All Enemies Foreign and Domestic (Kelly Blake series) (37 page)

      The queen saw the flying machines move off to the northwest.
 
She saw this as a sign that even they could see the pointlessness of resisting her.
 
Then she saw an orange light in the sky as a hot glowing ball of fire descended from on high.
 
The plasma bomb landed in the middle of the first swarm assaulting the perimeter and a thirty-meter circle of soldiers disappeared in a cloud of smoke and vapor.
 
Soldiers out to 50 meters just lay down, facing away from the explosion like felled trees.
 
Another and another slammed into her lead force to the same effect.
 
When a fourth and fifth landed in their midst, she could sense them falter.
 
She rode forward in her transport to near the leading edge and stepped out.
 
The sight of a queen on the battlefield stiffened the soldiers’ resolve and they continued forward, firing as they went.
 
She was only 200 meters from the fence line.
 
Her soldiers’ fire was keeping the enemy’s heads down and the enemy’s individual fire diminished.
 
She could still see victory if she could get inside the fence and in and amongst them.

      She rubbed antennae with soldiers near her, sending the message, “Press on.”

That message got passed from soldier to soldier and they moved faster.
 
They were now 100 meters from the wire and firing on the move.
 
Occasionally she saw a biped go down.
 
Fire from the bipeds’ front line was starting to have an effect.
 
Heavy vehicles now arrived behind the defensive position.
 
The queen started slipping on the gore and ichor upon the ground as the bodies started stacking up.
 
Mortar shells and beams of destructive force landed and passed around her, but none got close to her.

* * * * *

      Mary looked through her binoculars and saw the queen.
 
She quickly called a fire mission to her mortars and walked mortar rounds ever closer.
 
When she felt she was right on, she ordered them to fire for effect.
 
Six rounds left the tubes, went almost straight up due to the close proximity to the target, and plummeted down.
 
Two more salvoes of six rounds were fired and in the air before the first rounds hit.
 
The eighteen enhanced plasma rounds vaporized a 100 by 50 meter oblong of tightly packed T’Kab soldiers.
 
Mary scanned the area with her binoculars, but no longer saw the queen.
 
That was the first of Mary’s surprise weapons.

      The T’Kab faltered for a moment then quick marched towards the fence line.
 
Companies from the 1st Battalion, 22nd Marines (Heavy) formed up on Mary’s flanks and behind her positions, and poured fire from their transporters and assault guns into the massed T’Kab.
 
The battalion commander found Mary and said, “I’m Dave Cantor, the CG said I work for you.
 
Is where I put my guys okay?
 
I figured you’d want them engaging the enemy as quickly as possible.
 
The rest of our brigade will be setting up behind you shortly.”

      Mary told him to bring his command post up behind the bunker and have his mortar carriers emplace and start firing about 500 meters back and work their way forward to 100 meters from the fence line.
 
Mary stuck her head into the bunker and saw a team from division fire support had arrived to take over running fire missions from her exec.
 
More and more sorties were flying in.
 
More artillery was firing in support, including some 5th Corps artillery firing from inside the city.
 
Two bombardment frigates were now dedicated to supporting Mary and were working on two concentrations of T’Kab units the size of the one attacking Mary.
 
Both were hidden in a forest a kilometer from the spacedock.
 
The frigates were tearing them up pretty fiercely.
 
A third frigate was moving into orbit to further assist and it was 23 minutes out.

      The T’Kab front line appeared to be faltering.
 
The increasing firepower of artillery, 1st of the 22nd Marines, and Mary’s surprise rounds were taking their toll, as was the ever-increasing carpet of dead T’Kab those coming forward had to negotiate to move ahead.
 
In spite of the devastation, the swarm had finally reached the fence line and started tearing it down.
 
Mary’s Special Support Company commander hit a button on his command tablet and a wall of flame exploded into the breaching party and roasted nearly 50 T’Kab, but even this did not stop them.

       Another party arrived at the fence and started to tear it down.
 
A few T’Kab broke through and raced for the mortar pit.
 
The heavy machine gun on the mortar team’s X-55 stopped that assault in its tracks.
 
Heavy fire concentrated on the fence line built up an ever-higher wall of dead T’Kab, until they could just crawl over the bodies stacked against the fence like a ramp.
 
As they dropped over the fence into the area between the fence and the strung out tangle wire, Mary pointed to her Special Support Company commander and he pushed a second button on his command tablet.
 
Another wall of flame erupted, but this one stuck to the attackers.
 
It was an ancient mixture called jellied fuel that the Special Support Company whipped up from some hydrocarbon fuel found in transporters around the spaceport.

      That broke the back of the lead soldiers and they started to fall back.
 
Some still pushed forward, but they were easily dealt with by personal and crew served weapons.
 
Mary harried them as they withdrew with direct fire, indirect fire, space bombardment and AG-122 attacks.
 
Mary considered pushing her unit forward after the T’Kab, until she stepped up onto her bunker and saw the bodies of T’Kab soldiers as far as the eye could see.
 
The corner fence post still stood.
 
Now she had a disposal problem to deal with.
 
Fortunately, she had engineer equipment in her unit position already.

      Mary checked in with her executive officer to see what the true cost of her successful defense of the perimeter was.
 
Five KIA:
 
Two in Alpha Company (Lance Corporal James, Private First Class Subotai), one in Special Support Company (Sergeant Ross), one in Headquarters Company (Corpsman Petrov) and one in C Company (Staff Sergeant DeSilva), 12 wounded, none seriously.
 
Mary asked for the names and addresses of the next of kin of the dead and she would take care of the letters.
 
She wanted to see the company commanders’ letters before they went out.

      She and Lieutenant Colonel Cantor rode up to division in her x-55.
 
She asked him, “Do you have to write any letters?”

      He responded with a sigh, “Not this time.
 
How about you?”

      “I lost five, all good men and women.
 
I should be on an adrenalin high right now, but all I feel is numb and all I see is their faces the last time I saw them.”

      He looked her in the eye and asked, “How many letters would have needed to be written if you hadn’t done what you did?
 
What other commander would have taken the initiative to fill that hole and stayed up all night to make it defensible?
 
It was an honor working for you, Lieutenant Colonel Chen.”

      That put a smile on her face, which stayed as she walked into the Division briefing room to a standing ovation.

Chapter Eighteen

      Mary’s defense of the corner broke the back of major hostilities in the capital region.
 
The T’Kab Supreme Queen would not surrender to any mere biped she considered a potential meal.
 
She did, however, realize that the loss of 10,000 of her children meant the Civilization might not overcome.
 
She initially doubted the report, thinking it a biped trick, but was convinced when she was allowed to speak to a captured soldier.
 
He could not lie to her even if he wanted to.
 
She lamented that she was a prisoner in her own capital and had no way to affect the situation.
 
She used the sentient queen to communicate with the enemy and see if she could find any honorable way out of the situation.

      She asked Ambassadors at Large Steele and T’Rak what it would take to get them off her world and for them to leave the Civilization alone.

      The ambassadors sent back in Morse code that she had to agree on boundaries to her Civilization.
 
She would have to give up the five worlds.
 
She would have to cease randomly firing colony pods into other species’ space.

      The queen responded that she would think on these things.

* * * * *

      The reserve fleet commander waited at the communications relay for days, while ships of all shapes and sizes wandered through on their way to the far reaches of the Civilization.
 
Eventually the first Civilization fleet arrived, then two days later the second.
 
It was a full week before the third showed up.
 
They conferred on the reserve fleet flagship and agreed to place themselves under her command and attempt to break the stranglehold of the biped fleet.
 
They spent three days formulating a plan and working out the problems until all agreed it was doable.
 
They set course for the home system, but on a circuitous path to get there.

* * * * *

      The 1st Unified Force landed at the airfield north of the city with little incident.
 
The 20th Armored Division had secured the facility and run off the few T’Kab remaining behind.
 
The K’Rang quickly organized their logistics, moved out into the countryside to the north, and seized numerous military facilities controlling the few towns and villages, bases, and depots in that area.
 
Its five combined units fanned out and secured a 50-kilometer circle.

      The 7th Light Corps landed at the main spaceport, acclimatized to the home world, and moved in to relieve the 5th Mobile Corps and secure the capital.

      Three days later, the 5th Mobile Corps moved west to the airfield held by the 68th Mechanized Division.
 
The 20th Armored Division was released with the successful landing of the K’Rang Unified Force and moved to join the 5th Mobile Corps at the western airfield.
 
When the 5th Corps was whole again, Lieutenant General Tsien mounted up and started a 500-kilometer march.
 
He joked with his senior staff that now that General Brown and the 6th Army Staff were here, he wanted to be as far away from the general’s flag as possible.

      The first two days were relatively uneventful for the corps, then on day three things started to deteriorate.
 
The first incident was at the 160 kilometer mark, where the bridge over the central river was destroyed.
 
This required deploying the mobile bridges for the wheeled support vehicles, first sending a brigade from 16th Armored across the river to secure the far side before building the bridges.

      1st of the 85th Armor was chosen to lead the assault across the river.
 
Luck of the draw had Ingrid’s company as the lead element.
 
Ingrid knew her M-25 was capable of hovering over water; she just had never done it, nor had her driver.
 
The first sergeant sensed her trepidation and pulled her to the side.

      “Sergeant, do you have some concern about a 50-ton vehicle being able to float across that river?”

      She said, “No, First Sergeant, just my ability to swim in freezing water.”

      The first sergeant laughed and told her, “Just pretend it’s frozen over and you’re skating.”

      She laughed, “Top, I’m from the Texas Hill Country.
 
I never saw ice skates, much less ice thick enough to skate on.”

      “You’ll be fine.
 
Just have your driver button up so he doesn’t get a lapful of river if he hits the water too fast.
 
You might want to button up, too.”

      “Thanks, Top.”

      She went back to her commander’s tank and talked with her crew, especially her driver.

* * * * *

      The K’Rang 1st Unified Force commander had asked Kelly to accompany him to the T’Kab home world.
 
The purpose was to orient the K’Rang on the gate system and help with the initial liaison effort.
 
Kelly brought along Lieutenant Colonel Ellie Johns, formerly a 5th Corps armored battalion commander.

      They spent the first day in conference rooms aboard the space station above K’Rol, the military planet.
 
They gave brief hour-long classes on the gate system in the morning and classes in the afternoon on ground force coordination measures, liaison officer duties, and space, artillery, and air mission request procedures.
 
Lieutenant Colonel Johns covered ground force tactics, at least as much as could be covered in an hour.