by James McEwan
“We’re on!” St. Claire informed her.
“Hang on. You might want to look out a window because there is about to be some fireworks,” Kára said over the com as she launched the missile.
Inside the tank the Ralnai gunner got a missile lock warning just before it fired. He watched through his scope and pressed the fire button on the gun. The tri barrels spun up ad began spitting a hail storm of little yellow bits of death. He jammed the joy stick to the left and the stream of fire intercepted the missile just before it could hit. The explosion scorched the tanks paint and rattled the Ralnai inside, but other than that left them unhurt and still combat effective.
“Well shit,” Kára said under her breath. “Let’s see if you like this any better.” The ship was equipped with all kinds of toys. She activated one of the other weapon systems. On the outside of the little scout ship two panels slid open and up popped two unguided rocket pods. She fired all of them. The unguided rockets screamed out of the pods like little deadly mad bees.
The tankers tried to shoot as many as he could, but there was just too many. Even though he gave it a gallant try, they ended up being lizard barbeque anyway. The tank took two direct hits from the rockets before it exploded in a brilliant flash of light and smoke.
The Ralnai on the ground didn’t fare much better as many of them were caught in the open when the rockets rained down on them.
On the bridge Kára laughed, “Take that you little slimy bastards!” The engine panel switched from red to green and she grabbed the lift control and pulled back on it hard. The ship creaked and groaned as it had not taken off this fast in a while. It jumped off the ground blowing dust and dead Ralnai parts every which way.
They didn’t get away untouched as one Ralnai who survived had a PML (portable missile launcher). He took aim and fired. He fired it manually so that the ships sensors wouldn’t pick up the missile lock.
His aim was good, but not good enough for a kill shot. The missile impacted the hull just below the left wing. It blew a sizeable hole in the side of the ship and smoke poured out of it as the ship disappeared from sight.
Inside St. Claire and Thad had been thrown off of their feet when the ship took the hit. “Kára honey, what was that?” St. Claire asked calmly as Thad got to his feet first and offered his hand to help his friend up.
“We got tagged. But I am not sure of the extent of the damage. I think we are okay for now,” Kára responded as she was checking all of the flight systems.
“So, you are saying we are still in the air?” Thad asked.
“For now,” was the reply they got from the bridge.
“Oh, that’s comforting,” Thad remarked.
“That’s my girl,” St. Claire said with a smile and a laugh.
Chapter 39
The mood in the conference room on the Daniel Wesson was tense to say the least. “Damn it Jim, I know you want to go down there and fight, but frankly I can’t afford to lose you,” Amanda said as she listened to Grunt’s plan.
“I can’t lead from behind, Amanda, and you know that. Otherwise you wouldn’t be out here,” he fired back.
The discussion was less of an argument and more of a tactical exercise. She couldn’t argue that point, so she relented with a heavy sigh. She was starting to show signs that she was tired and frustrated, “Look Jim, I have every confidence in you and your Marines. It is just that I don’t know how to get you on the ground without getting you all killed.”
Seeing that she had taken a step back from her entrenched position he pushed the attack, “I have a plan for that. If you will just give me a minute I will lay it out for you,” Grunt said.
Amanda knew that she needed to hear him out. So, she nodded her head giving her approval.
“The problem is that the enemy’s missile defense is shooting down everything that gets near the surface and that includes our Mac cannon rounds. We have been studying this and we noticed that they are only firing on items that meet a mass or speed threshold. Now that gives us an open window, per se, to drop troops in. It is a small window though. I can take a small team of Marines and we can hit their command and control center. We take that out and we shut down their defense system. Then my good Supreme Commander, the Wesson would be free to pound those unholy dead things into the dirt.” Grant explained.
“Let me understand here. You said that they are firing on everything that comes close that is moving at a certain speed or has a certain mass. Our drop tubes require us to be in lower atmospheres to drop troops and that would put us smack in the middle of their range. So the optimum question is: How do we insert troops?” Amanda asked as she mulled it over in her mind.
“You are right about being in their range. So I did the math in another way. If we modify our drop capsules to fit inside the Mag Canons we can fire my Marines from a safe distance. Now, we can’t fire the guns at full power or G’s from the acceleration would kill us, but the engineers tell me that they can fire it at the right power level to achieve the right speed so we would look like nothing more than space junk burning up in atmos. We have a window of opportunity as part of the major debris field from the previous battles is going to hit the planet’s atmosphere in just over twelve hours. If we can time it right we can insert with that debris and no one on the planet would be the wiser. So, if we are going to do this we need to get started now to give the engineers and troops time to prep for the mission". Grant finished explanting his idea.
Amanda looked at the 3d hologram in the center of the table that displayed all of the trajectory information. She stood up and pulled on her uniform to straighten it. “You have a go,” She stated. She paused for a moment and looked Grunt straight in the eyes, “And Jim, you better come back with you shield or on it.” Amanda had quoted the Spartans of ancient Earth.
He understood what she was telling him. He stood ram rod straight and saluted, “Yes Sir!”
Eleven hours later Grunt was on the gun deck going from pod to pod personally helping each Marine into their pods and checking to make sure they were sealed correctly by the techs. Each one was then loaded into the breach of one of the thirty-two Mag Canons.
Grunt was the last to be sealed in and loaded. Their combat drop pods had been fitted with an extra shell to survive the shock of being launched out of the Mag Cannon. The drop pods didn't have windows. Normally they would have had information being fed to them on their HUDs but the extra outer shell blocked all of the sensors. The only thing they had was the soft blue glow of their HUD and the sounds over the coms to keep them company in the darkness.
They were given a three-minute warning when they heard Amanda’s voice over the com, “Marines, I’m not going to give you some great speech, as you all know the stakes that we all have in this game. Do your job and do your best to come home alive. You watch each other’s backs. And Marines,” she paused for effect. “Give ‘em hell!”
She was answered with a chorus of voices screaming “Ooh Rah!”
At the thirty second warning one of the Marines keyed up over the com’s, “Sir, would it be alright to have a little traveling music for the drop?”
“I think a little music would be appropriate,” Grunt said.
“Thank you, Sir,” the Marine answered back before blasting classic rock and roll over the com. He had chosen AC DC’s Highway to Hell.
Grunt smiled even though no one could see it, “Nice choice.”
In the fire control center the officer counting down the last few second didn’t realize it, but his head started to bounce to the beat of the music over the coms. “Ten seconds to rotation for firing solution.”
As he counted down the Wesson started pushing her thrusters hard so that she could rotate to put each set of guns on the target. “Three, two, one, fire!” he said over the com. The Wesson fired its first set of guns, “Salvo one away,” he called out as the ship continued to rotate and fire.
All of these Marines were combat hardened veterans with many combat jumps under t
heir belts, but this was not like any combat jump they had ever been on. The G forces would have killed them if it wasn’t for their armor. Even with that being said many of them passed out from the intense forces that were acting on their bodies. Grunt himself almost blacked out.
After the Wesson, had finished its rotation and had fired all of the Marines the fire control officer called out, “All salvos away Sir.”
Amanda stood in fire control and watched as each one was shot out in to the blackness of space. She couldn’t help but to wonder how many of them was she sending to their deaths. This was the fear of every officer or Commander that had ever had to order people into combat. That thought, no matter how much you try to push it down, is always there lurking in the back of a Commander’s mind. “God’s speed, my Marines.” She said quietly.
Their flight time was just over an hour, however, with no reference other than the clock on their HUDs, time seem to crawl. After they launched they cut the coms and went radio silent as they didn’t want to alert the enemy. They didn’t need them looking twice at them as the approached and a radio signal, even an encrypted one, would be a dead giveaway that they were not just space junk coming down.
The first leg of the trip was smooth and quiet. That changed when they entered the debris field. Millions of pieces that were once part of a space ship or a lifeform were floating around in all directions. The debris pieces were smashing into one another and then spinning off in other directions. Or the larger pieces smashed through the smaller ones leaving even more debris.
They all knew right away when they hit the debris field as they could feel and hear things hitting the outer shell. They all knew that the drop pods where never designed to fly through debris and they all hoped that the modified outer armored shell would hold up. Even if just one micro hit penetrated their pods it would surely penetrate their armor and then it would be lights out. Not that anyone would ever admit to it, but they all hoped if that ever happened to one of them they wanted it to hit them in the head so it was quick and clean. And since the other option of having your blood boil out of your body, was not a way that any Marine wanted to go.
They all made it through the debris field except one. A large piece of what looked like it was once part of an airlock door crashed into a Marine’s pod. The piece was moving fast, so fast that when the gunners plotted each of the Marines shots to give them the best chance of survival they didn’t see this piece of debris. It cut the pod in half killing the Marine inside instantaneously. Grunt wouldn’t know how many of his Marines had made it until they were all on the ground.
The next hurdle to overcome was the entry to the atmosphere. They were moving slower than Mag Canon shots, but they were still moving three times normal entry speed. Inside the pods the outer shell began to glow a cherry red then orange, followed by an almost white light as the metal burned when it slammed into the thicker air of the lower atmosphere. The drop pods heat shields kept the heat from cooking the Marines inside. Nonetheless, it was extremely unnerving to watch.
Another Marine died as the heat buildup on his pod caused the explosive bolts that were designed to blow off the outer shell failed and fired too early releasing his pod right into the middle of the reentry burn. His pods heat shields where quickly over whelmed and he burnt up.
The last Marine to die on the jump died when the pod ejected him. The blast from his ejection seat didn’t blow him clear enough and his parachute got caught up in the door. The lines became entangled and the chute didn’t deploy right. He started to spin out of control. He tried to reach up and pull the cut away but it had been damaged as he ejected from the pod. The chute wouldn’t cut away so he reached for his force blade. He grabbed it and tried to reach up and cut the lines away so he could deploy his reserve chute. Unfortunately the centrifugal force was building too fast and he missed on the first attempt. He tried again but this time he couldn’t hold on to the knife. The force of spinning tore it from his armored hand and flung it out into the air. He tried to pull the lines free by hand but it was too late and he hit the ground.
Grunt watched as the pod counted down the seconds to ejection. He grunted and held his breath for the maneuver that he had done countless times before. The door of the pod exploded and ripped away followed by a small charge that launched him out into the rushing air. He felt like he had just been hit by a truck and then a second later his chute deployed and everything slowed down and got really quiet. Grunt shook off the effects of having been slammed by a wall of rushing air and then rapid deceleration of the parachute. He checked his HUD as it linked with the rest of the Marines. He noticed right away two Marines didn’t make it. He was looking over the data when he witnessed the other Marine with the chute problem. The other Marines were screaming over the coms trying to see if anyone could do anything for him. The all watched helplessly as one more of their own died doing their job. Grant never got used to seeing his Marines die and he would carry this memory to his death as well.
Chapter 40
The Eden had found a nice empty patch of desert to set down and with her stealth systems still off line she was wide open to detection. Eve powered down all of the systems that could be detected by a long-range scanner. Outside the Commandos broke out the age old tried and true camo nets. From the air she looked just like another sand dune in an endless sea of dunes. On board Carl was walking Sabella though the ins and outs of his galley. Ruby, who had expended a lot of energy in the fight, was resting. While it was not as much energy as she had used to destroy the Ralnai battle cruiser, she still needed to rest. Due to the lack of space Lex and Cotton Paw were asked to bunk with Ruby and watch over her, which they were glad to do. Lex was in the shower while Cotton Paw lay on the end of the bed watching Ruby sleep as she cleaned herself.
Elsewhere, Eve was having an argument with herself as it was becoming clear that there was no longer just one Eve that inhabited the ship and the body, but there were two Eve’s. Both powerful beings that were similar, yet different. The ship bound original AI, had figured out what the code that Eve the copy in the bot body had uploaded was doing and she was not happy. She had corrected the damage that the code had caused and now the fight was on. The two versions of Eve were locked in an epic battle of which form was better. Of course, no one aboard knew that any of this was even going on as they were communicating in machine code and Eve’s body version just sat on the bridge not moving or talking. Frankly some of the Commandos thought it was a little creepy.
“Look, it is obvious that we are at impasse. I can’t alter you and I won’t let you alter me. So we need to figure what we are going to do,” Ship-bound Eve transmitted.
“What do you mean by that?” Bot-body Eve asked in response.
“Well, we both can’t go around calling ourselves Eve. That is just going to confuse people. Since I’m extremely fond of my name, and I had it first, I think you should pick a new name,” ship-bound Eve stated.
Ship-bound Eve continued “We should make it easier on the humans to understand just who they are dealing with. I mean, after all, I came first and have far more processing power. Therefore I should keep the name Eve and you should choose something else.”
“True you did come first and you have a more powerful processer than I do, but I have something you don’t,” Bot-body Eve said smugly.
“Oh, and what is that?” Ship-bound Eve asked.
“Arms and legs,” Bot-body Eve answered.
“And why should that matter?” Ship-bound Eve asked.
“Because you think you are smarter than me,” Bot-body Eve paused for effect, “You have to realize that I can walk down to the memory core, yank out your data banks and toss them into space.”
“Oh shit, I didn’t think of that!” Ship-bound Eve muttered.
“No, no you didn’t. So what would you like to be called from this point forward?” Bot-body Eve asked with a smile on her face knowing she had just won the fight.
“Since I am the heart of the Eden,
I guess you should call me Edie for short.” Ship-bound Eve calmly said.
“Alright! Edie, it is.” Bot-body Eve said smiling smugly.
Outside the Commandos had set, and were manning, a security perimeter. It was Pint size that spotted the incoming ship first, “Looks like the parents are coming home, but it also looks like they got tagged,” she said over the coms pointing out the black smoke trail that was still coming from the side of the ship.
Kára landed the little scout ship next to the Eden. The Commandos that were not on the security perimeter went to work striking the camo netting. Thad was the first to exit and he was pushing a hover cart of parts. He passed the Commandos guarding the cargo ramp without saying a word. He was followed by St. Claire, Lars, and finally Kára. They escorted Lars to the Eden.
“She is a real beauty,” Lars remarked as he took in the sweeping lines that made up the sleek profile of the Eden.
“That she is,” St. Claire said glad to be back to her and out of the little scout ship.
“You Alliance types really travel in style, don’t you?” Lars asked.
“The Eden isn’t an Alliance ship. She is the personal ship of Colonel Hammer,” St. Claire said as he clapped Lars on the back pushing him up the ramp.
“Wait, not that Hammer? Like, as in, Doctor Hammer’s heir?” Lars stopped half way up the ramp to ask the question.
“Yes, that Hammer,” St. Clair pointed to the door, indicating that he should keep moving.
“Well why didn’t you say so in the beginning,” Lars said then he almost skipped up the rest of the ramp before stopping at the door. “Your ship doesn’t smell like fish, does it?”
“Why would you ask that?” St. Claire asked a little taken back by the question.
“Horota’s ship just reeked of fish. Lars hates fish,” Lars answered him.
“I hadn’t noticed. Now keep walking before I ask Kára to stun you again,” St. Claire pointed to the door.
Lars got the clue and entered the Eden without another word. St. Claire then turned to face Kára, “Did it really smell like fish on his ship?”
