“Aye, ma'am,” Perry said with relish, his hands working the controls he had been forced to abandon long ago, old skills returning as he delicately guided the missiles towards their approaching target. First one winked out, two warheads mutually destroying each other, then another. Finally, with a triumphant punch in the air, he guided his remaining missile in, knocking out two members of the enemy salvo.
One track remained, still doggedly locked on Daedalus, and Scott began to use every trick she new, sending the ship tumbling around, lurching on its thrusters in a likely-futile attempt to fool the missile's guidance computer. Harper tried to hack in again, but now she was engaged in a one-on-one battle with an enemy sysop who knew his systems far better than she did, easily countering his blows.
Sitting back in her chair, she frantically thought over old battles, knowing that she was out of ideas, but hoping that she could steal one from someone else, before her eyes lit up. She turned to Ingram at the rear, the nervous technician staring at the approaching missile.
“Spaceman, stand by to launch one of the escape pods.”
Scott laughed, and said, “Kris, that's crazy.”
“You have a better idea?”
Shaking her head, the helmsman returned to her console, leveling out the ship, as Ingram pulled down a panel, turning a key, his hand poised over a button. Getting the idea, Perry brought up the guidance computer, entering a series of instructions to the primitive guidance computer of the escape pod, giving Harper a curt nod.
“Ready. It's going to take split-second timing, though.”
She looked at Ingram, then said, “Switch over to me, Spaceman. I'll do it.”
“Yes, ma'am,” he said, throwing a control in relief. She looked at the missile, locked onto their engines, still inexorably closing on their position, and at the last second, tapped the control to fire the escape pod in its way, Perry's programming sending the pod's thrusters on a quick pirouette through space as the missile crashed into it.
Alarms sounded as debris peppered the rear hull, sirens alerting her to a series of hull breaches, mercifully in unoccupied areas. Daedalus passed out of firing range to the collective relief of her crew, and Harper moved back to the command couch, wiping the sweat from her forehead. She looked up at the sensor display, the shuttles ahead diving towards the retreating transport, course projections providing some good news for once.
“I don't believe it,” Arkhipov said. “We made it through.”
“The fun isn't over yet, Spaceman,” Harper said. “Kat, execute the swing around the moon, and take us back towards the planet.” Before anyone could protest, she added, “They'll be another wave of shuttles coming up any time now, and they'll need an escort. We've still got work to do.”
“Aye, ma'am,” Scott said. “Executing course change.”
Sitting back in her couch, Harper looked around the bridge, watching the technicians working, the monitor board showing the damage they had already taken from a single missile. Only a madman would go in again for a second try. She shook her head as the engines fired, taking them back into the battle.
Chapter 20
It had taken seconds for the battle to collapse into chaos. Cooper hadn't even tried to impose any order, knowing that it would be a futile waste of time, instead ordering his platoon into fire teams, trusting his squad leaders to do their job. Over at the landing pads, he heard the roaring of another group of shuttles fighting for orbit, their engines sweeping across the field, getting another hundred refugees to safety. Salazar was getting them off the ground as rapidly as he could, but only so many shuttles could be in the sky at once.
Leading a rag-tag group of Neander under the command of Lance-Corporal Akjes, he raced to the far left of the rapidly shrinking defensive perimeter, towards a group of Xandari attempting to set up a missile launcher that could ruin all of their hopes. The screams of the dying echoed around the field as he half-tripped over a corpse, a frozen soldier with rifle in hand, defiance on his face even unto death. He might have given his life, but hundreds of his fellow Neander were getting away.
Raising his rifle to his shoulder, he fired a ball of plasma flame towards the enemy, watching it wash over the Xandari gunners, the rest of his squad finishing them off with a burst of well-aimed rifle fire. Pausing for a second to look at his datapad, he frowned as he saw that the most recent orbital update was minutes old. Alamo had left orbit on its way to intercept the approaching task force, leaving him without any support from the sky.
Not that it mattered. A quick sweep of the field showed him the tactical situation, which could be summed up in a single word. Desperate. The defenders were fleeing the field to take to their ships, and the Xandari were perilously close to outnumbering them as well as outgunning them. A tower of flame leaped to the sky as another dome went up, over on the far side of the landing field. Now only a defiant pair of habitation modules were still standing, the remnants of a once-proud settlement.
Pulling out his communicator, he ordered, “Fall back to the field! Go to reserve positions! Move it!” Gesturing at the rest of his squad, he moved to obey his own command. Seeking out the enemy and hitting them wasn't going to work, not any more, and the Neander control structure had collapsed when Salazar had knocked the now-missing Lostok cold. He saw Kelot, the nearest thing they had to a commander on the ground, leading another charge against a series of enemy machine gun nests, desperation taking the place of strategy, and gestured for him to fall back.
Corporal Stewart had managed to throw up a wall of crates, stores that hadn't been deemed essential enough for urgent transport to orbit, around the perimeter of the landing pad. As he dived behind the improvised cover, he tapped the box, suppressing an urge to laugh at the pitifully flimsy structure they had put together. It might block line-of-sight, but it wasn't going to stop a bullet. He looked back at the landing field, a couple of dozen shuttles still boarding their passengers, explosions ripping through the air all around them as the Xandari artillery found its mark. While he watched, one of them smashed into a small passenger transport, and he saw bodies being tossed through the air like sacks as the shuttle exploded.
The defenders didn't seem to be faring any better. He caught a glimpse of First Squad, six figures racing back to shelter, Corporal Stewart carrying another trooper over her shoulder, while Yaskova limped at the rear of the column, dropping to the ground with a scream as he watched, Price turning back under heavy fire to attempt a rescue. Raising his rifle, Cooper unleashed a blast of plasma in his direction, towards the unseen enemy that was laying down sweeping fire, and the brave trooper snatched her from the ground, staggering over the barricade, blood seeping from a wound in his back.
“Sergeant Hunt!” he yelled, not expecting an answer, but the smiling veteran raced over towards him, rifle in hand, sporting an angry welt on his forehead and a cut on his cheek.
“Here, sir!” Hunt replied, gesturing at the gathering Xandari. They'd paused for a moment to regroup, ready to make their final assault. “Going to be one hell of a last stand, sir!”
Another shuttle roared from the deck, the pilot swooping low over the enemy in an attempt to provide brief relief for the troops, the blast of his lateral thrusters sweeping a group of Xandari to the ground as he watched. The pilot paid the price for his bravery, a rocket sliding up through the air towards him, but Hunt raised his rifle and fired, shooting down the anti-aircraft missile with one smooth motion, the shuttle rocking to the side from the force of the blast before continuing its ascent into orbit.
Looking around, Cooper said, “Volley fire, everyone! Ten more shuttles for the refugees, then it's our turn. No one on the perimeter leaves until the last civilian is away!” Some of the Neander looked at each other, Cooper suddenly conscious that all of them were volunteers, pressed into service for the duration of the battle, but Kelot, who had somehow survived his brush with near-certain death a moment before, yelled a battl
e cry that urged them on, and they turned back to the approaching enemy with renewed dedication.
Gunfire and flame roared from the defense line, sweeping across the front ranks of the enemy, dozens of Xandari dropping to the ground, either in a bid to escape the devastating counter-fire or from wounds they would never rise from. Over to the right, a cloud of smoke rose, roaring flame punctuated by screams of anguished agony, some of the men under his command dying where they stood.
If it was as simple as resisting a ground assault, they might have a chance at holding them back, but with bombardment from above joining the fray, survival on the firing line was measured in minutes, maybe seconds. Two more shuttles launched, this time vertically rising, and he belatedly remembered Salazar, out beyond the perimeter at his bunker. Rescue was out of the question, certain death for any party he sent, and all he could do was hope that the Xandari were focused on the attack on this flank, that all of their fire was drawn here, and they were ignoring the forgotten outpost beyond.
When the battle began, he had hundreds of soldiers scattered across more than a mile of battlefield. Now the scope of his command reduced only to what he could see through the scope of his rifle, his capability limited to the seven shots remaining in his power pack. He spotted a clump of enemy troopers surging forward, and unleashed a plasma bolt in their direction, searing death wiping them from the field.
In response, four more blasts rocked the field, another shuttle exploding on its launch pad, the others hitting the perimeter. The air tasted of smoke and cordite, growing so thick that visibility was poor, even with the snow that continued to fall, the weather ignoring the acts of the men fighting underneath it.
He glanced from left to right, the grim-faced Hunt taking a shot at a nearby Xandari raider, Specialist Reeves attempting first aid on a fallen Neander one-handed, his right arm hanging limp. The rest of his men were out of sight, obscured by the smoke and fire, and it was easy for him to imagine that they was alone on the battlefield, everyone else left for safer reaches.
The roar of shuttle engines broke through the glare, and he saw two more vehicles fly over the battlefield, one of them rocking from side-to-side, dipping its wings in a last gesture of appreciation for the pilot. Three more refugee shuttles to go, before he could start ordering the remnants of his own command to safety. He spent a second cursing Lostok, and all the others who had made this desperate battle a necessity, before reaching down for his communicator.
He fired twice more with his rifle, two more balls of energy racing towards their targets as a shell crashed into the ground close behind him, a burst of flame soaring into the air, an unknown figure using his last breath to scream in agony. Then, mercifully, the last of the refugee shuttles rose into the sky, kicking its engines into maximum acceleration in a bid to reach safety, to make for the sanctuary of orbit.
“That's the last of them,” he yelled into his communicator, hoping and praying that his voice was making it across the last shards of the tactical net. He had to keep some sort of order from the chaos, and knew that there was only one option left. “Neander to their ships. Espatiers to the perimeter.”
Hunt looked at him, nodding. No matter how well they had fought, there was no order to the Neander ranks, and a rout was almost inevitable in the circumstances. His own command, whatever was left of it, would be the last to leave this world, no matter how unfair it felt.
Turning to the rear, he saw dozens of Neander racing back to the heart of the perimeter, while a roar of plasma fire burst in all directions from the perimeter, the battlefield briefly illuminated a violent green as the pulses of deaths rained down on the Xandari. They might win back this world, but they were paying a desperate price for it.
Somehow, the retreat was holding together, the wounded being dragged to safety. Some of the Neander had disobeyed his order, remaining at their posts, fighting alongside the Espatiers, and it came as no surprise at all that Kelot was one of them, hurling an improvised grenade over the barricade towards the advancing foe.
As one, five shuttles roared, taking the bulk of the Neander to safety, and the Xandari held for a moment, as if knowing that most of their prey had escaped, and that by a strange process of natural selection, only the deadliest remained on the battlefield to deny them their prize. With one last look around, spotting a tattered flag waving in the air, somehow surviving all of the enemy fire, he knew that the time had come.
“That's all, folks!” he yelled. “Fall back to the shuttles!”
Hunt rose to his feet while Cooper prepared for one last burst, willing to cover the retreat of his men, but the veteran refused to give him that option, two pairs of hands dragging him away. Accepting defeat, he sprinted for the shuttle, the inviting hatch waiting for him, Hunt and Kelot on either side. The engines began to roar, lateral thrusters firing at minimal power, and he thought for a second that it was too late, that the shuttle had been forced to launch, but before he quite realized it, they were at the hatch, bullets smashing across the field behind him, the Xandari urging them on.
He pushed Hunt inside, then Kelot, and stood at the door for one last second, looking around, hundreds of corpses scattered around, Neander, Confederate and Xandari, all together in death. He had no way of knowing how many of his people were left behind, some of them perhaps only wounded, not killed, but as a bullet crashed into the hatch by his head, he knew that he was out of time, and tumbled back into the cabin as the door closed, the pilot not waiting even for a second before activating the launch sequence, the ground rushing away as the airlock slid shut.
Silently, he stepped back into the passenger cabin, slumping down on one of the couches, his rifle dropping unneeded to the deck. He looked around the room, a dozen faces staring back at him, more than half of them Neander who had chosen to share the last moments of the battle with his men. He glanced down at his datapad, hoping for a tactical update, but the screen had been smashed by a bullet in the last seconds of the melee, the gadget unknowingly saving his life.
The engines roared as they kicked into orbit, and he looked out of the view-port to see four more points of light ascending alongside him. Six shuttles had been left to pick up the last of the survivors, and five of them were rising. Only Salazar and his team remained on the surface, and he could hear his friend's voice coming from the pilot's cabin, issuing instructions to guide them to safety. He could only hope that at some point, he'd find a way to save himself.
“Cup of coffee, sir?” a voice asked, and he looked up to see Spaceman Fitzroy, a smile on his face, offering him a steaming plastic cup. He took it with a nod, and looked down at the deck, numb from the battle. As the planet fell away behind him, he struggled to take it in. They'd lived through it. And for the rest of his life, he'd not quite know how.
Chapter 21
Salazar placed down the microphone, then looked up at the sensor display, smiling with satisfaction as the last of the shuttles crested into orbit, a flotilla of vessels making their way to safety. Outside, the battle was dying down, a few isolated pockets of resistance being defeated by the Xandari, some of the Neander who had been unable to make it to the shuttles, or perhaps had decided that vengeance was preferable to survival. He looked around the bunker at a fidgeting Rhodes and a calm Maqua, before rising to his feet.
“That's it, boys. We've done our duty, and can do no more. It's time to go.”
“At last,” Rhodes said, looking through the door. “Our shuttle is still there, though I don't know how. Let me go first and draw their fire, and the two of you run for it after me. I'll give them a few bursts to keep them interested.”
“It's all a damn act, isn't it,” Salazar replied. “That performance you usually put on.”
“Don't tell Ensign Cooper, sir,” the trooper said with a grin. “Heaven knows what sort of things he'd make me do if he knew.” He raced out onto the battlefield, screaming his head off and firing controlled bursts
of semi-automatic fire, and Salazar followed him, Maqua right by his side as they dashed for the shuttle, the hatch open and waiting for them. The wings were blackened with smoke from a near-miss, and there were a series of bullet marks running down the side of the ship, but as far as he could tell, it was ready for take-off. Not that they had much of a choice.
As they sprinted across the battlefield, he saw a wounded Neander crying on the ground, and with a quick glance at Maqua, they weaved to the side, snatching him up, carrying him to the shuttle, the injured man's arm dragging on the ground, waving a strange snake-like trail through the snow. Rhodes looked at them as though they had lost their mind, before firing his final rounds and throwing his now-useless weapon away.
“Lostok…,” the Neander muttered. “Lostok...”
“Too hell with him,” Salazar said, almost crashing into the side of the shuttle. The two of them loaded the wounded figure on board, before scrambling in after him, Salazar immediately moving to the cockpit hatch, sliding the hatch open and dropping into his seat as Rhodes dived through the door, blood running down his leg, the airlock closing less than a second behind him.
Salazar ignored the pre-flight checks, immediately tapping the controls to send the shuttle rising into the air on its lateral thrusters, noting with satisfaction as he scattered a squad of Xandari underneath him, the blast sending them flying across the field. Tipping the nose upward, he reached down to throw the engines to full acceleration, the battlefield beginning to recede away.
“Energy spike!” Maqua said, and a flash appeared on the sensor screen, a missile reaching up from the surface towards them, some Xandari soldier taking one last moment of revenge against their enemies. He threw the ship to the side, dumping chaff into the snow, then cut the engines for a second, lurching forward as the shuttle lost speed, the missile flying ahead and harmlessly away, burning through the last of its fuel before it could recover.
Battlecruiser Alamo: Forbidden Seas Page 19
