Jason was dying.
But his secondaries still had a small stock of ammo, and his Hellbore was fully functional even yet. There was still some fight left in the battered machine, and Jason showed no intention of ending the fight now, no matter how badly he had suffered.
Fife glanced around the room. Wilson and Kyle, side by side near the front of the room right under the monitor, hadn’t moved or spoken in a long time. The General had finally managed to coordinate the scattered defenders to make a start at a counterattack, but it would take time to materialize. All New Sierra’s senior military leaders could do now was watch. Watch and admire the last stand of Unit JSN of the Line.
Beside Fife, Major Durant was sitting hunched over the readouts from Jason, face pale. “I can’t believe he’s still fighting,” she said softly. “I can’t . . .” She trailed off, then looked him in the eye. “With the whole regiment, we’d be invincible. . . .”
He nodded his head slowly. “Maybe so. The Legura have better AI systems than Jason, they say. But I don’t think their machines could match him when it comes to spirit.”
Another wave of missiles impacts around my position, and my pain center registers the hits. The pain is very great now, but I focus my waning abilities on sustaining Hellbore fire against enemy forces attempting to return up the pass from the friendly side of the mountains. I have noticed an increasing number of such attempts in the last 4,987 seconds. It should be possible to make an estimate of enemy situations and intentions based on this datum, but I find it impossible to project such information any longer. All that exists now is the pass, the need to hold it at all costs . . . the enemy that continues to attack, though in a disjointed and dispirited fashion now.
A part of me is aware that 26,135 seconds have now passed since my first engagement, and I know I cannot maintain an effective resistance much longer. I have fallen short of my original estimate of combat sustainability due to a miscalculation of the total firepower of enemy forces attacking me. It seems that there are incalculables in warfare beyond the ability even of a Bolo combat unit to resolve. This explains, at long last, the many inconsistencies I have pondered in my study of military history. If a Bolo computer cannot calculate all possibilities, than neither can a human general. Humanity, I have discovered, is more fallible in many ways than my own kind, and yet they have a quality, an intangible something, which I can seek to emulate but now know I will never understand. . . .
Another swarm of missiles strikes my position. The barrages are more ragged and uneven now, but still dangerous. The contingent of human troops who rallied to my aid early in the fight are long since dead, proof of the fact that the modern battlefield is no place for human frailty. But they have given their lives in the defense of their homes and families, and I have been careful to record their transponder serial numbers so that they can be enshrined as heroes once the fight is over.
My on-board damage assessment center reports serious injury to my reactor coolant system. Soon I will be forced into shutdown, or if I attempt override of my fail-safe systems I will risk a core meltdown. That will no doubt put a final end to the enemy’s attempts to ~retake the pass, but it will also render the area uninhabitable for a period of centuries . . .
In either event, my mission is almost done. I terminate the independent action mode subroutines that prevent acceptance of contact with my compromised headquarters. I will accept the risk now of having messages intercepted by the enemy, since it can no longer matter to my ability to resist.
Before the battle ends, I wish to speak once more to my commander.
“Unit JSN of the Line to Command,” I transmit. “Request permission to file VSR.”
His reply is uncharacteristically slow. Evidence of an enemy trick? I do not know . . . and all that matters, at this juncture, is that it is his voice I am hearing when he finally does answer.
“Jason! Goddamn it, Jason, I didn’t think you’d still be able to transmit!”
“Request permission to file VSR,” I repeat. When he grants the appeal, I run through as detailed a summary of my condition as damaged sensors can provide. “Requesting relief force,” I conclude. “Unable to sustain further combat operations. . . .”
“The cavalry’s on the way, Jason,” my commander tells me. “It’s over. Revert to minimum awareness mode until we can do a repair assessment, see what we can salvage. . . .”
I am suspicious of his words. Perhaps the enemy still thinks to force me to shut down prematurely and intends to take advantage of my weakness.
Then my surviving sensor array tracks a fresh round of artillery and missile fire, and I brace myself for the inevitable impact. . . .
And realize it is passing over my position, directed beyond the mountains at the enemy batteries I was ~unable to silence before exhausting my counterbattery howitzers. I tap into the satellite feeds with a last, difficult effort, and see the cluster of friendly IFF beacons registering near the foot of the pass, advancing rapidly to my relief.
Then I relax my control over peripheral systems, at long last allowing myself to fade into the oblivion of minimum-alert down-time. . . .
“Report, Lieutenant,” Smith-Wentworth said wearily. He didn’t really need a verbal report to tell him what the computer maps had already revealed, but he went through the forms anyway. He was drained, emotionally and physically, and there was solace in empty routine.
“The assault has failed, Father Hand,” Lieutenant Bickerton-Phelps said quietly. “The Bolo isn’t firing any more, but our forces beyond the pass have been routed by an infidel counterattack. And thanks to your efforts, we no longer have the strength to reverse the situation once more. . . .”
The Hand looked up, his eyes meeting the younger man’s cold gray stare. “I’ll thank you to remember your place, boy,” Smith-Wentworth told him harshly. “You’re in no position to pass judgment.”
Bickerton-Phelps touched a stud on the clasp of his belt, his expression unchanging. “You were a good officer once, Third Commander,” he said. “But after today . . .” He shook his head slowly and turned away.
A pair of burly guards in the dress black uniforms of the Holy Order had appeared in the door of the command van. Bickerton-Phelps detached the front cover of his belt clasp and held it out for one of the guards to examine. “I am Executor-Captain Bickerton-Phelps. This officer is relieved of duty and placed under arrest for offenses against the Lord. Take him away.”
Smith-Wentworth looked from the guards to the young Holy Executor. The suggestion that his aide might have been an agent of the Archspeaker’s religious inquisition would have shocked him a few hours before. But now nothing could surprise him. In fact it seemed somehow right, a fitting end.
Hyman Smith-Wentworth was laughing as the soldiers led him away.
It took six more weeks and the threat of a Concordiat blockade to bring the war to an end, but when all was said and done the failure at Hot Springs Pass marked the true high tide of the Army of the New Messiah, on New Sierra and elsewhere. Though ~Deseret remained a potential threat to the security of the region, the activation of the rest of the Bolos of the First Robotic Armored Regiment guaranteed that they would not be back anytime soon.
The technical staff on Fife’s team pronounced Unit JSN of the Line as beyond reasonable hope of salvage and refit. The intensive pounding the Bolo had taken during the battle hadn’t left much beyond the core electronic subsystems, and the damaged fusion plant was ordered shut down and removed to avoid the dangers of a meltdown.
Captain David Fife was on hand for that final task, though Technical Sergeant Ramirez and his crew were fully capable of dealing with the job without him. In fact, there were a score of senior civilian and military officials at the site, including Coordinator Wilson, General Kyle, and Major Elaine Durant.
Before the final shutdown procedure, there was a short ceremony in front of the battered Bolo. No ~parades, no reviewing stands or cheering crowds. Just a cluster of dignitaries come to do the final honors for the hero of the battle of Hot Springs Pass.
Most of the dignitaries gave speeches, full of lavish praise for the heroic men and women who had fallen here mixed with solemn vows that the bloodshed would not turn out to have been in vain. But when it was Coordinator Wilson’s turn to speak, his words were in a different vein.