Galen watched, waited. The Mosh rested for another hour and then began moving forward at a walking pace. “Forward, driver. Gunner, target.”
Trooper Bier pulled forward and stopped on top of the hill. Corporal Wine fired. He had an oblique view of the Mosh command tank, twenty three hundred meters away. He chose to hit its glacis plate, aimed for its thickest armor. Showing off. The particle cannon’s shot bored right through and out the other side of its target, stabbed into the slightly higher ground beyond and left a fiery backdrop for the Mosh command tank. It burst, all but its lower hull and road wheels vaporized.
Bier backed up a hundred meters and turned right and prepared to climb up on another low hill. Galen said, “Halt.” It would be another forty five seconds at least before the particle cannon was ready to fire again. Takes a while to spin up that much energy.
All along the line, tank and missile fire erupted. Some small arms too, Marines raked the approaching Mosh with grazing fire. Then artillery arced in to splash in the general vicinity of Mosh units. Normally, Mosh point defense lasers could knock out most incoming artillery but there was so much happening at once, they were overwhelmed. The loss of command and control, the lack of coordination…the Mosh kept on with their last order given, to advance.
And they did, right into the buzz saw that was the Jasmine Panzer Brigade defensive line. Oblivious, the Mosh still advanced. Interceptors approached from the north and struck at the lead elements of the Mosh divisions still in the mountains, to stop them from coming forward to provide support. Galen saw one of the Interceptors hit in the ass by Mosh ground fire, shot straight up after hitting its target. The Interceptor spun wildly and burst into a white ball, its atmospheric thruster propellant exploding. But the other twenty three Interceptors got away, went west and circled low to the ground, awaiting orders.
A text came, addressed to all Brigade and Marine units, “Weapons free.”
“Forward, driver. Gunner, take your pick.”
Bier pulled up on the hilltop and Wine chose a light command car near the left flank. It was speeding along the back of the advancing Mosh line, a hard target to hit. Bier fired into the ground fifty metes in front of the light vehicle. The particle cannon made a gash in the ground ten meters deep, and the gash ended in a crater of hot gas, a ball of fire. The light vehicle drove right into the ball of hot gas, vaporized inside it. Gone. Galen said, “Nice shot.”
Bier backed up. Wine said, “Sir, capacitors nearly depleted. It’ll be half an hour before we can shoot again.”
Galen said, “Roger. Bier, take us over to Mech’s location.”
Galen then keyed comms to call Tad, “I think they’ve had enough. We can withdraw at your discretion.”
“Roger, Six. Three out.”
The Mosh division in the kill zone had come to a stop. No longer combat effective, the smaller groups of survivors organized and began a slow withdrawal back toward the mountains. All of their vehicles were destroyed. Wounded Mosh warriors were carried by their comrades. Galen looked at reports and saw an estimate of eighty percent losses for the Mosh.
His task force began withdrawing around the south end of Cherry Fork. Then the space shield of Cherry Fork began taking hits. The Mosh brought its space force in close enough to get effective shots. That also meant they were close enough to take defensive fire from Mandarin cities farther to the east.
Bier parked the Lion tank on the side of the road near the Mech battalions’ checkpoint. Galen popped his hatch and stood and watched his units roll by in convoy. The Interceptors made a strafing run on the kill zone, picked off a few retreating Mosh, turned east and went back to their base. Galen looked at his auxiliary status screen and saw that the Mosh had brought nearly three hundred war ships forward to bombard Cherry Fork. They were losing ships to ground fire from nearby cities, but the Mosh commander thought it worth the price, acceptable losses. The space shield of Cherry Fork collapsed and the Mosh space ships began turning the city into rubble. They also blasted the ground around it, the areas where Galen’s task force had been just minutes before.
Galen knew the bombardment would have to stop soon, the Mosh were losing a ship every three minutes. He looked toward the city and saw that it was now little more than a smoking ruin of rubble and ash, surrounded by cratered and broken ground. The bombardment stopped and the Mosh war ships withdrew. The Mosh ships could now deploy to more forward positions, with Cherry Fork’s space guns destroyed. They began firing up what had been the defensive line of Galen’s task force. A wasted effort; the task force had already withdrawn.
Eighteen kilometers to the southeast of the ruined city, the task force took up defensive positions along a low ridge. It gave them a new kill zone, everything between them and the city. The Ajax tanks maneuvered slowly and parked eight kilometers beyond the ridge and took on a full load of ammo. The task force TOC and ALOC were located near them. Last out of the old area of operations was the Mechanized infantry battalion. Galen convoyed with them and then split off to park near the entry point of the TOC perimeter, facing out.
Galen told his crew, “Fifty percent security. I’ll be back in a few minutes.” He then dismounted and walked over to see Tad, helped the TOC crew set up the canvas extension.
Tad said, “Hey, boss,” and handed Galen a tent stake.
“Hey yourself. That was a fine combat operation.” Galen slid the stake through a grommet.
“We did all right. Lost about four percent. Not bad.” Tad tapped the stake with a hammer.
Galen said, “Now what?”
Tad handed Galen another stake, pointed at a troop. The troop was holding a rope that came off the left rear corner of the canvas. Galen slid the stake through the loop at the end of the rope and pulled, touched the stake to the ground.
Tad tapped the stake. “We stand down. Mandarin wants to send regulars to defend the rubble, but they’ll have to let it cool for a couple of days.”
Galen stood and said, “Sounds about right. It’ll take the Mosh about two weeks to pick their way through Cherry Fork. That rubble makes excellent defensive terrain and the cratered ground around the city will slow their armor. We’ll wait here and shoot up the Mosh when they try to move east, after they take Cherry Fork.”
Tad said, “Sounds good. You know, our kill ratio today was well over eighty to one. That’s epic.”
Galen puffed his chest and stroked an imaginary beard. “It is good, to fight the Mosh.”
Tad said, “We got lucky. The Mosh are learning.”
“By the way, what happened to those three Mandarin armored divisions that were supposed to attack the Mosh in the Skeleton desert?”
Tad said, “High Command took too long trying to decide where to commit them. They ended up pulling them back and they organized them into a reinforced armored corps. Now they sit near the capitol of the Western Province, awaiting orders.”
“That’s funny. I’ll see you at your after-action brief.” Galen saw that the chuck wagon was parked nearby, ready to serve chow. He walked back to his tank, took his place in the cupola and sent his crew to eat.
Chapter Eleven
“It’s raining again.” Tad entered the TOC extension and brushed water off the sleeves of his rain jacket with his bare hands. “Chow was cold. I skipped supper.”