“Yeah,” the general said slowly. “Tell me the rest.”
“I have a short company of Abrams and about the same of Bradleys,” Anderson interjected. “I’ve also got a couple of batteries of artillery; the Brads and arty were from a recon unit that tacked down the Long Wall. The Bradleys are short on bodies, but I have plenty of infantry personnel.”
“Sir, our plan is for Bun-Bun to approach Balsam Gap using cover to prevent taking fire,” Ryan continued. “Simultaneously, our mechanized forces will take a hide position near, but not too near, Balsam Gap. Bun-Bun will fire one air-burst into the Gap whereupon the artillery will follow it with airburst and penetrator shells while the mechanized force performs a ground assault. Bun-Bun will then move forward to provide cover fire from the C-Dec if it has survived the assault.”
“Classic prepared assault,” the general said. “With one little fillip.”
“Yes, sir,” the three of them chorused.
Keeton laughed and shook his head. “You haven’t had time to practice that much. Okay, I can’t give you a friggin’ release. So I’m going to call Jack Horner and the two of us are going to… counsel National Command Authority.”
“Yes, sir,” Colonel Mitchell said.
“This may take a little while; the President really hates nuclear weapons. In the meantime you get your assault forces together,” the general continued. “And get everything you can out of that pocket. I’ll get you the release. If I have to send a company of MPs down to sit on the President. Clear?”
“Clear, sir,” the colonel said, wondering how serious the general was.
“Sir,” Major Ryan said, “it is my intention to move up other roads and render them unusable.”
“You’re talking about 19 and 441?” the general asked. “After the support groups have passed through?”
“Yes, sir,” Ryan said. “But there’s no way to do that effectively and still be able to use them on the way back.”
“Don’t worry about coming back,” Keeton said, tapping at his computer for a moment. “23 will be enough for that. Rip them to shit. That’s an order. While you’re out there, keep an eye out for a company of MetalStorm tanks. We lost contact with them right after we ordered them in. They should be a help if they survived.”
“Er…” Mitchell said.
“Yes?” Keeton asked. “Did they survive?”
“Sort of, sir,” the colonel replied. “Their turrets are lashed on top of Bun-Bun.”
“On… top?” the general asked. “I suspect there’s a story there. Have you put them into operation?”
“No, sir. Not for want of my gunner asking for it. And, yes, sir there’s a story.”
“I have to ask; where are the chassis?”
“Betty Gap, sir,” Ryan replied. “We have them precisely located. They’re not going anywhere.”
“Let me guess,” Keeton said. “You blew them up?”
“Not blew them up, sir,” the engineer said.
“Later. I can tell it’s bad. Gentlemen, you have your orders. Carry them out. As soon as we’ve retaken the Gap and Bun-Bun is repaired, I expect you to begin an advance down the valley.”
“Yes, sir,” Mitchell said.
“General Keeton, out.”
“Madame President,” General Horner said. “We now have the situation I discussed.”
The President shook her head at the image on her monitor; unless the hookup was badly distorting the image the officer was gray. “General, are you okay?”
“Yes, ma’am, I am,” Horner replied. “However, the remainder of the Rabun Gap forces are not. The Posleen have taken Balsam Gap by a coup de main and have them cut off. Our sole remaining SheVa is in the pocket among others. Most of them could get out by secondary routes, assuming the Posleen don’t take those positions as well, but we need Balsam Gap to push forces back down into the valley.”
“You want to nuke that Gap as well,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am, I do,” Horner replied. “Furthermore, I would like full tactical release for the remainder of this campaign.”
“So you can call the fire?” she asked bitterly.
“No ma’am,” he said with a smile like a tiger. “I intend to give it to a colonel.”
“Now I wish we were hooked up,” Captain Chan said. “This is going to be bloody.”
The SheVa was swaying from side to side as it maneuvered up the Scotts Creek valley, more or less paralleling Highway 23. The valley was a twisted complex of small hills and hollers that was the equivalent of a SheVa obstacle course; Reeves had had to back up and refigure his route twice in the last few hours of slow, careful movement. But the same broken terrain that was slowing the SheVa should help the human forces caught in the vise to defend their positions.
“And close,” Pruitt said over the intercom. “Although some of it had better not be too close; my AD rounds are 100kts. The explosions in the mountains were lovetaps compared to that.”
“Oh, hell, those were love taps,” Chan snorted. “We didn’t even notice them until afterwards.”
“Well, you were firing at the time, ma’am,” Kitteket broke in. “Trust me, in anything but a Meemie they didn’t seem like love-taps. Okay, I’ve got all the units plugged into the database along with their commo codes. The mech team is in movement to its ORP. And I’ve got an update on the repair batt; they’re not only carrying repair gear, they’re carrying slap-on armor.”
“Cool,” Pruitt said. “It sounds like they’re intending for us to fight in-close.”
“We could use it now,” Mitchell said uncomfortably.
“Well, I’ve also updated the Posleen position,” she added. The map they all had been looking at suddenly blossomed with data. The area around Dillsboro was red with Posleen indicators.
“We need to get some support here or we’re going to be a melting puddle of slag,” Reeves said.
“All it will take is one plasma round the wrong way through the treads and we’re in trouble,” Indy pointed out.
“Then we’ll need to stay hull down,” Pruitt pointed out. “Not that hard around here.”
“Where’s the data coming from, Kitteket?” Colonel Mitchell asked.
“There are still scouts on the hills,” she said, highlighting scout positions. “Their positions are guesses; they’re not obviously telling us where they are exactly. But they’ve been calling in PosReps. All the intel guys didn’t leave with the main group; there’s a small intel team collecting and analyzing with the assault force. I’m feeding off of them.”
“I wish we could be in the assault,” Pruitt said. “That’d be cool.”
“We can’t fit,” Reeves said. “And we don’t have any direct assault weapons; it would be like taking an artillery piece along.”
“I think I’ve figured out a way to hook up the MetalStorms,” Indy said.
“Really?” Chan said over the intercom. “Direct or remote?”
“You’d have to stay in them,” Indy said. “But I’ve been looking at your manual CD. We pulled the whole turret assembly, including your control motors. All we have to do is provide a mount — and really that can just be a circular piece of steel — and power. I think if the repair group has lance cutters, which it should, we might be able to drop you into the turret. It would also require some bracing, we’ll see what the repair batt people say.”
“Well, at the least, they should be able to recover our parts,” Chan said with a sigh. “I don’t know what we’ll do after that.”