Carnifex cl-2

by Tom Kratman

  She didn't get another word out before Jaquie lunged at her. Toward the bow someone fired a long burst. Marta felt one bullet impact on her doubled chest protection, and heard two more whine overhead. Three others made a different sound. Jaqui's lunge struck her but the smaller girl impacted loosely, like a bag of skin and bones. It was still enough to knock her from her feet.

  Marta felt Jaquie's body laying atop her, then smelt the iron-coppery blood her love spilt onto the deck in a torrent. Screaming, she grabbed the first weapon her hand came upon, Jaquie's already cocked Pound. Still laying on her back, head toward the stern, Marta pointed the thing toward her feet and the ship's bow, and pulled the trigger. She held that trigger pull until the bolt clicked back. She held it even after two splashes indicated she'd hit all the targets there were to hit.

  The ship immediately broke into pandemonium, with klaxons ringing and the sound of booted feet running on deck. Up ahead, a single mount 40mm began to arise from the deck with a whine.

  With the Pound empty, and the assailants gone, Marta bent over Jaquie's limp body, unwilling to believe what had just happened. Her fingers dabbed at the blood. "Please don't be dead . . . . please?" Marta begged of the corpse. "You were the only good and decent and clean thing in my life. Please be okay?" .

  And then she raised her head to the sky and screamed an inarticulate shriek like a lost soul descending into Hades. A couple of crewmen or Cazadors, she neither knew nor cared which, bent to help her.

  "Don't touch me!"

  Leaving the body behind, Marta arose to her feet and walked up to the 40mm. By that time, two other crewmen were manning it. She tore them off and tossed them to the deck, taking the gunner's seat herself. She knew how to use the gun; she'd seen it done often enough.

  A sudden gust of wind parted the smoke, revealing to Marta scores of people crowding a ramshackle junk. She didn't see them as people, however, neither the men nor the women . . . nor the children. Marta pressed a foot pedal to swing the gun around to aim at the other ship's bow. Her handles allowed her to bring the sights and barrel down.

  In the wheelhouse, Chu asked, "Should we stop her?"

  Rodriguez, who was one of those that had tried to lift Marta from the corpse, just shook his head, slowly.

  From the junk, from the people upon it, there arose a great moan of despair as the 40mm began to fire, starting at the bow and sweeping down the length of the thing. Nor did Marta stop until the magazine ran dry.

  She left no survivors.

  34/8/468 AC, Nicobar Straits

  The classis proceeded in what amounted to an arrow shape: three corvettes in a V followed by one minesweeper, then the heavy cruiser, Tadeo Kurita, then by the Dos Lindas. Behind Dos Lindas came the rest, escorted by the single remaining patrol boat and Qamra.

  Fosa wasn't overly worried about attacks on the support ships, not the way the classis was proceeding. He watched with a smile as a flight of Yakamovs took off, carrying a full load of Cazadors. Up ahead, Kurita's turrets, all that could be brought to bear, swiveled in their mounts to point generally to the west.

  * * *

  Yuan Lin had found a place for herself and her children. Rather, she had found a place for herself as one of Parameswara's concubines. The children were fed, clothed, and housed because the pirate chief liked his concubines happy.

  Of course, happy doesn't mean I don't have to work, Lin thought, beating some dirty clothes against a rock in a stream a half mile from Parameswara's fortress. She was not alone. Thirty or more other women and girls, likewise engaged, were there with her in the clearing by the stream. But it's not so bad a life, Lin thought. Para doesn't hurt me anymore than I like to be hurt. And the kids are doing well enough. And—

  She felt a sudden pressure in the air. It was like the prelude to of rain, really, except much more sudden. She looked up and saw the fortress suddenly bathed in smoke and fire. Then she heard the freight-train racket of flying shells, followed by the body- and soul-buffeting explosions from the fort.

  The pounding went on for many minutes, the column of smoke rising to the sky. When it stopped, mere seconds after it stopped, she noticed small dots in the sky that she took for helicopters. They were descending.

  Lin never heard the Turbo-Finch that dived down upon the group in the clearing. Before she could have, she and they with her were perforated by dozens of small finned nails called flechettes the plane had fired by rocket before the noise of its engines could reach ground.

  UEPF Spirit of Peace

  The ship was quiet, or as quiet as it ever was. There were still sounds from the vents refreshing the air. If one listened carefully, one could hear the crew going about the business of keeping the ship in space. High Admiral Martin Robinson was oblivious to all that, concentrating instead on the scene being played out below.

  The big Kurosawa in Robinson's quarters showed it in all its gory detail. Starting in the southeast, and at this point about halfway through the Nicobar Straits, the "bloody, bastard, never-sufficiently-to-be-damned, mercenary swine" were doing their best to scour the Straits free of pirate life. Word was spreading faster than the fleet moved, however, so many of the little villages and towns were emptying themselves before the first shell came in or bomb dropped, before the first sound of a helicopter ferrying in troops reached them.

  Even so, some of those troops were landing in the brush to either side of the straits. Robinson noted that the aerial attacks away from the coastlines, and the naval gunfire from the newly recommissioned heavy cruiser upon those refugees, tended to match where small teams of troops had been landed.

  "It's not a total loss, Martin," Wallenstein comforted. "The people will be back, and back to their old occupation, in time. We can set things up again to support that useful pig, Mustafa."

  Robinson said nothing, at first. Instead, he turned to manipulate his computer to have the Kurosawa zero in on the smoking ruins of Parameswara's fortress. A few hours ago there had been armed legionaries swarming the place. Now there was nothing but shot and hanged men, and women and children left with nothing but their eyes to weep with.

  "I don't think so, Marguerite," Robinson said. "Not for one hundred local years. That's how badly those people are going to be terrorized."

  "Well . . . the Tauran Union and the World League, down below, have issued very strongly worded condemnations," Wallenstein said. At that, even she had to laugh. "Condemnations. Like the mercenaries care about condemnations."

  "They care as much as Mustafa does," Robinson said. "And why shouldn't they? They're Mustafa's children." And, I suppose, mine.

  "I'm sorry, Martin," was all Wallenstein could say. "What now?"

  "Now, I am afraid, I am going to have to do what perhaps I should have done years ago." Robinson hesitated before continuing; what he had in mind was a serious step. "I've contacted our people in Hangkuk. I'm going to purchase and, if necessary, deliver to Mustafa what he's been asking for all these years."

  Wallenstein shook her head. "Oh, Martin, I can't tell you what a really bad idea that is."

  "Would you rather see our world destroyed, Captain Wallenstein?"

  The mention of her rank, and the implication of the caste that kept her there, shut Wallenstein up completely.

  EXCURSUS

  From: Janus Small Arms Review, Terra Nova Edition of 472 AC

  The F-26 Rifle is a gas operated, electronically fired and controlled, magazine fed shoulder weapon of 6.5mm caliber. A joint development between Zion Military Industries (812 Ben Gurion Blvd, Nazareth, Zion, Terra Nova) and Balboa Armaments Corporation (57 Avenida Omar Torrijos-Herrera, Arraijan, Balboa, Terra Nova), a subdivision of the Legion del Cid, SA, the F-26 compares favorably with such weapons as the Volgan Abakanov, the Federated States of Columbia's M-42 Wakefield, the Sachsen STG-13, Gaul's Daudeteau-31, and the Zhong Type-57, with all of which it competes in the international arms market.

  Specifications:

  Caliber: 6.5mm x 31 SCC (Semi-Combustible Cas
ing)

  Weight: 4.1 Kg (Zion), 4.3 Kg (Balboa) w/o magazine or bayonet

  Barrel Length: 533mm

  Length Overall: 795mm (Zion's bullpup version), 1022mm (Balboa's conventionally shaped version)

  Action: gas operated w/ piston, rotating bolt

  Materials: The rifle makes extensive use of carbon fibers, plastics and glassy metal stampings. Unique among modern military firearms, the barrel is constructed of a relatively thin steel lining around which is wound carbon fiber (the barrels being produced under license from Thorsten Arms, a subdivision of Thorsten Prosthetics). This saves about 80% of the normal barrel weight. Moreover, given the high rate of fire, cooling becomes critical. The graphite barrel is superior to steel as a heat shedding medium, though there have been complaints from the field of it being too fragile for the uses to which it is sometimes put.

  Max Effective Range: 850m

  Rate of Fire: 3 round Burst: 1975 RPM. Full Automatic: 2 settings: 700 RPM and 1200 RPM. The weapon also has the capability of firing single rounds. The ROF is set by a side switch above and to the right of the trigger and controlled by an integral computer chip.

  Sighting: All weather, day-night, medium range thermal imaging sight with integral laser range finder. The effective range of the sighting unit for target acquisition and range determination is 900 meters, day, and 250 meters, night, though this may be reduced by extreme dust, smoke or precipitation.

  Command and Control: The rifle is the key component in "Soldier V" the joint Balboa-Zion project to create a fully digitalized ground combat soldier. As such, it contains its own global positioning system receiver with compass. The soldier's frequency hopping communication system is also partially contained within the rifle stock. Leaders can, by use of a heads-up display integral to the Mark V helmet, not only determine the relative locations of each of their soldiers or subordinate teams, but can also see graphic displays of their arcs of fire. This feature has substantially reduced both blue on blue fire and training accidents (except when the "moral training" magazine, q.v., is used).

  Cycle of Operation:

  The weapon being set on one of its four firing settings and a round being chambered, the firer depresses the trigger (which, being nothing more than an electronic switch, has no "break point" and is thus very smooth). An electronic charge passes through the bolt face, initiating the primer, which sets off the propellant while expanding propellant and stub to obdurate (seal) the breach. The bullet moves down the barrel until reaching the gas port, near the muzzle. A stream of gas passes down the gas port, forcing the operating piston to the rear. The piston, in turn, causes the bolt carrier to begin to retract, unlocking the bolt. At that point the rearward movement of the bolt and bolt carrier causes four things to occur almost simultaneously: the VHTP (Very High Temperature Plastic) stub is ejected out the bottom ejection port, a rammer beneath the bolt—driven by a reversing cam—three-quarter feeds the next round from the magazine, a flywheel is set to spinning (recharging the integral battery until the trigger is released, at which point a brake is automatically applied to the flywheel), and a ratcheting rod is driven downward into the magazine which compresses the magazine spring from the center/rear. The bolt and bolt carrier then return forward, finishing the loading of the next round begun by the rammer. The bolt then rotates again to lock in position. At that point, and assuming the trigger is still depressed, the rifle will either fire and begin the cycle again (3 rd burst), or will have a very brief, computer-controlled delay before firing (high or low automatic), or will cease fire (rounds). It is the short distance to be traveled by the bolt to load and eject that enables the weapon to attain such high rates of fire.

  Note: In the event of battery failure or weakness the magazine may be removed, the trigger depressed and the bolt jacked six to ten times to build up a firing charge.

  Ammunition:

  The single greatest complaint about the F-26 (called, for reasons best left to etymologists and corporals, a "Zion" in Balboa and an "Arraijan" in Zion) is its weight. Between the relatively long barrel, the batteries, the integral thermal sight and range finder, and the flywheel and generator, it is the single heaviest general issue rifle on Terra Nova today. This is made up for by the ammunition.

  The 6.5mm SCC round is a high ballistic coefficient, high cross sectional density bullet of 120 grains set into a hollow cylinder of cook-off resistant propellant which is capped at the base with a very high temperature plastic semi-rimmed semi-casing, with dual electrodes, referred to as a "stub." The stub is of 10.4mm in width and 9 mm in height. The electronic primer is set into the hollow of the propellant and connected to the electrodes. The stub serves to obdurate (gain gas sealage of) the explosion of the propellant and to transmit the electrical energy that detonates the primer from electrodes in the bolt face.

  The ammunition comes prepackaged in sealed, generally disposable snail drum magazines containing 93 rounds. The magazines are approximately 109mm in diameter and 42mm in depth. One fully loaded magazine weighs just under 1162 grams, or about two fifths the weight of a comparable quantity of standard brass cased ammunition of similar caliber and capability. Thus, the F-26 with 465 rounds and a spare battery weighs 10.6 Kg while, for example, the lighter and somewhat less capable Abakanov with a similar sight and 465 inferior steel-cased rounds would weigh approximately 12.3 kilograms, not including the weight of the sixteen magazines required to have each round ready to fire.

  The decision to pack and issue the ammunition in drums, rather than to issue accountable magazines and loose or stripper clipped ammunition to individual soldiers was a difficult one for ZMI and BAC. The cost, even when the magazines are recoverable for reprocessing at the plant, is at least twice that of the steel cased ammunition used in the Abakanov and comparable to that of the brass cased ammunition fired by the FSC's Wakefield carbine. Testing, however, revealed that the SCC was simply not up to the rough handling and exposure to weather that the more usual system entailed.

  Magazines are known to come issued in at least 8 varieties, specialized but useable by all versions:

  Standard: contains standard ball and tracer in a ratio of 2:1.

  CQB: composed of equal numbers (31 each) of standard ball, armor piercing (tungsten), and eccentric (a particularly unstable, once it has penetrated flesh, tumbling round) in sequence.

  5x1: larger magazine (17.7 cm in diameter) containing 211-213 ball and 42-44 tracer. Generally issued to machine gun crews.

  Match: contains 93 rounds of match grade, 6.5mm ball

  Humanitarian: match grade frangible ammunition used to engage targets mixed in closely with non-combatants. Like Match, Humanitarian magazines are normally only issued to snipers. There has been complaint from the international humanitarian community that use of the ammunition, in the hands of both Zion's and Balboa's armed forces, has not been uniformly restricted to such circumstances.

  Blank: contains 93 rounds of pure blank ammunition.

  Training plastic: contains 93 rounds of plastic tipped ammunition fired by underpowered propellant which, upon hitting a human target, is extremely painful but not generally deadly except at point blank ranges.

  Moral training: contains 88 rounds of plastic tipped ammunition and 5 rounds of tracer, the tracer being loaded in at random. A perusal of unclassified information on the frequency of use of this magazine indicates a frightful willingness to risk losses in training on the part of the Balboan armed forces.

  The magazine rear face has a key which it turned 2.5—3 times to compress the feeder spring. As rounds are fired the rifle's retreating bolt drives a ratcheting rod into the magazine (integral to the magazine not the rifle) to maintain compression.

  Further, a portion of the back plate is composed of transparent polycarbonate to allow the firer to visually check available ammunition.

  Variants:

  Machine Gun:

  The adoption of the F-26 rifle has, for Balboa at least, led to the elimination of the belt fed Gener
al Purpose Machine Gun from the inventory of its armed forces. In lieu of the GPMG a heavier version of the F-26, called the M-26, has been developed. This weapon has both a heavier, ringed barrel and a variant on the Volgan Pecheneg forced air cooling system. Both the single shot and low rate automatic fire capabilities were eliminated in the M-26 and the burst feature program modified. Thus it fires at either 6 round burst (1975 RPM) or high rate automatic (1200 RPM) only. Though it has a 265 round magazine it will feed from the same 93 round drum magazines as the F-26 (and, uncommonly, vice versa). The M-26 with 2120 rounds weighs 34 Kg, 41 with tripod. Its effective range is 1300 meters. Grazing fire range is 705 meters. It has an automatic magazine drop feature that releases the magazine when the last round is expended.

  Marksman's Rifle

  Although the Balboan Armed Forces have two heavier sniper rifles, the .34-caliber LRSS and the .41-caliber VLRSS, both of which fire more conventional, brass cased, ammunition, both Zion and the Legion felt that there was a place in the rifle platoon or squad for a more than normally accurate battle rifle capable of firing the same ammunition as the F-26 and M-26. This rifle, called the F-26FT (francs tireurs) is almost exactly the same as the F-26, differing only in having a longer and heavier barrel and a better and longer ranged (and much more expensive) sight and range finder combo. This rifle weighs 5.4 Kg and has an effective range of 1300 meters. Match grade ammunition is available and issued.