The Battle for the Ringed Planet

by Richard Edmond Johnson

  “There goes our medical coverage.” The woman engineer commented glumly.

  Clive popped up beside them, “You two all right?”

  “Yeah.” Torian wiped the dust from his arms, “Where’s Andy and Nick?” All three ducked as another arty round plastered the shields above them with a bright flash while static charges resonated around the small shield towers making a buzzing noise.

  Their own guns answered by firing continuously through the shield at the enemy’s positions. Despite the artillery, other soldiers left the trenches to fight the fires and try to save anybody trapped inside.

  “Come on!” Clive called as he climbed out.

  Torian turned back to the woman, “Are you good?” She nodded and the flight specialist helped her crawl out following Clive.

  A camouflaged hover utility vehicle with a plasma canon mounted on the roof pulled up with a black female lieutenant who had loaded it with fire extinguishers and backpacks. Kat parked the military vehicle and climbed out throwing a small red tubular object at Torian.

  She yelled, “Get to work lady’s man! The infirmary first!” He nodded and spied Callie with a fire extinguisher running towards a wall of fire.

  The scene at the medical facility was ghastly as a firestorm raged. Patients that lined up in stretchers in front from the dust off were all roasted corpses and medical personal inside did not stand a chance. A line of soldiers fought the flames with the powerful extinguishers shooting a white foamy substance twenty to thirty meters into the inferno. The heat was intense and sweat mixed with black grime rolled down Torian’s forehead and into his eyes stinging.

  He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to see a grim Andy wearing a backpack attached to his extinguisher with a hose. The tall black engineer held another pack and helped Torian into it attaching the extinguisher. The foam was powerful shutting out flames upon contact.

  “Have you seen Nick?” Andy called out over the noise of the roaring fire.

  “No, you?” Torian replied and the engineer shook his head.

  The tall brown haired young man and the engineer joined a line of marines sending geysers of white spray slowly diminishing the flames.

  --

  “If I tell you how to take down the shield, will the killing stop?”

  “I can’t make a promise like that, but a victory here will help the war effort.” Neil stared hard into her eyes, and she felt vulnerable.

  Firmly, she backed away from the blonde haired major with a strong jaw and perfect teeth, making her wonder what was real and artificial, “You can’t go in the city or you’ll die.”

  “We were hoping you knew some way to protect us from the effects, maybe a power you have, or an area where it’s safe.”

  Shaking her head, she sighed, “The shield decides, not me. It allowed Torian and May to live.”

  “Both of them? I don’t understand. How does it decide?”

  “Jarlan designed it, I have no idea about the technology, and he’s hiding.”

  “But why did it let Specialist McCallum and Private Xiong pass? How come no others?”

  “Maybe it’s not working right, I don’t know.”

  Neil nodded and walked to his table with the holo displays, “Then we’ll send McCallum and Xiong in to de-activate or destroy it, assuming she’s still alive.”

  That part made her afraid, she did not want to go back in, and especially not Torian, considering the danger, “Is May alright?”

  “I’m bringing up her Con reading now …” He maneuvered floating screens with his fingers, “The Dragons are scattered, but most of the battalion are retreating back to the base.” Neil flipped a screen that showed May’s life sign readings, all elevated with high adrenalin. Her wounds appeared almost fully healed and she was otherwise unscathed.

  “She seems unharmed.” The intelligence officer selected another screen, “I’ll send some commandos in an armored vehicle to get her here.” While he spoke to a screen, Siiri sat back on the chair in front of the table.

  “Now, McCallum’s up top, he doesn’t have a Con …”

  “Is he all right?” Siiri peered at the major worried and anxious.

  When he flicked on a holo, she stood up near the table and they both watched dozens of marines fighting the fires on the surface. The artillery bombardment had stopped, but with facial recognition from Torian’s military file, Neil soon pinpointed the young man. The lanky flight specialist and a couple of other marines, including a female, were kneeling over a prone figure in a pool of blood and Siiri recognized the dead man from the mess line.

  “Looks like chaos.” He glanced up from the holo.

  Then Siiri sighed, “I have to go into the city with them.”

  The major frowned, “No. You’re too important.”

  “The shield controls are guarded, and only I can get through, because of my DNA.”

  “We cannot risk losing you.”

  “Then you can’t get the shield down. Besides, if you can get through the city, you can examine Jarlan, he was one of the scientists who did the experiments.”

  “He was here a century ago?”

  “Yes, used his powers to extend his life.” Well, she really did not know that for sure, but it would help convince the major.

  The blonde man let out a low whistle, “Then we need to secure him before the rebels find him.”

  “You better hurry.”

  “I’ll have to get approval from the CO. It’s a gamble to use you, but maybe worth it to secure a bigger prize.”

  “And I have two conditions.”

  The intelligence officer frowned, “Conditions?”

  “I’m not going unless you meet them.”

  His eyes narrowed, “Go on.”

  Siiri strode around the table back to the chair and sat down with a defiant expression, “First, May gets to go home after we get the shield deactivated. No penalties and she gets a good report card, or whatever it is you give soldiers for getting an ‘A’.”

  “An honorable discharge?”

  “And a nice medal.”

  “Like what?” Neil was clearly not amused, but Siiri almost smiled, wait until he heard her next condition.

  “I don’t know a nice one.”

  “How about a Bronze Star?”

  “I like gold.”

  “We don’t have a gold star.”

  “Silver then.”

  The major sighed, “Fine that can be arranged.”

  “Torian gets one, too.”

  “The CO will love that.” Neil brought up his floating comms screen, “Approval might take a while, they’re a little busy. In the mean time, we can get McCallum down here and work out a plan.”

  “You haven’t heard my other condition.”

  Major Neil Duncan shot her a tired look, “What now?”

  Siiri swallowed, a little less confident now, unsure whether he was going to go for it, “Make Torian an officer.”

  He stared at her incredulously, “You’re joking.”

  “I am not. He’s, well, maybe not that well educated, but he’s really intelligent, and important … to me, anyway.”

  “That will be difficult.”

  “More difficult than winning this battle with the shield still up?”

  She had him and he knew it, “Well, he’s fleet; maybe we can make him an ensign.”

  “Lieutenant.”

  “No, no, see they’re different, a lieutenant junior grade in fleet is higher than a second lieutenant in the marines …”

  Siiri folded her arms, “The same rank as that annoying lieutenant you assigned to me.” Oh, she would love that!

  “Do you realize how much screen work that’s going to be?”

  “I’m the one who has to go back into the city!”

  The handsome blonde officer sighed, and brought up a direct link to Colonel Benjamin Trilling.

  --

  “McCallum, get your ass over here!” Kat barked. She had orders to get him to the CO rig
ht away, which meant he probably did something really, really bad, and it served him right.

  Scowling as he stood over the body of Private Nick Grimes, killed by a hunk of metal in the back of his head from an explosion, Torian shouted back, “Give me a moment.”

  While fires still raged in the background silhouetting human forms running back and forth in the smoke darkened sky, Clive stood beside Torian, “You better go.”

  Reluctantly, and a little bit angry, Torian walked away from the death scene of his new friend towards the hover utility vehicle, simply called a Multipurpose Utility Vehicle, or MUV, (pronounced like ‘move’) with the gun mounted turret on the roof. He hastily saluted the officer and climbed into the passenger side glancing back at the engineers covering the Nick’s body with a green ground sheet.

  “I’m sorry about your friend.” Kat tried to make peace.

  “What do they want with me?”

  “I don’t know.” She started the military hover vehicle and it floated above the ground a meter and with a little dust sped towards the Command Center. Above ground, it was just a small building with an array of antennas; most of the complex was underneath. Exiting the hover vehicle, they both strode inside where communication technicians operated holo stations and in the back was a flight of metal stairs. A few moments later, they stood at the doorway of the command bunker and Kat saluted, with Torian lazily followed suit.

  A captain approached and Kat showed him her Con with her orders, “Specialist First Class McCallum to see the colonel.”

  The man with two small solid black bars on the front of his tunic gave Torian a long contemptuous look, one he had seen on many occasions when called in to see someone in charge. When the captain motioned them to follow and turned around Torian raised his hand with his middle finger extended, but Kat immediately slapped it down.

  “Don’t make it any worse for yourself!”

  “After that SNAFU up there I hear the jail is the safest building to be in.”

  “I’m sure you’ll find out soon enough.”

  They followed the captain in silence over to several men surrounded by holos, talking animatedly to the floating virtual screens. A man with a beak-like nose and deeply tanned skin glanced at the pair, then spoke to another officer and waved them to come inside the circle of virtual screens.

  Kat immediately saluted as did Torian and the colonel nodded, “You’re McCallum?”

  “Yes sir.” He thought it was strange, hauled in front of the CO just because Siiri kissed him.

  “I’m Colonel Trilling; I hear you had a rough time up top.”

  All of sudden the fatigue hit him, and Torian shot the commanding officer a weary look, “Yeah, it was messy.”

  The grey and brown haired man pulled up a floating screen with a document bearing the seal of the Confederation Armed Forces, or CAF, “Congratulations, son. This is your commission sent to your profile. You’ve been promoted to fleet Lieutenant, junior grade.”

  Torian stood speechless, while Kat`s mouth hung open, and they both exclaimed simultaneously, “What?”

  “And a silver star.” The floating screen displayed the medal, actually a large gold star with a small silver star in the middle and a blue, white and red striped ribbon.

  Swallowing, the young disbelieving flight specialist, now lieutenant, squeaked, “For kissing a girl?”

  “I don’t know anything about that.”

  “But I hate officers …” he caught the colonel’s hard stare, “I mean …”

  “Listen son, you have important mission, go see Major Duncan, he will brief you. Once again, congratulations. Don’t make me regret this.”

  They both saluted the colonel and Kat sighed, “This way to see the major.”

  Turning away, Torian uttered, “What just happened?”

  The black woman, still stunned, just shook her head.

  “We’re the same rank? Does that mean I get to eat with you and Siiri?”

  “Follow me!”

  “And sleep in her quarters?”

  “No!”

  Chapter 22: Mission

  “Torian!” Siiri glowed when the new lieutenant entered the secure underground S-2 office followed by Kat. Her expression turned to concern when she how exhausted he looked with sweat and grime dirtying his face.

  “What did you do?” She detected the hint of a smile under his mask of annoyance.

  “What do you mean? I thought you would be pleased?”

  The intelligence major drummed the table with his fingers, “We’re short on time.”

  Torian turned from Siiri and strode to Neil’s desk, “I think I know why I’m here, so bring up a map of the city.”

  “I figured you knew all along, your Con has been tampered with.” The major handed Torian the device and touched a few floating controls, Tristan could always hide things better than he ever could. “What else do you know?” He motioned to Siiri, “About her?”

  The young man, with dirty brown hair under his cap, glanced at Siiri then at the major, “That she can get people promoted with a wink and a smile.” he winked at Siiri and she smiled.

  “Powers! Her powers, she must have something?”

  “You have Private Xiong en route from that mess up you call a recon by force?”

  Neil was starting to dislike Torian tremendously, “Let’s start with a tactical update. We took out three enemy cruisers and now have secured orbit for the moment.”

  “They’ll be back.” Torian knew the enemy was dogged.

  The major checked a screen and touched another, “The Dragon marine is coming into camp now, here’s the map.”

  They all stared at the hologram of the city encompassing Neil’s table, and even Kat stepped forward while Torian walked around, pointing “The shield controls are in this tower, part of the university. The tower is made of some sort of amplifier that caused the special powers of the original city dwellers.”

  “We can take that out with a ‘God of War’ cruiser.”

  “Jarlan would have thought of that, I imagine he has similar amplifiers in other areas, you’d probably have to flatten the whole city before you got them all, and then you couldn’t be sure without sacrificing more lives.”

  The major nodded and gave Torian a hard stare, then glanced at Siiri; the young man definitely had a presence, but Neil still doubted he was officer material, “So what’s your plan, lieutenant?”

  The young man walked around to the south side of the city near the marine’s lines, “Siiri, where’s the nearest tunnel entrance?”

  “Um, I think I told you all the ones I could remember.”

  “What’s this place?” He pointed a large multi-storied building with a huge parking lot.

  Siiri walked around and studied it, “The hospital.”

  “Did Jarlan play doctor? I mean, did he use medicine, drugs, and instruments?”

  “When were sick he administered pills and things, sometimes hypos. He was very good and we always got better.”

  The new young officer glanced at Neil, “That means he got the medicine from somewhere, there must be a tunnel there. The hospital isn’t far from the south edge of the city, we can go on foot and from there go underground. If you read the logs in my Con you know there’s a complex tunnel system under the city. I am pretty sure we can get to the shield controls without getting seen by the enemy.”

  “A vehicle would be faster. We could use a list of all tunnels entrance locations. You might lose the Con links from the cruisers in orbit.”

  “But we should have contact with you, and then you can bridge us to them.”

  “All right; you’re going to be vulnerable once outside our perimeter. The rebels are positioning themselves in the west forest and soon will be probing our defenses.”

  “The hospital is 7 clicks from the perimeter, I agree, a vehicle would be faster. We can shield it, so only a direct hit would damage it.” Torian watched the major.

  “We don’t want to draw too much
attention to you. We’ll have fighter cover over the base and counter measures for their scanners. We can start a fireworks show to the west as a diversion for your exit, and bombard their main base with artillery and from orbit.”

  Torian nodded.

  “When you clear the shields, I’ll have an infantry vanguard standing by.” Then he shot Kat a hard stare, “That will be your platoon, Lieutenant Martine.”

  Kat gave him a solemn nod and Siiri glanced at her uneasily, realizing that the black marine’s life was in their hands.

  “Major,” Torian wiped grime from his cheek with the back of his hand.

  “Yes Lieutenant?”

  “I need full access to anything I need in the stores and armory, no questions asked.”

  “Is there something I need know about?”

  “I just have a hunch, I’m probably wrong, but Private Xiong needs to have security code crackers. I know the Special Forces have those.”

  “She knows how to use them?”

  “Read her file.”

  Major Duncan nodded slowly, “You have your team then, and any support you need.”

  Lieutenant Torian McCallum turned to pretty blonde haired girl watching him intently, “You ready for this?”

  She nodded, and then shook her head, “No.”

  “When can you go?” Neil checked the time on a floating screen.

  “As soon I have a vehicle and equipment.”

  “Take Lieutenant Martine’s MUV.”

  Outside the command bunker Kat led Torian and Siiri into the hazy compound blanketed by drifting smoke from the burned out ruins. The marines had finally put the fires out and all that remained was the removal of the bodies, a task Torian was glad he was going to miss.

  Beside the MUV that Kat had driven, a huge armored box with tapered sides and a big gun turret zoomed up. As soon as it stopped, both heavy back doors swung open and two commandos exited followed by a slow reluctant May, with a distant battle weary look, wearing her full combat attire.

  “May!” Siiri called and the tall marine glanced over at the blonde girl. A faint grin appeared on the chapped lips below the dark visor as she lifted off her helmet.