Never Sound Retreat Part 22

Marcus motioned for Vincent to step away from the flag bearer and division staff.

"d.a.m.n all, Vincent, don't do this," Marcus asked, a note of pleading in his voice. "It's suicide."

"We have to fix his attention, convince Ha'ark our attacks will come straight in here."

"There's got to be a better way than this."

"Got any suggestions, then?" He motioned to the east.

"Ha'ark's obviously getting reinforcements in. We have to convince him that the full weight of our attack is coming in right here. That way his reserves will be here, and not waiting for you when you lead Sixth Corps in tomorrow morning."

Vincent looked at the column behind him . . . veterans of Hispania, and the disaster in front of Junction City. They were eager now for revenge, their blood up to the point that the all-but-certain annihilation that awaited them was not fully registering.

"We need a diversion, Marcus, and this is it, a diversion to hold Ha'ark's attention here. And, by G.o.d, if I'm going to order this attack, I'm going in with it."

Marcus fell silent and lowered his head.

"You're holding up the attack. Now get back to your post, d.a.m.n it. You know what to do later."

"Don't go in like this, Vincent. Your job is to direct it from the rear. d.a.m.n all, you know Andrew would relieve you if he knew what you were doing."

Vincent slowly shook his head.

"I'm ordering this division into almost certain annihilation. I'm not going to stand behind the lines and watch it. These boys have to believe this attack is meant to carry the day, and that means I go with them. And Ha'ark-I'm willing to bet he's just on the other side of this hill. I want him to know it as well, that I'm here."

"You're committing suicide."

"If you had to order this, would you stay behind?"

"That's not the point, Vincent."

"It is the point, d.a.m.n you, Marcus. Now get the h.e.l.l back to your post."

"Let me do it."

"General Marcus Graca, get back to your d.a.m.n post!" Vincent barked out the order so that it echoed along the line.

Startled, Marcus looked at the men drawn up in solid lines before him.

Raising his hand, he gave the old traditional Roum salute to Vincent, then saluted the colors behind him.

"May the G.o.ds be with you, Hawthorne." Tears in his eyes, he reached down, took Vincent's hand, then, spurring his mount, he galloped down the line, standing in his stirrups, clenched fist raised in salute, a cheer erupting down the line.

Vincent looked back at the line and held his sword aloft.

"For the Republic!" he roared, and pointed his sword toward the crest of the ridge. Turning about he started forward, ma.s.sed drummers behind him picking up the beat.

Second Division, Fifth Corps, in spite of its casualties at the battle of Junction City, presenting a battle front nearly a quarter mile across and six ranks deep, started forward. Along the crest line, a hundred yards ahead, the ma.s.sed batteries redoubled their effort, eighty guns pouring a near-continual stream of fire against the enemy position fifteen hundred yards away.

As Vincent reached the crest the guns fell silent, crews by their steaming-hot pieces, many with hats off, standing in reverent silence as the thirty-five hundred men of the division pa.s.sed through their ranks and scrambled over the wooden footbridges laid down across the trenches. Formation broke down for a moment as men scrambled over the trenches, up over the breastworks, then weaved their way through the abatis. The first sh.e.l.ls from the Bantag artillery and mortars started to fall, and Vincent stood silent, drawn sword resting on his shoulder as he waited for the division to dress ranks as if on parade. Skirmishers darted past him, moving at the double time down the slope, pus.h.i.+ng several hundred yards ahead of the advance, and already there was a scattering of rifle fire as Bantag in forward positions opened up on them.

Seeing that the ranks had re-formed, Vincent raised his sword and again pointed toward the enemy position. Turning about, he set the pace, marching at a hundred and ten yards a minute ... fourteen minutes to cross the valley of death.

As they pa.s.sed down the slope the artillery behind him opened up again, sh.e.l.ls screaming overhead, geysers of dirt erupting along the enemy earthworks.

Looking to his left and right he saw the line coming steadily on, wavering at points where men had to scramble around a hillock or tangles of brush, but then forming up again.

Smoke started to obscure the field, most of the Bantag artillery shooting high, but the mortar fire acquired the range and stayed with them as they advanced, the piercing whistle of the sh.e.l.ls coming down, explosions crumping, men going down, ranks dressing to the center as holes were punched in the line.

A sh.e.l.l detonated to his right, spraying him with dirt. His guidon bearer dropped, screaming, clutching the stump where his right leg had been severed at the knee. A corporal burst from the ranks, tossing his rifle aside, and scooped up the colors. Rifle fire erupted, skirmishers darting forward, reloading on the run, following the dark forms of Bantag moving back up the slope, withdrawing into their main lines.

Reaching the bottom of the valley, he leapt down the muddy bank of the stream which divided the field between Bantag and human lines, the cold water coming up to his thighs. A body of a Bantag bobbed in the middle of the stream; a human skirmisher, clutching his stomach, was curled up on the opposite sh.o.r.e, looking at Vincent, wide-eyed. Scrambling up the muddy bank Vincent paused to look back as the first two ranks plunged into the stream, colors held high, bayonets gleaming red in the late-afternoon sunlight.

The lines plunged through the stream, geysers of water erupting as a salvo of mortar sh.e.l.ls plunged in. Hitting the eastern embankment, men clawed their way up the muddy slope. The ridgeline disappeared in a cloud of yellow-grey smoke as the Bantag infantry opened fire. Dozens of men tumbled backwards into the stream, cursing, screaming.

"Who's with me?" Vincent screamed. "Who's with me?"

Holding his sword high, he started forward, moving at the double.

"They're insane!" Ha'ark cried, watching as the human waves struggled over the stream and, breaking into a slow run, started up the slope.

His riflemen were firing as fast as they could reload, popping breeches open, slamming in cartridges which many had laid out on the breastworks in front of their positions. Behind him, a mortar team concealed on the reverse slope loaded rounds as fast as they could be brought up from the caissons, the shots whistling overhead to slash down into the advancing lines, the gun commanders, adjusting the barrels higher and yet higher after every three to four shots.

It was difficult to see the humans as smoke from the explosions bracketing their lines rolled up the slope on the western breeze.

Ha'ark looked up at an observer positioned atop a tower that was fortified with sandbags.

"Any land cruisers?"

The observer, shading his eyes against the sun, scanned the lines.

"I thought I saw something, my Qarth, by the railroad track pa.s.s, but it's not moving forward!" The observer started to raise his field gla.s.ses to examine the position once again, then jerked backwards, the gla.s.ses shattering, his face exploding as a sh.e.l.l detonated on the tower.

What are they waiting for? Ha'ark wondered. Suicide to send unsupported infantry in like this.

The smoke parted for an instant, and he saw a gold-embossed flag moving forward, up the slope, an officer beside the flag, waving his sword, urging the human waves on.

Was this Hawthorne?

As he considered the thought the human looked up, as if gazing straight at him, and there was the sense of a cold, deadly hatred that was startling. This one was coming to kill him, he could feel that, an intensity of belief and hatred that felt more Bantag than human.

Vincent stood still for a moment, focusing his thoughts, driving all else out of his soul.

"I'm coming for you, you son of a b.i.t.c.h," Vincent snarled. "It's here, it's all here. It's not to save Andrew; it's to kill you."

The second flag bearer went down by Vincent's side. Scooping up the colors, he held them aloft. The first two ranks of his charge were disintegrating under the blasts of canister and scathing rifle fire. Men staggered past him, bent low, as if advancing into a gale. A drummer boy ran past, tears streaming down his face, mechanically beating his drum, which was shattered and hanging in tatters on his b.l.o.o.d.y thigh. He saw an old man cradling a young boy, crying, then collapsing as a round struck him in the chest. A sergeant ran past, screaming obscenities, urging the line forward, and disappeared into the smoke.

Looking back through the smoke he saw the rear ranks of his charge fording the stream; rifle fire, which was pa.s.sing high over the heads of the front ranks, was plunging into the ranks farther to the rear. The distant slope was covered with blue-clad forms, a carpet of bodies stretching all the way back to where the artillery continued to work, firing in support of the advancing charge.

Men around him were wavering, slowing down, some of them raising their rifles to return fire.

"Keep moving!" Vincent roared. "Charge boys, charge!"

Waving his guidon, he started forward again at the run, holding the colors high.

A quavering scream rose up from the ranks, bayonets poised forward, all formation breaking down, the division sweeping up the slope at the run. The ground ahead seemed to stretch into an eternity, wisps of smoke swirling around him. A soldier sprinted past, screaming, the sound of his voice lost in the roar of battle. An explosion of blood erupted from his back; mechanically, the soldier continued for half a dozen more steps before he fell. Vincent leapt over his body, pressing on, no longer even aware if anyone was following. The smoke parted again, a Bantag was kneeling before him, blocking a path through a line of sharpened stakes, raising his rifle. An explosion erupted next to Vincent; the Ban-tag fell over. The soldier who had shot him, screamed in triumph as he rushed up and pinned the Bantag to the ground with his bayonet. The soldier flipped over an instant later as a spray of canister tore across the field.

Reaching the narrow path through the rows of sharpened stakes, Vincent slowed, turning to look back. A knot of men pushed up around him, beating at the stakes with rifle b.u.t.ts, knocking them aside, pus.h.i.+ng through, casualties falling, some of the men tumbling onto the sharp points, shrieking, writhing as they were impaled.

Vincent could sense the charge disintegrating on the barricade, men piling up, falling, screaming, survivors going to ground, huddled behind bodies, rising up to fire, then ducking back down.

"Keep going!" Vincent roared. "Come on, keep going!"

Holding the colors aloft he started to push through the abatis, turning to look back at his men.

He didn't feel any pain, only a numbing blow as the rifle ball smashed into his right hip and cut crosswise through his body. His knees buckled. He slammed the staff of his guidon down, bracing himself against it, while driving his sword point into the ground with his other hand.

Locking his arms, he held himself up, looking back at his men. The world about him seemed to s.h.i.+ft, everything slowing down, focusing in on details . . . one of his staff, openmouthed, screaming, coming toward him, then collapsing, a soldier standing, firing his rifle, fumbling at his cartridge box, a drummer boy sitting on the ground, hands clasped over a b.l.o.o.d.y face, an hysterical sergeant clutching the body of a comrade and shrieking, a lone soldier, standing, laughing taking deliberate aim, firing, then reloading, untouched in the storm of steel.

Men drifted past him, wide-eyed, madness contorting their features, pus.h.i.+ng around him, collapsing, coming up, going forward again.

There was no pain. He looked down and saw that his mud-stained trousers were red, blood trickling out of his boots. Funny, he thought, where is it coming from?

He looked back up . . . the world was distant . . . unfocused, as if he was gazing through his field gla.s.ses from the wrong end. Not even aware that he was falling, he slowly sagged to his knees and pitched forward into the mud.

"Get him! Get him!"

Ha'ark, pointing his scimitar, urged his warriors up out of the trenches, sending them forward into the smoke. Hand-to-hand fighting erupted as his warriors surged down the slope, human soldiers coming up to meet them, firing rifles at point-blank range, clubbing muskets or coming in low with bayonets raised to impale the foes towering above them.

He could see a knot of humans gathering around the p.r.o.ne form, tearing the flag from the staff and using it as a litter, dragging him back. As quickly as one dropped, another leapt forward to pick up the bundle.

One of his warriors reached the group, cutting down two of the bearers before being clubbed down and pinned to the ground with a bayonet. Smoke swirled around, obscuring the fight, and he could sense that they were getting away.

Cursing, he slammed his fist down on the parapet.

Rifle fire continued to blaze along the line, smoke blanketing the ground around him. The attack had lurched to a halt, the survivors clinging to their forward position, crouched behind bodies or abatis which had been torn down and piled up into barricades. Artillery pieces in the earthen forts along his line had depressed their muzzles and, in some cases, were switching to sh.e.l.l, plowing shot in low, striking the frail barriers and scattering them like stacks of matchwood.

The light was starting to drop away, and, gazing to the west, he saw the rim of the sun sinking behind the hills, silhouetting another line forming up as if ready to go into the a.s.sault. The fire from their batteries continued unabated, some of the shots falling short to plow into their own men.

The ferocity of the attack was startling, a grim madness which he sensed was an act of wild desperation. He had what they wanted-Keane bottled up on the other side of his position-and they would bleed themselves white to get him out ... it was precisely as he desired.

It was going to be here, a straight a.s.sault right in, following the line of their railroad tracks eastward. Moving through the trench, he reached a covered way which zigzagged up the slope and then down into the rear, his staff following.

Once over the crest the trench emerged into clear ground, where a dozen of his land cruisers were drawn up, wisps of smoke pouring from their smokestacks.

In the twilight he could see the railroad junction and beyond, on the southern horizon the slow-moving line of land cruisers coming up as reinforcements.

Ha'ark motioned his staff to gather around him.

"It will be here. They will a.s.sault through the night. We keep the cruisers in reserve."

As he started to pa.s.s orders for the night's deployment he walked to where the land cruisers were deployed. Most of the machines were barely functioning. The movement from the coast and the week of deployment in the field had overtaxed their feeble engines and they were already cannibalizing parts from a half dozen of the machines to keep the rest moving.

So d.a.m.n primitive, he thought, but still there should be enough in them for one more fight. Let the fools bleed themselves white here, then in the morning unleash the land cruisers, shatter their line here, then pivot back on Keane.

"All reinforcements to here," Ha'ark announced. "Here's where they have the line of supplies. Keane will wait for a breakthrough. By tomorrow night Jurak will be up on the other side. Then we can finish them as well."

"My Qarth, all reinforcements?"

Ha'ark hesitated for a moment but the image of Hawthorne held him. He was the commander on this flank. That he led the attack himself showed his desperation. Sh.e.l.ls from the bombardment by the humans continued to scream overhead, shrieking down into the valley below, scattering his rear-echelon units. The rate of fire amazed him, hundreds of rounds bursting every minute. They were trying to isolate this section for a breakthrough.

"They'll press through the night. It's here," Ha'ark announced.

"My G.o.d, Vincent, my G.o.d, why?"

Through the haze of pain he could barely see her, leaning over the stretch.

"Andrew would have." The effort even to speak caused him to gasp in agony, the pain redoubling to a level he did not believe possible as two orderlies took him by the shoulders and another two by his feet, lifting him onto the table.

He could hear Kathleen barking orders, but the words were unintelligible.

Turning his head he saw the tent filled to overflowing, casualties lying on the dirt floor, waiting their turn.

"Kathleen."

"Here, Vincent, I'm here." She turned back, her face covered with a gauze mask, the kerosene lamp hanging above her head blinding, so that it looked as if she were wreathed in a halo.

"Them first, them first."

"This time rank gets a privilege," she said in English. "This is going to hurt for a moment, then you'll be under."

"I'm dying; save the others."

"You're dying and will die if I don't get in there now and stop the bleeding."

He felt something tugging at his leg and, lifting his head, saw two orderlies cutting his trousers off. He stifled a cry as they peeled back the blood-soaked pants. He felt a wave of embarra.s.sment at his nakedness as Kathleen walked around to the side where the bullet had entered. She leaned over, then ran her hand across his stomach and groin, pus.h.i.+ng down, trying to feel the bullet and the extent of damage.

A wave of red-hot fire erupted, a scream escaping him. She looked up, her eyes filled with pity.

"I'm sorry, Vincent. I know it hurts. Now tell me which hurts more."

She pressed down across his stomach, probing, watching his expression. Moaning, he gasped for breath, grateful when an orderly wiped the sweat from his eyes.

"How is he?"

Kathleen looked up just as Vincent saw Marcus standing on the other side of the table.

"You're not washed, get out of here now!" Kathleen barked.