"What's the time down there?"
"Midnight."
"So shift change in the mine," said Amanda.
"Looks like it," said Sam.
"How do we want to do this?" asked Annabelle.
The discussion lasted until lunchtime. The other teams were recalled in time for lunch, after which we tooled up ready for the afternoon's entertainment.
Four in the morning for the planet, and two in the afternoon for us, we descended on the village.
Custer came in first, hovering two hundred meters up over the center.
George gave Jane the command, and all the combat suits moving on the walls and in the streets were reclassified as missiles. Mosquitos fired off, each one targeting a 'missile'. Seconds later, every single red dot was down. Before they could get up again, the second wave of Mosquitoes hit them. A third wave followed. No-one got up.
Custer moved towards the mine entrance, and came down as low as George dared. Team one launched themselves out of the Cargo Bay, and used leg thrusters to control their drop to the ground. They were using the giant suits, as well as normal combat suits. Team two dropped out behind them. They moved into the mine area. Custer rapidly climbed, and assumed a high guard at five thousand meters.
Gunbus touched down outside the barracks we assumed housed the medical center. Unthinkable and Camel also landed next to barracks. The latter was carrying team six, with five to support them, and they stormed the troop barracks. Team three was with me, and four was with Annette. Our job was to get the prisoners out.
The troops with me were divided into several groups. One group followed me into the medical center. The other headed for the nearest door into the remainder of the building. Carter and some of her people were waiting for the okay to join us, in case they were needed to move anyone. We'd brought several dozen portable care units with us, just in case.
Combat suit sized sword in hand, I kicked in the door. Inside, I found a combat suit in my way, who'd been expecting me. His shot hit me in the chest, but didn't slow me down. I sliced him in half before he could get another shot off. I was mumbling the release words to myself as I moved further in, trying to assess what the situation was. The team behind me stopped as I stopped, looking on in shock. Every person in the beds crammed together here, had a broken limb, which had only been given basic medical attention. My HUD gave me an assessment of the atmosphere in here, and I was glad I wasn’t smelling it.
A scream sounded further in, and I went to investigate. Behind me, Carter was already inside, and giving orders for the moving of everyone to Gunbus.
On the other side of the room was a door, which gave entrance into a passage way. There were several doors on each side. I kicked the first one in, found it empty, and did the same for the next door on the other side. Also empty, so I kept moving. The next door showed me a scene which made me very angry indeed.
There was a naked girl on a bed. It was quite obvious she had a broken arm.
On top of her was a naked man. Thrown over a chair was a uniform, with what looked like a Colonel's rank on it.
He was raping her. She was resisting, trying to make her one usable fist hurt him, but without success. She writhed under him, kicking out when she could, and screaming hysterically. Neither of them had heard me come in, which was surprising for me given the noise the combat suits usually made while moving, but on second thoughts, the noise they were both making would have covered a lot.
Before I could move into the room, his fist connected solidly with one cheek, and she went limp. I took several fast paces into the room, grabbed him by the neck, and hauled him sideways so he slid out of the girl with minimal impact on her, and then hauled him completely off the bed. The girl screamed again, obviously having no idea what was going on now. I slammed his face into the wall, hearing the crunch as his nose broke, let go of his neck, spun him around, and pushed him back against the wall, his feet scrabbling in empty air.
"Who the fuck are you?" he grated through several obviously broken teeth.
"Jon Hunter," I answered through my suit speaker. I laid my sword against his chest, and a line of red appeared. "Tell me why I shouldn't cut your dick off, and let this girl kill you."
I cast a glance at the girl, but she was now curled up in a tight ball, and appeared to have fainted. I wondered if that was a lucky break for him, or not.
The man glared at me.
"So," he spat at me, blood spattering my chest. "You're the self-righteous pig whose been slaughtering us when we object to being arrested, arresting us when we didn’t do you the courtesy of dying, and dropping the survivors onto a mud ball to rot. I heard you died there for a while, but I guess it was wishful thinking. Big man needs his combat suit, doesn’t he? What's the matter? Have I offended your sensibilities?"
"Yes."
"So, arrest me, throw me in jail, and send me to rot."
I had no idea what this rot business was about, but he seemed to be taking it seriously. Wherever this Justice place was, they seemed to be very afraid of it.
"Why are you raping this girl?"
"Because I can, stupid. I can do what I like with the slaves here. This is my personal kingdom, and I do what I want."
"Not anymore."
"So arrest me."
"No, I don’t think so. Pirates who surrender get arrested. Rapists caught in the act deserve something different."
He actually snorted, his face a sneer. No mean feat with a broken nose, and shattered teeth.
My right arm dropped, and the sword point dropped with it. There was no resistance, as a now very small appendage dropped fee of his body. Blood spurted. He screamed, much louder and longer than the girl on the bed had. His hands cupped himself, trying to stem the blood flow.
His scream turned into a whimper.
"Help me. I'm bleeding. I'll die if you don’t stop it."
An info screen popped up, telling me it was extremely unlikely he would die this way.
"You're going to die anyway. The question is, do I make it quick, or do I make it last as long as possible?"
"You can't be Hunter. He's not a cold blooded killer. They say he's spiritual."
He spat out the last word as if it was a curse.
I did the release for killing him, verbally. Still hanging with my left arm holding him against the wall, he cringed as I said the entire release. I coughed a couple of times after.
When I finished, I lowered him to the ground, and forced him to kneel.
"Any last words?"
"You won't get away with this!"
I pulled his head up, let him see the sword coming for him, and then quickly sliced through his neck. Head and body slumped down and forward. I used a foot to shove both into the corner behind the door. The girl was still out.
"Carter," I bellowed, as I moved out into the passage. "Need you in here. ASAP isn’t fast enough."
I didn’t wait for her, but moved down the rest of the passage, kicking in the doors. There were no surprises in any of the remaining rooms. I retraced my steps, and exited the building through the door I'd entered.
"Sitrep," I said into team coms.
I'd had mine turned off, letting Jack handle the ground action, and Annabelle supervise from BigMother. I stood there, watching people being moved to Gunbus.
Jack answered, letting me know all teams had achieved their objectives. All hostiles had been eliminated.
I realized I was still holding my sword, and sheathed it. It vanished from my back. I walked into Gunbus' Armoury, parked in a recharge slot, and backed out of the combat suit.
The medical team were still working on people. I stood at the top of the ramp, looking out. A combat suit came out the door, carrying the girl. Carter followed. When she saw me, she stopped, gave me a very strange look, got a hold of herself again, and continued up the ramp after suit and girl. I turned and watched them place her into one of the care units.
A group of people were approaching from the other end of the bui
lding. At their head walked a man with barely recognizable captain's bars on his shoulders.
"Young man," he said, "I need to speak to your leader immediately."
"Jon Hunter," I said. "Admiral."
"I thought you'd be bigger," said someone back in the group.
He was immediately silenced by a woman next to him.
"I thought you’d be older," said the captain. "Never mind. This was good work tonight son. But have you taken the main bunker?"
"What main bunker?"
"I knew it," said the man behind. "It's too well shielded to be detected from orbit."
"Where is it?" I asked.
My suit changed to full protection mode in that instant, and the Meson pulse hit me square in the middle of my forehead.
Ten
I drew my Long Gun as I was lifting off the ground. I twisted and sighted in on my assailant before reaching the top of the hop, and fired just as I achieved non-motion. The target took the hit on his combat suit, which wouldn’t have done him any real damage.
By the time I was down again, I’d holstered the gun. I was the only person standing. Everyone around me was lying flat on the ground, looking up at me in wonder.
"Get inside," I said quietly.
They began to crawl up the ramp as fast as they could.
"So," said an amplified voice. "You can take a Meson hit and survive it. They said you were invincible. They said that even in death, you couldn't die. With all the hype, I thought you'd be bigger too. But all I see is a boy."
I looked around for the audio pickup, since he had to have heard what had just been said to me. Wherever it was, it wasn’t obvious. There was a clanking noise from behind me, but I didn’t turn. I faced towards the voice.
We'd goofed. Again. Along one entire length of the wall in front of me, the facing had dropped forward onto the ground, showing the wall itself to be hollow. Lined up along the whole length were combat suits. The entire area was now lit, forming a killing zone.
"Jack," I sub-vocalized. "Form a skirmish line in the dark, in front of the civilians. Get them loaded onto the ships and out of here. Have the teams go to code red, and execute kill mode."
"Roger that."
"What, no reply from the great Admiral Hunter?"
The voice was booming now, and totally full of itself.
"My apologies," I said. "A Meson to the face does tend to disorient one. Would you care to enlighten me as to whom has the drop on me?"
He laughed.
"The drop, yes. You are outnumbered three to one. I am General Maxim Ubuntu. Perhaps you've heard of me?"
My combat suit stopped beside me. Jane's twelve were coming up behind me now, previously unused.
"I'm sorry, no. Should I have?"
I hadn't actually. So far I’d only come across ship officers.
"Yes, you should have. No matter, now you know who defeated you, we can get on with ending this."
I took a quick step back, and sideways, and entered my suit. It closed behind me, and the systems came up. I activated code red. An armband on the left arm, shifted to a full suit, and the combat suit itself took on my likeness.
"Does this meet your expectations more General?" I asked, now using the external speaker.
The suit shifted again, 'slinky red' becoming blue jeans over combat boots, bare chest with bulging muscles, and a white sweat band tied around the forehead, and dangling to one side.
"Don’t play games boy. You can't win this. Why throw away your lives? Lay down your arms, leave your combat suits, and we'll allow you to live. As slaves mind you, but at least you will be alive."
"George and Jane," I sub-vocalized, "bring the rain."
"Raining!"
"Confirmed."
"Slaves is it?" I said. "You mean the men work in the mines, and the women get raped by your officers?"
"Ah, you met one of them then? Whom do I need to demote?"
"A Colonel. And he won't need demoting, I've already seen to it."
"Ah, the spiritual mercenary, who takes his enemies prisoner. How noble of you."
"Actually no. I AM Karma's instrument. When no-one is able to collect the karmic debts, the Cosmos sends me. Karma can be a real bitch when you fuck with it."
I heard my voice say it, but it wasn’t my mouth moving.
I said it.
"So you consider yourself a Karmic Debt Collector do you?"
"Only for the worse cases."
It was Kali talking again.
"And what form did Karma take in this instance?"
"I cut off his small head so he couldn’t rape again, and then cut off his big head so he couldn’t even think of doing it again in any form."
This time it was me talking. But it felt like the words were not my own, while being my own. Such is channeling.
"A pity. He was so very useful to me. Alas, as you have done, so shall you receive…"
He broke off as someone interrupted him. Damn, if he'd only kept rabbiting on a little longer.
"Charge!" yelled the General, and his people sprinted forward.
They made it just far enough to avoid being cut down by the capital ship and Mosquito missiles which reduced the wall to rubble. Most of the lights vanished. But we didn’t need lights to fight.
"Wait for it," yelled BA, as the line of enemy suits advanced towards the loosely grouped teams, forming a basic line between the mine and where I was.
"Jane, cover me."
"Confirmed."
Her suits formed up around me as an escort, Meson streamers raised and ready to fire.
"Fire!" said Jack quietly.
Every heavy weapon we had, hand held, or on the ships, fired. Enemy suits went down, but not enough of them, as we were grouping fire to make kills, instead of each person taking on an individual target. Jane was coordinating fire over team coms. I wasn’t listening. The enemy were also firing as fast as their Pulse Rifles would cycle. The Mesons had died in the missile strike, so it had achieved something. But our line was going to be overrun very quickly, and then it would come down to suit on suit combat.
"Sword," I muttered.
It materialized on my back, and I reached back to pull it free. It was again combat suit sized, and it felt identical to wield as if it was in my real hands.
I sprinted forward, aiming at the enemy suit directly in front of me, who was near the end of their line. Pulse fire was coming at me, some hitting, others hitting the Jane's around me. I ignored the fire, and ran forward as fast as I could.
The suit in front of me, showing red on the HUD, slowed down when he realized I wasn’t holding a gun. It gave him a couple of extra shots at me, before I was on him. The first cut took off both arms, and the Rifle dropped to the ground with them. The next cut took his head off. I was moving towards the next one before the rest of the suit hit the ground.
An intense feeling of déjà vu overtook me, even though these were all combat suits, and not Jane's I was fighting. But the fighting was very similar. The sword cut through everything I aimed it at, and enemies were dropping before me. I was hopping and jumping more than walking, as fire which hit me made my suit hop.
A ninth enemy dropped before me, as my outer suit shredded. The next armband shifted to return the suit to being my likeness, although this time in 'slinky red'. I didn’t stop as this change happened, and I was on the next target before the shift completed.
The teams by now had formed up into defensive clusters. Their fire was less effective now, as fewer could fire at the same target. They were holding their own, for now. The ships were firing when they could, but it was becoming increasingly more difficult for them to shoot without risking hitting a friendly.
I cut down the next nearest enemy, and kept moving, now behind the enemy line. A pulse came in at me and I idly flicked the sword at it. The pulse bounced away. I hadn't known the sword could do that, but now I did, I paid more attention to protecting myself as I moved between targets.
"Let me at
em," screamed Grace from above us, as eight Dropships came down, and began firing Meson's into the now massing enemy troops around each team cluster. The turrets appeared to be manned, so I assumed some of my pilots had decided to join the fun.
The suit in front of me paused to look up at the Dropships, and his head went rolling in the direction he'd been looking. I kept moving.
The outer suit shredded again, and the third armband on the left arm took its place. I hardly noticed the change this time, still moving, cutting, jumping, and cutting again.
Gunbus roared past above me, on her way up with her load of civvies. Unthinkable was close behind, but further away. Camel lifted last, but instead of heading upwards, took on an angle which brought her front weapons into play. A torpedo launched downward, and a combat suit positioning a Meson Blaster tripod, became a hole in the ground.
My moments of inattention allowed a group of three combat suits to approach me. There were only four of Jane's suits around me now, with no idea of where the others had gone, and two each moved to take the outsiders, as I brought my sword up to take the middle suit. Cut, slice, swipe, rinse and repeat. We moved on.
"Anyone with less than fifty percent suit integrity," bellowed Jack, "fall behind someone with more, and fire over them."
On my HUD, the teams reformed. I noticed each team had a giant suit now, each one forming the front point of the defensive wedges, their guns damagingly effective when they hit. The Dropships were now over each team, firing down on the slowly thinning ranks of enemy suits.
My third outer suit shredded, and the first armband on the right shifted.
On and on the fighting went. My mind began to wander, as the body kept on fighting. This must have been what it was like on the old battlefields where swords were the main weapon, and guns were of limited use in close quarters. No matter how good you were, fatigue set in eventually, and I was starting to feel it, even with the mechanical boosting.
Hunter Legacy 9: Hero at the Gates Page 6
