Whatever Gods May Be Part 12

"We're an experiment," Rhys said quickly. "Some regimental HQ hotshot wants to try teaming us for scouting missions-you snipe, me spotter. Thinks we don't stink as much as the p.e.n.i.s people. Some frigging thing about hormones."

A few months ago, Jamie would've laughed, but now she barely smiled. "C'mon," she said, "our humble hooch is this way."

* 102 *

Once inside the tent, Rhys reached for her and she responded. But all during the kiss that Jamie had wanted for so, so long, she struggled not to weep.

v When it came to living day-to-day through the Real Thing, Alonzo taught that the people who mattered were the grunts around you and your senior NCOs. Commissioned officers occupied another, almost abstract universe. They theorized, they coordinated, they scheduled, they planned. They stuck to themselves and expected to be cleaned up after. For the most part, they were worth avoiding.

And for the most part, Jamie didn't bother to form opinions about individual officers. That changed the first time the Three-Eight scout/ sniper platoon's new commander opened his mouth as the platoon stood at attention before him.

"I am here to ensure this unit outperforms every United States Marine Corps battalion scout/sniper platoon on the planet. Squad NCOs, you will bring comprehensive, up-to-date personnel note files to the platoon leadership meeting at fourteen hundred hours."

"Uh-oh," Rhys mumbled without moving her lips or her eyes.

"Another hard-a.s.s king of esprit de c.r.a.p."

"Now. As you know. The, uh, Three-Eight is now part of an Expeditionary Brigade that's, uh, eight thousand strong now," First Lieutenant Koenig droned on. "This Force has driven the PIA from Busuanga and from the islands of, uh, Culion and Linapacan farther to the south."

Koenig paused for effect. And to pace along the line of snipes so he could make sure everyone was properly eyes front. Then he stopped and pivoted to face the platoon. "Soon we go to Palawan Island itself."

"Ta- dah," murmured Rhys.

The first lieutenant resumed pacing. And lecturing. "Long considered 'the last Philippine frontier' and rich in both fossil-fuel and mineral resources, Palawan Island is, uh, more than six hundred klicks long but only about forty klicks across at its widest, bisected by a cave-riddled range of small but rugged mountains running its length." Koenig paused again. He frowned as though he'd misplaced something.

* 103 *

"f.u.c.king A," Jamie muttered to Rhys, "who writes this guy's speeches?"

Koenig nodded at no one in particular and pressed on. "Relentlessly exploited by illegal logging, the canopies of once-extensive forests are thinner now and cover just, uh, thirty-five percent of the island, making the steeper-sided valleys p.r.o.ne to flooding and mudslides. This and the devastation of the pandemic ten years ago have reduced Palawan's official population to well under five hundred thousand people." Koenig pushed out his chest. "Now. In preparation for our mission on Palawan..."

For a solid half hour, he kept the platoon standing at attention.

Typical new CO. Start with an inspection, b.i.t.c.h about the condition of everyone's cammies because everyone's weapons and combat gear were good to go. Then order them all to get haircuts and announce that he would personally supervise a short-notice physical fitness test that would be the beginning of a complex, demanding, and mostly useless combat fitness training exercise.

v "Things been going pretty good, huh?" said Rhys as she glanced around the Three-Eight's new forward operating base.

Jamie continued to pound in the last tent stake. "Mmm."

"h.e.l.l's bells." Rhys almost smacked her lips. "We scooted 'em out of El Nido in a day. A few pings and poof!-they're gone. Two weeks and we got almost the whole frigging munic.i.p.ality. What'd they say? Seven hundred square kilometers, right? Goes on like this and we could be finished with this tropical paradise by-"

"I'm gonna go start finagling with Supply, before the crowd," Jamie said. "We'll be needing all kinda s.h.i.t for this Squeeze Play op." She couldn't stop thinking about it. Operation Squeeze Play called for taking the northern third of Palawan in one swift sweep via an air-sea flanking move across a rugged eight-kilometer-wide isthmus some hundred and fifty kilometers south of the Three-Eight's new FOB. In a single action, the Marines would reach the northern outskirts of Puerto Princesa, the island's capital, and in the process surround and trap what the intel geeks estimated to be at least a regiment's worth of PIA.

The Three-Eight's snipes' role seemed straightforward enough.

* 104 *

Ahead of the infantry's thrust, they'd use a diversion to night-insert by helo right onto the isthmus. Once Squeeze Play commenced, they'd hold the high ground across the narrow stretch of land and for several hours, until infantry units relieved them, block what would be only minor PIA movement.

First squad would cover the northwest section from the highest elevation on Mount Peel down to the western oceanside cliffs, while third squad would take the middle stretch from Mount Peel to Baheli Peak. Second squad-Jamie's squad-would form a jagged line from Baheli Peak southeastward down a ridge that terminated above the only paved road across the isthmus, the main coastal artery along which significant numbers of PIA fighters would attempt to move.

The last 1,200 meters of this ridge belonged to Jamie's fire team.

Jamie and her spotter had orders to make a hide at the southeast end of the ridge and from there hamper PIA attempts to travel the coastal road.

The other two members of Jamie's team would locate farther up the ridge to prevent anyone from sneaking behind Jamie and her spotter.

Properly placed, second squad's three fire teams would be able to cover almost five kilometers of ridge.

a.s.suming no PIA fighters already occupied Mount Peel or Baheli Peak or the ridge. a.s.suming there weren't too many PIA. a.s.suming they'd be "raw"-not cloaked by countersurveillance gear.

Near the bottom of the chain of command, Corporal Gwynmorgan had her doubts. Every instinct in her screeched NO! If the Squeeze Play intel was even a little bit wrong, they'd be screwed. The entire mission would be screwed. And when the h.e.l.l is intel ever totally right?

RT110 and she'd started to wonder if the officers planned missions for the same conflict she fought in-the one where the PIA turned up in unexpected numbers and in unexpected places, the one where the enemy regularly had countersurveillance gear and were actually figuring out how to use it. Where's this Squeeze Play intel coming from, anyway?

Jamie sent Rhys off to snoop. "Not a whole lot of unit info or recon about the isthmus," Rhys reported after friending one of the battalion S-2's staff a.s.sistants. "Intel's mostly from informants and agents run by contractors-those peace-and-stability outfits like Columbia Aegis and FDL/Roque. Mercenaries and their freelance spies, you know? But the bra.s.s trusts it."

Jamie sighed. Wish I did.

* 105 *

v "Just make sure your people are ready, Corporal." So much for all that hoopla about operational risk management.

"Hey, Sergeant, I'm just respectfully pointing out to my squad NCO that there's some tactical residual risk and respectfully requesting the resources necessary to mitigate that risk, okay? Standard operating procedure."

"What-the-f.u.c.k-ever, Gwynmorgan. Request denied. Get your a.s.s outta here."

At least Alonzo's buddy in Supply found a way to get Jamie three GLaC SAWs-grenade-launch-capable squad automatic weapons- and as much ammunition as she figured her crew could haul. At the end of the ridge overlooking the road, she'd use a new dual-barrel E112 sniper rifle able to fire armor-penetrating .50-caliber as well as anti-personnel .416-caliber rounds.

When Rhys found a moment to privately b.i.t.c.h about lugging a GLaC SAW and all that ammo up the ridge, Jamie popped like a kernel of corn.

"This is a cla.s.sic cl.u.s.terf.u.c.k, Marty! Koenig's been told to make it work somehow and he isn't gonna push back. Probably can't, because the big shots don't think much'll happen along the ridge. They think it'll all go down at the road. And they sure as h.e.l.l don't want to believe the PIA have any surveillance countermeasures worth mentioning. Well, we're gonna find out. Us, not the fobbits in the ops center." Rhys scowled, her expression eloquent: What the f.u.c.k do you know, Corporal?

"Think about it, Marty. We drive a wedge north of Puerto Princesa, right? And what're the PIA really gonna do?" Skepticism jutted Rhys's chin. "Jeezus, Jamie, I don't know.

That's what we got bra.s.s for."

"And the bra.s.s built the whole op on merc intel. What if the intel's wrong, Marty? The mercs work all sides-the Corps, the energy industry, defense contractors, G.o.d knows who else-and they got some d.a.m.n merc agenda of their own."

"So you wanna just ignore our orders?"

"No, not ignore them. Work our bolt, you know? Adapt our orders to the real world."

* 106 *

"Oh yeah, General Gwynmorgan? And where's your intel coming from?"

"From a hundred and eighteen days of this s.h.i.t, that's where. You see how it's been going. Most of the PIA have countersurveillance gear now and they're pretty good at using it. C'mon, Marty, think about it."

"f.u.c.k, Jamie, I'm not supposed to think about it!"

"Dammit, don't you get it?" Jeezus, Marty, three months in that green zone outside the Two-Eight's FOB didn't help your edge sharpen any. "PIA units will converge on the isthmus when they realize we're cutting the island. Even if they're not on the ridge already and we're able to get into position up there, it won't take long for them to pile into the ravines below us. They'll try like h.e.l.l to break our wedge wherever they can. Means PIA coming at us from the south and from the north to take the ridge, Marty. And if they take just a small slice north of us, we get cut off. And if our infantry comes up late and all we have are sniper rifles and E19s, we get overrun. And then we get our f.u.c.king throats slit like Arnie. Is that what you want?"

Rhys's eyes went wide.

s.h.i.t. Jamie hadn't intended that last thought to spill out. But at least it got Rhys's attention, made Rhys hesitate and consider. What was on Rhys's mind showed, too, as her eyes slitted and her chin pushed out farther. She wanted to know how Jamie dared to even think like this, much less act on it.

Jamie drew in a long, calming breath. Try it again, goober. If you can't sell Rhys, this'll go uprank and then we'll be worse than screwed.

We'll be impaled.

"I know Koenig said this one should be easy. That it'll all go down right on the coast and all we have to do is occasionally nip at a few guys who light up bright and shiny on our IMS. But our own experience with cloaked PIA tells us that bit of the intel is dubious. Maybe everything's sweet-but it could all be complete s.h.i.t. Way I see it, we'll be snipes for a few hours. If we're lucky. Then we'll be infantry, and while we're screaming into our comlinks for help, the four of us will be trying to keep G.o.d knows how many PIA from breaching more than a klick's worth of ridge." Jamie rested a pleading hand on Rhys's shoulder. "I've been checking out the topo maps and the imagery. Our piece of ridge has lots of cover-crevices, caves. Several places where we can move back and forth for almost thirty meters staying behind good cover.

* 107 *

Little fortresses. That's where we position, that's our leverage. Gives us decent odds, you know? And if I'm wrong, Rhys, you can ream me when it's all over. I'll wear my skivvies on my head for a month, okay?"

"Okay." Rhys nodded grimly. "You're the corporal, Corporal. I'll do it."

"Thank you."

"When this is over, Gwynmorgan, I want to see you draped in bright red skivvies, understand? Those ones with the naked dancing women."

"Deal," said Jamie. "Now about the GLaC SAWs..." v Because of Rhys-only because of Rhys, Jamie had no doubt-the other two fire team members, Omara and Ebbers, allowed themselves to be loaded up without a squawk.

The diversion, a helo a.s.sault of identified PIA boats out on Honda Bay, went well enough that Jamie's team got to the highest part of their section of ridge on schedule before dawn. And they encountered no PIA at all.

For Jamie, it was a happy but disconcerting surprise. At least this part of the Squeeze Play intel turned out be to right on the money. What if the rest of it's solid, too? Should I back off?

"When the h.e.l.l is intel ever totally right?" the voice whispered in Jamie's ear as the team reached a deeply creviced outcrop that rose well above the surrounding trees.

Just my luck this'll be the first time.

"Just your luck it won't."

"First hide's here," Jamie heard herself say. "It's yours, Ebbers." Then, one more time, she went through the commo protocol that would enable her to get away with what she was about to do. "No uplink communication with the ops center. Receive only. Word is some PIA have active cancellation countermeasures now, so we don't know anymore how quick they can multilaterate our signals. Means for this one all commo between us is limited to no more than five seconds, then at least a fifteen-second delay before resuming." Jamie waited for them to confirm, then pointed to a high point on * 108 *

the outcrop. "Set up there, Eb. It's a good spot for your GLaC SAW, you got a clear three-sixty sweep there. Make sure your IMS detector covers all three hundred and sixty degrees, but don't rely only on IMS, because some of them will cloak. Keep your eyeb.a.l.l.s on both sides of the ridge. And don't get too comfy. This'll be the Mexican jumping bean fixed-position defense. You'll pick up and move plenty, to, uh-" She turned slowly, pointing to other spots on the outcrop. "There, and also there. Both got sweep and good cover. Also, I'm belaying the initial order. We're now four one-man units. For this one we're all snipes. And we'll all be infantry before it's over, so keep your GLaC SAWs prepped and mobile. You'll be scurrying. A lot."

Omara and Ebbers exchanged an are-you-serious glance. The order to abandon protocol, to work alone without a combat buddy, was insanely dangerous, but Rhys didn't blink. Omara and Ebbers said nothing.

"We'll have three more hides along the top of this ridge and they'll each have line-of-sight one to the next. Last one'll be me." Jamie pointed southeast. "Slightly more than a thousand meters down that way." Jamie climbed with Ebbers to the first spot she'd chosen, then the other two, and made sure he was as ready as she could make him.

"Good shooting, guy," she said as she left. He nodded but couldn't smile.

Rhys occupied a similar outcrop some four hundred meters southeast of Ebbers, and Omara took up a position another three hundred meters farther along. Setting up her team took all day. By the time she approached her own position where the ridge ended above the road, daylight was ebbing fast. She came upon four cloaked PIA snipes only because one of them pulled down his pants at their latrine and her IMS picked up his bare backside.

They weren't human beings. Not yet. Jamie saw them as targets to be stalked and eliminated. When she was close enough-maybe twenty meters-she exhaled evenly to produce the almost-but-not-quite hum that soothed her racing heart and generated a band of calm between her temples, behind her eyes. This she always did while she sighted a target, refusing to think about time pa.s.sing as she hummed into that instant of utter stillness between breathing in and breathing out-and squeezed off a shot, then three more before she inhaled again. One silenced pistol shot each, smooth and fast and fatal. She shoved and * 109 *

pulled them out of their hide without looking at their faces, avoiding the blood from their wounds, thankful for the darkness that helped keep them anonymous.

After that, she used the PIA snipers' hide to good effect. Most of the targets on the road below required shots between 1,500 and 1,800 meters. But not all. Three separate times during the windless dawn, she made a 2,600-meter killing shot. The confusion this caused-because it was impossible to hear the rifle report or determine where the shots came from-stalled the PIA for hours.

It also triggered precisely what Jamie feared: PIA fighters hastened inland-initially to find her, then, as Squeeze Play progressed and Marine infantry units cornered them, to search for a viable back door across the isthmus. Jamie's team staved off attack from both sides of the ridge, but mostly from the south, where swarms of PIA fighters poured into the ravines below and climbed up the ridge right at Omara, then shifted west toward Rhys first and finally Ebbers.

The GLaC SAWs saved their part of the mission. They benefited from a bit of luck, too. A few PIA lacked countersurveillance gear-just enough so that their tactics became evident and predictable, especially in the comparatively lower-elevation sector defended by Rhys, who managed to adjust position and keep any enemy from getting past her.

Omara and Ebbers were less fortunate. Just about all of their attackers had cloaked up, so the few blips that appeared on their IMS revealed no patterns.

"Where the f.u.c.k is Lima!" Jamie and her teammates screamed over and over.

When Lima Company at last ascended the ridge from the north, forcing back the PIA fighters who had started to push past Ebbers, no one in Jamie's team had more than a handful of rounds left. Even worse, both Omara and Ebbers had suffered go-home wounds. Yet, somehow, they were all still alive.

v "Hey, did you hear?" After sleeping for ten hours and then departing the hooch in search of chow, Rhys had come back sounding almost animated.

* 110 *

Jamie didn't look up from cleaning her E112. "Nope."

"We're getting Silver Stars."

Jamie stilled her hands and fixed her eyes on the weapon as a wave of heat wrapped around her head. Let's see: Forty-one going in.

Eighteen killed, six wounded bad. Close to sixty percent functional loss.

Yep, Silver Star country. And all squared away in less than three days.

Might be a record.

"All of us in second and third squads."

Hmm, eighteen posthumous Silver Stars. Now there's a challenge.

Bet they won't be doing that in one afternoon. "What?" Jamie looked up. "Not the two wounded from first squad?"

"Oh, they'll get Purple-" When she saw Jamie's hard stare, Rhys shut up and slinked into her hammock. "Sorry. It just doesn't feel real yet, I guess."

"Yeah, well, give it a while."

After a long, squirmy moment, Rhys offered up more scuttleb.u.t.t in a chastened near whisper: "Heard Koenig's claiming upchain that he issued a last-minute 'field adjustment' to our orders." She snorted. "So he's getting a commendation."

"Better than me getting a court martial." Yet a court martial and a demotion to buck private had plenty of appeal; she'd be spared responsibility for anybody but herself. She returned her eyes to her rifle so Rhys wouldn't see them.

"The medal-that's a good thing, right?" Rhys pleaded.

"Least for us it's not posthumous." But Jamie wouldn't look up again.

The next day, the entire battalion was relieved and given ten days'