If they withdrew their center and hit our flanks, where we’re weakest—
A voice from field HQ, barely audible through the squeals and buzzes, took his report and gave back what had been seen elsewhere. Large maneuvers right and left, yes, it did seem the Fallonites were going to try a breakthrough. Could be a feint, though. The main body of the Sierrans must remain where it was until the situation became clearer. The Rolling Stones must hold out a while on their own.
“Will do,” Mackenzie returned to the head of his columns. Speyer nodded grimly at the word.
“Better get prepared, hadn’t we?”
“Uh-huh.” Mackenzie lost himself in a welter of commands, as officer after officer rode to him. The outlying sections were to be pulled in. The beach was to be defended, with the high ground immediately above.
“Men scurried, horses neighed, guns trundled about. The scout plane returned, flying low enough to get a transmission through: yes, definitely an attack on the way hard to tell how big a force, through the damned tree cover and down in the damned arroyos, but it might well be at brigade strength.
Mackenzie established himself on a hilltop with his staff and runners. A line of artillery stretched beneath him, across the strand. Cavalry waited behind them, lances agleam, an infantry company for support. Otherwise the foot soldiers had faded into the landscape. The sea boomed its own cannonade, and gulls began to gather as if they knew there would be meat before long.
“Think we can hold them?” Speyer asked.
“Sure,” Mackenzie said, “If they come down H»e beach, we’ll enfilade them, as well as shooting up their front. If they come higher, well, that’s a. textbook example of defensible terrain. ’Course, if another troop punches jthrough the lines further inland, we’ll be cut off, but that isn’t our worry right now.”
“They must hope to get around our army and attack our rear.”
“Guess so. Not too smart of them, though. We can approach Frisco just as easily fighting backwards as forwards.”
“Unless the city garrison makes a sally.”
“Even then. Total numerical strengths are about equal, and we’ve got more ammo and alky. Also a lot of bossman militia for auxiliaries, wbo’re used to disorganized warfare in hilly ground.”
“If we do whip them—” Speyer shut his lips together.
“Go on,” Mackenzie said.
“Nothing.”
“The hell it is. You were about to remind me of the next step: how do we take the city without too high a cost to both sides? Well, I happen to know we’ve got a hole card to play there, which might help.”
Speyer turned pitying eyes away from Mackenzie. Silence fell on the hilltop.
It was an unconscjonably long time before the enemy came in view, first a few outriders far down the dunes, then the body of him, pouring from the ridges and gullies and woods. Reports flickered about Mackenzie—a powerful force, nearly twice as big as ours, but with little artillery, by now badly short of fuel, they must depend far more than we on animals to move their equipment. They were evidently going to change, accept losses in order to get sabers and bayonets among the Rolling Stones’ cannon. Mackenzie issued his directions accordingly.
The hostiles formed up, a mile or so distant. Through his field glasses Mackenzie recognized them, red sashes of the Madera Horse, green and gold pennon of the Dagos, fluttering in the iodine wind. He’d campaigned with both outfits in the past. It was treacherous to remember that Ives favored a blunt, wedge formation and use the fact against him ... One enemy armored car and some fieldpieces, light horse-drawn ones, gleamed wickedly in the sunlight.
Bugles blew shrill. The Fallonite cavalry laid lance in rest and started trotting. They gathered speed as they went, a canter, a gallop, until the earth trembled with them. Then their infantry got going, flanked by its guns. The car rolled along between the first and second line of foot. Oddly, it had no rocket launcher on top or repeater barrels thrust from the fire slits. Those were good troops, Mackenzie thought, advancing in close order with that ripple down the ranks which bespoke veterans. He hated what must happen.
His defense waked immobile on the sand. Fire crackled from the hillsides, where mortar squads and riflemen crouched. A rider toppled, a dogface clutched his belly and went to his knees, their companions behind moved forward to close the lines again. Mackenzie looked to his howitzers. Men stood tensed at sights and lanyards. Let the foe get well in range—There! Yamaguchi, mounted just rearward of the gunners, drew his saber and flashed the blade downward. Cannon, bellowed. Fire spurted through smoke, sand gouted up, shrapnel sleeted over the charging force. At once the gun crews fell into the rhythm of reloading, relaying, refiring, the steady three rounds per minute which conserved barrels and broke armies. Horses screamed in their own tangled red guts. But not many had been hit. The Madera cavalry continued in full gallop. Their lead was so close now that Mackenzie’s glasses picked out a face, red, freckled, a ranch boy turned trooper, his mouth stretched out of shape as he yelled.
The archers behind the defending cannon let go. Arrows whistled skyward, flight after flight, curved past the gulls and down again. Flame and smoke ran ragged in the wiry hill grass, out of the ragged-leaved live oak copses. Men pitched in the sand, like insects that had stepped on. The fieldpieces on the enemy left flank swiveled about, and spat return fire. Futile ... but, God, their officer had courage! Mackenzie saw the advancing lines waver. An attack by his own horse and foot, down the beach, ought to crumple them. “Get ready to move,” he into his minicom. He saw his men poise. The cannon belched anew.
The oncoming armored car slowed to a halt. Something within it chattered, loud enough to hear through the explosions.
A blue-white sheet ran over the nearest bill. Mackenzie shut half-blinded eyes. When he opened them again, he saw a grass fire through the crazy patterns of after-image, A Rolling Stone burst from cover, howling, his clothes ablaze. The man hit the sand and rolled over. That part of the beach lifted in one monster wave, crested twenty feet high, and smashed across the hill. The burning soldier vanished in the avalanche that buried his comrades.
“Psi blast!” someone screamed, thin and horrible, through the chaos and ground-shudder. “The Espers—”
Unbelievably, a bugle sounded and the Sierran cavalry lunged forward. Past their own guns, on against the scattering opposition ... and horses and riders rose into the air, tumbled in a giant’s invisible whirligig, crashed bone-break-to earth again. The second rank of lancers broke. Mounts reared, pawed the air, wheeled and fled in every direction.
A terrible deep hum filled the sky. Mackenzie saw the world through a blaze, as if his brain were being dashed back forth between the walls of his skull. Another glare ran across the hills, higher this time, burning men alive.
“They’ll wipe us out,” Speyer called, a dim voice that rose and fell on the air tides. “They’ll reform as we stampede—”
“No!” Mackenzie shouted, “The adepts must be in that car. Come on!”
Most of his horse had recoiled on their own artillery, one squealing trampling wreck. The infantry stood rigid, but about to bolt. A glance thrown to his right showed Mackenzie how the enemy themselves were in confusion, this had been a terrifying surprise to them too, but as soon as they got over the shock they’d advance and there’d be nothing left to stop them. ... It was as if another man spurred his mount. The animal fought, foam-flecked with panic. He shagged its head around, brutally, and dug in spurs. They rushed down the hill toward the guns.
He needed all his strength to halt the gelding before the cannon mouths. A man slumped dead by his piece, though there was no mark on him. Mackenzie jumped to the ground. His steed bolted.
He hadn’t time to worry about that. Where was help? “Come here!” His yell was lost in the riot. But suddenly another man was beside him, Speyer, snatching up a shell and slamming it into the breach. Mackenzie squinted through the telescope, took a bearing by guess and feel. He could see the Esper car where it squatted among dead and hurt. At this distance it looked too small to have blackened acres.