you couldn’t,” the other pilot interjected. “I had no more ammunition, so all I could do was try and scare them by flying low. That’s when they shot up my ship as well.”
“I was scared and ran.”
“We’re all scared,” Jack replied softly. “Now get some rest. I want both of you back up tomorrow at first light, wounded or not. Anyone who can fly has to be in the air tomorrow. You saved your ship, so don’t think about anything else now.”
They continued on, Hans catching a glimpse of a bottle being passed around as soon as they had passed.
The headquarters hut for the airfield was nothing more than a-hrown-walled adobe shack, typical of Tyre, where lumber was in such short supply. It was the only light on the field as the men labored under the glow of the twin moons that were breaking the eastern horizon.
As they stepped in Hans was startled to see Gregory Timokin. His face was still puffy, pink, blistered. Hands were wrapped in bandages, and it reinforced yet again just how desperate this venture was. Stan stood beside him, grinning, obviously eager for the operation to begin.
Though his stomach was still in rebellion over the flight he quickly took up the bottle of vodka sitting on a rough-hewn table, uncorked it, and took a long drink.
“All right. What’s the bad news first?”
Gregory snickered.
“You want the long or the short version?”
“Go on.”
“Fuel first of all. If we were burning coal, there’d be more than enough. Fifty-two ironclads. I’ll need twenty-five thousand gallons if you want them to get to Carnagan.”
“I have first priority,” Jack interjected.
“And that’s at least another forty thousand gallons for one way.”
“We supposedly had it stockpiled,” Hans said, rubbing his forehead as the vodka hit him.
“The oil field is lost. We had enough stockpiled through our coking of coal and getting the coal oil,” Vincent said. “What’s the problem? And what do you mean ‘fifty-two ironclads’?”
Gregory sighed, staring at the ceiling. “One of the ships carrying more coal oil and ten land ironclads hasn’t docked.”
“What the hell? There was supposed to be a monitor escort for you people.”
“Fog. Yesterday and the day before. We came out of it, near Tigranus Point, and the ship was missing. I asked a Hornet to go up the coast, and the pilot thinks he found the wreck. It went straight into a shoal and foundered.”
“Damn all,” Hans snapped. “So we’re short how much?”
“Fifteen thousand gallons.”
Hans looked over at Vincent, who shook his head.
“We could make that up in a week from the coking plants at Roum and Suzdal. It’s getting it here, though.” An argument broke out between Jack and Gregory over who got priority on the fuel; Hans just sat woodenly, staring at the bottle for a moment, while meditatively munching on a piece of hardtack to put something back into his stomach.
“Ground the Hornets that got shot up. Pull off the Eagle that cracked its undercarriage, then detail off four more Eagles to stay behind.”
“What?” Jack snapped. “That’s ten percent of my remaining force.”
“Our force, Jack, our force. We need fuel for the ironclads. The Eagles can be used locally for support. Once more fuel comes in they can be used to haul what, a couple of hundred gallons each out to the column to keep it supplied. Gregory, I’m taking five thousand gallons from you for our remaining airships.”
Now both Gregory and Jack were^on him, but he sat silent, his icy stare finally causing them to fall silent.
“I know that won’t give you enough fuel to reach your objective with any margin to spare. Figure this though. Half your machines will break down before you even get there. Do like we did on the Ebro. Drain off the remaining fuel, load it into the ironclads still running, then move on.”
The two started to object again, and Vincent slammed the table with his fist.
“Damn all. There’s no time to argue now. This operation is supposed to kick off tomorrow morning. The argument’s over. Gregory, your machines, are they ready?”
“If you mean off-loaded, yes sir. Like I said, we’re down to fifty-two.”
“And did the Bantag see them before the lines got cut?”
“Certain of it.”
Hans smiled. “Good. That’s what we wanted.”
“I don’t get it,” Gregory replied sharply. “Why didn’t you cut the telegraph wires first before we brought the ironclads down here. Now they’ll know and be on us.”
“That’s what I wanted,” Vincent replied. “We’re the bait.”
“The what?” Stan asked. “And what do you mean ‘we’?”
“Because I’m going with you, Stan.”
“Fine, but what the hell is this about bait?”
“We had to cut the lines before we flew all the airships in here to Tyre. The moment we did I assumed Jurak would figure what the real target is. I didn’t want him to guess the true intent, so I wanted him to get word that all our ironclads had been moved down here. He’ll assume that we are trying to break out of Tyre and take Camagan. After all, it is a logical move. We take Carnagan even briefly and we could threaten his supplies moving over the Great Sea. Beyond that we could tear up that rail line they’re building from there over to here. I want him to focus on here while Hans presses the main attack.”