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The Geek Luftwaffe and the Kragan Airlift
At 02:45, an attack developed on the northwestern corner of the Reservation, in the direction of the explosives magazines. It turned out to be relatively trivial. Remnants of the mob that had been broken up by air attack on the road had gotten together and were making rushes in small bands, keeping well spread out. Beating them off took considerable ammunition, but it was accomplished with negligible casualties to the defenders. They finally stopped coming around daylight.
In the meantime, Themistocles MтАЩzangwe called from Konkrook, appearing in the screen with his left arm in a freshly white sling.
тАЬWhat the hell have you been doing to yourself?тАЭ von Schlichten wanted to know.
тАЬCrossbow-bolt, about half an hour ago. A couple of inches lower and acting Brigadier-General ColbertтАЩd have been talking to you, now, instead of me.тАЭ
тАЬLucky it didnтАЩt have a nitro-capsule on the end. How are you making out? Have KankadтАЩs people started coming in, yet?тАЭ
тАЬOh, yes, about six hundred of them have gotten in already, in the damnedest collection of vehicles you ever saw. Kankad must be using every scrap of contragravity he has; itтАЩs a regular airborne Dunkirk-in-reverse. Kankad sent word that heтАЩs coming here in person, as soon as he has things organized at his place. And the geeks here have scraped together an air-force of their ownтБатАФfarm-lorries, aircars, that sort of thingтБатАФand theyтАЩre using them to bomb us here and at the mainland farm, mostly with nitroglycerine. WeтАЩve shot down about twenty of them, but theyтАЩre still coming. They tried a boat-attack across the Channel; thatтАЩs how I got this. WeтАЩve been doing some bombing, ourselves; we made a down payment for Eric Blount and Hendrik Lemoyne. Took a fifty-ton tank off a fuel-lorry, fitted it with a detonator, filled it with thermoconcentrate, and ferried it over on the Elmoran and dumped it on the Keegarkan Embassy. It must have landed in the middle of the central court; in about fifteen seconds, flames were coming out every window in the place.тАЭ His face became less jovial. тАЬWe had something pretty bad happen here, too,тАЭ he said. тАЬThat Konkrook Fencibles rabble of Prince JaizerdтАЩs mutinied, along with the others; they got into the hospital and butchered everybody in the place, patients and staff. The Kragans got there too late to save anybody, but they wiped out the Fencibles. Jaizerd himself was the only one they took alive, and he didnтАЩt stay that way very long.тАЭ
тАЬHow are you making out with your Civil Administration crowd?тАЭ
MтАЩzangwe grimaced. тАЬI havenтАЩt had to put any of them under actual arrest, so far, but weтАЩve had to keep Buhrmann away from the communications equipment by force. He wanted to call you up and chew you out for not evacuating everybody in the north to Konkrook.тАЭ
тАЬIs he crazy?тАЭ
тАЬNo, just scared. He says youтАЩre going to get everybody on Uller massacred by detail, when you could save Konkrook by bringing them all here.тАЭ
тАЬYou tell him IтАЩm going to hold this planet, not just one city. Tell him I have a sense of my duty to the Company and its stockholders, if he hasnтАЩt; put it in those terms and he may understand you.тАЭ
тАЬYes, IтАЩll try that out on Meyerstein, too. HeтАЩs in a hell of a state about the losses the Banking Cartel are taking on this deal.тБатАКтБатАж Well, IтАЩll call you when thereтАЩs anything new.тАЭ
By 03:30, it was daylight; the attacks against the northwest corner of the perimeter stopped entirely. Wallingsby had the three-hundred-odd Skilkan laborers at work; he had gathered up all the tarpaulin he could find, and had the two sewing-machines in the tentmakerтАЩs shop running on sandbags. Jules Keaveney, to von SchlichtenтАЩs agreeable surprise, had taken hold of his A.R.P. assignment, and was doing an efficient job in organizing for firefighting, damage-control and first aid. Colonel Jarman had his airjeeps and combat-cars working in ever-widening circles over the countryside, shooting up everything in sight that even looked like contragravity equipment. Some of these patrols had to be recalled, around 10:30, when sporadic nuisance-sniping began from the side of the mountain to the west. And, along with everything else, Paula Quinton managed, along with her other work, to get a complete digest prepared of the situation elsewhere in the Terran-occupied parts of the planet.
The situation at Konkrook was brightening steadily. The second wave of KankadтАЩs improvised airlift, reinforced by contragravity from Konkrook, had come in; there were now close to two thousand fresh Kragans on Gongonk Island and the mainland farms, Kankad himself with them. The Aldebaran had reached KankadтАЩs Town, and was loading another thousand Kragans.тБатАКтБатАж There was nothing more from Keegark. A message from Colonel MacKinnon had come in at dawn, to the effect that the geeks had penetrated his last defenses and that he was about to blow up the Residency; thereafter Keegark went off the air.тБатАКтБатАж By 07:30, the Northern Star had landed the regiment Murderers, armed with first-quality Terran infantry-rifles and a few machine-guns and bazookas, at the Palace at Krink, and by 08:45 she had returned with another regiment, the Jeel-Feeders. The three-lane street connecting the Palace and the Residency had been widened to six, and then to eight.тБатАКтБатАж Guido Karamessinis, at Grank, was still at uneasy peace with King Yoorkerk, who was still undecided whether the rebels or the Company were going to be the eventual victors, and afraid to take any irrevocable step in either direction.тБатАКтБатАж Eight men and four women, the survivors of a trading-station on the eastern shore of Takkad Sea, reached Konkrook in a lorry; another trading station, on the south shore, reported by telecast that the natives there had refused to rise against them, and had crucified five of RakkeedтАЩs disciples who had come among them preaching znidd suddabit.
At 11:00, Paula Quinton and Barney Mordkovitz virtually ordered him to get some sleep. He went to his quarters at Company House, downed a spaceship-captainтАЩs-size drink of honey-rum, and slept until 16:00. As he dressed and shaved, he could hear, through the open window, the slow sputter of small-armsтАЩ fire, punctuated by the occasional whump-whump-whump of 40┬аmm auto-cannon or the hammering of a machine-gun.
Returning to his command-post at the telecast station, the terrain-board showed that the perimeter of defense had been pushed out in a bulge at the northwest corner; the TV-screen pictured a crude breastwork of petrified tree-trunks, sandbags, mining machinery, packing-cases and odds-and-ends, upon which WallingsbyтАЩs native laborers were working under guard while a skirmish-line of Kragans had been thrown out another four or five hundred yards and were exchanging potshots with Skilkans on the gullied hillside.
тАЬWhereтАЩs Colonel Quinton?тАЭ he asked. тАЬShe ought to be taking a turn in the sack, now.тАЭ
тАЬSheтАЩs taking one,тАЭ Major Falkenberg, who had commanded the action at the native-troops barracks and the labor-camp, the night before, told him. тАЬGeneral Mordkovitz chased her off to bed a couple of hours ago, called me in to take her place, and then went out to replace me. Colonel GuillifordтАЩs in the hospital; got hit about thirteen hundred. TheyтАЩre afraid heтАЩs going to lose a leg.тАЭ
тАЬThatтАЩs a bloody shame!тАЭ He pointed to the northwest corner of the perimeter on the screen. тАЬWhose idea was that?тАЭ he asked. тАЬItтАЩs a good one; I ought to have thought of it, myself.тАЭ
тАЬYour new adjutant,тАЭ Falkenberg grinned. тАЬShe asked somebody what those big domes, up there, were. When they told her there were ten thousand tons of thermoconcentrate, five thousand tons of blasting-explosives, and five tons of plutonium, under them, she damned near fainted, and then she ordered that, right away.тАЭ
More reports came in. The entire garrison of the small Residency at Kwurk, the most northern of the eastern shore Free Cities, had arrived at KankadтАЩs Town in two hundred-foot contragravity scows and five aircars. Two of the aircars arrived half an hour behind the rest of the refugee flotilla, having turned off at Keegark to pay their respects to King Orgzild. They reported the Keegark Residency in ruins, its central buildings vanished in a huge crater; the Jan Smuts and the Christiaan De┬аWett were still in the Company docks, both apparently damaged by the blast which had destroyed the Residency. One of the aircars had rocketed and machine-gunned some Keegarkans who appeared to be trying to repair them; the other blew up King OrgzildтАЩs nitroglycerine plant. Von Schlichten called Konkrook and ordered a bombing-mission against Keegark organized, to make sure the two ships stayed out of service.
The Northern Star was still bringing loyal troops into Krink. King Jonkvank, whom von Schlichten called, was highly elated.
тАЬWe are killing traitors wherever we find them!тАЭ he exulted. тАЬThe city is yellow with their blood; their heads are piled everywhere! How is it with you at Skilk?тАЭ
тАЬWe have killed many, also,тАЭ von Schlichten boasted. тАЬAnd tonight, we will kill more; we are preparing bombs of great destruction, which we will rain down upon Skilk until there is not one stone left upon another, or one infant of a dayтАЩs age left alive!тАЭ
Jonkvank reacted as he was intended to. тАЬOh, no, general, donтАЩt do all that!тАЭ he exclaimed. тАЬYou promised me that I should have Skilk, on the word of a Terran. Are you going to give me a city of ruins and corpses? Ruins are no good to anybody, and I am not a Jeel, to eat corpses.тАЭ
Von Schlichten shrugged. тАЬWhen you are strong, you can flog your enemies with a whip; when you are weak, all you can do is kill them. If I had five thousand more troops, here.тБатАКтБатАжтАЭ
тАЬOh, I will send troops, as soon as I can,тАЭ Jonkvank hastened to promise. тАЬAll my best regiments: the Murderers, the Jeel-Feeders, the Corpse-Reapers, the Devastators, the Fear-Makers. But, now that we have stopped this sinful rebellion, here, I canтАЩt take chances that it will break out again as soon as I strip the city of troops.тАЭ
Von Schlichten nodded. JonkvankтАЩs argument made sense; he would have taken a similar position, himself.
тАЬWell, get as many as you can over here, as soon as possible,тАЭ he said. тАЬWeтАЩll try to do as little damage to Skilk as we can, butтБатАКтБатАжтАЭ
At 18:30, Paula joined him for her breakfast, while he sat in front of the big screen, eating his dinner. There had been light ground-action along the southern end of the perimeterтБатАФKing FirkkedтАЩs regulars, reinforced by Zirk tribesmen and levies of townspeople, all of whom seemed to have firearms, were filtering in through the ruins of the labor-camp and the wreckage of the equipment-parkтБатАФand there was renewed sniping from the mountainside. The long afternoon of the northern autumn dragged on; finally, at 22:00, the sun set, and it was not fully dark for another hour. For some time, there was an ominous quiet, and then, at 00:30, the enemy began attacking in force, driving herds of livestockтБатАФlumbering six-legged brutes bred by the North Ullerans for foodтБатАФto test the defenses for electrified wire and land-mines. Most of these were shot down or blown up, but a few got as far as the wire, which, by now, had been strung and electrified completely around the perimeter.
Behind them came parties of Skilkan regulars with long-handled insulated cutters; a couple of cuts were made in the wire, and a section of it went dead. The line, at this point, had been rather thinly held; the defenders immediately called for air-support, and Jarman ordered fifteen of his remaining twenty airjeeps and five combat-cars into the fight. No sooner were they committed than the radar on the commercial airport control-tower picked up air vehicles approaching from the north, and the air-raid sirens began howling and the searchlights went on.
As a protection from the sudden fury of the summer and winter gales, the buildings were all low, thick-walled, and provided with steel doors and window-shutters which were electrically operated and centrally controlled. These slammed shut in every occupied building. The contragravity which had been sent to support the ground-defense at the south side of the Reservation turned to meet this new threat, and everything else available, including the four heavy airtanks, lifted up. Meanwhile, guns began firing from the ground and from rooftops.
There had been four aircars, ordinary passenger vehicles equipped with machine-guns on improvised mounts, and ten big lorries converted into bombers, in the attack. All the lorries, and all but one of the makeshift fighter-escort, were shot down, but not before explosive and thermoconcentrate bombs were dumped all over the place. One lorry emptied its load of thermoconcentrate-bombs on the control-building at the airport, starting a raging fire and putting the radar out of commission. A repair-shop at the ordnance-depot was set on fire, and a quantity of small-arms and machine-gun ammunition piled outside for transportation to the outer defenses blew up. An explosive bomb landed on the roof of the building between Company House and the telecast station, blowing a hole in the roof and demolishing the upper floor. And another load of thermoconcentrate, missing the power-plant, set fire to the dry grass between it and the ruins of the native-troops barracks.
Before the air-attack had been broken up, the soldiers of King Firkked and their irregular supporters were swarming through the dead section of wire. They had four or five big farm-tractors, nuclear-powered but unequipped with contragravity-generators, which they were using like ground-tanks of the First Century. This attack penetrated to the middle of the Reservation before it was stopped and the attackers either killed or driven out; for the first time since daybreak, the red-and-yellow lights came on around the power-plant.
As soon as the combined air and ground attack was beaten off, von Schlichten ordered all his available contragravity up, flying patrols around the Reservation and retaliatory bombing missions against Skilk, and began bombarding the city with his 90┬аmm guns. A number of fires broke out, and at about 02:00 a huge expanding globe of orange-red flame soared up from the city.
тАЬThere goes FirkkedтАЩs thermoconcentrate stock,тАЭ he said to Paula, who was standing beside him in front of the screen.
Half an hour later, he discovered that he had been overly optimistic. Much of the enemyтАЩs supply of Terran thermoconcentrate had been destroyed, but enough remained to pelt the Reservation and the Company buildings with incendiaries, when a second and more severe air-attack developed, consisting of forty or fifty makeshift lorry-bombers and fifteen aircars. The previous attack von Schlichten had viewed in the screen at the telecast station; it was his questionable good fortune to observe the second one directly, having been out inspecting the defenses around the ordnance-depot at the time.
Like the first, the second air-attack was beaten off, or, more exactly, down. Most of the enemy contragravity was destroyed; at least two dozen vehicles crashed inside the Reservation. As in the first instance, there was a simultaneous ground attack from the southern side, with a demonstration-attack at the north end. For a while, von Schlichten found himself fighting hand-to-hand, first with his pistol and then, when his ammunition was gone, with a picked-up rifle and bayonet. It was full daylight before the last of the attackers was either killed or driven out.
Five minutes later, while he was reloading his pistol-clips with salvaged cartridges, the Northern Star came bulking over the mountains from the west.