Fourth Vector Ch. 42

Trevor took a deep breath before replying. "We will win because we want it more. Because we need it more. Because for us, tomorrow will truly be life or death. I'm not going to lie to you men. Tomorrow is going to be the biggest challenge that we ever faced. It's going to be long and bloody and we will be tested to our breaking point. But if we fold and allow our lines to break, we will never go back to Tyrol. We'll never see our loved ones again. We'll never shake hands with our brothers, never kiss our women again. We'll never know what it feels like to hold a baby in your arms and know he's yours. And if we fall tomorrow, all of Tyrol falls with us."

"The war will be over," muttered the freckle-face private.

"That's right," replied Trevor. "The war will be over. And the first thing that Javans are going to do is unleash hell on Tyrol for all we've done to them in the past year and a half. They won't stop killing until there's no one left. You've seen with your own eyes how far they're willing to go to bring this war to an end. Entire villages have been murdered. Picture that on a grander scale. All of us that have loved ones back at home are counting on us. We're their protection. We cannot fail. I know that I've asked a lot from all of you in this campaign. We've certainly seen our share of reversals. But I need you to do one more thing for me. I need you to fight tomorrow like your life, and the lives of your family, depend on it. Because they do. They truly do."

"I reckon I can do that," said the first private. "One more fight. I have one more fight left in me."

The rest of the men looked from Trevor back over to the freckle-faced private, who spoke up next. "I think I can do it too. One more fight. For Tyrol, right, boys?"

"For Tyrol," confirmed Trevor. "We can do this for Tyrol."

It was one of many similar-sounding speeches that Trevor gave that night. By the time most of the men were retiring for the night, Trevor found his way back to his command tent where Nina and Gavin were waiting for him.

"How do they feel tonight?" asked Nina tentatively. "Are they ready for what's going to happen in the morning?"

"They are better off than I imagined," replied Trevor. "Even after all this time, they are still willing to give it their all tomorrow. I couldn't ask for a better army."

"Nor could they ask for a better leader," said Gavin. "I happened to stop near a group that you talked to, shortly after you left. They were still talking about you long after you left."

"Probably complaining about me," said Trevor with a small smile.

Gavin shook his head. "Far from it. They admire their leader, Trevor. They would follow you across this damn continent if you willed it, moving on spirit alone. This is your army, Trevor. The men are with you."

It was a remarkable thing to say but it was a much-needed thing to hear as well. So many times, Trevor had felt the weight of his inexperience as their commander. He had wondered often if there would ever come a point where the army left him behind, preferring someone who wasn't so green in leading men.

If anything, Gavin's words that evening were what Trevor needed to hear, similar to what he did for the regular soldiers out in the field.

It didn't take the three of them long to get down to business. Tomorrow's battle plan was hedged around the defense but there was one spot in Trevor's line that was attracting more attention than most. This was because this spot was the only one without the coverage of the stream, and it was also flat and open ground wide enough for bodies of troops to march across.

"If I were the Javans, I'd place all my weight opposite of this gap," said Gavin as he gestured to the spot on their makeshift map. "They can roll up our flank if they do so and our resistance is over."

"Then it becomes all the more important that we defend it," replied Trevor. "Can we stack the defense in this area? I'm talking multiple trench lines and supporting, overlaying fire?"

"Not without significantly weakening the other areas of the line," said Nina. "The Javans outnumber us and our position on this hill is wide and thin. We can't concentrate any further because we'll allow the Javans to take the high ground but we also can't stretch ourselves out too thin or else we'll be easy to break."

"We need to do something about this gap then," said Trevor. "We need our most deadly firepower here. Maybe even our best men. Handpicked if we have to."

"Even our best men won't be able to defend that gap if the Javans throw a brigade or two down it," said Gavin. "They'll be overwhelmed like everyone else."

"It's going to have to work no matter what we do," said Trevor. "We can't move now and we can't shrink the lines like Nina said. So we have to make the best of what we have. Let's get our handpicked veterans in multiple trenches there, making sure we get the men with the best shooting. They're going to need it tomorrow."

"What about the rest of the army, Trevor?" asked Nina. "What are the rest of our orders?"

Trevor didn't answer that right away. He paused to look at the map, studying their positions as well as the likely avenues of attack for the Javans tomorrow. No doubt, the Javans would come at them from several different directions, putting weight on a number of thrusts in order to break them.

The gap in the stream would be the most deadly. The line had to hold there.

"We hold them," said Trevor firmly. "No matter what happens in the morning, we can't take one step back. If we do, we die. We cannot fail."

*****

"We cannot fail in this attack," said Jack, reminding his three generals of the stakes in front of them. Around them, the heavy bombardment by the Galician fleet still rang out against the city of Dagobern. "This is the last push. By dawn, I want this war to be over."

"Understood, Jack," replied Art, giving a crisp salute in the process. "We'll make you the master of Dagobern shortly."

The sun was starting to fall in the western sky but the naval bombardment showed no signs of stopping just yet. It was hardly needed at this point.

Dagobern was nothing short of a wreckage. The intense bombardment by the Galician fleet over the course of the past eight hours had proven devastating. There wasn't a single part of the city that hadn't felt the heat of their guns, and great stretches of Dagobern stood in ruins or ablaze.

It was a fitting destruction for all the trouble the Swabians had brought to the other peoples of the West. Tonight, that devastation would be turned back on them.

"You all know your assignments. Get me that city," instructed Jack as the three of them began to move. Notably, Greg and Lindy stuck together as they headed toward the eastern part of the city and their headquarters there. Art would take the western portion, which had rougher terrain and a longer way to go until he could converge on the palatial hill in the middle of the city where the center of power could be found.

All of it was according to Ferberg's advice. If Ferberg proved right about this strategy, Jack was going to stop being so suspicious of the former Swabian general.

Still, Ferberg had to prove himself tonight. Hopefully, this would be the best route into the city.

Jack took up his position in his central command tent and soon grabbed his radio.

"That's enough, Russ," said Jack through the radio. "It's time for the army to do it's part. Stop the guns."

"Aye, Jack, we'll let them have their turn," joked Russ.

About ten minutes later, the last guns of the fleet fell silent. With the silencing of the guns came the quiet acknowledgment that the fight was about to begin. True to form, Jack heard the first sounds of mortars and small arms fire.

"So it begins," he muttered. "The last battle of this war. Or so we can hope."

*****

"Let's go, boys! We have a city to take!"

Art moved along the ranks of his men as he took his position in his western headquarters, not far from where the city eventually petered out into the countryside. It had been his headquarters for the last month, being about two hundred yards from what had developed into the front lines in the city. Today, he would see his men come crashing through those front lines and march their way toward the center.

The first thing that had to be done was to give his men the signal to move in. The naval bombardment had stopped all but fifteen minutes ago but the city was far from calm. Fires raged in some sections of the city, accompanied by the sounds of collapsing buildings that had suffered too much strain.

It was the kind of conditions meant for a final dogfight, and Art relished every thought of the upcoming battle.

After giving the order to his commanders to advance, he watched as his forward units picked themselves up from the trenches they'd grown comfortable in and started to move across the hellish landscape.

Immediately, they came upon the web of Swabian defense, and the first soldiers fell not far from the trenches they emerged from. Small firefights broke out all over the western suburbs but it soon became apparent that the initial resistance from the Swabian line was more token than anything else.

This couldn't have been more apparent by the sight of the Swabian corpses. Art bent over to inspect several of them as his units pressed forward. The corpse in front of him, that of a young woman, was so thin that her cheeks were nearly hollow.

"Grisly sight," muttered Art to his nearest subordinate. "Our siege has had quite the effect."

"It was said that the Swabians had resorted to eating dogs, cats, and rats," replied the subordinate. "Once the real food was gone, they ate anything they could put their hands on."

Art shook his head. "And for what? They had to have known they were beaten once we got here. Why not surrender? Why would Avila put his people through this?"

The subordinate said something so poignant that Art could only nod his head in approval.

"Pride does strange things to men," said the subordinate. "Often times, it can make them unable to see what's right in front of them."

It was an incredibly accurate statement but it didn't mean that Art didn't feel for every emaciated corpse that he passed. His men were moving quickly after bursting through the initial lines of defense and what had been only outer suburbs soon melted into more prominent urban buildings.

It was here that Art also realized that the Swabian resistance was all but beaten, and that was due to the way they fought. If the Swabians were serious about holding the city, they would have stationed guns in every building and on every floor, making the taking of the city more treacherous than anyone could have imagined. If the Allied Army had to fight for every single building and every city block, it would have dragged the fight on forever.

Instead, the Swabians could only offer resistance in the streets, using what natural barricades they could find but melting away as Art's men pushed closer. It was another confirmation that their resistance was more token than serious, a stunning reversal of what happened a month earlier.

The fiercest fighting took place in a stretch of city block that contained several government buildings, including one that looked like it had been a state granary at one point. Art knew it no longer functioned in that manner because the doors were busted open and all the windows smashed. No doubt that had occurred when the food ran out and the populace became angry but this was one spot that the Swabian defenders chose to make their last stand.

"Keep up covering fire," yelled one of the captains as his men rushed forward toward the open doors of the granaries. One of the men in the lead was quickly taken down by a stray bullet while the rest of his team burst through the doors. They were covered by two squads ten yards away, while another two squads behind them sprayed bullets into the upper windows of the granary.

All in all, it took nearly half an hour to clear the granary but if this was the most resistance they would see all night, Art had much to be thankful for. As the ground started to rise the closer to the center of the city they reached, Art knew they'd finally reached their second objective.

They'd reached the palatial hill that contained the imperial palace. Now they had to fight their way up it.

*****

"All right, men! Get those mortars going! I want the Swabians to hear us coming before they see us!"

Greg and Lindy were in joint command on the eastern approaches to the city, and they had just arrived at what would be Greg's headquarters for the upcoming fight. It was only to be Greg's as their forces would be splitting up in the battle.

Greg's troops were to take the most direct route to the palatial hill by the southeasterly route but Lindy would be taking a different approach. Lindy's men were going to move north and then they were going to circle around south to approach the palatial hill from the center of the city.

The hope was that they could trap several Swabian formations between them, cutting them off and destroying what was left of their strength.

It was still an incredibly risky move under normal circumstances. If Lindy's men became bogged down, they could be the ones that got cut off and surrounded.

Still, it was a risk they were willing to take. Knowing that the Swabians had to be on their last legs, it was deemed necessary for them to move quickly through the city and bring the fight to a speedy conclusion.

With the mortar rounds beginning and the first waves of soldiers pushing in, Greg's men quickly found out what Art's had already discovered--namely, that the Swabian resistance was more feeble than they imagined.

"My god, look at those pathetic corpses," muttered Greg as he saw the bodies of two old men, way past their prime. They looked like they hadn't had much to eat recently, even before the food ran out. It wasn't hard to tell that the Swabian granaries had long been operating at a less than optimal rations for quite a while now.

As Greg's men pushed on, they soon encountered stiffer resistance as they closed on the palatial hill. Greg reckoned that the best men that Avila had left were stationed in this sector, knowing it was the shortest route to Avila's center of power, and hence, had to be defended as the likely route of the attackers.

Even so, that resistance was nothing like it was over a month ago. The Swabians put up as much of a fight as they could muster but Greg quickly figured out their heart wasn't in the fight. They were too hungry to care for anything other than getting as far away from the attackers as possible.

And so that was when Greg's men started to see the first signs of surrender.

"They're throwing down their rifles!" yelled a lieutenant not far from Greg's position. "I have a whole regiment surrendering!"

Even with the fierce resistance in this quarter, it couldn't stop the Swabians from admitting the inevitable--the battle was a lost cause.

*****

"That son of bitch almost shot me! Take him down!"

Lindy found himself ducking near a short stone wall as bullets sprayed all around them. If he'd been any slower, there was no doubt he'd have been one of the dead. The men around him answered the call with a steady barrage from their position while the position across the street opened up covering fire.

It only took about two minutes of actual firing before half the Swabian defenders laid dead while the other half took off into the bowels of the city.

It was a situation that had played itself out many times that evening. As Lindy and his men swooped toward the north, they found the Swabian defenders engaging in hit-and-run tactics that were designed to cause initial casualties before melting back into the city.

It might have been more of a problem if the Swabians had better aim. However, quite too often they would simply open up a burst of rifle fire that was far from accurate. A few Allied soldiers managed to catch a bullet that way but it could have been far worse.

Lindy was also glad he didn't catch yet another bullet. He had just about recovered from his wounds from the Battle of Castus, and there was no way he was going down again because of a hail of bullets.

"Keep pushing forward, men!" yelled Lindy. "We need to keep moving!"

Like the other generals, Lindy's men made remarkable time in their movement north. As they neared the signs of the Swabian harbor, they suddenly pivoted to the west, fighting their way through sections of the city that were barely defended. It was only once they reached the main avenue that led north-south in Dagobern that they turned once more to the south. Between Lindy and Greg's forces was a stretch of about fifty city blocks, and the hope was that a great mass of defenders would get caught up in the net that it had created.

That net was closed once Lindy's men rendezvoused with Greg's close to midnight as they came to the windy road that led up to the palatial hill. Immediately to the west of Lindy's position, his forces were busy rounding up all those surrendering Swabians who'd been caught in the net. In the process, Lindy had to detach several formations of men to deal with those surrendering, but by the time he was linked with Greg, there were truly no other bodies capable of resisting them throughout the majority of the city.

"I just heard from Art on the west side," informed Greg as the two generals met up. "He's closing in on the palatial hill from that side but the route toward the top is heavy with defenders. He's expecting to get held up."

Lindy pointed to the road in front of them. "It looks like our route will be no less deadly. It looks like the Swabians saved what was left of their men for this section of the fight!"

Lindy's words couldn't have been more spot on. At that very moment, their forward teams took heavy casualties as they started advancing up the road to the top.

Lindy had to wonder what their force would even look like if they managed to make their way all the way up.

*****

"Soften up that trench in front of the road! Drop some mortars on them!"

Art stood about a hundred yards from the fighting, watching as his men attempted to push up the palatial hill's western approaches. This part of the hill was narrow and uncompromising, and that was mostly the reason why the main thrust of the Allied Army was going on the eastern side. About several hundred feet above him were the remains of the imperial palace, but it was a long and narrow road to the top, fraught with danger.

Part of that danger was the quality of the troops in front of them.

"General, check out the uniforms of the dead we've just passed by," said Art's subordinate as they moved closer to the hill. "These are not the citizen soldier levies that we've been fighting."

Art took a closer look. These dead men in front of them had grander uniforms than the citizens they'd fought until this point. They'd also been fighting with some semblance of actual tactics as well, which was the first thing that was noticed by the men in front.

"This is obviously some type of imperial guard in front of us," said Art. "These troops will be of much higher quality. They are going to make us bleed as we take this hill."

That couldn't have been more true. Resistance stiffened as the men pushed up the first main pass. Casualties were thick on the Allied side and the going definitely slowed. As Art coordinated more supporting fire on the hill to support his men on the ground, he had to wonder just how much juice the enemy had left to throw at them.

He also wondered if he was getting in over his head.

*****

"This is one beast of a hill!"

That was the understatement of the day, but Greg couldn't help but agree as he stared at the defenses in front of them. The road that led up the hill to the palace complex couldn't have been more suited for defense.