CHAPTER 15


   “That dickwad is going to get me killed,” mumbled Lolita as she stomped her way towards the ready line. She was happy to be reunited with her scout platoon but, the job they were given was not something she was convinced they could handle. She was pretty sure they lacked the numbers to pull it off. Most of the five-oh-six was hitting the southern outskirts of the city, along with the rest of first brigade. General Landry wanted to push the Orc back to the river, before they could cross over in force and shore up their defenses in and around Uea-Au. That plan sounded logical enough but, what Hogan had ordered Vega and her scouts to do was insane.
Naturally, the new battalion executive officer disguised his suicide run with the usual office bullshit. He told Lolita, “Vega, you’re the most experienced junior officer in the entire brigade, probably the entire division. That’s why you got this op.” Naturally, the dick head had to spoil it by noting further, “don’t take that as a compliment, just as an example of the shortfall we have of seasoned officers.”
Vega did not take that laying down ether. She pointed out, “colonel, my people have spent all their time fighting up in the Hurt. You want us to go romping through the woods that’s one thing, we can handle that. I ain’t done nothing like urban ops since IOBC.”
The colonel surprised Vega by agreeing with her, “I know lieutenant. No one has. We’re all going back to school on this one. You have your orders, you have your objective, go make it happen.” If there was any consolation prize, it was the fact that Hogan seemed genuinely distressed by issuing the orders. Vega wondered if that should make her happy but, before getting back to her people, she realized it was a really bad omen. It was why she was even more distressed when she saw the vehicles cutting across the field they were using as a landing zone.
Lolita should have been impressed by the sight of the giant box like vehicles that were rocket launchers from 18th Airborne Corps. She knew that at least two batteries had been stationed out the at the air field for some time. Quite often, those guys were the butt of many jokes because sitting on the side of the runway, polishing their windows, was about all they ever did. It should have been satisfying to see those bastards finally having to work for a change but, Lolita realized, if they were going into action then everybody else was in even deeper shit.
Everyone in Lolita’s platoon seemed to have drawn a similar conclusion. She told them the straight dope and it did not make their mood any better, “the egg suckers have managed to shove a lot of troops into Way Out. They’ve got bridgeheads on the south side of the Par-Phveng river now.”
One corporal, Doug Slattery, obviously understood the implications and whistled before asking, “then what the hell are we doing landing on the north side?”
Lolita responded with her usual grace, “fuck you Doug.” She then continued, “air recon has confirmed, there are still districts on the north side that are in friendly hands. That includes egg temple and, more important, our consulate. There’s still fighting going on around there. Egg temple isn’t our problem but, we got to get our people out of the consulate. They probably can’t hold out much longer.”
Sergeant Kensworth grunted at the sound of that, “Jesus H. Christ Lieutenant, we’re talking about setting up an LZ, providing security for it, and needing an assault force to clear the consulate perimeter. We’re just a platoon.”
Again, Lolita snapped, “it’s not like they left me with any goddamn choice, so live with it. We got four squads, so two is on perimeter, the rest of us know the drill, assault, cover, and support. We’ve done this before people.”
Kensworth added, “not in a city.”
“Just pretend the buildings are trees,” was about the only advice that Lolita could offer. It was actually better than it sounded since most of the trees, that they were used to fighting around, were bigger than any buildings in Uea-Au. She then issued the usual standing orders that went in one ear and out the other. These guys were all veterans of Feyland, most had been in the field for over six months, and they knew that crap inside and out.
Just when Lolita got past the point of being worried, she heard the rockets launching. The firing position they had picked was close enough that the sounds they made were loud enough to require ear plugs. Lolita could also see the rockets streaking off over the trees in rapid succession. It should have been a cause for celebration and, for some of her guys, it was. They did not realize, as Lolita did, that they were supposed to depart for their objective before the artillery strikes began! The distant rumble of more conventional artillery told Lolita all she needed to know about that. They would be grounded until someone could find them a safe flight path across the river.
All that Lolita had to say on the matter was a very frustrated, “where the fuck is our ride!”
Lots of helicopters did show up and, in fact, there were more of them in the sky than Lolita had ever seen in one place, at one time. Wave after wave of V shaped formations flew over at low altitude and high speeds, causing the very ground to almost vibrate as they did. Lolita had to admit that it looked impressive. She told one of her troopers, “if I had a dick I’d be getting a hard on right about now.” It was also pretty easy to tell when the choppers got to where they were going. It did not take very long either.
The concentration of choppers was not the only thing that Lolita had never seen in such volume. Unfortunately, the enemy fire proved to be even more massive. Lolita watched the horizon light up with tracers from twenty-five millimeter shells that were racing skyward in what were practically sheets of fire. Lolita’s jaw dropped and she mumbled, “holy shit. I ain’t never seen that  before.”
Just when Lolita was rethinking her anxious desire to get moving, the guy who was running her landing zone ran up and yelled at her, “get your sticks on the ready line, Lieutenant!” Her people were ready when the choppers landed but, Lolita could not say that about her rides. The first problem was that there were only a few of them that were US Army. Apparently, what she had been told by the ground guys was true. There had not been enough choppers for the plan and they were now improvising. She had wondered how it was they could not find four Blackhawks for her platoon but, then she discovered they were actually guarding an airlift. Most of the helicopters going in were empties since they would be needed to load up the people at the consulate. No one even knew how many people were over there, so, they prepared for worst case.
Most of the helicopters in her flight belonged to the IAF. Some of them were piloted by elves but most by those little dragon guys. Lolita was willing to bet they had just dropped off the first waves of the attack going into Uea-Au. The reason she thought that was actually quite simple. Some of those choppers had a few big holes in them. It was not something Lolita pointed out to anyone else because, it did not inspire any confidence in her. She just tried to ignore those sights and had her people load up on the choppers that belonged to her army. The one good thing she was happy to see was that the crews already had the ropes ready to go. With them going into an urban area, they were likely to need them.
Once they were airborne, the choppers got higher than she had ever been. Lolita was a lot more used to flying just above the tree tops and when she asked the pilot about that, his reply was, “not tonight.” There was also the little problem with their direction. The consulate was north of the river and, probably, about a two or three minute flight from her landing zone. They were speeding due east and, this was confirmed when they went ‘feet wet’ not long after they leveled off from their climb. When the flashes of war were a distant sight, on the western horizon, Lolita asked about that. This had not been in any version of her orders. Again, the pilot replied with ease, “we’re improvising Eltee.”
Most of the flight began to circle far out to sea. Lolita had no idea how long they had been out there but, when she saw one chopper flashing a light at another, she could guess what was about to happen. It made her think of something that should have been on her mind from minute one. All of their operations, up till this point, had been in rural settings and the average size was patrol strength. That could easily be done without wireless because it did not require your component parts to have that much contact with each other.
This had to be the first time that anyone, in over a century or more, had tried to coordinate a brigade sized battle without the luxury of a radio. It could be done, easy enough, if it were just ground pounders going in but, this was combined arms. They had choppers, fixed wings, artillery, different kinds of ground units, and all trying to accomplish different goals that were spread out to hell and high water. How was anyone coordinating anything in this mess? Lolita could only come up with one simple answer, they weren’t.
That thought was fresh in Lolita’s mind when the Blackhawk dove for all it was worth and began to pick up speed as it approached the city. It was dark out there and, just maybe, that would help them. Lolita hesitated to call it night time since, during this time of year, it seldom got much lighter than twilight at these latitudes. She knew the Orcs hated these lighting conditions but, it had not seemed to have slowed them one little bit. The fire that the flight started taking, as they approached the land, was proof of that.
The pilot called over the intercom, “get ready!”
Lolita was ready with a reply because, if they were improvising, she was too. The ride was proving to be a little too rocky, “fuck that! Put us down right on top of the compound!” She was sure that they could. There was no GPS here but, the army had long since purchased some devices that did the same thing, more or less, without the need of a satellite. She knew that all the Blackhawks had them now and while they were sometimes useless, out in the The Hurt, where the problem was a lack of corresponding maps to go with them, here in the city they should work just fine. That did not seem to be the pilots problem and Lolita could guess about that too. That was why she told him, “if we can take the LZ, I’ll send you the exfil signal. Otherwise figure the whole op is a bust.” She did not bother to mention that it would mean they were all dead but, that went without saying.
The real problem was what the pilot pointed out, “what about friendly fire?”
“Let me worry about that,” Lolita snapped back. The real question was, why was he? Anybody in the compound would not be stupid enough to think the choppers belonged to the bad guys. Lolita figured she could handle the rest. It was a gamble but, then again, so was this entire mission. It was one of those kind of jobs that they only did so that they could say they did it. Lolita doubted if anyone back at brigade really believed they could pull anyone out of there. Unfortunately, that also included her and the scout platoon.
It took a Blackhawk exploding into flames before the pilot actually sounded eager to follow his new instructions, “anything you want Eltee!” Lolita had already forgotten about the dumb ass pilot when she began wondering who she had just lost. It was an entire squad and she was not even sure which one. All that time out in the Hurt and she had just taken more casualties in one second than her entire time of humping the bush. Lolita gulped, made a sign of the cross, then angrily pulled her D-ring from her belt and flipped the clasp, “we’re roping in, get ready you ass holes!”