“Shuttles Victor One and Victor Seven badly damaged by ground fire. Returning to base ships.”
“Target building desig five one one! Hit it!”
“They’re on the left, too. Small structures bearing zero two one and zero two three true.”
“Mines. We’re in a field, two Marines down. All units watch for mines.”
“Can’t somebody do something about that damned artillery?”
“The fleet’s on it. Bombardment hitting now.”
“Lighting up a bunker. Put a round on it!”
Desjani, who was listening and watching as well, shook her head. “Are we winning?”
“I think so.” Geary turned as the combat-systems watch called.
“Sir, we’re getting a lot of bombardment requests from the Marines—”
“Every bombardment request outside the one-hundred-meter safety zone from our Marines is supposed to be approved automatically,” Geary replied a bit irritably.
“Yes, sir, but we could respond to them a bit faster if they were one hundred percent handled by the automated systems, just like when we engage other ships.”
Geary shook his head. “Lieutenant, we might shave some seconds off the response time if we did that, but the Marines asked that every bombardment be verified by a human set of eyes before final approval to ensure it’s aimed at the right spot. I’m not going to overrule the preferences of the Marines in this.” The lieutenant looked unhappy, so Geary took a moment to explain. “We have no choice but to leave targeting entirely up to the fire-control systems when we’re engaging Syndic warships. It’s physically impossible for human beings to react quickly enough at the velocities involved. But neither the Syndics on the ground nor our Marines are moving at any appreciable fraction of the speed of light. We can afford to have a human in the loop. If you get any reports of undue delays in approving bombardment requests, I want to know. I assure you that the Marines will be the first to let us know if they’re unhappy.”
“Yes, sir.” Only slightly abashed, the lieutenant focused back on his tasks.
“You’re tolerant of lieutenants,” Desjani remarked, her eyes still fixed on her own display.
“I used to be one. And so did you.” Like Desjani, Geary kept most of his attention on the situation but welcomed anything that might cut the tension slightly. He suspected she could see how wound up he’d become and was trying to relax him a little.
“Not me,” Desjani denied. “I was born the commanding officer of a battle cruiser.”
“That must have been painful for your mother.”
She grinned. “Mom’s tough, but even she didn’t like having the sideboys in the delivery room.” Then the smile vanished as a high-priority transmission came over the Marine net.
“Third Company is pinned down!”
Geary tapped windows until he picked up the lieutenant in command of that unit. The view from the lieutenant’s combat armor showed broken, tumbled walls shuddering and blowing apart under the impact of enemy fire. “Heavy-weapons emplacements and hidden bunkers,” the lieutenant continued. “We must have stumbled onto some kind of citadel area. We’re badly outgunned here, and we’ve taken substantial casualties.”
Colonel Carabali’s voice came on. “Can you withdraw toward the center of the camp by stages, Lieutenant?”
“Negative, Colonel, negative!” The view through the lieutenant’s armor jumped as something exploded with enough force to toss around nearby Marines. “We cannot move without being targeted. Request all available fleet fire support.” Geary watched the tactical maps pop up on the lieutenant’s heads-up display, watched as the lieutenant tagged scores of targets in a rough circle around the friendly symbols marking the positions of the Marines of the Third Company. “Request bombardment support on the following coordinates. All available supporting fire as soon as possible.”
“Sir,” the combat-systems watch reported, “we’ve received another Marine fire-support request, but the targets are inside the safety parameters.”
“How far inside?” He read the data, blowing out a long breath as he saw the distances.
As Geary was checking, Colonel Carabali’s image appeared. “Captain Geary, my Third Company needs fire support and it needs it now.”
“Colonel, most of these targets are only fifty meters from your Marines. Some of them are within twenty-five meters.”
“I understand, Captain Geary. That’s where the enemy is.”
“Colonel, we’re dropping rounds through atmosphere. I can’t guarantee that our own fire won’t hit those Marines!”
“We know that, sir,” Carabali stated. “The lieutenant knows that. This is what he needs. He’s the senior officer on the scene. He’s made the call that these targets have to be engaged despite the danger to own forces. Request approve and execute the fire mission as soon as possible, sir.”
Geary looked into her eyes. Carabali understood the danger, too, but was accepting her on-scene commander’s judgment. As fleet commander, he could do no less. “Very well, Colonel. It’s on its way.” He turned to Desjani. “How can we maximize the accuracy of a surface bombardment right now?”
Desjani spread her hands. “Through atmosphere and all the junk we’ve already tossed up? Get the bombarding ship in as low an orbit as you can manage. But that will expose the ship to fire from the planet.”
“Okay.” A quick scan of the display showed the right candidate. A battleship could deliver enough firepower and have the best chance of surviving counterfire from the ground. “Warspite, proceed to lowest orbit and execute following fire-support mission as soon as possible.”
“Warspite, aye. On our way.”
“Sir, we have detections of aircraft en route the POW camp. Aircraft assessed military profile, all using maximum stealth capabilities.”
“Engage them,” Geary ordered.
Hell lances lashed down from orbit, forming webs of high-energy particles around the Syndic aircraft. With so many Alliance warships in space above the planet and able to fire on targets, the aircraft didn’t have a chance. Hard to see though the aircraft were, even a glancing blow from a hell lance was enough to knock them out, and a lot of hell lances filled the atmosphere around the aircraft. “All aircraft assessed destroyed. Warspite opening fire.”
On the view from the lieutenant commanding the Third Company, walls began blowing inward, and the ground jumped in a continuous wild dance as Warspite hurled hell lances and small kinetic projectiles into her targets. The feed from the lieutenant hazed as the destruction continued, dust and charged particles filling the air around him, then cut off completely.
“We’ve lost comms with the Marine Third Company,” the communications watch responded. “There’s so much junk in the air from the bombardment and the hell-lance fire that we can’t get signals through. We’re trying to reestablish contact, but it’ll probably be a few minutes.”
Was there anyone left to reestablish contact with? Geary had just had time to formulate that thought when another watch-stander called out.
“Missile launches from Syndic orbital facility Alpha Sigma. Three missiles. Assessed orbital-nuclear-bombardment warheads. Initial tracks toward site of POW camp. Combat systems recommend vectoring light cruiser Octave and destroyers Shrapnel and Kris to destroy the missiles, and launching kinetic rounds from Vengeance to destroy the firing installation.”
“Approved. Execute the commands.” Geary looked toward Rione. “So they did have nukes in orbit.”
“These might not be all of them,” she answered.
“More aircraft inbound toward POW camp. Assessed military.”
“Engage them,” Geary ordered.
“Surface-based Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile launches detected. Trajectories targeted on POW camp. Combat systems recommend engage missiles immediately with hell-lance fire and that Relentless bombard the IRBM launch site.”
“Do it.”
“Marine Sixth Company reports encountering a
booby-trapped area. Several casualties.” An alert sounded. “Warspite has taken a hit from a surface-based particle-beam battery. Warspite is undertaking evasive maneuvers and engaging the battery with bombardment munitions. Warspite reports fire-support mission complete.”
Still nothing from Third Company on their circuit.
“IRBMs and launch site destroyed. Octave has destroyed two of the nuclear bombardment missiles. Shrapnel has taken out the third. Warspite reports surface particle-beam battery destroyed. Estimated time to kinetic-round impacts on orbital launch site is three minutes.”
Carabali’s image appeared again. “Sir, we’ve spotted two ground convoys heading for the camp under cover of the dust thrown up by the bombardments so far.” Next to her, imagery of the convoys appeared. “Our recce drones operating under the dust identified uniforms and weapons in both convoys before we lost one of the drones to ground fire.”
“All right, Colonel. We’ll take care of those convoys.” Geary passed the data to the combat systems and watched a recommended engagement pattern pop up an instant later. He punched approve and saw another wave of kinetic rounds burst out of several Alliance warships, headed downward. “Good thing kinetic rounds are cheap and plentiful,” he remarked to Desjani. Was this what ancient gods would have felt like, hurling death and destruction from above onto the humans and their structures far below?
“Bombardment impacting Syndic orbital facility Alpha Sigma.”
Geary saw a flock of escape pods heading away from the doomed Syndic facility, then the Alliance rocks began hitting and blowing apart huge pieces of the Syndic orbital base. Within moments, it vanished, replaced by a cloud of junk.
“Comms reestablished with Marine Third Company.”
Geary tagged the window and saw a static-riddled vision of almost total destruction. The lieutenant sounded stunned as he reported in. “Enemy fire has ceased.”
Carabali’s order snapped back. “Withdraw immediately along line one zero five true. I’m sending forces to link up with you.”
“Colonel, our dead—”
“We’ll come back for them. Get you and your wounded out now!”
“Understood, Colonel. On our way.”
Our dead. Your wounded. Geary looked at the status readouts for the Third Company. It had landed with ninety-eight Marines. Sixty-one were still alive, and of those, forty showed various degrees of injury.
The bombardments aimed at the two Syndic surface convoys reached their targets, and two sections of roadway and surrounding terrain rose toward the sky as everything within the strike zone blew apart under the tremendous impacts of the Alliance projectiles.
“Sir,” Carabali reported, “we have indications of enemy pursuit organizing behind Third Company’s withdrawal.”
“Thank you, Colonel. We’ll take care of it.” Geary passed the target area to Warspite. After viewing the Marines’ casualties, he wasn’t interested in humanitarian gestures toward the enemy trying to kill his people. “Turn this area into a dead zone, Warspite.”
“Warspite, aye. It’ll be a pleasure, sir.”
As Warspite hurled another bombardment toward the planet’s surface, Geary pulled back his view for a moment. The region around and at the borders of the POW camp had been turned into a seething hell of craters and dust. Other areas on the ground showed craters where kinetic rounds had taken out surface launch sites or batteries, and here and there clusters of damage marked where Alliance hell lances aimed at Syndic aircraft had gone on to strike anything on the surface in their line of fire. Parts of the city nearest the POW camp were burning, but so were substantial portions of other cities on the planet, and as Geary watched, a massive explosion obliterated a section of one of the biggest cities on the planet. “They did that to themselves?” he asked.
“On purpose or by accident,” Desjani confirmed.
“More aircraft inbound.”
“If they’re assessed military, then engage. Weapons free on all military aircraft heading toward that POW camp.”
“Yes, sir.”
Rione was gazing bleakly at the display. “You think they would’ve figured out how useless this all was. Everything they throw at us is just getting destroyed, usually with damage to other things on the surface.”
“If the command and control net is still as fragmented as it looks, no Syndic in orbit or on the surface may have a decent picture of what’s going on,” Geary pointed out. “We don’t even know who’s giving orders to these units. Some of them may be operating independently, following standing orders to resist any force attacking the planet.”
His eyes went to the window for the lieutenant leading Third Company. The battle armor showed a gradual lessening of destruction as the Marines made their way out of the area flattened by Warspite. But as Geary watched, the image suddenly blanked, to be replaced by another of roughly the same scene but from another spot. “Lieutenant Tillyer is down,” someone was saying. The window identified the new speaker as Sergeant Paratnam. A building to one side collapsed as Marine fire tore it apart. “We got the sniper.”
“Understood,” Carabali replied. “I read you one hundred fifty meters from a linkup with elements of Fifth Company. Do you have them on your HUD?”
“Yes, Colonel. Got ’em.” Paratnam sounded immensely relieved. “Proceeding to linkup.”
Geary tapped a control, getting the health stats for the Marines in Third Company. Lieutenant Tillyer’s status readouts were all zeroed. “One hundred fifty meters,” he murmured.
“Sir?” Desjani asked.
“It’s funny, isn’t it? In a space engagement, one hundred fifty meters is too small a distance to worry about. At point one light speed we cover that distance in a tiny fraction of a second. It might as well be nothing. Except for weapons targeting. Then it means the difference between a miss or a direct hit. And for a Marine on a planet’s surface that small distance decides life and death. He takes the chance of calling in our own fire right on top of his own position, he leads his unit to safety, and just short of safety, he dies.”
Desjani looked away for a moment. “The living stars decide our fates. It often seems random, but there’s always a purpose.”
“You truly believe that?”
Her eyes met his, and Geary thought for a moment that he could see reflections of every death Desjani must have witnessed in this war, every friend and family member she’d lost. “If I didn’t,” she said quietly, “I couldn’t keep going.”
“I understand.” Not for the first time he remembered that the people around him had grown up with this war. So had their parents. He couldn’t begin truly to feel the pain they must have endured as the casualty tolls mounted ever higher with no end in sight.
“You didn’t always.” She gave him a sad smile. “You couldn’t handle even minor losses once. Now, you can endure them and keep on. But I felt sadness back then, seeing your reaction to the loss of a single ship, and wishing I hadn’t been born in a time when such innocence could never be.”
“I can’t remember the last time I was called innocent. Back when I was an ensign, I guess.” Geary took a deep breath. “Let’s get this battle done with and make sure we lose as few more people as possible.”
The watch-standers and automated combat systems would alert him to anything he needed to know, but Geary made a last check of the larger picture before diving back into a close-up of the action in the POW camp.
On the overhead image of the POW camp, a swarm of human bodies could now be seen clustered near the large, open center. Left open in the middle was the landing field where Alliance shuttles were touching down and lifting off in what appeared a calmly choreographed operation. Geary called up a screen for one of Marines controlling the evacuation and saw a scene of seeming bedlam, the sky painted with the aftereffects of Alliance bombardments and hell-lance fire, peoples rushing here and there, shuttles dropping fast, loading liberated POWs as quickly as they could pack the bodies in, then leaping back upward. It
took a moment to spot the order hidden behind the frantic activity.
The officers among the POWs were apparently keeping the other POWs in clusters until called to send people for a shuttle, and the Marines were sorting out and guiding disoriented former prisoners while shouting everyone into maintaining discipline. To one side he saw battle armor labeled with Colonel Carabali’s ID huddled next to a Marine shuttle with a couple of other Marines standing watch over her while she doubtless concentrated on the movements of her units.
“I wonder,” Desjani remarked, “if those former prisoners are trying to figure out if they’re being rescued or if the apocalypse has come.”
“Maybe both. Colonel Carabali, when opportunity permits I’d like your assessment of the operation.”
Her image appeared instantly. “Better than I’d feared, sir. We’ve taken casualties in almost every unit as we withdrew toward the center of the camp, but only Third Company got badly beat-up. Apparently they did stumble into an area intended as a last-ditch defensive zone for the Syndic guards. The evacuation of the liberated POWs is proceeding with no other holdups. I estimate forty minutes until the last POW is off, then another twenty minutes before the last Marine shuttle lifts.”
“Thank you, Colonel. We’ll try to keep the Syndics off your backs until then.”
Carabali frowned in surprise and it took Geary a moment to realize it wasn’t in response to his statement but to something that had come in to her over another channel. “Sir, we’ve got guards and their families trying to surrender in exchange for safe passage out of here.”
“Families?” His stomach clenched as Geary thought about the bombardments hitting the camp.
“Yes, sir. We hadn’t seen any, either. Just a moment, sir.” Carabali turned to some nearby POWs and spoke quickly, then reactivated her circuit with Geary. “The former prisoners say the guards’ families lived outside the camp. The guards must have brought them in for safety when the fighting started on the planet.”
“And then invited a battle on top of their heads?” Geary barked in disbelief.
“Agreed, sir. Our personnel who were imprisoned here say there are extensive underground storage areas in the north portion of the camp and are guessing the guards kept their families safe in those.”
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