048: Going Commando

Leonid, September 19th, 2000

We're out of meeting.  We're committed. 

Alphabit hops and claps like small child.  "Time to make the explosives!"

Kat nods and sends him on his way, "Yeah, Alphabit.  Use up everything we have."

"Sure thing Cap!"  Off he goes.

"I'm going to double check his work.  You need to get some sleep."  She takes me by the shoulder and gives a good shake.  "You, you just make sure to come back.  I'll wake you in two hours."

"Do my best Kapitan."

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The militia men give me coveralls, heavily stained and patched, and heavy work gloves.  Both camoflage and protection from the ruin they say.  It is almost uniform here. 

Donald sets out the toys.  "Two charges, 1 kilo and 10 kilo, both with radio dets.  The small one is for the breach if you can get close enough.  Use it on the hinges.  They won't be able to repair that in the field."

He opens his mouth wide and gives a hearty laugh.  "Now the big one.  This one is for throwing or emplacing.  If you can emplace it on top you'll ruin the cradle and recoil systems.  Last choice throw it underneath.  No guarantees, but you might should snap the mount.  Either way, jobs a good one."

Donald walks over activating the individual remote detonators and the radio trigger.  I bury the charges in my pack under fistfulls of dirty rags, some warped handtools, and a days food and water.  My pistol goes under the coveralls with the had set and radio trigger.  AKR on the sling and extra mags in the pockets.  I have 3 hours till dawn.

"Kiss for luck, Don?"

"You're not the pretty Leo!"

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It takes three hours to cross the no man's land between Sielce and Czarny's territory.  Another hour to find a good hide in the ruin where I can observe his "Palace".  The joke is, it is a palace.  The Palace of Culture, built by Stalin as a gift to the people's of Poland.  A multi-story eyesore of reinforced concrete and steel.  The only building still standing after two airbursts and the natural headquarters for feudal meglomaniacs.

I have my little map.  The gun and the ammo bunker to the southeast in dugouts.

I'm in place before sun up.  I wait.  I watch.

The laborers come in from the surrounding, improvised structures.  They till the fields inside the haphazard walls.  Work in the outbuildings.  Armed guards patrol the interior.  They're sloppy, I think, knowing the populace is cowed.  Large pots are brought out from one wing of the palace.  The guards bunch and eat first.  Workers take the scraps.  Is not quite perfect example of proletariat oppression by aristocracy.  Teacher would be proud the lesson stayed.

There is corporal punishment in the afternoon.  Announcements of infractions.  Lashes given.  Czarny is one for whipping.  Bet only way to get his sadist dick up.  I will enjoy this work.

The gun and bunker positions worry me.  The men there pay more attention to their duty.  The punishments in the courtyard, are they a pointed reminder?

Evening falls.  Laborers take themselves out of the palace in the twilight.  I power nap.  Wish there were two.  Moon-pie or George would do.  Wake and observe.  Plan and nap.

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Early morning.  They aren't stirring, yet.  I break down the AKR and stow it away in the pack.  Dry swallow a wake-me-up.  Move slowly to the edges of the cleared zone.  As the morning laborers pass, I join the stream.  Flow into the palace courtyard.  The guards at the MG check-point barely notice us.  Field workers go to the far southeast wing to receive tools.  We wait in 'efficient' lines.  Some take a moment to step into the dead woods and shrubs and relieve themselves.  I take a similar opportunity.  The pack stays behind jammed into a window well.  I receive my tools.

I am peasant now.  I give Czarny a full day of sweat.  Work takes me as close as I dare to the bunker and pit.  The men at the bunker have steps to see just over the dugout walls, 360, while two stand guard at the breach.  Through it I can see the bunker is dug down into the earth.  The gun sits in a circular pit.  An eight man squad watch the cardinal directions form inside the pit.

I work it through the day.  His force is made of the bits and pieces of former armies.  Pact browns predominate, but I see Ami-forest, German flecktarn, police, and mixes of all flavors.  Orders are barked.  Attitude is everything.  The gears turn, can you hear them?

Twilight, I stop for a piss and don't come out.

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More waiting.  Doc's wake-me-ups go faster than candy.  I can't afford to sleep.  4:00 am doesn't come quick enough.

I double damn make sure the remote trigger is off and only then activate the radio detonators.  Strip out of the coveralls, reassemble the AKR, and beat my cap into a semblance of shape.  I think of that insufferable bastard Gronikov the night before and 'insurgent' snuck in and grenaded his fighting position.  Walk just so, back straight, scowl set.  Be brisk, you're up at a god awful hour.  You have job and damn if they fuck with you.  Off to bunker.

They challenge as I come into view.  "Padgorny, sergeant.  I need Kowalski.  Now."  The sergeant gobbles something about the challenge. 

"Do I look like I give a fuck."  Step.  "Kowalski.  Now!"  He stiffens at the snap in my voice.

"Sir, no Kowalski assigned this position."  They eat, drink, and breath the fear in this place.

I tap the breach of the AKR slung across my chest.  Ting, ting, ting.  "I am sent to get Kowalski.  Is important to Black." Ting, ting, ting.

"Sir, Kowalczyk?"

I give him one arched eye.  "All you fucking Poles sound alike."  Hiss, "Where is he?"

"Sir, he's assigned to gun wat..."

I turn and stalk over to the D-30's position.  They're already looking our way.  I wasn't screaming, but I wasn't quiet by any means.  Their sergeant climbs out of the pit as I approach.  He gestures up another soldier.

"Kowalczyk.  You have a fucking emergency.  You're relieved, return home."

"No.  Is it Mara?"

"Yes," I lie smoothly, "now go."

His sergeant puts a meathook on his shoulder.  "No.  Eight men on watch.  You're going no where."

"I've told him to go.  Are you countermanding me?"  Just a hint of threat.

"Eight men, no less."  Good, he still has his pride.  "Baron's orders, as you know."

I let myself shake with anger.  Ting, ting, ting.  Bring it visibly under control.  "You are.... correct, sergeant.  Kowalczyk, I relieve you.  Show me his position."

Sergeant show me Kowalczyk's position.  Tells me Kowalczyk's Mara is in her seventh month.  Fuck you for showing me you're human.

I shrug the pack off and place it on the dug-out as if I'm going to use it as a weapon brace.  Scan my assigned sector.  Wait five.  Roll my neck.  No one watching.  Sweats running down my back.  Give it another five.

Turn, swinging the pack off the wall and under the gun.  The sergeant is fast.  His gun comes around as I vault the dugout wall.  A searing pain along my left arm.  I roll into the outer wall.  One arm over my head.  The other clamps onto the trigger.  Contact.

The shockwave drives up and out.  In the lee, I survive, deaf and dumb.  The world swims as I quick crawl towards the crops.  Anyone looking then is flash blind.  Anyone looking now sees a confusing dance of ember and shadow.  I crawl through the crops to the wall.  Along the wall to the corner.  Gather my wits.

Back at the pit all is shouting and running.  Men everywhere.  The wall sentries are all running in to help.  I clamber up their steps.  Fight off the ringing in my head.  I damn near break my leg getting down the east side.  Then, stupid me, I turn back and run into the courtyard.

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Czarny's men grab soldiers out of the crowd.  Form search teams.  Send them back out to look for the attackers.  I volunteer.

047: Council of War

Captain Katriana Paterson, September 18th

Poor Rataj.  I knew.  Knew as soon as we cleared the rubble and saw what they had carved out of the ruin that they wouldn't leave.  Rataj though saw only his mission.  His brother-in-law, Filip, finally had to rub his face in it.  He took Rataj by the arm, drug him bodily out into the fields, and pointed.

"There."  His finger lashing out.  "There Dominik was crushed clearing rocks for the crops."  He turns Rataj.  "There, there is his final resting place."

"Dom, Dominik?"  I remember hours in the wheelhouse as he spoke with pride of his youngest grandchild.  He'd have been thirteen.

"We wrested this land from the end.  Our blood, your blood, fertilized it.  We can't leave."

"What, what can I do?"

"Help us."  Rataj turns tear filled eyes at us and I nod.

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This used to be a stadium.  Underground were locker rooms, showers, maintenance spaces, and deeper still fallout shelters.  The number that existed would boggle the mind of your average American, but these people knew they would be the front lines, and planned accordingly.  We go down deep to learn about the enemy and plan for war.

Filip introduces us to his leaders, those that could be spared from the defense of the wall, and his allies; a young man in a ship captain's coat and two Russian lieutenants.  The ship captain comes form the river boat people.  The lieutenants, Zalesky and Savin, offer salutes and are quick to explain that they, 10th Guards Tank, are on 'our' side.

"General Koronov,"
"And the Commissar!"
"And the Yefromovitch too, say the war is enough.  Done.  We will no longer kill ourselves for those worthless men."
"They sent us 12 burnt out tanks and a hundred untrained black ass replacements."
"Tell us one week later to go onto the offensive!"
"One week."
"Fuck that they say.  We all agree."
"Broke out of the line."
"We're going south."
"After the winter."
"It is good to see more Americans.  You need to see our American."
"Da, he is Civgov.  Spring we go south.  You meet him.  Come too?"

Like a pair of golden retriever puppies; young, cute and unrelentingly enthusiastic.

Filip let them wind down before taking the meeting in hand.  They, Sielce, are the last community in Warsaw to not fall under Colonel Czarny's control.  Enemy troop estimates range from 800 to 1500.  So far, Sielce with a scant 350 under arms has held out.  Their knowledge of the rubble and the communities defenses have repulsed every attack until now.

And now is the problem, Filip has spies spread throughout the surrounding communities.  They report this mad Baron, as he styles himself, has cut a deal with another band of unspeakable marauders to the north east.  He is giving them something of value and in return they are giving him many rounds of blood agent for his big gun, a 122mm D-30 howitzer if the description is accurate.  That changes everything.

Czarny, damn if I'll call him Baron, used up the little ammunition he had for the big gun during earlier assaults.  The HE he'd fired hadn't been effective as other than a terror weapon, but blood agents would change everything.  The militia of Sielce had fought hard, but they didn't have the equipment or training to resist this.  The gasses from the shells would worm into every crevice and choke out anyone in the way.  Then Czarny's men, appropriately masked, would overrun the targeted portion of the wall and the defenders would have lost every advantage. 

"The Baron's men have already left to retrieve the shells.  They are expected back in no more than 6 days.  Given what we know there are 5 bridges along the Bug river.  They will have to cross one."

Zalesky points to the easternmost bridges.  "These we can cover.  If anyone comes, BOOM," his hands fly up and apart, "they meet the river, yes?"  Hands back down, fast to the level.

"And these other three?" I find myself asking.

"My men," Filip answers, "couldn't stand against soldier's in the open.  It is not a question of bravery, but ability.  But you, you are soldiers.  And from what Rataj says, highly skilled."

I sit back to give it a good rolling over.  We've fifty men, one APC and an immobile tank.  They're fucking nuts!

Leo stands and leans over the table.  Quietly he begins, "Ever played shell game?  We have three bridges and one pea.  Where will the pea go?  You don't know."  He sighs loudly, "It is bad game, you never win.  I don't play.  Here is big gun, no shells," he grins at his joke, "and one pea.  Take it and his blood agent is worthless."

Filip shakes his head in awe at Leo's stupidity.  "They have a thousand men or more.  We can't take it.  We can barely hold our own!"

Calmly, "Da, you don't.  I do."

The table explodes as everyone adds their two cents to his idiocy.  Leo just rocks back and waits it out.

"Over there are marauders, deserters, and slaves.  They can't know each other.  I'll be one more face, one common, smiling Russian face, among a thousand others.  I do this."

The talk goes on, but he's won.  He'll cut the Gordian Knot.  If he fails, we're down one man.  We can still play the shell game.

046: Sielce

Captain Katriana Paterson, September 18th

This place punishes you.  Everywhere, the rubble reaches out at you with sharp steel edges, broken glass, and shifting layers underfoot.  You can't climb above it.  The ridge drifts are too unstable.  We have to move down, around, and through.  The morning rains haven't helped.  Down in the drifts the dusted rubble takes on the consistency of a clay pit.  We're drowning in sweat, fighting for every step, and forget about stealth.

Rataj takes it the hardest. Fighting age and despair.  He talked the whole trip down, sharing memories of his sons, daughter, and grandchildren.  Strong hopes of finding them hale and whole.  Instead, this ruin.  He spoke quietly to me before the trek took his breath.  "How can they live in this?"  We've seen nothing but rats.

Leo has the point.  He's making better headway than us.  Seems to have a knack for the terrain that we haven't caught yet.  I'm following at 20.  Doc and Rataj take the middle with her lending a hand whenever possible.  Alphabit has the man-pack radio and the tail.

I should be paying more attention to the surroundings, but I'm watching Leo, trying to figure out how he's doing it.  Damn near bouncing from slab to rock past the concrete mires.  He's going to break a damn ankle.  And then he's gone.

Fist in the air, signal stop.  We're down in the drifts, nearly a valley in the rubble, closed in by the sides.  A voice calls out, polish, "Hands high, you fucks!"

Alphabit turns, drops to his knee, covering the back.  Doc's caught out, helping the Old Man.  I keep the big gun's barrel down, the safety's snicked off.  No sign of Leo.

I try tell them, scan, pick, and move.  From slab to slab.  You make faster time going one side, other side, than slogging through.  I'm past ambush before I know it there.  Catch a glimpse of movement where it should not. Take three quick bounces away and up, freeze.

There's the fuck.  No uni, gray coveralls hanging with bits and pieces of  ruins.  Gillie suit for Warsaw.  Shouting behind, no shooting, yet.  He turns away towards party.  I see how he got there.  Hop, hop, hop like bunny.


"Who are you?"  I cry back, playing for time.

"You know  you black owned bastards!  Now I want to see your hands or we'll send you back in pieces!" 

Rubble shifts above and ahead of us as his men reveal there position.  Walked right into it.  They have elevation and cover.  In open ground I could laugh at the shotguns and engage from 500 plus meters.  Here, I remember Moon-pie stretched out as Doc cleaned his gut of pellets.  We might make it, but the Old Man would be nothing but rags.  I raise my hand from the barrel.

Wait, Black Bastards?

Keep eyes front.  Cover your sector as assigned.  I'm right behind.  The cold barrel end press into his neck.  A frozen moment and a whimper as his eyes roll back to me.  I mime silence.  Put the gun down.  I see him think hero thoughts.  Decide against it.  His gun goes down followed by him.  I take his position, foot and weight on the upper back, I've got three targets.  Dial in and hold  We're still talking not shooting.

Polish is a second language.  Not blacks, but Czarny's.  He thinks we're his men.  Which means he isn't.

Deep breath.  Let the gun swing free.  Hands out.  "Wrong man, Captain Rataj pays my wage.  I wouldn't piss on"

"Rataj?"

 Before I can answer the Old Man speaks up in his captain voice.  "Captain Adam Rataj.  I've come seeking my family."

To his men, "Cover them well."  To us, "I'm coming down."

I have a good view of talker.  His shotgun is at the ready as he works his way to my comrades.  He'll be first.  Then  up and to the right.  Give them the mag in one long run.  They shit and cover.

The leader shambles forward.  His clothes are a splotched gray with a steelworkers apron over them.  Looks as if he's glued rubble to the apron in a haphazard pattern to make it blend in better.  His head is cover with a welder's mask sans the leaded glass.The heavy work  glove on his right hand is missing all the fingers.  Urban guerrilla.

His shotgun wavers as he closes.  His hand comes from the trigger.  "Brother?"

He lifts the mask back, shock on his face.  Rataj chokes, "Andrezj?"  Then the two are on each other with a joyful noise.  Trading crushing embraces and slapping backs.

Andrezj turns back to his men shouting, "MY BROTHER!  HIS MEN, HIS!  COME DOWN, THEY ARE FRIENDS!"

I won't be shooting him today.  I step off my prisoner.  Help him up.  "I won't tell them if you don't."  He nods, grabs his weapon by the barrel, and looks to me.  "After you comrade, after you."

We're surrounded again, in a good way.  Andrezj's men around us, shaking hands, slapping shoulder, and making like they weren't about to kill us moments before.  I'm having the same adrenalin release, grinning like a loon and slapping back.

The Old Man's eyes are full of tears.  "My sister, my brother, the children are here.  Little Brother will take us in."

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Two more hours in the rubble and mud.  We come to a wall.  Challenge and response.  That's it, we're in.



Past the wall they've build out of the ruins themselves, the ground opens up, gold and green for nearly two kilometers from the north east to the southwest.  They're the scents of hay drying, fresh turned earth, and honest work.  God it is beautiful.

"We make this," such pride in Andrejz's voice, "we make this."

How can they live like this?

Because it's right.



 

045: Heading Inland

Eddie's Journal

September 15th, 2000

We're in dock at Otwock.  Seven more pirate vessels in the drink, two in trail of the tug.  Taxi!  The locals made nice to us once we made clear we weren't here to rape, kill, and loot.  They told us the remaining pirate support had taken the last 2 functional trucks and a UAZ after the sounds of fire and the sight of our smoke made it clear we were coming upstream.  They headed off towards Warsaw.  big surprise


September 16th, 2000

We left the Tug at Otwock.  Wish we hadn't.  Gunny's been left in command of the troops, Uller's got the helm.  The Old Man and our old crew are following "cap'n tom" downstream.  As she explained it, it would be too easy for the tug to get ambushed pulling through the city, either by direct fire or artillery, we'd go in the captured small boats, meet up with Rataj's family and see what needs to be done. 


September 17th, 2000

Overnighted on the shore.  The pilot "cap'n tom" loaned out guided us into Warsaw with the morning sun.  'My God' does not do it justice. 

We passed true ruins to the south of the city.  Rotting or burnt out strutures that soon passed.  Then tall remnants of walls with a suggestion of structure, broken teeth in a ruined mouth.  Even further in I can't tell where the building were, there's only drifts of rubble and brocken concrete lapping to the river bank.  Can there really be a space or people to live in here?

We found a spot to pull up and cover the boats.  Our pilot says we could have sailed further in and pulled into an estuary, but Captain Kat wants to see these folks before they see her.  With the troubles on the river and the troubles on the shore, they might not be in charge of themselves anymore.  So they're going to walk in.

I gave them the lecture before they left.  You know the one; Personnel Operating in Contaminated Environements.  My geiger is reading clean-ish.  Its the cancer in 10+X years level.  Don't know how hot it'll be further in.

I get to watch the boats.  Yay, me.


September 18th, 2000

Warsaw has some f'ing BIG rats.

Radio contact with the Captain.  Alphabit's heading back with a few locals.  We're to sail to the pilot's estuary and link up.

044: Ambush at Swider

Admiral Jerzy Waitrowski

"Captain, scouts report the vessel is in sight."

Yes, as if he didn't know.  He's been watching the smoke plume wind its way downriver.  Soon, very soon.  "Report"

"Tug and Barge.  Two vehicles on the barge's forward deck.  He reports it as an OT-64 and a T-72.  Sir, the OT is on the starboard side."

Damnation.  The OT is a box on wheels, over 2 and a half meters tall, a people mover.  The T-72 is built short and low to the ground to make a small target and use available cover.  He wanted that tank first shot dead, but that OT casts a shadow.  The OT won't stand up to the Rapira, but it costs time, time the tank might use to get it's own shot off.  The Wislakrew doesn't have armor.

He leans out the bridge window and bellows down to the gun crew.  "Gunner, the tank is obscured by another vehicle.  Take the best shot you can get as soon as the barge clears the headland.  You'll only have a small window."

"Aye, Captain!"

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Leonid

Tadeuz takes another sounding.  "Dat the Swider ahead.  Capt'n knows to go slow.  Outflow slows as it meets the Wistula.  Drops dirt, makes bars as it mingles."

The same short speech he gives every time we pass another river.  I am shoreman, da, not know anything.  After we're past the mouth he'll share his homemade.  Take the paint off the barge.  Best kind.

I feel something wrong.  Eyes on me.  There in the Swider's mouth is something.  Grey and angular.  I reach for the radio to the bridge.

FLASH-CRACK!

I'm on the deck, the air moved around me.  Radio up, "Bow to bridge, contact in the river mouth, 300 meters!"  No clang, no deck shift, no flash of heat behind me.  They missed.

The tug sounds it's 5 times sharply, pause, 5 times, pause, 3 times....

FLASH-CRACK-CLANG!

I feel the flash of the detonating shell against my back and the pressure pushing me down into the deck.  Out T-72 jumps against it's moorings.  A perfect hole on the upper right glacis.  Smoke begins to pour, black, off of the rear deck.  Sgt Ormen clambers off the turret.  His mouth flaps wildly, but nothing in my ears. 

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The bridge crew roars.  A large plume of black smoke rises off of the tank's deck.  Little figures run about wildly.

"Cast off bow and stern!"

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Smoke.  No flames.  No boom.  I pick myself up.  Clamber aboard the tank's deck.  Reach for the turret hatch.  Smoke greets me.

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"Hold fire!"  That's a kill.  "Load HE!  Put rounds onto the superstructure!"  Lose the bridge and she'll be adrift, helpless.

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Hold that breath.  Find your sight.  Blink the tears from your eyes until you can see.  The turret's already swung partway around.  There it is.  Pull.

The autoloader chuckles as it cycles a new round into position.  Keep that breath in.

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The torpedo cutter doesn't have much armor, really, but it is enough to set off the self-forging charge in the HEAT round.  The molten metal penetrator cuts right through the thin metal of the bridge spraying a hose of molten metal across instruments and men.  Shattered glass and sheet metal shrapnel chew everything outside of the stream. 

On the deck, shadowed by the forward walkway from the explosion against the bridge, the crew of Rapira pick themselves up.  The gunner works the screws to bring the gun back around to what he thought was a confirmed kill.

CRACK
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BOOM... The T-72 rocks back as the Rapira's HE round impacts on the hull front.

Like a fucking dog with a bone.  I'm banged around the turret interior.  My breath rushes out.  I choke on the smoke.  Exhale and hold.  Fight the burning inside.  Damn them.  Are they still in the sight?  Yes, no, yes?  Fire.

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The round strikes the shield of the Rapira anti-tank gun.  It jumps it shocks, twisting to port, and listing over the rail.  The gun crew crushed in its wake.  Shells bounce across the decking.

----------------------------------------

"Gunny!  You see it!"  The barge's bow is awash in thick smoke, lit by cannon flash and impacts. 

He doesn't bother to answer me.  He's damn calm.  "Mortars, 50 degrees off the bow, 400 meters.  Give it everything."

It'll take time to calculate the angle and orient the tubes.  Our MG emplacements are lashing back.  I don't know if they're going to be able to do anything to it.

-------------------------------------------

The autoloader chunks to itself as it cycles the next round, fire.  Cough.  Cycle, fire.  Cough, cycle, cough.  Fire.  Doubled over with wracking coughs.  Can't breath.  Fire.

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Four more 125 rounds slam downriver.  Two impacts on the cutter.  The first strikes where the Rapira had been braced against the superstructure.  The penetrator cuts down into the interior of the ship, lancing molten metal through bulkheads and spraying across the crew and cargo spaces.  The second impacts on the hull and slices through cargo and a fuel bunker.  Molten metal flash boils the fuel forcing it out the entry point and down the fuel lines.  A jet of flame rises cutter's bow.  In the engine compartment, fuel lines snap and superheated liquid mixes with open air.  If the Wislakrew still ran on diesel, it would have exploded, instead alcohol flashes throughout the compartment, strangling the engine gang, and blossom out of every open hatch, air intake, and exhaust.

Random mortar fire falls about the stricken ship.

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"Check fire.  All mortar's check fire."

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Smoke, choking smoke.  Hands on my uniform and under my arms.  Choking.  Good God, I'll never smoke again.  Coughing so hard I'm puking too. 

Wonders, I can hear too.  "Get the Oxy from sick bay!  Now!"  Try to tell them.  I'm ok, just need to sleep.

-----------------------------------------

Crewless, powerless and holed, the Swider carries her into the bank.  She lists and settles.

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"Doc, casualties."

Doc nods her head.  "Concussion, some shrapnel wounds, five patched and back on light duty.  I pulled three more off duty.  They'll need to be watched." 

"And our fine fucking Russian."

"Leo's our worst, smoke inhalation.  I have him on oxygen and moved into sick bay.  We're going to have to just wait and see."  This is for public consumption.  I'd already cornered Doc.  Leo should be dead, strangled on burning lubricants, but given our 'special circumstances' I knew he'd be back in days.  Right?

"Eddie, the tank?"

"First round cored her Major.  Right through driver's compartment, fuel tank and into the engine.  Would have been really bad if we hadn't drained all the juice when we started this trip.  Instead the grease and lubricants went and took the rubber and wiring with them.  APU and electronics went as well.  I'll run lines from the OT and see if the turret comes back, but she's a bunker now."

Gunny?"

Any heads in the water got worked over.  We don't see anyone on shore.  Doesn't mean they're not there, crew is still at GQ.

"Good.  Captain Rataj, ship status?"

"Completely operational.  Karl reports damage to forward decking, none to hull.  I'll be ready to move when you are."

"Great!  Captain, the cutter was waiting for us.  Is the Swider just a good place to park or is there a potential base to be found?"

"Swider is deep channel.  Up here," he taps the map, "Otwock, 3 kilometers upstream, industrial town, good docks before the war.  Was on my route."

"In your opinion, can we still run it?"

"Swider runs fast.  Blockage would be at the mouth."  He grins, "Make side trip."

"You wouldn't want to take a bunch of small fry when one big stick would do."  My command staff  thinks it out.  Grins appear.  We may have a chunk of their force bottled here.  And support personnel, if they're based there." 

"We'll stay here until Eddie and the mechs finish running lines and we know the tank's status.  Then, side trip."