Pathspace: The Space of Paths (49 page)

His mouth felt suddenly dry, and he
looked around the interior for a canteen.

“
Here you are, sir.” One of the men was handing him a cup of
water.

He thanked the man. “Don't know why I
feel so dry all of a sudden.”

“
It's the filters, sir,” the other man volunteered. “I saw in
the manual this model was originally supposed to be able to fight
anywhere.. Must have thought they'd be using them south of the
border, down near Panama.” The man took a sip from his own cup.
“Anyways, the air intakes have filters to absorb moisture from the
outside air before it gets in. Guess damp air must be bad for the
electrical stuff.” He grimaced. “We found 'em sealed in plastic
boxes. If we'd known they'd dry us out this much we'd have left 'em
packed up.”

“
Live and learn, corporal. We'll know better what to bring and
what to leave home next time.”

“
Yessir. We're almost out of water as it is. And we'd sure
appreciate it if we could stop soon, and, you know, let it back
out.”

He absorbed that in silence, thinking,
yet another detail we didn't anticipate. When he'd been younger,
out on campaigns fighting Okla and Newmex, you had to be careful to
not overtax the horses, which made for natural stops along the
trails and roadways. Now that they had these vehicles, it was the
men, not the horses, you had to worry about. The sheer power of the
motorized conveyances would tempt you to travel far from sources of
water, as horses would not.

“
It'll be dark soon,” he said. “Well find a pond somewhere,
break the ice and refill our water while the fuel truck is topping
off the gas tank. We ought to be getting near Denver before
midnight.”

One of the men swallowed,
but he wasn't swallowing water. “Er, you really sure you want to
attack at
night
,
sir?”

The Honcho smiled.
“Does that worry you, son? I should think it'll be hard to miss the
Governor's 'scraper, even at night, don't you? Not to mention,
it'll be even harder for her lookouts to spot our trails.”

The man tried to look brave. “Oh, I, uh,
just wanted to be able to see 'em fall when we shoot 'em, sir.”

Finding water turned out to be more of a
challenge than he had thought it would be. They passed the remains
of ancient truck stops and towns too far from rivers to survive the
fall of civilization, and he looked at them wistfully, but there
was no water to be had there. Given time, they could probably have
located a pond or creek in the hills, but he elected not to take
the time for it. It had snowed again, and when he climbed out to
survey the area they were passing through, he could see that it
might be hard to find even a shallow pond under the winter's
blanket of white.

Instead, he told the driver to stop between
towns, and they climbed out under the darkening sky to gather the
snow itself Shielded from distant eyes and the bone-chilling wind
in a dry gully by the shoulder of the old highway, they built a
small fire and melted the snow, pouring the still-cold water into
their canteens before climbing back to resume the drive.

When darkness fell there was a new magic,
one he hadn't noticed before. Just as he wondered how he would feel
in the closeness of the tank interior when it was emphasized by
darkness, he noticed that it had stopped getting darker. A soft
glow had somehow appeared inside the tank, preventing total
darkness within.

“This thing has glowtubes?” He was amazed
and delighted, remembering how it was in his father's time, before
the last glowtubes in the old headquarters of the Lone Star Empire
had finally died. He knew the lifespan of the ancient magic seemed
random, that some tubes lasted longer than others, but somehow he
had never dreamed that the ancient weapons of war would have some
still alive within them.

In the dimness, the soldier who had shared
his water hesitated, seeming unwilling to disappoint him. “Er, no
sir. Not as such. Not the sort that glow by themselves.” He pointed
to the driver and gunner stations, where parts of the controls were
glowing in tiny pinpoints of green and blue. “The manual calls them
LEDs, sir. The engine generates power for them, as well as for the
electric motors that swing and tilt the gun. And for the monitors,
although the 'cams for them don't seem to work.”

Ah, now he understood. Like glow-worms, the
little light they put off had been too faint for him to notice when
sunlight had still been pouring in the open hatch. Now the coming
of night had let his eyes adjust to the dark enough to let him see
the feeble illumination.

He did his best to hide his disappointment.
“How clever. Do the manuals tell us how to make these LEDs?”

The man shrugged helplessly in the dimness.
“I'm afraid not, sir. But on that panel over there, there are
enough of them to read maps at night, at least.”

“Do all of the tanks have them? In case we
get separated in the dark?”

“I don't know sir. They should, but I don't
know for sure. This is the tank I trained on.”

More details to learn. Peter leaned forward
to speak to the driver. “How far are we from Denver now?”

“Not that far. We crossed the border a while
ago. We should be inside their outer lookouts within the hour.”

“Good. Stop here for a few minutes. I want
to confer with my Commanders.”

Arranging for the convoy was a simple
matter, since they were the lead vehicle. Once the tank stopped the
others had to follow suit to avoid crashing into them. Peter
clambered out of the tank and walked back.

Brutus, in the tank behind him, had already
emerged. In their starlight it was hard to make out his expression,
but it was probably impatience modulated by curiosity. “What's
up?”

Peter waited for Jeffrey to join them before
speaking. “One we get into Denver we won't have as much room to
maneuver,” he said. “Denver isn't Noodle.”

“Neither is Noodle, anymore” Jeffrey said.
“Thanks to us.”

“My point is, we can't draw up the tanks in
a line abreast, or anything like that, to concentrate our fire. My
original plan was that we would keep making passes pounding rounds
into the foundations of her fortress until we bring it down.

“And if we have to bring it down, we will.
But that's not our primary objective, actually, is it? We're here
to begin the conquest of Rado. With a larger army we would have
begun at the border, swallowing up territory mile by mile, then
bringing up reinforcements to hold it. We don't have enough
vehicles to mount that sort of campaign, though. So our real
purpose here is to end the Governor's rule. To destroy her forces,
and kill or capture her to remove the possibility of any effective
leadership trying to rally the resist our main force of cavalry
that won't be here for days.”

“So what are we going to do?” asked
Jeffrey.

Peter unfolded the map and held it against
the front of Brutus's tank as he pointed. “Brutus and I will take
two tanks right down her street and begin lobbing rounds into
buildings to get her attention. If we meet any of her forces there
we'll finish them, then head back to here, where Jeffrey, you'll
have the rest of the tanks waiting in ambush. We won't come back to
you until we have her main force in pursuit. You'll line up the
rest of the tanks, there, and when we lead her main cavalry past
you'll be waiting to blast 'em.”

“But we won't be in single file any more.
They'll see the trap and abandon chase.”

Peter grinned. “No, they won't. You'll be
lined up abreast, true, but your gauntlet, from their point of
view, will still be in a line. Captain Ludlow can deploy the
cloaking device on the tank closes to them and they'll ride past
you, ducks in a row, to their slaughter. You won't even have to
aim, just fire into the column of horses as it passes.”

Standing near to him to see where he
indicated the position on the map, he could see their faces. Brutus
was grinning, but Jeffrey looked sick. “If Kristana is fool enough
to lead her own forces,” he continued, “that'll be it for her.
Otherwise, when she realizes her main force is gone, she'll
probably beat a 'strategic retreat' and go off to hide and fight
another day. Either way, she's finished in Rado. After that, we'll
position the tanks around her fortress until our main cavalry
catches up to us, then dismount some and sweep the building clean
of any stragglers floor by floor. Then we consolidate our position
here and use it as a base while we mop up and take the rest of the
country. Any questions?”

Jeffrey shook his head. “You're forgetting
that this isn't Noodle. Denver's a big city, and even if a lot of
it isn't standing any more ...”

“And even less will be, when we're done,”
Brutus laughed.

“...there are still plenty of places for
resistance fighters to hide, regroup, and strike from. We can't
possible flatten the whole place, even if we wanted to. Your army
could be here for weeks, months, maybe
years
trying to root
them all out and finish the fighting. Your whole Expansion could
get bogged down with your army kept busy trying to secure this one
city.”

“We'll do whatever we need to do,” Brutus
grunted.

Jeffrey snorted. “I don't think either of
you have really thought this through. Denver isn't a walled city.
Even if you killed most of the fighter that are here now, more
could slip into the place from dozens of roads. We need a better
plan.”

Brutus sneered. “And I suppose you have
one?”

“How about this? You destroy her main force,
sure, but you spare the Governor and leave her in place here as
your puppet. Less chance of an organized resistance then.”

“What makes you think that?” Peter
asked.

“She's popular,” said Jeffrey. “I could see
it in their eyes. With her still in place, her people will have
something to keep them from a long guerrilla struggle.”

“And what's that?”

“Hope. Don't you see? They'll be sure she
has a plan to push you back out again, and they'll sit waiting to
see what it is, instead of organizing a rebellion. They'll be so
sure she can pull it off that they won't want to do anything to
hinder her, believing that she'll find a way to turn it around and
shake off our occupation. But she won't even try.”

Peter stared at his son. “Why not?”

“Because you'll have her daughter. Her only
child. The last bit of the General she has left. The Governor might
be one tough lady, father, but Aria is her plan to continue the
Legacy. She risked her only wizard to get her back! If we take Aria
back to Dallas, your problems in Denver will be over, and then you
can move most of your army on to your next objective.”

He awoke from a nightmare, in which a
leering Brutus in a ridiculously huge tank stood on a hill
surveying the smoking ruins of Denver. For a moment he lay there on
the couch, shivering even though Xander's everflame on the table
had been warming the suite as usual, driving out the chill of
Winter. Then he forced himself to roll to his feet and paced in the
main room, trying to get a grip on his thoughts. It had only been a
dream, he told himself. Just a dream.
So why is it so hard for
me to shrug it off and fall asleep again?

He look out the narrow window and saw it was
snowing again. He ducked his head into Xander's bedroom, intending
to see if the old wizard was up for some late-night conversation.
But Xander was gone again. He had been doing that a lot lately, but
mainly during the day, off on some private project. On impulse,
Lester went to the door to the corridor and tried the knob. Had The
Governor summoned her court wizard for a late-night consultation on
strategy? Maybe the guards knew what was happening.

He turned the knob and the door swung open,
unbolted. The guard was gone.

Surprise gave way to worry. What could have
pulled them away from their post? He hurried down the hall to the
stairwell and dithered for a moment before heading upstairs, to the
roof. Maybe the old man had been restless and they had escorted him
to the roof.

Emerging onto the roof, he strode over to
the signal observer, intending to ask if he had seen the mage. But
before he could open his mouth to speak. A flash and a distant boom
grabbed his attention. “The Texans are here!”

The guard, who had been staring in that
direction already, half-turned at the sound of his alarmed cry.
“You think? We found out a few minutes ago when they started
blasting. I guess he was too busy getting down to street level to
wake you.”

“But why are they wasting ammo over there?”
Jeffrey suppressed the urge to duck as another flash exploded
against a building in the distance. He found himself counting off
the seconds, reaching five before the sound of the blast reached
him. “It's over a mile away.”

The guard shrugged. “Better there than
here.” Another flash preceded a delayed boom. “Maybe they're trying
to get our attention, put the fear into us by showing us what they
can do before they get here.”

“Well, it's working,” said Lester. I can't
believe he didn't have someone wake me.”

BOOM!
“I guess he figured you'd hear
them soon enough.”

Lester dashed back to the stairwell and
fairly flew down the steps, while a tiny part of his awareness
tried to keep him from descending even faster, head first. By the
time he was down to the twentieth floor, he had to stop to catch
his breath. It was too soon! They weren't ready. Why hadn't the
lookouts signaled the approach of the Honcho's forces?