Dragon Two-Zero (Fury's Fire Book 1)

by William McCaskey

  The answering call from Raider Three was quick and to the point. “Copy strobe marking, LZ cherry."

  The reprieve was short-lived as enemy rounds answered Space's, snapping into the pavement and walls around the Marines, Wolf grunted and swore as a slug grazed her right shoulder and sliced past her face. She managed to keep her feet, but the words spilling from her mouth were reflective of her home planet and derogatory of the Renks’ parentage. Her wrath turned to Reaver when he started to slow down. “Keep going, Reaver. I'm fucking fine," and to show she was, she increased her speed. Meanwhile, Space Case was laughing. Mars had some inventive curses.

  The three Marines cut right, into a side street, rounds chasing them the whole way. The road led to a large open area edged on the north and south sides by warehouse buildings, with an administration building on the east side and sandwiching the access road between the northern warehouses and forming a primary route of entry. The docks and ocean formed the western boundary of the area. The assault team had reached the rally point. Reaver and Wolf dragged their prisoner to a ramp up to the southern warehouse and dropped him to the street. As Wolf pulled out her medkit, Reaver triggered his mic. “Bull, what's your twenty?"

  A scuffling noise behind them caused all three Marines to spin, their weapons drawn to a firing position just as Bull's voice reached out from the darkness of the interior of the warehouse. “Raven."

  Reaver responded with the acknowledgment password. “Nevermore." The four Recon Marines from the overwatch teams exited the warehouse. The sound of feet pounding on pavement grew louder, so Reaver motioned for his squad to spread out. "Hawks are inbound, four mikes. We hold this area."

  His answer was six Marines checking their weapons and taking up firing positions. Sliding a pair of infrared strobes from their pouch, Reaver activated them and tossed them into the middle of the open area between all the buildings and the harbor.

  Next to come out was the wasp grenade Bard had removed from the booby trap. Keeping a firm grip on the spoon, Reaver gave the pin a sharp twist and pulled it free, priming the weapon. As the first group of enemy soldiers came into view on the access road, he heaved the grenade toward them shouting. “Grenade out!" The explosive tumbled through the air, arcing almost perfectly, landing with the tell-tale sound of metal striking pavement within the crowd of Renk soldiers.

  Reaver had timed the throw just right, the initial charge within the grenade launching it from the street about a half-meter into the air without giving the enemy a chance to scatter too far. The secondary charge detonated the grenade, sending the razor flechettes held within slicing outward and into the still clumped enemy soldiers, reaping a bloody toll amongst them. Only then did Bull and Titan open fire, and the assault cannon and heavy machine gun mowed down those still standing, like corporate threshers through a wheat field. The fusillade lasted for only a few seconds, but the cost for the Renks was high, their initial charge into the courtyard having been stopped well short of its goal.

  The troops behind the lead charge took shelter on either side of the access road, choosing to maintain cover and send their shots into the courtyard rather than risk the Marines' disciplined and accurate fire. From within the enemy ranks, a few gruff voices could be heard, and two sharp pistol shots resounded. Moments later a contingent of enemy forces charged up the access road; better to face the barrage of fire laid down by Bull and Titan than their own officers. Alice and Harlequin added the snap-crack of their rifles to the mix. The press of bodies from the rear forced the soldiers at the front forward even as they strived to escape. Reaver, Wolf, and Space Case added controlled bursts from their rifles to the opera. The discipline, accuracy, and sheer relentlessness of the Recon squad's fire forced the enemy back.

  Reaver felt a heavy pressure strike him in the chest, driving the air from his lungs, as he was knocked backward. From a distance, almost as if through a cave tunnel, he heard Wolf's voice. “Reaver's down! Bull, covering fire! Space, check him!"

  Space Case's face appeared in Reaver's field of view. His lips were moving, but Reaver couldn't quite make out the words. Thunder rolled overhead, and Reaver fought to keep his eyes clear, but the black clouds at the edges of his vision refused to be held back.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The smell told Reaver he wasn't dead before he had even attempted to open his eyes. Hospitals always smelled the same; it didn’t matter if it was an advanced trauma center in a booming metropolitan area or a pre-fabricated medical station in the middle of a warzone. The aroma of antiseptic and resignation combined into an acrid bite at the back of your throat like day old coffee reheated one too many times. Mix with equal parts fear and hope. Now every hospital had its overlaying sights and smells changing from location to location, but that underlying scent remained.

  After the scent came the sounds one would associate with a hospital. The low rhythmic beeping and soft hum of monitoring equipment mixed with the muffled voices of nurses conversing with one another in between tending their wards. Opening his eyes, the lack of blinding lights was striking and immediately telling. The hospital was on its ‘night rotation’ so it was either early or late.

  The second thing Reaver noticed was the sleeping body, suspended between two chairs, about a foot from the left side of the bed where he lay. They weren’t in a proper bed, so it couldn’t be another patient. Best guess, one of his people had been here since they brought him in; same thing he would do and had done for them. The sheet they were laying under was tucked up around their head so he couldn’t tell who it was; though it wasn’t big enough to be Bull or Titan, and the utility uniform didn’t hold Alice or Wolf’s curves. Had to be Space Case or Harlequin.

  The weight in his bladder registered next with Reaver, and the urgent need to piss. This wasn't his first time in a military hospital - hell, he was certain it wouldn't be his last - and the SOP of Alliance hospitals never changed. A brush, like kissing a trigger, and he felt the uneven ridges of the Call button against his thumb. Knowing where the button was gave him the ability to avoid it.

  Moving slowly, testing his range of movement with each action, Reaver worked himself to a sitting position, a slight pull in his abdomen but nothing sharp. Once he was sitting up, he swung his legs out from under the sheets covering the lower half of his body. As the sheets lost contact with his skin, the monitors beside his bed quieted. The sensors that kept a constant vigil on each patient were woven into the material of both sets of sheets, the mattress cover, and those laid over the patient, were much more efficient and trustworthy than sensors stuck to the chest and stomach of combat veterans who were not given to restful nights of sleep under the best of conditions.

  Reaver winced as he bare feet touched the cold metal floor. You would think they would have figured a way to keep the floors warm for recovering wounded who no one ever gave shoes or slippers. They had left him in a new pair of skivvies, for which he was thankful. Walking to the sliding door closing off his recovery room did not take nearly as long as he had expected it to and told him he hadn't been out for very long, maybe a few days at most. The door slid into the wall smoothly, with simply a small amount of pressure exerted by his hand, an audible click signaling that the door had locked into place.

  The hallway outside was dimly lit by the parallel lights running the length of the ceiling. During daylight hours, their brightness could be turned up or left as is, depending on the sleep cycle of the patients. Reaver paused in the doorway for a moment to get his bearings. Recovery wing, square layout with rooms on the outer edge; that meant the doors leading to the head, showers, and dining facility would be on the inside wall. The idea of a shower appealed to Reaver. Once he left, who knew when he was going to have a shot at hot water again, but with his bladder screaming at him and being one of those guys who had philosophical issues with pissing in the shower, he started searching for the door to the head first.

  The nurses hadn't paid the half-naked Marine any attention as he had made his way towar
d the head, but someone else had been because when he slid the door open to leave the lavatory, he found Harlequin leaning against the opposite wall, a cup in either hand.

  "Saw you walk out, figured you needed a piss and coffee. Knew you weren't the type to walk into the dining facility in only your shorts." Harlequin’s light teasing tones absent for once and his eyes serious, as he offered one of the cups to Reaver.

  Taking the proffered cup and lifting it to his lips, Reaver took a deep swallow of the hot coffee, the caffeine hitting his system like a shot, and he closed his eyes, savoring the rush. "I know I've been out of it when coffee hits me like this. How long?" Reaver asked, his voice slightly hoarse.

  The two Marines began walking back toward Reaver's room, Harlequin filling Reaver in between drinks at his coffee cup. “A little over four days, they took the cath out and killed the sleep drugs last night, but they aren't expecting you to be coherent for another ten or twelve hours. They had to knock you out three times on the table, and the docs were getting pissed. You scared the shit out of them the first time. You woke up while they were cutting you open and just started screaming. They thought you were feeling what they were doing, then they realized you were screaming for your dog. Bull said the Doc looked like he was gonna slug you." Harlequin was laughing by this point, and Reaver just shook his head, a half-smile splitting his lips. Reaver believed what his sniper was telling him but couldn’t remember a damn bit of it. His tolerance to pain meds had caused quite a few pissed off doctors in the past. And he had loved that dog.

  Reaver led the way into his recovery room. Harlequin had turned the lights up when he had gone for coffee, so Reaver could see the room more clearly than when he had woken up. The bed was the standard prefabbed military cot repurposed for use within the hospital, and it was as he had left it, covers rolled down and to the side. Hanging from the wall on the far side of the bed was the monitoring equipment, currently inert from lack of a body in the bed. Pushed against the far wall were the chairs Harlequin had been using as a bed; pillows were tucked against the sides and back of the chair where his head and upper body had been resting. Since the pillow from Reaver's bed wasn't missing, he was pretty sure his Marine had put his scrounging skills to use. On another chair on the side of the bed closest to the door was a neatly folded fresh uniform with a new pair of boots sitting on top. Leaning against the chair was a shower kit, probably scrounged from the troop transports, and seeing as Harlequin was freshly shaved, Reaver knew that at least a field razor within the kit.

  Walking over, Reaver lifted the kit from the floor and shot a glance to his Marine. “I'll be back in ten." With that, the Staff Sergeant left the room and made his way back toward where Harlequin had met up with him. Pushing open the door into the showers, Reaver was greeted with such consistency that he could have sleepwalked the room, with its rows of shower stalls lining the walls while benches stretched down the area separating the stalls on either side of the room.

  Being early in the day, no other occupants were present, which meant Reaver could get his hot shower. The entrance and exit were centered on the wall, with the row of showers lining either wall away from the door to the left and right. Reaver walked to the right side, electing the last stall in the row, on the same wall as the door. Laying the shower kit on the bench opposite the stall, Reaver undid the mag-straps holding the bag closed and pulled it open. He snapped a soap tab from its block and pulled out the small metal box that held the field razor from within the kit. Reaver moved to the shower stall and stuck his arm in; setting the tab and container on the waiting shelf, he then tapped the knuckle of his right forefinger against the actuating pad to get water pouring out of the shower head. Moving back to give the water time to heat up, since he well knew from experience field conditions lacked the instant temperature response ships had, Reaver stripped his skivvies off and hung them from the hook on the right-side frame of the stall. Stepping fully into the stall activated the “door”; the quiet hiss of air from the nozzles lining either side of the opening barely audible beneath the powerful spray of the shower. The continuous streams of air would create a ‘frosted glass’ effect, as well as dry him completely off when he stepped out of the shower.

  Within the stall, Reaver placed himself under the needle-sharp spray of water, a hissed intake of breath as the water scored across the tender line of new scarring raised on his chest. With a finger, he traced the puckered scarring where the round had entered his chest just left of his sternum. His vest would have slowed the round a considerable bit, but even dragon skin wasn't meant to stop a full-on shot the way that scales were. It was a hazard of the job that Recon accepted.

  Lifting the soap tab from the shelf, Reaver let it sit in the palm of his hand under the water for about six seconds. He brought his hands together, the tab popped under the pressure from his palms, and shortly after a thick lather began to form. Reaver spread the lather over his body and up into his hair, the water rinsing the foam away as it was applied. His right hand paused over his left pectoral, his thumb tracing the scars that hadn't been there before Dragon Two had dropped from Fury’s Fire. The wound started at the top of his left pec and traced the edge of the muscle, then followed the line of his sternum. Flexing in the ribcage where it should have been rigid told him what it had taken to save his life. New heart was almost certain, based on the entry wound, new lung at least on the left side was a possibility, and bone composite to repair the ribcage. They weren't the first replacements he had received, but certainly the most drastic. His thoughts turned to the shots that had taken Bard, and he paused. So much was left to chance; you controlled what you could to lower your risks, but there were some things Murphy gripped far too tightly for someone else get a hold on.

  Shoving his head under the water to rinse the soap from his hair and the dark direction his thoughts were going from his mind, Reaver scrubbed his fingers through the bristles of hair atop his head, then pulled his fingers down across his closed eyes to clear them of soap. He needed to get back in the fight, concentrate on what he could control and worry about emotions later. Spitting water from his mouth, he reached for the box holding the field razor.

  The lid flipped open silently; resting inside was what appeared to be a thin bar of soap. Either short edge could be slid across the surface to be shaved, leaving behind a thin film that raised the hair follicles and acted as a protective agent for the skin. After the shaving area was covered, the long edges would be dragged across the surface of the skin, a light acidic coating seeping out over the cutting edge to remove the hair. The razor edge of the device could be used without the protective film and would only cause minor skin irritation, though a few enterprising soldiers had proven that if used in a sawing motion long enough the razor could slice through a steel bar. It was quick, quiet, and had proven relatively harmless if used properly. Reaver still preferred his straight razor and shaving regime, but this is what he had, and he would make do.

  Nine minutes and forty-five seconds after he had walked out of the recovery room, Reaver returned wearing the skivvies he had woken up in. Harlequin glanced up from where he had been leaning back in one of his chairs while his squad leader moved to the chair where the uniform and boots waited. Reaver lifted the boots from the clothes and set them on the floor. Feeling better after his shower but not willing to risk pulling something the docs had fixed, he kept his movements slow and began dressing. After he had stepped into his trousers, Reaver sat in the chair to pull the boots onto his feet. Tightening the straps, he could feel Harlequin’s eyes on him. “Spit it out, Quinn."

  Harlequin coughed and gave Reaver a side-eye. “You flat-lined on the table, twice, Boss. You damn near died in the Hawk, and you're not going to ask why you're up and walking around four days later? You’re just gonna get dressed and Charlie mike?" His tone was incredulous, as if he couldn't believe Reaver was so calm about everything.

  Reaver collected his thoughts as he lifted the undershirt over his head to pull down ove
r his upper body and rolled the shirt down. Tucking the bottom into the waistband of the trousers and feeding the top button through its matching hole to close the fly he eyed the young Recon. “Not my first stint in a recovery room, Quinn. If I'm up and walking after taking a chest shot, then they cloned something and got it pumping. Shit kid, if Bard hadn't taken a round to the face, we might've been able to get him out in time too. Only thing the Alliance won't clone is the brain; too many things can go wrong. So, no, I'm not gonna wonder at the fact that I'm walking and talking. I'm a Marine, I've got a job to do and no time to be laying about in a hospital bed. You want to talk feelings, hit the Chapel and talk to God; it’s what I do."

  Grabbing the uniform blouse from where he had tossed it onto the bed, Reaver slid his arms into the sleeves and pulled the front closed, the magnetic catches locking in place with slight clicks. “Let's go find the doc. I'm checking out. Then we're gonna go wake up the CO. I want to know what's happened while I've been out. If I'm lucky, the Army's done their job and cleaned this rock, so we can get Bard and Scarface home."

  Harlequin followed his squad leader out of the recovery room and down the hall, silent for a moment before responding. “Slim chance of that, Boss. Space is clear, for now, but the Renks grabbed hold of turf and are holding on like a dependa grabs onto a booter fresh off the Island."