After an hour without attack, Akaljeet scouted the perimeter and determined that it was safe to move. She helped Panveer into what was left of the aid station tent and uprighted a medical bed turned over in the attack. She did not see any doctors around. Several wounded soldiers were being treated by surgical robots. She made Panveer comfortable and then called her position in.
“There are no doctors available,” Command said. “Your unit has been evacuated to the landing zone.”
“I have wounded here. I can’t leave them here. Over.”
“No troops available to relieve you position at present. Mechanized relief on the way. Retreat with wounded if possible. Out.”
Akaljeet cursed. Robots without close support were a recipe for disaster. Too many times they fired on friendly and enemy positions together. They needed to move back to the beach.
She awakened Panveer from his drug-induced unconsciousness. He looked around. “Where is everyone?”
Akaljeet assessed the situation. There were three wounded soldiers, plus Ranveer. He could probably move on his own. Two of the soldiers had lost legs, a third was unconscious. She checked his vitals: Blood pressure 90 over 40, pulse weak, fever. He needed evacuation to the ship off of the coast.
“M2328 to command. Require emergency evac to Defiant. Three wounded, over.” She waited, then shouted, “Command!” There was no answer.
She turned; Panveer was behind her. “No answer,” he said.
“None. How are you feeling? Any dizziness?”
“I’m fine. We need to evacuate. The drones are picking up soldiers moving in this direction.
Akaljeet felt the situation tightening around her like a noose. Although she wasn’t scared, she had not trained for more than a couple weeks in combat techniques before joining the convoy here. She felt the terror of combat descending on her. She was ashamed; she wanted to run away.
“We can’t leave the wounded here,” she said. “They will be executed.”
“Wait.” Panveer scrounged around the station until he found the controllers for the medical robots. There was a main panel the size of a laptop that could be used to override their automatic functions. There were seven medibots in all; more than enough. He took control of three of them and sent them to the wounded. Then using his wrist controller, he called a sweeper over.
“The medical robots will transport the wounded. I want you to retreat with this sweeper as protection. Head directly to the beachhead. Command has issued a general withdrawal.”
She placed her arm on his. “I won’t leave you here.”
Mortar rounds exploded in the near distance. Panveer lowered his eyepiece from his helmet and saw that they were going to be overrun. “Fine, he said. No time to argue. Get the wounded loaded.” He issued commands to his robots to fire at will.
Akaljeet had the wounded loaded on the robot, then issued order to head south to the beach. They were five miles inland. She was not optimistic they would make it. Panveer followed them, issuing commands to the field robots as he walked.
“I’m calling in an air strike,” he said, “to give us some time. ETA two minutes. Go for that rock overhang.” He pointed east. An indentation in a cliff was two hundred meters away. Akaljeet commanded the robots to head for that. They had barely reached that when the sky lit up. Battalion drones dropped cluster rounds in the area of the aid station. Wile the rounds went off, the Iranians deployed an EMP. The drones fell from the sky and exploded loudly on the ground. After the explosions, the battlefield was quiet.
No comments:
Post a Comment