"I'm making a command decision and ordering you to get someone back there to check on the captain," Callahan said. "Get someone right this fucking second or you'll be doing it yourself!"
A pause, then an angry voice replied, "Okay, I got some guys moving back there. If I was you, I wouldn't let myself get in their gunsights later if they survive this."
"You make another remark like that and your fucking head will be in my gunsight before you're done making it," Callahan told him. "Is that clear?"
"Sure, whatever," Corals said.
Callahan checked his map display again, watching to make sure Corals wasn't just jerking him off and pretending to send someone. He wasn't. Three dots separated from the rest of the platoon and began to inch their way backward — no doubt crawling on their bellies — toward the dot that represented Ayers.
"He's dead," Corals reported a few seconds after they arrived at their destination. "Took a couple of rounds right in the head and blew it clean open. You happy now?"
"Thrilled," Callahan said, unable to muster up anything like emotion to attach to news that the man who had been his friend for the last six years and his boss for the last two was dead, lying in a heap on some shitty Martian hillside. He was too tired and too scared to care. "Listen up. I want you to hold in place and keep the fire on that hillside. I'm gonna see about getting us some reinforcements."
"Sure," said Corals. "Take your time. We're just lying here under these fucking rocks enjoying the pretty light show."
Callahan ignored this for now. He turned his radio to the platoon frequency and told Corporal Hennesy, the most senior squad leader (which meant he'd been in that position almost thirty-six hours) that third platoon was all his. He then switched to the battalion command frequency and hailed Lieutenant Colonel West, commander of Second Battalion. "This is Lieutenant Callahan," he told him. "Captain Ayers is KIA. I've assumed command of Charlie Company."
"Goddammit!" barked West, who was commanding from an APC far in the rear. "That's two of my company commanders I've lost in the last fifteen minutes!"
"Uh... yes, sir," Callahan said. "We need some..."
"Schafers of Bravo Company over on the left flank got smoked by a mortar shell," West said although Callahan hadn't asked and didn't care. "And now Ayers is gone too? Goddamn! He was like a brother to me. We went to the academy together."
"My sympathies, sir, but..."
"Are you sure he's dead?" West cut in.
"I'm sure," Callahan squeaked as another stream of SAW fire slammed into his rock. "Some of the men checked on him after he stopped transmitting. But anyway..."
"How'd he get it?" West asked. "Was it those fucking mortars?"
"Uh... no, sir, it was bullets, probably SAW fire during the last advance. Took him in the head. Look, sir, we're pinned down here on the side of the hill, just above the base. We've taken heavy casualties and the Martians have reinforced their position. They have two SAWs and at least eight M-24s up there now. We need some more people up here if we're going to make it up that hill."
"No can do, Callahan," West told him. "Bravo and Delta Companies are taking heavy fire in the center of the hill and Alpha is pinned down just like you are."
"Uh... sir," Callahan said carefully, through clenched teeth, "aren't Bravo and Delta just a diversionary force to make the Martians think we're attacking the center? They're not meant to go up the hill until its secured, right?"
"Well... no," West said. "But they are keeping the bulk of the greenies occupied while your company and Alpha Company advance on the flanks. If I start shifting forces from the center they might figure out we're planning to take the hill from the flanks."
An explosion boomed ten meters to Callahan's right as a fragmentation grenade launched from a Martian M-24 detonated over the top of one of his squads. Two of his men rolled lifelessly down the hill. Another simply slumped over. "I think they've already figured that out, sir," he said. "They have at least one grenade launcher up there and they're starting to use it."
"Grenade launchers? Hmmm. Sounds serious."
Another one came flying in, air-bursting over yet another squad of marines, killing two more. "Yes, sir," Callahan said. "I'd say it's pretty fuckin' serious. If we don't get some reinforcements over here in the next five minutes we're gonna have to pull back!"
"There will be no retreat from this hill, Callahan!" West barked at him. "Do you understand that? No retreat! I will not have it be known that my battalion ran away from a bunch of greenies!"
"Then get me some more men over here, sir!" Callahan yelled back. "If you don't, your whole battalion will be dead! We need to get up that hill and stop this fire!"
"Valentine, man the eighty!" Sanchez ordered. "Command reports the marines are reinforcing the units on this flanks. At least two platoons heading this way!"
"What about the tanks?" Zen asked as another laser shot slammed into their barrier, burning through another section of their rapidly crumbling defensive emplacement with enough energy left over to peel a layer off the front of their turret.
"Fuck the tanks!" Sanchez replied. "Our job is to protect the infantry, not ourselves. Those platoons will have to pass right through that open area at two o'clock. Get some fire on them when they do. I'll man the twenty and rake up any stragglers."
"Fuck my ass," Zen said, popping off one last tank and then abandoning his laser cannons. He switched his control set up to the main eighty-millimeter gun, checking to make sure a round was in it. He looked toward the two o'clock position, a small open area about one hundred meters wide and tried to ignore the dozens of tanks and APCs that were still trying to kill them. He had never wanted to be away from any place as much as he wanted to be away from this deathtrap right now.
He had lost count of how many WestHem tanks he'd killed in the last fifteen minutes. The entire battle so far had been a mad, endless, terrifying stream of explosions and flashes, of covering tanks with his recticle and firing, of watching turrets flying into the air, of hearing Xenia cry out the damage being inflicted on their barricade and their tank, of hearing the reports of other tanks being destroyed or damaged when the overwhelming fire against them managed to burn through and hit in just the right place. Of the sixteen tanks of their unit, four had been annihilated with all hands. He supposed that wasn't a bad ratio since their unit was responsible for the destruction of at least seventy marine main battle tanks — their burned out carcasses were everywhere on the battlefield — but the knowledge that he might annihilated at any second, flash-fried by a laser burn-through or, even worse, blown to pieces by detonating ammunition — weighed heavy on him.
There was a clank as Sanchez used his load button to jack the first twenty-millimeter round into the externally mounted cannon. It was belt-fed from a compartment on the outside of the turret. The weapon was fired with remote control from inside by means of a camera/infrared system although the actual gun could be physically reached through the commander's hatch in the event of a jam.
"Artillery coming down out there," Sanchez reported, unnecessarily since Zen could see it as well. "Mortar fire too. They must have them in sight."
"They stopped firing at us," Xenia said. "Did you notice? Since we stopped shooting at them they must think we're dead."
"Let 'em think that," Zen said.
"The illusion will only last until we open fire on their dismounts," Sanchez said. "So enjoy it while it lasts. Xenia, I want you to put us up just long enough to take a few shots. Get back in the hull down position the second I tell you to. Remember, our turret will be exposed to direct fire from the marine MBTs while we're up."