“Well?” Starukhin said, in a voice of measured restraint.
“Comrade Commanders,” the staffer said, looking back and forth between them. “The Third Brigade of the Forty-ninth Corps is being overrun.”
The sounds of combat action reverberated in the middle distance. When large-caliber shells struck, the roughly erected tentage sheltering the area between the vehicles of Anton’s command post shivered, jouncing the maps lining the canvas walls. The radios sputtered with grim updates. The manning of the command post had been reduced so that a defensive perimeter could be established at the edge of the grove. There was still no enemy contact in the immediate vicinity, but American forces had passed by on both flanks.
“Try to raise corps again,” Anton said to the staff at large. “There are helicopters. We’ve been promised helicopters.” He half remembered a meeting in the night with the corps commander. They had spoken of helicopters that would come to the rescue.
Anton had a budding suspicion that his staff had begun to work around him, struggling to carry out his orders to block every key intersection and to establish a hasty defense. They had been caught, and caught badly. The brigade, the entire corps, was a splendid offensive weapon, well-structured to fight meeting engagements. But they had moved too swiftly, brigades out of contact with one another, and with gaps between elements of the individual brigades. It had all been too fast, and the intelligence had been too slow, and now they were paying the price.
Yet even if all of that was true, the failure remained his, Anton realized. He tried to blame the acid sickness in his guts and the fever and his flesh rubbed so raw it hurt to sit. And the dizziness that made it difficult to stand. He should have turned over the brigade to someone more capable.
But to whom? Where did duty end? What would his father have thought? Perhaps even that he was a coward. A Malinsky brought low by a bad digestion. In any event, it would have shamed the old man. And Anton would not do it. No matter what it cost.
He thought of Zena, of all the things he had to tell her. They often talked together. They shared everything. Yet it seemed to him now that an incredible amount had been left unspoken.
“Where are the helicopters?” Anton asked suddenly.
“Comrade Commander, we can’t reach the corps.”
“Try manual Morse.”
“Comrade Commander, we’ve tried everything.”
“Don’t tell me that you can’t do this and can’t do that,” Anton shouted. “Get the helicopters. Do you understand me?”
“I’ll try to relay through the Fourth Brigade.”
“Why didn’t you tell me we have communications with the Fourth Brigade?”
There was no response. Anton looked around him. Work had almost stopped. Several officers stared at him.
“What is the situation of the Fourth Brigade?” Anton demanded.
“They are… in contact. To the north of us. Comrade Commander, you listened to the report as it came in.”
Anton tried to make sense of this. The north was the wrong side. He remembered that much. And the Americans were to the north of them now.
“Report on subordinate units,” Anton demanded. “We must form a counterattack force.” He tried desperately to remember the formulas, the rules, how the schools and manuals insisted it must be done. But he only remembered faces without names.
Then Zena returned. Zena enjoyed nakedness. She said she wanted to live where there was always sun and no one needed to wear any clothing at all, and Anton always pictured that place as Cuba, but empty of everyone but the two of them. Beaches. Sun. The sun was enormous now, blinding him.
“Report,” Anton insisted. He felt his belly beginning to cramp again. He would need to go outside soon. But he struggled to wait until the last possible moment, punishing himself. He would not abandon his post.
“Comrade Commander” — the chief of staff placed his hand on Anton’s shoulder — ”Comrade Commander…” He shook Anton slightly. Anton realized what was happening, but he found it difficult to respond.
“Colonel Malinsky,” the chief shouted at him.
Anton looked up at the man. He was unshaven. Officers needed to shave, to set the example.
“Your father is on the secure radio. He wants to speak to you. Can you talk to him?”
His father. Anton rose quickly, a bit too quickly. As though he had been caught committing an indiscretion. Letting his father down.
The chief of staff helped him across the command post to the vehicle containing the secure radio sets. An operator pulled up a stool for Anton. But Anton would not sit. Not in the presence of his father.
“Your call sign is ‘Firebird,’ “ the operator said. “The front commander is ’Blizzard.’“
Firebird. Blizzard. Anton took the microphone, steeling himself.
“Blizzard, this is Firebird.”
His father’s voice came to him, instantly recognizable even through the disturbed airways. “This is Blizzard. Report your situation.”
Anton sought to order his thoughts. “This is Firebird…” he began. “We are in heavy combat. Enemy units have penetrated…” He forced his speech to behave, to conform to military standards. It required an enormous effort, the greatest of his life. “We have been penetrated by American armored forces attacking on a minimum of two axes. We have suffered heavy casualties, especially to enemy attack helicopters. Our current course of action involves the establishment of a series of local defenses, oriented on retaining control of vital intersections. We are attempting to channel and slow the enemy’s attack.”
The voice at the other end was slow in responding. Did I make a mistake? Anton wondered. Did I get something wrong? He stared out through the open rear of the vehicle, straining to read the situation map’s details from an impossible distance, desperate to offer his father whatever he wanted.
“Firebird, this is Blizzard. Your decision is approved. Continue local defensive actions. Do all that you can to break the enemy’s tempo of attack and to disrupt his plan.” The voice paused, and Anton thought for a moment that the transmission had come to an end. He nearly panicked. He wanted to tell his father… he wasn’t certain… but he knew there were important things to say. Yet how was he to say them now, using this means? The officers and technical specialists around him stared. The hull of the vehicle had grown very still, as had the entire command post. They were all listening. Only the irregular sputterings of fire off in the distance offered any covering noise at all.
“You must hold out,” the voice came back, and Anton imagined that he could detect a note of human warmth in it now. He realized with perfect lucidity what such a breach in his rigorous personal discipline must have cost the old man. “You must hold out. We will support you. We will support you with every available sortie of attack aircraft. You may expect relief by our ground forces in twelve to eighteen hours…” Again, the voice paused. “Can you hold on?”
Anton straightened his back. “Blizzard, this is Firebird. We will do our duty.”
“I know you will do your duty,” the distant voice said. “I know that all of your soldiers will do their duty. And you will have all the support the Motherland has to give you. Good luck.” And his father formally ended the transmission.
Anton stood still. He felt as though a critical link had been severed, not just in a military context, but in his life. He wanted to hear his father’s voice a little longer. Anything not to let go of the old man.
Voices picked up around him, calling in nervous haste. The chief of staff yelled for the ranking forward air controller. Yes, sorties. Aircraft. We’ll hang on, Anton thought.
His stomach rebelled. The pang hit him so violently that it bent him over the radio set, and he feared he would lose all control on the spot. He hurried for the entrance flap in the canvas.