Blood In the Water (30 page)

Courtney frowned. “I understand your concern. But we need all the people of this land. Hopefully, none would remain to take yours.”

“Even if that were so, that you could get all the clans of the Shee-ree and others to agree, the Erokighaani would never go. None of us would
want
them to go,” he added with a bitter blink, “and they would come here at last.”

“
I
swear we would return with you and help regain your lands from such as they,” Chack assured with certainty. Courtney looked at him, surprised by the vehemence with which he'd openly contradicted the conditions for arming these people. Then he understood. Learning the full truth about the eastern river folk at last, Chack had equated them with the Grik. They were probably even worse, in his eyes, just as many
humans considered the Doms worse than Grik as well. He sighed. Were they doomed to fight wars upon wars
within
wars for the rest of his life? Most likely, he supposed, given the nature of the world they lived in.
The nature of
any
world,
he conceded ruefully. But a confrontation with the Erokighaani was for the future and would be a ridiculously insignificant affair compared to the current conflict. “I will swear that also,” he said. “For myself and the entire alliance I represent. If any tribe dares take the land of another that has left it to help us, to help
all
people everywhere against our common enemy, as the Allied plenipotentiary at large, I hereby commit the full power of the Grand Alliance to the utter destruction of anyone so cowardly as to do such a thing.” He looked squarely at Ror'at. “Let your traveling tellers of tales carry
that
warning.”

Ror'at blinked, then his eyes narrowed in deep concentration. “I will have to consider this. The scale of the Alliance and war you describe is hard to imagine, but since you five alone could probably keep your pledge, armed as you are, it carries great weight indeed.” He paused. “But even if we agree to leave here, to join you in the war, we cannot do so now. The war is already here again. That is why
we
went looking for you!”

Courtney blinked incomprehension.

“The Gaa-rieks gather another force, larger than the last—and different. It is farther inland as well, somehow pulled upriver on big, flat boats by other boats that smoke. Perhaps they hide from your scouting boats and flying machines? But they are here, and more come with every night. They are even closer to my people than before, near a village of the Khot-So Clan of the Rik-Aar. We are at peace with the Rik-Aar, but are not allied to them. If we were, we would have gone immediately to their aid,” he hastily added, trying to assure them—and possibly himself. He blinked regret. “We must assume the Gaa-rieks can only be preparing to come against us here or against your people once more.”

“Have you sent this, um, tale to the Aan-glis, who might pass it to our leaders?” Courtney asked, alarmed.

“Yes, and we sent it to be told without reward.”

“How long ago?”

“Five suns. As soon as we learned of it. But it took that long for the tale to reach us.” He paused. “At the same time, though, we also heard the tale that you were crossing the mountains, and sent a party to find you.”

“Fatefulness indeed,” Courtney mused. “So, a new Grik army has
been gathering for a fortnight or more. And you say it is already bigger than the last. How is it different?”

Ror'at made a strange face and blinked. “The last was like the flock of herdbeasts you saw when you approached. They surged back and forth as directed, but lived packed together in their own filth except to strip the land of animals and people to feed themselves until they left. These, the tale goes, move together in groups, and build night lodges in groups as well. And one group can attach itself to another, and all move as one.” He blinked. “They are visited by flying machines of their own,” he added, almost reluctantly, “if that part of the tale is true. It is difficult to believe, since it is said they look like horrible great fishes that swim in the sky!”

The visitors looked at each other.
Zeppelins.
“I fear it's true,” Courtney said. “We've seen these machines ourselves.”

Ror'at just stared at him, but then continued, “They strip the land around them as before, but use the stronger people they have taken—several clans, it is said—as slaves: to dig trenches for their filth, erect their night lodges, and unload great heaps of things from the big, flat boats. They eat the weak, of course,” Ror'at growled. “But using slaves is strange and new for them—and disturbingly sensible. The slaves will all die in time, of course. Some are probably Shee-ree,” he added bitterly.

“How many?” Courtney asked quietly.

“The tale tellers could not count them any better than the Gaa-rieks, but many hundreds.”

“It sounds like Halik in Indiaa,” Silva said grimly, “except he didn't have locals to enslave. Prob'ly would've, if he did, but it sure sounds like his style of army.”

“It does,” Courtney agreed and took a deep breath. “So, General Esshk's army, the
real
army our reconnaissance to the mainland has had glimpses of, is mustering in the south by night and apparently just far enough inland to avoid the few reconnaissance craft we can spare to inspect the coast. This General Esshk is very shrewd. Apparently, he's guessed—correctly—that the last place we'd expect another attack is from a similar staging area as before. The next question is, will the army attack as before, or march overland?”

“A
part
of his army, at least,” Chack agreed. “And overland, I suspect. With
this
part,” he stressed. “It sounds like what they're preparing for.
And though they're apparently slipping ships past our patrols, they could never gather a sufficient transport fleet, or move it toward Grik City, without being observed. Let us hope the tale tellers reach Captain Reddy in time, before the army advances into the jungles to the north and are completely lost to view.” He scratched his furry nose. “But we can't wait for that, and certainly can't count on it.”

“What do you propose?” Courtney demanded. “We're stuck here. We could try to fix the radio in that Beaufort, I suppose.”

“We could do that,” Chack agreed. “We
should
check to see if it is possible, at least,” he added doubtfully. “How did, ah, Lef-ten-aant ‘kill' it?”

Kaam pointed at the holster at Chack's side. “With the thunder weapon he carried like that.”

“Oh. Indeed,” Courtney said. “You
do
have another proposition?” he asked Chack hopefully.

Chack looked at Silva. “They've got smoking boats.”

“Obviously steamers,” Silva agreed. “But how many? Just two? A dozen? It'll make a difference.” He turned to Lawrence. “How's your Grik lingo, Larry, ol' buddy?”

“Sufficient, I think,” Lawrence answered calmly.

Courtney was increasingly
less
calm. He'd seen these three act this way before, and it was particularly unnerving that they all seemed to have the same idea at once.

“You will fight them?” Ror'at demanded, his yellow eyes brightening. “You can defeat them all alone?”

“Not alone, Your Excellency,” Chack confessed. “And I doubt we can beat them. But with your help, and all the help you can quickly gather, we can hurt them, and maybe stop them long enough for our people to get their shit in the sock and hit them from the air while they're still in the open. We might even be able to get some of the, ah, ‘slaves' out. More important, I want to get all
your
people out and away, where they can join ours and we can all fight the Grik together.”

Ror'at looked from one to the other. “Very well,” he said. “The fatefulness of the circumstances and the flowing together of purpose cannot be ignored.” He let out a long breath. “We will join you—based on the promises you gave. What choice do we have? If we do nothing, the slaves are doomed. If the Gaa-rieks come here, we are doomed. If they destroy your
people—our first, last, and only chance of resisting them—we are still doomed to at best continue as we always have. That is not enough. I will send word to the other clans of the Shee-ree who joined me before, and you will lead us to war.”

“Oh, swell, here we go,” Miles groaned under his breath.

“What's the matter?” Silva whispered at him.

“Gunny Horn always told me to stay away from you. Said you attract crazy trouble like a magnet.”

“He was right,” Silva said, “an' he should'a listened to himself. Horn's barely livin' proof there's such a thing as a useful
China
Marine.” He'd stressed “China,” glancing at Chack. “Old world” rivalries didn't always translate perfectly. “But he always was a idiot. You think
I'm
nuts? I could tell you a thing or two about Gunny Horn, from before the war . . . but you ain't earned them tales.” He shook his head. “Don't matter now. I got you, an' you're finally gonna rare up on your hind legs like a man an' turn into a real live Marine if it kills you.” Suddenly, he flashed his signature gap-toothed grin at Courtney. “Say, how many machine guns does a Bristol Beaufort carry?”

CHAPTER
20

1st Fleet (TF Alden)
October 9, 1944

“Damn, I love this ship!” Commander Perry Brister grated, smiling, leaning back in his captain's chair, bolted to the forward bulkhead of USS
James Ellis
's pilothouse. The chair was just like Captain Reddy's on
Walker
, but considerably more comfortable. For one thing, it was padded with cushions that, like almost every item made of cloth aboard the entire ship, were embroidered with the ship's name. Not that Perry would ever admit to having “tested” Captain Reddy's chair. . . . It was a gorgeous dawn, with kind seas and a clear sky, exactly the kind of morning any destroyer skipper with a new, fast ship steaming at twenty knots would adore. A cool breeze whipped through the pilothouse and the gentle pitching of the ship threw steady, concave curls of water away from her sharp bow.

“That's not what you was sayin' last night, Skipper,” admonished Taarba-Kaar (Tabasco), the ship's Lemurian chief cook, as he handed Perry a cup of monkey joe. His kind of almost coffee was far better than Earl Lanier's and particularly his mentor, Juan Marcos's, had ever been, and it was served in a proper Navy cup without a handle. The skinny, dark-furred 'Cat had thrived out from under Earl's, and even Juan's, thumbs, offering up what was probably the best chow—for humans and Lemurians—in the Navy, and Perry wouldn't trade him for anybody.
Well, nobody short of Spanky, or maybe Tabby,
he thought with a trace of disappointment directed at Lieutenant (jg) Johnny Parks. Parks was a decent engineering officer, but
James Ellis
, the first of her class and the first steel-hulled destroyer the Lemurians had ever built, had a lot of idiosyncrasies that sometimes needed an . . . imaginative engineer to sort out. Parks was competent but not overly imaginative.
Hell,
Perry thought.
I'd settle for one of the Mice!

“Last night, we lost the feedwater pump to the number three boiler. Again,” Perry said, as airily as his damaged voice would allow. “I thought you 'Cats were good with pumps,” he goaded. “But now it's fixed, and all's right with the world!”

“You called
Ellie
a ‘piece of shit,'” reminded Lieutenant (jg) Paul Stites in an aggrieved tone, without taking the Imperial telescope from his eye. He was staring out forward, far beyond the busy fo'c'sle below them. Once one of Dennis Silva's chief minions aboard
Walker
, the rangy Stites had risen to the post of gunnery officer on
Mahan
, and now
James Ellis
. It was he, in fact, who'd coined the diminutive
“Ellie”
for their ship. The loss of Jim Ellis still stung, and the use of the ship's proper name was a constant, stiff kick to their grief.
“Ellie”
lightened that a bit.

“I was just frustrated. I get that way when one boiler's on its third pump repair in as many days. I didn't mean it, not really,” Perry said. “And I still love her. With four boilers, she's faster than
Walker
. We've had her up to thirty-five knots with pressure to spare more than once, and she didn't rattle her guts out. She's got four
dual-purpose
four-inch-fifties, and eight fully operational torpedo tubes—with decent fish in 'em—in her two quad mounts. They ought to put quad mounts on every ship we have,” he added seriously. “I hear
Tarakan Island
's got a pair of them for Captain Reddy. Other than that,” he continued, “she doesn't
leak, she doesn't bitch, and she's
clean
. I miss
Mahan
, and wish we could've gotten her back in action.” He frowned. “Say, I hope those yard apes don't catch hell when word spreads that they're still tinkerin' with her in their spare time.” He shook his head. “But I'm mighty glad to have
Ellie
.” He rubbed his chin, gazing out the windows at the sea ahead.
James Ellis
and her sister,
Geran-Eras
, were casting about, ahead of the task force, blasting the depths with their sonar. Their purpose was to not only frighten any mountain fish that might cross their path, but to make sure there weren't any other undersea threats. Nobody really expected that, but they hadn't expected the strange sub that sank
Respite Island
and a DD either. As the morning progressed, they'd slow to match the convoy's speed.

“Look,” Perry said after a moment. “She does have problems—everybody knows. Nothing we can't handle,” he added hastily, “but she maybe . . . wasn't quite as ready as
Geran-Eras
was. A lot of improvements went into her sister.” He nodded at Tabasco. “The 'Cats did a swell job on them both.
Ellie
's hull is sound. Hell, it's way tighter than
Walker
's. And after all the trouble they had tooling up to make turbines—and reduction gears, by God”—he shook his head at that, still amazed—“I bet her engines are better too. The gun and torpedo directors are probably the most complicated gizmos on the ship, and they made those
perfect
, down to the smallest detail.” He shrugged. “It's the little things, mostly, things they didn't take as much—or took
too
much—care with that're giving us fits. And the little things always affect the big things.”

Stites took the glass away from his eye and looked at him, grinning. “Yeah. Like the 'Cat's inclination to decorate every damn thing they get their furry little hands on. They understand the notion that form follows function, but can't seem to get it out o' their fuzzy heads that plain form is usually better than fancy form on machines!” He shook his head and chuckled. “It's like that lathe operator in Baalkpan who kept turning wedding bands on all the recoil cylinders for the new 4
″
-50s during his lunch breaks. Kid got tired of polishing all those straight, smooth pieces without doin' a little somethin' to doll 'em up. He didn't know what they were
for
, that they
have
to be smooth to work right. He only knew they weren't pretty. Lord knows how many he trashed before they caught him, an' we even had a few aboard here, packed as spares. It wasn't really his fault; that's just the way 'Cats are. They're proud of what
they make an' want it to look nice. Last I heard, they set him up makin' more complicated stuff so he wouldn't get as bored—along with a warnin' to make 'em
exactly
like his templates!”

“That's what I'm talking about,” Perry agreed. “Some stuff is so crude it barely works, and some is so fancy it
can't
work right. Think of the mixed signals they get. Somebody tells 'em to forget polishing the outside of some cast casing, because it doesn't need it, but then tells them the mating surfaces have to be perfectly smooth. Things like that. They wonder why they shouldn't finish out the whole thing, and when somebody tells them to let part of it slide, they think,
What the hell?
and do a half-assed job on the critical stuff.” He grimaced. “And there are things like that all over the ship.” He looked at Tabasco. “The feedwater pumps are just one example.” He nodded at the brass compass binnacle, standing in front of the wheel in polished, blazing glory. The most striking thing about it, though, was the deeply engraved, heroic tableau of Jim Ellis, Bernard Sandison, and several 'Cats standing on the sinking stern of
Mahan
during the Battle of Baalkpan Bay.
Amagi
's shattered, burning silhouette loomed large in the background. “Look at that thing. It's a work of art! And it works too. But Ronson says the wiring running all over the ship is the worst nightmare he ever saw.” Ronaldo “Ronson” Rodriguez was Perry's XO. He shaved his head because his hair grew in clumps around some old burn scars, but wore an enormous Pancho Villa mustache. He'd started as one of
Walker
's electrician's mates. “Says, from what he's seen so far, it looks like a pile of spaghetti, on paper. He's busy right now, as a matter of fact, tracing circuits with all the EMs, drawing new diagrams for damage control. Apparently, the builders threw the whole wiring diagram out the window and just ran everything however it made the most sense to them.” He nodded back at the binnacle. “The light in there? It's not on an independent circuit, with the other instrument lighting on the bridge. It's spliced into the power for the comm shack, the chart house, and the wardroom!” He rolled his eyes. “All that's going to have to be rerun, eventually.”

He stood, stepping out on the starboard bridgewing, and the wind whipped his shirt. Stites followed and caught his captain gazing fondly back at the Lemurian bridge watch. “But you know,” Perry told him, “as much as I gripe, griping's all it is. I do love this ship, and she's got a fine crew, even if it's a little human-heavy.”
James Ellis
had more “old”
destroyermen aboard than
Walker
. That was largely because
Mahan
had needed them, and they'd just shifted, en masse, to the brand-new ship. Now she needed them almost as badly as
Mahan
had, Perry thought. “Maybe they should've worked out more of the bugs before they sent her out here, but it's not like we haven't had plenty of practice doing that for ourselves. And she's damn sure needed.
Walker
's been on her own, in a lot of respects, for an awful long time. It always seems to fall on her to save everybody's ass. And who knows? Maybe it's our turn.”

He looked aft, past the familiar four funnels, the amidships gun platform, and the seemingly distant aft deckhouse, to the broad, foamy wake. He glanced left to see
Geran-Eras
steaming about five miles away, leaving a similar wake, and it was easy to imagine they were all alone on the wide, empty sea.
Geran-Eras
had an all-'Cat crew, and Perry still thought politics may have been involved. But even if it was true, he doubted Cablass-Rag-Laan had anything to do with it. He and Perry had become close friends, and Cablass had turned into one of the very best skippers they had, even if most of his experience had been in sailing steamers. Many of his crew had time in
Walker
or
Mahan
and had therefore dealt with an amazing variety of battle damage and mechanical casualties.
He should be okay,
Perry judged, somewhat protectively, but it was probably just as well that Cablass had drawn the “better” ship of the pair.

He turned aft again, and there, stretching to the horizon, was the bulk of the task force, steaming at a respectable fourteen knots. Four great ships dominated the scene: The Fleet carrier
Baalkpan Bay
was paced by
Andamaan
, the former Grik battleship–turned–giant seaplane tender. He had a hard time thinking of it as an AVD. Behind them steamed
Sular
, the other Grik battleship that had become a protected troopship, and beside her was the SPD
Tarakaan Island.
Clustered around them were the
Scott
Class oilers and transports, along with a large number of smaller auxiliaries. Screening the formation on either side were the sail/steam frigates (DDs) of Des Ron-10. Some of those had seen a lot of action—
Bowles
,
Saak-Fas
,
Clark
, to name a few.

“I
hope
it ain't our turn to save everybody's ass,” said Chief Bosun's Mate Carl Bashear, joining them on the bridgewing. The blond-haired and -bearded fireplug could've had his own command by now, but like Fitzhugh Gray, lost at Grik City, he was a Chief Bosun now, and that's
all he ever wanted to be. Trying to get him off
James Ellis
and away from Perry Brister would've been as difficult—and pointless—as taking Gray away from
Walker
and Captain Reddy.

“I hope not, Boats,” Perry agreed, nodding aft. “And with that much combat power, it's hard to imagine. But stranger—and worse—things have happened.” He looked at Bashear. “I thought you were helping Ronson chase wires.”