Firestorm

CHAPTER 20

New Dublin

The battle for New Dublin raged furiously throughout the rest of the night as the Doms fell back toward the bastion in the northwest part of the city. Chack, Silva, and Lawrence rejoined the companies pushing north with Jindal, and after a brief meeting when Silva told them what they’d seen from the air-and Lawrence squirmed under the amazed scrutiny of strangers-the push resumed with a better idea of what they faced. More and more townsfolk, either honestly rising to aid in their liberation or cynically taking what appeared to be the winning side, swelled Chack’s and Jindal’s ranks to the point that they finally reestablished communications with Blair’s larger force on what had become the allied left. He’d known they were coming through the coastal suburbs and palatial estates of the elite by the numbers of Doms-and their sympathizers-streaming past his own right toward the bastion. When the flood became a trickle, he knew the linkup was at hand, and he and his staff met them as the moon began to fade in the brightening sky. The entire allied line was finally reestablished among the affluent-and far less congested-homes southeast of the bastion between the mountains and the glimmering, graying sea.

“We meet again, Mr. Silva!” Blair said, extending his hand.

“We do?” Dennis asked, clasping it, and shaking vigorously.

“Well… yes. I was but a lieutenant of Marines at the time, but we met at a quaint dining establishment in Baalkpan before I sailed with Commodore Jenks and the squadron bound for the west.”

“Zat so?”

“Perhaps you’ll remember later,” Blair said uncomfortably. He saluted Chack. “A most interesting night. I’m glad you’re well, sir. I apologize for the… disorganized nature of the assault.”

“I’m glad you made it, Mr. Blair. And as for the confusion”-Chack blinked-“my Marines have never fought a battle like this before either.”

“Yeah,” said Silva. “More like a drawn-out street brawl in Olongapo-with no SPs-than any battle I ever saw.”

“What’s the situation here?” Chack asked.

“The enemy has skirmishers in the dwellings ahead, but the greatest threat is that they’ve massed their artillery on this front of the bastion.”

“If we could flank the fort, they’d be at our mercy,” Chack observed.

“True, but we can’t move along the cliffs on this side of the mountains. The slopes are bare and within range of their guns. They would see the movement and merely shift their batteries accordingly. And even if we could embark enough troops on ships in all this chaos to get beyond the fort, we’d have to take them nearly to Bray-which is in enemy hands-before we reach a suitable place to land them.”

“Mortars?”

“Most of the crews brought their weapons up to the edge of the city, hoping to support our movements, but we had no contact with them through the night. They showed admirable initiative, and would have saved us if we’d been repelled,” he admitted, “but their utility now is questionable. They’re low on ammunition, and they haven’t the range of artillery. If we move them close enough to drop their bombs into the bastion, they’ll be slaughtered.”

“We can try to get air support,” Chack suggested.

“Uh, maybe,” said Silva. “Lieutenant Reddy, the pilot of the plane that brung me and Lawrence…” He saw Blair’s surprised expression. “Yeah, he’s the actual cousin of ‘Himself,’ if you can imagine.” He chuckled. “I guess it’s a small world, even when two of ’em get mashed together. Anyway, he’d know what we can get and how to do it, but I ain’t got a clue.”

“Semaphore back up the mountains and down to Waterford?” Jindal suggested.

“Maybe,” Silva allowed, “but everything at the lake looked like a mess to me-before we might’ve sorta made it a little worse,” he added cryptically. He saw the others stiffen. “Don’t worry, I reckon the Doms in the valley are the least o’ your concerns, and the garrison there should be safe enough, but things were already a goose pull at the command level even before…” He grinned. “I like that Lieutenant Reddy. He has a elegant approach to fightin’ I can appreciate!”

Chack’s tail swished with… nervous anticipation, but Silva didn’t elaborate.

“Anyway,” Dennis resumed, “we might get word to Sor-Lomaak, who can holler at Cap’n Lelaa, an’ maybe she can sort it out. But what about them flyin’ Grik? Is there more of ’em? Where’re they roostin’? Tough to bring more planes in when they might just get knocked down.”

“I can’t answer that,” Blair said. “We’ve taken few prisoners and none would speak. The loyalists we’ve asked never saw them before last night, so it’s doubtful they ‘roost’ in the city. Yet further proof this… treachery was planned and begun long before the attack on New Scotland! The question of where all these Doms and their support elements have been preparing still remains, however.”

“Oh.” Silva shrugged. “As for that, I got the word before we got tangled up with them Grik birds. Cap’n Lelaa sent a recon north, and several Dom ships was seen steamin’ toward here outta the west. She figgered they were troopships, from your folks’ description of their warships still bein’ under sail. She recalled them scouts to be armed an’ sent to sink ’em! What’s west o’ here where the Doms might stage up?”

“The India Isles?” Blair speculated. “A couple are substantial, but not particularly suited for habitation. They’re rarely visited.”

“Sounds ideal,” Silva agreed. “They use ’em for a stagin’ area for here. If there’s anything left on ’em after this fracas, just park a couple ships there an’ starve ’em out.”

“Indeed, that seems the most likely explanation,” Blair said, “and the best way to eliminate the problem… there. We still have our problem here, though.”

“Why not just starve these creeps out too?” Silva asked. “I mean, you said yourself we’ve about got the boogers bottled up in that fort. Leavehem to rot.”

Chack was surprised by the relatively passive suggestion, considering the source.

“No,” Blair said, determinedly. “They’ve invaded our country, and we’re only beginning to learn the extent of the atrocities they committed here in the name of their sick Church! They’ve ‘sacrificed’ hundreds of people, mostly women, and not even most were indentures! Most were daughters of citizens! We must destroy them root and branch so any here that sympathize with them will learn the cost of treason!”

“I agree,” Jindal growled with no less intensity.

“I as well,” said Chack, less eagerly but with equal determination. “We have a much wider war to consider. Our forces cannot be tied here waiting for the enemy to starve.” He looked at Silva. “I’ve faced these ‘people’ before, and they fight with near the same determination and fanaticism as Grik. Unlike Grik, however, their fanaticism is based on thought and teaching, not instinctual rote. They do as their priests demand of them believing it is right! As long as they hide behind those walls, we must keep sufficient forces here to protect against an attack from within, and they are smart enough to plan an attack to coincide with our moment of least preparedness. They might inflict heavy casualties before they’re stopped, and may even raze the city completely. Worse, they won’t care if all die in the attempt, because the leaders of their faith assure them they’ll be gathered into paradise at the very instant of death!”

“So these ‘padres’ o’ theirs are like Hij gen’rals, er somethin? What’s the top dog look like?”

“Like those that attacked Scapa Flow, a ‘Blood Cardinal’ is present, and would be their overall commander,” Blair said. “His vestments resemble their flag: a red cloak with a barbarously shaped gold cross embroidered upon it. Their headgear is ostentatious, but its shape is different from one to the next. The descriptions I’ve heard of the one here makes it sadly clear it’s not that damned ‘Don Hernan,’ who orchestrated the plot on New Scotland. He must have fled east, back to their lands after all.”

“What would happen if he got bumped off?” Silva asked casually.

Jindal snorted. “Who knows? He’d never expose himself to harm, I’m sure, but ‘Blood Cardinals’ are reputedly immune to ‘earthly injuries’! That’s one reason we’ll hang the bastard for all to see when we catch him. That might go a long way toward undermining the foundations of their perverted teachings!”

“Don’t they ever just, you know, croak?”

Blair snorted this time. “Oh no. To attain ‘godliness’-and I do mean they’re semideified!-Blood Cardinals must mutilate themselves to death! For your average Dom, it’s enough that they ‘die in pain at the hands of another’ to enter paradise!”

“Do they really do it?” Chack asked, amazed. He knew more than Silva, but hadn’t known that.

“Their ‘popes’ sometimes do, when they’re old and sick. I’m sure they’re drugged silly at the time. Usually, those like the chap here, or Don Hernan, are simply laid out for viewing after they’ve suddenly been ‘called to the heavenly embrace.’ I suspect they’re mutilated after a natural death.”

“Wow,” said Dennis. “Huh. I bet them Dom soljers’d flip if they seen their head witch doctor spattered by a cannonball!”

“A lovey thought, and likely correct,” Blair said, grinning, “but as I said, he’ll be well protected-and better protected the longer we wait to finish this!”

Chack looked at the Imperials, then studied the condition of the troops gathered round. “We must destroy them now, while we have the momentum, before they have time to consolidate and improve their defenses!”

All during the conversation, the guns in the bastion continued a steady fire, demolishing houses and shops on the ground separating the two forces. The air was filled with white dust and gray smoke from shattered masonry and rampant fires. A few buildings remained standing, probably full of observers, but it was clear the Doms were making a killing ground that would be difficult to cross.

“Big guns for a fort not designed to protect a harbor. What are they? Eighteens? Twenty-fours?” Dennis suddenly asked.

“Twenties,” Blair said, and Silva blinked at the odd, non-“British” standard bores.

“Watcha got in them forts Sor-Lomak’s fellas took?” he asked.

“Thirties… but many will be damaged and none will bear!”

“So? Look, Chackie here knows you ain’t gotta prod me to fight, but a great hero o’ mine once said, ‘Never send a man where you can send a bullet’! How long would it take to bring them thirty-pound whoppers up?”

“Considerable time, I’m sure,” Blair said, “but they would outrange the enemy batteries and negate their efforts to improve their defenses-once we started battering them down! Mr. Silva, I’ve heard a

… great many things about you, but the accounts have neglected your tactical value!”

“Oh, he’s a taac-ti-caal wonder, gentlemen,” Chack said dryly. “Just pay no heed to his… straa-teegic suggestions!”

“I’m too modest to crow,” Silva proclaimed grandly, looking at Lawrence, who stood there with the broken Doom Whomper. The artillery duel he’d proposed would make a hell of a show, but he intended to send a few well-placed bullets of his own. “Say, anybody in this dump got any glue?”

Colonel Tamatsu Shinya strode into Waterford at the head of his column of Lemurian troops late that afternoon, still staring in wonder at the forest of blackened, skeletal trees surrounding the surely once-picturesque lakeside town. His eyes quested upward occasionally, searching the sky for “dragons,” or “Grik birds” as the fliers called them in their reports. Nothing flew, not even the blizzards of parrots and small, indigenous “dragons.” There was nothing in the air but smoke.

It had been a grueling day. First, they’d come ashore under stiff fire from Dom positions on either side of the beleaguered town of Cork, where the pitiful remnants of the garrison had managed to hold through the night, despite gloomy expectations. The survivors were overjoyed to see them and the mighty USS Maaka-Kakja, as her massive form resolved itself offshore in the light of the breaking day. Another Imperial ship of the line had joined her in the night, and added her guns to Maaka-Kakja ’s as she shelled the enemy positions. Air strikes from the great carrier and the planes she’d recalled from Lake Shannon quickly disrupted the Doms and rebels investing the town across the Belfast and Easky roads. Unable to stop the landings, both forces withdrew as the crack Lemurian regiments streamed ashore. Imperial Marines disembarked from the newly arrived ship of the line, under the direct command of t one-armed Sean “O’Casey” Bates, who’d come to represent the Governor-Emperor himself. As soon as the enemy pulled back, Bates went aboard Maaka-Kakja to greet Rebecca Anne McDonald, his long-lost princess. It was a tearful and touching, if brief reunion, between the child and her onetime fugitive protector and guardian, but Bates quickly returned to shore to oversee his troops and the reconsolidation of the defenses around Cork.

The Imperials remained there while “Shinya’s Division” pushed over the Wiklow Mountains and saw firsthand the results of the previous night’s action in the valley below. None had seen the valley before except the local scouts who led them, but by all accounts what had once been a beautiful, green, sprawling land of old-growth timber, now more closely resembled the bristly black back of a rhino pig. Miraculous pockets of green remained in freakish clumps or lines where the vagaries of the vortex had spared them, but most was now a charred, smoldering landscape as far northwest as the eye could see. Denser smoke still choked the sky in the far distance, fed by the awesome firestorm Lieutenant Reddy’s air attack the previous night had sparked. Nothing could have survived in the path of the monster the fire became, and Shinya doubted any of the Doms that came so close to retaking Waterford had lived.

They’ll be lucky to save Bray itself, he thought, unless the rains come to its rescue or the wind shifts back on itself. Shinya was.. . horrified by the sheer scope of destruction, and suspected their allies would be none too pleased, but he knew Captain Reddy’s cousin and Dennis Silva-of course Silva had been involved!-had done the only thing they could to ensure the forces fighting in New Dublin weren’t cut off from Cork, or attacked from the rear. That didn’t mean he was unaffected by what he saw. Tamatsu Shinya had viewed many horrors in this terrible war, and though the dead valley couldn’t compare to the countless dead people he’d seen, it struck him in a visceral, almost-prescient way that deeply disturbed him.

Adding to that discomfort, all the long day he hadn’t known what became of Reddy and Silva after their flight to check on the situation at New Dublin ended with a terse “bats outta hell” sent by Silva’s erratic Morse, and he’d been surprised how concerned it made him. They’d lost so much in this bizarre war, but he’d come to truly believe Silva was indestructible. And there was the issue of Captain Reddy’s cousin to consider. The captain had become such a source of moral strength to the western allies, not to mention these new ones in the east, some of that… aura… had been bound to rub off on his cousin to some degree, he supposed. How much was uncertain, but with Captain Reddy so far beyond help or even communication, and his fate utterly unknown, the possible loss of the young aviator so closely connected to his “clan” had caused a notably chilling effect aboard the ship beyond what he would’ve expected. It was… odd. Adar was unquestionably Chairman of the Grand Alliance, but whether he realized it or not, or even wanted it, Matthew Reddy had become “royalty” of a sort, and that status extended to his “family.”

Finally, shortly before, a courier arrived from Cork on horseback with the latest intelligence via Sor-Lomaak, describing the battle at New Dublin and the evolving situation there. Included was a brief statement that Reddy, Silva, and Lawrence had survived the downing of their plane. Reddy had been taken to Salaama-Na with a concussion, but Silva and Lawrence had vanished into the swirl of battle. Shinya was relieved but still disturbed. It looked like the battle in New Dublin might require a costly frontal assault to finish, and he was anxious to get there and see the ground for himself. H of Captaired, his division was tired, and they had a long, long way to go.

“Halt there, I say!” cried a hoarse, officious voice.

“‘Imp-ees’ coming, sur,” the company commander walking beside him said-belatedly.

His Springfield rifle on his shoulder, Shinya had been walking, almost oblivious to his immediate surroundings. He was so focused on the scope of the desolation, he hadn’t noticed the procession of dusty, smoke-blackened Imperial officers riding toward him from the edge of the ruined town. “Thank you for the warning, Captain,” he said wryly. “Have we no pickets to the right?”

“Only friends to right… Nothing to left,” the ’Cat said.

Shinya watched the Imperials bring their horses to an ashy, dusty stop. “Perhaps you have not learned human expressions well, Captain,” he said. “I’m not convinced these men are necessarily friends.” He raised his voice to the new arrivals. “I’m Colonel Tamatsu Shinya. I would speak to the person in command here. If none of you are he, please lead me to him, bring him to us, or get the hell out of our way. We have a battle to join.”

“The battle here is quite over!” the officious voice declared, allowing Shinya to put a face with it. The man’s expression seemed more annoyed than relieved by that.

“Excellent. Then we’ll continue on to find another,” Shinya snapped. He kept walking.

“To what purpose? To further destroy this land?” the man snarled.

Shinya waved the column on but stopped himself. “It’s been a long march already today-after a predawn landing and a short fight that began it. I’m weary. It was my understanding this battle ended in victory, for which you should be thankful. The Dominion does not treat those they conquer with kindness, true? Rejoice that the fighting here is done and you still live.”

“But… that madman and his flying machines destroyed one of the most beautiful-not to mention strategic-resources in the Empire! This valley is almost sacred to those who live within it, and the timber is essential to the shipbuilding industry!”

Shinya looked around. “No one lives here now, and there are other forests in the Empire.” He waved about him. “These trees will still make fine ships; they’re only scorched on the outside.”

“Damn you, sir!” raged the officer. “Have you no compassion? No understanding of the tragedy here?”

“Damn you!” Shinya roared, his eyes darker than the blackened trees. “Have you no understanding of the word ‘ war ’? I desire words with the commander here, not fools. If you can’t produce such a specimen, I’ll be on my way-anticipating the day you and I meet again on the Dueling Grounds at Scapa Flow!”

“I command here, Colonel Shinya,” another officer announced firmly, after a brief hesitation. “As of this moment. Run along now, Colonel Meems. Perhaps I can convince this belligerent gentleman not to murder you in front of your children, come the next ‘Meeting Day’ Sunday!”

The officious officer whirled his mount and galloped away, followed by another, amid a rising, gray cloud, leaving four mounted men.

“Major Gladney, at your service,” the “commander” said, dismounting. “Of the artillery. Meems is an excitable fellow, where his trees are concerned. He has holdings here. Please, I brought maps when I saw your column. We have recent news of the fighting across the Sperrin range, and I think I can show you some pathways your infantry might use that will place you well to support our friends. The paths are quite steep in places and utterly unsuited for artillery, but men or… your people… should be able to negotiate them in daylight.”

“Thank you, Major Gladney. I’d hoped as much.” Shinya paused, looking at his tired troops marching by. “Can these trails be found in the dark?”

Gladney was taken aback. “I suppose, by one who knows them. I could not recommend it, however.”

“Nevertheless, there will be a good moon again tonight, and we must move with haste.”

“You’re talking about a march of thirty miles-as the parrot flies!-over two rough, high ranges without stop!”

“We will stop… now and then. I may not make it with all my troops, but I’ll certainly have my Marines. They have… practiced marches such as this.”

Gladney shook his head. “Very well. I’ll see that you have guides.”

Sunday, January 8, 1944

“Well, well,” Silva said, staring through an Imperial telescope with his good eye and stifling a yawn. “I figgered it was gonna be a helluva show. Glad we got here early for a good seat, hey, Larry?”

All night, the big guns in the bastion and the heavier ones the allies dragged forward from the ruined forts flared and snarled thunderously at one another, jetting white, orange, and yellow fire from vents and muzzles amid sparkling streaks of tiny red embers. The bastion was taking a pounding, as was the entire city most likely, but the Doms simply couldn’t give as good as they got. They were more concentrated, engaging well-placed and dispersed targets, and the weight of metal alone left them at a disadvantage enough to smother them eventually. That fact didn’t seem to discourage them, and they did their best to match the allies shot for shot. Silva had to wonder just how much ammunition had been stowed in the bastion. The Doms had to know they couldn’t last long under such a storm of iron and must’ve decided to use their artillery to cause as much damage to their enemy-and the city-as they could before their guns were silenced.

“Are you sure our guys know we’re here?” Lawrence asked nervously when a heavy roundshot struck the building on the ground floor below, crashing through the volcanic rock wall and sending pumice and plaster dust swirling up the stairs into their second-story overlook.

Silva turned and spat a yellowish stream of “tobacco” juice that missed Lawrence’s clawed hand by inches. “ Course they know, dummy! You think I’d lie here all comfterble an’ ser-een, careless o’ danger, if our fellas didn’t know we was in what the Doms’d expect to be a prime target for our guns?”

“Yess!” Lawrence hissed darkly. “That was one of ‘ our ’ guns!”

Silva shrugged in the gloom. “So? With all that flashin’ out there, some poor gunner was prob’ly seein’ triple. ’Sides, it might raise suspicion if they didn’t shoot at this shack once in a while. It was an observation post, after all.”

Six Dom corpses kept them company in the building that had once been a drying house for a wheelwright. The Imperials made good wheels and the place was full of them. There were probably thousands of spokes and felloes of all sizes, and hundreds of hubs. Five dead Doms were downstairs where they’d been killed by Silva’s Thompson when he and Lawrence burst in upon them, utterly unexpected. A sixth man had fled upstairs, but Lawrence caught him from behind and tore out his throat before he could leap from the window they now stared through.

“I wonder why the ene’ee doesn’t shoot at us,” Lawrence said. “It’s not as if we send any signals. They ha’ to think we’re here.”

“Naa. What would we do if we was them dead Doms? Run back ’n forth ’mongst all that iron an’ shit out there? Make a light? They prob’ly had ’em here for daylight spottin’, or to holler if we was doin’ somethin’… like we did. Now, quit bein’ a weenie!”

Dawn began to break at last, and the cannonade slowly tapered off. It was as if each side yearned for a look at what they’d done to the other. Then, by some unspoken, mutual consent, all the guns on the north side of New Dublin gradually fell silent. Sunday was a holy day to all present, except Lemurians, and perhaps no one wanted to be first to resume the killing under the bright sun creeping above the eastern sea and displaying for all to view what that terrible night had wrought. Dark smoke towered into the sky from a large percentage of the city, rising above the mountains and joining a purple-brown haze moving west. Dennis, and likely the rest of the allies, caught their first real glimpse of the “dragons” then, spiraling high above on rising thermals in the clear air to seaward. There weren’t many, maybe half a dozen in view, and they weren’t nearly as scary in the daylight-at least to Dennis, who’d seen far more frightening things. They did look like big Grik, though, with longer, more feathered tails-and broad, almost batlike wings, of course-and he knew if Lieutenant Reddy had been able to see them they’d have never brought his “Nancy” down. One of the creatures approached the battlefield from upwind and swooped down to light on a corpse, savagely tearing into it. Where the body was, it had to be a Dom.

“Eww. Not particular about the menu, I guess,” Silva said. “Flyin’ Griks, all right. Nasty bastards. Can’t even tell whose side they’re on down here!” He blinked. “Hey! Maybe they can’t tell, with everything so mixed up. I wonder what good they are? They would’a had to already be here before the Doms ever saw a plane! Maybe they use ’em for goin’ after ships or somethin?” He shrugged. “Get a load o’ this, Larry! Your lofty relations got shitty table manners!”

“Not relations!” Lawrence snapped. “You’re a ‘right guy,’ Sil’a, usually. You’re also an asshole!”

“Well, this world is so screwed up, I guess it’s up to me to balance the scales,” Dennis replied philosophically. He continued to watch the creatures kiting lazily above. “Not real energetic this mornin’,” he muttered to himself, “and they don’t seem to care much for smoke. Every time one gets close to any, he veers off, soon as he notices it. Huh.”

The “cease-fire” persisted, and it started getting hot in their upstairs lair. Eventually, a distant church bell tentatively rang, then another. Still the Doms didn’t fire.

“I’ll be damned,” Silva said. “I was hopin’ for somethin like this!” He was peering through the telescope again, adjusting the length to sharpen the focus.

“What?”

“Everbody’s takin’ a break from the killin’, for a prayer meetin’! Since that didn’t poke the Doms into shootin’ at the ‘heretics,’ maybe they’ll have a ‘God save my murderin’ ass, ’cause I’m fixin’ to die ’ meetin’ of their own!” He shifted his view to the steep mountains beyond the enemy stronghold, refocusing and examining, then returned it to the bastion. Quite a few guns had been dismounted, their carriages shattered, and the walls were largely battered to rubble. There were probably still more than two thousand men inside, some near remaining guns and others milling around. Corpses had been piled in heaps, and the yellow-and-white uniforms of Dom “regulars”-“Salvadores” he’d heard them called-and the yellow and scarlet of the “Blood Drinkers” were spattered and smeared with blackening red. He stiffened when a group, not nearly as soiled as most, emerged from what looked like a companionway in the ground, near the most heavily reinforced portion of the structure.

“Yes indeedy! That goofy-lookin’ devil’s gotta be ol’ Bunny Crap hisself!”

During the night, Silva’s name for the Blood Cardinal had changed many times. First, it was simply “B.C.,” but that didn’t seem right for a lot of reasons. Finally, he’d taken the initials and expanded them in numerous ways, ultimately settling on “Bunny Crap” with a vigor Lawrence didn’t understand. Of course, he had no idea what a “bunny” was. Maybe their excrement was particularly notable?

Silva hefted the Doom Whomper and inspected the repaired wrist in the growing light. The brownish glue hadn’t quite set, but the joint seemed firm. He’d also wrapped it tightly with about a thousand turns of fine, strong thread. It felt as if it would hold. A bunch of dust and other debris had stuck to the tacky glue saturating the thread, but the weapon was otherwise spotless. “Gimme my pouch,” he ordered. Lawrence handed it over. Dennis removed a “paper” cartridge. (Although the allies had “real” paper now, the cartridges were a kind of early “industrial” grade, unfit for writing on, made from pulped, pressed “linen,” and waxed when assembled.) He tore it open and poured the powder down the barrel. Then he opened a small wooden box he’d made in one of Maaka-Kakja ’s shops, expressly for protecting a dozen “perfect” bullets from deformation-particularly of their relatively fragile “skirts.” He chose a pair of the massive, prelubed projectiles and laid one aside, then carefully inserted the other into the muzzle. Drawing the rammer, he seated the bullet down the long, 25-mm barrel until it rested firmly against the powder charge. Removing the rammer, he handed it to Lawrence.

“You hang ready to hand me a cartridge, that other bullet, and the rammer quick, you hear?”

“I hear.”

Dennis nodded and raised the frizzen of the old Imperial lock he’d lovingly tuned, picked the vent with a hammered bronze pick that dangled by a thong from the triggerguard, and poured a dash of finely ground priming powder into the exposed pan. Closing the frizzen, he retested the edge of the flint clamped in the jaws of the gooseneck-shaped “hammer,” or “cock,” with the tip of his finger. “She’s all set,” he said softly, easing closer to the window and sitting down. He’d spent some of the night erecting a sturdy rest for the long, heavy barrel, and he’d placed a wooden chair where it would support his right elbow. Carefully, he settled in.

“You sure you can shoot that long?” Lawrence asked, his eyes flicking from Dennis to the distant target. “ I never saw you shoot that long! Four hundred ’Cat tails…”

“Just shut up, wilya?” Dennis growled. “I shot it this far enough times to mark the sight,” he added, flipping up the sight slide and easing the aperture up. “I ain’t done it since then,” he admitted, “but I ain’t had to. I know it’ll do it… I know I can do it. That’s what counts. Now, I’m gonna start concentratin’. Things might fuzz up, and ol’ Bunny Crap’s just a red blob in this sight. You get that glass and tell me everything you see!” He pulled the hammer back all the way and squeezed the rear trigger until it clicked.

Lawrence raised the brass telescope and peered through it, adjusting the length to suit his vision. The device fascinated him. He couldn’t use human binoculars, but the telescope worked just fine. “He’s the guy dressed in the red sail, right?” he asked.

“Yeah. Real fat booger with a goofy white hat. There’s other guys in red capes, or whatever, but they got helmets on.”

“Okay. I got hi… he. He’s going through the soldiers, touching they, raising his hands o’er they… I think he’s going to get on a wrecked thing so they see he easier.”

“Swell.”

“You still got he?” Lawrence asked.

“I still gottee,” Dennis mocked.

Lawrence’s crest twitched upward, but he said nothing for a moment. “You… don’t think this is… incorrect to your soul, to… ass-assinate he like this?”

The brow over Dennis’s eye patch arched slightly, while his right eye continued staring fixedly through his sights. “Uh, nope.”

“It… gi’s I a strange… sensation…”

“You ain’t gettin’ cold flippers on me, are you?” Silva demanded. “We’ve killed lots o’ fellas together that had less of a chance than fatso over there.”

“Yes… in war, in ’attle. Close. This ’eels… sneaky-like hunting, though not to eat. You should not hunt thinking, knowing things.”

“It is sneaky, you nitwit! But I ain’t gonna eat him. He’s like a shik-sak, see? You kill ’em to keep ’em from killin’ you or people you care about. Some things need killin’ just because they’re bad, and there’s folks the same way. Bad folks that need killin’-an’ damn sure don’t deserve a ‘fair fight.’”

“Shiksaks don’t know they’re ’ad.”

“Which makes me feel more regret killin’ them than that fat bastard over there! Look, you know me. I’d rather walk over there and knock his brains out with a rock, but I don’t expect all them other fellas around him would let me. I’m told he’s the… shiksak’s head around here. If you cut a shiksak’s head off, the body might flop around a while, but it ain’t near as dangerous. In this case, if I take the ‘head’ off, the ‘body’ could do the same thing for a while, but it won’t necessarily die. Maybe… not all of it really deserves to die. Lotsa times, the body only does bad things it needs killin’ for because the head makes it… see?”

Lawrence sighed noisily. “Sorta. Now I think sad to kill… ’ody, and not just head!”

Silva grunted. “Well, that won’t do. Look, war’s a hell of a thing, and there just flat ain’t any rules like we think of ’em otherwise. You try not to kill folks that don’t have it comin’, but the bottom line is to protect those that matter to you. Period. The enemy’s gonna try to do the same thing-and somebody’s gotta lose. That’s the deal, and it’s our job to make sure it ain’t us and ours doin’ the losin’. Now, we been sittin’ here most o’ the night waitin’ for this, and we better not screw it up. I gotta concentrate, an’ if you won’t spot for me, then get the hell outta my sight.”

“I’ll s’ot,” Lawrence said quietly, and refocused his glass. “Okay, he’s on wreckage, still talking. He’s standing still-exce’t his hands. Looks like all now gathered to see… To hear. They kneeling, looking down, all exce’t ’unny Craph. He’s looking down too now, still talk…”

Lawrence jerked when the mighty roar and physically stunning overpressure of the Doom Whomper took him completely by surprise. He almost dropped the glass, but he managed to steady it just in time to see most of the Blood Cardinal’s head erupt in a crimson explosion that launched large chunks of flesh, bone, and other matter in all directions-and sent the ridiculous white hat tumbling high in the air. The bloated body beneath the red blast instantly collapsed and rolled from its perch.

“I thought you only see red thing!” Lawrence cried.

“So?” answered Silva, his voice strained.

“You knocked his head… gone!”

“No shit? I was aimin’ pretty much ‘center of blob.’ Musta shot high.”

Lawrence looked at him then and saw Dennis still sitting, a slightly stunned expression on his suddenly bloody face. The Doom Whomper remained in his hands, but the wrist repair had obviously failed under the intense recoil of the weapon, folding the buttstock back on itself within the frayed and shattered coils of thread. Something, most likely the hammer, had struck Silva under his right eye as the gun traveled backward, opening a long gash. Dennis shook his head and blood pattered the dusty floor around him.

“Damn. Busted my favorite gun again.” He looked at Chack, his eye now clear. “We better get the hell outta here! Nobody else is shootin’ just now, and they’ll have seen our smoke. Remember what I said about cut-tin’ a shiksak’s head off? I bet its whole, floppin’ carcass is about to land on top of us!”

Lawrence’s bright eyes bulged. “You didn’t say carcass could choose where to land!”

Dennis gently kissed his broken weapon and laid it on the floor. “So long, Doll. I’ll be back for ya!” He snatched his Thompson and the belt loaded with his pistol, cutlass, bayonet, and mag pouches that he’d removed for comfort during his shot, and hustled Lawrence toward the stairs. “Well… maybe it won’t, but you know how them shiksaks are! They tend to flop toward what killed ’em even after they’re dead! Don’t forget your musket-might need that!”

“Batteries, commence firing! Fire at will,” Chack roared down from the crumbling rooftop on which he, Blas, Blair, some of their staffs. .. and others… had assembled.

“What in blazes are they shooting at?” Blair demanded. “All morning, not a shot, then they grow irked at that one structure? Madness!”

“That ‘structure’ is the one Chief Silva asked us to avoid demolishing last night,” Chack reminded him, his tail swishing irritably, “while he was repairing his giant musket. He and Lawrence must’ve secured it, and now they have managed to… do something exceptionally annoying to the Doms. You may have heard Silva has that effect on people?”

The “grand battery” the allies began assembling the morning before now included almost thirty big guns, plus all the field artillery with its explosive case shot Chack and Blair could bring down from the Waterford pass. From their hastily formed, then carefully reinforced positions roughly a thousand yards or “tails” (handy how that worked out so closely) from the “Dom” bastion, Chack’s batteries opened fire in ones and twos, but soon the entire line hammered at the enemy from within an impenetrable white cloud of continuous, earsplitting thunder and dazzling, lightninglike flashes. Smoke billowed across the shot-churned, devastated “no-man’s-land” that had evolved between the positions, and drifted west toward the base of the more extreme slope that still lay under a blanket of lingering gun smoke caused by the long duel. Despite the improved visibility daylight afforded the enemy, Chack was amazed to see, from his elevated post, almost the entire remaining Dom artillery target the nearly lone-standing structure both sides had thus far largely ignored. The building was very rapidly disintegrating under the combined hail of iron.

“Whatever he did,” Blas said, “ ‘irked’ seems a weak word. It means ‘a little pissed,’ yes? They pissed a lot!”

“I certainly hope your strange friends have made their escape,” Blair said, “but whatever they did to attract such fire, our guns are now slaughtering theirs with virtually no reply.” He looked meaningfully at Chack. “And the enemy’s attention is suddenly quite fixed.”

“Very well.” Chack looked at Blas and motioned her to join the “partisans” who’d brought them one of Colonel Shinya’s exhausted “Maa-ni-lo” Marines, along with a squad of the first Imperial Marines he’d found when he wandered into a command post near the waterfront a few hours before. “Assist that Marine in his task, Lieutenant,” he said. “He has earned the honor.”

The Marine, a corporal by the stripes on his kilt, blinked appreciation, but waved at the locals. “Thank you, sir, but this is their Home.”

“Well put,” Chack agreed, nodding. “Corporal, would you assist Lieutenant Blas-Ma-Ar in showing the loyal citizens how to fire the signal rockets Colonel Shinya sent? Major Blair, I’m going to join my troops. I suggest you remain here.”

Blair smiled. “Major Chack, if I thought it necessary for anyone to remain behind, I’d insist it be you… but we’ve all earned this!”

Chack grinned, his sharp teeth shining in the sunlight. “Very well, Major. Lieutenant Blas will remain and direct the reserves, if any are needed.” He glanced at the furiously blinking female. “ She has ‘earned’ the rest!”

“Rockets!” Lawrence said, staring into the sky from the debris-choked culvert where they huddled, scarcely a hundred and fifty yards from the wheelwright’s shop being systematically pulverized. Fewer Dom guns were firing now, however. “’Retty rockets!”

Silva looked up at the sputtering, dissolving flares. “Those’re signal rockets, you imbi-cile!” he shouted. The sudden thunder of drums couldn’t compete with the allied guns, but it bled through between reports. “Attack’s a’comin’!” he announced gleefully. Then his abused ears heard other drums, more distant, resonating against the mountains. “Ha- ha! I knew that Jap couldn’t stay outta this!” He removed the twenty-round stick from the Thompson, blew dust off of the rounds clustered at the top, and slid it back in with a shklak. “C’mon, Fuzzy, let’s try to get back in this fight before it’s all over!”

Lawrence looked at the cap under the hammer of his musket. “You think it’s nearly o’er?”

“Yep… if it ain’t already! Let’s go!”

“Ain’t ’uzzy!” Lawrence grumbled, and the two of them bounced up amid a cloud of plaster dust and ran and leaped toward the middle of what had once been the exclusive “Company” district of North New Dublin where nothing of the desolated houses and shops still stood higher than Silva’s knees. That was where the center of the advancing ranks would pass.

“It” wasn’t completely over for some. Now almost surrounded, the Doms in the old bastion had no chance. The grueling, almost thirty-hour bombardment had taken a terrible toll on lives and nerves, and the “regulars” and rebels had been ready to surrender with the coming of the day and the realization they were all alone. The city burned and smoldered beneath the smoky sky and against the incongruously achingly beautiful landscape beyond. Reinforcements weren’t coming; there was nothing on the coast road from Bray but refugees fleeing the only direction they could from a wall of fire that encompassed all the vast valley of the island. The entire host Don Alfonso and the Bishop of the Seven Relics led down the Waterford road had surely been consumed by the flames of the hell they’d marched into. Even Bray would probably burn. Nothing re- mained on that now-desolate, virtual plain between the stronghold and the enemy in New Dublin, and nothing could possibly remain of the grand plan to advance the “Modo de los Santos” and take this place for themselves, their leaders, and the greater glory of God.

Into this outpost of ruin, misery, death, and defeat, Cardinal Don Kukulkan de los Islas Guapas, newly appointed Ruler of the Conquest and Saver of Souls, emerged into the hot, bloody day and went among the shattered men of the garrison. Few were unmoved by his gesture and most honestly expected him to Purify himself before them and release his soul into God’s embrace. Perhaps that was his ultimate intent, but first he began to pray. He prayed that the men of the garrison would enter paradise boldly, each with a long tally of the unclean heretics they’d cast into hell. He prayed their families wouldn’t suffer excessively due to their sacrifice, and if they did, that God and the saints would readily accept them because of it-in some capacity at least. He’d just finished this last plea on behalf of the doomed men around him, the men he was condemning with his words, his charge, his edict not to yield, when his head blew up.

At first, there was shock and, frankly, superstitious awe, until an artilleryman cried that the cardinal had been shot by a distant, hidden marksman. That announcement created pandemonium because it just wasn’t possible… was it? Regardless, the artillery commander shook off the dreadful implications of the event and summoned the wits-or whatever it took-to order all his guns to fire on the indicated building. That galvanized all the troops into action of some sort, and they’d begun reverting to their training… when the barrage suddenly resumed. Dominion soldiers, rebels, fugitive family members, all were caught in the open when heavy roundshot and high-velocity shards of stone slashed them apart. Case shot exploded over the fort, scything into flesh and bone with red-hot copper fragments and musket balls. The hail of death was unrelenting, and the screams competed with thundering guns and bursting case. The garrison would cast no heretics into hell; hell had found them there, within their demolished walls.

Then the apostates formed for their final assault, not only from the southeast, but from the west where no troops could possibly have gathered! The artillery commander, who’d somehow survived the onslaught, saw this, and his confused mind finally crystallized around a coherent thought: surrender. He raced for a pair of blood-spattered breeches that had been blown nearly off a corpse, yanked a mangled leg out of them, and cast it away; then he began tying the morbid garment to a rammer staff. A “Blood Drinker” cut him down with a sword. Outraged, the artillerymen fell upon all the Blood Drinkers, joined by the regulars who dared to brave the maelstrom. The elite, holy guard of the pope himself all got their most fervent wish when they were shot, stabbed, and torn apart by their own countrymen. Only then did the white flag wave above the bastion.

“All that beautiful music, then somebody called off the dance!” roared an unhappy voice behind Tamatsu Shinya. He was standing on the rubble of what had been the southwest wall of the bastion, thinking dark thoughts, and staring down into a pulverized cauldron of mangled flesh. Men and ’Cats moved through the carnage, coughing on the dust they raised and occasionally retching at the stench. They were searching for signs of life, but there were few survivors after the majority of the shell-shocked defenders had been led or carried from the fort. In spite of himself and the scene he viewed, a corner of Shinya’s mouth quirked upward, and he turned. Dennis Silva stood grinning at him, Lawrence by his side. Both were filthy, and Silva had an ugly wound on his face.

“You have contrived to cheat death once more, I see,” Shinya said.

“Good to see you too, Colonel. I’m fine. Thanks for askin’.” Silva gestured around. “You missed a good fight.” He paused. “In the city the other night, I mean. This was just killin’.”

“I heard you had a hand in that… again.”

Silva waved modestly and kicked a bronze gun tube, half-buried. “Shucks, it was nothin’.” His expression turned serious. “You musta seen Chack?” Shinya nodded. “Good. He was lookin’ for you.” The grin returned. “You mighta missed the fight, but I sure was glad to see you come marchin’ across that field, yonder. How’d you get there, and so damn fast?”

“A quite dreadful march, I assure you,” Shinya said ruefully. “And still too late.”

“Don’t worry. There’ll be plenty more fights in this war, and you can’t miss ’em all! I’ve decided to retire from the battle-winnin’ business. Folks are startin’ to whisper that maybe I’m hoggin’ all the glory.” Silva shook his head. “Spread the joy, I always say.”

Shinya chuckled. “If I had not spent so much time around you, and Americans in general, I might think you were serious.” It was Shinya’s turn to shake his head. “You will never retire-and you will never die

… my friend. The day may come when you no longer breathe or live among us, but you will never die.”

For a moment, Dennis said nothing. Suddenly, he stuck out a grimy paw. “Say, did you just call me ‘my friend’?”

“I did.”

“Didja mean it?”

Shinya took the offered hand. “Yes. Yes I did, if you’ve no objection.”