them time to learn their trade. Militia units already had a bad reputation for breaking under fire. Two of the reasons was lack of training, and lack of time to get used to this hellish punishment. High Command shouldn’t treat them like a penal battalion, even if that’s what they were. It was wasteful of American lives.
We’re just a tripwire for the enemy.
Jake curled into a ball and plugged his ears. The noise was too much. The blasts, the shaking, the dribbles of dirt on his helmet—men weren’t born to take this. It was enough to drive him mad.
Jake didn’t know how long it lasted, but there came a moment when it finally stopped. Tentatively, he unplugged his ears. Soon, he sat up. With the caution of a wary gopher looking out of its hole, he climbed to his feet and peeked over the lip of his foxhole. He’d dug his deeper than anyone else’s foxhole, but he bet that would change now.
Much of Castle Rock burned. The small city was to the south of Greater Denver on I-25. North from here the freeway led to Castle Pines and then to Centennial where the Mexico Home Army waited.
The stink of gunpowder and burning flesh mingled with oil and gas. The destruction…one had to see this to believe it. This was like being in Dante’s Inferno of brimstone and fire, and fumes kept billowing up from Castle Rock to feed the black cloud above.
Slowly, it dawned on Jake that he heard voices and whistles. The Detention Center people loved blowing the shrillest noises. Officers appeared, with their silver tools between their lips or clenched teeth like high school football coaches. Soon officers began shouting, and one used a bullhorn. He pointed south in the direction of the worst destruction and the leaping, crackling flames.
These officers were former Detention Center guards. They didn’t look too happy, either. Few of the former detainees—the Militiamen grunts—had yet to get out of their foxholes.
Jake climbed out of his. So did others of his squad.
“We’d better line up,” Jake told them. The others looked pale or trembled. A few had obviously been crying. They must be wondering now why they’d ever volunteered for this insanity. Punishment drills or even the isolation cells back in the Detention Center had never been as bad as this.
I must have been an idiot to leave Lisa.
It took ten minutes, but finally the rest of the Militiamen circled their lieutenants and sergeants. Jake listened as theirs told them they were heading forward to drive off the invaders. Enemy artillery had demolished the forward posts and buried the luckless spotters and heavy machine gun teams. During the tail end of the bombardment, Chinese infantry had roared up in their IFVs, unloaded and were already crawling into Castle Rock to claim it. HQ wanted the Eleventh CDM Battalion to drive the Chinese out, or at least buy Division time to reorganize and get a full-scale counterattack going.
Frightened Militiamen glanced at each other. The uncertainty and fear in their eyes made Jake realize this was a stupid plan. Militiamen might hold their ground in foxholes, but advancing to meet the enemy after this hellish artillery pounding—
Whistles blew. It was a shrill sound and seemed to drive arrows of noise into Jake’s ears. Officers shouted and a few screamed, threatening a return to the Detention Center for cowardice in the face of the enemy.
“Come on,” Jake said. “The sooner we get to our new positions, the sooner we can dig in.”
In a ragged group, they started forward into the burning city. Some of the Militiamen shouldered M-16s. Others carried Javelin missile-launchers. Jake belonged to a heavy machine gun team.
Jake carried the Browning M2 .50 caliber. It was heavy on his shoulder. He noticed once again that none of the ordinary Militiamen wore body armor, just the officers. It hadn’t been that way in the Seventh in Texas. There, the officers had tried to make soldiers out of them. They seemed to have cared about the troops in their care. These guards–turned-officers had the feel of angry men taking it out on those below.
Machine gun fire started ahead, cannons barked. There were screams, bloodcurdling things. Everyone around Jake slowed down. Taller buildings with huge concrete chunks taken out of them blocked their view of what happened up there and made everyone imagine the worst.
“Double time it!” the captain shouted.
The lieutenants and then the sergeants began whistling. If they’d had whips, the officers and NCOs would probably