The Vanguard Emerges (Maraukian War Book 2)

by Michael Chatfield

  The mind was an odd machine. He pushed that from his mind, a big smile on his face and a story to tell others. His seat moved forward and he ran his hands over the familiar controls, taking over from Bobbie.

  “Trip information to your NIAI— just take us in,” Young said. Although NIAIs had replaced the need for a secondary position in civilian ships and shuttles, there was no replacement for another ass in the seat on a combat mission.

  NIAIs were technology and might fail; having two people aboard served to make sure everything went smoothly.

  With the mergers, the co-pilots were not only there to assist the captain of the vessel but to also assist those on the ground, make sure that they had what was needed, lend their help to fire control and they could also link into the Ares fighters that were onboard the Moby as the Ares fighters would be closer to the drop-ships than the carrier. They would have a greater command and control of the fighter with the reduced distance between the two.

  Yu checked on what was happening with the legionnaires and the mergers. They were pushing forward hard, using the opening that the Ares fighters had given them to gain some more depth and give the people of Edani some more room between them and the apes.

  ***

  Lila held onto her daughter’s arm as they were corralled through the city center, nothing but a backpack on her shoulders and a smaller water carrier on her daughter’s. “You okay, Macie?” She looked down to the bedraggled and frightened youngster.

  Macie’s wide eyes stared up at her, and Lila gasped. Blood streaked her child’s face. “Were you hit?” She stopped suddenly in the midst of the crowd and was buffeted to the side of the street by others before she even knew it.

  Macie started crying, but all Lila could do was hold her to her chest and try her best not to panic. There was nothing she could visibly see on her daughter’s face or neck that belied she’d been injured.

  “Please, ma’am, keep moving.”

  Lila looked to the legionnaire who pointed down the street. They’d been walking and running for hours—when was this nightmare going to be over?

  That’s when the explosions around them worsened. The sky itself lit up and gray lines spread out. Fire erupted as the building to her left shook. Debris and dust filled the air. Lila choked and then saw the rubble heading down. She wasn’t sure which way would be best to run, but she sure as hell tried. “Hold on, baby,” she whispered, holding her daughter close. “Cover your head. We’ll get through this.”

  The large plaster and concrete pieces slammed into the pathway ahead. Lila choked out a scream as several things struck her from behind. She tried not to let the pain wracking her body get to her, but blood oozed from a cut in the side of her head. Lila’s knees gave way and she fell, just managing to keep hold of Macie as she did.

  Then, turning to face the sky, she saw her ending. The concrete headed her way was not going to move. With a shove, Lila pushed her daughter away from her, shouting out, “RUN!” as she did so.

  Macie ran a few short steps as the concrete slammed behind her.

  Lila’s cries were heard no more.

  Chapter 26

  Edani Northern Wall

  Indalia, Otarvi system

  7/3555

  Mark watched as the Ares fighters dropped from orbit, carving through atmosphere and toward the valley. They made no pause as they came right over the drop-ships.

  “We’ve got support coming in! Have your people ready to advance. This is where we make the Maraukians dance to our fucking tune!” Mark turned and rose from where he’d been hiding. Twin gray streams connected him to the Maraukians. Four more went down as Mark jumped for cover, rounds tearing through where he had just been.

  “All right, you ugly bastards! We’ve gone through a lot, you’re tired, you’re hurting, and you need a fucking shower! Trust me, I can smell it from here!” Quina said, her legionnaires listening to her. A number of their brothers and sisters weren’t making it back from this fight and others were classed as unknown as they’d been pulled back to the rear lines. They’d done damned well by themselves to do as they had. They all knew it.

  If they hadn’t trusted in their leadership that hadn’t in turn relied on them, then they would have been a broken legion over the mountains to the east of Edani.

  “But you’re fucking legionnaires! This is what we do—we stand in front of the people we are entrusted with protecting, standing next to our brothers and sisters! Either we keep retreating all the way back to Edani, letting the Maraukians rage among those of the city. Or we push forward! We take these ape fucks and we show them what a fucking shield wall is. We show them what it means to come up against the legion!” Quina’s voice rose, gaining momentum with each word. As she finished, her men and women—her legionnaires—roared.

  They might be just humans, they might be scared, hurt and afraid, but they knew something else: they were legionnaires, part of a group of people few could call home, and those who did found a brotherhood and sisterhood.

  The sounds of Ares engines filled the air, growing closer and closer with each second.

  “Mergers! Up!” Mark yelled, rising from his position of cover to lay fire into the Maraukians in front of him. Instead of dropping down, he moved forward.

  The forest was filled with tracers fighting one another, green and silver bisecting one another. Explosives dotted the landscape. Trees that were nothing more than large splinters splattered the landscape; the smoke of battle covered the valley as walls of dirt were thrown into the air.

  The mergers advanced; joining into one whole, they fired, covering one another and moving from cover to cover. Their M20s lit up the Maraukians, keeping them at bay.

  “Centurions, to your people! Thirty-Ninth, with me!” Quina yelled, more war goddess than human.

  Legionnaires rose from their foxholes, craters, and crude trenches, their M19s in their shoulder as they fired on the Maraukians.

  The air seemed to shift as explosions wrecked the area. Ares fighters now moved in, low and dangerous.

  Tracers colored the valley, as weapons fire was exchanged between the two forces. The people were invisible but the tracer pinpointed their location.

  Anti-matter missiles and heavy rail guns fired from above, tearing through the Maraukian lines.

  “Use the cover! The Ares soften them up—we take ’em down!” Mark yelled.

  The mergers ranged ahead, feeding information to the legionnaires, using them as support as they were able to continue straight into the teeth of the Maraukians.

  “Covering!” Mark yelled, laying down fire as mergers rushed past him, using their anti-gravity and their suits to power forward, shooting the entire time.

  They broke down into teams, covering one another and advancing. A shockwave, channeled through the valley, washed over them. The legionnaires fought to keep their footing while the mergers fought onward.

  Mark winced as he felt the connection go dead to one of his mergers, feeling their last thoughts and emotions before they disappeared.

  A missile came out of nowhere, hitting Jarek just as he started to rush forward. Mark’s vision slowed as he saw the missile tear Jarek’s armor apart, getting to him inside.

  He flopped to the ground, his last thoughts of shock and bewilderment as his life signs went black, showing that he was no longer with the living.

  “Mark!” Sarah yelled, taking over his suit and throwing him sideways into a crater. Rounds cut through where he’d just been. Shock at being yanked out of harm’s way filled his mind

  “You okay?” Sarah and Ava asked together.

  “Fine. I just need to kill something,” Mark thought back to her. Even his thoughts were hoarse as he bit back on his emotion.

  He sunk deeper into the merge, no longer a person, but an entity of three: suit, man, and NIAI.

  He came out of the crater, firing and moving, not pausing once as he charged forward. As he reached the Maraukians, he didn’t slow his speed at all. He rushed f
orward, his guns blasting away. Blue blood splashed on his armor as he used the M20s as bats. He turned in the air, grabbing one M20 and one sword. His every action was cold and calculated. The more his rage built, the calmer he became, his revenge exacting and terrible.

  None of the Maraukians were left alive in his path, blue blood and lifeless corpses around him. Feeding off that rage, the other mergers surged forward, rage fueling them and their actions.

  The legionnaires seemed to sense the anger and the bloodlust in the air, losing themselves as they raced forward. Legionnaires were always the losers when coming up against the Maraukians, but here—here they were unstoppable, gods in their own right.

  The Ares had thinned out the Maraukians. Against the 4,500 remaining legionnaires, they weren’t able to put up nearly any resistance.

  Mark jumped up and smashed his fist into a Maraukian’s face. He grabbed their neck, hitting the stunned Maraukian again and again as blue blood covered his armor, riding the Maraukian to the ground until they stopped moving.

  Mark flung himself to the side. Rounds ripped through where he had been hitting the now dead Maraukian’s body.

  Mark came out of his roll, his M20s extending as a stream of silver rounds tore through several Maraukians.

  Mark ran forward through the chaos of the battlefield. He drew his sword. With a yell, he ducked low, bringing his sword up and under a Maraukian’s guard, cutting them in two. He swung his blade over, cutting through another Maraukian’s weapon; reversing the blade, he drove it through the Maraukian’s chin. Mark tore the blade free and jumped to his side, hitting a Maraukian in the side with his shoulder. The Maraukian, who had been shooting at another merger, was confused as his aim went off target and he fell to the ground.

  Mark turned his M20, snapping into place as several rounds hit the Maraukian point-blank in the face.

  Mark continued the charge forward. This was where the mergers showed that they weren’t humans anymore. Even across the chaotic battlefield, they coordinated with one another perfectly. Their reaction speed and strength allowed them to fight up close with the Maraukians.

  Axes, blades, even mono-wires and daggers were used by the mergers. Anything and everything was a weapon, even their own bodies. If they lost a weapon, they’d tear one from a Maraukian or use their body to fight.

  “Line!” Mark called out.

  They had moved through the forward ranks of the Maraukians. As a rule, the Maraukians closest to the front would be standing up with their weapons in hand. Those that came behind would usually be still down, ready to run and move fast, or standing up without a hand on their weapons.

  Clearing out the front line, now the mergers were greeted by the unarmed Maraukians.

  The mergers took a knee; their M20s snapped together. The world seemed to turn silver as their M20s fired round after round.

  Maraukians were cut down. Without weapons in their hands, they didn’t even have the capability to shoot back.

  “Advance!” Mark barked.

  Half the mergers moved forward, stopping as one and taking a knee; then the other half moved ahead of them, maintaining a line at all times.

  The Maraukians were like wheat before the scythe. With no way to fight back, they were blown back by the thousands of rounds that tore through the Indalia undergrowth and Maraukians.

  The legionnaires weren’t out of the fight either. They fired through the gaps between the mergers, laying down supporting fire.

  In battle, this kind of work needed skill, absolute trust, and fearless dedication.

  The mergers were advancing right into the Maraukians’ teeth while their friendly forces fired just a few feet on either side of them.

  The legionnaires’ fire started to slow as they could no longer see targets. The Maraukians that had been bunched up together were cleared up, leaving just the roaming bands of Maraukians that were slowly drifting forward.

  These were the dregs at the rear of the Maraukian formations.

  “Chyna, have your contubernium hold the rear. Ava, support him!” Mark’s rage and anger had subsided but he still glanced to where Jarek’s armor was. It continued to repair itself even as its user was dead.

  “Maps,” Mark said to Sarah. Information flooded his mind as he was updated on everything.

  “Quina.” There was a clicking noise as Mark was connected to Quina.

  “Mark?”

  “This seems to be the best we’re going to get. I’m going to pull my people back to Edani and dig in. Take your forces and start marching through Edani to Ducharev. The different transports can get you guys on your way back, reduce the time to get on board and get the hell out of here,” Mark said.

  “Got it.” Quina’s words were harsh as she understood what Mark wasn’t saying. “We’ve got a bunch of ammo—do you want it?”

  “If you could drop it at Edani, we’d appreciate it. Make sure you have enough to deal with anything that comes at you on the run.”

  “Yeah.” Quina took a moment to collect herself. “I’ll get my people organized.”

  Chapter 27

  Edani Northern Wall

  Indalia, Otarvi System

  7/3555

  “What kind of information do we have from the other mountain passes and the major openings to the north and south?” Mark asked.

  “We’ve got what the space legion tells us and then what our own scouts tell us. Our biggest problem is that we’re covering such a large area that we can’t be watching everything,” Quina said. “This is something that will only get worse as we pull people back. We’re going to need to pull people from the sides back first and then through the center.”

  “Shit, you don’t have any remote sensing platforms?” Mark asked.

  “We do, but then these hills are pretty damn good at stopping signals. To communicate to most of my people, I have to keep drop-ships running behind the lines to relay my messages and act as transmission towers. Now that the satellites are gone, it’s getting much harder to pass information and know what the fuck is going on.”

  “To confirm—you don’t have a way to communicate on the ground?” Mark asked.

  “We don’t. See, we’ve never heard of a Maraukian ship making it into the protected systems. Why would we keep maintaining expensive equipment buried in the ground that is hard to get to, rather than a satellite in the sky that can last ten times as long and won’t need much maintenance because it’s in vacuum?”

  Mark grunted.

  “You need anything else?” Quina asked.

  “I think we’re good. We’ll be moving up to the position. We’re going to be calling down orbital drops for ammunition. We don’t know how long we’ll be able to hold the wall for, but as we start moving back, it would be an idea to start pulling your people back,” Mark said.

  “I’ll have my people start making more defensive locations to pull back. We won’t be able to make many.” The map moved from the defensive wall that had been compromised and to a place where the valley came together. To one side there was a deep river; the other side was filled with rough ground. “This is the next best place to mount a defense if you need to pull back in a hurry. Most of the trails and the different entrances come back there. We didn’t mount our defense there because after that, there’s nothing until you meet the city.”

  “We’ll call that fallback one. When you guys bug out or if we’re getting pushed too hard, then we’ll have to move back to there,” Mark said.

  “Okay, you need anything more from me?” Quina looked from Mark to all of those in the landing bay.

  “We’re good. We’ll get boarded up and drop in and see what we can do,” Mark said. “Could we get the support of your artillery park?”

  “You have it,” Quina said.

  “Can we be authorized for anti-matter rounds?”

  Quina was a bit shocked by the question. Most people shied away from using anti-matter weapons. They were so damned powerful that they would strike the fear of the
gods into a man or woman who saw them.

  “Centurion, I feel like I have to warn you in the usage of anti-matter warheads.” Even Quina was hesitant to use the weapons of destruction.

  “Legate, the power source for our armor is an anti-matter power source. We are well aware of what happens with anti-matter warheads. Our strength doesn’t come from our stronger weapons, although it is an advantage. It is because we are able to communicate nearly instantaneously with one another. If we can’t access all that we might be able to use, then it’s as if we’re fighting with one hand behind our back,” Mark said.

  Quina let out a heavy breath, looking at all of the men and women in front of her. She couldn’t see their features, only their towering armor that was darker than space itself.

  “Fine.” She nodded. They had come in her people’s time of need. What they needed, they would get; if it was to kill them in the future, it wouldn’t be her fault.

  She also felt that although they were talking about all of this in a relaxed manner, as soon as they were on the front line it would be a different matter.

  “Thank you, Legate. Then we have a drop-ship to get,” Mark said.

  The different suits turned and boarded the ships. Once again, the engines of the drop-ships came alive as the ramps started to close behind the last of the mergers.

  Quina watched as they rose upward and then shot forward, out of the city, traveling the opposite direction of the flying vessels that were hauling people toward the safety that Ducharev promised.

  She looked to the picturesque mountains that she had grown up in as a kid. In the distance, she could see the flashes of explosions, the dust rising from impact, and the haze that surrounded the areas where the worst fighting had happened.

  She steeled her heart and continued jogging with the rest of her legionnaires.