“You know the drill, kitten? We have to open a portal large enough to allow the transit of a V-150 armored car and a YWH-531 personnel carrier but no larger. We want to be able to shut this one down after we’ve finished with it.”
The fact that kitten knew what a V-150 and a YWH-531looked like was another change. There had been a time when she’d known none of this. Now, she savored her new knowledge. “How large is the unit going through?”
“A full regiment with a battalion of artillery attached. The first of three groups, the other two will be moving later as the occupation takes hold. We’ve only got one sensitive to lock in on down there so there’ll be a gap while he relocates. Ready to get started, kitten?”
“Any time you’re ready.” kitten relaxed and tried to make her mind go blank. In the background, she could feel the electronics warming up and emitting the carrier wave signal, the dummy load as the operators called it. When given the word, she would start searching for the sensitive in the region designated. As soon as she found him, the equipment would measure and digitize the characteristics of the signal she was sending and receiving, then duplicate it. Once that was done, it would transmit that signal, with enormously boosted power so that a portal would open up. No human, not even a Nephilim, could produce the power necessary to open a portal but the computerized equipment could. All she would have to do was to hold the contact so that the situation remained stable. Even that was becoming unnecessary now, the most advanced systems could maintain a portal without the services of a sensitive. Provided it was driven through from Hellside of course. Driving one through from Earthside was different.
That was something kitten remembered, the tearing pain that had gone with punching portals through from Earthside. It had felt as if somebody had had a giant rake inside her head and had been scrambling her brains with it. The weeks when she had been the only sensitive capable of opening and maintaining an Earthside portal had been terrible and it had only been the thought of the people the other side depending on her that had kept her going. To show for it, she had a small cabinet in the apartment she and Dani shared. One that had an international collection of medals in it, topped by a simple strip of pale blue silk with five stars. Dani had told her that getting The Medal implied she was in the armed services, but she didn’t know if that was true or not. Anyway, those days were gone. Punching a portal through from hellside was almost a pleasant experience, like standing in a fast-flowing stream of water. An Earthside punch was still uncomfortable, reminiscent of standing too close to an open fire, but it was no longer agonizing.
“As soon as we get the word that the sensitive and equipment is in place, we’ll be moving. Can we get you and Dani anything?”
“Some ginseng tea would be nice.” As usual, Dani spoke for her.
“Coming right up. The Chinese sent some over for you, absolutely the best. Apparently it’s the same one that the Politbureau drinks.”
Sangkhlaburi, Nong-Lu province, Thai-Myanmar Border
For the last five days, Sangkhlaburi had had the communal feeling that it was sitting on top of a smoking volcano, waiting for the inevitable explosion. When the Burmese troops had crossed the border and headed for Kanchanaburi, all the wise heads in the village had nodded and assumed that Sangkhlaburi would be next, opening up a second front, one that led to Ayuthya and then to Bangkok. Some of the more nervous citizens had started to leave, heading north or east, away from the invading Burmese. Others had started to take whatever arms they could find and had dug crude fortifications around the town. As it became obvious that Third Army wasn’t moving to intercept the invaders, heads had begun to nod knowingly. This had happened before when the Burmese invaded. Everybody knew the story of Ban Rachan, the village that had held out against the invaders even though they had been deserted by the Army and the Government. Ban Rachan had held for months, buying time for the defense, even though it had done little good in the end.
Then the situation had changed. Matichon, the national tabloid newspaper, had run a cartoon of a dragon bursting into Third Army Headquarters, breathing fire and sending the indolent occupants of the headquarters running for their lives. Third Army had suddenly started moving, sending two of its regiments to stop the Burmese advance, then a newly-arrived cavalry division to help drive it back. Sitting up here in the north, Sangkhlaburi had watched the battle unfold. The wise heads in the town had said that this would bring no good, with the invasion stopped at one point, the Myanmar Army would try somewhere else. And where else than Three Pagodas Pass, the opening in the hills that was the traditional invasion route?
But, the invasion hadn’t happened. Which only meant that it hadn’t happened yet. The townspeople had kept building their improvised defenses and searched the town for more ammunition for their shotguns and rifles. And they had waited. Today, it seemed like the time they had expected and dreaded was coming for they could hear the traditional whup-whup-whup noise of a helicopter’s rotors.
The four AH-1 Cobras burst over Sangkhlaburi, swerving around the end of the ridgeline they had used to mask their approach and flying over the center of the town, as if daring any enemies to open fire. At first the people below stayed silent but that only lasted until they saw the red-white-blue markings on the fuselage of the helicopters. They were Thai, and they meant the Army had arrived. The gunships prowled over the town, swinging their noses backwards and forwards as they hunted for their prey. Two started up the road that led over the Three Pagoda Pass where they were finally challenged by bursts of automatic rifle fire from the Myanmarese border post. One helicopter went to hover, its nose seeking backwards and forwards for a second, before its stub-wings erupted into flame as the Cobra discharged a salvo of unguided rockets. The gunfire from the ground stopped abruptly as the border post was obliterated (due to the inaccuracy of unguided rockets, the helicopter took the Thai border post out as well, but fortunately the two Border Police officers there guessed was about to happen and had abandoned their post in a great hurry when their Myanmar counterparts opened fire).
With Sangkhlaburi apparently cold, the next wave of helicopters, UH-60 Blackhawks were already landing in the town streets, disgorging the better part of an infantry battalion. The troops were actually part of Third Army’s rapid reaction force and had been flown up direct from Kanchanaburi. As they spread out and secured the town, a third group of helicopters landed just north of the built-up area. One of them was a big Russian Mi-17I and it started unloading the equipment and personnel necessary to open a portal to Hell.
This was the third time the team had gone through this performance in the field and by now their routine was smoother and slicker. The equipment was laid out, the portable diesel generators on their skids positioned and the portal-generators assembled. Within 45 minutes, less than half the time taken during their first effort at Kanchanaburi three days earlier, the black ellipse opened up and a long column of military vehicles started to move through. The mechanized infantry was first through the portal, the platoons emerging, assembling and then setting off to take up pre-determined positions in defense of the town and the pass above it. They were followed by the armored cars of the light armor battalions that started to assemble west of the town for their lunge along the main road that would, eventually, take them to Moulmein. Finally, the artillery battalion, towed 105mm howitzers, emerged and started to position themselves to support the rest of the regiment.
“Well done!” Colonel Thanas reached down to shake the hand of the young man relaxing on the couch.
“No problem Sir, its easy when the punch comes through from the other side. Have you got all your vehicles through?”