by M. D. Cooper
A klaxon blared, and Chase was pressed back in his seat as the ship began to spin through the air.
Thick smoke filled the cabin, and Chase switched to his armor’s internal air supply, trying not to look at how rapidly his HUD said they were falling.
The drop ship had emergency thrusters that should keep them from creating a new crater in the city below, but they weren’t firing.
Then he heard someone cry out on the combat net that the pilot was dead.
Chase had flown drop ships before when things were dire, so he tapped into the ship’s navigation systems. They were a mess; one engine was gone, and the other was on full bore. He switched it off, and fired control thrusters to slow the drop ship’s spin.
The ship passed below a thousand meters, and the emergency landing systems signaled that they were ready to deploy—but the braking jets were still offline.
Someone was screaming on the combat net, and Chase yelled,
As the ship passed five hundred meters, Chase hit the jets, praying they’d fire.
Five of the eight jets lit and slowed the ship, but then two shut down, and the remainder kicked the ship over into a crazy spin. Chase killed them all, and the emergency foam deployed both inside and outside the ship.
Then they hit.
The foam that filled the inside of the drop ship dissolved almost as quickly as it had appeared, and over the combat net, he could hear Casey shrieking
Chase fumbled with his harness, trying to find the buckle around his right leg. Then he realized that the strap had been torn off, and there was nothing holding him down anymore. He rose from his seat and rushed out the back of the drop ship.
Outside, Ralph was directing first squad to cover the north of the drop ship, while Henry, fourth squad’s sergeant, was moving to the south.
Casey nodded.
Chase took a step back, and surveyed the ruin of the courtyard the ship had crashed in. He suspected that it was a school of some sort—which he confirmed a moment later when he cross-referenced their location with his map of Jersey City.
A string of confirmations reached his ears, and Chase turned back to the drop ship. Losing the LT and the platoon sergeant in the first moments of a drop was bad, but every other soldier had survived, and the ship was mostly intact.
He sent a passel of drones out, and they rose into the sky around the courtyard. There was no movement in the streets or the walkways around the dormitories his squads were clearing. He pulled up the map of Jersey City on his HUD, examining his platoon’s options.
They were seven kilometers northeast of their designated landing zone. Through the drones’ feeds, he could see the other drop ships coming down in the correct location, disgorging their troops and taking to the skies again.
As he watched, a ship exploded in midair—this one not so lucky as it fell from the sky in a ball of fire.
His drones made a comm uplink, and a voice came into his mind.
Gunnery Sergeant Dawson’s statement was punctuated by starfire flaring bright in the noon sky, as it rained down on several locations in the city.
Streams of plasma burned through buildings, and, hopefully, no small number of Niets. With any luck, those shots would end the enemy’s anti-air capabilities—but Chase wasn’t holding his breath.
Dawson killed the connection. Chase returned to the back of the drop ship to see first squad stuffing a pile of magazines into duffels, along with four heavy beams, three surface-to-air missiles, and one launcher.
RESCUE
STELLAR DATE: 12.23.8948 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Kenmore Building, Jersey City
REGION: Pyra, Albany System, Theban Alliance
The fighting had lasted through the night. It was arduous, brutal, and no small number of Marauders lost their lives in Jersey City. But by morning, Alpha Company held the first three blocks of towers along the canal, and was moving closer to the city’s core.
Rika was sprawled on a sofa across from Leslie, who was asleep in a chair. They were in the lobby of one of the towers.
She didn’t even know its name until Barne walked up with a smile and said, “Enjoying the Kernmore’s hospitality, are you?” He was pointing at Rika’s charge cable, which was plugged into a power socket in the floor.
She smiled before responding, “Yeah they’ve got the best cocktails here. This juice is just my flavor.”
“Weak metaphor, Rika,” Barne smiled. “You better top off fast. Ayer is sending us to give Fifth Battalion a hand.”
“Fifth? What for?”
“They’re pinned down on the far side of the city center; didn’t make it in as far as we did. The artillery platform is repositioning to soften up the Niets over there, but it’ll take them over an hour.”
“Just us, or all of fourth platoon?” Leslie asked, cracking an eye open.
“Just us,” Barne shook his head. “Fourth is going to keep pushing toward the city center with the rest of Alpha Company. We’ve got a Theban regiment pushing in from the west, as well. They’re going to focus on the building-by-building clear-outs.
“Welcome to it,” Rika said. “That’s brutal work. Have there been a lot of civilian casualties?”
Barne nodded. “More than a lot. The Niets didn’t really play nice. They killed some in retaliation, but from what we can see, a lot were already dead. I guess they didn’t feel like taking care of them.”
“Or getting attacked by the occupied populace,” Leslie added.
“How we getting there?” Rika asked. “Can’t really go through the city center.”
“And I’
m not crawling through kilometers of sewer,” Leslie added.
“I’m wounded that you two ladies would doubt me,” Barne said, drawing a hand to his chest. “I’ve secured a boat. It’s in the canal, waiting.”
“A gunboat?” Rika asked with a smile.
“Uh…no…just a boat boat.”
Leslie chuckled as she pulled herself up. “Well, let’s go take a look at your boaty boat. You topped off, Rika?”
Rika nodded as she pulled her charge cord from the floor. “Good enough. But I’m starved. Any food around here?”
* * * * *
Five minutes later, they were at the canal. Rika carefully lowered herself into the boat while Barne and Leslie stood on the far side to keep the small craft balanced. Once in, Rika sat on the deck in the middle of the vessel while Leslie released the moorings and tossed the ropes onto the dock.
Once they were free, Barne gunned the engine, moving the vessel out into the water, but staying close to the south shore where the tall buildings would obscure their passage.
Rika closed her eyes and leaned back, enjoying the feel of the boat surging through the water. It occurred to her that she had never been aboard a civilian watercraft. It was strange to be in a vessel made for pleasure. Even after the war, she had only been aboard freighters and other utilitarian spacecraft.
As they passed more pleasure boats tied up along the docks, Rika tried to imagine what the canal looked like before half the boats had been smashed by fallen windows or falling debris from the park across the canal.
It must have been heavenly.
A part of her felt responsible for the destruction wrought on Jersey City, but she knew the blame was ultimately to be laid at the feet of the Nietzscheans.
She had stopped herself from killing the Theban president. And even though Ariana was dead now, Rika reminded herself that in the end she had done the right thing. Ariana’s parting words still rang in her mind.
‘I forgive you.’
Rika would treasure that utterance for all of her days—even though she would never see Ariana again to thank her.
The boat passed into Jersey City’s harbor, and Rika watched the pleasure craft that had dominated the canal give way to commercial vessels, and larger cruise ships.
At one point, a shot hit the boat, fired from a building near the water. Rika calculated the origin, and returned fire with a ballistic round. She didn’t know if she had hit anyone, but no further fire came their way.
The ride was almost surreal in its calming silence; but every now and then, the sounds of artillery, or the burning glare of starfire falling on the city, reminded them that they would soon be in the thick of it once more.
Rika watched a series of drop ships fall toward the city, and wondered about the soldiers within. They tagged as Marauder craft on her HUD, and she suspected that some day she might fight alongside the occupants—maybe even this day.
A barrage of SAMs launched from one of the buildings in the downtown core, sending dozens of missiles streaking toward the drop ships.
The ships fired chaff, and flew wildly to lose the missiles. Point defense systems activated. One ship took an airburst and dipped for a moment. Then another was struck, and one of its engines exploded. The ship began to spin wildly, but somehow stopped; no small feat, with the ship’s nose missing.
“C’mon,” Leslie whispered. “Get those jets going. Slow that fall!”
Rika didn’t speak as the drop ship plummeted toward the city, its velocity continuing to increase. Then, just below five hundred meters, the emergency jets fired—not all of them, but the ship slowed, then began to barrel roll.
“They’d better hope their foam deploys,” Barne said. “They’ve slowed, but they’ll still dig a hole.”
The ship passed below the buildings, and the three members of team Basilisk didn’t see if the foam systems deployed or not—though there was no visible fireball, or debris cloud.
“Might have made it,” Barne allowed.
“They’re close to our route,” Rika said. “We could take a look.”
“I’d like to,” Leslie said. “Marauders don’t leave one another on the field.”
“No objection here,” Barne said. “We’re here to help their push into the city. Seeing if we can help out a platoon fits the bill.”
Her response was punctuated by another drop ship exploding midair, and she watched as starfire rained down on four locations in the city.
No more SAMs streaked out from the ground, and the remainder of the Marauder ships touched down.
Four minutes later, Barne pulled the boat up against a pier, and Leslie leapt onto the dock, tying off a mooring, and Barne leaned out on the port side of the ship to balance it as Rika stepped off.
He snorted as he jumped onto the pier. “Gonna need to get you some lighter limbs, if we ever take you to Innoa for some water sports. They have these crazy caverns under the ocean that get these waves you can surf on underground. Fun times down there.”
“It’s beautiful,” Leslie nodded. “All the lighting is bioluminescent. I—” she didn’t complete the statement, and began moving down the pier.
The trio spread out with Leslie in the lead, Rika in the center, and Barne bringing up the rear. Twice, Leslie spotted Nietzscheans, and both times, Basilisk made short work of them.
As they walked, Rika approached Leslie and gently touched her arm.
Leslie sighed.
Leslie glanced at Rika.
Rika nodded.
They walked in silence for several minutes before Leslie spoke again.
Rika replied.
Rika wondered why Leslie was asking. Maybe she just needed something to talk about that would keep her mind off Jerry—though conversation about Rika’s love life seemed like an odd choice.
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Leslie sighed.
Rika nodded silently. That they did.
Their conversation was interrupted by Barne signaling that they were approaching the crash site.
* * * * *
“Looks intact—mostly,” Barne said, as he crouched with Rika on the south corner of a dormitory. Leslie was circling around to the north, checking the buildings for hostiles.
“No beacon on it,” Rika replied. “I’m going to move in.”
“Could be trapped,” Barne whispered. “Wait for Leslie to finish her sweep, then you can go play steel hero.”
“Drones don’t see anything. No comms, though. Going to send one up to see if I can Link with Major Weston’s company HQ.”
Rika directed a drone to fly up over the site, and once it reached three hundred meters, it made a line-of-sight connection with the drop ship’s original landing site.
Leslie appeared on the far side of the courtyard.
