"Major, we're coming up on the ridge."

Natasha turned and looked out the forward windows. The rolling terrain of mountains and valleys stretched out below them. Ahead, the tall ridge reached slightly higher than their own altitude, and she had to crane her neck to see the top of it. Plumes of smoke rose from the ridge. She thought she saw light glinting off something near the smoke directly in front of them.

"Captain," one of the bridge crew called, "the topside lookout reports a signal coming from ahead."

Natasha and the captain both turned towards the man. "He says there's a gunship grounded near the ruin of Emplacement Charlie. It seems to be signaling us."

"Well, out with it, man. What are they saying?"

"It doesn't make sense, sir. Something about lightning guns. They’re telling us to drop on this side of the mountain."

The captain frowned. "That doesn't make sense. It must not be intended for us."

"Wait!" Natasha held up her hand. "Is there any indication of who sent it? Could it be our assault force?"

The captain shook his head. "The plan was to fall back after their attack. If there's a gunship there, it means they either succeeded with their mission and are already gone or they were defeated."

Natasha frowned, considering. What the devil was a lightning gun? Who else would they be signaling? Her instincts told her not to ignore this. "Captain, signal the fleet. We'll make our drop on this side of the ridge."

"Major? That’s not the --"

Her glare quieted his protest. "On my responsibility, captain. Just do it."

The Mech hangar shuddered as the airship touched down. The floor tilted slightly; there really had not been a good landing zone here. The combination door and ramp at the back of the hangar swung down. As soon as it touched the ground, Natasha moved forward. She shouldered her pack and hefted her rifle, grimacing inwardly at the idea of having been reduced to infantry. She slung her rifle beside the small pack and waited for the first mech to move down the ramp. With her own bond lost, Natasha would have to ride along on one of the other Russian mechs.

The wing commander paused to let Natasha climb up. She hung from the hand and foot holds on the side of the mech as its pilot started up the slope. She resisted the urge to critique the girl's technique. As they started up the mountainside, they heard machine gun fire from the ruins above. By the time they arrived at the burned-out bunker complex with the gunship landed next to it, everything was quiet. Dead golems lay strewn about the ground between the gunship and the concrete edifice.

"Hold your fire!" Natasha yelled as a familiar figure appeared from inside the gunship. This golem wore the flowing cloak of a wraith soldier.

"It's about time y'all got here," the Polish golem called out. "Can you tell that airship to hold its fire? I want to move this contraption off the ridge." He smacked the side of the gunship with his palm. "It's too exposed up here."

As if on command, they heard a distant rumble. A moment later, there was a whistling, and a fountain of dirt exploded seventy meters to the north. The golem swore and disappeared inside the gunship. A moment later, it lifted off the ground. Its propellers weren't even running, but with a cough, one of the propulsion engines sputtered to life. The machine drifted almost lazily as it passed over the Russian mechs and dropped down into the valley toward the airship.

Natasha shook her head at the spectacle and then turned back to the task at hand. "Deploy along the ridge. First wing to the south, second wing to the north. We need counter-battery fire." Four of her squadron were armed with howitzers. Hopefully, they could silence the enemy gun emplacement. If the enemy fire came from the fortress itself, that might be a difficult task.

Natasha directed the pilot of her mount to move farther north than the others. Then she dropped off her perch and moved up on her own feet. She crouched down next to a boulder on the lip of the ridge and pulled out her binoculars.

The fortress on the other side of the valley looked much more imposing in person. How could those damn Hungarians let the madman build such a massive fortress in their own territory? Apparently, their secret police were lax.

When she had seen enough, Natasha left her position, staying low as she worked her way back down the safe eastern side of the ridge. Then she moved quickly, staying below the edge out of view of the fortress.

She tasked three of the mechs from the first wing with returning to the airship to ferry equipment up the slope. The others she set to work suppressing Frankenstein's artillery. Then she went to find the Polish golem.

The golem sergeant was on his way back up the slope with the first group of infantry from her airship, keeping out of view of the bunker as they made their way back to the boulders to the north where Natasha had just been. It rankled Natasha to get help from an enemy, not even an officer, and a golem, for crying out loud. But the creature seemed to know its business.

"What you really have to watch out for," the construct said, "is those antennas. Do you see the coils with balls on top? Those are lightning guns."

"What-guns?" Natasha asked, incredulous. She considered re-evaluating her opinion of the creature.

"No, seriously! They fire bolts of lightning." He pointed out the tangled mess of metal on the prominence to the south. "They fired several times from there before I was able to destroy it. It took about fifteen seconds between each shot. There were three antennas there. I don't know if that's the normal cycle time or if they could fire three times as fast with more antennas. And watch out! I'm pretty sure they can aim where they want the lightning to go. It was either an incredible coincidence or those things are scary accurate."

Natasha studied the valley, looked at the tower, and then back to the valley below.

"There are a lot of those things."

The golem nodded. "Yeah, they seem to be pretty evenly spaced across the valley. I suspect if you had dropped down there, your airship would have been a fireball before you even touched down."

Natasha swore under her breath. She hated to admit it. The golem was either a spectacular liar or his signaling with the light gun had saved all of their lives.

The golem pointed down below. "Do you see those groups of transformers down there?"

Natasha followed his finger. There was a cluster of metal objects, squat cylinders with horns on top. Through her binoculars, she could see them clearly enough. The power lines crisscrossing the valley went to them before fanning out to the nearest antennas of what the golem was claiming were lightning guns.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

"You think those are the weak points?" she asked.

"Yeah." The golem pointed out three more places along the valley floor where there were clusters of what he called transformers. "Those are supplying the antennas down the middle of the valley. If you can take those out, you should be in the clear."

"Except for Frankenstein's artillery."

The golem shrugged. "Yeah, except for that."

As they talked, the mechs and riders she had detailed as porters brought the first load up from her airship. They dropped off the barrels and actions for several pack howitzers, and the Russian infantry set to work assembling them. These handy transportable guns were used in rough terrain where wagons couldn't reach and all material had to be hauled in by mules or men on foot. They could be carried through the densest forests or hauled up cliffs with ropes and used to set up an artillery battery almost anywhere. That was just what the infantrymen were setting out about doing, assembling an impromptu artillery battery along the ridge.

The artillery across the valley kept firing at them from the battlements of the fortress. There were at least two guns on squat turrets at either end of the fortress. Natasha’s howitzer-armed mechs continued to return fire, but so far none of their shots had landed close.

The golem considered her soldiers and nodded. "Yeah, you'll want to suppress those guns. They seem pretty accurate."

Another shell slammed into the ruined bunker complex, throwing a shower of cement shards into the air. Natasha frowned. "They're accurate shooting at a pre-surveyed target, but we'll see if they do as well against something moving." She looked around. "What happened to the wraith troopers that were with you?"

The golem shrugged. "They all got themselves killed. They weren't very good at taking my advice."

She scowled at him but didn't respond.

"Hey, do you think you could loan me some of your troops?" the construct suddenly asked.

She just looked at him.

"We've got that gunship now. I was thinking of taking it across the valley to pay Frankenstein a visit."

Her eyebrows went up. This thing was gutsy. "Our own gunships will be here soon for phase three."

The golem nodded. "Yeah, I just thought I’d like to get in on some of that action.”

Natasha nodded. “I’ll see what we can spare. It’s a good thought.” She glanced to the sky. “Your friends should be here soon.”

I glanced nervously at the sky, thinking about what Natasha was saying. If the Hussars got off the ground on time, and if those bombers flew the speed I thought they did… I didn't hold out much hope that people of this era would be able to pull off coordinated combined arms.

In my day in the Army, the 160th Special Operations Air Regiment had a slogan that they could put boots on the ground within plus or minus 30 seconds of a planned time. If these guys were plus or minus an hour, I'd be surprised. What I was really worried about was when the air support was supposed to show up. There was a squadron of pursuit planes on their way. How well would they be able to coordinate close air support? Would they know friend from foe? I really didn't relish being on the receiving end of friendly fire— as if any fire was friendly, especially when it was Russian.

We heard a voice yelling faintly from behind and turned. Three Russian soldiers were puffing their way up the slope towards us.

“Ah,” Natasha said, sounding as pleased as if she’d made it happen herself, "the signal men have arrived."

None of the men carried rifles. Instead, they were bent double under heavy packs with poles and other equipment lashed to them.

"Major," the first one to reach us called. He clutched his side, gasping hard to catch his breath. "We got word from..." The man struggled to puff out the words. "...airship flotilla three. They're inbound, 6 kilometers away."

"Did you tell them the new drop point?"

"That's the problem. We did, Major. But Colonel Demetri Tupolev is in command." The man paused, very portentously. Apparently, that name implied something. Natasha swore.

"What's the trouble?" I asked.

"Colonel Tupolev is an ass. He's the worst sort of self-serving rule follower."

I thought about what that meant here, tactically. "You don't think he'll go to the new drop point?"

Natasha shook her head. "Not a chance." She seemed to be thinking hard.

"They're gonna get pounded," I offered.

Her teeth were gritted, but her anger was not directed at me. "I know. The only question is, is it worth my squadron to save their asses?"

I shrugged. This was beyond my pay grade. I was already pushing my luck giving advice to my own officers. Doing it to an enemy officer was really rolling the dice. I was fairly surprised with how well the major had been accepting my input. Whatever faults she might have, being willing to listen to a non-commissioned officer always raised an officer in my eyes.

I guess I shouldn't have been surprised. In my experience, few people get to the rank of major in a war zone if they don't know how to listen to their men, particularly their NCOs. If the enemy doesn't get them, an accident will. “If it means mission success, we should probably do it,” I said.

The major nodded, apparently coming to the same decision. She turned back to the squad of men still catching their breath. "Signal the squadron. We're going to start our assault."

One of the men nodded and started shaking out semaphore flags. I vaguely remembered having been introduced to the concept in basic training, but it wasn’t something a modern army needed. None of my implanted golem knowledge seemed to cover it either. With a triangular flag on a short stick in each hand, the man faced down the ridge. He lifted one over his head and stuck one off to the side, held it for a few seconds, and then moved. The combination of the flags in two different positions indicated letters and numbers. He could stick them up, down, or 45 degrees in any direction, and someone paying attention would be able to read the message. Of course, they had to be paying attention.

I turned my attention back to the valley below. Our pack artillery had started firing. Following my suggestion, they were targeting a set of transformers about half a mile away. This closest set seemed to supply the nearest banks of lightning cannons, including the one I had destroyed. They hadn't been able to hit it yet, but they were walking their shots closer with every blast.

I noticed movement across the valley. "Major, you need to see this."

The Widow stepped up beside me, and I pointed across the way. About three-quarters of a mile south of the fortress, a group of vehicles were on the move. They were on a road, headed generally towards us across the valley.

"Looks like trucks," she said.

"Yeah, and something else. You see the big one in the back?"

She lifted her field glasses. "Looks like a hauler."

"I don't know. I was thinking it was more like one of your mobile fortresses."

"You mean the Rolling Bastion?"

I shrugged. "If that's what you call those metal tanks the size of a house with guns all over them, then yeah."

She studied it through her binoculars for a moment. "I don't see any gun turrets."

Apparently, my vision was more keen than hers, because I was able to see it clear enough without field glasses. "I see the gun turrets, but I don't see a maintenance deck for mechs."

"Hmm." She made a noncommittal noise. "There's some armored cars in the mix, too. We should probably target that column when it gets close."

The column of vehicles was several trucks, a handful of armored cars, and the big maybe hauler, maybe mobile fortress. The armored cars were weird looking to me, but typical for the era, a metal box with an oversized turret on top. The body and spindly tire wheels looked too small for the turret, giving the whole thing an ungainly look. Since the armor wasn't actually very thick, they weren't nearly as top-heavy as they looked.

"Signal the guns," Natasha told her man. "If they're not paying attention, send your runner. When they've destroyed that electrical complex, they are to target that column of vehicles."

The signalman nodded and went to confer with his two companions. The semaphore man was still waving his flags. A moment later he stopped and turned.

"The second wing acknowledges, Major. They're ready to move out."

All along the ridge to our south, the Russian mechs straightened up and started forward down the steep slope. The top of the fortress, which had been silent for several minutes, opened fire.

The Russian mechs continued plodding down the slope carefully. The Major and I moved forward to get a better view. I was surprised she didn't catch a ride and go with them, but I suppose there was a better vantage point from up here to see how the battle would unfold. That, or she didn't want to get near those lightning cannons. For myself, I was in absolutely no hurry to dodge bolts of lightning.

"Seargent," the Major said, continuing to look through her field glasses.

"Ma’am?" I asked.

"Take command of those two howitzers." She took a hand off her binoculars to gesture south along the ridge. Two of our four pack howitzers had set up there, a few yards apart. "I want you to use your discretion targeting that convoy and any more of those transformers that you think need to be disabled."

"Yes, ma'am. What kind of range do those guns have, ma'am?"

The Major shrugged and went back to her binoculars. "How should I know? Those aren't Mech Force's weapons. Ask their crews."

"Yes, ma'am," I said, and started along the ridge.