Chapter 438 — The War Reaches Home I

Chapter 438: Chapter 438 — The War Reaches Home I

By eight the next morning the clubhouse at Castlebellingham was louder than it had been at midnight.

Radios went off along the bar every few seconds. Somebody had moved the big map table nearer the windows for the light, and three officers were bent over it with pencils. Boots came and went across the wooden floor. A signaller stood at the end of the bar with a headset half off one ear, writing on a pad, while a captain read over his shoulder.

The secure room at the back was empty now. The crate had gone south at dawn on the back of a truck, with an escort front and back. Somewhere between here and Dublin it had become a document with a reference number and a list of everything Ireland now knew about the GC-12 Longbow. That list had gone out overnight to every unit on the line and every Challenger fighting with them. Ganner Corp’s name was on the front page of the *Irish Times*.

James stood at the edge of the map table with a mug of tea he was not drinking, and looked at the north.

"Say again," said the signaller at the bar. "Say again, Donegal, you’re breaking up."

He listened. He wrote. He stopped writing.

"Colonel."

The colonel came down the bar, read the pad, and put it flat on the counter.

"Finner," he said.

---

British forces had come across in the north-west before dawn, in strength, at the Irish positions round Finner Camp outside Bundoran.

The first reports were thin. The colonel wanted more, and he got it, a piece at a time, from the units defending the camp and the roads round it. There was infantry, a lot of it. There were armoured vehicles on the coast road and artillery firing from somewhere north of the border. And there were Challengers. Every report said Challengers.

The Irish were fighting, with guild Challengers sent north-west on the first night and independents serving under the army. James did not know any of their names. He had spent four days on one junction in Louth, and it had felt like the whole war. It had been one corner of it.

---

Finn came in at half eight, from the back.

He had been with the people organising Eamon’s transfer. Eamon was going to Dublin, and then to Cork, to his family, in the back of an army ambulance with a flag on him. Finn had signed something. James could see it on his face.

He came and stood at the map without saying anything.

"All right?" said James.

"Yeah."

He was listening to the radio. When the signaller read out a casualty report from Finner, Finn’s head turned toward it. He listened to every word and said nothing, not even a joke.

---

"Right," said the colonel. "What’ve we got? Can it hold?"

"Unknown, sir. The camp commander says he’s holding the main gate and the eastern perimeter. The approaches on the coast road are—"

"Under artillery," said another officer. "The unit on the coast road has pulled back four hundred metres. They had to."

"Who’s on the Ballyshannon road?"

"Mixed. Infantry and two Challenger teams. They say they’ve stopped a push. For now."

"For now."

"That’s what they said, sir."

"Medevac route?"

"The N15’s open south of Ballyshannon. North of it—" The officer shook his head. "They can’t confirm."

"Then confirm it."

Someone went to a radio.

---

It got worse an hour at a time.

At nine, one Irish formation defending the coast road reported it had been forced back again under sustained artillery. It had lost two vehicles and was now a kilometre behind where it had started.

At half nine, another unit reported British Challengers had broken through part of its forward line. The Irish Challengers with it had stopped them, holding a crossroads in a village James had never heard of. They were holding, but they had lost the forward line.

At ten, a unit further along the front reported it had beaten off an attack completely. The British had come at it and had been sent back with losses.

It did not help Finner.

James watched an officer move the markers. Blue markers went back on the coast road and on a road inland. Red ones came forward from the north, on another road, and round behind the camp from the east. None of them was big. There were a lot of them, all moving at once toward the same place.

He knew that shape. Four days ago at the junction, the British had come loud from the front while other soldiers walked round the side and took the roads behind. This was the same thing, bigger. They were pushing everywhere at once, so the Irish had to choose which places to save.

He was not a general. He knew what it felt like from inside.

---

"Send them east forces," said a major at the map. "From here. We’ve got the junction back, the British pulled north yesterday. We’ve got units here we could move west."

"And the minute we move them, the British come back south," said another. "We only closed that gap yesterday. We pull out of here and they’ll walk straight back in."

"Then what do we send?"

"Nothing we can spare."

"That’s not an answer."

"It’s the only one I’ve got."

The colonel let them argue for a minute, then raised a hand.

"Status on the other contingents."

The signaller read it off. Emerald Spire was in contact on the Monaghan side, pressed, holding. Marcus Hale had reported that his sector was active and could not release anyone without opening a gap of its own. Saoirse Doyle’s force was committed on the river line, holding a crossing the British had tried twice that morning.

James listened to Marcus’s name come out of a radio.

"I’ll ask," said the colonel. "Higher up." He picked up a handset.

He asked, and he got an answer, and James saw from his face what it was.

Everybody close enough to Donegal to help was already fighting or already moving.

---

At twenty past eleven the camp commander came on the radio himself.

The signal was bad. Behind the voice James could hear gunfire, and something heavier under it, a deep regular thump.

"*—into the western perimeter. I’ve British inside the wire on the western side. I can’t hold the gate if they’ve got the west. I’m—*" Static. "*—Challenger teams are covering. We’re getting the wounded out. Vehicles we can’t move under that. We’re leaving them.*"

"Finner, say again your intent."

"*Withdrawing. Repeat, withdrawing. South to—*" The signal went.

They waited.

"*—Bravo’s lost contact. I’ve no comms with Bravo. Last seen at the northern blocks.*"

Then nothing at all for four minutes.

Nobody in the clubhouse said anything. The officer at the map had his hand on the marker for Finner Camp and did not move it.

At twenty-five to twelve, a different voice came through. It was a lieutenant, out of breath.

"*Castlebellingham, Finner. We’re out. The camp’s gone. Repeat, Finner Camp is in British hands. We’ve withdrawn to the line at—*" A place name James did not catch. "*Most of us. Not all. I don’t know how many. Over.*"

The colonel picked up the handset.

"Understood. Well done getting out. Get me numbers when you can. Over."

He put it down.

"Mark it," he said.

The officer at the map took the blue marker off Finner Camp and put a red one on it.

---

Several people started talking at once.

"What’ve they got going south from there?"

"If they’ve got Finner, they’ve got the stores, the vehicle park—"

"Did anyone get the fuel out?"

"They can stage from it. Bring stuff in by sea at Donegal Bay."

"I *know*."

Nobody said Ireland was losing. They talked about fuel and roads and where the next line was, and that was worse.

James waited until it had quietened slightly.

"The Challengers who were defending it," he said. "Did they get out?"

The officer with the casualty reports looked at his pad.

"Some came out with the regulars. Some are injured. Some—" He turned a page. "Some we haven’t accounted for yet."

"How many?"

"I don’t know yet."

"And what’s coming after the camp?" said Finn. "Is there anything in front of them? Something that can stop them?"

"There’s a line forming. They’re still moving into it. I can’t tell you how strong it is."

James thought about offering, him and Finn, west, now. But Finner was two hundred kilometres away and it was already over, and every move the colonel had made all morning had a hole behind it. He did not offer.

---

A captain came in through the front door at a jog with a sheet of paper.

"Colonel. Air warning. Aircraft inbound from the north-east, heading for Drogheda."

The room went still again.

James knew Drogheda the way everyone at the junction knew it. Everything came up through it. The ammunition, the food and the fuel came up through it, and the wounded went down to it. The hospital there was full of soldiers from Louth. There was a logistics yard on the north side of the town where the army had been staging supplies since the first night. Every truck James had seen on the road since he arrived had come through Drogheda or was going to it.

"Get the warning out," said the colonel. "Every unit in Drogheda. The logistics yard. The hospital. Transport. Now." He turned to another officer. "Whoever’s covering the M1 bridges and the rail yard, tell them. Tell the Gardaí."

"Already going, sir."

For four days it had been infantry, Challengers, artillery and one rifle in a quarry. James had not, he realised, really thought about aircraft.

---

The first reports from Drogheda were careful.

Transport had been suspended on the north side of town. Personnel at the logistics yard were in cover. Emergency services were on alert.

Then they stopped being careful.

"*Explosions at the logistics yard. North side. Multiple—*"

"*—vehicles destroyed. I can see fire. I can see a lot of fire—*"

"*—damage outside the yard. Into the streets. The houses on—*"

The reports came in out of order. One said three hits, another five. One said the fuel store was burning and the next said it was not.

"Get me one picture," said the colonel. "One."

It took twenty minutes.

The strike had hit the logistics yard on the north side of the town. It had destroyed at least one supply truck and damaged others. There were fires in the yard. Debris from the yard had come down across the road behind it. The road was blocked, and the fire engines and ambulances trying to reach the worst of it could not get through.

The damage did not stop at the yard fence. There were houses on the far side of that road.

There were civilians hurt.

"*Requesting additional medical. Repeat, requesting additional medical support at Drogheda north. We’ve got—*" The signal broke. "*—more than we can handle. Over.*"

The colonel was already on the handset, going down a list, unit by unit, asking who had a section that was not holding anything. He could not pull troops off the junction or the river line without the British knowing within the hour.

James put his tea down.

"Colonel."

The colonel looked at him.

"I can’t do anything about planes," said James. "They’ve been and gone. But there’s people under buildings down there and roads full of rubble. I can lift things. I can move things people can’t. Finn can too."

The colonel looked at him for perhaps three seconds.

"There’s a response group going down in twenty minutes. Medics, engineers, a section of infantry. You go with them. You do what the officer running it tells you. And you stay out of the way of the fire brigade. They know what they’re doing and you don’t."

"Understood."

"I’ll come," said Finn.

"I know you will. Go."