Unto the Breach

Chapter Fourty-Four

The mortar missed Adams’ position by barely a meter, dropping in the trench instead of directly on them.

That wasn’t much of a mercy. The blast area of the 120mm mortar was nearly twenty five meters. At a meter, the concussion could kill you.

The walls attenuated the concussion, though, the angles funneling it to the rear of the position and away from the two fighters. They also caught most of the shrapnel. Most.

Oleg’s left leg caught most of the rest.

The team leader let out a shriek of agony that morphed into a bellow of pure rage.

Adams was knocked nearly unconscious by the blast. His position was more in the line the concussion had taken and it threw him against the earth and rock wall, the combination of overpressure and impact slamming the air out of his lungs and causing his head to ring.

He shook the fog off like a horse flicking a fly and looked at Oleg. The first thing he saw was that the Keldara was either screaming or shouting. It took him a moment to track down to the leg.

It was a mess. Meat had been stripped away from the bone and Oleg’s foot was lying across the trench.

Adams slid forward and pulled out a fast-tourniquet, slipping it around Oleg’s thigh, low down by the knee. If they were lucky they might keep the upper thigh. There was no way that the best reconstructive surgeon in the world was going to keep the leg.

Oleg had his hand clamped around the thigh and Adams had to push it to the side. He slipped on the fast-tourniquet and pulled it tight then used the latch to cinch it down. The red arterial blood stopped squirting out at least.

“I gotta get you back to the bunker, buddy!” Adams shouted, sliding his arm under the big Keldara’s armpit.

Oleg was shouting something at him but Adams couldn’t catch it. He realized he was deaf as a post. It should pass; it had happened before. But right now he couldn’t figure out what Oleg was shouting. The Keldara pushed him off and reached down to his belt, pulling out that tomahawk all the Keldara carried. He pointed it at the leg and made a chopping motion.

“No fucking way!” Adams shouted, shaking his head. He reached into his own harness and pulled out a morphine ampoule. The guy was clearly crazy with pain.

Oleg slapped it out of the Master Chief’s hand and reached forward, grabbing him behind the head and dragging him down to look directly in the eye.

“I NEED TO LEAD!” Oleg screamed. “TO FIGHT! TOO MUCH PAIN! ONE LEG!”

Oleg took the axe and shoved it into Adams’ hand, then pointed at the leg.

Adams understood. Oleg only needed one leg to stand in the position and fight the Chechens. He didn’t need any to command his troops. But he couldn’t do that with the pain of the ripped-up leg. Or on morphine.

There was just one problem. Adams looked at the axe for a second and then held up one finger, getting up in a crouch.

He went down the trench, hunched over, to the position where Dmitri Makanee was located. He gestured at the Assistant Team Leader with one finger and the two went back to the position.

When he got there, Dmitri took in the scene in an instant then looked at the axe in the Master Chief’s hand.

“I don’t know how to use one of these fucking things,” Adams admitted. He could probably have cut the leg off, but he knew one of the Keldara could do it better.

Dmitri took the axe and knelt by Oleg then stretched his mouth wide. Oleg opened his and Dmitri shoved the hilt of the axe in for him to bite. Then he drew his own axe and in one swift motion cut down.

The blow cut through the shattered bones of the leg just below the knee and through half of the meat. It only elicited a coarse bellow from Oleg. A second strike to cut through the remaining tissue didn’t even get that.

Oleg, pale and sweating, pulled the axe out of his mouth and buried it in the dirt. Dmitri leaned forward and held up his own bloody axe, looking Oleg in the eye.

The team leader wrapped his hand around Dmitri’s, the blood running down over both then leaned forward and licked the axe head. Licked off his own blood and bone.

“Aer Keldar,” Dmitri shouted.

“Aer Keldar,” Oleg replied, pulling him forward to slam helmets together.

“Aer Keldar!”

“Aer Keldar!”

“AER KELDAR!” they screamed in unison, pounding their helmets in time with the chant.

“Fuck,” Adams said, sliding down the side of the hole. “And I thought Hell Week was fucked up. What do they feed these guys? Oh, yeah. Beer.”

“Pavel.”

“Go, Kildar.”

Pavel had a bird’s eye view of the entire battle. Unfortunately, it meant he was out of the battle. Mostly.

The Chechens were trying to get sniper teams up on the ridgeline to the north. They weren’t having much luck, though, because Pavel was letting them get mostly set up and then taking them down. So far it was like hunting mountain goats; they never looked up. They seemed to think that the counter-sniper fire was coming from the defenses below. They would get towards the top of the ridge at a walk then drop to their bellies and crawl forward. The snipers on the mountain would let them get into position overlooking the main Keldara position then fire them up. They never knew what hit them.

It wasn’t exactly sporting, but good tactics never were.

And there were compensations. The view from their position was outstanding.

“We’re getting our ass mortared off down here and hunkered down. So we’re kind of blind. What are the Chechens doing?”

“Trying to get snipers on the ridge and failing,” Pavel said. “And it looks as if they are moving into pre-attack positions.”

“Tell me when they start heading up the hill,” Mike said. “And thanks for keeping the snipers off our backs. I don’t suppose you can see the mortars.”

“No, Kildar,” Pavel said. “I can climb higher.”

“Nah. You’re good. Kildar, out.”

Damn. The mountain above him had one face that had to be at least three hundred meters and looked to be somewhere between a four and a five with some nice overhangs. He really wanted to climb it.

War sucked.

“This sucks,” Sivula said, “but this is as far as we can go.”

There was no question of recovering any injured Chechens from the bunkers. What was left was mostly pieces and they had scattered a flock of ravens when they approached.

“It’s all right,” Jessia said, smiling and walking to one side. She set her box of ammunition on the ground and gestured to the other women to start piling in the same spot. “This is as far as I go as well.”

“Huh?” Sivula said, calculating distances. He’d seen the map. They were still at the back side of the pass. There was no way they could range all the way to the entrapped Keldara.

“This is as far as I go,” Jessia said. “But others will go further.”

“Well,” the sergeant said, sighing. “I hope I’m still around when you get back. I’d… well this has been. Interesting.”

“What you’re trying to say is that you hope you see me again,” Jessia said, smiling. “I hope I see you again as well, Andrew. But now you must go and I must lay in the guns.”

“This situation so sucks,” Sivula replied. “Look… ”

“I left an email address you can reach me through on your bunk,” Jessia said. “Which, by the way, was very messy. I hope you guys clean the barracks up before you leave; we worked hard on them before you got here. Now… go. We can talk later. Talk much.”

“We will sweep the infidels from our lands, yes, Mahmud?”

The older fighter just grunted. From his perspective there wasn’t much to talk about.

Mahmud Al Hawwari had been a young factory worker in Grozny when the Berlin Wall fell. He had never cared much about the Berlin Wall, or international politics. All he cared about was getting paid enough to afford some vodka and a little partying on the weekends.

But as the Soviet Union collapsed the economy collapsed with it. The factory closed. All the businesses in Grozny closed. Where before there had been long lines for anything of any worth, now there was no money for even less goods.

He had found solace in one of the new mosques that opened in the wake of communism. At first he just went because the mosque served food, if not vodka, and gave him a place to sleep out of the cold. So there was a little preaching to be put up with, it was worth it.

But the longer he stayed in the mosque the more he came to realize how empty his life had been and how little he understood the world. He had always known that his family was Islamic, even if they had “Russified” their name. Some of the grandparents talked of the Prophet and the word of Allah. But until he came to the mosque for the free hand-out the Prophet had decreed, he had never understood the importance of Allah in his life.

And the mosque taught him more than just the importance of charity. Chechnya was a part of the Dar Al-Islam, Islamic lands that had been occupied for too long by the Russians. Whether godless communists or Orthodox Christian, both were sins in the eyes of Allah. Those lands that had once been under proper Muslim rule must be returned to submission to Allah. And there was a way. The path of Jihad.

The battle for Grozny, though, had erased that long ago furor. It was a miniature version of Stalingrad fought with not much more high-tech weapons. The Russians poured masses of half-trained conscripts into the machine and got out sausage. The Chechens fought a hit-and-run campaign that the Russians never quite got a handle on. It was a cauldron of blood and fire that seemed to go on and on.

But over time, mass has a quality all its own. The Russians suffered ten times the casualties of the resistance but in the end the resistance was forced out.

Somewhere in that cauldron Mikhail Mihailovich Talisheva, AKA Mahmud Al Hawwari, a one time factory worker and current “freedom-fighter”, lost his faith in Allah, in the Dar Al-Islam, in shariah and jihad and all the rest. He knew that there was no road back to the man he might have been. There was no road to vodka and chess on the weekends. Some of the factories were reopened but he couldn’t go back to shoving parts on a line. Not after the things he’d seen, and done. Not with the price he had on his head. And the resistance did not take kindly to deserters. The umah did not take kindly to those who recanted their faith.

The only road forward was the one he was on. And that road, currently, led up a hillside covered with the dead of a previous attack. The road led into a storm of mortar fire and an enemy that was whispered of by the men who were from these hills.

It led to another cauldron. One that, if Sho’ad walked out of it, might teach the young fedayeen a thing or two.

So Mahmud just grunted as the lines of fighters sprayed out on the hillside and shook into lines.

He pulled out a bottle of water and drained it, wishing as he always did that it was vodka, even the cheapest vodka. Then he opened his fly and took a piss. There weren’t any trees around and he didn’t really care. He’d lost that, too, the caring. He’d left it behind in Grozny.

“Piss,” he said to Sho’ad.

“What?” the younger man said, surprised. A few of the other old fighters were pissing as well. It didn’t seem very… right.

“Piss,” Mahmud said, again. “Did you take a crap recently?”

“No,” Sho’ad said, reluctantly drawing out his pecker. Showing it in public like this felt, no was, sinful.

“Then don’t cry to me when you crap your pants,” Mahmud said. “Crap before battle. Drink and piss just before battle. It’s the only thing I can teach you. If we’re both alive tomorrow, you might be ready to start to learn shit like reloading and aiming.”

The company leader whistled and the group started moving forward in teams. Up ahead there were two units that Mahmud had never fought with. One of them was Bukara’s old unit. He’d met Bukara one time and thought he was a blowhard. He was like one of the old comissars who’d come down on the factory floor and tell you how to do your job when he’d never been on the line.

There was a three hundred meter gap between them and the Sadim Brigade. Let those fuckers soak up the the ammunition and hope of the defenders. Then the Sadim Brigade would descend on them like the efreets.

He began whistling a tune, a sad one that was best rendered by the balalaika. The Chechen fedayeen didn’t like the balalaika since it was a Russian instrument. But Mikhail’s mother had lulled him to sleep to the tune and he had listened to it often over the years in bars when he was young and happy in his vodka and chess. It was a common tune with many lyrics attached to it. But the refrain was usually the same.

“Tum bala, tum bala, tum balalaika,” he half sang, half chanted in Russian. “Tum balalaika, play balalaika, laugh and be gay.”

The words were drowned, though, by the thunder of the mortar barrage and the sound of the first wave of the assault opening fire.

“Tom and Hank are up and on station,” the supervisor called. “You have the first position, designated Tango One.”

“When?” the pilot asked. He’d been circling the damned thing for nearly half an hour. Ten minutes my ass.

“Coordinated fire,” the supervisor said. “Tom and Hank are up.”

“I’m up.”

“Then five, four, three… ”

“Adams, how’s it going?” Mike asked.

“Pretty fucked up, good buddy.”

Adams was screaming. He must have lost his hearing. Again. Since Mike’s ears were ringing from all the concussions, he was pretty loud, too. Before long both of them were going to be deaf as posts.

“Had to cut off Oleg’s leg,” Adams continued. “Actually, Dmitri cut it off. We’re cool otherwise. You?”

“What?” Mike screamed. “Is he okay?”

“Fine. Just fucking peachy. I gave him the last of my beer, so he’s happy as a clam, cleaning his M-60 and for some reason belting together one fuck load of 7.62. Was this a social call? Because I’m getting my fucking ass mortared off at the moment!”

“Well, be of good cheer. The Chechens are coming up the hill. As soon as they get here, the mortars will stop.”

“Keep going!” Shayeed shouted. He had been chosen to lead the remnants of Bukara’s force by default. Now he wished he’d kept as far away from the idiot as possible. He’d come to realize early on in his tenure as driver and bodyguard that Bukara wasn’t nearly as smart or tactically sound as he’d thought. Now he was in the middle of an Allah damned nightmare. And the men with him weren’t interested at all in running into a hail of mortar fire. OR at the Keldara. Being a martyr was all very well to shout about in the mosque but when the bullets were flying and the artillery was hammering down, when the force before you was meat for the ravens, doubts had a way of creeping in. “We must close with them just before the mortars stop! Keep going!”

They were still two hundred yards away and the group was faltering. Fine.

He stepped to the rear and fired over their heads. A long burst that emptied his magazine.

“Go towards the Keldara or be cut down from behind you pig-eating cowards!” Shayeed shouted, reloading. “If I don’t kill you, Sadim’s Brigade will. Now move. And fire as Allah wills! To victory in the name of Allah! God is Great! Alahu Akbar! Yell it you pig-eating cowards! Alahu Akbar!”

They were moving again. And yelling. Whether from fear of him or Sadim’s brigade of killers or for belief in Allah he didn’t care. Whatever it took. Whatever it took.

“Kildar,” Pavel said. “There is a large explosion to the north. Several.”

Mike frowned at the call and shook his head to clear it. The bunker had sustained several direct hits. Dust filled the air and his head was a fog from concussions. He tried to make sense of what Pavel was saying but couldn’t.

“The Chechen first wave is closing,” Pavel continued. “They are at two hundred meters.”

“Okay!” Mike shouted, holding his head. God he wished the fucking mortars would just stop for one fucking second. “Pavel, go to full team freq. How far?”

“One hundred meters!” Pavel called on the other frequency.

“Teams, open fire at fifty meters,” Mike yelled then stopped yelling. The mortars had stopped. That was early. They should have kept firing until the Chechens were right on them. When you were in an assault like this it was best to actually catch a few casualties from your artillery support rather than have it stop early. That way the enemy had to keep their head down until you were right on them. Either the enemy had fucked up, always possible, or… He wasn’t sure and didn’t have time to think about it.

“Seventy-five!”

“Prepare to open fire!”

“Fifty!”

“Mother Lenka, the mortars are laid in!” Jessia said, straightening from the mortar sight.

“Very well,” Mother Lenka said. “Now, you must keep firing right up until we reach the lines! That is very important. I would rather we have some of the girls hit than the fire stop too soon. You understand?”

“I do,” Jessia said, swallowing hard.

“Kalisa has given you the coordinates so start firing as soon as we move out,” Mother Lenka said. “And keep firing until we are there. You have enough rounds.”

“Yes, Mother Lenka.”

“Good girl,” Lenka said, smiling and hefting her AK. “It is many many years since I have held a gun. But I think I still know how to use one. And then there is this,” she added, tapping the hatchet at her side. “Good for close quarters you know. I personally always liked a sharpened shovel, good for burying your friends, too. But these axes are nice.”

“We should go to help,” Kamas Al-Rakabi said to Haza.

The hill Haza had occupied was a relatively small morraine, a bare sixty feet or so over the surrounding rocky terrain. But it was right in the mouth of the pass, less than five hundred meters from the saddle. From it Haza had full control of entry and exit. It was where he wanted to be and he wasn’t planning on budging.

“We are helping,” Haza said, losing patience with the young man. He had been an excellent scout but he had no head for tactics. “We forced them to ground and now, by staying here, we prevent them from escaping. I won’t say it again.”

“You don’t understand,” Kamas replied. “I want to kill Keldara.”

“What is so fucking important about the fucking Keldara?” Haza snapped, finally losing it. “Everyone has been whispering about these fucking Keldara! Tigers of the Mountains! Evil pagans! So what? They are just men.”

“They are the Keldara,” Kamas replied. “Did your mother not frighten you with anyone when you were a child? Did she not whisper that if you were not good that something would come for you in the night? They have not been back in generations and we are glad. Is there nothing that you, deep in your gut, fear, Haza Khan?”

“Ah,” Haza said, nodding. “Now I understand. They are the djinn that come for bad children. Yes, we had the same stories, but about a people called the Ghurkas. But I have fought the Ghurkas. They are good. Very good. Better than your fucking Keldara, I am sure. But they are men. They die.”

“The Keldara eat the dead of their enemies,” one of the fedayeen in the trench whispered in reply. “They are pagans who perform sacrifices to their black gods. They cut out the hearts of their enemies and eat them. Raw. They say that that way they eat their souls.”

“Stupid stories,” Haza said with a sigh. “There are many such stories. The people that the stories are about support them and hope the rumors spread. They make you fear. They break the will. But they are, always, stupid stories. I have heard the same stories about the Ghurkas but I know from experience that they don’t eat the hearts of their dead. In one war a whole battalion ran rather than face the Ghurkas, because they’d heard the stupid stories. We will not run from these fucking Keldara and we will not run to them. We will wait and keep them in place for the others to destroy. Then we can eat their hearts, or say we did, and thus start stories about us. Yes?”

“I just want to kill Keldara,” Kamas replied, sullenly.

“The radio said that we will attack their valley after we finish off their defenders,” Haza assured him. “Then you can kill Keldara. And have their women as prizes as the Prophet decreed.”

“That will be… ” Kamas stopped and looked up and back towards the pass at a whistling in the air. He didn’t see what was causing it but he did see something he thought never to see in his whole life. On west side of the pass, on the ridge above the saddle, was a tiger. A real tiger. It looked like it was not full grown but it had to be big for him to see it at this distance. He stopped talking, wide mouthed.

“INCOMING!” Haza screamed, grabbing the young idiot and dragging him down. Mortars. Fucking mortars. The only people around here with mortars was supposed to be the fedayeen! Where were they coming from?

“I don’t have time to teach you bitches fire and maneuver,” Mother Lenka said over the booming of the mortars. They hadn’t reached the saddle of the pass, yet, but they were close. “So when we get out in the open just spread out and head for the hill!” The first rounds were landing and the slamming of the explosions were racketing down the snow-covered pass. Hopefully they wouldn’t cause an avalanche. That would be seriously unfunny.

“But if you see something to shoot, take one knee and aim!” she screamed as they approached the saddle. “Do you understand me?”

“YES, MOTHER LENKA!”

“On target,” Kalisa whispered over the radio. She had run ahead and was now hunkered down by a boulder, calling fire. “One hundred Islamic Jerry’s Kids in open trenchline. Fire for effect.”

“All guns!” Jessia screamed. “Fire for effect! High explosive, mixed contact and proximity, continuous!”

Gana Kulcyanov hefted one of the high explosive rounds and slid the end into the tube. She released the round and slid her hands down either side of the tube then turned and took another round as the firing round slammed outwards. The explosion of the round compressed her chest like a giant fist but she ignored it, counting time as she took the next round from Jelena Makanee and twisted through three dimensions to raise it to the tube.

The modern 120mm could fire sixteen rounds in one minute. But they were, potentially, going to be dropping far more than that and she didn’t want to wear out the Kildar’s barrel. So she was firing “continuous” speed, one round every seven seconds, the speed she had been told by her American Special Forces trainer that “saved tubes and broke armies.”

“Six Mississippi, Seven Mississippi,” she muttered then let the round drop, sliding her hands down the tube and doing it all over again.

She wasn’t sure where or what Mississippi was, but it must be a horrible thing if it was used as a mantra for the guns.