Part 3: Descend
Chapter 1
"At 0430 hours Eastern Time this morning, the defensive armed forces of the Central Commonwealth of York engaged warships of the military hegemony that identifies itself as the 'United Earth Government.' York's security forces are also at this time preparing to enter the city of Manhattan. Although these actions take place ahead of the original deadline given for Manhattan to comply with our conditions to maintain peace and safety, these measures were necessary due to the imminent threat presented by terrorist elements harbored by Manhattan's rogue government, and especially the outrageous provocations by UEG military forces and their Zentraedi mercenaries. We are in possession of incontrovertible proof of a planned invasion by the United Earth Forces, and of their conspiracy with the monstrous alien invaders who murdered most of humanity.
We will not stand by as we are threatened and stripped of our sovereignty and freedoms. We will not remain complacent and idly await our destruction by a second Rain of Death. We will stand strong and defend ourselves. We call upon the UEG to withdraw its warmongering soldiers. We call for Manhattan to surrender and allow the entry of our peacekeepers. We call upon all independent, sovereign nations to join with us in resisting the domination of a tyrannical world order. And to any who are unwilling to see reason, who insist on a pointless war, know that we will fight you to the last!"
General Carter's address began looping through the Ops Center again, and Bron scowled.
"Switch it off! He's got nothing to say that we need to hear!"
He turned from the bank of monitors to look at Mary and the Manhattan officials. The Ops Center was a hardened, basement level space in the enormous Manhattan Municipal Building, originally intended for managing disasters, which Bron supposed this was. Abhram, Carstein, former Marine captain Frank Martin, who was relaying information for the giant Commander Ztren, and numerous lesser bureaucrats and functionaries were present, and the mood in the room was near panic. He saw sweat on brows and wide, white eyes.
"Mister President," Bron said, turning to the leader, "we need to get supplies and personnel over to Battery Park. Phantom Squadron will be arriving soon."
Abhram, who was not a young man, seemed to have aged another ten years this morning. He frowned, uncertain. "We have the holding action to coordinate, and we'll need those first responders. I think we may have to go through with the evacuation plan. With the navy group gone there's just not much hope…"
"Help is coming, and you have to be ready, or this is over before you've started. Yesterday you were planning to fight even though you had no guarantee anyone was going to intervene," Bron reminded him.
"But I have to consider what just happened out there. If I allow UEF troops to enter the city now, the retribution and destruction could be terrible. I never expected bloodshed on this scale."
"Didn't you?" Mary asked, sternly. "You know full well how ruthless York is. They won't be feeling merciful. And that's not even to speak of what the Zentraedi face if the city falls."
"Trust me, Mister President. This is our best chance," Bron added.
The President stroked his neatly trimmed beard, gazing at the light table of Manhattan and its environs that dominated the room. Each second that ticked by, Bron felt like a fist was tightening around his heart, until Abhram finally looked to his subordinates for their opinions. Captain Martin, a deep-voiced man of African descent, answered first.
"Commander Ztren is already preparing to give the invaders a hell of a welcome. I don't think our defenders or our citizens are ready to give in just yet," he said, his words lent weight by the power and confidence still residing in his fifty year old frame. Next to him, Carstein nodded stoically.
"York will take everything from us, if we let them."
Abhram drew in a deep breath and straightened.
"Very well. Inspector General, we'll cooperate with your troops, and allow them to land within our territory. Understand that I am trusting you that you're not leading us toward disaster to further the UEG's interests. I'll have City Services pull together the required first responder crews, mechanics, and supplies. Captain Martin, be sure to send a subordinate to meet the squadron and act as liaison on the ground."
"Right away, Mister President!"
Bron quietly released his held breath. Abhram had understandable misgivings about allowing outside troops into the city, but their backs were truly against the wall. This wasn't the time for indecisiveness.
"Sir!" a coms technician called out. "Update from the monitoring station! Hostile aircraft inbound! We have a visual feed coming online."
The image that appeared on the largest of the room's dozens of monitors was shaky and grainy, transmitted from an observer at the listening post on Inwood Hill. The early morning was overcast, but Bron could still make out the formation of fighters, identifying the F-16's by their small profiles, single engines, and triangular, fixed wings. The heavily armed warplanes were approaching in staggered lines.
"I count twenty-four F-16's," the on-site observer reported.
It was a formidable show of strength to open the battle. As the flat gray aircraft grew larger in the camera's frame, they released a full salvo of missiles, solid black shapes against the clouds.
"Incoming missiles are targeting our positions at Inwood Hill Park!" a tech reported, monitoring the readouts from the repurposed civilian radar domes around the city.
Anxious seconds passed, and then the missiles pounded the hill and woods. Billowing mushrooms of dark smoke were punctuated by the dull thump of the warheads' blasts. The audio feed was distorted by alarmed shouts from a near miss, and the camera dropped, showing nothing but out of focus dirt and rocks inside the camouflaged observation post. The image shook in vertigo inducing spasms for a moment, then steadied and aimed back at the sky, trying to find the fighters again.
"Still here, Ops," the observer said hoarsely. "My assistant is checking in with the command post to assess the damage."
Bron set his mouth in a thin line. There was very little the defenders could do to respond to the air attack. Zentraedi giants firing back with armada-issued auto-rifles would only make targets of themselves.
"They're coming around for another pass," the observer reported. "They're-"
"Nine o'clock! Nine o'clock!" he was interrupted by the shouts of another occupant of the dugout, who was out of view. The camera hauled around, shook, zoomed in, and focused.
"New group of aircraft, coming in fast and low!"
The Phantoms rose above the broken earth like avenging spirits rising from the grave. With the low level of their approach masking them from radar, and the focus of York's pilots directed towards their ground targets on Manhattan island, Phantom Squadron achieved complete surprise. Two missiles were launched from the wing hardpoints of each Valkyrie, leaving arcing white trails as they zeroed in on every one of the F-16's. York's formation disappeared, the fighters scattering like frightened pigeons and maneuvering desperately to evade the attack, but they were unprepared and hopelessly outmatched. Having witnessed such a volley so many times with battlepods on the receiving end, Bron winced when the advanced warheads detonated in spidery black bursts. The F-16's were instantly reduced to clouds of aluminum-alloy confetti. The reversal was so rapid, so shocking, it was almost like watching a murder, and he had to remind himself that the pilots who had just died had been fully prepared to bombard a city of noncombatants and defenders who were just as badly outclassed as they now were.
The ops center staff sent up a surprised cheer, which was echoed by the troops at Inswood Hill. The cheer died quickly, because the massed weapons batteries in York's siege lines wasted no time striking back. Scores of surface-to-air missiles screamed skyward from hidden launch platforms, leaving choking gray exhaust in their wake, followed by the deadly pale glow worm trails of tracers fired by the point defense turrets of every armored vehicle in line of sight. High explosive payloads and thousands of tungsten alloy slugs reached for the dozen Valkyries of Phantom Squadron.
The visual feeds from the battlefield became chaotic as Edwards's pilots broke into tightly grouped pairs and began dodging the ground fire, but Bron was trained to interpret this kind of information, and keeping one eye on the radar screen, he was able to follow the general flow of the combat.
"Christ riding a handcart!" Mary exclaimed. "They'll have 'em in bits before they can even fire again!"
"No." Bron shook his head. "I've seen Valkyries fight. They won't be shot down that easily." He remembered his own terrifying first-hand encounter with a younger Lieutenant Hunter, who was at the controls of an up-armored battloid. Rico had been no slouch piloting a Cyclops Theatre Scout, but Hunter had shot down a heavy spread of missiles, shrugged off a spray of energy beams, and then muscled his way past the scout's nose cone to break into the crew compartment. Bron and the others had been lucky to escape with their lives, even if they had managed to cripple Rick's Valkyrie by scuttling their scout. Here, Phantom Squadron's veritechs weren't facing state-of-the-art Robotech armaments, so the contest was far from equal.
"Watch now," Bron prompted. The Valkyries spread their wings and transformed to guardian mode, dropping low to skate along with their leg thrusters almost touching the ground and casting up great clouds of ash as they flitted between crumbling buildings. Streams of solid rounds followed them down, but the weapon turrets had little hope of tracking them at that speed and range, with the ground so cluttered. The missiles flew high, turning to drop back down upon the Valkyries, but the guardians left the western bank and began crossing the Hudson River just as the missiles reached the top of their arc. The veritechs simply aimed their gun pods toward the sky and began skeet shooting them. With the initial missile volley eliminated, the Phantoms reached the opposite bank, entered the Bronx, and went hunting.
"Prioritize anti-air and artillery assets," Bron heard Colonel Edwards order tersely. York had weapons batteries, armored vehicles, and supply dumps concealed all throughout the ruins of the Spuyten Duyvil, Kingsbridge, and Riverdale neighborhoods, which all faced the north end of the island of Manhattan across the Harlem River.
The dusty streets of the Bronx rang with the chatter of high caliber automatic weapons and high explosives. The walls of gutted buildings slumped and collapsed under the fury of the fast-moving, close quarters firefight. It became even more difficult to follow the battle, but Bron was still able to form an impression of what was happening from the brief glimpses in the video feeds sent by the spotters on the Manhattan shore and the transmissions of the Phantom teams.
"Artillery battery confirmed at position three."
"Acknowledged, Phantom Five. Destroy and proceed to mech infantry staging area at position four."
"Phantom Ten here. Have reached missile launch site at position eight. Light armor defending. They're holed up in a cul-de-sac. Switching to battloid and engaging."
"If you haven't dug them out within thirty seconds, move on to the next position. Nobody is to stay in one place and get surrounded. Strike and fade, Phantoms!"
Half of the veritechs operated in pairs, sowing confusion and firing on targets of opportunity. The rest, under Edwards's direct command, moved from position to position, changing from guardian to battloid wherever needed, and striking with bone-crushing force. Artillery pieces were tumbled from their firing platforms, their ammunition stocks destroyed in titanic explosions. Camouflaged missile batteries were lanced by head mounted lasers. Armored fighting vehicles were set ablaze and their crews scattered. As the strike continued, billowing dust, muzzle flashes, and the occasional stray laser beam gave away the movements of the Valkyries through the neighborhoods, as well as those of Centaur hover tanks fleeing the area to escape them.
"This'll delay York's main attack until they can reorganize," Bron said.
Mary shook her head in disbelief at Phantom Squadron's rampage.
"Delay? They're tearing York's troops apart! They'll have every one of them on a slab by noon at this rate!"
"That's highly unlikely ma'am," Captain Martin said. "In fact, the squadron will probably break contact with the enemy very soon."
"But why?"
"Because 'Quantity has a quality all its own,'" Martin replied.
Bron wasn't familiar with the reference, but as a former Zentraedi soldier, he understood the principal all too well.
"Edwards's twelve veritechs are still facing an entire army, even if they're not Robotech equipped forces," he said, nodding his agreement. "If he stays too long, he'll run low on ammunition, while York's troops will rally, set up ambushes, and eventually counterattack. Even a veritech can be taken out by bad luck and overwhelming firepower. If he wants to be able to continue to defend Manhattan, he'll have to pull his Valkyries out of the fight and get to friendly ground, like we planned."
Mary raised an eyebrow at Bron's commentary.
"Very insightful, Bron. It's too easy to forget your background, most of the time," she said softly enough that no one would overhear her. Bron frowned.
"That's… not who I am anymore. I hate war."
"I understand. But don't think I haven't noticed the guilty look on your face when you see something or someone says something that reminds you of the Robotech War or the Rain of Death. Those tragedies weren't your fault, but your past has given you knowledge and skills. You have true empathy and compassion for those who fight and those who've suffered because of war."
"It's not a big deal," he said haltingly.
"You can't hide your feelings from me, Bron, any more than Rico or Konda can. I have my own background, you know," she said with a crooked smile. "Poor Rico fumbles for a joke every time someone asks him about his time in the fleet in anything but the vaguest way, and Konda will just look at his tablet and pretend he doesn't hear me if I try to talk to him about the old days."
"I'm fine, Mary," he said, not meeting her eyes. He felt it was hardly the time or place for this conversation- or was it just that she was hitting uncomfortably close to the mark? Her smile became gentler.
"Sure. I'm not a psychiatrist. Just try to keep what I said in mind, alright?"
"Ok," he agreed, and returned his attention to the bank of monitors, trying to recapture his sense of the battle's ebb and flood. That was when he saw it happen. One of the Valkyries, still in guardian mode, was zooming south down the 87 Expressway, and the pilot must have caught a glimpse of a trio of armored fighting vehicles retreating along 225th Street as it passed. The AFV's threw themselves into reverse and began backing west, trying to escape, while the Valkyrie pulled a hairpin turn at the end of a shopping center and came back north along the railway that hugged the shore of the Harlem River, its wingmate following close behind. There was a small parking lot just past the shopping center that would allow the pilot to cut off the AFV's.
"Wait," Bron whispered, and then shouted, "Wait! Get me Edwards, get me somebody from the Phantoms!" But it was too late.
The Valkyrie cut around the corner, still skimming gracefully on its leg thrusters, inches above the cracked asphalt, and found itself facing the standing half of a fourteen story apartment building. A trap. Hidden infantry teams launched shoulder-fired rockets from positions all over the windowed face of the building.
Boxed in on either side, the Valkyrie pilot threw full power to his thrusters, but was unable to boost vertically in time, and took multiple direct hits. Loaded with conventional armor-piercing warheads, most of them could do little but smear themselves uselessly across the veritech's armor, leaving black soot stains that marred the mottled gray and white of the right shin, left forearm, and the upper right of the fuselage - all but the last missile, which struck the seam where the front of the canopy met the nose cone. Instantly, a shaped blast of molten metal and superheated gases shattered the canopy and incinerated the cockpit. Out of control, the Valkyrie flew straight up, then tumbled backwards and to the left, until it finally dropped and crashed on its side, its thrusters guttering and dying. The gun pod clattered free from its metal hand and spun away down the railroad track, while the giant fingers clutched spasmodically. The guardian's limbs were curling in and stiffening like a dying bird's when its wingmate reversed thrusters and came to a halt, narrowly avoiding colliding with it or falling into the trap.
"Ten here, Phantom Eleven is down!" the other pilot called out. "Phantom Eleven is confirmed KIA!"
"Sanitize and withdraw," Edwards ordered coolly. "All Phantoms, disengage and move to the rally point."
Bron, watching the wobbly camera image, could see the pilot of Phantom Ten hesitate for just a moment, regarding the flames that continued to lick hungrily from the burning cockpit of Phantom Eleven, and the column of black smoke that was rising into the sky, already taller than the surrounding buildings. Then she lowered her gun pod and squeezed off a short burst directly into the undercarriage of her wingmate's Valkyrie. The generator went off, and the stricken veritech came apart in a blinding flash. Phantom Ten took off and joined up with the rest of the squadron as the Valkyries came boiling out of the war torn district, and they all flew down the Harlem River toward their landing point on the south end of Manhattan. Bron shook his head, knotting his fingers through his sweat-dampened hair. Mary put a hand on his shoulder.
"You tried, Bron."
"This is the easiest it will be. The next skirmish is going to be bloodier." He looked back at the screens. The veritechs were out of visual range of the Inswood Hill positions. "Let's see if we can find a vehicle and a driver. I want to talk to Colonel Edwards when he lands."
Bron and Mary nearly didn't make it to Battery Park, because York's troops had a surprise waiting for Phantom Squadron when they came around the bend of the river and prepared to land. Swarms of missiles filled the skies, launched from somewhere south of Manhattan. Bron was climbing into the back seat of a black SUV after Mary, when he heard the shriek of the engines and looked up to see the bright glare of their thrusters. He roughly pushed Mary across the seat and threw himself in.
"Drive! Drive!" he shouted, and the city employee floored the accelerator. The SUV's tires squealed, leaving black patches in the street as they took off. Seconds later, Manhattan shook under the indiscriminate bombardment. The front three floors of the Municiple Building's facade collapsed, blocking the street with masonry and glass.
"Sorry," Bron muttered as he and Mary buckled themselves in. It was impossible to tell the full extent of the damage, but he could see burning fires, police, ambulance and fire vehicles racing through the streets, lights flashing and sirens howling, and three times, their driver had to divert around burning debris. The only factor mitigating the loss of life was the city's low population, but he knew that also meant that many of the fires would burn out of control for hours or days before someone would be available to deal with them. Bron felt sickened by it all, but Mary was furious, her face nearly purple and her fingers clenched into tight fists.
"How can York do this? In front of the whole world!"
"Mary-" he began, but she raised a hand and took a deep breath, visibly calming herself.
"No, thank you. I'm ok. I know what they're trying to do- brutalize the people so much that Manhattan surrenders. They think that once they occupy the city, they can spin the story however they want. And they may be right. The UEG's hold is too tenuous, and anti-Zentraedi paranoia too strong. There are factions that want to believe them."
"Then we do like you said. Keep resisting, and keep putting the truth out there for everyone to see."
"But even if somehow we beat back York, it'll kill me if their leaders weasel their way out of being held responsible for their crimes," Mary replied, glowering.
"It's too soon to be worrying about that. We've got to get through today."
"I'm sick of just getting through 'today' Bron. We've had to fight tooth and nail for everything, whether it's the Ministry, the Assembly, or the independents, and the vision for something better just isn't there."
"Well, there's the Pioneer Mission," Bron pointed out.
"Yes, and that's great for the future, but our today looks pretty dismal. When this is over, and we're both out of jobs, promise me we're going to do something about it."
"I promise, if you'll help me find the way. Now let's see what we can do about surviving today."
"And with unending strength and resolve, the Army of the Southern Cross will defend the people of Manhattan and drive back the invaders, just as we will defeat anyone who would threaten the peace and safety of our United Earth."
Colonel Edwards certainly knew how to set a dramatic scene. The columns of smoke behind him left no doubt as to the scope of York's indiscriminate attack, but he had also had the good sense to carefully position himself to leave Phantom Five's burning veritech out of view of Aria Stockton's camera drone, as well as the paramedics working on the critically wounded pilot lying on the grass a short distance away.
Instead, Edwards stood in front of his nine remaining Valkyries. They were arrayed in a parade perfect line, the battloids kneeling with their heads bowed and holding their gun pods with the muzzles in the air and stocks resting on the ground. They looked like armored crusaders grasping their swords and praying before going into battle. Bron and Mary, having just arrived, waited nearby as Stockton interviewed Edwards.
"Indeed Colonel, there is no doubting your pilots' courage. But York still has vast reserves, and they defeated an entire navy task force. Is it realistic to continue to fight against such odds, after seeing the destruction Manhattan suffered in just this first bombardment?" Stockton asked.
Under the face-plate that covered his injuries, Edwards's cheek pulled back in a vicious half-smile.
"Better to direct that question to Supreme Commander Dolza… if he were still alive. York's leaders will be made to understand that they cannot overcome the will and vision of one United Earth. Manhattan has a place in that vision, but rogues and criminals do not."
Next to Bron, Mary blew an anxious breath out between her teeth. "Stating our case rather strongly, aren't we?" she muttered.
"That will be all for now," Edwards said. "I have a defense to organize."
"Thank you, Colonel." She turned to face her drone. "Colonel Edwards, commander of the 15th Tactical Air Force Wing of the Army of the Southern Cross. Broadcasting live from Battery Park, in the besieged independent city-state of Manhattan, this is MBS reporter Aria Stockton, signing off."
Aria's sleek camera drone went to standby mode and hovered by her shoulder like a faithful hound.
"Good to see you made it here safely," she said to Bron and Mary. "That was quite a barrage."
"You too. Where did that come from?" Bron asked. "It looked like the missiles launched from south of the city."
Aria nodded. "It appears that York placed some of their salvaged battlepods on Governor's Island, out in the bay. They massed together their missile equipped units in the old colonial fort on the island and unloaded as Phantom Squadron came out through the mouth of the river. They shot down two more Valkyries before they could reach cover."
Bron shook his head grimly. "They keep surprising us. This is going worse than I ever feared."
"Edwards still seems quite confident. He has a very… commanding presence," she said with an arched eyebrow.
"I'll say," Mary put in acidly. "I won't complain about him coming to the rescue, but his kind of talk is what gets us into bigger wars."
"Would you care to make a statement of your own, Inspector General?" Aria asked Bron.
"I really need to get with the colonel, but Mary might have something to say for the UEG," suggested, and looked at Mary, who nodded.
"Thank you. Stay safe, and best of luck, Inspector General."
"Same to you, Miss Stockton."
The initial shock of the attack was wearing off as Bron made his way across the park to Edwards's improvised command post. Fire crews were spraying down the burning Valkyrie with mountains of suppressive foam from a yellow and red crash tanker. Police were keeping the perimeter of the park secure to free up the city's thinly stretched defenders. An ambulance was speeding away with the wounded pilot, lights strobing and siren blaring, while Edwards's remaining aviators were gathered under a canopy tent, gulping down electrolyte-replacing drinks and wolfing down chewy trail bars handed to them by grateful first responders. The parked battloids were now swarming with mechanics from the municipal motor pool, their welding torches crackling, and Bron squinted against the glare as they patched rents in veritech armor. They couldn't replace the advanced alloy panels, but they could protect the vital internal components from shrapnel and incidental debris.
Bron approached Edwards's temporary headquarters, a hulking white and blue truck that had previously served as an NYPD mobile command center. When Bron climbed the steps into the well-lit, heated interior, he found the colonel conferring with one of Ztren's micronized lieutenants over a monitoring and communications station.
"Figure two hours minimum for York's units in the Bronx to reorganize and attempt a crossing, but that leaves Queens and Yonkers. How well positioned are your defenses in those areas?" Edwards asked.
"I don't think they'll attempt to cross from the Yonkers side," the lieutenant said. "It's too broad, and they can't easily cross the river with anything but Centaurs. We could funnel them through the dockyard and cut them to pieces."
"It's Queens I'm more concerned about," Commander Ztren said from the coms monitor. The small image of her face was incongruous with her true size, but her tone was authoritative. "The river is narrower there, and the bridges are all heavily damaged, but could potentially be used if a good team of engineers worked on them."
"Which York has," Edwards noted. "Alright, I'll concentrate my veritechs on the east side then, with a reserve to deal with any emergency. One team to remain at Battery Park in case those battlepods make a move from Governor's Island."
"That is acceptable."
"Good. But understand, my Phantoms are an independent command. We won't be taking orders from you." The colonel's statement left no room for compromise. Ztren's face didn't twitch so much as a muscle.
"Very well then. We thank you for your help. Please continue to coordinate with my officers," she answered.
"Certainly." Edwards grinned. "Don't worry, the United Earth Forces are here to stay!"
Something in the way Edwards said it created a new underlay of anxiety in Bron's gut. He stepped closer as the monitor blanked.
"Colonel, I'm sorry about the pilots you lost."
Edwards shrugged. "They died well. They'll be far from the last before this day's work is done."
"I don't understand what York expects to accomplish. They must have thought destroying the Persephone would be a knockout blow, but Manhattan didn't surrender. You've already hurt them, and your reinforcements are coming. Why are they taking this risk? The outcome could be disastrous for York's army - and their people."
Edwards accepted a styrofoam cup of steaming black coffee from a Manhattan Defense Unit soldier and slugged back half of the scalding liquid, then answered, smirking, "Because you're thinking like an elected leader, not a despot."
Bron's heart sank as he thought about what Edwards meant. "They're not rational, are they?"
"Heh, as rational as a pack of greedy xenophobes can be. You heard General Leonard yesterday. In a year, they don't have a prayer of ever meeting the UEG on equal terms. But right now, if they bloody our forces on the coast and overrun Manhattan before we can respond, they put us in a bind. Our leadership isn't ruthless enough to risk the civilians here in a counter-invasion, and they can't threaten York's civilians either. York wants to take Manhattan and leverage its physical and symbolic significance to raise the banner of a new Anti-Unification League, and counter the power of the UEG. Not for any noble reasons, or the good of their people, but for their personal power."
"I can't imagine they'd be so reckless," Bron said, shaking his head.
"Can't you?" Edwards sneered. "What about Dolza? I would have thought the Zentraedi understood all or nothing gambles very well."
Bron stared at Edwards, feeling as if he had been slapped. "Most of us don't think like that- or we don't anymore."
"Which is why York's troops have more guns than your people do. And the willingness to use them."
"The people of Manhattan will fight." Bron glared at the abrasive officer.
"They'd better. My plan isn't to die here." Edwards led Bron down the steps and back outside, away from the local soldiers and officers.
"What is your plan?" Bron demanded.
"Simple enough. Respond to any incursion, disrupt their attacks, hit back where they're vulnerable, and disengage when they threaten to overrun us. The Centaurs are fast, but they don't really have anything that can pin down a guardian."
"And what about the local troops - the giants?"
"They'll cover our withdrawal."
"They'll die!"
Edwards shrugged. "Probably. The point is to keep Manhattan in the fight until enough of our own reinforcements are here to counterattack and secure the city. It'll take several hours for Ghost Wing to arrive, and longer for more help."
"Then you plan to sacrifice the defenders."
"That's what it will take, if we want to beat York."
Edwards appeared to be right. The battle resumed by seven AM, concentrated on the east side of Manhattan, where there were many ruined bridges and the crossings were narrowest. Engineers with bridge laying equipment, conventional armor and mechanized infantry, and the Centaurs, far less capable than a Valkyrie, but still highly mobile, well armed, and dangerous, all stormed Manhattan in coordinated attacks, supported by artillery, rockets, and missiles fired by York's reserve F-16 squadrons, which kept a respectful distance.
Edwards and his Phantoms parried each thrust, using their veritechs' superb speed and maneuverability, for over an hour. Then the attackers unleashed a wave assault, coming from four directions at once, while also sending a full company of Centaurs toward Inswood Hill Park on the northern approach. Edwards split his flight groups, trying to respond to each attack, while giant troopers of the MDU sold their lives battling from block to block, depleting their auto rifles and then fighting on with their bare hands, overturning tanks and grappling Centaurs. Word came that Ztren and her senior command group died in an air strike after charging and routing an advancing armored column on the Williamsburg bridge. The Phantoms, themselves down to lasers and a handful of carefully hoarded missiles, lost three more Valkyries to the flames of battle, and for another hour they still prevented a breakthrough - until the battlepods joined the attack.
"Negative, Ghost Leader, the artillery pods haven't moved from Governor's Island. We've been monitoring them closely. This is a new group," Bron said in reply to Edwards's indignant query. With the extreme losses to the city's defenders, Captain Martin and all of the more experienced officers had left the Ops Center and taken to the battlefield to rally decimated and leaderless units. Bron, an experienced soldier and analyst, had taken over much of the monitoring and coordination with Edwards and with the rest of the friendly forces. Though he held no military rank and was an official of a foreign power, no one complained. A small part of him appreciated the irony of his doing nearly the same job Vanessa would do if she were here, but a greater part of him was just sickened by it all. He pushed those thoughts aside and tried his best to keep people alive.
"About forty battlepods have crossed at five different points, and the MDU isn't able to even slow them down now," Bron told Edwards. "Two more companies of Centaurs have crossed up at the north end, going directly over the water, and bypassing Inswood Hill. Based on their movements, my best guess is they're all converging on the Municipal Building."
Edwards grunted. "Classic decapitation strike. They think if they kill the President, it'll all be over. But it's not going to be over until I'm out of Valkyries. If I pull my reserve from Battery Park, I can block maybe three of these thrusts, but I can't stop them all until the rest of the Ghosts arrive in… twenty-seven minutes."
Bron's shoulders slumped. "That's not soon enough."
"It's the best I can do. My pilots will fight on, no matter what. Good luck."
Bron inspected the city overlay, seeing if any more local units were available to block the path of the invaders, hating himself, because they would be sacrificial lambs to the slaughter. Mary, who had been watching closely, tentatively approached.
"We'll- we'll be alright, though?" she asked. The morning's violence and horror had banished all of the confidence and bravado that had carried her through the dangers of the negotiations with the warlords in the Southlands last summer. There was a tremor in her voice as she spoke. "I thought they said this sub-basement was hardened against disasters."
"Not against this kind of disaster," Bron said grimly. "We're not nearly deep enough to be safe from sustained particle beam fire. They can burn their way in here with enough time." He put a hand on her arm to steady her as he turned.
"Mister President, we need to arrange transport and evacuate this building. You and your staff must be moved to a less well-known location. There's nothing left to stand in York's way."
Thousands of miles above the sweat and blood, collapsing masonry and wrecked war machines, above the towers of flame and the billowing clouds of smoke, the shrinking numbers of defenders and the overwhelming massed ranks of their foes, above even the slate gray clouds and the thin layer of atmosphere that allowed life to cling to the Earth's surface, warriors in their thousands watched the bloodshed. Watched, and waited for the words that would unleash them.
Captain Gotta regarded the streams of data flowing across the project-beams, arms folded. Aides, technicians, and REF officers held their breath.
"Not yet," the Captain intoned, with a single shake of his head.
Vanessa felt as if she would die of the pain and helplessness those words instilled in her. She opened her mouth to speak, when she felt a soft touch at her elbow. Wide, mismatched eyes looked up at her. They were disconcerting in their lack of irises, and yet she saw wisdom in them.
"Not yet," Exedore repeated.
And Vanessa held her breath, still.
Next time… Interlude VI: One Last Ride to the Rescue…