Set for continuous beam, the M-580 lost most of its punch. Certainly, it couldn’t hurt the centimeter-thick armor laminate of a Chinese zidong tanke.
“Kaminski!” he shouted over the company channel. “Painting! Take him! Now!”
Kaminski
Ice Station Zebra, Europa
1610 hours Zulu
Kaminski’s optics couldn’t see the laser paint from this angle, but he could see Leckie far up the inner rim slope and knew what the Marine was doing. He slapped Jellowski’s helmet. “Laser lock! Fire!”
“You’re clear, Jelly!” Kaminski called, verifying that no one was standing behind Jellowski, in the threat zone of the Wyvern’s vented backblast.
Jellowski squeezed the trigger, and the rocket slashed into the black sky on a plume of white exhaust.
“She’s targeting!” Jellowski called. “Tone! Lock!”
Kaminski was already releasing the spent load tube and slamming and lock-twisting another into its place. On the crater rim, a tank exploded, with bits of armor and unraveling track spinning through the sky.
The angle was too severe from down here for a decent paint, but Leckie had a good position, and was close enough to hold a sharp, steady beam on the target. Once the Wyvern was free from its tube, its sensor picked up the reflected backscatter of laser light and homed in with deadly accuracy.
“Second target!” Leckie yelled over the radio. “Painting!”
Jellowski loosed a second tank killer, and seconds later, a second tank staggered as its left track was blown away, then began a slow-motion tumble from its perch atop the rim, rolling over and over in a silent avalanche of debris all the way to the crater floor.
Descending Thunder No. 4
Two kilometers west of Ice Station
Zebra, Europa
1611 hours Zulu
Colonel Yang winced as the shoulder-launched missile slammed into his face. The shock of the disconnect didn’t hurt, exactly, but it shook him. There was no word for the sensation in any language, but it was as strong as pain, and as startling. He’d been killed several times now in rapid succession—or the steeds he’d been riding had been—and the successive shocks had left him feeling muzzy-headed, a little dizzy. Hu was dead, cut down by laser fire moments ago. Most of the troops were scattered, pinned down, or isolated in small, savagely fighting pockets.
The tide of battle was turning against him. He could feel it. Every battle has a rhythm, a pacing…and the pacing of this one was swiftly slowing, from a surging beat of victory to chaos and defeat.
“The enemy has shown unexpected flexibility, General,” he said, speaking into the satellite-relayed channel back to the main base. At the same time, he used the optics of one of the surviving zidong tanke to stare over the edge of the rim, down into the crater. Men were moving everywhere, loping along as if in some slow-motion dream, a tangled confusion impossible to sort out.
“The enemy is heavily armed and quite determined,” he continued. “The bombardment had little effect and we have had heavy losses. I request permission to pull back to the lander and abort the attack.”
“We can have reinforcements at your position within fifteen minutes, Yang,” Xiang’s voice said. “Can you hold until then?”
“Not without risking complete destruction. What are your orders, General?”
There was a long pause. “Fall back to the lander. Save what you can and fall back. We will need to deal with the Americans in a different way.”
Yang heard the anger in Xiang’s voice. “We have hurt them badly,” he said, needing, somehow, to justify the losses.
There was no reply, and he began issuing the orders for the withdrawal.
Niemeyer
On approach to Ice Station Zebra,
Europa
1607 hours Zulu
“What the hell are you trying to do?” Downer shouted.
“I was trying to fry a tank,” BJ replied. “But I think we just lost the engines!”
“Oh…shit!”
The crater rim was rushing toward them now. “Unstrap!” BJ shouted. “Get ready to jump!”
“What?”
“No more thrust! We’re going down hard!” She was unfastening her own harness as she spoke, and Downer followed suit. They were dropping now, the lobber almost on its side, falling toward the flat, wedge shape of one of the Chinese robot tanks. Campanelli, he realized, had been trying to pass the lobber above the tank with the plasma thrusters on—a difficult and dangerous tactic that, if it had worked, might have fried the robot’s circuits.
Unfortunately, the damage they’d taken from the enemy lander’s point defense lasers had junked their engines, and they were in free fall now.