Run the Gauntlet: Echoes of War Book Six

by Gibbs, Daniel

  “A few Goliath suits, mostly station security… but there’s a lot of them, sir—hundreds of tangos.”

  Shit. The tough Marine pondered the situation for a few seconds. Station security doesn’t have good armor. I can work with that. “Hold your position at all costs, Lieutenant. I’m on the way with reinforcements.”

  “But, sir, we’re running out of time.”

  “Leave no man behind,” Calvin ground out. “Hold the line.” He cut off the commlink before Mayborn could respond. Using the advanced features of his command and control HUD, he called up a list of all Marine platoons in the hangar area. Quickly highlighting three heavy weapons squads, he designated a waypoint for all of them directly outside of the nearest gravlift.

  “Colonel, we’ve got to wrap it up,” the voice of Master Gunnery Sergeant Ruben Mannheim called out. He was Calvin’s senior enlisted Marine. “I’ve got demolitions teams setting up our little surprise… and that’s all she wrote.”

  “Thanks, Master Guns.” Calvin started out the hatch with one last glance at the cavernous hangar bay. “I’m going to try and get the rest of our Marines and the commandos out of the predicament they’re in, six decks up.”

  “Need some backup, sir?”

  “Negative. Get our people back onboard and dust off without me if we run out of time.”

  “Godspeed, Colonel.”

  “You too, Master Guns.” It took Calvin less than fifteen seconds to cross the distance between the hangar bay entrance and the gravlift, where he found twelve other Marines waiting for him. Each carried either a fully automated grenade launcher with an underslung belt of forty-millimeter shells, a squad automatic weapon, or a minigun. “You boys ready? We need to punch through to our people and get out of here before this place goes up.”

  “Ready to cap some Leaguers, Colonel,” a young corporal replied as he hefted his grenade launcher.

  The rest either hollered or shouted “Hoorah!” in reply.

  “Let’s do this,” Calvin said as he stepped into the lift. The rest followed him in, their power armor creating quite the squeeze. “We’re gonna hit hard and fast. Punch through these assholes, get our people, and go home. Who’s with me?”

  “We’re with you, sir!” The shout seemed to shake the lift itself.

  The gravlift dinged as it reached the desired floor, and its doors swished open. Without warning, bullets pinged off their armor and the passageway around them. Friendly Marines were pinned down behind whatever cover they’d been able to find, while a seemingly unending mass of enemy troops sprayed death in their direction. A round found the faceplate of the Marine next to Calvin, puncturing it and killing him instantly. The young man—no more than twenty-two—dropped in his tracks.

  “Cover! Cover! Push forward!” Calvin screamed at the top of his lungs as he jerked his battle rifle up and returned fire. Several of the grenade-launcher-toting Marines did the same, and the rest of the team was able to get to the sides of the passageway without further loss. “Lieutenant Mayborn, this is Demood. Where the hell are you?” he called into his commlink.

  “LT’s dead sir,” another voice replied. “These Leaguer bastards have us bottled up. Too much fire to get down the corridor and to our people. It’d be suicide to try a frontal assault.”

  For a split second, Calvin almost ordered an all-out attack anyway, thinking that volleys of grenades would break up the enemy, even if they did take causalities. Gotta be another way. I’ve already lost too many Marines today. He called up the schematics for the deck they were on and viewed the area around them. Hmmm. There appeared to be large rooms all around them, crisscrossed with passageways. “Anyone know what’s behind these walls?” he asked on an open commlink.

  “Yeah, Colonel. Computer and storage for the supercomputer that runs the station,” Rostami cut in from the commlink. “Row after row of ‘em.”

  “I’ve got an idea,” Calvin replied, a glint in his eye. “Who’s got explosives down here?”

  A Marine hunched behind a container turned around between volleys from her battle rifle. “I do, sir. C-15 and detstrips.”

  “With me, Private.”

  The two of them strode about five meters down the corridor and stopped. Calvin scanned the wall, then marked a few spots on his HUD and shared it through the tactical link. “Detstrips here, here, and here,” he said as he pointed to several spots. “Should be enough to burn through.”

  “Yes, sir!” the private replied enthusiastically. She went to work, unrolling the putty-like material onto the alloy surface. Once a rough rectangle was laid out, they both moved down the passageway to a safe distance. “Fire in the hole, sir!”

  An enormous explosion roared, filling the area of smoke and a brief flash of fire. Debris rained down, filling the corridor with fine ash. It took a few seconds for the air to clear enough to see again. Calvin charged through the newly blown opening and into a room filled with computer equipment, just as Rostami had said. “Heavy weapons teams, on me. Private! Get your butt in here and set another string of detcord.” He used the HUD to mark a waypoint for her.

  “Sir, yes, sir!” she shouted.

  Calvin stood to the side as the young woman did her work, and the eleven Marines remaining from the heavy weapons elements climbed into the room. One of the newcomers held out a minigun—a huge, rotating barrel machine gun capable of throwing thousands of rounds downrange per minute—toward him. “Sir, thought you might be able to make use of this.”

  He reached out and grabbed the weapon by its handle, and in a single fluid motion, locked it into place on his power armor. “Thanks, Corporal,” Calvin replied. His fierce warriors’ grins showed through his faceplate. “Let’s get some payback on these damn Leaguers. No finesse here… as soon as the detcord does its work, we charge through on full auto. Anything that moves gets shot. Questions?”

  There were none.

  A moment later, the young woman’s voice echoed across his commlink. “Everything’s set, sir.”

  “Stand by,” Calvin called out and took control of the explosives through his suit taclink. “Fire in the hole!” He triggered the detonator remotely, and yet another explosion rang out. Fine alloy debris showered over them, along with smoke and flame. “Go, go, go!” he screamed as he ran forward. The minigun barrels whirled and reached critical mass. He squeezed the firing stud as he bounded through the hole in the wall, right in the middle of a formation of Leaguers. Bullets sprayed out of the weapon, cutting down a dozen men before the next Marine emerged. On and on they came, grenade launchers and squad automatic weapons firing as they did.

  The enemy force knew it had the upper hand—moments before they’d had the entire corridor locked down and had the Terrans caught in a pincer movement. Now they were being decimated on two fronts. It wasn’t so much that they broke—they died. The Terran Coalition Marines pushed forward, bodies dropped in their wake, and there wasn’t a single thing the Leaguers could do about it. The pitiful few remaining dropped their weapons and raised their hands.

  “Cease fire, cease fire!” Calvin shouted as the enemies surrendered. “Secure those weapons; we need corpsmen over here. Move up to the commandos!” Without another glance, he jogged forward down the passageway. Around a bend in the torus structure of the station, half of Alpha team faced toward him, the other in the opposite direction where they traded fire with another group of Leaguers.

  MacDonald immediately pointed his weapon in a safe position. “Sorry, Colonel, thought you were a hostile.”

  “We’ve cleared a path to the gravlift. How’s your man?” Calvin’s eyes darted to the fallen form on the deck. Blood stained the metal around the damaged power armor.

  “Harrell lost a lot of blood,” MacDonald replied, his tone somber. “Touch and go if we can get him to a surgical ward in time. I’m on a private channel, so please keep it quiet. We’re family, you understand.”

  “We all are, Master Chief.”

  At that moment, a team of corpsmen
—easily identifiable by the red crosses on their power armor—rounded the corner, carrying an anti-grav stretcher. They rushed to Harrell’s side, and one plugged a small diagnostic tool into his cracked and burnt power armor. “Hey, Senior Chief, can you hear me?”

  “Yeah,” Harrell said weakly.

  “Okay, we’re going to cut this armor off so I can see the wound. I’m giving you something for the pain now.” The man went to work with a small, high-powered laser saw. It quickly burned through the damaged piece of armor, revealing the wound within. Blood pumped out of it with regularity. “We’ve got a damaged artery here. Get the trauma kit. We’ll have to find it before we move him. Two pints of O-negative, now!”

  As the medics worked, Calvin moved up and the rest of Alpha team pivoted to face the opposite direction—where the Leaguers would come from, if they attacked again.

  “How much time we got left, Colonel?”

  “Seven or eight minutes, I think.”

  “You think?” MacDonald asked. “Seriously?”

  “I was more focused on capping the bad guys than the clock, Master Chief.”

  “Thanks for coming back for us.” MacDonald put an armored gauntlet on Calvin’s shoulder. “I’ll owe the Terran Coalition’s misguided children one.”

  Calvin snickered and slapped him on the back. “Damn straight you will, and don’t even think about forgetting it.”

  “Colonel!” the medic called out. “He’s stable for now, but we’ve got to move.”

  “You heard the man,” Calvin bellowed. “Double time, Marines!” There was surprisingly little contact with the League security force on the way back to the captured destroyer they’d rode in on. Maybe the Leaguers finally woke up to us blowing their precious shipyard apart. With two minutes to spare, he was the last one to run up the ramp leading to their ship. “Bridge, this is Demood. Launch now! We’re clear!”

  “Understood, Colonel. We’re dusting off.” Mancini’s voice carried over the commlink. “Please join me on the bridge.”

  “On my way.” Calvin paused for a moment, watching as the medics hauled Harrell off on the stretcher. God, please take care of my wounded brother and all of our wounded brothers and sisters. The prayer complete, he turned on his heel and reached the bridge within thirty seconds, thanks to the small size of the destroyer and the mechanical assist of his power armor.

  “I thought we were going to have to leave without you, Colonel,” Mancini called out as a greeting as Calvin cleared the hatch. “As much as it would’ve pained me.”

  “You and me both,” Calvin replied as he popped off his helmet. “How’s it looking?” He took a seat in an extra chair with a console display. “I can’t stand being on these League tubs.”

  “Conn, navigation. Clearing the docking bay, sir.”

  “Navigation, ahead emergency flank. Best course to Lawrence limit,” Mancini said, then glanced at Calvin. “Might get bumpy. They’re trying to launch a few cruisers over there.”

  “Leaguers, always showing up at the wrong place at the wrong time,” Calvin replied. He brought up his arm with a flourish and tapped at the integrated digital display on his forearm. “We left a surprise for our friends.” G-force pressed him back into the contoured seat as the destroyer picked up speed. It grew ever stronger as the acceleration increased. “Direct the viewscreen to view out the aft cameras.”

  A few moments later, the large screen in the front of the destroyer’s bridge flashed on with an image of the shipyard. Its hangar bay doors were open, and several vessels of different classes were visible, headed towards the opening.

  Calvin held up his arm and pressed down on the small screen. “I don’t recall inviting those assholes to our party.” A second later, a colossal explosion erupted from the hangar bay. In moments, it consumed a cruiser, caused pieces of the bay itself to launch into open space, and the shockwave threw smaller ships around like ragdolls. While the crew stared at the result, time continued to tick down—and then the entire shipyard went up like a roman candle. The screen turned white before the picture failed, and the deck pitched up from the shockwave, slamming into their ship.

  “Scratch one Leaguer space station!” a young woman yelled from her console. Cheers and applause broke out spontaneously.

  “Now comes the hard part, Colonel,” Mancini began from his perch in the CO’s chair. “Getting out of this system and back to the fleet, alive.”

  Those words did much to darken Calvin’s mood, at least until he replayed the sight of the shipyard going up in his mind.

  24

  While the lights on the bridge of the LX Ho Chi Minh were dimmed and red in tone, Alec Hartford’s anger matched the color. First, local commissars had violated his express orders and sent two battlegroups piecemeal at the Terran Coalition interlopers. If that wasn’t bad enough, they tried to force him to commit ships without concentrating them into a workable fleet first. There are times when I wonder how the League of Sol and Society succeeds in spite of the low-quality political officers assigned to our Navy. He was a devotee to the ideals of the League, a true believer in every sense. I must understand some day how Admiral Seville keeps such a lapdog around as his commissar.

  “Admiral, the last group of cruisers you were waiting for has jumped in,” his tactical officer called out.

  Hartford allowed himself a thin smile. “Order them into formation and signal the fleet to prepare for wormhole jump to Trotsky. Let us avenge our brothers and sisters!” The last part he added to build a final fire in those around him.

  “All ships report ready, Admiral,” the communications officer called out.

  “Engage wormhole drive.” The words fell out of Hartford’s mouth like a hammer.

  The Ho Chi Minh and her consorts powered their FTL drives. Dozens of artificial wormholes popped up in front of them, like a forest of many-colored vortexes. There was little comment on the wonder of these tunnels through the fabric of the universe as the League vessels shot through at maximum speed. A few seconds later, they appeared on the other side. After the typical five-second sensor blackout period, everything came back on.

  “Admiral, we’ve got the Terrans. They’re approximately a million kilometers away, and their course takes them on a direct line to the FTL limit. I’m reading the same formation of the Lion of Judah, six unidentified heavy cruisers, and a Saurian battleship,” the tactical officer said.

  “Display it on the central holotank, Lieutenant.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  A moment later, the tank came alive with a map of local space, showing Teegarden and its planets. A cluster of red dots indicated the CDF fleet, and just as had been reported, they were moving away. Something is wrong. Even those big ships go faster than that. “Scan the enemy ships, Tactical. Are they damaged?” The thought ran through his head that David Cohen was a dangerous opponent who might have a trap up his sleeve.

  “All the enemy vessels are damaged to some degree, Admiral. Especially the Lion of Judah.”

  Hartford steepled his fingers together and smiled. This couldn’t have possibly turned out better. Even with the loss of our yards, the destruction of that infernal ship will crush the Terrans. I’ll redeem myself and bring favor to my mentor. “Maximum acceleration, all ships. We’ll run them down like the dogs they are.”

  * * *

  On the bridge of the Lion of Judah, David stared at his tactical viewer in disbelief. Somebody finally woke up over there and got smart. He’d been counting on the League standing down long enough for them to escape after wiping the floor of the last battlegroup. Taking the mass of enemy vessels in, his brain struggled to work the problem.

  “Conn, TAO. Contacts confirmed, four Alexander class battleships, designated Master One through Four. Numerous Rand class cruisers, Cobra class destroyers, and Lancer class frigates, sir,” Kelsey said, her voice higher in pitch than usual.

  Ruth leaned closer and whispered, “Sir, they’re not close enough to catch us before we get to the L
awrence limit.”

  “I know that, Lieutenant. But the last estimate was two to three hours to get our flight deck back online.”

  “We could jump out without the remaining squadrons.”

  David’s head snapped around, and his eyes bored into Ruth. “I am not leaving those people behind, Lieutenant.”

  “There’s less than a hundred of them, sir,” Ruth replied and closed her eyes as she said it. “I hate the thought of leaving a friend, especially Colonel Amir, to the tender mercies of the League… but we can’t sacrifice the battlegroup for them. If you asked Colonel Amir, he’d tell you to jump as soon as we’re able.” She opened her eyes, matching his gaze, and stared straight at him.

  David set his jaw. The worst of it is I know she’s right. “TAO, time to enemy intercept?”

  “Give or take eighty minutes, sir.”

  “We’ve got that much time to come up with a better option, XO. Start cranking. Nothing is too far out there.” He forced confidence into his voice. It would help them all to hear it. “We’re not leaving our people, and if we can, we’ll tweak the Leaguers’ nose one more time before we make good on our escape. Now get to it.”

  * * *

  One hundred lightyears away, Godat forced himself to stay focused. They ran at complete EMCON, with no transmissions going out, and had no indication of success or failure from either shipyard strike. Each tick of the mission clock seemed as if it took an eternity. He let out a sigh and glanced around the control room. The crew, from his fellow officers on down to the most junior rating, seemed to share the anxiety he felt.

  “Conn, TAO. Aspect change to port, three hundred kilometers. Inbound wormhole,” Oleson interjected. Fear radiated from his voice.

  “Navigation, stand by emergency jump.” God, please let it be the skipper and the Marines.

  “Conn, TAO. IFF confirmed, it's our captured destroyer. Contact designated Sierra One.”