“Granite-Three, this is Oriole-fFve. Sorry, my comms are spotty, but I caught you have a Nine-lLne?”
That caught Liege’s attention. Oriole-Five was one of the Wasps.
“Uh, roger, we had. But Lightening-Six shot it down,” the captain passed.
“Granite-Three, once again, my comms are wonky. I just heard you pass you had a Nine-Line, but all after that was cut off. I say again, I didn’t hear anything you said after that. Please pass your Nine-Line now. I am overhead looking for approaching enemy forces, and I can be at your pos in two mikes.”
“Oriole-five, this is Lightening-Three-Alpha-Oscar,” a voice came over the net.
Lightening’s G-3AO would be the air officer located within the MEB headquarters, Liege knew.
“You are not authorized any additional missions. Granite-three’s Nine-line has been denied.”
“Granite-Three, I think Lightening keeps trying to contact me, but I can’t hear a thing. Nothing. If you have a Nine-Line, I suggest you send it. I’m now 90 seconds from your pos.”
Send it! Liege silently implored the captain.
The pilot could hear the MEB, she knew. She was giving herself cover to come save their asses, not that it would do any good. They’d know once they examined her instruments that nothing had been wrong with her comms.
There was another pause, then the captain made his decision.
“Roger that, Nine-Line to follow.”
His Nine-Line brief might not have been complete given the time crunch. He cut it down to basically “shoot the bad guys on the road.” Fifteen seconds after he sent it, a Wasp came screeching over the hills to make its first run over Route Grape. Her guns were already blazing and she flew low, strafing the PIP armor.
“Yee-haw! Get some,” somebody yelled over the net.
Liege watched the pilot crank up her Wasp, a steady stream of orange falling like piss to splash onto the road. She couldn’t see the armor itself, but clouds of black smoke reached up into the sky. Liege wanted to stand, shout, and pump her fist in the air, the infantry just 200 meters away notwithstanding.
The Wasp broke high into the sky, her anti-air flares popping out behind her. She conducted a huge loop, coming back around for another pass.
Liege was vaguely aware of MEB raising hell on the net, ordering the pilot to break off, but she didn’t bother to listen.
The big, beautiful bird came swooping down for another strike. Her 30mm guns spit out death and destruction.
“She’s fucking them up but good,” Moose said from where he had his head around the corner of his wall so he could watch.
For the first time in almost four hours, Liege thought she might actually survive. She swore she’d find the pilot when all this was over and buy her a drink—ten drinks.
The Wasp broke off again, reaching for the sky, when it seemed to shudder just the tiniest bit. Liege watched as the smooth arc was interrupted. It looked like the Wasp was falling to the side. When in controlled flight, the Wasp was deadly grace. Oriole-five was wounded, though, and she started to fall awkwardly back to the ground.
“Kick ass, recon,” was the last transmission before the Wasp hit the ground 20 klicks away.
Cheers sounded from the PIP infantry. Both sides had quit firing as the Wasp made its run. One run from the Wasp would have wiped out the soldiers, and with it downed, they had regained the upper hand.
With another snarl, Liege stood up and fired on auto down into the soldiers, hitting at least one of them as the guy cheered. He dropped like a rock, but that seemed to remind those around him that nothing was settled. Several opened fire at her, and the fight was back on.
“There has to be 80 vehicles knocked out,” the captain passed. “Some tried to make a break for it, off the road, and now everything’s blocked. There’s no way they’re clearing that for at least a couple of hours.
“I’ve got Doc Pierce and Bumhead moving forward to see if we can’t get some better plunging fire on the infantry down there.”
Liege looked up the hill. She wasn’t 100% positive where the captain was, but while he had great lines of sight down Grape, with the PIP infantry just 200 meters away, the hill blocked his view on them. If Pierce and Bumhead could bring them under fire, they could pick them off one by one.
A large blast sounded from less than 150 meters away.
“I see they found the directional,” Moose said. “Maybe that’ll slow them down.”
The team had emplaced their four C13 Directional Personnel Mines 100-150 meters out from the edge of their position. Each directional could put out 300 stainless steel ball bearings. With a narrow setting, that was a curtain of destruction, as a soldier evidently just found out. If the Marines were lucky, the directional had taken out more than one of them.
Liege didn’t like her position. She just couldn’t see enough. She looked to Moose to consider if she should get back with him. Moose was on one knee, firing on auto, when he suddenly lurched forward, his face in the dirt. He stayed that way, butt in the air, for a moment until he slid flat.
“Moose!” Liege shouted as she sprinted to him.
Two rounds hit her, and the second one knocked her off her feet, but her bones did their job. She’d be bruised tomorrow—if she had a tomorrow—but the rounds hadn’t penetrated.
She turned her friend over. Arterial blood was pouring from his neck, spurting bright red arcs up and splashing on Liege’s chest. He’d been leaning forward to fire, and the PIP round had caught him right over his collar, cutting down through his right carotid and into his chest cavity. He’d bleed out in about 90 seconds.
Another round hit her shoulder, knocking her back on her ass. She dragged Moose closer to the wall.
She couldn’t hesitate. Reaching into Moose’s neck, she tried to squeeze the severed edge of the carotid that was closer to his heart. It slipped two or three times before she was able to get a hold of it. With her left hand, she reached into her kit and pulled out a hemostat, clamping it into place next to her fingers.
The carotid was not the only blood vessel that had been destroyed. Blood was still pouring from him. Liege broke open the AM pack, spreading the foam through as much of his mangled neck as she could. She knew the round had torn up his lung as well, but she had to prioritize her efforts.
With the AM pack administered, she slapped on a number 6 pressure patch.
It’s not going to work, she thought.
There was too much damage. But short of cutting him open and getting at his lung, there wasn’t much else she could do. The volume of fire from the PIP forces was picking up, and she doubted they’d give her the time for field surgery.
“Fidor, shift right,” Warden passed. “You’re being flanked!”
Liege knew she had to get Moose into stasis and quick. But he’d lost lots of blood—too much. Stasis with this much blood loss raised the chance of a catastrophic systemic collapse, one in which resurrection might not even be possible. If she could get a Hemocap and a saline into him first, he’d stand a much better chance of survival.
She broke out both packs, piggybacking the Memocaps into the saline, and then thumbed the AV snake free. She activated the snake and watched it worm its way into his cephalic vein. Once it was seated, she lifted the bag with her left hand to let gravity take over.
“Doc, I’m hit!” Fidor shouted out from 30 meters away.
“Where?” she passed on her P2P.
“Right through the foot,” he said, calmed by the mere fact of using comms instead of screaming.
“Is it spurting?”
“No, my boot is keeping it tight. But it hurts like shit!”
“OK, keep fighting. I’ll get there when I can.”
“Doc, how’s Moose?” Warden asked.
“Bad, but I’m stabilizing him. Four minutes, five minutes, tops, and I can ziplock him.”
“I don’t think we’ve got that long. Can you move him?”
Liege looked down at Moose. He was twice
her size, and although she’d bulked up over the years, between his size and the need to keep him still until she could put him in stasis, she didn’t think moving him as a possibility.
“Here they come,” Warden said. “We’ve got to move back. Can you move him?”
“No. You go back. I’ll stay.”
“Fuck that,” Fidor said. “I’m coming.”
“No! You go!” Liege shouted as Fidor started to sprint to her.
He only made it half-way before an energy beam hit him, his body locking up before it fell stiffly to the ground. The “stiff dive” was the sign that he’d been hit with a disrupter, and his nervous system had been scrambled. There was almost no chance of resurrection from that.
“Fidor,” Liege said quietly, the only emotion she allowed herself for the moment.
“Liege! You’ve got to move back,” Warden said.
Three soldiers rushed into view. Liege had laid her M91 just out of reach, a rookie mistake. She pulled the Ruger out of her holster, firing at the three just as they noticed her. Amazingly, all three went down, the first before they started to react, the last getting off a shot that hit Liege dead on the chest.
She gasped for air. Whatever she’d been hit with packed a kick.
“I’m staying here with Moose,” she told Warden, barely managing to get the words out.
She looked at the IV pack. She needed another minute for it to empty, then yet another to get Moose ziplocked.
Three rounds hit her side, one after the other, and fire exploded in her left kidney. She went down, her right hand out to stop her fall. One way to defeat the Marines’ reactionary armor was to hit the same spot in succession. When the bones embedded in the fabric of the skins hardened, it was only for a moment. As they swung back to normal, the armor inserts were vulnerable for a few seconds at that spot. Hitting at the same spot again before it could recover could defeat the armor. And that’s what the PIP soldier had done. At least one round had pierced her skins and bones and had penetrated her left side.
Trying to keep Moose’s IV pack high with her left hand, she reached under her body with her right hand and fired her Ruger across her front. She didn’t really aim, but at five meters, the soldier who’d just shot her took at least one round low in his belly. He folded over into a fetal position, moaning.
“Are you coming?” Warden asked.
Liege could hear the distinctive chatter of his M114 as he kept fighting.
“I can’t. I’m hit.”
“Oh, hell, I didn’t want to run, either.” Warden said.
An energy beam of some sort hit her. Her mind went bright white for a moment, her consciousness gone before the real Liege rushed back into her body. Her skins didn’t offer much in the way of protection against energy weapons, but she was still alive, so it must have been a near miss.
Near miss or not, her arms weren’t working right. She dropped the IV pack. She couldn’t hold it up anymore, so it would have to do. She fumbled out the ziplock just as something exploded near her. Hot knives dug into her neck, but what horrified Liege was the ziplock. It now had at least three rents. It was now useless.
She fumbled out another, but her arms were rubber.
A body landed beside her, and Liege scrambled to pick up her Ruger.
“Need help?” Warden asked as he fired off another burst from his M114.
“I can’t get this on him,” she said.
Together, the two managed to slide the ziplock over Moose’s big body, and with relief, Liege activated it. The lights cycled green.
“Can you walk?”
“I think so,” she answered.
“Let’s get into Gidge’s position. You know, away from here.”
Liege’s body was failing her, but her mind was back. Warden wanted to get away from Moose so there would be less chance of the PIP soldiers damaging the ziplock while trying to kill the two of them.
“You’ve got it,” she told him.
She stood, then doubled over and screamed as the pain in her side overwhelmed her. Warden put an arm under her right arm and around her back and supported her as they stumbled away from Moose. Liege somehow managed to not only shoot at a soldier with her Ruger, but hit him. She felt a surge of satisfaction as the soldier dropped.
She tried to make her legs move quicker, but they weren’t cooperating. She made one last huge effort to reach Gidge’s fighting position when the world exploded around her. She was vaguely aware of falling, then of Warden falling on her, when darkness took over.
Chapter 39
Something was tugging at her medkit. Indignation struck her. No one messed with that.
She tried to sit up, but her body wasn’t cooperating.
“Moose,” she croaked out.
Her kit was for Moose.
She felt her kit being taken away, and she struggled to open her eyes.
Oh, God, it hurts, she realized as waves of pain washed over her.
A PIP soldier had her kit in his hands. He rummaged through it, then pulled out her ziplocks.
“I count seven in here,” he said. “You know how to use them, right?”
“Yes, I do,” said another voice. “They’re not hard.”
“But you’re really a vet, not a people doc,” the soldier with her kit said.
“Medicine is medicine, and as I said, the stasis kits are not difficult to operate.”
“OK, if you say so. God knows we need them. I don’t know if Suffy’s going to pull through, so you gotta save him.”
“Don’t forget the one on the big Marine. That makes eight of them,” another voice said.
Big Marine? Moose! she thought as she tried to figure out what was going on.
She was a prisoner, obviously. Where were Warden and Moose?
“No, I told you, once activated, they can’t just be taken and used again. They’re one-time use only,” the vet said.
“We can try,” the soldier replied before looking back down at Liege.
“Hey, she’s awake,” he said, nudging her with his foot.
Liege stifled the scream that tried to escape past her lips.
“So what do we do with them?”
“Zero them,” the unseen soldier replied.
“OK,” the first soldier said with a shrug as he dropped her medkit and reached to unsling his UKI.
There wasn’t any more fear left in Liege. She looked up at her executioner with steady eyes. When she’d gone unconscious, she’d thought she’d already been killed in the battle, so this was just the conclusion of the process. She knew she should yell out, she should try and run, but she just didn’t have it in her anymore.
“No!” the vet said. “You can’t kill her like that.”
The soldier turned to look back, a condescending smile on his face and said, “You heard the second corporal, Doc. Orders are orders.”
“And I’m a sub-lieutenant, Private. I outrank him.”
The soldier looked confused, then turned to look past Liege to where the second corporal had to be.
“But you’re not a real sub-lieutenant,” the other soldier said. “You’re just a doc.”
“Do you see the star on my collar? Does that look real to you?”
“Only one star, Doc. You’ve got one of those medical thingies on your other collar.”
“A caduceus, Second Corporal. But my one star still out-ranks you.”
Liege turned her head to see the other soldier, sitting on the remnants of a wall. He looked like anyone she’d see back home, just another guy. There wasn’t anything remarkable about him, if you discounted the little fact that it seemed like he had the call on whether she lived or died.
“Touché, mon sub-lieutenant. But pray tell, why should we let this feddie live? These turds killed a lot of us, friends of mine.”
“Well, I’d say because we aren’t animals, and we follow the UAM[22] Retained Persons Convention. I’d say because who do you think put the brevet major in stasis, saving his life? One o
f us? I’d say because if anyone harms one of the prisoners, I’ll bring them up on charges, so if you’re going to kill them, you’d better kill me.”
“Jason,” the first soldier said to the second corporal, “you can’t kill the doc. He’s gotta save Suffy, right?” He paused for a second as it seemed what else the medical officer had said just registered. “You’re saying she saved the brevet major?”
“Who else?”
“Oh, man. I don’t think we should kill any of them,” the soldier said. “Right, Jason? I mean, we’re the good guys here.”
Second Corporal Jason got off the wall, walked over to Liege and squatted low, his face centimeters from Liege’s face.
He looked her in the eyes for a moment, then whispered, “Lucky girl.”
Standing up, he said, “I don’t give a shit one way or the other. I’m not going to waste my time here, so, Sub-Lieutenant Horse Doctor, they’re all yours.”
Over the low wall, a line of vehicles made their way down Route Grape, shaking the ground under Liege.
Chapter 40
“That’s about all I can do for you here,” Sub-lieutenant Frencle di Murray said as he cut the loose end of the bandage off. “You’re going to need surgery soon.”
“I need a Series 4,” Liege said, then added, “I’m not blaming you for that, though.”
Contrary to the Retained Persons Convention, Liege’s med kit had been confiscated. That bothered her more than was logical. They’d been a gnat’s hair away from being executed, and they would have been had the good doctor not intervened, so why was she still bitching about the kit?
She looked over to where Warden was laid out beside Moose. Moose’s ziplock indicator panel still showed a steady green. Warden, despite the fact that Moose had been much worse hurt, was in more danger. Liege would have put him in stasis had she still had the ziplocks, but that was now out of the question. With an interested di Murray assisting, Liege had field-dressed Warden’s face, stabilizing his shattered jaw, and inserting a tube scavenged from a destroyed vehicle to keep his airway clear. The airway was vital. He was swelling up, and without the tube, Liege knew he’d already be dead.
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