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.Fires were burning in the direction of where the mines had detonated – we’d included a little something in the explosive mix to encourage fires – but at first we saw no signs of the Warriors.We couldn’t hear anything over the sounds of Voodoo Child, but we saw, from time to time, some individual Warriors trying to get to us.The gunners cut them down with swift precise bursts and we drove past them, not even slowing to take better aim.There was no need.The Warriors had no choice, but to show themselves, just to take a shot at us.We gunned them down mercilessly.Whatever restraints we had once acknowledged had died in the heat of battle.Behind us, the remains of the FOB burned.I turned my head, craning it as far back as I could to look at the burning ruins, but there was no sign of Dutch or any of the rearguard.I could still hear Voodoo Child until it cut off suddenly, accompanied by a massive explosion.The Warriors had probably hit something explosive and destroyed the loudspeakers.There was some shooting, brief isolated bursts of fire drifting in the warm air, but nothing else.Silence was gradually falling as we drove away from the scene of recent carnage…And we had lost the battle.It did not, I decided, bode well for the future.A few more battles like that and we would be ruined.And when we got to the next set of defensive lines, we discovered that Mac wasn't with us any longer.He’d remained behind until the end.Chapter Thirty-ThreeThe only thing worse than a battle won is a battle lost.-Duke of Wellington“Not Christians,” Reverend Thomas McNab said.His voice had absolutely no give in it at all.“They’re nothing like us.”I gave him a reproving look.The half-wrecked warehouse had once belonged to a packing company and had contained a surprising amount of useful equipment.We had stripped it of everything that could be useful; now, it was packed with dozens of wounded men, receiving what medical care we could give them under the firelight.Outside, the remainder of the force I’d led to the FOB waited, some huddling around fires, others watching for advancing enemy forces.It looked, to my eyes, like a scene from another world.“They think they’re Christians,” I said, bitterly.I felt numb deep inside my heart, as if the events of the day hadn’t quite caught up with me.I was one of the lucky ones.There were several soldiers who had started to sob as soon as they were out of danger and had gone completely to pieces, despite everything we could do for them.They’d been shell-shocked during the battle and would take time to recover.I’d been forced to send them back to Ingalls and hope that they recovered.“How do they do it?”I remembered, chillingly, the vast waves of human fodder coming on and on, their faces twisted with a fanatical determination to destroy us, to wipe us out as if we had never existed.How could they be Americans? What had they been in the years before the Final War? How could this nightmare have come to our soil?“You don’t like organised religion very much, do you?” Thomas said.“Don’t you have any faith of your own?”“There are no atheists in foxholes,” I said, absently.“I believe in God, but not so much in those who claim to dictate policy in his name.”Thomas snorted.“And yet you must understand that those who think that they serve as his representatives on Earth are human and can therefore err,” he said, dryly.I hadn’t realised just how involved he was in the argument, which was, in hindsight, foolish of me.“If you can take the words of the bible to support any argument you like, why shouldn’t they be wrong from time to time?”I shrugged, too tired to even move.“But they claim to know what’s right?”“Name me a religion,” Thomas challenged, “that doesn’t claim to have the ultimate keys to the Kingdom of the Lord in its holy book, or in the words of its priests, or in miracles witnessed by the believers [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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.Fires were burning in the direction of where the mines had detonated – we’d included a little something in the explosive mix to encourage fires – but at first we saw no signs of the Warriors.We couldn’t hear anything over the sounds of Voodoo Child, but we saw, from time to time, some individual Warriors trying to get to us.The gunners cut them down with swift precise bursts and we drove past them, not even slowing to take better aim.There was no need.The Warriors had no choice, but to show themselves, just to take a shot at us.We gunned them down mercilessly.Whatever restraints we had once acknowledged had died in the heat of battle.Behind us, the remains of the FOB burned.I turned my head, craning it as far back as I could to look at the burning ruins, but there was no sign of Dutch or any of the rearguard.I could still hear Voodoo Child until it cut off suddenly, accompanied by a massive explosion.The Warriors had probably hit something explosive and destroyed the loudspeakers.There was some shooting, brief isolated bursts of fire drifting in the warm air, but nothing else.Silence was gradually falling as we drove away from the scene of recent carnage…And we had lost the battle.It did not, I decided, bode well for the future.A few more battles like that and we would be ruined.And when we got to the next set of defensive lines, we discovered that Mac wasn't with us any longer.He’d remained behind until the end.Chapter Thirty-ThreeThe only thing worse than a battle won is a battle lost.-Duke of Wellington“Not Christians,” Reverend Thomas McNab said.His voice had absolutely no give in it at all.“They’re nothing like us.”I gave him a reproving look.The half-wrecked warehouse had once belonged to a packing company and had contained a surprising amount of useful equipment.We had stripped it of everything that could be useful; now, it was packed with dozens of wounded men, receiving what medical care we could give them under the firelight.Outside, the remainder of the force I’d led to the FOB waited, some huddling around fires, others watching for advancing enemy forces.It looked, to my eyes, like a scene from another world.“They think they’re Christians,” I said, bitterly.I felt numb deep inside my heart, as if the events of the day hadn’t quite caught up with me.I was one of the lucky ones.There were several soldiers who had started to sob as soon as they were out of danger and had gone completely to pieces, despite everything we could do for them.They’d been shell-shocked during the battle and would take time to recover.I’d been forced to send them back to Ingalls and hope that they recovered.“How do they do it?”I remembered, chillingly, the vast waves of human fodder coming on and on, their faces twisted with a fanatical determination to destroy us, to wipe us out as if we had never existed.How could they be Americans? What had they been in the years before the Final War? How could this nightmare have come to our soil?“You don’t like organised religion very much, do you?” Thomas said.“Don’t you have any faith of your own?”“There are no atheists in foxholes,” I said, absently.“I believe in God, but not so much in those who claim to dictate policy in his name.”Thomas snorted.“And yet you must understand that those who think that they serve as his representatives on Earth are human and can therefore err,” he said, dryly.I hadn’t realised just how involved he was in the argument, which was, in hindsight, foolish of me.“If you can take the words of the bible to support any argument you like, why shouldn’t they be wrong from time to time?”I shrugged, too tired to even move.“But they claim to know what’s right?”“Name me a religion,” Thomas challenged, “that doesn’t claim to have the ultimate keys to the Kingdom of the Lord in its holy book, or in the words of its priests, or in miracles witnessed by the believers [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]