by J. N. Chaney
People had halted when Rev screamed, looking about uncertainly, but when the bodies on the bridge exploded, panic set in. People started running in all directions. Some took whatever cover they could. Others were mindless.
Rev ran forward to the opposite alley from McCough and started shoving people inside all the time watching for the Centaur. Screams from beyond the bridge reached him.
“Isolate the sound!” he ordered.
A Centaur is relatively quiet for something of its bulk with just the tick-tick-tick of the legs hitting the road. Rev couldn’t hear the sound over the shouts, but Punch could eliminate those. As if flipping a switch, the screams fell away to whispers, but there he couldn’t pick out the telltale ticks. There was just a soft, grinding-type sound.
Rev continued to get people out of the road while he listened. A woman took off her shoes and tossed them, then made a break for the bridge. She didn’t come close. Five meters from the bottom, she was hit.
“Do not try for the bridge!” he shouted at full amplification.
“What the hell is that? A paladin?”
But Rev didn’t need an answer. He saw it. On the road along the far side of the river, a true monster appeared. Twice the size of a paladin and too large for the reticulated legs of other Centaur armor, a courser appeared, rolling along on almost human-like armor tracks.
The huge vehicle’s cannon tracked to its right and fired just as Rev jumped back into the cover of buildings. Five or six people still on Geltrain disappeared into red mist.
“Get off the street!” Rev screamed.
“What’s the probability of success against that thing with my Moray?”
Rev leaned his back up against the wall of a building, his eyes closed. Those odds were horrible. He looked down at the Moray in his hands as if he could will it into something more powerful.
A tree on the south side of Geltrain exploded into splinters. The courser had the angle to cover a good chunk of the south side of the street, while on the north side, where Rev was, the buildings put the people in defilade. If the Centaur advanced to the bridge, it would have fields of fire all the way up and down Geltrain. And to the east was the market, with at least a hundred people rushing toward it.
There were a couple dozen people still on this side of the bridge with Rev. He knew what he had to do.
He put down his Moray and unslung his M-49. He swung out until he could see the courser and fired a quick burst at it before he darted back just as the air centimeters from him snapped with ionization. His right arm tingled, as if he’d gotten a sunburn.
Rev flexed his fingers, but they still worked. He didn’t want to know how close he’d come to getting hit.
“Just come to us,” he muttered.
But who knew if it would take the bait and steer away from the market and those still on the road? Rev readied his Moray again. The odds weren’t good, but any chance was better than none.
He turned and looked at eleven sets of eyes locked onto him. The alley was a dead-end, a four-story building blocking the way. Rev studied it for a moment. He might be able to scale it and get away, but he doubted anyone else could.
Rev turned to look across the street to McCough. He gave the hand-and-arm signals for retreat. Evidently, the signals hadn’t changed since the older man’s time in the Corps, because he signaled negative.
It is what it is.
Now that he knew what he was listening for, he was able to track the courser as it rolled to the bridge. Rev stuck his head out, then, knowing the arch gave him cover. He prayed it wouldn’t turn to the east. He heard the snap of the cannon, and he realized it had fired toward the market. Most of the market was still blocked by buildings, but once the Centaur reached the square, it could raze the place.
He stepped out, ready to run to the top of the bridge and take his chances when the top of the cannon appeared. Rev jumped back into cover. It had evidently fired one shot to the east before deciding to cross the bridge. Then the sound stopped.
What is it doing?
Rev didn’t have his full combat load by any stretch of the imagination, but he was able to bring some of his gear. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small Optiscope, a flexible periscope. He gave it a ninety-degree turn, raised the eyepiece, then slid it out. The courser was sitting at the apex of the arch, the cannon rotating toward the west.
He mentally kicked himself. He’d had a few seconds with the cannon pointing to the east where he could have engaged it. Now, that slight advantage was gone. Rev had seen how quickly the courser could engage him when he’d snapped off the M-49 burst at it. That had taken just two seconds, two seconds that almost got him fried. He’d need at least four seconds with the Moray. He needed a diversion.
There was only one he knew, and it had to be done quickly. The courser could move at any moment.
McCough was watching him from the temporary protection of the alley. With a heavy heart, he signaled to the staff sergeant what he wanted. The man didn’t hesitate. He signaled he understood, then pulled Rev’s MF-30 handgun out of his pocket and held it ready.
They needed to act, but Rev signaled “Semper fi, Marine,” and a huge smile broke out across his face.
The staff sergeant didn’t signal but yelled, “Semper fi, brother. Let’s kick some ass!”
There was the grinding noise of the courser’s tracks. Rev pulled the Moray up to his shoulder and shouted, “Now!”
Former Staff Sergeant Tanton McCough, Perseus Union Marines, emerged from safety screaming at the top of his lungs as he charged the courser, emptying Rev’s MF-30 at the hulk.
Rev followed, and an instant later, standing tall as he activated the sight reticule, he saw the cannon swivel and fire, cutting off McCough’s shouting. He got a lock just as the cannon started to swivel back.
“Run true,” he muttered, thumb depressing the trigger . . . when for a reason he’d never be able to determine, he dropped the reticule to the bridge’s surface right in front of the descending courser and fired.
He was a dead man anyway, so instead of diving for cover, he watched, just as he had when firing the prototype back at Camp Nguyen so long ago. The missile took a split second to cover the distance, hitting the bridge just as the Centaur’s cannon lined up on Rev. The resultant explosion jolted the courser just enough so that the beam was knocked off target, hitting the adjacent building. Reflections off the building’s walls made Rev’s skin tingle, but he barely noticed as the courser lurched forward with a jolt as its front tracks hit the hole that had opened onto the bridge’s surface. Rev stood in awe as the Centaur tried to reverse the tracks, but its weight, combined with the damage to the bridge, was just too much. Ten meters of the bridge fell into the river below, and the courser started to tip over when with a roar, the entire bridge collapsed, a fountain of water rising into the air before falling back.
Rev had almost been killed when a paladin had gone into self-destruct mode, so he hit the surface of the road. But there was no detonation.
Rev stood. The first thing he did was to look for Staff Sergeant McCough, hoping for a miracle, but there wasn’t much left of the man. He felt a hollow pit in his stomach, an overriding sense of sorrow and guilt. Rev had essentially ordered the man to die. Maybe officers were used to that, but Rev was just a corporal, and he’d never had to do that before.
Rev shook his head at Punch’s simple reminder. He couldn’t afford to get lost in that now. He ran up to the edge of the river wall and cautiously looked over. Ten or twelve meters below and on the other side of the river, the courser was three-quarters submerged in the water and futilely attempting to scale the river walls. It kept ramming it, using the cannon as an arm to reach the top and pull itself up. But the cannon continued slipping off.
Evidently, the Centaur inside realized it was a lost cause, becaus
e the courser turned downstream and drove off. When the cannon started traversing, Rev ducked back out of sight.
He knew he should feel a sense of victory. He hadn’t killed the courser, but he’d stopped it. But the weights of the dead, of Staff Sergeant McCough, were heavy loads to bear.
“Corporal?” a weak voice called out. “Is it safe?”
He still had a job to do. Rev turned around and spotted Vivian sticking her head out of the shop’s recessed entrance.
“Everyone, come on out!” he shouted as he strode to check on the woman, Craig, and Fint. Slowly, nervous heads poked out of more places than Rev had expected.
He passed the alley into which he’d ducked, and reached Vivian. She helped Craig up and said, “I don’t think your guy made it.”
Rev looked back at the destroyed bridge. The three of them should have been safe from the cannon.
“Fint? You with us?” he asked as he took the man’s arm and turned him over. He dropped the arm and stood back.
Vivian was right. The man was dead. As before, he didn’t have a mark on him, but there was no mistaking the face of death.
“Son of a bitch,” Rev muttered. He quickly raised his arm to wipe the tears that had started to flow.
People had just been killed. Lots of them. McCough had sacrificed his life, but somehow this hit him hard.
“What now, Corporal?” Vivian asked.
He looked up where people were starting to gather, looking at him for guidance.
Rev took a deep breath, mentally shook his head, and said, “We’ve still got to reach the market. The bridge is gone. You tell me the best way.”
“The walking bridge should still be up,” someone said.
Rev pulled up his map overlay. The walking bridge was three blocks upstream. They could cross there, then cut straight across and hit the market closer to the north end of it instead of at the southwest entrance.
He looked down at Fint’s body. In a medical facility, he’d been dead for a short enough time for them to try and bring him back. In this situation, with the assault imminent, he doubted anything could be done. But he wasn’t going to abandon the man. He picked the body up and slung him over his shoulder.
“Lead on,” he told the man who’d mentioned the walking bridge.
Rev waited for the last one to start moving. He didn’t have another Moray, only his M-49, but protecting him was still his mission.
He avoided looking at the red splotches on the road as they moved, but something still caught his eye. He stopped, knelt, and picked up his bloody but undamaged MF-30, and slid it into his pocket before following Vivian and the rest.
7
Vivian stumbled, almost sending Craig to the ground. Rev couldn’t hold back, shifting Fint’s body and rushing up to take Craig’s free arm.
“I’ve got him,” Vivian protested, but didn’t otherwise object as the three crossed the remaining twenty meters into the market. Three people rushed to help, taking Craig.
“Where’s Corporal Reiser?” Rev asked one of them.
“The Marine?”
No, the other Corporal Reiser.
But he just nodded and said yes.
“I think she’s at Jeremiah’s Shawarmas.”
Punch flashed up an overlay with the place highlighted.
“Thanks,” he told Vivian. “You get some rest, now.”
The place was packed with humanity, and the hubbub was almost a low roar. He caught snatches of speech as he wended his way through them. Some people were scared, some were ready to take up the fight. Most made way for him as he approached, and he was slapped on the back and thanked at almost every step.
“You’re an angel from heaven,” an older man said, stepping out to envelop Rev in a hug.
Rev carefully extracted himself from the man’s grip, mumbled something he hoped was appropriate, and pushed on.
Not all the looks sent his way were positive. More than a few brimmed with anger. Rev didn’t know if that was because they feared the coming battle or were Angel shits caught up in the rush. There had to be some serious screening when all of this was over.
He turned down a major thoroughfare and into a center food court. At the far side, Jeremiah’s Shawarmas dominated, a gaudy blue sign proclaiming them the best shawarmas on the planet.
Rev wasn’t about to test that claim. He made a beeline for the restaurant and through the entrance. Tomiko was just off to the left, arguing with three civilians. She spotted him, and he could see the relief flow over her face.
“Give me a sec,” she said, pushing through other civilians.
Rev thought for a moment that she was going to hug him, but she stopped herself and said, “You don’t know how glad I am to see you. You get everyone here?”
“Not everyone. Courser.”
She raised her eyebrows in a you’re-going-to-have-to-tell-me-about-that-but-not-now look.
“How many here?” Rev asked.
“I don’t even know. Thousands have come in, but the exact number . . . ?”
There were 22,406 registered people living in their two cordons. Some of the people Rev brought in actually lived in the next cordon, and some of those 22,000 had been killed or were not home at the time. Rev had no idea how many more people were out there in what could soon be a hot battle zone, but if there were “thousands” in the market now, then there had to be many more still left to gather.
“Time?”
So, they had forty-three minutes, maybe a bit more as the Drop Marines descended. Call it an hour.
Rev was trying to keep his thoughts off the people who hadn’t made it: McCough, Fint, the rest. He knew the best thing he could do would be to keep busy. And if he could save more people, all the better. It wouldn’t erase the loss of his charges, but it would help.
“I’m going out to see who I can scoop up.”
“And me?” Tomiko asked.
“You need to stay here and control this. The last thing we need is for people to get scared and make a break for it.”
Tomiko set her mouth in a tight line. She wasn’t happy about that, but she’d comply. Someone had to stay in control here. The No Fire Zone ended at the edges of the market and attached parking lot. The buildings just across the street were fair game for the Navy and Marine firepower.
“I’ll be back,” he assured her. “We both need to be in control if the evac ships arrive.”
“You’d better.”
Just the thought of shuttles landing to take people off planet was a scary proposition. Sailors would debark to help, but the shuttles could only take so many at a time, and if things were so bad that they needed to leave, well, people would be in full panic mode.
“I need two of your Morays.”
Tomiko didn’t hesitate, sliding the pack off her back. She popped two of the missiles out and handed them to him. He’d left his pack back at PASCO, so he slid them under his belt.
“No. You don’t need to fry your family jewels,” Tomiko said, handing him her pack and pulling the two loose ones out.
“Thanks.”
“Gather up who you can, but keep your ass whole. I don’t want to manage this madhouse alone.”
Rev didn’t reply. He wheeled around and made his way back through the growing mass of people, many calling out to him asking questions. He ignored them—not out of arrogance, but because he couldn’t take the time. As he left the market, he saw a familiar face.
“Teddy, you’re with me!”
The young man smiled and ran up to him, and together they plunged into the Free Fire zone to round up whoever they could.
“But won’t so many people just be a big target?” the man asked, his two-year-old daughter on his hip.
Rev wanted to take the man by the shoulders and shake some sense into him. In minutes, this entire area could become a battlefield. True,
such a concentration could be targeted by the Centaurs, but they were about to have much more dangerous targets to contend with.
He took two deep breaths, willing his voice into something more reasonable.
“Any minute now, the Marines will be descending. They’ll be supported by Navy space-to-ground fire. Have you seen what a twenty-giga-joule meson cannon can do to targets on the ground?”
“No,” he said in a faltering voice.
“All of this,” Rev said, sweeping an arm to encompass the entire area, “could be gone. Leveled. Hell, it will be leveled.”
“But they’re supposed to be on our side!” he wailed, causing the little girl to start crying.
“Peth, maybe we should listen to him,” the woman standing next to him said, taking his upper arm in her hand.
“The Marines are on your side, sir. That’s why we’re coming. But the tin-asses—I mean, the Centaurs—they’re going to fight. And if that fight reaches here, it’s going to be targeted. I guaran-fucking-tee that.”
The man seemed to consider that for a moment, but then he said, “It’s my right to stay at my home.”
Rev was at the end of his rope. He and Teddy had managed to send forty or fifty people on their way, and there were probably more out there. But this obstinate asshole was putting his family at risk.
Rev ignored his battle buddy. He didn’t need a hunk of crystal to tell him that. With everything that had happened over the last two hours, and now with this guy being a moron, Rev was about to blow.
“You have the right to stay, but you don’t have the right to put your wife and daughter at risk. Stay here if you want to, you fool, but I’m taking your daughter. She can’t help having a friggin’ idiot as a father.”
With that, he snatched the little girl before the man could react. She immediately started screaming. The mother let out a yelp and lunged for the girl.
“Your choice. Live or die,” Rev said, easily fending off the woman with one arm.
An explosion sounded in the distance, and Rev looked up. Still high in the sky, the unmistakable sight of Drop Marines appeared. This was the first sign that the assault force had made it into orbit, and a wave of relief swept over Rev.
