“Back to the vehicles!” shouted out Callahan.
He was already moving by the time Jack and the others chased after him. The vehicle pool might have less cover, but it was also the part of the base containing fewer of the enemy warriors. Instead of fighting as a single bloc, the marines had been split up into dozens of small groups, each fighting a miniature battle until casualties and lack of ammunition forced their defeat. Jack made it to the nearest Bulldog in time to see a rocket rush overhead from one of the Biomech war machines and strike the crew section. The impact rolled the Bulldog to its side and sent him plus three others flying through the air. For the briefest of moments, he thought he might never come back to the ground, but he did, and the impact almost knocked him unconscious as he crashed down onto his back. Incredibly, the reinforced spinal ribbing absorbed the crash and spread the impact away from the fragile parts of the body.
“Look! They’re sending in more warriors,” called out a marine, two seconds before a pair of Canners put a dozen rounds into her chest and waist. The poor woman fell down screaming from the oozing wounds until a third stepped in and took her head clean off with a cut of its scythed arms. Jack pulled out his pistol and rolled to his right to get a clean shot before spotting the two warriors pinning Riku to the floor. He almost panicked, but his training kicked in. The drills they’d practiced time after time saved her life as he put two rounds into each of their skulls before checking for signs of more.
“Riku! Are you hurt?”
He lifted himself to one knee, but Jenkell had already beaten him to her. She grabbed the fallen marine’s arm and dragged her back to the side of the smashed Bulldog. Small groups of marines moved about nearby as they looked for anywhere to make their last stand. Jack lifted his pistol and took aim, but the sight of the sea of Biomech warriors disheartened him. He could see them everywhere, and black plumes of smoke had now completely blotted out the background.
This is how it all ends, then.
For a second, he contemplated using the pistol to shoot himself rather than suffer the assault of the creatures. He just couldn’t bring himself to lift the pistol though, and instead emptied it at the nearest two enemies. As soon as the last round fired, he flipped the catch so that the magazine slipped out and slammed in one of his last few clips. A bright yellow flash erupted to the left where the Khreenk warrior had vanished and quickly spread along the entire length of the broken wall.
“Keep down!” he shouted.
The explosion continued to spread and then smaller flashes rippled closer inside. Black shapes emerged through the darkness and then moved into the compound.
Great, like they need more to finish us off.
There was something wrong though. He took aim at the new arrivals and almost fired when he spotted the hooded shapes.
Just like the Khreenk.
His finger was half pulled on the trigger when the nearest group opened fire with thermal carbines and rifles. The blasts tore holes into the bodies of the Biomech warriors and quickly shattered their flank. Jack was sure he could see nearly thirty of these warriors, but they moved quickly and rather than hold back, they rushed into the fray, hacking at the warriors with curved blades. They fired their carbines from the hip and then just as quickly as they had arrived, the entire lot were hacking, stabbing and shooting. Without thinking, Jack sent an open-channel flash message to all the nearby units.
“Khreenk troops have broken through the wall. Do not fire upon them!”
He raised his pistol and fired, but dozens more of the warriors continued forward, many being spurred on to attack so that they might avoid the flanking attack coming from the Khreenk. One of the warriors lifted up and flew overhead, revealing Gun and his bodyguard. They barged through the enemy and directly toward Jack and his comrades like a charging herd of rhino. Any that blocked their path was shot down and smashed with edged weapons.
This is our chance. It has to be!
Jack grabbed Riku and pointed at the remaining Bulldogs.
“We need to get out of here, come on!”
Gun slid next to the wrecked Bulldog and spun around to unleash a burst of fire from the weapon mount on his shoulder. His guards pulled up alongside him and did the same. Gun cut down two more before barking out his orders over the communication network.
“General Daniels is bringing a relief force down. Everybody fall back to the vehicle pool.”
Jack assumed that meant they were all to use the armored vehicles, but as he stepped to the open door of the nearest working vehicle, a hand grabbed him. He looked around to see the shape of Lieutenant Elvidge with the robed Khreenk warrior helping him to cover.
“Private, a little unexpected don’t you think?” said the officer.
Jack sensed the man was a little light-headed, and he could only think it must be the drugs. The Khreenk warrior made almost no sound as he moved, and a group of his comrades, each similarly dressed, moved in behind them. Biomech warriors tried to pursue, but the combined fire of the final remaining marines plus the dozen or so Khreenk mercenaries halted the attack, even for just a few seconds. The Lieutenant threw his carbine to Jack who caught it with one hand. He automatically looked down at the ammunition marker.
Full, about damned time!
Gun lifted himself atop of the damaged Bulldog, exposing himself to gunfire but also allowing all the surviving Alliance personnel to see him.
“Whatever ammunition you have left, use it. Help is coming!”
He pointed up to the sky, and on cue a dozen objects appeared, each wreathed in flame and smoke. They looked little different to those of the Biomech landers, but Jack had faith in Gun. He checked that Callahan, Jenkell, and Riku were safe behind the shattered Bulldog and then turned his attention to the rest of the ruined base. His best guess was that there must be close to a thousand of the enemy inside the walls. On top of that, there were three of the massive war machines at the northern wall. He didn’t even want to think about the large numbers outside the base. To his left, multiple platoons of marines fell back to the top of the vehicle pool. Some lay down in the open to present the smallest target while others crouched behind damaged vehicles.
This is going to be close.
He looked to his right where the shattered wrecks of at least a dozen Bulldogs marked their flank. A similar number of marines had dug, in along with at least two Vanguards plus Gun’s personal guard unit.
“Jack, in front of you!” shouted Riku.
He twisted a few centimeters and took aim with his carbine. In front of them, a small group of nine of the warriors with the blades for arms clambered toward them. Their gait looked even more alien, due to the slightly lower gravity than normal. He aimed at the center of the formation and squeezed the trigger. One fell down howling, and another dropped down on one knee.
“Kill them all!” ordered Gun.
The mighty warrior simply pointed his arms at the enemy while his shoulder-mounted gun tore chunks out of the group. More rockets whooshed overhead and landed around the marines. The shots were wildly inaccurate, but at least two marines succumbed to the blasts.
“Here they come!” said somebody to the right.
But there was no time to look, as six large Marine Corps Maulers swept down over the overrun base. The multiple turrets on the craft sent a torrent of fire to the ground, instantly shredding any Biomechs that came too close. One took three rockets to the flank and rather than landing, it continued overhead and crashed a kilometer outside the base in a bright orange fireball. The other five came down hard around the vehicle pool, one even lowering itself down onto one of the damaged barrack buildings, using its engines to stay upright. Its doors flew open, and small groups of marines stepped out to add their own gunfire to the battle. One man in particular stood out amongst them all in his tiger striped armor.
“General!” howled Gun, delighted at the sight of his friend and rescuer.
“Which General?” asked Callahan.
Jack
grabbed him by the shoulder.
“Are you kidding? Let’s get out of here.”
They leapt from their position even as projectiles crashed about them. Riku was fastest. As they moved closer, they ran into dozens more fireteams emerging from scores of hiding places throughout the base. More Maulers and Hammerhead gunships whooshed down; some landing to extract the survivors, the rest providing support. A flight of Hammerheads loosed a missile barrage that vaporized one of the war machines, and their turrets shredded any Biomechs in sight.
Move it, faster!
Jack ran as fast as his legs could carry him. The low gravity made it awkward, and he stumbled twice before finally reaching the ramp leading up into the Mauler. The General waited at the bottom of the ramp, waving the marines in. Unlike the Hammerheads and shuttles used in the past, the Mauler was massive. Jack had heard tales of the craft being used to deliver entire combat companies into action, along with support units. He was a little dubious about that, but on this occasion, not one of them worried about numbers. One by one, they streamed inside, and as he ran up the ramp and past the General, he tapped him on the shoulder.
“Thank you, Sir!”
Inside were scores of marines busily pulling down the clamps and harnesses to secure them inside the craft. It was now two thirds full when Gun and his guard move through the entrance. The General followed close behind and then two Vanguards, their armor punctured and torn in a hundred places. General Daniels slammed his fist into a red pulsing button, and the hatches slammed shut.
“We’re clear. Go, go, go!”
The pilots were evidently waiting for his order because the craft shook by the time the General had shouted go for a third time. Jack could just about make out the fires and smoke through the tiny windows as they lifted up and away from the Fort. His tactical overlay on his visor showed dozens more craft circling around the base, but it was the great masses of red around the fortress that astounded him.
General Daniels had fitted the clamp around his body and was busy watching two large screens on the wall nearest the pilots. They showed both an aerial view of the battlefield and a collage of camera feeds from those still on the ground. Craft were everywhere, and Jack could only imagine how many they would be forced to leave behind.
The Khreenk!
He tried to stand, up but the clamps held him firm.
“General!”
The man turned to glance at him.
“Son, I’m a little busy.”
“The Khreenk, Sir. They helped with that last attack.”
The General nodded, turning back to his screen.
“Private, don’t worry about it. They are in a holding area on the third Mauler. We have bigger things to concern ourselves with.”
Jack looked to his right where Gun stood up, clamped into position like the Vanguards along the sides of the craft. With his armor, he could never fit into the seating clamps used by the regular marines. He flipped open his armored visor to grin. Jack could see blood running down from a wound to his head, not that Gun seemed to care.
“The General means what’s happening up there.”
He pointed to the ceiling.
“What do you mean?” asked Riku from her seat next to Jack.
Lieutenant Elvidge groaned from across the craft and then muttered something.
“What did he say?” asked Jack.
The marine next to the officer called out louder than he intended.
“He said there’s nobody waiting for us in orbit, just the Biomech fleet.”
Jack looked to Riku, Callahan, Jenkell, and then to Gun. He found it impossible to speak as his throat dried up and seemed to clamp tightly, almost stopping any air entering his body. Gun laughed at his expression.
“Calm down, Jack. Admiral Lewis will be there when we arrive.”
“Yeah,” snarled Callahan, “and what if he isn’t?”
Gun showed that ridiculous smile that unnerved Jack even more than he expected.
“Then we’ll have to find other ships to land on!”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The fighting through the Helios System brought back the horrific specter of combat with Biomechs. As in the Uprising, they unleashed unholy creations made from the corpses of their defeated enemies. There were differences too though, and some Alliance scientists suspected the biology and technology of each group of warriors was based heavily upon the source material used. The ground combat on Eos, however, introduced the spectacle of Biomech frontline warriors for the first time. In space, the Biomanta class of warships showed what a fusion between technology and biology could produce. On the surface, a whole new breed of enemy was found, warriors that had been built as purely synthetic fighting machines with armor and weapons built directly into their flesh. The twisted creations fought in the Uprising were a mere taste of what was to come.
Evolution of the Biomechs
Admiral Lewis looked at the schematic of his ship, shaking his head in astonishment. They had managed to get past the Biomanta blockade with nothing but minor casualties and a damaged bank of defense turrets. The attack had been so quick; they’d slipped past the enemy ships and destroyed three before they were even detected. The remaining eleven ships had targeted each Alliance ship one at a time as they passed; as opposed to the Alliance ships, they concentrated their fire on a single ship as they moved underneath them at incredible speeds. The XO looked at the damage reports and nodded his head happily.
“Admiral, I don’t know quite how that worked, but we pulled it off.”
Admiral Lewis gave a forced smile.
“Yes, three destroyed evens up the odds in our favor. I just hope when we come back around, they’ve not done anything to surprise us.”
“True, still, we are in pretty good shape. The escorts even made it through, incredibly.”
The communications officer turned and called out over the noise of the CIC.
“Admiral, an urgent message is coming in from the General.”
“Good, put it on the main screen.”
With no more than a nod, the officer transferred the feed directly to the main screen. The other video streams from the ship moved to smaller frames on the left and right of the image of the General.
“I’ve grabbed as many as I could. We are heading back for the rendezvous.”
A cheer rang out through CIC, but the XO barked at them for silence.
“Great work, General.”
He meant to continue, but the marine commander shook his head angrily.
“We’ve got a problem, Admiral. Some of my birds were hit on the way back up, and it’s taken longer to get into position. We’re going to be eleven minutes behind schedule.”
It didn’t sound much, but eleven minutes would mean the fleet would have passed the rendezvous point and continued on in their orbit about the moon.
“Damn it!” sighed Admiral Lewis. He looked at his tactical map and then the list of craft heading up from the surface. There were hundreds, perhaps thousands of survivors on their way to low orbit. If he weren’t there when they arrived, the fourteen remaining Biomantas would massacre them.
“Okay, General, meet us at the following coordinates.”
There was a short pause while the General checked the information. He looked back into the camera, a confused look on his face.
“Admiral, that is high orbit, and on the same level as the enemy blockade. Are you sure?”
Admiral Lewis did his best to look confident.
“Either we will punch a hole for you, or there’ll be no Alliance fleet left.”
The General nodded before cutting the feed.
* * *
Spartan and Khan waited at the secondary deck where so many of the station’s refugees had arrived. Now that the fighting was over, the number of people had increased. Many returned to where they had been before, but others just sat down crying or running about to look for missing loved ones. Three medical staff helped move the body of the engineer that
had helped them in the final stages of the fight.
“He did well, in the end,” was the best Khan could manage.
Spartan touched the stretcher as it moved past the two of them.
“Better if he’d lived.”
Multiple groups of officials emerged from the passageways, more than either of them would have expected.
“Here come the bureaucrats,” muttered Khan.
A small group of Earthsec security arrived, none carried anything more than a stun baton. Their uniforms were the usual dark tunics and black trousers used by security guards throughout the Alliance. On their heads were grey caps, marked with the insignia of Earth, and thick black utility belts wrapped around their waists with datapads and stun batons attached.
“What going on here?” asked a gruff-looking, gray haired man as the security guards looked about. They moved with the assured nature of men used to being given respect. As they checked the passageways, they came across the dirty and bloodied shapes of Khan and Spartan. Upon spotting the weapons in their hands, they immediately made for them.
“The machines are gone,” said Khan in a matter-of-fact tone.
“Is that so?” asked the man sarcastically.
Spartan moved closer to the man.
“Yes, it is so. Now, what exactly are you doing here?”
The man looked up and down at Spartan as if he were nothing more than a common criminal. He refused to answer him and waited until three more of his comrades move in to support him. Now confident of his position, he extended his hand toward Spartan, perhaps to grab him.
Yeah, I don’t think so, Spartan thought.
He tilted a few degrees to the left and brought his leg down on the back of the man’s knee. His leg gave way instantly, and then he was on the floor, face first. Spartan stood his ground, and Khan growled, that low, deep down snarl that even a fool would avoid.
Star Crusades Nexus: The Second Trilogy Page 43
