3. This is the tragedy "Man"
Puppet trudged through the hissing sand, goggles fixed over his eyes. Through the dust, the moonlight shifted, chasing blurred shadows along the ground. Division HQ was lit up like an Ishbalan bazaar at dusk, visible through the sleeting clouds of grit. Camouflage netting had been thrown across the ruined bulk of an ancient temple surmounted by the worn figure of a stone harpy, detail etched from its face by time. He'd forgotten to wrap a shemagh around his face, and the alchemist's mouth curled as he tried to spit out some sand, settling into a resigned grimace as he neared the cluster of tents. Throwing the sentry a desultory salute, he made to enter. The canvas walls rippled in the wind, surrounded by a waist-high sandbag barricade. Unclasping the entrance's fastenings, he stepped across the threshold and out of the relative calm of the storm.
The Division HQ was a buzz of activity, built around the message centre. Three shifts of signal corps personnel worked tirelessly, letting Falkender and his headquarters company bring the Division's unwieldy bulk into motion. Like fabled Behemoth, it could only move slowly, and reacted to attack with ponderous might.
The 6th and 12th Divisions had long since parted ways, as Battlegroup Falkender split in two to handle the demands of the Fuhrer's campaign. While Falkender himself remained in nominal command of the 12th, the distance was too great for effective leadership, and he trusted in his junior, Major-General Blaine, to sucessfully hold the line along the Reyo Chiprana.
After their signal victory at the Aerugan border, the battlegroup had proceeded unmolested more than forty miles into enemy territory, necessitating a halt while their lengthened supply lines were able to establish a new supply point further forward. Major-General Falkender leant on a creaking table that spanned the far side of the message centre, hovering over soldiers from the Signals company constantly working the switchboards. The 2/22nd was in the process of fighting off a night attack, their enemy Aerugan irregulars down from the hills, the so-called Broken Lances. A sound like thunder rose above as the divisional artillery fired in support of the dug-in grenadiers, and Falkender's eyes flicked up to fix Puppet.
"You'll accompany the cavalry to the 2/22nd's bivouac. They're waiting at the wire." he said flatly. Puppet's salute was less sketchy this time.
"...yes, sir." He strode away.
The convoy sat, as promised, at the wire barrier delineating the end of the camp and the beginning of the temporary minefields the pioneers threw down every time Division HQ settled. A squadron of six tanks hunched alongside ten armoured cars from the division's armoured cavalry troop. Painted along the flank of the second car in line was a fairly neat depiction of the rampant Amestrine dragon swallowing a stylised Aerugan wasp. The troop commander looked up as Puppet approached.
"Major, just in time!" The captain gave the alchemist a hand up into his command vehicle. The thinly-armoured car had a soft top that provided scant relief from the scouring dust, but it was better than nothing. As he sat, the captain reached down, selecting a stone from a small pile on the floor of the vehicle's bed. Puppet stared quizzically as the officer pitched it, striking the lead tank's turret. The captain caught his look and explained, "It's the storm fouling up our radios; the blasted dust gets into everything." Now the tank commander had emerged and turned to face the captain. Clenching his fist, he waved his arm in the go signal. The convoy shuddered into motion.
---
He feels the sand beneath his feet, between his toes. The Aerugan man sitting by the fire looks up (his eyes are red) and smiles, motioning for him to sit beside the fire. He smiles as well, and presses the muzzle of his pistol to the man's forehead.
This was the third night enlivened by that dream. Early woke with a start, eyes flicking around the shaded length of the tent. His nerves were on fire, and he sighed at the unfairness of it. Safely behind the lines at the 4/23rd's supply dump, Red Company was taking what amounted to R and R, spending their days riding shotgun on the field convoys keeping the rest of 4/23rd fed, and then - untold luxury! - falling asleep on bedrolls within the shelter of a tent as night fell. Rumours abounded that irregulars were about to pour out of the mountains and swamp the State forces, but apart from the Lances further south, the quasi-religious factions that the Aerugans had ceded border control to - the Orders Limitant - had been utterly silent. The Special Operatives had alluded to hidden troop movements and the building up of supplies, but Early knew they thrived on that kind of cloak-and-dagger stuff. He wasn't complacent, though. The border forces, their honour sullied, would either turn and attack - as the Lances had - or bide their time, waiting for the State's forces to be attrited by combat before striking out at its vulnerable flank. Not that Old Man Falkender would let that happen; he'd no doubt dispatch the SOs and picked detachments of troops to root out the Orders in their mountain fastnesses before they became a real thorn in Division's side.
Settling further down in his cot, the sergeant stared at the moon, a glimmer through the canvas. It took an instant of conscious effort to hear the sand whistling past the walls; the noise had been ubiquitous for the last few days. Over the muffled roar, he fancied he could hear the squad breathe. He'd expected Abrams, at least, to snore, but the big man slept silently, and none of the others broke the hush within the tent. Despite the hour, he suddenly felt no need for sleep. The voice of experience shrieked within him. Grab every second you can. This may be the last chance you'll have to rest. Fatigue dulls your edge, gets your men killed. He forced his eyes shut, and willed dreamless sleep to come.
---
The car bucked as it traversed the broken ground, knocking about the men within. The cavalry troop's commander, going by the name Kilgore, had been pleased to make Puppet's acquaintance once he'd recognised the badge of a State Alchemist. The convoy had travelled as a staggered column for the last half an hour, as rough country roads faded into unmarked dirt and scrub, and now they neared the fighting. The storm had begun to clear, allowing an awesome starlit vista to open up ahead of them. At each horizon loomed the mountains of the border zone, their chill heights glistening. As they approached, shells whickered overhead and threw the approaching ridges into relief against the star-specked sky.
One of Kilgore's men had manage to coax the vehicle's radio back into working order, and had made contact with the 2/22nd's headquarters. Their field telephone lines had been cut, but they'd managed intermittent radio contact with Division HQ since the convoy's departure.
"This is it, Major: up the next ridge and we'll have direct sight of the 2/22nd's field base." Kilgore's eyes were unreadable behind their field goggles, but his bared teeth shone. The tanks were outpacing them now, their broad treads and lozenge-shaped hulls leaving them well-equipped for the navigation of treacherously sandy inclines. The armoured car wove back and forth across the face of the ridge, gradually gaining purchase. Then the base came into view.
The second battalion, 22nd Infantry Brigade had made their camp on the crown of a wide, low-slung mound that looked out across the plain, unchallenged except by the ridges the convoy now crossed. The entire battle was lit in actinic intensity; mortars raining star-shells down on the perimeter, and threads of tracer fire swinging down the slope, where here and there Puppet could see irregulars concealed behind boulders and in ditches, exposing themselves as little as possible as they fought. Puppet had come from a scientific background instead of a martial one, but here he had no problem discerning the tactical problem facing the 2/22nd. Night's fall and the ferocity of the storm had allowed the Lances to exploit the terrain, slipping past the listening post that should have been established outside the battalion's perimeter and closing to within a hundred metres of the Amestrine position. Danger close. Two words encapsulating the fear inspired by even friendly artillery. Puppet gazed open-eyed as another barrage landed, utterly obliterating an swathe of empty field. With the enemy concentrated so close, Division's firepower was essentially neutered, useful only for preventing retreat. In the face of the enemy's fanatical resistance, that wasn't a great comfort. Still, broken bodies scattered no closer than fifty metres of the Amestrine fighting positions spoke of their continued discipline, and even as the convoy gained the top of the ridge another assault was repulsed, the survivors scuttling to safety as bullets threw up showers of dirt.
"Shit, the apes have a whole battalion down there, at least." Kilgore grabbed the radio's handset and began barking orders.
"Captain, this is where I leave you." Kilgore looked at him, aghast. "Don't fret, this is my area of expertise. Thank you for the ride." The alchemist eased over the car's door and dropped to the ground, landing in a crouch with his eyes fixed on the battle ahead. Without looking down, he tugged the gloves from his hands. On the left, an alchemical array was revealed, spidery lines tatooed across each surface, converging on the palm. He rose, framing the scene before him, dozens of Aerugan irregulars, apes, holding fast in the dead ground below the State positions. A dance of alchemical energy lit up the array and ahead sparks danced along the ground, jumping across the startled Lances with no ill effect. Puppet released a breath in a convulsive shudder, and looked up. "Captain? Order the tanks to fire when ready." Perplexed, the officer nodded. A moment later and the snub-nosed barrels spat, their shells detonating amidst the Aerugans-
-and being completely subsumed in the hellishly bright glare of an explosion that wreathed the bottom of the hill in fire. Thunder rolled over the 2/22nd on a wave of dust. The twisted cloud above the detonation lingered for a moment, then frayed in the desert wind, revealing a smooth-sided crater where before the Lances had rallied. At its periphery a scattered few lay, apparently intact. The entire battle paused for a further few seconds, and then the guerrillas broke, all but the most die-hard throwing down their weapons and running for the hills.
"Major, what did you do?" Puppet pulled his gaze from the crater.
"Let's join the second battalion." He smiled thinly. "Your men are heroes now."
---
Dietrich and Early strode along the buried length of an ancient highway as they approached the temple Division HQ had reclaimed. The eyeless stone woman perched above the capstone still managed to regard them balefully as they trudged into the command tent, letting a shaft of unfiltered daylight in with them. Dietrich brought his eyes up as he entered and pulled up short as he recognised Captain Haumaier. He resisted the urge to salute; the HQ was still technically in the field, and saluting a superior was an excellent way of wishing them death by sniper. He stepped further forward, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the rest of Red Company's lieutenants, gathered around the captain. As he nodded at Irons from Two platoon, Major-General Falkender looked up from the table he'd been working at and turned to face the gathered officers.
"That's it? Good." Falkender wasn't a particularly remarkable man; of average height, sporting an impressive moustache matching hair bleached by age. Round spectacles gave the Old Man a somewhat fatherly appearance, but his posture was impeccable and Dietrich straightened further still as the general's gaze rested upon him for a moment. "The captain will brief you in-depth later, but for now I need volunteers and you're them. Special Ops have identified a guerrilla stronghold in the mountains and Red Company is tasked with erasing it. The major here will provide support to the extent it proves necessary." Now Dietrich noticed the man standing at Falkender's side, the soot-dulled gleam of a State Alchemist's pocket-watch visible at his hip. He'd spoken briefly with the man, in what seemed an age ago back at the mustering ground deep in South City, and had never learned his name.
---
Red Company inched along through the brush, an ochre column dragging their feet in the parched soil. Early cast hooded eyes along the ridge looming ahead of them, the latest knife-edged barrier in a series they'd conquered so far, these weary miles out from the western encampments. The plains beyond the border mountains were visible only as a flat sliver over the farthest rises to the south, coloured a dull red in the light of the sinking sun. There was a crackle from Jochim's radio and Dietrich reached out for the proffered handset. He listened for a moment.
"Copied, sir. One platoon out." He replaced the handset and shouldered his gun, reaching for a canteen as he met Early's look. "We're stopping here and digging in for the night. Get the men dispersed." Early nodded and hopped atop a nearby rock, catching Axel's attention. The junior sergeant stood at the back of the platoon, and he signalled his understanding. The three sections ground to a weary halt, each squad falling apart as men found places to sit and shucked off their webbing, loaded down with water and ammunition. After a brief respite, the sergeants took over, assigning tasks and cursing the grunts out of their torpitude.
"Get those fox-holes ready! Sweat now, or you'll bleed later!" Jens' bellow was clearly audible and brought a smile to Early's face. He looked expectantly at his squad, and with a groan they got their entrenching tools clear and began hacking at the ground. Dietrich, Early and Sieg remained standing, eyes out in every direction to provide local security. Back to the east, down a slight slope, the rest of Red dug in. A line of mules was being led upward by a sour-looking corporal from Red's command section. The vile animals carried the company's rations and additional ammunition, leaving the men only their essentials and freeing them for combat. Accompanying the junior NCO were a gaggle of privates: the company cook and his assistants. Tonight their culinary talents were exercised only in the doling out of mess tins and cardboard-packed ration boxes.
After some initial resistance, the baked earth had proven amenable to excavation and now each member of the squad stood within a deepening waist-high hole, dirt piling up at each parapet. Sieg had been reassigned to sand-bag duty and Dietrich's place in the watch had been replaced by Axel, with the second lieutenant making his way down-hill to put his head together with the other officers and work out the company's defensive disposition. Now the LT was making his way back to One platoon, a quintet of grenadiers from the heavy weapons platoon in tow. Their senior introduced himself as Corporal Moresby, and the four privates under his command made up one of Red's two machine-gun teams. Their tripod mounted weapon had a long, air-cooled barrel and outsized Abrams' LMG by a fair margin. Three of the gunners began assembling the weapon while Moresby and the fourth began hacking out a pit for the weapon next to Connol's fox-hole. The rest of the squad had completed their pits and now converged on the pile of ration packs at the edge of their makeshift camp.
The State's "C" Field rations consisted of three cans of tinned meat per man, one tin of vegetables, and a packet of crackers. The men wolfed them down cold, unwilling to build a fire in the enemy's territory. Early dug in his pocket and brought out a four-ounce chocolate bar, "D" ratio issue. He made a habit of saving the things; they were too bitter to eat unless you were desperate, which was the entire point. He still needed something to take the edge off after the "C", though. Munching slowly, he swept his eyes over the rest of the company. The whole thing was spread out in a roughly triangular shape, a rifle platoon forming each corner and the HQ section buried in the middle with the weapon platoon's mortars. The rest of Heavy Weapons had been split between One, Two and Three platoons to provide extra perimeter security. A party had been detached from HQ to mark out firing lanes for each machine-gun and set trip-flares at likely lay-up points for enemy scouts.
"Connol, you're first up on night watch." The private nodded uphappily and accepted a pair of binoculars and an extra canteen from Dietrich. The stars were dimly visible against the darkening sky, and the lieutenant stared for a moment. Growing up with Central's light pollution meant that Aerugo's stars were the first ones he'd really had time to sit and gaze at. They weren't worth it, though. Not with everything else he'd seen.
Early sat back in his fox-hole and pulled his rain-cape over to cover the entrance, hoping to trap some warmth within as the night gradually grew chill. His eyes had lain closed for an hour before they flew open again, the smiling Aerugan fading from his vision as gunshots sounded. The sergeant bolted upright, fixing a magazine in his submachine-gun as he rose. Eyes narrowed, he lifted the rain-cape's edge and scanned the mounded top of the ridge. There. A muzzle-flash, a hint of movement, figures caught for a moment by the starlight. Three hundred metres away, but closing at a steady lope. Early threw aside the cape and raised his voice.
"Squad, fingers on triggers!" The others were rising now, and Connol, nearing the end of his shift, had already emptied one magazine at the enemy and was crouched down, the top of his helmet visible as he brought another home. More to direct the squad than in the hope of actually hitting anything, Early fired a burst at the rushing shapes, hearing the squad's rifles join him one by one. Abrams opened up with the light machine-gun, expending an entire drum of ammunition with a sound like tearing cloth. There was a shout from Moresby and the heavy machine-gun opened up, its incessant howl drowning out the rest of One platoon as it spat red tracer rounds in an arc, over the heads of the advancing guerrillas. The gunners adjusted their weapon and the chain of glowing rounds was interrupted shockingly as one irregular fell into its line of fire, his death a pause in the red stream as a hail of bullets pulped his torso. Heedless of the fire, the Aerugans continued to close, screaming in their incomprehensible tongue as they ran, shooting from the hip or kneeling for a moment to loose an aimed shot. Dirt danced into the air near Early and he snarled, crouching further and resting the barrel of his gun atop the fox-hole's parapet. The guns continued to chatter and a star-shell drifted overhead in a lazy arc, casting its glow over the battlefield and narrowing the night into knife-edged shadows. "Berhold, Sieg, hit that fucker with the grenade," Early yelled as a guerrilla brought his arm back, a stick bomb clenched in his hand. Red stars bloomed on the man's chest and he fell to his knees, losing his grip on the grenade. It detonated a moment later, driving him face-first into the ground.
The remaining guerrillas had taken cover on the reverse slope of the ridge's other side, exposed to Two platoon's fire but out of Early's sight. A few feet away, Dietrich struggled out his fox-hole and cast around, grabbing his webbing and submachine-gun.
"Sarge, I'm taking Jens' squad and flanking the bastards. Hold here."
"Understood, sir," Early replied "no heroics, right?" The lieutenant's eyes were in shadow as he grinned. Bounding across the dead space between the dug-in squads, he brought up Jens' men with a gesture and the eleven of them set off at a jog, heading towards the ridge's crown. As they approached, each man dropped flat to avoid silhouetting themselves, and every second man primed a grenade. Three hundred metres away, Early heard the collective shout from his fox-hole: "Frag out!" Plumes of dirt rose from behind the ridge and the men rose swiftly, darting forward the last few feet to the summit and dropping prone once more, each man in a firing position.
Dietrich's world narrowed down as if viewed through a telescope. Below him, a platoon's worth of Aerugans, at least forty men, lay crouched or prone, exchanging fire with the Amestrine troops further down-hill. Some had been torn by the volley of frag grenades, and still others rolled to focus on the new threat to their flank. Eyes widened in dirt-smeared faces and rifles swung to regard the enfilading squad. Too slow!
Moments later, they looked down on a score of corpses. A groan sounded and the men fired again on reflex.
"Cease fire," he raised his voice, "cease fire! Snowball, get Doc up here." He'd begun to look back at the wounded when the gunfire started afresh; a second detachment of Lances coming from the north. Dietrich swore and wriggled further into cover as tracers swung overhead, out of the darkness. The bastards have a machine-gun. By the sound of it, one of the cumbersome water-cooled models that ape central command happily dispensed to the feudalistic border groups. The gun was set up in defilade on an adjacent ridge, and the second wave of guerrillas were advancing under the cover it provided. Jens coaxed the men into opening fire once more, and ahead one of the advancing figures dropped to the ground as if his strings had been cut.
Dietrich started as a man dove to the ground beside him. It was the alchemist accompanying Red, and he'd brought a section from Three platoon with him. Tugging the shemagh from over his mouth, he faced the lieutenant.
"Have you started zeroing in the mortars?" Dietrich blanched; he'd been too caught up in the firefight. Hastily he grabbed a handset from Jens' radioman and tugged out a spare pair of binoculars. The newly-arrived squad was dispersing into firing positions, and more of the guerrillas ahead staggered and fell.
Puppet dared a look above the ridge's summit. Exposed like this, it was damn lucky the irregulars had no field artillery with them. On their own initiative, the mortars had launched star-shells beyond Dietrich's position, putting a spotlight on the advancing guerrillas. That gun's a little far for line-of-sight transmutation, but these men out in the open...
"Ease!" Bellowed the unnamed major. That was a signal in the artillery corps, a sign to open the mouth before the cannon fired and the air pressure changed. The rest of the men repeated the yell on instinct. Dietrich had given the fire-for-effect order only an instant before his vision was washed out by a blast that outshone the star-shells and gave way to a boiling crimson cloud of ash and smoke that rose before the ridge. His ears sore and ringing, he rolled back onto his stomach and stared open-eyed at the expanding cloud that blotted out the stars above like a thunderhead.
---
The door's bolt surrenders with a screech as it flies apart, revealing a sun-bleached panorama that staggers him before his eyes readjust. He stands under the lip of a multi-kilometre-wide crater, looking down on to a terraced city, a wilting amalgamation of stucco walls and red-tiled roofs. Rising in the centre is a spired building that commands a set of scenic grounds, their lush green shocking in the midst of this bleakness. He stumbles through the threshold in a daze, his feet resting on compacted earth. In the shadows to either side of him, in artificial caverns hollowed from the crater walls, webs of steel and machinery boom in the darkness. Looking up, he sees that the crater's rim is limned in grey, one thousand thousand shades of it, pumping torrents of smoke skyward.
Even standing in the shadows as he does, he feels the air's warmth, so greatly different than the chill confines of the bunker he's just escaped from. He's much further south than he'd suspected, but comfort fills him as memories tumble back, and he knows he is safe, at least for now. Retreating back through the doorway, he resculpts himself carefully, preening over each detail until he's appropriately inconspicuous.