Chapter 7

They hit two more of the convoys protected by two tanks and the results were the same. Dick began to wonder if the Wenrarians had any idea of how to defend a convoy. However, the protection scheme finally changed. The tanks were replaced by homemade APCs. Steel plates were welded to the sides and back of truck bodies, and heavy machine guns were mounted on the truck bed. Talk about overkill! The machine gun rigs were four machine guns on a single mount arranged sort of like on the four corners of a box. This was a devastating amount of firepower. There was no way their body armor could stand up to one of these monsters.

The only problem from the Wenrarian point of view was that the "quad" machine gun mount was slow and awkward to maneuver. Anything hit by the blast of bullets coming from this rig was DEAD! But it was so hard to move around that only a small amount of warning was sufficient to allow a human to escape by simply running sideways. No Wenrarian was strong enough to traverse the quad rig fast enough. Power assist would have fixed that problem, but the Wenrarians simply could not do that in the field.

They assigned several of these jury rigged quads to a convoy. One led, one trailed, and there was one every fourth or fifth truck in line. The humans didn't attack the first convoy to show up protected like this; they needed time to evaluate the new weapon and consider how to attack it. This inactivity must have fooled the Wenrarians into thinking that they had the humans' number with this new defense, because the next convoy was double the length of the previous one. Now, this really forced a change in tactics on the part of the humans.

Dick decided that their real mission was to keep the convoys from getting through, not just playing games destroying as much as they could and keeping score based on how many trucks burned on a given day. They really needed to stop the convoys on as nearly a permanent basis as they could. Therefore, their job was to block the road and keep it blocked. They had to prevent the Wenrarians from removing the burned vehicles and reopening the road. There were only two roads through the area capable of sustaining the weight of the trucks; therefore, if they could keep these two roads sealed, they would have made a significant contribution toward defeating the Wenrarians.

Step one was to seal the first road. Dick had a good idea of the schedule followed by the Wenrarians, so he would be able to have his platoon in place well before the first element of the convoy showed its head. Dick had 4 rocketeers at his disposal, so he would place them to hit the first four quad-equipped trucks in the convoy. The riflemen would take care of the personnel in the trucks. Once this was accomplished, the four rocketeers would be sent with a squad of riflemen to take care of the remaining elements of the convoy. While that was going on, the remaining three squads would turn the disabled trucks sideways in the cut and burn them. The trucks were long enough to do a good job of blocking both lanes of the road through the cut. This would be an effective blockade of the road rendering it unusable until the trucks could be removed. Preventing that would be step two, but step one had to be accomplished, first.

The humans spent a couple of days making sure that everybody understood his job, then they were ready to attack the convoy. The convoy would not arrive until early in the afternoon, so they had plenty of time to get ready. Again, the troops were so confident of Dick's ability to take care of them that most napped while they were waiting for the convoy to get to the cut. Then the word was passed down the line, "Here they come!"

As usual, the lead elements of the convoy were allowed to get deep into the cut unmolested. When the convoy reached what Dick judged to be the perfect position, he fired a single shot. SWISH... BANG! Three times it was repeated almost as one sound up and down the convoy as the quads were taken out. Massive rifle fire eliminated the personnel in the regular cargo trucks. Meanwhile, the rocketeers were already running down the line to take their shots at the next set of 4 quads.

So far, not a single quad had fired, except as the ammunition cooked off. There simply were no humans to be seen until they were shooting, and then it was too late! The Wenrarians were at a fatal disadvantage with their myopic vision; they couldn't see who was shooting at them! SWISH... BANG! Another set of four quads were taken out, and that was all of them! The single squad of riflemen took a little longer to take out the personnel in the cargo trucks, since there were not as many of them to shoot at the Wenrarians, but it really didn't make any difference. They and the rocketeers stayed in place as a rear guard while the rest of the platoon wrestled the trucks crosswise in the road.

The trucks were built to be driven by an operator who had 4 arms and 4 legs, so it was a little hard for a human to manage all of the controls. The Wenrarians apparently had never heard of automatic transmissions. Why the hell did they need two clutches? Where's the fucking brakes? Eventually, the trucks were all shifted to block both lanes, so they were set on fire. The troops stood around and watched the trucks burn for a while, Dick figured that they had earned the treat. Finally, though, everybody but the 3-man scout unit went back to camp.

It wasn't until late the next day that a detail of Wenrarians showed up to clear the mess in the cut. The fools didn't have any shooters along, probably because the humans had never before tried to stop them from cleaning up the road. This time was a different story. All of the Wenrarians were shot dead and left in place to be seen by the next crew to show up.

Late that day, a Wenrarian patrol car tooled up to the cut and was shot at as it got close. However, it managed to escape to carry word of the carnage back to headquarters. The next day, another detail of engineers showed up to work on moving the junk out of the road. There were a few riflemen along, this time, but not nearly enough to protect the engineers. A squad of humans wiped out this bunch, too.

The next time, the detail of engineers were protected by a tank and two trucks with the quad machine gun mount. There was a platoon of riflemen along, also. It appeared that the Wenrarians at headquarters were finally taking the situation seriously. Dick had an answer for this, too.

Three of the rocketeers fired simultaneously into the tank and the quads and destroyed them all. However, the rocketeers were seen as they ran from the cut toward the trees. About half the Wenrarian riflemen were sent in pursuit. The rocketeers were in no real danger unless they tripped and fell, since their body armor could stop a bullet fired from an enemy rifle. The reverse was not true! The human rocketeers disappeared among the trees with the Wenrarians in hot pursuit. When they got close enough to the tree line, the entire platoon of human riflemen cut loose on the unsuspecting Wenrarians. When the shooting was over, none of the Wenrarians had survived.

The humans ran to the cut and opened up on the engineers and remaining riflemen still working at the cut. A lot of the enemy were cut down before they had a chance to shoot back, but, as in the case earlier in the day, not a one managed to survive the massive firepower of the human onslaught. The humans took the time to burn whatever was still usable before they left for the evening.

The Wenrarian effort was turning into a tragi-comedy. Or maybe, it was more like a slapstick comedy. Whatever the Wenrarians tried to do, it was never quite enough to counter the humans. The Wenrarians made three more efforts to clear the road before giving up, but they had lost a hell of a lot of men and equipment in the fiasco. They finally did what they should have done earlier, they switched to the other road.

The new supply route was longer for the Wenrarians, but it didn't have any convenient cuts for staging ambushes. However, this road wound its way through swamps that neither the Wenrarians nor the Ixlerns dared to enter. In most places, trees had been left to mark the edge of the swamp to warn people of the limits for safe travel. There were few bridges over water, since the locals had an almost pathological fear of water. The road would wind for miles to avoid crossing even the smallest stream, so great was the fear.