by Mark Wandrey
“Don’t kill her, you addled fool!” Chosht snapped. He turned to the Human leader. “Why did this Human flee?”
“I don’t know,” the leader said.
“She was with the old government,” another Human said, “before you came.”
“What is your name?” he asked the Human in question. The female was struggling to her feet, one side of her fleshy face bleeding profusely.
“Tessa Melvic,” she said, swaying on her overly-long legs.
“What do you do?”
“I maintain relations with the outlying islands.”
“Why is this important?” Chosht asked the leading Human.
“They are difficult to deal with,” the Human said.
“She is also good at maintaining databases,” the leader said, “and was willing to help us.” The Human looked at Tessa Melvic and made a face. “Now I think she betrayed you.”
“No,” Tessa said, shaking her head. Blood splattered from the wound, “I hadn’t had a chance to yet. But I would have.” She spat bloody saliva at the Human leader. “Fucking traitors to your own race. And for what? Fish?”
Chosht shook his huge head in disgust. Even the Humans who’d said they would cooperate weren’t. It was becoming obvious to him this colony would be unmanageable. They should have just destroyed every habitation center from orbit with nuclear weapons.
“Kill all of them,” he said to his troopers.
“Wait!” the Human leader screeched. “Why us, too?” The Human named Tessa Melvic looked at the leader of her group and smiled in the strangest way.
“It should be obvious,” Chosht said, “you are devious and untrustworthy even to your own race. I hope General Peepo sterilizes your home world as well.” The Human leader looked like she wanted to say something else. Chosht cut her off with a burst from his battle rifle to the face.
All the other Humans began to scream and beg for their lives, except for Tessa Melvic, who just kept smiling that strange smile as the troopers opened fire. A second later, the roof of the structure exploded as 500 kilograms of hurtling alloy and steel crashed through.
* * * * *
Chapter Twelve
Mika and Dandridge fired on the crabs as the irregulars led them on a merry chase, working them into a froth. Every once in a while, one of the aliens would fall behind its scuttling fellow troopers and thrummm, cooked crab.
“One more turn,” Dandridge said. Mika nodded, not taking her eyes off the scope. “Looks like it’s all set.”
“Better hope so,” she said. Kilometers away, a group of ten running and dodging irregulars were slowing. Sensing blood, the Xiq’tal accelerated and looked like they would catch them in a moment. Hesitantly, out of desperation, the Humans turned abruptly into a narrow street between two office buildings. The troopers raced around the corner to find the Humans kneeling across the street, weapons raised and ready.
In a flash, the Humans opened up with a fusillade of gunfire. Mika swapped out for her next-to-last magazine as she scanned back to the detention center. The body of the HecSha commander still lay there, only now a crab was investigating it. She considered putting a beam through it, then decided against it.
Back in the alley, bullets bounced and flew off the Xiq’tal’s armored carapaces like rain, tearing into the buildings and roadbed all around them. Several jerked and fell as bullets found their mark, more by accident than skill. The crabs began firing back with their arm-mounted guns. Several irregulars fell, and the rest fled into the buildings on either side of the narrow street. The Xiq’tal who were still mobile moved forward, just as another twenty irregulars led by Kelso leaned over the roofs on either side and started dropping grenades.
The Xiq’tal were tough aliens, their carapaces able to resist a lot of ballistic small-arms fire. High explosives were another matter entirely.
“Team One,” Kelso called from the rooftop, “crabs are soup. Proceeding to final objective.”
“Well done,” Mika said. “Murdock you get that? Murdock?” Oh, fuck, she thought, what has he gotten himself into now?
* * *
“Powered armor!” one of the more alert HecSha yelled as Murdock exploded through the roof. He gave his jumpjets a tiny pop to adjust his angle before bending his knees and landing on one of the dinos. Being only flesh and bone against half a ton of armored merc, the CASPer smashed the alien with a horrendous crunch and splatter of blood.
“Surprise, motherfuckers!” he yelled over the armor’s PA system. The alien who had realized what was happening dove clear of the bloody carnage. Of the three others, two gaped, and one opened up with the heavy portable machinegun they all carried. The bullets splashed off the combat system’s composite armor, only chipping paint.
Murdock pivoted and swung the suit’s left arm with all its augmented strength, activating the switchblade as he swung. A meter of titanium-edged woven carbon/steel snapped out and through the trooper firing the gun, neatly cutting him in half. He finished the other two who were still gawking at him similarly.
I miss this shit, Murdock thought as he pivoted, looking for the last HecSha, the one who’d spotted him first. He got a glimpse of it diving out the door, moving faster than he’d ever seen a dino move. Death is a great motivator. With no threats, he finally saw the slaughter all around him.
“Oh, Tessa,” he said. She was lying on her back, the top of her head missing from one of the HecSha’s huge bullets. Of course she was the reason he hadn’t taken out the quisling government along with the Sharps. Vince had found out she was on the inside, biding her time, hoping to help at some point. All she’d gotten was her brains blown out. He realized he’d been getting a call for several seconds.
“Murdock, damn it!” Mika was yelling.
“Yeah, go.”
“Oh, thank God,” she said, the relief in her voice obvious. “We’re moving to Stage Two here. What’s your status?”
“Had to go into action a little early,” he said. “The HecSha hit the new government group; everyone is dead.”
“I’m sorry about your friend,” she said.
“Yeah,” he said, and put it behind him. “Team two, go.”
“You bet, boss,” Dod said.
Murdock moved to the door and checked for the HecSha who’d fled. There was no sign of him. “Fucker’s quick, all right,” he said.
He looked at the Tri-V built into his CASPer’s cockpit, where the four drone feeds were displayed, one tasked to each of the teams.
Vince’s Team Four, its harassment job done, was evacuating civilians from near the starport as best they could. Kelso and Team One were splitting up and beginning their attack on the detention center. With luck, all the civilians who’d been prisoners the last few weeks were about to be free, including Sheela and Shannon Dresdin. Mika and Dandridge in Team Two were up in their sniper hide watching the attack on the detention center. Lastly was Dod with Team Three.
Putting the crusty old bastard in charge of a team wasn’t his first choice. He’d wanted to send him with Mika as a spotter. The problem, however, was that there was no way in hell the bastard could climb nine stories with his bum leg. Everyone else had a job, so it was up to Dod on this one.
Murdock could see the old hydrogen-powered garbage truck burst through the starport fence where the pups had weakened it. Dod was driving the machine; the back had been cut open to act as an improvised armored car. Two dozen irregulars were in the back, guns bristling, as the truck roared toward the nearest HecSha dropship. Everything was going perfect; Murdock should have known it wouldn’t last.
There was a ripple of light from the other HecSha dropship as its systems came online. Fuck me, Murdock thought, so that’s where the slippery fucking dino went! The garbage truck skidded to a stop by the other dropship, unloading irregulars, who were whooping and hollering as they raced toward the quiet ship.
“Dod!” Murdock yelled. “The other dropship!”
“We’ll get to it,” Dod said.
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Afraid it was about to open fire on the truck, Murdock pushed through the door. Unfortunately, the door was quite a bit too small for a Mk 7 CASPer, and he temporarily got wedged in the metal frame. He watched on his drone feed as the big cargo ramp at the back of the other dropship fell to the concrete, and a brilliant beam of crackling energy lanced from the rear of the dropship. It licked the side of the garbage truck, which exploded in two pieces.
“Dod!” Murdock screamed and wrenched himself free, shattering the door frame. Out of the back of the HecSha dropship came a familiar sight, a J-F9 tank, a heavy fusion-powered behemoth designed by the Zuul. He knew the design well enough. For a time back on Kash-ka, he’d been certain one had taken his commander, Jim Cartwright, with it when the thing’s fusion plant detonated. None of their intel had indicated the HecSha had armor.
The J-F9 rolled clear of the dropship so it could maneuver, its four sets of tracks working independently to allow it surprising agility for a forty-ton pile of guns and armor. The fifty-megawatt particle cannon on the turret, its main armament, flashed again and another crackling beam of energy blew the rear of the garbage truck into a shower of molten metal and half-melted shrapnel. The irregulars who survived fled in all directions, some of them into the dropship they’d been next to.
The tank was amazingly quiet for something so fucking big; the sound of its alloy treads chewing into the starport tarmac was far louder on the drone’s feed than its fusion-powered engine. It accelerated toward the vicinity of the other dropship, small anti-personnel lasers looking for survivors.
Murdock pointed his toes, and the Mk 7 CASPer roared into the snowy night sky. A deep feeling of desperation filled his heart, mainly because this was very bad. He’d come to Valais with a few missiles which might have hurt the J-F9, but he’d used them on the pirates. Now he was pitifully underpowered for such an adversary. Dod’s people had some handheld rockets, but it looked like they were all toast.
“Come on, asshole,” he chastised himself as his suit sailed through the sky. “It’s just a bitch dozer.” CASPer drivers loathed tanks, hence calling them dozers, short for bulldozers. CASPers were the lords of the battlefield. There was only one place tanks could outperform CASPers—open terrain. Just like a starport.
He activated his shoulder-mounted MAC, his magnetic accelerator cannon, bringing it on target for the J-F9’s rear deck, where the armor would be weakest. He held until well past apogee, then clicked his right fingers. The MAC cracked as the gun’s incredibly powerful magnets accelerated a 500-gram titanium/tungsten/carbide dart from zero to Mach 7 in a quarter of a second. In the time it took his eyes to register the muzzle blast, the round had already hit the tank.
A bright flash of kinetic energy release from the impact showed a deformation of the rear deck and some missing paint, and that was it. The tank slewed from its original course and the turret with the particle cannon began to swing. Oh, shit.
* * *
Chosht had had just about enough of the entropy-cursed Humans. Sure, he’d run like a hatchling when the powered armor had crashed through the roof and started slaughtering his troopers. He justified it as a tactical withdrawal. When he got outside, the only place to run was Dropship #2. Just before he got to it, he realized what was still inside. Time to die, Human scum!
The J-F9a’s fusion plant spun up in only a second, and he remotely dropped the loading door, instantly spotting a ground vehicle full of Humans trying to steal the other dropship.
“Eat charged particles!” he roared as he blew the truck apart. It was incredibly satisfying. Chosht carefully drove the tank clear of the dropship, then maneuvered toward the fleeing Humans, shooting the cargo compartment of the already ruined truck. Sure, it was overkill, but it was so much fun!
He was pretty sure Khisht was dead, killed by still more treacherous Humans. Too bad, because he would love to have thanked him for bringing the tank. This variant, the J-F9a, possessed impressive automation. The base model took a crew of seven, but this version could be operated by three, or one in a pinch, as he was doing. It wasn’t too much work against these crunchy little Humans.
Wham!
The entire tank rang like the inside of a bell, making Chosht snap his jaws in irritation. Oh, right, he thought, the powered armor. The downside of only having one crewmember was there was nobody to watch your back. Well, he’d kill the Human fly and go to the barracks to get more troopers. Then they’d kill all the others, including the Xiq’tal for good measure, and get off this cold, wet, nasty planet. He would nuke the place from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.
Chosht acquired the powered armor–equipped Human and locked it into the targeting system. The turret swung, the Human fell from the middle of his jump, and he flicked the firing stud. The lights inside the tank dimmed, and the gun fired, filling the inside of the tank with a rising scream of accelerator coils discharging. The Human was still there.
“Entropy!” he cursed and triggered the gun again.
“CHARGING,” the computer complained in flashing letters on the weapons control panel.
“You have a fusion power plant!” he complained, looking over the controls.
Wham! Another projectile from the powered armor slammed into the tank, very near the first hit according to the computer. Rear deck armor was degraded by 25%. Unacceptable. He threw the tank into a near U-turn.
Wham! This hit was off the turret and did no appreciable damage. The turret was so thickly armored the Human could shoot it all day and only annoy its driver. As the tank maneuvered, Chosht examined the controls. He finally found the power controls and saw the fusion plant was set to automatic. He stabbed it with a claw and slid the power selector to “Full.”
“CAUTION – FULL POWER IS NOT RECOMMENDED.”
“I don’t care!” Chosht bellowed and stabbed the override. The floor under his tail vibrated with increased power, and the gun indicated it could fire much faster now. His thin lips skinned back from rows of sharp teeth. “Okay Human, let’s play.”
* * *
Murdock knew his only advantage was mobility. The tank was quick, especially for a forty-ton beast, but it wasn’t as fast as a half-ton flying armored combat mech. Sting and move, he thought, sting and move while hoping for a lucky shot. He jumped over the tank, which tracked him but didn’t fire. He put another round into its rear deck exactly over the first. This time when the flash cleared, he saw the armor was damaged. Now we’re talking.
The tank wasn’t doing a good job of driving and firing. It only made sense, the Zuul dozer was supposed to have a pretty big crew. If only one dino was running it by himself, he had his claws full. Good, advantage me. He decided to take a page out of Jim Cartwright’s playbook. On the next jump, he altered his flightpath mid-course. The particle beam it fired came close enough to make the hair stand up on his head just before Murdock landed on the tank’s rear deck.
Jim had given Murdock a blow-by-blow account of how the fight had gone. If the kid had had more time in the suits, he probably could have finished it off. The crew was obviously less than proficient with their machine. They’d been fighting helpless, local, non-merc aliens, after all. Jim had managed to knock out the anti-personnel lasers and wreck several heat vents. It eventually caused the tank to have a containment breach—aka a nuclear explosion.
“Let’s avoid that,” Murdock said as he stomped on one of the vents, crushing it closed. An anti-personnel laser opened up on him, scoring two good hits on his torso before he deployed the laser shield on his arm.
“CAUTION!” His status board flashed a warning. He’d lost a central mobility servo. Shit, this dino wasn’t a pushover. He tried to stomp another vent while using the shield to protect himself, and the HecSha driver responded with a hard turn. The massive tank slid on the snow- and ice-covered tarmac, sending Murdock tumbling over the side to crash on his back.
“Ouch,” he said.
“Murdock, report,” Mika said. “Did we just see a partic
le beam from the starport?”
The dozer flipped around much faster than he’d expected. Murdock didn’t have time to get up, so he flicked an override with an eye gesture and pointed his toes. The jumpjets roared, sending him skating along the icy tarmac like a fucking hockey puck. The tank rumbled over where he’d been, a second too late. Better than being crushed, he guessed.
“Yeah,” he replied to Mika, “it’s a damned Zuul dozer,” he said, trying to bend at the waist to alter his flightpath. Because of the damaged servo, he failed. The CASPer crashed into the building the government quislings had been using, putting him right back where he’d started. He slid to a stop amidst furniture and rubble. “Ouch,” he said again. A few more warning lights appeared. Yeah, still better than being run over, he supposed.
“Do you need help?”
No fucking shit? he thought. “Negative, continue on objective.”
“Murdock, are you cra—” Mika’s transmission was cut off when the tank’s particle beam passed through the building, turning a substantial amount of it into rapidly-expanding disassociated matter and fire. There was a lot of fire.
* * *
Mika was frozen in shock as the only intact starport office building turned into a fountain of fire and debris with Murdock inside.
“Murdock!” she screamed.
“He’s gone,” Dandridge said, his jaw set, “continue on objective.” Far below them, the assault on the detention center was proceeding. For a second, she shifted her view to observe the fight. The Xiq’tal were in complete disarray. Human irregulars were rushing the perimeter, some treading through the still-spreading puddle of blood leaking from the HecSha commander’s exploded brain. Her vision washed red with rage as she shifted her aim back to the starport. The tank was coming to a stop, barrel still pointing at the carnage it had wrought.
“Mika,” Dandridge said, “what are you doing?”
