Secretary Barnes pushed a button on his desk then rose to his feet and shook Grisha’s hand. “Lieutenant Anderlik will take to your transport. I wish you Godspeed and victory, Colonel.”
“Thank you, Mr. Secretary.” He nodded to the Dená delegation and followed the lieutenant out of the room.
“Right this way, sir,” the lieutenant said. They entered an elevator and dropped farther than Grisha remembered ascending. The door opened into a large bay filled with ranked equipment and military personnel moving in all directions.
“Please follow me, sir.” Lieutenant Anderlik moved briskly through the confusion and Grisha had to pay attention to his guide rather than gawk at the activity around him. After traversing a second bay they emerged into the hot California afternoon.
A topless military vehicle with an enlisted driver sat idling while two officers leaned against it, smoking and chatting. When Grisha appeared both men stiffened to attention and saluted. The major remained silent while the colonel spoke.
“Good afternoon, Colonel Grigorievich. I’m Colonel Buhrman, commander of the Third PIR. You’ll be riding with us. This is my exec, Major Coffey.”
“I’m pleased to meet both of you, and grateful for the ride, not to mention deeply appreciative of your aid.”
“Aw hell, we’ve always wanted to see Alaska,” Colonel Buhrman said.
“We hear the fishing is fantastic,” Major Coffey added.
“Once we kick the Czar out, I’ll be happy to take you fishing,” Grisha said. “I know a lot of good spots.”
They rode three blocks to an airfield where a row of transports were filling up with men. Grisha noticed that every trooper carried far more than did his soldiers back home. To a man they looked formidable and menacing.
“How many are going north?” he asked.
“Nine hundred and sixty on this flight and we have the Fourth PIR in ready reserve if we need them.”
“The last I heard there were over twenty-four hundred Russians heading toward our lines from two different directions.”
“They aren’t there yet, Colonel,” Major Coffey said. “We also have—”
Three waves of five fighters buzzed over the field in tight formation. The paratroopers lined up outside their transports cheered and waved.
“—them,” Coffey finished. “Those are P-61 Eureka long range fighters of the 117th Attack Squadron who will provide cover for us and then seek out targets of opportunity once in the combat zone.”
Grisha couldn’t stop grinning. “This is great!”
They pulled to up the lead transport.
Colonel Buhrman looked over at Grisha. “Going—”
A scout car roared up and screeched to a stop. Colonel Benny Jackson stepped to the tarmac. He nodded at the other two R.O.C. officers. “Del, Joe, glad to see good people are going north with me.”
“You’re going north?” Grisha said.
“Yeah, they’re letting me take a Special Forces strike force to get your ass out of the jam we helped put you in.”
“Benny,” Colonel Buhrman said with a grin, “you’re going with us, not the other way around.”
“Sure, Del, whatever you say.”
Colonel Buhrman looked at Grisha and motioned to the transports. “Going my way, Colonel?”
70
“Colonel Romanov, the last of General Myslosovich’s supply train has left the area.”
“Thank you, Sergeant Severin. Let us enjoy the silence for a while before we bring Captain Kobelev’s motorized scout unit back to the garrison.”
Romanov stepped to the window and opened the blinds. He loved this place more than he had loved any other thing in his life. Most of his men thought of their posting to St. Anthony Redoubt as punishment, but not him.
The Delta River joined the Tanana River less than a kilometer from his office. The redoubt enjoyed a view that few appreciated. Stepan Romanov felt drawn to this country.
Despite his aristocratic name, Roaanov’s grandmother was a Yakut from Siberia and he held deep sympathies for the Dená. He tried to keep his attitudes to himself, but others had noticed.
A visiting colonel once asked for an Indian woman for the night.
Stepan had frowned. “I’m not a whoremonger, colonel, you’ll have to solicit for yourself.”
“You do not know women who—”
“No. You’ll have to ask one of the privates.”
Thankfully, the colonel let the matter drop. Romanov would not allow his men to molest the local women or mistreat any of the civilian population. He preached brotherhood to his troops and had a corporal lashed within inches of his life for beating an old Athabascan man.
Now this stupid war has made a hash of everything, he thought. Not that he blamed the Dená. In fact he felt they were right: the Czar and his ancestors had caused limitless suffering in Alaska and the time for change had long since passed.
Colonel Romanov glanced up guiltily at his sergeant to see if the man had interpreted his silence correctly. The sergeant was staring out of the other window at the same view.
Romanov grinned, then eased back into his military role.
“Very well, Sergeant Severin, notify Captain Kobelev to bring his people in, we have room for them now.”
71
General Taras Myslosovich pulled idly on his white mustache until the scout finished his report. His jowls shook as he turned to Bear Crepov sitting next to him in the command car. “They only shoot from concealment, like the brigands back home?”
“Yes, they are animals without courage. They cannot stand up to the might of the Imperial Army, so they attack like coyotes in the night.” Bear kept his eyes in constant movement as the column clanked up the RustyCan. The Dená could be anywhere.
His loathing for the Indians barely eclipsed his hatred of the Russians. Fate had dealt him a deadly hand. The Russians didn’t trust him and the Indians had put the price of five hundred California dollars on his head.
The Dená bounty was the only thing that kept the Russians from shooting him outright for leaving Valari behind at Chena Redoubt. They thought he should have died to save her, the two-faced bastards, after they had bombed the place flat! He spat out the window of the command car.
“Perhaps war is not to your taste, woodsman,” the fat old general said, barely concealing a sneer.
“The way you wage war is not to my liking,” Crepov said. “The Indians have already proven they can destroy your fancy machines, whether they fly or crawl. We should be advancing quietly through the forest to surprise them in their beds.”
“Reconnaissance shows they have fortified the road at Chena Redoubt as well as the bridge over the Yukon. Infantry, no matter how brave or skilled, cannot take positions like that without armor or air support.” General Myslosovich pulled on his walrus mustache again. Squinting at Bear, he continued with an air of condescension.
“When you have fought as many battles for the Motherland as I have, understanding tactics will become as instinctual as mating with a woman.” He broke into hoarse laughter. “And it can be a damn sight more fulfilling!”
Bear watched the old man crumple into a coughing fit. He felt doomed. This fool was like all the others.
Bear didn’t think the Imperial Army had won a major engagement since the Great War. As far as he knew the troops had spent the past forty years balanced on the backs of the people of Russian Amerika.
Can it be I’m on the wrong side?
A vein of ice pulsed through his head as he considered his past decisions and present limited options.