Invasion: California Read online

The Behemoth’s penetrator size and weight was much lower than an ordinary sabot round. It could therefore carry much more ammo onboard than otherwise. Nor did the crew need to worry about explosives in the tank. The greatest benefit was that at this velocity the rail-gun had much greater range, less bullet drop, faster time on target and less wind drift. In other words, it bypassed the physical limitations of conventional firearms. In fact, the rounds flew so fast, they ionized the air around them.

  The Behemoth rail-gun theoretically fired farther, faster and with greater penetrating power than any comparable conventional gun. Its range was also much greater than the targeting precision, meaning it was easily possible to fire a Behemoth round over one hundred miles.

  Stan blew out his cheeks and cracked his knuckles. The Behemoth clanked onto the desert sands, the treads rolling over a cactus so moisture squelched onto a nearby rock, wetting it. Captain Reece’s tank followed behind them by fifty yards.

  “How far are we going?” Jose asked.

  “Eh, what’s that?” Stan asked.

  “How far are we going?”

  “Several miles,” Stan said.

  No one talked after that. They listened to the steel monster rattle and clank. The Behemoth could theoretically perform marvels. Unfortunately, on the testing grounds the giant vehicles had broken down all the time.

  Stan now pulled up a map and began studying the terrain. If he could find a level—

  “Hello,” Stan said.

  Jose arched an eyebrow.

  Stan got on the radio with Reece and they talked things over. Ten minutes later, the two giant tanks parked fifty yards apart.

  There was a thin, last ditch screen of Americans ahead of them. Coming hard against these shreds of Tenth Division were the lead elements of two T-66 divisions.

  “What else is there out here?” Reece asked over the radio.

  “It’s just us now,” Stan said, “with artillery support once we call for it.”

  “I hope you know what you’re doing, Higgins,” Captain Reece said.

  “I hope the Colonel knows what he’s doing,” Stan replied.

  Captain Reece said nothing to that.

  Stan studied the data on his screen. They had a high-flying drone in position. Ah, look at them, Chinese T-66 tanks plowing head-on. Using the computer to study the enemy, Stan counted one hundred and eleven tri-turreted tanks, seven miles out, a bit more than eleven thousand meters. They were just beginning to appear on the same horizontal plane as the two Behemoths and almost in effective range.

  “I’d say we give them another eight hundred meters,” Stan said, trying to sound more confident than he felt.

  He knew it was important to get the maximum advantage out of a technological surprise as one could. The Germans had failed to do that during World War II with their newest Panther and Tiger tanks in 1943. Hitler had ordered the new tanks into combat before all their teething problems had been overcome. The Panthers and Tigers were supposed to be new wonder weapons, helping the Germans defeat the much more numerous Russian tanks. The new tanks had been thrown in too soon into the giant cauldron of the Battle of Kursk, the greatest tank battle of the war.

  Are we throwing our Behemoths into the fray too soon?

  If America lost California, but had time to prefect the Behemoth and enter battle for the first time with a hundred of them instead of twenty, or the two out here—

  Stan shrugged. It didn’t matter now. He was out here. On his screen, he watched the last Americans of the Tenth Division standing their ground in the desert and dying.

  “Are you boys ready?” Stan asked his crew.

  Jose, the gunner and the air/radio operator nodded or muttered a yes.

  “Captain Reece,” Stan said, “I suggest we open fire on the enemy.”

  “We should order some artillery down on them first,” Reece said.

  “Agreed,” Stan said. He was feeling surreal. He was about to enter combat again. He hadn’t fired in anger since Anchorage.

  Can I do as well this time? Stan shook his head. He doubted he could, but he might halt the Chinese advance. He could buy the U.S. Army time to regroup and defend LA. It might even save an entire Army Group, allowing them time to fight their way out of the trap.

  Thirty seconds later, American artillery began to pound the enemy, who used onboard defensive armaments to shoot down the vast majority of artillery shells.

  Stan checked the Behemoth’s batteries. They were at full power. “Okay, rev up the engine.”

  The driver did just that.

  “Target the nearest tank, Jose.”

  “Roger,” Jose said, with his brow pressed against the high-powered thermal scanner.

  The Behemoth had an auto-loader, which just dropped a round into position.

  Stan’s hands were clammy. They weren’t in danger yet from the enemy. The T-66s had conventional ranges.

  “Fire,” Stan said.

  The giant electromagnetic gun hummed with power. Then the current pumped the twin rods in the cannon. The round fired, and it exited with a hard surge that rocked the Behemoth. It was one of the reasons the tank needed its incredible weight. For every action, there was an equal reaction in the opposite direction.

  Stan watched on the thermal screen. The round’s flight time—it was incredibly short. Within two seconds, a T-66 lit up on the screen and exploded.

  “Fire at will,” Stan said. He felt as if his spirit stood outside of his body, watching him at work.

  Stocky Jose proceeded to do just what he did best: target, laser-wash the enemy, wait for the chambered round and the crack of the shell going supersonic before it even exited the gun. The Behemoth rocked with violent force, expelling another of its incredibly hyper-fast rounds, reaching out around over ten thousand meters or six and a half miles.

  Stan grinned at first, hit! A T-66 blew up. Seven seconds later, hit! On the thermal sights, a second T-66 lay on its side like a dead beast. Every seven seconds another hard surge sent a shell screaming across the desert, slamming into a Chinese tank.

  It’s working. The Behemoth is behaving, but for how long?

  The smile slipped three minutes later. Stan kept a clicker, counting hits, counting kills. So far, Jose had destroyed twenty-three tri-turreted tanks, almost eight a minute. Reece probably had a similar count. Stan’s smile slipped because a loud noise from the engine area made his gut clench.

  “What’s wrong?” Stan shouted.

  “A generator,” the driver said.

  “Battery power is dropping,” the radio operator said, who helped Jose right now.

  Stan peered through the thermal scope. The Chinese were still coming. Don’t fail us now. God, help us.

  For the moment, he needn’t have worried. Yet another hard surge rocked the Behemoth as a shell roared away. How long could they keep this up? Theoretically, a long time, but the desert tests had shown them not to expect that.

  Even as Stan worried, shell after shell continued to drop into the chamber. The turret swiveled, the gun adjusted and the penetrator round reached supersonic speed as it raced at the oncoming Chinese.

  COACHELLA VALLEY, CALIFORNIA

  Soon after the giant enemy tanks opened fire, the order came down the Chinese line of command: Charge the enemy and destroy the technological marvels at close range.

  First Lieutenant Sheng rode in his platoon’s last T-66. The other two tanks were smoking hulks. Behind him thundered hundreds of tri-turreted tanks.

  It was then Sheng learned the truth. The major told them over the company net. “It seems to be only two American tanks we’re facing.”

  “Two?” Sheng said. That couldn’t be right. Not two tanks. The way they fired, so fast, so accurately, each hit drilling though a T-66—these things were science fiction dreams.

  “We will be in firing range soon,” the major said. It was the last time Sheng heard from him, as the major’s T-66 blew apart.

  “Two American tanks are doing this?” Sheng
asked aloud in wonder.

  Sheng sat between his computer screens. Sweat soaked his back. How was this possible? Could the enemy have better weapons than China? No, that was impossible.

  Three seconds later, his internal debated ended. An electromagnetically ejected penetrator round smashed into Sheng’s tank. The velocity—white-hot BB-like sparks were the last things Sheng saw. One passed through his chest and First Lieutenant Sheng died. Immediately the T-66 generated an internal inferno and turrets popped off, spinning away onto the white sands.

  ***

  Stan’s Behemoth continued to malfunction, but in a more serious manner now. Sensors in the engine diagnosed trouble. It could begin a forced shutdown any second, stranding them out here.

  “Not now,” Stan said with a groan. “My engine is about to begin an involuntary shutdown,” he said over the radio.

  “Back up,” Colonel Wilson said. “Get out of there. We’re on our way with the rest of the regiment.”

  “Roger,” Stan said. “Captain Reece should probably come with me.”

  “Negative,” Wilson said.

  “Sir—”

  “I give the orders,” Wilson said over the radio. “Now scoot.”

  Stan licked his lips. He had won his famed medal by—

  “What are we doing, sir?” the driver asked.

  Stan only gave it a moment’s thought. An order was an order. “Okay,” he said. “Let’s move out.” He immediately got on the radio with Captain Reece and told him the score. “I’m moving out,” Stan told him. “Orders.”

  “Don’t worry about us, Higgins.”

  Stan did worry. Why didn’t the Colonel order Reece to come with him? Slowly, the Behemoth began to clank, retreating from the still sizable mob of enemy T-66s. It was the last time he spoke to Captain Reece and their crew.

  Twenty T-66s made it within range, and they fired salvos of sabot rounds at Reece’s Behemoth. The shells flew like angry wasps roaring with destruction. The defending beehive flechettes and auto-cannons took out most of the rounds. Most, but not all of them—with a terrific clang two penetrated the Behemoth from the side and blew the giant engine.

  Stan’s tank stopped by that time, the forced shutdown stranding them for the moment. The remaining T-66s started for him. They never reached that far, as the rest of the Behemoths had finally left Palm Springs and now closed with and destroyed the final enemy lunge at the city.

  It ended the first battle for Palm Springs, leaving one dead Behemoth tank, two out due to technical difficulties other than engine trouble and three with engine trouble. In return, they had destroyed three hundred and fifty-nine T-66s and for the moment, at least, halted the right hook to Palm Springs and LA beyond.

  -8-

  The Cauldron

  LA MESA, CALIFORNIA

  Paul Kavanagh sat on a stuffed chair inside the lobby of a large hotel. For almost a week now, he’d been craving a Snickers bar. Ever since he and Romo had started back to the American lines, he’d been dreaming of the chewy insides.

  Lying back on the chair, with his assault rifle propped beside him, Paul watched Romo stride nearer, Snickers bar in hand.

  The Mexican assassin had gotten thinner and he looked out of place in the striped green uniform of an American Militia corporal. Paul also felt out of place wearing a similar uniform, although he had a sergeant’s markings. But it made the Lieutenant happy, so what the heck, huh?

  The Lieutenant had saved their lives…yeah, that was three days ago now—an eternity of fighting. Three days ago, Paul and Romo had been crawling nearer and nearer the battered American lines, slithering past rubble, endless drifting paper and strewn garbage. It sure hadn’t been a line in the sand. The place had been many miles from the destroyed casements and smashed bunkers of the SoCal Border Fortifications they had crept past. It had been beyond the second and third trench lines. Dead and bloating bodies, with spilled intestines and thousands, no, millions of flies crawling over them—the dead had laid unburied in the maze of trench systems, American and Asian corpses alike. The flies had been clouds of greedy, buzzing testaments to the savage fighting.

  Paul and Romo had been crawling through rubble, easing past watching Chinese gunners. They had slipped past a Chinese patrol in the streets of La Presa. Then one of the patrol members had spotted Romo. A buzz and a quick look upward had shown Paul a small UAV with Chinese markings. That had been just great, spotted by an enemy drone.

  PAA bullets made the decision for them. Tired from days alone and from having walked endless miles after ditching the two stolen vehicles, they’d sprinted down the street for the American positions.

  Machine gun fire coming from ahead of them struck the paving, chips of cement hitting Paul in the chest. Then, as suddenly as the firing had begun—the friendly machine guns aiming at their faces—it stopped.

  Several seconds later, Paul discovered why. The Lieutenant had ordered his teenage machine gunners to stop firing. The man had recognized Paul and Romo as Americans.

  The two kids behind the .50 caliber, they had watched Paul with wide, scared eyes. Paul had merely nodded to them. Then he’d jumped down right there beside them behind the sandbags. Paul had added his assault rifle fire against the Chinese patrol that led the probe against the shrinking American lines.

  Paul and Romo had reached their destination, the one they had dreamed about for days, wondering if they would ever reach it. Since everything had been chaos three days ago, they’d donned the uniform of the Anaheim Militia Company that had saved them and joined the Lieutenant’s woefully understrength platoon.

  That had been three days and two cities ago of endless fighting.

  “Catch,” Romo said. He pitched the Snickers bar.

  Paul caught it one-handed. The kids looked up from their card game around a low lobby table. They’d scooted big, overstuffed chairs up to it. From the corner of his eye, Paul noticed them watching.

  There were four of them, what was left of the original Militia squad. They were painfully young, although two claimed to be juniors in college. The other two had worked in construction, meaning fortification workers, probably the grunts hauling material for the men who knew what they were doing. They were aged nineteen to twenty-one, kids really with old men’s eyes now.

  These four had looked into the face of death and it had aged them horribly. They tired fast during combat and recuperated even faster afterward. Paul had laid shoulder-to-shoulder with them on many occasions already. Whenever the Chinese artillery or missile poundings stopped, the wave attacks commenced.

  Their Militia battalion had a third of its personnel left, maybe less. Not all of the missing were dead. At least half of the missing had taken off, either to surrender or go AWOL with the hordes of streaming refugees heading north. Paul and these four kids had seen what happened to those who tried to surrender to the enemy.

  Americans with their hands on their heads had tried to approach enemy lines. Massed Chinese firepower had chopped them into bloody chunks of rat-meat.

  “Hungry?” Paul asked, holding up the Snickers bar.

  The four Militiamen turned away without answering, resuming their card game.

  There was a gulf between Paul and them. It was mainly age—at least Paul liked to tell himself that. They were so young, pure even, with innocence leaking from them. They had illusions, so many illusions it had surprised Paul more than once. During one firefight, the machine gunner just quit firing.

  “It’s butchery,” the kid had whispered.

  Paul had let go of his assault rifle, shouldered the kid aside and taken over. He’d killed pinned down enemy soldiers. Even as the Chinese had broken and scrambled away, Paul kept firing. When he’d stopped, the kid had just stared at him with a terrified look.

  Later, Romo told him what the stare had meant. “You are a killer, my brother.”

  “What?” Paul said.

  “They are scared of you.”

  “That’s crazy. We’re on the same side
.”

  “No, it is very sane,” Romo said. The two of them had been outside the strongpoint, collecting Chinese weapons and ammo from the dead. Supplies had been drying up lately.

  “We’re all fighting the enemy,” Paul said.

  Romo smiled. It hadn’t been a friendly thing, although the assassin had not aimed it at Paul in anger or disrespect.

  “Do you know that ten percent of the fighter pilots make ninety percent of the kills?” Romo asked.

  “Afraid I don’t.”

  “Many soldiers do not fire their weapons during battle. Among the others who do fire, many of them aim anywhere than at the enemy. Most men do not like to kill other men. It is one of the reasons it takes many thousands of bullets to kill one enemy. It is also one of the reasons why artillery is the great killer in battle.”

  “Is that a fact?”

  “Why are you angry?” Romo asked.

  “No reason. Being called a killer, yeah, that’s a real honor.”

  Romo’s smile had become sad. “We are the wolves, amigo. We are the ten percent. The young ones, they realize this in you. It frightens them. They are brave. I do not mean to disrespect them. But they are not the natural warriors that you and I are.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Accept who you are, my brother. I have. It is you and me, and men like us, who will drive the invader back into the sea.”

  As Paul sat in the wrecked hotel, sitting in the stuffed chair, he used his teeth to tear open the bar’s wrapper. He’d been craving this for days. Battle, being close to death, did that to you. Cravings would overcome him and he would just have to have whatever the thing was.

  Paul bit into the bar and savored the gooey, caramel chocolate taste. Oh, this was wonderful, but it would go even better with an ice-cold glass of milk. But where was he going to find that in this sinkhole?

  He wasn’t a natural killer. That was a load of crap. He was just a soldier who wanted to see his wife and kid again. If a bunch of Chinese or other Asians was going to get in the way of that, well, he was going to kill them. They had killed enough of his countrymen that he figured he was entitled. Besides, they had invaded his home, his country. If someone entered his house with the intent to steal or rape, bam, he would drill them in the head. End of story.