Okay, let’s assume there is still a country. It was Uncle’s order that sent my division to the west. They’ll be howling for his blood… so he’ll give them mine. And these three crewman will testify against me. They have to go. But I need them for now to get me out of here, so they cannot go just yet.
Once we’re at sea, then, I can dispose of them… but how to do it? Shoot them? Tough to do and the driver, in particular might escape. Sink the tank? Also hard to do and, what’s more, I don’t want to get sucked down with it.
Aha! I know. When we get close to land I’ll get out, as if to wave for help, then drop a couple of grenades into the turret. Grenades leave little trace even if they should somehow recover the tank.
My story? Let’s see. I had gotten out of the tank just as we approached land to get a better view. After all, the land has become unsafe and I had to watch out for the crew’s welfare. Suddenly — “I don’t know how” — the tank caught fire and blew up. I was thrown overboard. My life vest must have kept me afloat. When I awakened the tank was gone. I drifted for a while, then when I got close enough to land I swam for it.
Okay… that’s plausible and there’ll be no one left to contradict my story. Uncle can press the charges and then have them dropped for lack of evidence.
The setting sun cast its fiery light directly into Diaz’s eyes. He couldn’t see a thing ahead of him. He knew there was no sense in pressing on, yet felt he had to. The Estado Major, the general staff, had to learn the full extent of the disaster.
Diaz continued on, pulling to the right occasionally to catch and spiral higher in one of the mountain-directed updrafts. Sometimes, during those altitude gaining spirals, he could see yet more of the refuse of the massacre. He forced himself to look, despite the nausea it induced.
Finally, with the last rays of the setting sun painting the waves of the Pacific, and with the last known forward position of the 6th Division behind him, he turned one hundred and eighty degree and began to glide back to the east, to the base at Rio Hato.
It was chance then, chance that the sun had set at that precise moment, chance that he was looking in that precise direction, chance that someone on the ground fired human weapons in precisely Diaz’s field of view.
Unmistakable. Someone down there is still fighting. I’ve got to help.
In order to help though, Diaz needed to see more, understand more. He began a slow, lazy three-sixty. As he did he caught more flashes of rifles, machine guns, and cannon. The flashes seemed to form a broad circle.
“Christ!” the boy exclaimed. “They’re still hanging on down there. I’ve got to help.”
Suarez, aided by the communications array of the ACS, had only just managed to form a half circle facing north when the first wave of Posleen hit. The Posleen may have been more surprised at the resistance than the humans had been at the grand scale ambush, since their advance guards stopped and then recoiled at the sudden and unexpected wave of fire that met them.
The Posleen, however stupid they were in the main, were also a species quick to form and quick to react. The human defenders had a few brief minutes of respite before a more serious attack was thrown in. This was not repulsed so easily; Suarez actually had to throw in Connors and his ACS company before the attack was contained.
After that the attack in the north petered out into minor probes and sniping while the bulk of the aliens split east and west to find the vulnerable flank they were sure had to be there. For Suarez and his boys it became a race against time to form a full perimeter before the enemy turned one or both flanks. Cooks and clerks found themselves in the firing line, along with medics hastily armed with the rifles of the fallen. Still, by nightfall a perimeter, more or less cohesive, had been formed.
I couldn’t have even done that without the gringos and their armored suits, Suarez thought.
For his part, Connors, resting for the moment with his back against Suarez’s track, thought, Thank God this colonel knew what the fuck he was doing. Another man and we’d have been dead and peeled like lobsters already.
Simultaneously, both men had much the same thought, which went something like, Not that it much matters. We’re hopelessly cut off out here, no chance of relief or support. We’ll live until the ammo runs low or the fuel runs out or the power dies in the suits and then we’ll die anyway. Tonight, maybe at the latest mid-day tomorrow, and it’ll all be over but the munching.
Even as he finished that shared thought, Connors suddenly sat upright. Clearly and distinctly, through his suits communicator, he heard a Spanish voice, “Any station, any station, this is Lima Two Seven.”
“Lima Two Seven this is Romeo Five Five. Who the fuck are you? What the fuck are you?”
Diaz nearly whooped with joy. “Romeo, I am a glider. If you look carefully you might be able to see me overhead. How can I help?”
The answering voice sounded resigned, “You got a couple of nukes, Lima? Because short of that, I doubt there is much you can do to help us.”
Julio thought for a moment, then answered, “No nukes, Romeo, but I might be able to get something nearly as good. Wait, over… Daisy? Daisy? This is Julio. I need your help, Dama.”
Dammit, it had hurt to have had to run away; it had shamed. Daisy had seen Sally back to the cover of the mixed Planetary Defense Base cum anti-lander batteries on the Isla del Rey before turning back to the west. Unfortunately, by the time she had gotten within lunging range at the enemy, there was no one to talk to. Thus, impotent and infuriated, she had steamed south of the isthmus — to and fro, east and west — looking and hoping for a target.
Thus it was that, unconcealed glee in her voice, Daisy announced to McNair, “I’ve got us a ripe one, Skipper.”
McNair, still smarting over the loss of Texas, didn’t hesitate. “Bring us around.” His finger pushed a button. “All hands, this is the captain. Battle stations.”
“Julio, we’re coming,” the ship said.
“It’s neither as good nor as easy as it sounds, sir,” Diaz cautioned over the radio. “I wish I could connect you directly with the ship, but I can’t. If I could, you could direct the fires. As is… well, sir, the ship can toss a huge amount of firepower, and it’s unbelievably accurate, but only along the gun-target line. Anywhere from one third to one half of the shells will be over or under and some of them will be way over or under. If you have troops over or under the target…”
Chingada, Suarez thought. Fat lot of good it does me to blast the aliens if the same fire blasts holes in my own perimeter. The Posleen will recover quicker.
Suarez thought furiously while looking at his map. The ship was going to fire from the Gulf of Montijo, from a position just north of Isla Cebaco. What Diaz had told him meant that he could get effective fire to his east and west, but could not use the ship’s guns to help him break contact north and south.