Grand Alliance (Kirov Series) (17 page)

Chapter 14

The
desert seemed endless to Lieutenant Reeves of the 12th
Royal Lancers. He had been here twelve months, and still could not grasp the
enormity of all the desolation around him. There was nothing in the desert,
except the occasional camelthorn, weathered limestone, sandy salt marshes,
camel dung and the inevitable hordes of black flies. It was no place for any
sane man to be, and even less so now, with this impossible news that had just been
laid on all the battalion commanders.

Insane…
This was the way he felt inside now, empty, desolate, thunderstruck to the
point of madness. The meeting he had just had with Brigadier Kinlan had left
him slack jawed with disbelief. All the other battalion commanders had reacted
the very same way, amazed and perplexed with what the General was telling them.

Something
had happened when the Russians attacked them, some unaccountable exotic effects
of the nuclear detonation. That was the way he had tried to explain it. There
was blast, radiation, electromagnetic pulse—all three well known and guarded
against. But this was something altogether different. This was an effect on
time itself, the fourth dimension. The detonation caused displacement in time
for a limited quantity of mass within the effect radius.

Displacement
in time!

He
shook his head, still dazed with the news, hearing Kinlan’s words like an echo
in his mind.
“… It’s happened to the Russians themselves, who knows how, but
that’s how they lost that battlecruiser in the Norwegian Sea. We all heard
about the suspected accident there—a nuclear accident. We all knew they lost
that Oscar class sub, and the word was that Kirov went down with it, but that
was not so. The damn ship turned up in the Pacific a month later. Well, here’s
some more news for you. This Russian Marine detachment Reeves collared with
that KA-40 was commanded by the Captain of that very same ship! He was the one
who put this explanation forward. I thought it was a load of rubbish just like
you must now, but the evidence has been mounting with each passing hour, and it
leads to only one conclusion. Sultan Apache, the odd differences in moon phase and
star data, the loss of all satellite and comm-links—it’s all adding up to only
one thing—time displacement. It’s happened to us, gentlemen, and from
everything we’ve been able to piece together at Brigade HQ, we’ve been blown
clean out of the 21st Century! We figure the date and time now is the 2nd of February…
in the year 1941!”

That
had been greeted by blank stares, an uncomfortable shift in posture from the
men assembled, a smile from others who thought Kinlan was just trying to
lighten the mood before the brigade set out on what was likely to be its last
road march. But it was no joke.

General
Kinlan knew he had to tell the men something before they moved north with the
prospect of battle before them. Yet he could not tell them everything, just as
the Russian Captain had urged. Some would have to know, but not to the whole
rank and file. They would learn just as the crew of that ship learned the hard
truth. In the end he decided to limit the news to his senior officers. He had
to place faith in their training and discipline, and hope for the best. He made
an all points announcement stating they had been informed of enemy activity
ahead, a large unidentified force attempting to block their move north. He said
they were using antiquated equipment, but that there was a lot of it, tanks,
artillery and anti-tank guns. “Who knows,” he concluded, “maybe it’s Rommel and
his Afrika Korps.”

He had
tried to be a bit light hearted about it, saying they had also encountered Russians,
but determined them to be no threat. They were apparently traveling with
British officers, and should be treated as friendly. Then his voice became more
serious and he related the disturbing news concerning Sultan Apache, saying it
was a matter they were still looking into. That got quite a few men scratching
their heads, but they gave it little mind and buckled down for action as any
good soldiers would. Reeves heard the announcement over his comm-link command
set radio, as did every man in his unit. He knew much more—the full briefing from
Kinlan still clawing at him within, but he could not be forthcoming with the
men just yet. He had been handed the job of going out to obtain the final
evidence on all this.

“If
any of this is true,”
Kinlan had told him,
“then you should run into the German Army out there somewhere. Take your battalion
north and scout well ahead of the main column. I want to know what we’re
looking at here, no ifs, ands, or buts about it. I don’t want photographs or
thermal imaging data, I want flesh and blood men, and the cold hard steel of a
vehicle. You’re the best in the business, Reeves. Get this done…”

“How
you figure that?” said Sergeant Williams, a voice suddenly filling the void
within him and bringing Reeves back to this impossible here and now. “The whole
place gone?”

“What? You
mean Sultan Apache? The Russkies must have hit it again,” Reeves answered
sullenly. It was the only thing he could think of to explain the situation.

“The
General said there was no sign of another attack. You heard it—they went over
the site and detected no radiation. No blast damage either.”

“Sounds
loony to me,” said Reeves. “Maybe he got his grid coordinates wrong. General
Kinlan is no fool, mind you, but something just doesn’t add up here. So that’s
where we come in. When brigade wants information, who do they call? 12th Royal
Lancers, that’s who. So tighten your chin straps, boyo, and be sharp.”

“Yeah?
Well that bit about keeping our eyes peeled for enemy ground troops was rich.
Keep a look out for Rommel and the Germans, eh? And we advance in battle order
instead of column of march? It certainly sounds like the General knows
something he hasn’t told us yet.”

“Oh, he
told us alright,” said Reeves. “Battalion officers were briefed, but none of
that falls on you, Sergeant. You just settle affairs here on squad level. We’re
12th Royals and were out on point. I’ll want the Scimitars up front this time,
three squadrons in battle order, and we’ll follow with the Dragons in the
center. Pass the word. I want thermals and night opticals at all times. Report
any contact to me directly.”

Four
hours later Reeves got his first report, and from a bemused Sergeant in 2nd
Squadron who sighted light vehicles ahead. They had encountered a desert patrol
of some kind, and Reeves ordered his men to move up in their Scimitars and see
about it. What they saw soon boggled their eyes, and quashed the rounds of
humorous comments about General Kinlan’s briefing. The men had a good long
laugh as they set out before dawn, but just before sunrise the laughter stopped,
drowned out by incoming tracer rounds from heavy machineguns.

As was
so often the case in desert war, the recon elements of the two opposing sides
were the first to tangle with one another. Reeves listened to the chatter
between his units on his headset, and soon learned that 3rd Squadron on point had
also run into something. When his men came under fire he gave the order to
return in kind, thinking they had run across groups of irregular militias
riding about in SUVs and pickup trucks, out to raise havoc and then disappear
into the desert again. But here? What would they be doing so far south of the
coast? Then he got news that really raised an eyebrow, and reminded him that
there were no SUVs if this was 1941. Lieutenant Wright radioed in from the left
flank in 2nd Squadron and said he had prisoners.

“More
bloody Russians?” Reeves inquired.

“No
sir… well Lieutenant… It’s bloody Germans, just like Kinlan said! I have five
men here, all decked out in old style German army uniforms. I interrogated the
lot, but haven’t the foggiest.
Sprechen
sie Deutsch?
”

“Germans?
Somebody playing army out here again?”

“They
had a Kubelwagon, right out of the museum, and a nasty 50 Caliber MG on it. I
had to use the main autocannon, and that was that. The rest gave us the hands
up soon after, but one vehicle took off north and slipped away.”

“Very
well,” said Reeves, wondering how he was going to keep this cat in the bag.
“Stick them in one of the support vehicles, and keep moving. Secure that long
ridge line up ahead and wait there. I’ll be up to have a look. Reeves out.”

A
Kubelwagon with a 50-cal? That was a new spin. He’d bet get one of those back
to Kinlan. They were accustomed to Ford pickup trucks with old ZSU 23’s mounted
in the back, but this was a first. He reported, surprised by Kinlan’s
subsequent order to stop at Ridge 699 and wait for the Mercian Battalion to
come up. Then he was to jog left, set up all his Squadrons in attack echelon,
and wait for the Highlanders to come up on his right. The General was playing
it by the book. He was deploying the whole damn brigade in battle formation! It
was as if he thought we were about to tangle with a full enemy division out
there somewhere.

They
were about to do exactly that…

* * *

Hauptmann
László Almásy crested the barren desert hill that morning,
and he was late. Almásy had been scouting on the extreme southern right flank
of Rommel’s advance, with his Sonderkommando unit comprised if 12 scout cars
and a few squads of light infantry. Another patrol, the 3rd Oasis Group, had
been reconnoitering near an ancient tomb site near Gabr el Shubaki when they
thought they saw the telltale signs of vehicles approaching from the south.
Almásy heard about it, and one look at his map told him he could scout the area
well from the top of this hill, number 728, about ten kilometers due east of
the tomb. He would be late reporting back to Rommel, but at least he would have
the very latest information in hand when he did. He reached the hill he had in
mind just before dawn, in spite of the fact that his scout cars were also very
low on fuel, and he wondered if he would have enough to get back north.

So it
was that the famous Hungarian explorer would come to make a new discovery that
morning, and see a strange group of men, tall, strangely attired, and with
weapons the like of which no man alive in his world had ever known. The sun
rose, painting the stark desert terrain in a rosy hue, and the light soon
illuminated the whole valley floor to the south. To his amazement, there,
stretching for many kilometers in a long dark column, was a large mechanized
force. He could clearly make out eight wheeled armored cars in the vanguard,
and behind them he could see tanks. There were other odd looking vehicles,
topped with strange metal discs spinning fitfully, and whiskery antennae waving
in the morning breeze as the column slowly came to a halt.

What he
had seen was actually Reeves 12th Royal Lancers, the eight wheeled Dragons and
a line of Scimitars in 2nd Squadron that was now following. The Scimitar was a
vehicle that bore some resemblance to what Almásy would conceive of as a tank
of this era. Even the 30mm RARDEN cannon looked to be about the size and scale
of a typical 2 Pounder. Had he seen a Challenger II, his mind might be on other
things now, but as it stood, the presence of this force was enough to get him
moving again.

Good
god, he thought. What unit was this? It looked to be at least another full battalion
in strength, and he could already begin to hear the rattle of the tanks rolling
over the cold desert ground. I have to get word of this to Rommel!

“Hans!”
he rasped. “Get to the nearest radio. No time to get back there. Tell Rommel we
have visitors! That looks to be a battalion of British armor out there, and
it’s heading north, right on our exposed right flank!”

László
Almásy had never really found the lost realm of Zerzura, but he had just
discovered something that was about to change the entire history of the Second
World War. And his fate, in the maelstrom that was now emerging from the vermillion
shadows of a distant ridge, would be the least of things to be taken by the
storm.

* * *

Rommel
reacted to the news with great surprise. A British armor
battalion? Behind him? Yet the evidence was plain for him to see. The lone
scout car from a small oasis patrol had come barreling in on its last legs just
moments ago. The back end of the vehicle was shot to pieces by what looked to
be a round in the caliber of a twenty to thirty millimeter flak gun. It might
have been exactly that, he thought. The British had been throwing together
small ad hoc columns, like a German kampfgruppe might be formed. They would
scrape together whatever they could find, trucks, stray tanks, a few flak guns,
or a single towed artillery piece.

They
must have run into one of the British Jock Columns, he thought, smiling. His
signalmen had picked up the phrase on radio intercepts, though he did not yet
know where the handle came from. The men of the Oasis patrol were wide eyed
with reports of new, fast moving British tanks that could engage from very long
ranges and seemed to have eyes in every direction.

“Their
optics must be superb,” one man had reported. “They hit us from well over two
kilometers—and well before dawn! The moon was down and it was still very dark. We
lost three vehicles in the first minute, and I was only lucky to have escaped
because I was at the back of the column and had the good sense to get here with
this report!”