CHAPTER 3
////// Airborne
Six Miles NNW of Guayak
New Granada Province
Holy Dominion
South America
June 17, 1944
Orrin Reddy’s four-ship flight of PB-1B “Nancys” crossed the mountainous coastline at five thousand feet and turned north, paralleling the mighty peaks. The mountains here soared higher than aircrews could fly without oxygen, and since provisions for such were problematic for the open-cockpit Nancys, not to mention furry Lemurian faces, they formed a formidable barrier to observations of enemy activity in the interior. Certain passes could be used, but they were increasingly heavily guarded by what the Imperials called “dragons,” or what the human/Lemurian “American” Navy and Marines probably more appropriately described as “Grikbirds.” The things looked like Grik, with longer snouts and slightly different, if just as wicked teeth. Their feet sported talons better adapted to snatching prey than slashing it, and their plumage was much thicker, more colorful, and far better tailored for flight. Ultimately, the biggest physical difference between Grik and Grikbirds was that, instead of powerful arms with fingers and deadly claws, Grikbirds had broad, feathery, membranous wings, and could be very bad news for Nancys.
Nancys remained good little planes, considering they’d been in service for nearly two years with only minor modifications. They looked like miniature PBY Catalina floatplanes, from which their lines had been taken, and were powered by a single, four-cylinder, in-line “Wright-Gypsy”–type motor. The little engines were so reliable that they were being mass produced from Baalkpan to Maa-ni-la, with a new factory even setting up in the Empire of the New Britain Isles. They were used in everything from airplanes to powerboats, and heavier, more powerful versions had gone into the new “PTs,” or motor torpedo boats, being built in the Fil-pin Lands. There was even talk of putting them in some kind of land vehicle.
Orrin contemplated that for a moment as he scanned the skies for enemies. His Lemurian Observer/Copilot (OC), Sergeant Kuaar-Ran-Taak, or “Seepy,” in the other cockpit behind the high-wing-mounted engine and spinning pusher prop, would be watching behind them, as well as looking for troop movements on the coastal road below. Orrin wasn’t sure how useful a land vehicle would be on this world. A sort of truck might be handy to haul stuff around in the cities—definitely more cooperative than the Asian elephant-size “brontosarries” they used for such things now. They might even be useful in places like the Empire, where there were good roads. He frowned. Might use some here, if we can ever push out beyond our foothold at Guayak, he thought. It looks like the Doms have a few decent roads between their important cities, at least. He shook his head. Some kind of armored truck, or even a tank might be better for that. But making them and then getting them way the hell out here on the longest limb of the war probably isn’t going to happen any time soon. Besides, given a choice, I’d rather have some of the new pursuit ships they’re finally turning out! He liked Nancys fine. They were good for what they’d been designed for, and they were even pretty good for ground attack and antiship operations. They could float too, which was a definite plus, but they were vulnerable to Grikbirds. They were faster than the Doms’ flying lizards, but that was about it—and either the Grikbirds or their Dom trainers had figured out tactics to get around that. In response, Orrin’s wing had finally received some of the new “Blitzer Bug” SMGs for the backseaters to use to keep the damn things off their backs. This was the first sortie, in fact, when every plane was so armed. And in addition to their scouting mission, Orrin hoped to find out how well the new weapons would defend his ships. He smiled ironically.
As a “mere” second lieutenant who refused a more exalted Navy rank, and actually still considered himself a member of the US Army Air Corps, Orrin Reddy was very much like Matt, his cousin, when it came to sheer stubbornness. His official rank didn’t much matter to him or anyone else. He was Commander of Flight Operations (COFO) for the aircraft carrier/tender USS Maaka-Kakja (CV-4), and also like his cousin, he’d shouldered a lot more responsibility than the rank he’d accept would imply.
Orrin was different from Matt in other ways, many of them superficial. He was shorter, with lighter hair, considerably younger, and of course he’d gone Army instead of Navy. Since he’d been a prisoner of the Japanese in the Philippines, his arrival on this world aboard a hellish prison ship had been very different as well. As for personality, he had a lot of the “fighter jock” in him, but as a destroyer skipper, so did Matt to a degree. The biggest difference in that respect came with age, experience, and the fact that Matt had lost so many people under his command. That had given him a far better appreciation for the consequences of command. But Orrin was starting to learn that bitter lesson for himself.
“Ell-tee!” came Seepy’s tinny shout through the voice tube by his ear. That was another aggravation. He’d heard the fliers in First Fleet had voice com now, and pilots could listen in on what their OCs, who also operated the airborne wireless transmitters, heard. Nobody had a voice transmitter small enough to fit in a plane yet, though First Fleet also had Talk Between Ships (TBS) capability now.
“Whatcha got, Seepy?” Orrin demanded, looking at the ’Cat in the little mirror that allowed him to see behind. Seepy was staring down through an Imperial telescope.
“More Dom in-faantry! They marchin’ down that road outa the pass east o’ here. We go down an’ shoot ’em up? They is awful purty target!”
Orrin looked down. Sure enough, another long enemy column was snaking down out of the gap in the abruptly rising mountains. Even this high, their bright yellow and red, or white uniform tunics were clearly visible. There were lots of flags and pennants too, almost like some medieval army, flapping and flickering above the column and making it look like some fiery red and gold serpent. Although he couldn’t see it now, he didn’t doubt the whole force was marching behind another of the giant, grotesquely disfigured golden crosses they’d seen at the head of every arriving division. Orrin wasn’t particularly religious, but he did recognize the thing for the perversion it was—and fully understood its significance to the troops behind it. He was sorely tempted to roll in and blast the thing. “No,” he said with a reluctant grunt. “Not yet, anyway.” General Tomatsu Shinya didn’t want them bombing the Dom columns converging on Guayak. Orrin figured he wanted the enemy massed before they made such an attack, sucking as many of them into the killing field as he could before bringing on a major battle. Orrin didn’t know if he agreed with that strategy or not.
First, and he just couldn’t help it, but Shinya was a “Jap.” He knew Matt liked and trusted Shinya, but Orrin had had an entirely different experience with the Japanese in the Philippines and didn’t know if he could ever forgive them, one or all. Second, despite reinforcements from Second Fleet and the Enchanted Isles, the Allied Expeditionary Force at Guayak still numbered only about eighteen thousand men and ’Cats. There were already upward of forty thousand Dominion troops encircling the “rebel” city. Shinya and High Admiral Jenks were sure that deploying all those troops essentially back to this area from where they’d been drawn would weaken or at least delay the massive Dom fleet accumulating in the vicinity of El Paso del Fuego, most likely aimed at another attempt to take the Enchanted Isles. Those islands, better known to some as the Galápagos, constituted the Allies’ best and most convenient staging point for operations against the Doms.
El Paso del Fuego had come as a stunning surprise, and Jenks was still trying to sort out its implications—and how to deal with them. They thought they’d destroyed the entire Dom fleet, but now they knew the bastards had a whole other one to draw from—in the Atlantic! The pass was a large navigable strait between South and Central America, carved through what should’ve been Costa Rica. It might have been caused by volcanism, or who knew what—they’d long since learned this world wasn’t exactly like the old—but whatever made it, it was much, much larger than any Panama Canal. Apparently, it was plagued by terrific tidal races and was therefore only passable at certain times, but no one had ever even dreamed it existed. They hadn’t been able to get close to the place with ships or planes, and if it hadn’t been for Fred Reynolds’s and Kari-Faask’s escape from Dom captivity, they wouldn’t have known about it at all until it was too late. Fred and Kari had told them a number of other interesting and useful things, but the existence of the pass was the most immediately pertinent. The two friends were still recuperating from their ordeal, but a day didn’t pass that they didn’t ask to be returned to flying status.
“Send it out,” Orrin ordered. “Inform . . . General Shinya he’ll soon have even more guests to entertain, but we’ve got other business today.”
“Ay, ay,” Seepy replied reluctantly. Orrin banked the Nancy slightly east, toward the mouth of the mountain pass the troops were flowing from. He glanced left to ensure the other planes followed his lead.
“Grikbirds! Grikbirds!” came Seepy’s excited shout. “Ship number nine’s got ’em, ’leven the clock high!”
Orrin looked up and a little to the left. Maybe a dozen dark shapes were hurtling down to converge on the four-ship flight. They were tucked in like stooping hawks and would’ve slashed through the formation, ripping wings, control surfaces, or bodies with their terrifying claws in mere seconds.
“Break right!” Orrin shouted, wrenching the little plane over. His order was unnecessary, and Seepy couldn’t have relayed it in time in any case. Already alerted, the rest of the Nancys followed his lead, and the four planes quickly formed what was essentially a battle line in midair. The Grikbirds tried to compensate but were diving too fast and simply couldn’t correct their angle of attack sufficiently. What resulted was much as Orrin hoped: all the creatures tried to throw on the brakes, flaring out to come at the flight from the side. Such a braking maneuver had to put a lot of stress on the monsters and was probably very painful. About half the Grikbirds gave up and retucked their wings, instinctively realizing their attack had failed. They plummeted away. The rest couldn’t resist the equally strong instinct to drive their strike home, however, and for a moment they just hung there, their swoop having brought them up, their bleeding speed leaving them relatively motionless alongside the planes.
“Blast ’em, Seepy!” Orrin roared. Seepy had already yanked the bolt back on his Blitzer Bug, and he quickly sighted down the top of the tubular receiver. Almost simultaneously with the OCs in the other planes, he squeezed the trigger. Smoky tracers sprayed out with a rattling buzz. The little guns were hard to handle with their high rate of fire and heavy .45 ACP cartridges, but the ammunition was the same being issued to the new P-1 Mosquito Hawks (better known as “Fleashooters”) in First Fleet for zeppelin hunting. The burning phosphorous in the base of the bullets meant to light hydrogen helped the shooters correct their fire. Two Grikbirds immediately folded, hammered by the heavy slugs. The rest beat their wings to close the gap as the shooters redirected their initially wild fusillade. Another Grikbird staggered, a shattered wing throwing it out of control. A fourth monster fell, its shrieks audible over the drone of the motors. The final two appeared to decide to go for Orrin’s lead ship, probably thinking the others would scatter like any other flying prey they hunted.
“Empty!” cried Seepy, dropping a magazine out of the well of his weapon and groping for another in the vest he wore.
“Hang on!” Orrin yelled back. He knew the guns of the following planes would no longer bear. Damn! We gotta get guns in the front of these things! he raged to himself. His ship actually did have a .50-caliber machine gun in the nose, an “extra” that came to this world aboard Santa Catalina, but their current tactics wouldn’t let him use it. He could never turn on the Grikbirds now; they were too close. He slammed the stick forward.
One Grikbird, terrifyingly close, barely missed snatching his port wing in its jaws. He knew all it had to do was get ahold of his plane and it would latch on, tearing it to shreds with claws and teeth even as it fell. It would jump away before the wreck hit the ground—but return to eat him and Seepy after the crash. He’d seen it before. He’d also learned very well how to combat other more maneuverable but slightly slower enemies while flying P-40s in the Philippines. In a steep dive now, he started to pull away from the Grikbirds that had tucked in to follow. Unlike in the Philippines, however, he could do something about pursuers here.
“Hose ’em, Seepy!” he shouted into the voice tube. “And make it snappy. The world’s coming at us awful fast!” He was answered by a long burrrp! of the Blitzer Bug. A Grikbird tumbled and veered away in his mirror, but the last monster was actually closing! Just as bad, the ground was coming up fast, and Seepy wasn’t shooting anymore.
“Seepy!” he demanded.
“I empty again! Gimme a minute!”
“We don’t have one!”
“Okay! I ready! Pull up!”
Orrin hesitated. The ground was right there, but if he pulled up too abruptly, the Grikbird would have them almost instantly. He had no choice. Below, he saw the upturned faces of the Doms in the enemy column, watching the aerial battle overhead. They’d probably be shooting at him in a second. “Okay,” he yelled. “Here goes!” He pulled back on the stick. Just as he’d expected, the Grikbird grew large in his mirror, its talons outstretched to strike. Right then, as the Nancy swooped up over the Doms just a couple of hundred feet below, and their pursuer appeared mere inches from the red-and-white-striped rudder of the plane, Seepy hosed the Grikbird right in its open mouth. Instantly, it cartwheeled and tumbled lifelessly down to slam directly into the troops below.
“Ha! I bet that kill a couple Doms too!” Seepy chortled as a surprised but vengeful patter of musket fire chased after them. Nothing hit the plane, but Orrin was quickly on the lookout.
“Swell,” he shouted, relief turning to exasperation. “And we would’ve got even more if we crashed into ’em! What the hell’s the matter with you? We’re not playing chicken here . . . and get your eyes up! Where do you think those other Grikbirds went? They’re down here on the deck someplace. So quit fooling around!”
“Hey! Take it easy, Ell-Tee! You plan worked, an’ these Blitzers is swell guns! Way better than tryin’ to blaast ’em with a musket an’ buckshot!”
“Yeah, but if we were back there blowing dirt bubbles, all this fun you’re having would be over!”
Seepy was silent for a while as they climbed back to join the other three ships. “Could’ve got more of ’em too, if you thought to use you gun while we was divin’,” he finally accused, just loud enough to be heard through the voice tube. Orrin snorted and shook his head. He hadn’t been around when his cousin Matt first met the Lemurians, and he found it hard to believe they’d once been practically pacifists, almost as a race. There were exceptions. Supposedly the Aryaalans and B’mbaadans used to fight all the time, but from what he’d learned of ’Cats, they all seemed pretty bloodthirsty. Of course, it had taken the Japanese to make him a killer. And as soon as this patrol’s over, I’ll report to a Jap! War sure is funny like that.
* * *
The four Nancys set down on the gentle, protected water of Guayaquil Bay and motored in line like blue and white ducks over toward the pier established for their support. Beyond it was the strange city of Guayak the Allies had occupied almost without a fight, and the first “permanent” Allied foothold in the Dominion. The architecture was a combination of stone and adobe, but the adobe had been whitewashed or brightly painted. There hadn’t been a wall around the city when they took it, but the Allies had raised one with a lot of local help. Beyond the wall was a broad killing ground on a vast cropland plain, and it was studded with trenches, stakes, and barbed-wire entanglements. Everyone suspected that the barbed wire, newly arrived from Maa-ni-la, would come as a very nasty surprise indeed for the Doms.
Only the 9th and 11th Bomb Squadrons of the 3rd Naval Air Wing operated directly out of Guayak, while the other squadrons continued flying off their carrier, Maaka-Kakja. The great ship wasn’t far beyond the horizon, and Orrin alternated between her and shore. Right now, he felt more needed here because, besides his “test” that day, it was starting to look like things were about to pop. They’d only seen the one column of Doms for almost a hundred miles up the coast, and though they couldn’t get through to the interior to confirm no more were coming from there, the new arrivals would increase the enemy numbers to more than fifty thousand. That was plenty, and probably more than enough to make them sure they had the edge. That was likely all they’d been waiting on.
Orrin gunned his engine, and the plane surged forward to settle atop a submerged truck on a broad, newly graded ramp beside the pier. When his crew chief satisfied himself that the plane was properly supported, a large group of locals heaved on a line and pulled it out of the water. The fabric skin covering the Nancys was well sealed and they’d float for days, but they did tend to seep after a while. It was better to get them out of the water—particularly after an action that might have caused holes they weren’t aware of—and maintenance was easier ashore as well. Once Orrin and Seepy’s plane was high on the ramp, they climbed down and looked around. They’d been told that General Shinya himself would meet them. He wasn’t there, so they waited. Orrin’s gaze swept over the locals, toiling alongside the ground crew. They weren’t what he’d expected at all. Everyone had thought all the Doms were nuts, adhering to a wildly warped, slightly Catholic-flavored religion that was probably closer to what the Grik believed than anything. Their “pope,” like the Grik “Celestial Mother,” was basically God, or at least represented him. Orrin wasn’t clear on that and didn’t really care beyond the ways it influenced their enemies to fight. But the locals had their own screwy faith with a bunch of goofy gods, and what mattered to them was that, having seen the invaders tread upon the very soil of the Holy Dominion itself, they’d be killed just as mercilessly as the invaders. Orrin wondered how the Doms would justify letting the army sent to fight them live after also seeing them there. Maybe they wouldn’t? More likely they’ll cook up some new holy declaration that it’s okay to see us to shoot us after we’re already here, he thought. But that left the locals, poor devils, who didn’t much care for the Dom Pope either. They hadn’t wanted any part of the war, but now, all of a sudden, just because the Allies chose to land at their city, they were in it up to their necks. Orrin didn’t think that was really fair, but then again, it never was, was it? Another funny thing about war, he mused. The civvies in the way always get stomped on, and more of them usually die than soldiers do. The great lesson there, he supposed, was not to be a civilian when a war falls on top of you. By the look of things, the people of Guayak weren’t civilians anymore.
“Lieutenant Reddy,” came a voice behind him, and he turned. General Shinya and a number of others had finally approached, joining the fliers who had gathered around him.
“General,” Orrin said, saluting. Shinya returned the sudden swarm of other salutes very crisply.
“I gathered from the wireless traffic that your new air-to-air tactics are a success. Congratulations,” Shinya said.
“Thank you, sir. It was kind of a tight squeeze”—Orrin glanced darkly at Seepy—“but we got six of them without loss.” In the past, armed only with muskets, the aircrews would’ve been lucky to knock down three for one, and even though a trickle of crated Nancys was still arriving with supply convoys, the losses—particularly in trained aviators—were unacceptable. “Who knows how long it’ll work before they get wise,” he had to add.
“It may not have to work much longer,” Shinya said cryptically. He turned to the Imperial Marine Colonel Blair standing beside him. Orrin considered Blair one of the “good Brits.” He was one of the few high-ranking Imperials with any land combat experience, having learned a bitter lesson in Singapore, then honed his skills alongside Chack-Sab-At. “The map, please, Colonel,” Shinya asked.
“Of course.” Blair took the map offered him by Captain Blas-Ma-Ar. She was a Lemurian Marine, commanding the 2nd Battalion, 2nd Marines to be precise, and had seen a lot of action on every front. She was a tiny thing, and really cute in a kitteny sort of way, but Orrin often felt intimidated by her intense gaze. There were rumors about her going all the way back to the battle of Aryaal that might explain her unforgiving personality.
Blair displayed the map. “Yours was not the only reconnaissance of the day. We’ve had other planes up, as you know, and our cavalry actually skirmished with theirs south of the city.” He paused. The Eastern AEF had cavalry with real horses, but not very many, whereas the Doms probably had a full division of horse-mounted lancers. Fortunately, they didn’t use them very well, keeping them distributed in battalion-size clumps attached to infantry. “Our horse was pushed back,” Blair continued, “but not before confirming that the enemy has extended his flank to cut the south road.”
Orrin shrugged. He liked Blair, but despite their official rank difference, he didn’t consider him his superior. “So? My guys could’ve told you that, and we knew they were going to do it.”
“Yes, but they didn’t march fresh troops up to do it, as we’d expected, and there are no more coming from the south. They merely extended their lines. The cavalry skirmish is immaterial,” Blair added, waving it away, and it occurred to Orrin that it had probably been carried out on impulse by yet another Imperial officer who wouldn’t be an officer much longer. “But if the column you observed is indeed the last element of the enemy army, we can expect an assault on the city very soon.”
Orrin nodded. “That’s what I was thinking. I’m kind of surprised they haven’t hit us already.”
A dark-skinned man in a strangely cut but otherwise plain robe cleared his throat. His name was Suares and he was the liaison for the local high priest/mayor/whatever he was, named Don Ricardo Del Guayak, usually referred to simply as “Alcalde.” A former trader to the “Honorable” New Britain Company, Suares spoke a variety of English; no other locals did. Few locals, including the alcalde, even spoke Spanish, which everyone had always thought the universal language of the Dominion. The lingo here was apparently based on something much older.
“They will only attack when they are positive of success,” Suares said nervously. “To do otherwise courts even greater disaster than your presence here already represents!”
“That stands to reason,” Orrin agreed. “When Fred and Kari came in, they said things aren’t all peaches and cream in the Dom empire. Any hint of a defeat here could stir up a lot of trouble, maybe even a revolt.” Orrin scratched his head. “Which I bet that spy they ran into, Mr. What’s-his-name . . .”
“Cap-i-taan Aanson,” Blas supplied, and Orrin nodded at her.
“Yeah, Anson. The guy’s supposedly from some other ‘Americans’ who got here earlier than we did.” Orrin’s eyebrows went up. “Here since the Mexican War, in the 1840s! How weird are they liable to be? Anyway, I bet that’s exactly what he’s been trying to stir up.” He looked at Shinya. “Any idea how to get ahold of those people?”
“None. Mr. Reynolds suspected that contact might follow a decisive fleet action by them or us, on one side or the other of this amazing passage between the continents.”
“And since we can’t get eyes on what’s there . . .”
“Exactly. High Admiral Jenks refuses to bring on such an action, and hopes to avoid it until our own fleet is stronger. Thus,” Shinya said with a sigh, “here we remain, hopefully delaying that fleet from setting sail by occupying so large a portion of the army meant to join it!”
“All in a nutshell,” Orrin murmured.
“Indeed,” agreed Blair. “But, back to the original subject, I would appreciate your assessment of the enemy position. For our benefit, as well as that of Se?or Suares. This will be his first briefing on the overall tactical situation.” Orrin looked at him, surprised. “Yes. As you know, we’ve been giving rudimentary training to his people here of military age.” Blair frowned. “Male and female,” he added uncomfortably. “It’s time he was allowed to inform his alcalde exactly what we all face together.”
“Fair enough,” Orrin agreed. He cocked his head and looked at the map. “We’re surrounded, or about to be,” he supplied unnecessarily, “and besides their fifty thousand troops, they’ve got about a hundred guns. Big suckers, some of ’em, that it took a dozen of those goofy armadillo-looking things to pull.” The Doms used horses for their light artillery, but their siege guns—probably the same weapons used aboard their heaviest ships of the line—were drawn by animals that did look like giant armadillos with long, spiked tails. “Again, like their lancers, they haven’t concentrated them anywhere, so they’ll probably use ’em to pick at us all along the line. They might gather ’em all together for a big push someplace, which is what I’d do, but so far there’s no sign of that.” He looked at Shinya. “We’re good for ordnance, right?”
“For the time being, at least. Our line of supply is very long, but we have significant supplies already stockpiled at the Enchanted Isles.”
“Fine. Then unless they pull something really weird, we should be okay for a while.” He nodded at the bay. “My biggest concern is there. It’s the only place we can’t really fortify, and we don’t have enough ships to cover it unless High Admiral Jenks cuts more of Admiral Lelaa’s screen loose—which I doubt he’ll do under the circumstances. If they do get more troops and decide to cross the water, or worse, their fleet shows up and we can’t stop it, we might be in trouble.”
“A most succinct appraisal,” Shinya complimented.
Suares looked increasingly incredulous. “If I may,” he said. “I do not mean to seem rude or disrespectful, but I find it difficult to credit your confidence, Lieutenant Reddy.”
“I believe what he means,” Blair said with a trace of amusement, “is that he can’t understand how we, with just over twenty-five thousand troops, including his militia, can hope to resist twice that number.”
“Well . . . indeed,” agreed Suares, “though I mean no offense.”
Shinya considered. “No offense taken, and I understand your concern. But do not fear. You have not seen how we fight, and though the Doms have formidable numbers, none of those here can have the slightest idea of the monster they’ve marched against.”
“Then if you are so confident of victory, why do you need my people to fight? Why do you not simply destroy the Doms here and then continue fighting them somewhere else?”
“That is easy,” Blas suddenly interjected harshly, glaring at Suares. “This is your war now too. It should be all your people’s war, to rid the world of the Doms!”
“That’s one consideration,” Shinya confirmed. “The other is that I want the enemy to send more troops here for us to kill. I do not wish to chase him about. The best way to ensure that, I think, is to beat those already surrounding the city . . . and wait.”