Part 7 (2/2)
We've tried to call the Palace, but we can't get through. General, we must have help....”
A call came in, a few minutes later, from Krink, five hundred miles to the north-east across the mountains; the Resident-Agent there, one Francis Xavier Shapiro, reported rioting in the city and an attempted palace-revolution against King Jonkvank, and that the Residency was under attack. By way of variety, it was the army of King Jonkvank that had mutinied; the Sixth North Ullr Native Infantry and the two companies of Zirk cavalry at Krink were still loyal, along with the Kragans.
There was a pattern to all this. Von Schlichten stood staring at the big map, on the wall, showing the Takkad Sea area at the Equatorial Zone, and the country north of it to the Pole, the area of Ullr occupied by the Company. He was almost beginning to discern the underlying logic of the past half-hour's events when Keaveney, the Skilk Resident, blundered into him in a half-daze.
”Sorry, general; didn't see you.” His face was ashen, and his jowls sagged. ”My G.o.d, it's happening all over Ullr! Why, it's the end of all of us!”
”It's not quite that bad, Mr. Keaveney.” He looked at his watch. It was now nearly an hour since the native troops here at Skilk had mutinied. Insurrections like this usually succeeded or failed in the first hour. ”If we all do our part, we'll come out of it all right,”
he told Keaveney, more cheerfully than he felt, then turned to ask Brigadier-General Mordkovitz how the fighting was going at the native-troops barracks.
”Not badly, general. Colonel Jarman's got some contragravity up and working. They blew out all four of the Tenth N.U.N.I.'s barracks; the Tenth and the Zirks are trying to defend the cavalry barracks. Some of our Kragans managed to slip around behind the cavalry stables. They're leading out hipposaurs, and sniping at the rear of the cavalry barracks.”
”That'll give us some cavalry of our own; a lot of these Kragans are good riders.... How about the repair-shops and maintenance-yard and lorry-hangars? I don't want these geeks getting hold of that equipment and using it against us.”
”Kormork's outfit are trying to take back the lorry-hangars. Jarman's got a couple of airjeeps and a combat-car helping them.”
”... won't be one of us left by this time tomorrow,” Keaveney was wailing, to Paula Quinton and another woman. ”And the Company is finished!”
Colonel Cheng-Li, the Intelligence officer, approached Keaveney and tried to quiet him. At the same time, a woman in black slacks and an orange sweater--the one whose pursuers had been overrun by the Kragans at the beginning of the fighting--approached von Schlichten.
”General; King Kankad's calling,” she said. ”He's on the screen in booth four.”
Kankad's face was looking out of the screen at him, with Phil Yamazaki, the telecast operator at Kankad's Town, standing behind him.
”Von!” The Kragan spoke almost as though in physical pain. ”What can I do to help? I have twenty thousand of my people here who are capable of bearing arms, all with firearms, but I have transport for only five hundred. Where shall I send them?”
Von Schlichten thought quickly. Keegark was finished; the Residency stood in the middle of the city, surrounded by two hundred thousand of King Orgzild's troops and subjects. Sending Kankad's five hundred warriors and his meager contragravity there would be the same as shovelling them into a furnace. The people at Keegark would have to be written off, like the twenty Kragans at Jaikark's palace.
”Send them to Konkrook,” he decided. ”Them M'zangwe's in command, there; he'll need help to hold the Company farms. Maybe he can find additional transport for you. I'll call him.”
”I'll send off what force I can, at once,” Kankad promised. ”How does it go with you at Skilk?”
”We're holding, so far,” he replied.
Captain Inez Malavez, the woman officer in charge of the station, put her head into the booth.
”General! Immediate-urgency message from Colonel O'Leary,” she said.
”Native laborers from the mine-labor camp are pouring into the mine-equipment park. Colonel O'Leary's used all his rockets and mg-ammunition trying to stop them.”
”Call you back, later,” von Schlichten told Kankad. ”I'll see what Them M'zangwe can do about transport; get what force you can started for Konkrook at once.”
He left the booth. ”Barney!” he called. ”General Mordkovitz! Who's the ranking officer in direct contact with the Eighteenth Rifles? Major Falkenberg?”
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