“Lord General Halik!” the warrior cried as he flung himself into the grass at Halik’s feet. “I beg to report!”
“Rise, General Ugla,” Halik said almost mildly.
Ugla instantly rose to his feet, perhaps surprised he still lived. “Yes, Lord General!”
Halik looked at him, eyes steady. Ugla had reason for concern. Halik had not always been kind to those who brought ill tidings. But that was before. General Niwa had taught him a great deal. “Your assessment, General. Withhold nothing you perceive as truth.”
“Yes, Lord General.” Ugla still paused.
“Only your silence will anger me at this point,” Halik warned.
Ugla removed his helmet and shook out his crest. Halik noted that it was stiff with… anger?
“Lord General, we had them in our grasp. The prey was at bay and could not escape. It had gone to earth! It fought hard, still, and many Uul were slain. Many more would still have been lost… but we had them! Only you… Forgive me! Only the horns called us back before we gained all the prey atop that hill to feed upon!”
Halik said nothing for a moment, but only gazed into the west. Then he looked back at Ugla and pointed his sword at the smoldering hill.
“You are right, General. You would have had them. I know that as well, and I am… unhappy that I was forced to stop you.” He took a deep, rasping breath. “Not long ago, I wouldn’t have, no matter the cost, but the price of that stinking hill has grown too great to bear at present.” His own crest flared. “I like to believe I have grown wiser in the ways of war and I need your seasoned warriors, those that remain, for a far more important task we must set them to immediately.” He pointed back to the west. “We are out of time to pursue this sport. As you can see, the hatchling host draws near,” he said, using the somewhat derisive term he’d heard his generals use to describe the barely mature army of culls-some said-that had been bred to defend. “There are their banners now.”
It was true. Cresting a nearby rise, hundreds of bloodred pennants streamed in the afternoon sun, each signifying a hundred Uul warriors.
“We cannot linger here,” Halik stated. “As you say, the enemy on the hill is crushed, cut off from resupply or reinforcement. They can no longer threaten us. Leave a few thousands of your warriors to ensure they do not escape, but we must rejoin the bulk of our army and push the greater force of the enemy back, deeper into the gap. There we will hold him while the hatchlings deploy.” He paused. “You have shown great promise, General Ugla, and I need you and your warriors there.” Hesitantly, he patted Ugla’s shoulder as Niwa had often done to him. It wasn’t his people’s way to touch each other at all, other than while killing or mating, but Niwa’s touch had become oddly… comforting. Ugla recoiled, as Halik expected, but then let him pat him again. “Once that is done,” he continued, “we can finish our business here.”
He stared hard, thoughtfully, at the smoking hill, imagining the scene on it. “We know you had them, General,” he repeated, “but perhaps more important, and far more interesting, is the fact that the prey-the very worthy prey-you faced must know it as well. I wonder what they will think of that.”
Colonel Flynn stared at the withdrawing Grik a moment longer. They’d mauled them badly and they didn’t seem as numberless as they had, but he knew his guys were done. They’d never hold off another assault half as big as this one. They just didn’t have the numbers, ammunition, or strength left to do it. They should have had us, he thought. Hell, even the common Grik warriors probably knew it. I wonder why they pulled back. Suddenly, over the throbbing of his wounds, he felt a chill, and there wasn’t enough of a breeze to blame it on his sweat-soaked shirt. “ How in the hell did they pull them back?” he muttered. He’d been amazed to see the growing discipline the Grik displayed ever since Ceylon, but pulling the Grik off the shattered remnant of his division must have been like pulling a pack of dogs off a tree full of raccoons. Wearily, he shook his head and turned back to the trench to check on Bekiaa-and what was left of his troops. He was perplexed and uneasy, but he wouldn’t complain.
“Col-nol!” cried a filthy, blood-spattered Marine corporal.
“Yeah?”
“My cap-i-taan send me. Make sure you see!”
“See what?”
The corporal blinked agitation. “Pease come, sur! You see better on right.”
Almost reluctantly, Flynn followed the corporal around and over the tangled heaps of dead. The hill was a little higher on the west side, the slope a little steeper, and that was probably another reason the Grik had concentrated where they had. That didn’t mean the Rangers and the company of Marines emplaced there had gotten off without a scratch, but the enemy dead did extend considerably farther away from the breastworks, slain by the more accurate. 50-80s. As Flynn drew near, he saw that his troops were moving forward to reoccupy their forward defenses. Then he saw something else.
“Oh, good God,” he muttered. A few miles to the west-southwest, an army marched in long, dense, serpentine columns with the precision of a machine. The corporal’s captain joined them and handed Flynn his telescope without a word. Flynn raised it with shaky hands and managed to adjust the focus. “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” he whispered without even realizing he’d spoken. Leedom had told him, but he just hadn’t grasped it, hadn’t understood. Marching under the midday sun with a grandeur and geometric inflexibility Napoleon would have envied, an honest-to-God army of Grik churned rapidly, relentlessly, through the tall, green grass, as yet unspoiled by the battle that had raged around the hill.
“Are… are they coming for us?” The captain asked hesitantly but almost formally.
Flynn slammed the telescope shut.
“No,” he said. “They’re angling for the Rocky Gap. And look”-he pointed-“the Grik reserves that didn’t come at us are already moving that way.” He shook his head and snorted an ugly laugh. “Now I know why we’re still alive. That General Halik’s got bigger fish to fry, that’s all. There’s not enough of us left up here to worry about, and he knows it. Shit!”
William Flynn was as Irish as any American could possibly be, and despite his pain, even fueled by it, his temper soared. “We gotta report the absolute hell out of this. Pray God we’ve still got comm. Whether we do or not, we’re going to get word out somehow-and make General Halik wish he’d wiped us out when he had the chance!”
CHAPTER 16
Baalkpan
March 15, 1944
Dennis Silva walked with Bernie Sandison and Ronson Rodriguez at the head of a virtual army of young torpedo techs and strikers, ordnance ’Cats, EMs, and other “sparky” types. Lawrence trotted exuberantly alongside Silva, his crested head swiveling rapidly back and forth, taking in all the changes to the city. Within the column were carts piled with weapons, tools, and crated ammunition, and it snaked its way through the crowded, festive pathways toward the area between the vastly enlarged new fitting-out piers and the massive shipyard.
Dennis was still stunned to see how packed, bow to stern, the piers were, with completing ships of all descriptions. There was Santa Catalina, smoke coiling above her funnel, looking almost predatory with all the armor and weapons they’d lavished on her. Silva hadn’t seen the ship before-and had fluttery feelings when “her” P-40s thundered over-head-but he’d been told she looked like the old Asiatic Fleet destroyer tender Blackhawk.
Maybe once, he decided with a critical eye. The lines are still similar. Most of the cargo booms are gone, though, and she looks kinda… tough now.
His gaze wandered as he walked. He was particularly amazed by the monstrous, almost Home-size floating dry docks fitting out at a completely new facility in the far distance across the bay. These weren’t the same as the ones he’d seen under construction when he left. Those were finished now, and already in use either here or elsewhere. The new class was a powered, self-propelled variety that could steam wherever they were needed, and even fight!