Jack wondered how many of the prisoners had seen a Chit in real life. Sure, they would have seen them in government propaganda and in the training simulation VR games that just about everyone had played.
However, few people had seen a Chit in real life and lived. Jack knew how Marines acted when first confronted by the massive soldiers. They reacted with fear and surprise. Time and training removed the surprise, but fear was always present. Marines only learned to manage it.
The prisoners would have no training to help them manage their fear. They would, in all likelihood, panic. When they panicked, they would run, and the only place they could run was toward the landing bay and the landing craft. The landing craft was secure. They would be trapped, but they would be contained. In a situation with only bad choices available, holding out in the landing bay might be for the best.
“Hey, soldier boy,” Butcher shouted as Jack walked across the compound toward the prisoners, “want to tell us what we are doing here?”
A rumble of agreement ran through the crowd of prisoners. Butcher was asking what they all wanted to know.
“Chitin soldiers have entered the prison. They will likely try and capture you. They have a conversion process that will break you and make you a Chitin agent. If you run, they will chase you. If they catch you, you will wish that you had been killed.”
“You don’t scare me with your monster stories, soldier boy,” Butcher called back.
Jack saw a Chitin soldier break through the wall behind the ground floor cell to the north of the compound.
“Here they come,” Jack shouted. “Open fire.”
The Marines opened up with their pulse rifles. The well-aimed shots tore the Chitin apart, only to be replaced by a second and then a third.
The prisoners panicked, just as Jack knew they would. They ran away from the threat, but there was nowhere to go. The prisoners that ran to the south soon turned and headed to the tunnel that led to the landing bay. Jack let them go. They couldn’t do any harm down there, and at least he would know where they all were.
“Keep up the fire,” Jack said.
The Marines had formed up into a line, all thirty firing into the small breach where the Chits were entering the compound. Then another beach opened up with an explosion. The Chit plasma spears lanced through and slammed into the Marine line. Several fell, thrown back by the force of the Chitin weapons.
Jack could see more Chits holding back beyond the breach, launching their plasma spears into the compound, returning the withering fire from the Marines’ pulse rifles.
“Advance on that breach,” Jack said, shoving Marines forward. “Push them back.”
The Marines advanced. Jack pulled two out of the line and told them to gather the fallen, as well as their pulse rifles and the sidearms, and guard them. Jack realized the danger of having weapons lying around with a bunch of hardened criminals loose in the compound. Jack’s suspicions were confirmed as he saw Butcher lurking at the opening to the corridor to the landing bay, eyeing the fallen Marines and their weapons with devious, narrow eyes.
The Marines advanced and poured fire through the beach. Jack had a message on his communicator from Jarett in the control tower.
“Sir, we got them all. No more Chits inside the perimeter. We beat them.”
Jack nodded. For now, at least, the Chits were gone, but Jack suspected that they would be back. The best way to deal with this situation was to not be here when they returned.
“Copy that, Jarett,” Jack said. “Keep a watch on those sensors. Let me know if anything shows up.”
Jack posted Marines at the two breaches in the main compound wall. He needed to keep the Chits out and the prisoners in. There was a determined enemy on one side and a desperate enemy on the other, with Jack and his Marines in the middle. He assembled a squad and marched with them to the landing bay. If he was going to fix that landing craft, he was going to need it clear of prisoners.
The noise from the landing bay was deafening. Sixty voices shouting at once. The prisoners were crowded around the landing craft, shouting to be let in.
“The pilot is under orders not to open up,” Jack shouted, but he couldn’t be heard over the noise. He used his meat suit’s amplifier to speak louder. “If you want out of here, I’m going to have to fix that landing craft. I can’t do that with everyone crowded in here. Return to the main compound.”
A shot rang out from within the group of prisoners. A Marine next to Jack fell, a pulse round smoldering on his chest plate. Then another shot as a Marine returned fire.
“Hold your fire,” Jack shouted out.
Then Jack saw the arm reach around his neck and felt the pulse pistol bump into the side of his helmet. Out of the corner of his eye, Jack saw Butcher.
“Listen to the soldier boy. Hold your fire or this officer will have the worst and shortest kravin headache ever.”
14
Pretorius watched the pursuing Chitin Krakens close the distance to his ship. The fighters from the Monarch were fleeing just ahead of the Krakens and were increasing their distance. The fighters caught up with the carrier group and deployed themselves by squadrons throughout the group.
The Overlord Carrier Group was closing in. Pretorius readied himself to stop running. In just a few seconds, he would come about and re-engage the Leviathans. With two carriers and six destroyers, the massive Chitin craft would be destroyed. It was simply a question of numbers and in this instance, the Fleet had them.
But first, Pretorius needed to deal with the Krakens.
The Krakens were spread out behind the retreating Monarch Carrier Group. The group deployed drones as space mines and they detonated as soon as they came within effective range of the Krakens. Unfortunately, the small Chitin craft were spread out so thinly that only token kills were achieved.
Pretorius knew he was wasting his most devastating weapon. He wasn’t going to spend a drone for one Kraken kill. It was question of numbers, and in this instance, the Chitins had more.
“Load all tubes with combat drones. Set for maximum yield.” Pretorius was going to hit the first Leviathan with all he had. He watched the range finder on the holostage. The Krakens were closing in.
The rearmost of the Scorpio’s high-energy laser batteries was fully rotated and aimed toward the pursuing Chitin Krakens.
“Laser to give pulse fire,” Pretorius called out. “Automatic target selection.”
Commander Chou rushed to the laser control position and programmed the firing solution.
“Fire when ready.” Pretorius watched the holostage with a cool head. The battle was a constantly developing beast, it could change any moment and he needed to be alert. He needed to feel the pulse of the fight and prepare to change his attack if and when necessary.
The aft pointing laser let out a bolt that seemed to travel instantaneously to the target point. That point was a meter inside the hull of the nearest Chitin Kraken. The holostage recorded the kill.
The laser took one and three-quarter seconds to charge and re-aim. Then another Kraken was annihilated by the Scorpio’s rear laser battery.
The rear-facing lasers on the Pisces and Aries were pulsing away. The Monarch had its rear assembly of four laser cannons firing pulses of high-energy laser. The pursuing Chitin Krakens were being destroyed at a rate of four every second.
Still, they had the numbers. As they came into firing range, their forward spitz cannon blasted out a plasma rain that homed in on the Monarch’s engine assembly.
The Fleet fighters were already engaging. The Blades accelerated toward the Krakens, fighting fire with fire. The Krakens continued to take the punishment from the massed laser barrage, but they still outnumbered the fighters two-to-one.
Pretorius could do nothing more for now. The group was nearing grid eight-eight-thirteen. Any moment now, he would be turning back to the fight.
“Stand by for combat breaking,” Pretorius called. He activated the ship-wide communicator. “Combat breaki
ng alert. Stand by.”
The Blades from the Overlord Carrier Group came streaming forward. They joined the dogfight with the fighters from the Monarch. It was still a question of numbers. The Chitin Krakens were outgunned, outmaneuvered, and outclassed by the Fleet fighters.
The Krakens turned and withdrew. The Blades won their victory over the small Chitin interceptor craft. Now the big ships would go to work.
As the holostage showed the Krakens withdraw, Pretorius resisted the urge to celebrate with the rest of the command deck. The Chits weren’t running scared. Pretorius knew this was tactical. Everything about the Chits was tactical.
The Monarch group came up on grid eight-eight-thirteen the same moment as the Overlord group. Pretorius activated combat breaking and brought the starboard flank around toward the advancing Leviathans.
The Scorpio decelerated violently, the stress on the composite hull transferring through the superstructure to be absorbed by the internal dampeners.
The Monarch and the Overlord fired their cannon, and the full complement of cannons on both carriers lit up the nearest Leviathan. Then the destroyers, a fraction of a second behind the carriers, lit up the Chitin craft with their laser beams.
A devastating beam assault slammed into the nearest Leviathan. The combat drones from all ships raced away from their launch tubes toward it.
Then the Chitins’ return fire came on.
The Leviathan’s plasma cannon spat huge gouts of plasma toward the Monarch as she turned to present her starboard battery to the Leviathans. The gouts of plasma came on slowly but surely. They reached their target and detonated at the engine assembly. One of the engine nodes spluttered and died. Another spluttered but maintained a semi-functional state.
Then more plasma slashed across space, one from each Leviathan, arcing in a seething orange strand of barbed fire. Both plasma arcs slashed across the Monarch, catching her amidships. The composite bubbled away under the punishment.
The fire from the combined carrier group focused on the first Leviathan. The fire from its plasma cannon came at a reduced rate. Pretorius could see the groups were dealing damage. One Leviathan was losing power, but the Monarch had taken engine damage and was never going to get away from the battle. The Leviathans needed to be destroyed, or the Monarch would be.
The holostage was a mess of ship markers, energy weapon markers, ships’ headings prediction markers, and waypoints. Pretorius could see the battle was an evenly matched one. It would take one moment of genius, or one mistake, to create an advantage. For now, all Pretorius could do was stand his ground and fight.
The lights flickered on the command deck. All spare energy was being rerouted to the weapons systems. It needed to be devoted to maintaining the fire. Only by maintaining their fire could the balance be held. If one ship dropped their fire for a fraction, it might be enough to tip the scales in the Chitins’ favor. Once that happened, it would be an inevitable slide to destruction.
The support craft added their fire to the fight. The corvettes and frigates dived in and out of the combat zone, delivering as much damage as they could. The support craft were lightly armed and not built for a full-blooded slugfest between two massive forces, but their addition could provide that tipping point and give the Fleet that crucial margin of superiority.
The first wave of support craft attacks was focused on the only Leviathan to have taken any damage. Its plasma arc whipped across space toward the Monarch in a wide curve that put it in the flight path of the support craft as they raced away from their sortie.
One corvette failed to predict the plasma arc’s path and was sliced in two, both halves tumbling away into the space.
Griff looked at Pretorius as the distress call came in from the corvette. Corvette M9 was disabled. Her crew in survival gear awaited recovery.
“I can have a tac boat underway in three minutes,” Griff said.
Pretorius looked at the battle on his holostage. It was finely balanced. It was not the time to go chasing lost personnel.
“The carriers are better equipped to deal with that, Major,” Pretorius said.
Griff gripped the side of the holostage. Pretorius could see the Griff’s frustration. The battle was raging and here he was, standing idle. Pretorius knew Griff had been a front line Marine and was used to being in the eye of the storm.
“I just need to do something,” Griff said.
“You are doing something,” Pretorius said. “You are defending the command deck. I’ll be relying on you if the Chits board us, and you know how they like to do that. Review the battalion’s deployment if you need to keep yourself occupied.”
Then Pretorius saw the Chitins’ mistake. The Leviathans picked separate targets. One directed its plasma cannon at the second sortie from the corvettes and frigates. The second continued to fire at the Monarch.
“We’ve split their fire,” Pretorius said. He put a call out to the group captains. “That’s their first mistake,” he said.
The image of Group Captain Li and Group Captain Wellard appeared on the holostage. The image of Li flickered as another salvo from the Leviathan’s plasma cannon struck the Monarch.
Li was buffeted from side to side and the image flickered even more. A plasma arc slammed into her and all power was momentarily lost.
“How are you holding up?” Wellard asked Li.
“I’m still in the fight. Let’s take down one of these kravin Chits before they do too much damage.”
The holoimages of Li and Wellard disappeared. Pretorius reviewed his status. The Scorpio was firing at its ultimate rate. His laser cannons were delivering punishing beam assaults to the first Leviathan. The shot cannon was sending out one salvo after another of devastating kinetic hail and high explosive rounds. His combat drones were running low, but he continued to send wave after wave of the self-guiding antimatter weapons toward the Leviathan.
Pretorius knew they still needed another advantage. Something to tip the scales before they were all destroyed. Then he saw the Taurus flicker on the holostage, as if it had lost all power. It was a risky move, but one he himself had pulled in desperate situations, and the Chitins took the bait. He watched as both Leviathans targeted the destroyer Taurus, intent on destroying the apparently disabled ship. He prayed that Taurus could stabilize their shields before impact and prevent the ship from being completely torn apart.
With the pressure taken off the carriers, both the Monarch and the Overlord were able to divert all power to their weapons. The full brunt of a high-energy beam assault slammed into the first Leviathan.
The Leviathans ignored the devastating attack. Their plasma arcs slashed across the Taurus, both tearing over the hull from forward to aft. The plasma cannons from both Leviathans targeted the engine assembly. The Taurus’s engines spluttered and died. A fresh salvo of plasma cannon fire from the Leviathans slammed into the dead engines.
All Fleet craft poured their fire into the first Leviathan. A sudden flicker of light, running across the surface and branching like lightning across the entire Chitin craft told Pretorius that the ship was going down. It had taken the punishment from two carriers, six destroyers, and a full complement of support craft.
The Leviathan was out of the fight, but not before its final shot, a dying blow. Its final plasma arc slammed into the engine of the Taurus. The fiery arc cut into the destroyer and instead of slashing across space, it was contained within the destroyer. It filled deck after deck with the seething orange barbed fire.
The Taurus’s weapons ceased firing. The ship tumbled slowly, engines dead and out of control. It drifted toward the critically-damaged Leviathan.
The Leviathan exploded in a ballooning cloud of boiling plasma. The cloud engulfed the Taurus, smashing its broken hull to pieces. The billowing cloud grew further and slammed into the Overlord.
Pretorius ignored the automatic distress call from the Taurus.
“Trace,” Griff said. He looked at Pretorius. “Trace Matavesi was on the
Taurus.”
Pretorius redirected the Scorpio’s fire at the remaining Leviathan.
“We need to launch the battalion’s tac boats,” Major Griff said frantically. “There could be hundreds of survivors out there. The Marines in their suits will be well-protected, but we have to get them now.”
Griff walked around the holostage to Pretorius. He grabbed the captain by the arm.
“Captain,” he shouted, “we must do something.”
“Harry,” Pretorius said calmly, “we are doing everything we can.” Pretorius looked down at Griff’s hand and then back up to the Major. He looked Griff in the eye. “Let go of my arm, Harry. I’ve got a job to do.”
Griff let go of Pretorius. His hand dropped to his side.
“You knew Trace, Captain. She was a company commander on your ship for years.”
Pretorius nodded. “She was with the battalion when we first came on board. I knew her longer than you did, Major. If she is lost then I will mourn her, but—” Pretorius moved close to Griff but kept his voice down. “—we will lose more people if we don’t fight now.” Pretorius looked at the holostage. The combined carrier group was winning this fight, but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t take further losses.
“We will send out rescue boats if we win. No point bringing rescued personnel aboard a ship that might yet be destroyed.”
The battle was going well. The Fleet had destroyed one Leviathan for the loss of only one destroyer and a small number of support craft and fighters. The last Leviathan was standing its ground and delivering punishing fire to the Monarch, but it was already doomed. It couldn’t run, it was slower than the Fleet ships, and it couldn’t win, it was hugely outgunned. It was only a matter of time, and how many Fleet ships it would take with it.
The report from a corvette scanning at the edge of the battle detected an incoming signal. The carriers focused their scanners on the target, the wider signal range and combined data resolution confirmed the target.
Another Chitin Leviathan.
Jack Forge, Fleet Marine Boxed Set (Books 1 - 9) Page 43
