Carnage City: A World at War Novel (World at War Online Book 6) (9 page)

“Danny, who has the best gun crews?” Zach asked.

“Probably Ryan.”

“OK, keep them up here with you to crew the guns. Give me Xavier and Javy’s squads, and we’ll hold the ground level.”

“We don’t have much ammo up here.”

No, they didn’t. But what could they do about that right now?

“I’ll have the Hephaestus team form an ammunition passing line,” Zach told him. “Just crew the guns and keep firing.”

“We’re going to need help too.”

“That’s what the phone line up top is for too. I’ll send someone up for that as well.”

Danny shook his head. “Well, here goes nothing.”

Both of them began barking orders at the surrounding troops, trying to get everyone organized and in fighting shape. To their credit, Bravo Wolf responded quickly. Xavier picked up the phone and contacted the team downstairs, warning them of the impending assault.

Zach sprinted down to the ground level alongside Bravo 1 and Bravo 2, hoping he could get them into position before the storm broke. They had their personal weapons and a supply of grenades, but the platoon didn’t have any equipment. They lacked heavy machine guns, recoilless rifles and flamethrowers. He wasn’t sure they had enough ammunition either.

They needed Alpha Wolf back here, fast.

“Can’t seem to stay out of trouble, can you,” Paige commented as they passed on the stairs.

“Seems like.”

“Well, hold them off. I’m going to call for help.”

Zach hefted his carbine and moved toward their defensive positions around the doorway facing the enemy lines. It was made of glass, wide open with four doors standing side by side. The squads quickly went to work, tossing any kind of debris they could around the area to use as cover.

But would it be enough? Zach wasn’t quite sure, and he suspected their enemy would be bringing heavy firepower too.

Bam! Bam! Bam!

The sound of 81mm shells exploding outside caught his attention. Something that size wasn’t going to do a thing against a building like this, but it could kill troops lingering outside.

More to the point, it was also notable that Ragnarok wasn’t using their rocket artillery for the job. Apparently they wanted to take this place intact, and they didn’t want to risk destroying the entire structure.

That might bode well for them at first, but Zach guessed they had some sort of plan to make up for the loss of firepower. And he thought he knew exactly what that might be.

Someone tapped him on the shoulder. “Zach,” Xavier said, looking through his binoculars, “we have company.”

“Define company.”

“One… no, two squads of enemy soldiers, advancing down the street alongside a tank. Looks like there’s more coming in behind them.”

“A tank,” Zach said in a weary tone. “Let me guess, this one looks different from all the others.”

“Yup.”

“Like it has a flamethrower?”

“That, and a couple of large tanks on the back,” Xavier told him.

“Joy,” Zach replied dryly. “Well, at least we know they’re not fooling around.”

He didn’t need to give any orders. The troops around him moved into position, covering the doorway and any surrounding windows.

Zach readied his carbine for the coming battle. Right now, his concern was the infantry. The units with him couldn’t do anything against enemy armor, forcing them to focus on the infantry assault. They would have to rely on the anti-tank gun crews up above to deal with the incoming tanks.

He hoped Danny’s troops were up to the task, because if they weren’t, Zach and the rest of his comrades were about to be barbecued.

“
B
oth guns
, take aim at the enemy flame tank!” Danny barked, yelling as loud as he could to try and be heard over the racket. The sound of a dozen troops moving about filled the room, along with the clank of mechanical parts. He could hear the squeal of the enemy tank moving down the street at well.

All this noise, and they hadn’t even started shooting yet. Once that happened he was probably going to have to resort to using hand signals.

He watched as both crews aimed their weapons at the incoming enemy flame tank. It might be a waste of ammunition, but Danny wanted to make sure it died. The last thing he wanted was for it to get close enough to use its flamethrower on them.

One hundred to one hundred and fifty yards. That was the range that he had been told. Right now the distance was about two hundred yards. That left them with very little room for error.

“Stagger your fire! Ryan’s crew first, Joe’s crew next,” Danny ordered. Hopefully they could kill it in one shot. If not, then he at least wanted to have a backup plan.

“Firing!” Ryan shouted back, and a second later the gun went off.

Bang!

The shot sounded sharper, snappier than the artillery Danny was used to hearing. Instead of a reverberating boom it was more akin to a sharp crack, likely because they were firing much smaller ammunition.

He looked out the window, hoping that the enemy tank would go up in flames. No such luck. In fact, Danny saw the shell deflect off the frontal armor of the vehicle, barely even leaving a scratch. If he hadn’t believed Bryce’s warning before, he certainly had a demonstration of it now.

“Elevate the gun slightly,” Joe ordered calmly. His crew quickly made an adjustment.

Ryan’s gun had been aimed at too steep of an angle, sending the shell straight into the impervious glacis plate in the front of the tank. Hopefully by compensating a bit, Joe’s crew could send their shell straight through the top.

Danny was about to order them to fire when a hail of bullets started slamming into the concrete face of the building. He ducked instinctively, along with the rest. A few made it through the windows and impacted on the interior wall.

“Crap,” he muttered to himself. Ragnarok may not have known there were anti-tank guns up here before, but they certainly did now.

It sounded like they were firing two or more machine guns. Danny knew they probably couldn’t hit them at this distance. They didn’t need to, either. The mere threat of having a bullet suddenly pass through their skull would make even veteran troops duck and cover.

They needed to keep fighting regardless. If the tank got in range, they were all going to die. That was certain. So like it or not, they had to face the bullets.

Danny urged them onto their feet. To their credit, the squad responded quickly. Black Wolf had faced danger plenty of times before, and when the chips were down they could be relied upon to either do their job or die trying.

“Aim for the rear part of the tank,” Joe instructed. “I’m guessing that’s where they put the engine, as usual.”

Bang!

Another shell streaked toward the target. The tank suddenly ground to a halt. A second later, the world lit up.

BAM!

Even inside the solid concrete structure Danny could feel the force of the blast. It felt like his bones were rattling inside his skin. He couldn’t imagine what it would feel like outside.

Of course, anyone who had been close enough to the exploding tank wouldn’t be feeling much of anything now.

“Good work,” he told the others. Most of them responded with their thanks, but then he noticed Ryan had his binoculars out and was staring at something further down the street.

“We’ve got another wave incoming,” he said. “This one’s all infantry.”

“How many?” Danny asked.

“A lot.”

“What the heck does that mean?”

“It means at least a company, maybe more.”

“Crap.”

They might have a strong position, but that many troops could probably force their way into the building. Black Wolf didn’t have enough guns to hold off that kind of numbers.

That was, unless they had something to turn the tables. And Danny was looking right at it.

“Everyone,” he ordered. “Load up the guns with fragmentation shells. We’re going to repel them with firepower.”

The crews scrambled to comply. Danny knew they had less than a dozen of the shells on this floor right now, and they’d need a lot more in the coming battle. He sprinted toward the stairs and caught the attention of one of the Hephaestus Company engineers who was part of the ammunition line.

“Start bringing up the fragmentation shells. We need those the most.”

“Will do,” she replied.

Danny went back to the fourth floor to see the crews elevating their guns, aiming for the targets further down the street. From this location they had a surprisingly clear field of fire, since they were right next to a main boulevard. As a result, they could see almost a half-mile into the enemy-held lines.

“Looks like they’re being careful,” Ryan commented as he looked through his binoculars.

That made sense. The 45mm gun’s design was public knowledge, so doubtless Ragnarok knew about its capabilities. Walking outside in the middle of the street would be a death sentence, even at this kind of range. And if he knew one thing, it was that Ragnarok wasn’t stupid. Reckless, maybe, but not stupid.

“Target them anyhow. We have several hundred rounds of fragmentation ammo,” Danny told him.

It was just a matter of getting it up the stairs to fire, but that would be easier said than done. If the stockpile was already on this level he’d be more comfortable, but Danny wasn’t sure they could keep up the rate of fire they needed in the current situation.

Right now they would trade ammunition for time, keeping the enemy at bay while they called for reinforcements. Danny had no idea when Alpha Wolf would arrive, or what kind of weaponry they’d bring to the fight. He couldn’t go check, either, because they needed commanders in the thick of the fighting.

“Loaded,” Ryan said as the breach of the gun clanked shut.

“Loaded,” Joe added. “Do you want us to stagger our fire?”

Danny shook his head. “No. Just keep it up as best as you can.”

He brought up his own pair of binoculars as motion in the distance caught his eye. Through the lenses Danny could see dozens, scores of enemy troops hugging the sides of the streets, many sticking to the cover of the buildings. They’d move slowly.

But they were coming.

“Ready?”

“Ready.”

“All set.”

Danny held his hand up for a moment, trying to judge just when the right moment would come.

And then it was here.

“Fire!”

“
H
ere they come
!”

Zach sighted his carbine and squeezed the trigger, trying to take down as many enemies as he could at long range.

Danny’s pair of guns had torn into the Ragnarok force as they advanced down the boulevard, injuring and killing dozens with their payloads of shrapnel. Many other forces would have cowered and fallen back after sustaining something like that.

Not Ragnarok, though. Their troops pressed on, almost completely heedless of the shellfire raining down on them. As he watched, Zach could understand why. The shells looked deadly, and they did inflict significant damage when they hit. But the fragments could also be stopped by good cover, and the artillery crews were still a bit hit and miss.

The enemy realized that, and continued to press forward. Sure, they would lose troops, but by taking an aggressive stance they could close the distance quickly and ultimately suffer less casualties. And once they came to grips with Black Wolf, Ragnarok was sure to win. Even with their strong position, Zach didn’t think their single platoon could hold off scores, maybe even hundreds of troops. They’d need the anti-tank guns to do that, and once the enemy was in the building they’d become useless.

Zach sighted in on the lead trooper and squeezed the trigger. His first shot missed, but he readjusted his aim and scored a hit with another burst.

All around him the rest of his group laid down an accurate barrage of fire, mixing semi-auto shots with tight automatic bursts. Ragnarok troops started to fall like leaves. Another pair of shots from the guns above tore into the midst of the enemy, causing even more carnage.

But they just kept coming.

“They just don’t give up, do they?” Xavier shouted over the din of gunfire. “Though I don’t know why I thought they would.”

“Just keep firing,” Zach ordered.

But how long could they really hope to hold them off? Even with their considerable firepower, Black Wolf was on the back foot here. Their enemy was suffering casualties, but they knew how to use cover effectively to minimize their losses. Zach knew very well that his troops couldn’t kill enough to stem the tide.

They were in a bind here. Zach had no way to communicate with the other units in the building, so coordination was limited. He had no idea if or when reinforcements were coming, and no clue whether the rest of the line was coming under attack.

This jamming system might be the most annoying thing he had ever dealt with inside the game, and Zach wished they had some way to override it. At the very least, he wanted a telephone close at hand. They had one on this floor, but he couldn’t spare anyone to act as a go between.

“We’ve got trouble,” someone yelled out.

Zach was about to ask what kind when he spotted it. Another tank was moving down the street toward their position. It crunched over the remnants of its fallen comrade and continued trundling forward.

“Is that a fl-” Javy began to say, before his question was answered.

Wooosh!

Zach flinched instinctively as a jet of flame streaked out of the tank toward them. For a second he began to panic, but then it felt short, about forty or fifty yards in front of their position.

“Bad aim?” Javy wondered aloud.

No, Zach thought to himself. That was probably a ranging shot, judging from the small amount of fuel used. They probably wouldn’t fire again until they closed the distance. Once that happened, though, they were ashes.

He certainly hoped that Danny could kill the thing before that happened.

“
T
arget the tank
! Target the tank!” Danny ordered, struggling to be heard over the racket. Aside from the gunfire, the sound of clanking ammunition and moving players only added to the noise.

“Both of us?” Ryan shouted back.

“No, actually. Joe, your crew targets the tank! Ryan, keep laying down fire on the infantry.”

Both crew chiefs shouted back their affirmatives and went to work. Danny went to the stairwell to make sure the ammo chain was running smoothly. It was, for the time being, but the runners were getting tired, and right now they had no end in sight.

They were burning through ammunition at an alarming rate too. The 45mm guns could sustain fire of about fifteen to twenty rounds a minute, but their shells were having much less effect than he had hoped. Their stock of fragmentation shells on this floor had been exhausted almost immediately, and Danny didn’t know how fast they could get them up from the ground floor.

The flame tank might be the biggest danger at the moment, but he could spot Ragnarok troops with man-portable weapons in the midst of the enemy force as well. Once they closed, Zach’s units on the ground floor were in for a world of hurt.

They didn’t have any choice, though. Bravo Wolf had to keep fighting, trying to keep the enemy at bay for reinforcements to arrive on time. The tower had to be held at all costs.

“Firing,” Joe said, and a second later his gun went off.

Bang!

“Did you hit it?” Danny asked.

Joe frowned. “Not a great shot, but it looks like we’ve got a mobility kill, at least. We blew off the front left drive wheel.”

“Try to kill it with another shot,” Danny ordered. He didn’t want the tank to suddenly start moving again and get into firing range while they were all distracted.

As the crews continued to fire, he looked down at his wrist menu clock. About ten more minutes before the effects of the jamming device wore off. It might not amount to much, but at least they could communicate with the other units.

That was, if they were still standing in then minutes. An RPG smashed into the face of the building, momentarily causing everyone to flinch again. He wished they had a sniper to deal with the enemy heavy weapons teams, but everyone on his level was occupied trying to keep the guns running.

The only thing he could do right now was hope that Zach’s units would realize what was happening and take steps to protect them. Otherwise, given Ragnarok’s love of using massive numbers of RPGs, one was going to find its way inside and ruin everyone’s day.

Someone tapped on his shoulder. “We’re starting to run out of fragmentation rounds near the stairs,” one of the Hephaestus engineers warned him. “We’ll have to get the ones by the entrance.”

“Keep supplying us for as long as possible,” Danny told him, his mind racing. Backup had better arrive fast.

T
he second flame
tank started to burn, but it didn’t explode like the last one. That suited Zach just fine, because the relatively intact wreck would block the roadway to other vehicles.

But that was the least of their worries right now. Ragnarok troops had closed in to about one hundred yards from the base of the tower and were laying a fusillade of fire down on them. Xavier had immediately noticed they were targeting the fourth floor with RPGs and assigned the snipers to take care of the problem, but that diverted much-needed firepower from the assault troops that we closing in fast.

Zach resisted the temptation to just blaze away at the enemy. Even with careful conservation of his supply, he had a little less than half of his ammo load left, with no prospects of getting any more anytime soon. Instead, he focused on making semi-auto shots he knew he could hit. That limited the number of targets, since he wasn’t the best marksman, but it was better than the alternative. If he was careless then he’d be reduced to firing pistol bullets and then flinging rocks.