It appeared that the 1st Battalion, 55th Infantry Regiment (Light) appeared to be full of a bunch of joes who were still good guys. Salvador knew Lieutenant Colonel Prince well, and he wasn’t surprised that the cocky son of a bitch had not just survived the situation in Boston, but made it all the way back to Drum.
Salvador looked around. Only three other soldiers were with him in the basement, which served as the division’s final tactical operations center. The upper floors of Hays Hall had been riddled with bullets, and the brick-faced structure hadn’t been designed with the thought of withstanding direct enemy contact. The basement was the only place that was still secure, and Salvador had ordered the operations personnel to head underground while the rest of the troops—a collection of military policemen, cavalry, and the remains of the post’s garrison—tried their best to defend Hays Hall from the Klown onslaught. Those professionals had been backed by cooks, orderlies, medics, even two chaplains. A week ago, when Salvador’s boss Major General Lew McLaren had still been alive, they’d had a force three hundred strong. Since then, the numbers had been severely diminished, and with the last head count, Salvador had been told that only ninety or so troops remained combat effective. And a good percentage of those were wounded.
“Okay, get me Wizard Six Actual,” Salvador ordered his radio telephone operator. “We need to seriously consider unassing, and we’re going to need Prince’s troops to do the heavy lifting.”
THIRTY-FIVE.
“Six, this is Wizard. Over.”
Lee almost missed Walker’s transmission in the heat of battle. The battalion was fully engaged, with two companies on either side of the Hays Hall defensive perimeter, slowly rolling back the Klowns. It was a tough fight. The Klowns weren’t afraid of getting killed, but they weren’t interested in dying needlessly, so they were getting crafty. The military members in their ranks were rising to prominence, and they were clearly directing the rest of the crazies as they rallied and counterattacked.
Since Lee had deployed forward with the rest of the combat troops on the eastern engagement area, he had lost most of his overall situational awareness. As such, he’d ordered Walker to hang back with the rest of the headquarters company staff to coordinate resources while Captain Hayes oversaw combat operations in the western engagement area.
“Go for Six,” Lee said. He hunkered down behind Murphy and fired his M4 over the soldier’s prone figure.
Murphy was still working on the Klowns with his SAW. He had already gone through a couple of two hundred round ammo pouches.
“Six, this is Wizard. Mountaineer Five wants a heart to heart on foxtrot four three three. Wants to discuss retrograde options.” Walker paused. “Six, Mountaineer thinks Prince is still commanding the battalion. Over.”
Lee heard a quaver of nervousness in Walker’s voice. As the battalion XO, Walker had willingly stepped aside to let Lee assume command. While that wasn’t illegal—Lee had much more direct field experience than Walker—the fact that he had encouraged Lee to also assume the rank of lieutenant colonel was doubtless weighing heavily on him. General Salvador would certainly wonder just what the hell was going on, with a captain pretending to be a lieutenant colonel, and he’d probably expect a really good explanation from Walker.
“Roger that, Wizard. Listen, I need you to put some Ravens over the far side of the engagement area, over Sexton Field. Are any of the Klowns breaking off for an envelopment attack? Need to know that right away. Over.”
“Six, this is Wizard. We’ll have a bird in that area in about two minutes. Over.”
“Roger, Wizard. If there’s a breakaway element down there, see if Thunder can hit them. And let’s get some trucks staged forward. I’m sure Mountaineer doesn’t have much in the way of transportation resources. Questions before I flip over to four three three? Over.”
“Negative, Six. Wizard is good. Over,” Walker replied.
“Roger. Switching now. Talk to you in a few. Out.” Beside him, Murphy grunted and stirred uneasily on the ground. “What’s up, Mike?”
“Other than the fact that these fuckers keep coming, and I’m running out of ammo? Nothing, sir,” Murphy said.
“Oh, stop your bitchin’. You’ll still have time to fix your makeup, sweetheart.”
Foster crouched down beside them. He had three bags of ammunition for the M249, and he dropped them on the ground beside the gunner. “Here, don’t say I never gave you nothing.”
“Dude, I could kiss you,” Murphy said.
“Really? You know, this is like the tenth time you’ve suggested we get into a tongue fight. I’m starting to get worried about your orientation, man.”
“Blow me,” Murphy said as he reached for one of the pouches.
Foster looked at Lee. “See what I mean, sir?”
“When this is over, the two of you should go see a couples counselor,” Lee said. “Keep them back, guys. I need to check in with Mountaineer.” Lee switched frequencies. “Mountaineer, this is Wizard Six Actual. Over.”
“Wizard, this is Mountaineer Five Actual. Prince, is that you?” The responder’s voice was vaguely Latin-sounding.
“Mountaineer, this is Wizard. Negative, Colonel Prince was Kilo India Alpha. We need to pull you guys out of there, Mountaineer. How many faces do you have left? Over.”
“Wizard, this is Mountaineer. We have about eighty troops left, and several are injured. Wizard, if this isn’t Prince, is this the XO? Why are you using Prince’s call sign? Over.”
Lee chose to ignore the question. “Mountaineer, we have to abandon this post. We don’t have sufficient mass to hold on to Drum, so we need to get the hell out of Dodge. We’re holding the north side of the emplacement, and we have trucks staging nearby to take you out. Start rotating your troops to that side, and we’ll take it from there. Over.” Lee had to shout over the chatter of the SAW nearby, plus the crackle of over a hundred assault rifles and dozens of exploding grenades. Farther downrange, mortars began impacting the area. He figured the drones had identified a Klown staging area, and the mortar team was servicing it as directed.
“Roger, Wizard. How long can you hold the Klowns back? Over.”
Lee looked around. He was only able to view his flank, and it appeared secure. Captain Sommers was leading Charlie Company, call sign Chaos, into forward positions, where they could start segmenting the Klowns and chopping them into pieces. He didn’t doubt that Hallelujah Hayes was doing things any differently.
“Mountaineer, I think we’re good for at least ten minutes, but let’s not put that to the test. The quicker you can pull back, the quicker we can hit the road. Over.”
“Roger, Wizard. Stand by. We’re hitting the northern wall by squads. Over.”
“Roger, Mountaineer. See you soon. Wizard, out.” Lee switched frequencies. “Wizard, this is Wizard Six. Over.”
“Six, this is Wizard. I heard the conversation. I was listening on one of the other radios. We have six empty trucks lined up, but we’re starting to get a little light on transport. We can’t take multiple losses and still move effectively,” Walker reported. “Just the same, we’re ready for Mountaineer. Over.”
“Roger that, Wizard. There are more trucks in the Sustainment Brigade’s motor pool. We’ll fall back there and resupply on our way out. I’m looking to pull back inside of ten minutes, so make sure we have adequate transport for our troops, as well as Mountaineer. And pass on to Thunder that we’ll be counting on them to cover our retreat, so they better start pacing themselves. Over.”
“Roger all. I’ll get it squared away,” Walker said. “Uh… Six, stand by.”