“Oh come on, sergeant,” Mouth said. “This is practically a school field trip compared to when your sister beat you up.”
“And I still hold it against her,” Magnus quipped. Everyone knew he didn’t have a sister. Hell, now he didn’t even have a brother…
“Ready…” Magnus took a breath. “Go.”
The Fearsome Four spun out into oncoming blaster fire, choosing targets and firing one round after another. Flow downed three ’kuda in a row, landing consecutive headshots as each fish fell away to reveal the next, standing in a perfect line.
Mouth pulled a VOD—variable output detonator—from his kit and lobbed it far out over the enemy. Magnus watched as the device exploded on the fragger mode, showering a swath of the Akuda with shrapnel. Several fish lost limbs. The enemy who was closest had its head split in two.
Cheeks switched his MC90 to three-round burst and began spraying the enemy with a short back-and-forth motion. Normally, such a tactic would have been deemed reckless and inefficient by Marine standards, but the ’kuda were so damn plentiful that he couldn’t help but be accurate.
For his part, Magnus advanced methodically toward the waterline. His feet moved in a fluid motion, giving his upper body a stable platform to fire—pivot—fire—pivot. He delivered bolt after bolt, taking a slew of ’kuda down in a steady kill streak. The rhythmic pattern was Marine textbook as his legs, hips, shoulders, arms, and head worked together as a single lethal unit.
By the time the Four had crossed the distance to the farthest urchin, they’d downed a swath of Akuda that made the Marines upfront look back, double-checking just who approached from their rear. Magnus ducked behind the urchin and gave the onlookers a quick dip of his helmet. Over the platoon channel, he added, “Nice to see everyone.”
“Bring me any ammo, sergeant?” Wainwright asked.
“We all know how you like your charge packs,” Magnus said, turning so Flow could remove the supply case from his back.
“Cold and topped off,” Wainwright said, opening the crate and removing the magazines. He passed them out as the rest of first platoon continued to unleash a withering assault on the oncoming ’kuda. “Thanks for joining us, sergeant.”
“Our pleasure. Mind if we cut in?”
“Be my guest.”
Magnus’s squad relieved four Marines who, by the looks of their armor, could use a break. They climbed down the rungs in the urchin and let Magnus and the others climb up. Magnus looked over the barricade’s edge, and his heart nearly stopped.
“Day-um,” Flow said in two distinct syllables. “Would you look at that.”
Spread from east to west, the entire strand was covered with oncoming ’kuda. They moved out of the ocean as if they were the waves themselves, flowing up and onto the beach like a force of nature. This was worse than he’d expected. Clearly, his helmet’s AI and the Repub’s orbital sensor array weren’t keeping up with the sheer numbers of enemy combatants.
Magnus started firing, almost indiscriminately. He didn’t need to aim—just point and shoot. No wonder Wainwright had called for more ammo. And, by the looks of it, they’d need a lot more than what Magnus had brought before the day was out. Hell, he doubted if they’d even make it another fifteen minutes at this rate.
More explosions of sand and fire erupted from the strand as VODs exploded along the line. The sudden openings in the enemy ranks didn’t last long, however. More ’kuda filled the gaps within seconds. By the time Magnus had gone through two energy mags, he realized this was a battle they weren’t going to win, at least not here.
“I’m out,” Magnus yelled, and then dropped down the rungs.
Wainwright caught him and turned him around. “Fall back, Marine.”
Magnus double-checked the channel—Wainwright had opened a private line to him alone. “But sir—”
“I need you covering us when I give the order. I don’t trust anyone else. Battalion has diverted some air assets our way, but they’re still ten minutes out, and we need to clear the beach. Get the Four back there and give us covering fire.”
“Copy.” Magnus opened up the squad channel as he watched Wainwright climb up the back of the urchin. Regular COs weren’t supposed to do what Wainwright was doing. But then again, Wainwright wasn’t a regular CO—this he’d proven time and time again. “Fall back, Fearsome. We’re going to rally covering fire to give first platoon a way out.”
Flow, Mouth, and Cheeks replied with green affirmation pings and peeled off the urchin. Then they hunched over and followed Magnus back to the third line of barricades—two away from the dunes.
“You still got some ammo left, Mendes?” Magnus asked.
“Plenty, Magnus. You taking more up?”
“Negative—we’re gonna spend it all to cover first platoon’s retreat.”
“Retreat?”
“We have air support inbound.” Magnus checked the time. “Nine minutes. Gotta give our boys a way to clear the beach. Spread those mags out.”
“Copy.”
Magnus climbed up on the nearest urchin. He opened a proximity channel, and said, “Focus fire down the center. We gotta give Lieutenant Wainwright and first platoon a path back to the dunes.”
Then, across all channels—probably from onboard an observation ship in orbit—Magnus heard the company commander say, “Air support inbound in eight minutes. All units, clear the beach. I say again, air support in eight, all units return to base. Command out.”
“Open fire,” Magnus said over the proximity channel. Suddenly, a stream of magenta blaster bolts focused around the urchin that hid Wainwright and the rest of first platoon. As soon as ’kuda bodies started dropping, Magnus watched his platoon start to fall back. They didn’t waste time firing over their shoulders, they just put their heads down and started kicking up sand.
The Akuda must’ve sensed the change in tactics, however, because the enemy surge increased to the point that fish poured over the urchin. Several took blaster rounds square in the face, obliterating flesh and bone in pulpy sprays that covered those who took the dead fish’s places. But the covering fire wasn’t strong enough. The ’kuda were up, over, and around the urchin, driving straight into the Marine’s blaster fire.
“Sweet mother of mystics,” Flow said, swapping out mags. “These things just won’t stop!”
“Try mooning them, Cheeks,” Mouth said, to which the other Marine flipped him a middle finger.
“I mooned your mom and she didn’t run,” Cheeks said.
“Shift right,” Magnus yelled, noticing a new push that was closing on Wainwright’s icon. The damn fool was taking up the rear, Magnus realized. And that’s exactly why he loved the CO so much.
The covering fire shifted to account for the new rush. Round after round drove into the ’kuda, covering the beach with corpses faster than Magnus’s AI could update. He watched as Wainwright shoved his men onward, closing on Magnus’s position.
“Hey, Magnus?” Cheeks’s voice was an octave higher than normal. “What’da we do when—”
Cheeks was interrupted by enemy blaster fire that forced him to duck below the urchin’s top edge. Magnus realized that while they’d bought time for first platoon to retreat, the enemy was rushing so quickly that Magnus would not have anyone to cover their retreat.
“Splick,” Magnus said. He checked the topo map on his HUD and didn’t see any Marines on the dunes. If they made a run for it, they’d be exposed until they got over the tops. But that was better than staying here and getting overrun.
He reopened the proximity channel, which now would probably include Wainwright and first platoon. “All units within square B9, fall back to the COP.”
Magnus took out three more ’kudas before dropping back to the beach and backpedaling away from the urchin. Within seconds, first platoon had caught up, but slowed to turn around and cover their own retreat.
Up and down the central section of the beach, Marines ran backward, firing into the enemy ranks—in a f
ew places, it was point blank. When Wainwright caught up with him, Magnus tossed up an extra energy mag.
“Thanks, Magnus.”
“That one’s a bit warm, sorry.”
“We’ll discuss it later.” Wainwright ejected his spent magazine and inserted the fresh one. He charged his MC90 and started blasting away at three ’kuda that had gotten a bit too close for comfort in the time it took him to reload.
“Keep going!” Wainwright encouraged everyone.
Magnus checked the time. Five minutes remained. He felt the sand fall away under his feet, indicating the start of the dunes. His thighs burned as he marched backward up the hill, boots slipping and sliding. Still, he managed to keep a violent stream of fire trained on the enemy, hacking away at the aquatic bastards with trigger squeeze after trigger squeeze.
When at last they reached the summit, a new cluster of icons appeared with an arrow pointing off map. Magnus looked skyward and saw a cluster of ident tags in is HUD, indicating a squadron of FAF-28 Talons.
“Look who decided to show up,” Flow said over the squad channel.
“Yeah…” Magnus took out a ’kuda who’d just nicked his helmet with a lucky blaster round. “But they’re still three minutes out.”
“Copy that, sergeant.”
As soon as the rest of first platoon had crested the first dune, Wainwright ordered a full retreat back to the village. Fortunately, several Marines had set up mortar pits and laid into the enemy. The explosions were so loud, Magnus had to dampen his audio sensors even more than they already were. But he wasn’t complaining. The big guns would buy them just enough time to get to cover.
Magnus pounded up and down the dunes until the edge of the village rose to meet their boots. The green grass seemed electrified under the glare of blaster fire, and he was happy to be on the grounds of the COP. But the village wasn’t without its own destruction. Aside from the hotel—now a bleeding hulk of smoke and debris—several of the bungalows and outbuildings were on fire or razed to the ground. The Akuda’s underwater artillery had done its job of softening the base.
Once inside the village, Magnus turned and ordered his men to take up defensive positions. He sighted in on three fish who had made it halfway across the dunes—apparently the fish’s webbed feet made it much easier to skim along the shifting sands. Bastards.
“Outrun this, bitches.” Magnus dropped all three with deadly accuracy.
“One minute,” Wainwright called out.
If they could keep the Akuda confined to the beach, Magnus knew the Talons would take out enough to give the Marines an advantage—if not stem the battle’s tide completely. They just had to keep any more ’kuda from getting across the dunes.
But that was easier said than done.
6
With only one minute remaining, the Akuda made a wild dash for the village. Magnus didn’t know if they had some sort of sixth sense that warned them about imminent danger, or if their own ocean-based scanning tech had alerted them of the Talon’s arrival. But either way, the push was monstrous.
Magnus fired alongside the surviving members of the platoons who’d been on the beach. They fired into the onrushing fish until their MC90’s barrels glowed red. But still, the scaly beasts came, charging headlong into the relentless Marine fire. Like everyone else around him, for every two fish Magnus seemed to drop, another three took their places.
The hastily dug mortar pits were, perhaps, the only things truly keeping the Akuda from breaking into the village. They fired steadily, blowing holes along the dunes. Spouts of sand and body parts shot into the night sky, raining down on friend and foe alike. By the time the Talons arrived, however, Magnus was worried there wouldn’t be enough Akuda left on the beach to make the assault effective. He double checked his HUD’s topo map and breathed a quick sigh of relief as he saw a massive patch of enemy icons still clustered on the beachhead. It might not be the entire enemy contingent, but the fighters were certainly going to make a dent in the enemy’s advance.
“Stand by for air assault,” said the company commander over TACNET.
Magnus looked up as the Talons appeared, strafing from right to left. Their slender black fuselages and raked-forward wings made them look like midnight birds of prey skimming over the palm trees. They tore into the Akudas with their NR330 blaster cannons, nested on either side of the lower fuselage, while their secondary T-100 blasters in each wing tip shot high-frequency torrents that spit sand a hundred meters into the air.
The entire scene was lit up as if in broad daylight. Magnus could hear dozens of Marines breaking protocol and cheering over their open channels. But command let it go.
The final Talons to fly overhead must have been outfitted for bombing maneuvers as they dropped dozens of class-C torpedoes on the beach. The resulting explosions sent blasts rippling into the village, knocking scores of Marines off their feet. The concussions had been so loud that Magnus’s ears rang even within his helmet.
“HELL YEAH,” Flow yelled over the squad channel, pumping a fist in the air. Magnus could hear similar sentiments echoed up and down the line, many coming from Marines who were struggling back to their feet. A general sense of relief seemed to wash over the COP as the Talons powered up and away, their engines slapping the night sky with a blistering assault of heat and light.
“We ain’t done yet, boys,” Magnus said, calling his squad’s attention back to the dunes.
“Son of a bitch!” Mouth said.
The Four watched in awe as a wave of Akuda continued charging the village. Whatever forces the Talons had hit on the main beach, they’d missed those on the dunes.
Wainwright was on TACNET next. “Look alive, Marines,” he yelled. “Clear those dunes!”
Magnus leaned against a palm tree and opened fire, but it became clear that the battle was coming into the village. The Marines had lost precious seconds in observing the Talons’ assault—seconds that the Akuda had used to advance in the coordinated absence of the mortar fire.
Magnus fired on a line of fish that were headed between bungalows and funneling toward his position. He dropped several ’kuda and then started backpedaling. The only thing left behind him were the tents. He double-checked his last mag’s capacity—it was below ten percent. But based on the enemy’s decreasing rate of fire, it seemed they were running low on ammunition as well.
Magnus continued to fire with his right hand while he removed the duradex combat knife from his hip with his left. He silently thanked the recon Marine who’d gifted it to him. And now that this battle was going hand-to-hand, there was no better weapon to have at his disposal.
The first ’kuda to close on Magnus when his MC90 went dry was a venomous looking creature who’s serrated teeth and claws dripped with green fluid. He knew the stuff had infected more than one Marine’s wounds, and he wasn’t in the mood to be cooped up in a field hospital for weeks on end.
The fish swung at his head, but Magnus ducked. He jabbed at the ’kuda’s soft underbelly in response, feeling his knife drive deep into the creature’s gut. The fish screamed and threw back its head. Then it swiped at Magnus again but with the other clawed hand. Magnus blocked the blow with his MC90 and swiped his blade just under the ’kuda’s chin. A dark fountain of blood splashed on Magnus’s visor, but the beast was done, writhing in death throes as it curled up on the grass.
The next fish that assaulted him seemed more savvy. Rather than rush straight in, it juked one way and then another before leaping the last two meters. Magnus was knocked backward but was able to keep the animal’s hands away from his body—knife stabbing the fish’s left hand, and his right hand holding the ’kuda’s other wrist. The two of them wrestled on the ground, plowing into several tents. The fish snapped at Magnus’s helmet, its teeth cracking the visor and momentarily shorting out his HUD.
“Get off me, you son of a bitch!” Magnus used his legs to fling the Akuda over his head, which bought him just enough time to roll to his feet and lunge at the bea
st. He drove his knife into the fish’s eye just as it tried to stand up. The creature dropped to the ground so quickly, Magnus lost his grip on the knife.
“Look out!” cried a voice somewhere among the tents next to him. Magnus looked back just in time to see a ’kuda break free from a tangle of Marines and charge him. Turning toward the dead fish with his blade in its eye, Magnus retrieved the weapon and readied himself for the oncoming ’kuda.
The impact rattled Magnus’s head as the pair flew further into the tent village. They rolled into a grassy quad. Magnus felt them knock over several chairs and collide with the border stones of a campfire, embers still glowing from a fire earlier in the evening.
This particular fish was stronger than the others, forcing Magnus back and forth as it tried to dominate the Marine. But the beast had his hands immobilized, and it used its powerful jaws to try and pop his helmet like a piece of fruit.
“Kick it in the groin!” the same voice said from before. Magnus had no idea who would be watching his fight without coming to lend a hand themselves. But he also couldn’t deny the strategic suggestion. Magnus focused on his free leg and then drilled his knee into the creature’s pelvis.
The ’kuda produced a pitiful cry and lessened its grip on Magnus’s knife hand. The release of pressure was just enough that Magnus wrested his wrist free and swiped the blade across the fish’s neck. The loss of aggression was almost instantaneous as the ’kuda reached for its throat, attempting in vain to stem to loss blood that pumped from its veins into the open air. Magnus shoved the fish aside.
As soon as he gained his feet, Magnus looked to see who’d spoken to him. There, bound to a cement block on the far side of the campfire area, was a bare-chested young man in shorts and sandals. Magnus blinked in shock—it was the Marine from the basement. Nos Kil.
Magnus turned and started to walk away.
“Don’t leave me here, man,” Nos Kil yelled, a small whine to his voice. “Those things… those things gonna feed on me!”
Ruins of the Galaxy Box Set: Books 1-6 Page 67
