Gust Front

CHAPTER 46

Near Dale City, VA, United States of America, Sol III

1258 EDT October 10th, 2004 ad

It started with a crackle of manjacks. The observation post was a regulation one-hundred meters out from the company and in view of the Second platoon but, being barely in view and after the stresses of the night with multiple moves and digging in not once but a total of four times, as the division moved again and again and the battalion adjusted lines, reassigned areas of responsibility, moved the company forward and back, the two-man team had fallen asleep. They awoke to the rattling burp from the manjack set up beside their foxhole and the cracking whistle of railgun rounds in return.

In his foxhole, Captain Brantley dropped the half-eaten remains of a hotdog loaded with chili, onions and relish, and rotated his shoulders. To the captain's amazement the first sergeant had made it back. And although he had not found an open restaurant, he had found enough supplies and cookware to feed the entire company on hotdogs, hamburgers and a really horrible concoction of ca

The commander had been a history major in college. To him, the scene was reminiscent of the Union and Confederate Armies in the War Years. The same scene was replicated over and over in the woods and fields around his position. The soldiers digging their foxholes had turned up Civil War era «Minié« balls as they dug and the ghosts in their tattered gray and blue seemed to hover around them, urging them into battle. He heard them now, rattling their ramrods and whispering in his ear of the terrible sights to come and he wrapped the whispers around himself like armor.

He looked at his thin line of troops—the few in view in the thick pine scrub—and knew despair. What the situation called for was defense in depth, pillboxes and wire, trenches and no-man's-land. What it had was a thin screen of infantry, dug-in deep, with a few mines and claymores out front, hoping against hope for the strength to stop a force a hundred times their size.

The one bright spot was artillery support. With the shift in emphasis from human-human to human-Posleen combat, the Army had radically changed its approach to artillery equipment. Although the bulk of the Army would remain mechanized infantry, the lack of counterbattery ability—the ability of one artillery unit to fire on another—by the Posleen meant that the division and corps artillery did not need to be armored. Thus the M-222 «Reaver» was born.

Modified from a South African mobile artillery piece, the Reaver was a six-wheeled all-terrain vehicle mounting a 155mm howitzer. It had the speed to keep up with mechanized forces and the ammunition capacity to support them effectively.

Three full batteries of these artillery behemoths were in places to support the division and the resultant firepower exceeded the artillery of three divisions of the latter twentieth century. The Posleen might succeed in overru

The captain had previously ensured that he was authenticated on the automated central firing network, so he calmly picked up the microphone and called in his first ever real-world call for fire.

«Central, Central, this is Echo-Three-Five, fire mission, over.»

He paused and waited a moment for a response. Usually, the newly fielded Central Artificial Intelligence Targeting Artillery Fire Remote Command and Control System, or Central for short (the military, for once, had universally decided not to use the acronym), came back practically before you could unkey the microphone. In this case it seemed to either not receive the call or be overloaded.

«Central, Central, this is Echo-Three-Five. Fire mission, over.»

«Echo-Three-Five, this is Central, call fire.»

Better. «Central, Central, fire concentration, Echo-Two, say again, Echo-Two.»

There was another pause. Fire was building on the line, but these Posleen seemed to be the equivalent of scouts and there had yet to be a call for a medic. He waited a moment longer then called again.

«Central, Central, this is Echo-Three-Five. Say status fire mission, over.»

«Echo-Three-Five, no fire mission in status, over.»

«What?!» he shouted and stared at the radio in his foxhole. His RTO looked around, puzzled.

«What's wrong, sir?»

«The—« He realized a need to maintain a calm demeanor. Even if the one ace he thought he had in a hole was starting to look like a deuce. «I'm having a little trouble with the artillery net, I keep getting stepped on.» It was a bald-faced lie, but better than the truth.

He had used Central several times in Exercise Without Troops, map exercises and field problems and it had never shown a bit of problem, once you got used to the syntax. The system had been designed by the Advanced Technology Research Board, a board formed in reaction to the «GalTech» group, and was the brainchild of the former Ground Forces High Commander.

As a concept it was deceptively simple; rather than having fallible humans make numerous transmissions in the call for fire chain, let computers do the work. Practically «off-the-shelf» voice-recognition software would «recognize» calls for fire, given by authenticated individuals and in the proper form, register them and pass them to a central computer. The computer would determine priorities, make the fire calculations and both send out fire commands and update the units calling for fire on the status of their request.

Combined with the Inter Vehicle Information System and the Ground Tactical Positioning System, it would eliminate «blue on blue» or «friendly» fire and distribute the available fire more equitably and efficiently. As a salve to the technological nay-sayers, there were both system overrides that commanders could invoke and real human beings in the chain. And it was just about time to invoke one.

He poked his head up to get a look at the situation and called again. «Central, Central, this is Echo-Three-Five. Final protective fire, I say again, final protective fire. Command override, priority one. Over.»

Nothing.

«Sir?» said his RTO, as the first medic cry came from Second platoon, «where's the artillery?» One of the medics in the next foxhole crawled out towards the line, just as a centaur group broke through the firelanes and into view. Shotgun rounds flailed the foxholes, momentarily suppressing the company's fire and smashing the luckless medic into red paste. Captain Brantley dropped back into the foxhole just as the radio crackled back into life.

«Echo-Three-Five, authenticate Whiskey-Tango.»

I already did that! The captain dug into his rucksack and dragged out his ANCD. «Victor! Over!»

«Say, again, syntax not recognized, over.»

«Central, this is Echo-Three-Five, authentication Victor, over.» He ground his teeth, seemingly drawing patience out of the air.

«Echo-Three-Five, say again full callsign, over.»

«Juliet-Mike-Echo-Three-Five,» he said, very slowly and carefully.

«Juliet-Mike-Echo-Three-Five, welcome to the net, say request, over.»

«Central, this is Echo-Three-Five, fire mission, over.»

«Echo-Three-Five, call fire, over.»

«Central, this is Echo-Three-Five, fire mission, concentration Echo . ..» He popped his head up and took a quick look towards the front. The Posleen had begun to thicken, their fire beating down the company's with the exception of the manjacks. As he watched, a God King plasma ca