Down in the camp, a three-turreted ceramalloy monster shot out of the ground, the thinning dust clouds swirling behind its slipstream.
1st Section met this new threat with a volley of armor-piercing grenades. The tank rocked violently. The smaller turrets at the front and rear exploded, hurling themselves across the ground, gouging out channels in the dirt. But the tank kept coming, heading north toward the forward post made from heaped rubble.
Frakk! Frakk! Arun glanced at the GX-cannon, their main anti-tank weapon. Now it was fragments of twisted metal scattered over ground that had caught fire. The Marines down in the camp were on their own.
Another volley of grenades lashed the tank. Hecht must have ordered them to try taking out the gravitics motor. It was a difficult shot that meant skimming a grenade along the ground so it exploded underneath the armored vehicle. Most of the grenades went off prematurely but a couple bloomed underneath.
The tank didn’t seem to notice, plowing onward to the forward post where Bojin and Lewark waited with a handful of armed refugees.
Run! Arun urged them.
Arun’s spirit lifted when one of the slaves in the tank’s path broke cover, running for the blockhouse. She didn’t make three meters before being cut down by a machine gun mounted in the tank’s front glacis plate.
Meanwhile, the ever louder throb from underground spoke of the imminent arrival of more armor.
“Arun,” screamed Puja. “Get down!”
Instinctively, Arun dove for the ground, rolling away from his position, which erupted in a hail of darts from a strafing drone.
He came to rest on his back, his carbine aimed by Barney at the drone.
Arun relaxed his trigger finger. The drone had already erupted into a ball of flame, victim to one of Stopcock’s SAMs.
The sky was a confusing blur of flares and countermeasures and blurring motion as missiles and drones fought a deadly dance too quickly for humans to follow.
Down in the camp, the leading tank was traversing its main turret toward the occupied blockhouse as it unleashed another deadly weapon on the forward post: its gravitics motor.
Grav-tanks couldn’t fly, but could mess with the laws of nature enough to repel its underside up to a maximum of four meters off the ground. As the Hardit tank passed over the heaped rubble of the forward post, the sound of its motor changed from a deep throb to high pitch whine. It was changing its energy pulses to one designed specifically to resonate inside human flesh. The energy from the tank’s power plant was being transmitted inside the defenders’ flesh.
The tank’s armored body shielded Arun’s eyes from the sight of rapidly superheated human bodies exploding. The battlesuits were strong enough to withstand the resonance, but not so the Marines inside. Trapped inside the pressure seal of their suits, the energy build up would vaporize the wearer.
But even after their horrific deaths, Bojin and Lewark weren’t done fighting. One moment the tank was turning toward the western blockhouse, the next it was sitting on a blindingly bright cushion of plasma.
They must have set their carbine power packs to overload. The crack of the explosion hit Arun’s ears a moment later, drowning out the sound of the tanks about to emerge from the ramp.
When the plasma had cooled enough for Arun to look at the tank, he saw it was resting on top of the Marine position, the main turret upside down on the dirt having been blasted twenty meters away from the tank. Black smoke erupted from the hull’s three uncapped turret rings.
A second tank was now visible, making the final turn in the helix ramp.
Arun needed to get Stopcock to do something about the tanks, but he daren’t use WBNet again. He set off for Stopcock’s last firing position. Stok would have moved on to a new position by now, but it would be a starting point.
Movement a few hundred meters to the northeast of the camp drew his eye. A hidden entrance outside the main perimeter of the labor camp. They were uniformed infantry, and they looked eager to press forward in a way the Hardit militia never did.
Oh, frakk. A bone-numbing chill spread through Arun. He bit down on his lip, but the blood did nothing to fight the cold certainty that he’d overextended the Legion already. He’d gotten his friends killed and made their deaths meaningless.
Arun took a deep breath and used it to exhale his funk.
He turned WBNet back on. No one else in Force Patagonia would do the same, but they would all be able to hear his new orders.
“Abort! Abort! Regroup at Rendezvous Point Beta.” He waited long enough for Barney to confirm that he’d broadcast a tactical update of enemy deployment.
Then Arun cut WBNet. And with it any means of communicating to Gupta, Springer and all his Marines down in the camp.
“Come on, Narciso,” he said. “We’re not done here. We’ve got to find Laskosk.”
— Chapter 31 —
“Six hostiles,” relayed Springer.
“Not confirmed,” said Zug.
“Don’t see them either,” said Umarov.
“I’m seeing them clearly,” insisted Springer. “Thirty meters beyond the turn.”
“Thirty?” Kalis sounded incredulous, but not outright dismissive.
Maybe the 2nd Section NCO was finally coming round. “Okay, Tremayne, we’ll try it your way. Take Umarov and deal with them. We’ll cover you.”
Springer charged up the corridor, her panting breath loud in her helmet and her eyes fixed on the position of the Hardits as Saraswati firmed up their deployment in tac-display. In her peripheral vision she noticed Umarov clamp his carbine to his back and bring out the crescent-shaped combat blades from the attachment patch on his chest.
Everyone knew that a true Marine’s best friend was her carbine, which made Umarov’s preference to carry out close up work with poisoned blades fiercely deviant. Frakk, she hadn’t even known such a weapon existed before she met Umarov.
Then he did that other weird thing. Umarov was already pelting down the corridor faster than she could keep up, but the moment Kalis and Zug launched their grenades, Umarov upped his charge to lightspeed. It was as if he had a zero-point engine in his ass. Umarov was so frakking fast, it was inhuman.
He was already several paces ahead and still accelerating when two powered grenades, semi-intelligent micro missiles really, screamed over their heads and lit the passageway with a blue-white bloom of fire as their engines adjusted their course to turn the corner at speed. A far greater flare of light and noise filled the passageway when a flash-bomb went off, accompanied by the angry growl of a frag explosion.
Springer pushed into the heat, noise and light and rapidly assessed the situation. Umarov was standing over a heap of five Hardit corpses, reaching for his carbine. A sixth Hardit was fleeing. She shot it. Headshot. Before Umarov had brought his carbine to bear. Even he wasn’t that fast.
“Wait for support next time,” she chided. “We’re stronger together.”
“You’re right,” said Umarov who was double-checking the Hardits were truly dead. “But I can’t. It’s how they made me.”
“This is the Human Legion,” Springer announced, cranking up the volume on her external helmet speakers. “Anyone who thinks Tawfiq Woomer-Calix should be skinned and her pelt turned into a rug can stay where they are. On the other hand, if you realize her pelt is so disgusting that it’s not fit to mop out the head, make yourself known.”
She strained her ears, but heard no response.
She waited, sensing that Saraswati was working hard to process all the incoming sensor data. After a few seconds, the AI had enough to replay a woman’s distorted voice.
“Springer. Springer! You crazy veck. Is that you?”
As Saraswati fixed the woman’s po
sition and passed the intel along LBNet, Springer remembered where she’d heard that voice before. Last she’d seen of its owner had been sitting in the cab of a dung truck on the way back from a drunken party at Alabama.
“Adrienne Miller! You’re not going by a different name now are you?”
The reply was faint but serviceable. “Yeah. Told you before that name didn’t belong to me anymore. They call me Spartika now.”
“We’ve found her, Corporal,” Springer reported.
“Yeah, we could hear,” said Kalis “So could anyone within half a light year. Let’s pick her up and get out of here.”
“How long to effect rescue?” asked Gupta.
“Three minutes,” replied Kalis.
“Make it two,” said Gupta. “Kill WBNet immediately. All hell’s breaking loose up top. Enemy is employing mil-spec targeting systems and combined arms. Last message from the major was to fall back and regroup at Rendezvous Point Beta. We’ll wait for you topside. Two minutes. No more.”
The sergeant disappeared from BattleNet.
Alpha Fire Team was on its own.
“Stand away from the walls,” shouted Springer in Spartika’s direction. “We’re coming for you.”
One breaching charge later and the fire team was hurrying to rejoin the other Marines with Spartika and four other survivors in tow. It wasn’t until they reached the final flight of steps to the blockhouse that their luck ran out.
Zug had taken point, already up the stairs, followed by Spartika and the survivors. As rearguard, Springer covered the corridor with Kalis and Umarov while the others got away. They were just turning around to follow the others up to the blockhouse when tac-display updated with incoming hostiles… four… approaching from the direction of Spartika’s cell.
How the hell did you miss these jokers? She wondered of her AI.
Springer turned, firing where Saraswati told her to, firing blindly because her head exploded with the fire and noise of a flash-bomb. Tac-display had vanished too. When did Hardits get their filthy paws on such serious munitions?
Helplessly, Springer waited for a tactical update, but her helmet display was reduced to a dumb transparent visor, and Saraswati had deserted her, dead or stunned by the EMP pulse within the flash-bomb.
The supersonic crackle of railgun fire began to cut through the flash-bomb noise.
Another explosion threw her back against the stairs — frag grenade!
Head still spinning, Springer was alert enough to pick herself up and shift position. As the smoke cleared and her thoughts gained traction, she realized her powered armor was still amplifying her muscle contractions faithfully, meaning Saraswati’s base functions were still operational.
Springer’s mind repaired itself enough for her to realize that she was in the passageway, aiming her carbine at the attacking Hardits. Three were down. One was staggering away, wounded. Springer shot and it went down. As it fell she noticed it was missing half of one ear.
She shot it again. “That’ll take your mind off your ear!” she taunted.
She put more darts into the fallen Hardits just in case. She frowned. These Hardits were something new. For a start they wore uniforms. They were confident and well equipped too, but there was no time to investigate this mystery. She turned and checked the eastern side of the passageway. No one.
Saraswati came back online, thank frakk, and confirmed the Hardits were dead.
“Clear,” Springer reported, and then instantly wondered who was left to report to.
Zug and the prisoners had long since disappeared upstairs, hopefully topside by now. Umarov looked unhurt, but Kalis was down and Saraswati had painted a red cross over him. The AI was convinced he was dead.
“Leave him,” said Umarov.
His voice didn’t sound right. Springer looked Umarov over. His battlesuit was covered in self-repair patches and the top of his helmet was dented. It looked as if an axe had cleaved his skull. It seemed impossible that the brain inside hadn’t been sliced open too, but that was the way helmets absorbed the energy from otherwise fatal impacts.
“Come on,” urged Umarov, staggering up the stairs.
But she couldn’t bring herself to abandon Kalis. “No one left behind,” she said. “I want to reclaim that. Make it our own.”
“I know you do,” said Umarov. “I think you’re concussed. We’re also still stuck down a hole, facing serious armor, 300 klicks from our base, burdened by refugees, and cut off from Beowulf. You can barely carry yourself, let alone haul the corporal’s body.”
Springer crouched down and looked through the corporal’s shattered visor. She squeezed his shoulder. As a parting gesture, it was feeble, but she couldn’t close his eyes or touch his forehead because his face was too ruined.
Then she had an idea.
She activated the release mechanism for his suit AI. “Sorry I gave you so much trouble, Corporal,” she said, as she waited for the AI to progress through the liquid armor around the dead NCO’s chest.
They said the AIs of fallen Marines went insane. But Saraswati hadn’t, and maybe in his AI, a part of Kalis would survive.
Still gripping Kalis’s shoulder, she felt Umarov’s hand grasp hers.
“Hell, Tremayne. Even if we make it out of this, Gupta’s going to skin you alive for dragging your feet. I’m not sure I blame him. Move it!”
Grudgingly, she withdrew, bringing the remnant of Kalis in a utility pouch.
— Chapter 32 —
Arun ran as if his Marines’ lives depended on it, which, just maybe, they did.
He and Puja shouted into the woods: “Laskosk! Laskosk! Can you hear us?”
Stopcock flickered back into LBNet.
“Here, Major.”
Stopcock’s AI automatically transmitted ammo state. He had 6 fragmentation, 1 bunker buster, and 1 SAM missile left. No tank busters. They hadn’t expected to encounter armor.
“What damage can you do against grav-tanks?” Arun asked.
“Not much. But I can give them something to think about while our guys run for it. Actually...” Stopcock never could think and speak at the same time. “Sir, do you know the original purpose of this complex?”
“General purpose staging post for whenever the Hardits needed to be topside.”
“So it wasn’t built to be a military base.”
“Negative.”
“Good. Because I’ve an idea...”
Chung and Cusato reappeared. He couldn’t see Rohanna and Shelby, or hear their babies.
“Just do what you think is best,” said Arun. He was desperate to get his Marines out of there alive, knowing that every one that didn’t make it back was down to him. “Lance Corporal Stok Laskosk, you are now the most important person in the entire Legion. It’s up to you and your fancy blow pipe to cover the retreat of our comrades in the camp. Chung, Cusato, Narciso, it’s our job to cover Laskosk. We’ll catch up with the others at Rendezvous Point Beta. Don’t let anyone down.”
“We won’t, sir,” said Stopcock, speaking for all of them.
Arun moved out, taking a position nearby. The others did the same, putting a defensive ring around Stok while he set the parameters for his launcher.
Then events proceeded in such quick succession that Arun could barely keep up.
The second tank had lumbered up onto the ground and seemed to be struggling to maneuver. Maybe its crew were too busy concentrating on traversing the three turrets in the direction of the western blockhouse, which was now shrouded in the concealing fog of smoke grenades. The crew must have finally worked out how to tell the tank’s targeting system of their intentions because the turret traverse sped up, the barrels snapped down a little and fired!
The rounds hit the base of one wall, collapsing it inward. Another salvo like that, and the whole blockhouse would collapse into the tunnels below.
But that, as it turned out, was Stopcock’s idea. And he got there first.
More armored monsters were emerging, bu
t Stopcock’s first missile hit, not one of the tanks but the ground near the helix. The beautiful big lunk had shot a bunker buster into the helix itself. The tanks trembled, the ground shook, but the ramp held. Frakk!
Barney picked out camouflaged Marines fleeing the doomed blockhouse.
More tank shells slammed into the blockhouse. There was too much smoke and dust to see the effect, but nothing could survive that, surely?
Then Stopcock’s next salvo hit home. Arun counted six frag rounds, aimed at evenly spread points just inside the rim of the helix.
Already weakened by the bunker buster, this was too much for the buried structure of the helical ramp, which collapsed and subsided.
The grav-tanks could float a short distance above tricky ground, but they couldn’t fly. When the ground beneath them slipped away, the tanks fell too, adding their considerable weight until subsidence became a collapse. The tanks tilted at crazy angles, and then crashed together with such force that their hulls rang. Looking like children’s toys jumbled into a heap, the tanks disappeared into the ground. For several more seconds, the rumble of their descent echoed through the ground, and then it too was gone.
Silence.
Then the woods filled with a baby’s wail, accompanied by a mother’s shushes.
— Chapter 33 —
As Springer and Umarov ascended the last flight of stairs up to the blockhouse, the sounds of battle grew louder, crescendoing in a ferocious series of rapid blows that rocked the ground and threw them off their feet. As they were getting upright, a heavy shower of dirt and building debris rattled down onto them. Then it felt as if the ground was collapsing under their feet, an earthquake that shook the camp for over two minutes.
Just before the earthquake struck, Springer thought she heard the whine of missiles committing every last reserve of fuel as they closed the final distance to target. But if Stopcock had caused the earthquake, he was using ordnance she’d never heard of.
Umarov and Springer sheltered in the stairwell until the earthquake began to subside. As the dust cloud cleared, daylight streamed through the topside opening twenty meters above them.
Renegade Legion (The Human Legion Book 3) Page 11
