And it alerted Mosovich. Who lifted his AID.
"Ryan, listen up."
* * *
Ryan leaned forward as the distant AID poured information into the net. The Posleen charging up the saddle were clear and so was Mosovich's position.
"Are you going to be able to get out of there?" Ryan asked.
"I'll be fine," the sergeant major said. "I want fire on that saddle, right now, please, sir."
"On the way," Ryan said, sending the fire commands to the prelaid guns. "Twenty-seven seconds. I figured you'd fire up the saddle."
"Right," Mosovich said, leaning into the rifle and taking his first shot as the Posleen came into view. "Until we're done here my AID will give a continuous feed; keep the fire on the pass, though, I don't want you to follow the Posleen up the hill. And, if you wouldn't mind, sir, pass this on. I can see Clarkesville from here and I figured out why they're trying to keep us from observing them. They're digging in, like they do with their factories, but these are apparently barracks."
"That's not a surprise," Ryan said, watching the artillery flight clock. "Why would they be so worried about that? I mean, we have a pretty fair count on their numbers, so it's not like they're hiding anything."
"Well, they're barracks and motorpools, I should say," Mosovich added. He knew that firing the Barrett was giving his position away to the God King's sensors, but apparently they were all still in the trees. He saw one plasma round hit a poplar and turn it into a ball of fire.
"Motorpools?" Ryan asked suspiciously. "Splash, over." The rounds were only a few seconds away from impacting.
"Yes, sir," Mosovich said, as the first rounds started to land in the trees. "For the flying tanks. Splash out."
* * *
"A kenal flak, senra, fuscirto uut!" Orostan shouted. He shook his arm and glared at the flash burn. "I am going to eat that human's GET."
"Perhaps," Cholosta'an said, running up the trail behind the oolt'ondai's forces. "But only if he doesn't adjust that artillery onto us!"
The two Kessentai along with the first oolt of Orostan's force, by pure luck, had been off of the saddle and out of the beaten zone by the time the first round hit. But behind them the sound of superquick detonating in the treetops was mixed with the scream of oolt'os and Kessentai caught in the barrage. That included what was left of Cholosta'an's oolt, but he wasn't going back for it either.
A normal ahead of Cholosta'an grunted, slapped at his side and fell sideways screaming down the slope.
"The artillery is masking the fuscirto fire," Orostan snarled, pointing his plasma gun towards the hilltop. He had had a bead on the sniper earlier, but the thrice-damned trees had gotten in the way. His crest on his left side was scorched so badly it might have to be cut away.
He fired at approximately where he thought the sniper was and the normals around him followed the target point slavishly.
"Uh, Oolt'ondai," Cholosta'an said, darting past the older Kessentai, "you might want to move around a little."
As the words left his muzzle, Orostan let out a bellow of rage and clapped at the furrow that had appeared along his flank. "Sky demons eat your souls! Come out and show yourself, you gutless bastard!" he screamed. But he started back up the path anyway, ducking and weaving among the limited cover while peppering the smoking hilltop with shots from his plasma gun. "Gutless abat!"
* * *
Jake slapped at the leaves in front of his position to put out the fire. Fortunately the God King seemed to think he was firing from about fifty meters to the west. Unfortunately, he'd missed the one shot he got at the bastard. It was difficult to tell which ones were God Kings at this range, unless they lifted their crests and these seemed to be keeping them down. There was usually a little difference in size, but not enough to be noticeable at eight football fields. God Kings were generally more heavily armed, as well, but judging by this group headed up the hill that wasn't clear. Most of the Posleen had either heavy railguns or plasma cannon with a few hypervelocity missile launchers thrown in for giggles. Which one was the God King on the basis of weaponry was anyone's guess. The last difference was "attitude" or at least who did what first. In this case, one particular Posleen sporting a plasma gun had fired, then all the other Posleen followed suit.
Fortunately they all fired at the wrong place, but the misses, thermal wash and ricochets had been mighty interesting for a few seconds there. A chunk of the hilltop the size of a house had been flattened and was surrounded by a growing forest fire. The trees, shrub and dirt in the area were just gone and most of the exposed rocks were smoking. If they'd fired at the right bit of mountain, or if they spotted him, his ex-wife would be getting a telegram and a check.
It wasn't dying so much that worried him, but it really ticked him off that his ex would get the check.
"I gotta find a better beneficiary," he muttered, taking a bead on the next Posleen in the line.
* * *
Cholosta'an darted around the oolt'ondai and put his hand on the older Kessentai's chest. "Let the oolt'os go first, Oolt'ondai," he said.
"I will eat the heart of this thresh," Orostan ground out. "I swear it."
From just up the trail came a crack of another mine and the descending scream and clatter of a Posleen falling off the narrow track. "Yes, Oolt'ondai," the younger Kessentai said. "But you can't do that if you are dead."
The oolt'ondai lifted his crest for a moment then lowered it as more oolt'os trickled by. There was a steady stream making it through the artillery beaten zone and there was no way the human was going to escape this time; the other side was too sheer for even one of these damn rock-monkeys to scale.
They had made it far enough up the trail, apparently, that the human could not observe their location. But as he looked back he saw another oolt drop off the trail with a fist sized hole through his midsection and this one, in its flailing, knocked another off the path. The human was up there and still stinging them, but Cholosta'an was right; he would have to live to get any revenge worth savoring.
"Very well, youngling," Orostan finally said with a hiss of humor. He stepped to the side to clear the path. "We'll let a few more oolt'os get ahead of us, yes?"
"Yes, Oolt'ondai," the oolt commander said. He recognized a few of the oolt headed up the trail by sight and smell and that indefinable sense of "mine" that said they were of his oolt'os. But damned few. "So much for being unexpendable."
"Not at all, youngling," the oolt'ondai said with a limited crest flap, lest the sniper still have an angle on them. "Again you prove your worth. How many Kessentai in your position would have had the head to hold back? And of those, how many would have thought to stop my impetuousness? And, last, of those very few, how many would have dared?"
"Few, fewer and fewest," the Kessentai agreed as another "crack!" came from up the trail. "But I could wish that my oolt'os were not so few as well."
"That we will make up for after this," the oolt'ondai said, getting back on the path. "But I want to be there at the kill."
* * *
Mosovich stroked the trigger one more time and rolled to his feet. He had been carefully counting the mines on the hill and the last one was, indeed, the last one. If it did not kill the Posleen that had detonated it, a short dash would take the centauroid to the crest of the mountain. That spot was in a thick stand of rhododendron and mountain laurel, but just beyond there the Posleen would be in position to flank Mosovich's position, and, what was worse, cover the back door to the hide with direct fire.
Mosovich backed out leaving most of the boxes of ammunition and all of Nichols' dirty socks behind. He wouldn't, frankly, need either where he was going.