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bit! Five thousand pussy cats all lined up in neat rows, so's they're easier
to attack, and fixed gun emplacements so obvious we could wipe 'em clean with
an air attack. And with all that firepower there, do they take shots at us?
Try and knock us out o' the air? They do not! They sit there, posin', and
smile for the camera. It stinks, I tell you. Stinks wors'n a Susafrit beggin'
yer pardon, there."
One of the commanders, a strange, round creature with short quill-like hairs
all over its body, just shrugged. She was used to it by now: to all but her
own kind, her race literally stank when it wanted to. It came right out of the
pores in the skin.
"Now, then," Asam continued, "let's take a look here again. What would you say
the regular, orthodox military move would be here?"
"Use our flying people to drop hell on them," one of the commanders said.
"Then, when they scatter to their positions, send forces of one or two
thousand on either side and close in on the main one when we get into
position. Encircle and that's it." It sounded sim-ple.
"And what's the last thing you'd do?" he prodded.
"Attack straight on," another said. "Suicide."
He nodded. "And yet, that's exactly what I intend to do. Go in with a limited
aerial attack, keepin' most of the force in reserve to cover the flanks. Then
we'll send in our biggest, nastiest-looking crowd first, the type that won't
get bogged down there. I also want a squad of flyers those bat fellows will
do to drop a load o' rocks and buckshot on that swamp before dawn. Lots of
it and from a height."
Mavra watched him with growing admiration and fascination. This was his first
large-scale battle, yet he sounded like all the generals of past history.
Crisp, professional, analytical.
"Buckshot?" somebody asked.
He nodded. "Got to be mines in there. Tell artillery to bring up the cannon in
rows, too. I want a pattern of fire from just across the border slowly
advancin' until it's covered the whole territory
before our people go in. And emphasize strongly to the troops that they keep
advancin' as long as they don't hear retreat blown. Understand? Reserves
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follow the first wave in sections, wave after wave. Pack 'em in and move up
the artillery as soon as you can. Expect flank at-tacks. And when you get to
them trees, here's what you do. . . ."
Mavra listened with amazement at his detailed in-structions. And, after they'd
left to convey the mes-sage to their troops, she told him, "You're going to
kill a lot of people if you're wrong."
"I'm gonna kill a lot of people if I'm right, too," he responded gravely. "But
this'll be our test, how our dscipline works, how all our units work together.
And, if I'm right and I am I'll be the genius who
won the battle."
Asam had been right about the mines, but he hardly needed the artillery
barrage. The Olbornians understood a lot more about war this time, of course,
but they themselves were a thousand years removed from any practical
experience. On the theory that the more mines you had the more enemy you got,
they'd sunk them by the hundreds in that muddy swamp. When the aerial
bombardment of rocks and buckshot finally hit one, it set off every one near
it. The chain reaction was spectacular in the predawn sky; it looked as if the
entire world were blowing up. The concussions reverberated for kilometers in
all direc-tions, practically deafening all sides and almost knocking several
ghostly aerials out of the sky.
Asam, who had not slept all night, immediately sent word to the artillerymen
to cancel the carpet and concentrate on widening the area covered. He was
certain now that the mines had been laid in close rows and that hitting one in
a row would set off the entire row.
He was correct.
Mavra, who had never seen anything like it before, looked at the exploding,
bubbling mass uneasily.
"You expect people to charge into that?
"she asked, aghast.
He nodded. "On the run and laying down fire all the way."
With first light, he signaled for the attack to pro-ceed, and at the same time
diurnal aerials took off to either side while more started dropping much more
lethal stuff into the trees, mostly inflammables.
The Olbornians, although shell-shocked, knew that the attack was coming and
went to their emplace-ments. They had a good, solid defense line from the air
it could be seen that they had raised bastions, star-pointed redoubts that [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]