Stars & Empire: 10 Galactic Tales

by Jay Allan

  He drew his pistol and stuck his head up, realising that they’d been far luckier than they deserved. There was an enemy position on the roof, but the gunner hadn’t realised that they’d been coming out, perhaps because the noise of the shooting had prevented him from realising that the hatch was being unscrewed. Michael took aim quickly and shot the gunner in the back, before pulling himself onto the roof and shooting down towards the next gunner. Machine gun bullets ricocheted over his head as the other Crackers realised the danger, only too late. A bullet pinged off his helmet and sent him sprawling to the roof, but did no harm. One of his platoon mates was less lucky as a high-powered rifle shot hit him right in the face. Blood spewed out of his body as he toppled to the ground. Michael felt sick, but there was no time to mourn or even avenge his death. He had no idea where the bullet had come from.

  For the first time, as the other four soldiers deployed and started providing covering fire, he had a chance to take in the overall situation. A black cloud of smoke was rising up from the direction of their base, the converted Civil Guard garrison they’d arrived at yesterday. Other clouds of smoke could be seen in the distance, suggesting that they weren’t the only patrol that had been attacked. A handful of bodies—Crackers, he hoped—lay sprawled on the street, already being savaged by a handful of local birds. The Bloodsuckers hadn’t been scared off by the shooting, for humans rarely shot at them. The briefing had warned that Bloodsuckers might be omnivorous, happy to eat both Avalon’s native animals and the animals imported from Earth, but they tasted bad, even to a desperate human. Apparently, their blood chemistry had some potential commercial use, but Avalon simply didn’t have the resources to explore the possibilities.

  “Disgusting,” one of the soldiers breathed, as a Bloodsucker landed on the rooftop, eying them with beady red eyes. A rag of suggestive red meat hung from its mouth. “Can I shoot the little bastard?”

  “Don’t waste your ammo,” Michael said. The Crackers had fallen back, leaving the platoon alone, or so it seemed. He wished, not for the first time, that he had a Marine-issue terminal, something he could use to link into the drone’s systems and study the live feed directly. The Marines hadn’t brought enough of those from Earth for everyone. “If the creature tries to eat Robin, shoot it; if not, leave it be.”

  He keyed his radio quickly. “This is Charlie-one,” he said. “Enemy contact appears to have receded, but we remain trapped. Assistance would be welcome.”

  The dispatcher didn’t respond for a long moment. “There are multiple attacks coming in all across the board,” he said, finally. “Almost every garrison and patrol we had out there is coming under attack. Are you safe for the moment?”

  Michael glanced around, dubiously. “For the moment,” he said, grimly. It didn’t seem possible that they wouldn’t be compromised soon enough. Although they had managed to drive the Crackers off the rooftops, they were still keeping the soldiers trapped. “We may be able to break out if necessary.”

  “Negative,” the dispatcher said. There was a grim note in his voice that sent a shiver down Michael’s spine. “Hold your position. Drones report that you are surrounded and probably isolated. Helicopters are inbound.”

  Michael scowled. “Everyone get under cover,” he ordered. He’d seen the helicopters at work before. “Get the girls to the ground floor and under whatever cover they can find. Helicopters are inbound.”

  On cue, he heard the sound of rotor blades in the distance.

  CHAPTER 45

  The key to winning a conventional war is heavy firepower, applied liberally onto any enemy position that makes itself a target. The key to winning an insurgency is to apply minimum necessary firepower onto the target, taking extreme care to avoid collateral damage.

  - Major-General Thomas Kratman (Ret), A Marine’s Guide to Insurgency.

  “Incoming!”

  Jasmine threw herself to the ground as the first mortar rounds started exploding on the shields. The small base had been designed by the Civil Guard to stand off indirect attacks, but judging from the number of explosions, the Crackers had smuggled at least four mortars and firing teams up close to the base. It hadn’t been designed for outright bombardment and the attackers might get lucky.

  She crawled rapidly towards the observation tower, donning her helmet as she moved. The Marines had been held back as a QRF for the Army of Avalon, but it was starting to look as if the new soldiers were going to be on their own. The enemy weren’t using smart rounds—a relief, as a concentrated attack with smart warheads could have wrecked the base fairly quickly—but the longer the bombardment continued, the greater the chance that they would get lucky. They seemed to be lobbing bombs into the base at random, perhaps hoping to keep the Marines pinned down. At least they weren’t trying to storm the gate.

  The base itself hadn’t been designed with a major attack in mind. It had appalled her when she’d first seen it, for the Civil Guard had definitely been taken for a ride by the contractors. It consisted of one large three-story building, a heavy wall that wouldn’t have stood up to a heavy plasma cannon for a moment and a set of observation towers. The four gates—one on each side of the base—could probably have been knocked down by a determined or suicidal driver in a truck. At least the Crackers didn’t seem to be resorting to suicide attacks, although part of her mind warned that they hadn’t done it yet. The Marines had learned to hate suicide attacks a long time before the Phase Drive had been discovered and humanity started to expand outside the Sol System.

  “Enemy forces are concentrating on the north gate,” her helmet buzzed. The sound of shooting—heavy machine guns and rifles, as well as the incessant mortar fire—grew louder. Jasmine could see, in hindsight, just how the crackers had managed their attack. They’d hidden in the nearby houses and deployed once the first patrols were too far from the base for effective support. “All Marines, sound off.”

  Jasmine acknowledged her position as she started to scramble up the observation tower. The enemy might have seen her climb, but she knew that she would be a difficult target, unless they had a sniper out there with a high-powered rifle. That wasn’t so unlikely, she had to remind herself, but no one shot at her until she reached the top and started to peer through the slits. There were at least four columns of smoke rising up in the distance, each one—she guessed—marking the position of the four patrols that had been dispatched, thirty minutes ago. It had taken that long for the situation to degenerate into sheer hell.

  She keyed her communicator as she moved from slat to slat, looking for targets. “I can make out at least one mortar team firing from a concealed position,” she said, as a new round of shells crashed down on the shields. The heavy blocks the Marines had placed to provide additional protection were certainly proving their value, leaving her to wonder why the Civil Guard hadn’t manufactured them themselves. It wasn’t as if it was a new trick. “I also count seventeen gunners on the roof, firing into the complex.”

  “Roger,” the dispatcher said. Silently, she activated her helmet’s systems and started sending data back to the command centre, as well as drawing a live feed from one of the drones. The enemy positions were good, but they didn’t seem to have a reserve waiting for the Marines when they came out to fight, although that didn’t surprise her. After what the Marines had done to the bandits, the Crackers would have to be fools to fight them in open battle. Keeping them pinned down was hard enough. They weren’t even making any serious attempt to breech the gate. “You are cleared to engage at will.”

  Blake would have tested the dispatcher’s patience by demanding to know which of the enemy was actually called Will, but Jasmine was more focused on the mission. If she was cut off from the rest of the platoon, the least she could do was concentrate on clearing the way for them. She readied her MAG, activating the sniper settings, and peered towards the mortar team’s position. The standard-issue MAG wasn’t exactly a dedicated sniper weapon—the Marines had been known to note that it was a jack of al
l trades and master of none—but it would suffice, in a pinch. She might not have had a buddy backing her up, yet she could still shoot.

  She peered through the rifle’s scope, carefully taking aim at the mortar team’s leader—or at least she thought he was the leader. He was a tall fair-skinned man, with signs of a life spent working hard for a living, but it hardly mattered to her. She concentrated, studied his face for a long moment and carefully squeezed the trigger. The MAG launched a single bullet towards him and sent him reeling over backwards, shot through the head. Jasmine moved to the second target, and then the third, picking them both off quickly and efficiently. The remaining targets jumped out of the way and dived for cover.

  Jasmine understood their confusion. Unlike a normal weapon, the MAG produced no flash when it was fired, leaving them without a way of locating her easily. It wouldn’t take them long to realise that there had to be a sniper in the tower, but by then she would have accounted for a few other enemy fighters. It did help that her weapon was capable of telling the difference between friend and foe and helping her to avoid targeting the wrong side. A friendly fire incident would be disastrous.

  “I am engaging the enemy,” she said, as she moved her scope over a younger man carrying a small submachine gun, firing quick precise bursts of fire towards the defenders. Jasmine’s bullet slammed into his throat and sent him flying backwards, blood spraying everywhere. He might have survived if he’d been rushed into a stasis tube and transported to a first-class medical centre, but no such centre existed on Avalon. “One mortar team has been neutralised.”

  A series of explosions warned that the other mortar teams hadn’t been deterred. Jasmine’s audio-discrimination programs reported that their rate of fire had slowed, suggesting that they were either shifting position rapidly or were running out of ammunition and trying to make it last as long as possible. Jasmine would have bet on the former, if only to assume the worst. It was a shame that they hadn’t had time to set up a proper counter-battery system in the town, but the Captain would probably have balked at the thought of unleashing heavy weapons within the town, where civilians could be hurt. Jasmine swept her gaze over the nearby buildings and concluded, ruefully, that there didn’t seem to be any civilians in the area. They had either fled or joined the insurgents. She would bet on the latter.

  She watched carefully as a young face appeared on one of the rooftops, glanced from side to side, and then ran towards the fallen men. Jasmine tracked him, waited until he picked up the weapon, and shot him neatly through the head. He couldn’t have been out of his teens, yet the Crackers had been prepared to use him as a soldier, not unlike many other planets locked in endless insurgencies. Avalon, at least, had only a mild case of civil war. If they could break the Crackers, and the Council, perhaps the planet would have a chance to survive and develop its own potential.

  “The new bugs are pinned down,” someone said, over the general channel. “They’re calling for fire support and relief!”

  “We don’t have much to send,” someone else said. “Hang on; dispatch is trying to muster more reinforcements now.”

  Jasmine swore inwardly, biting her lip. If there were few forces that could be dispatched to aid them, it suggested that the attacks had been far more widespread than she thought. It didn’t bode well for the future if the Crackers could not just tie up the Army of Avalon, but also the Marines and the Civil Guard. So far, she didn’t think that there had been many causalities, but with barely-trained and inexperienced troops out there, it was quite likely that they’d run out of ammunition. When that happened, she knew, they would be slaughtered.

  She caught sight of a team of men running to the abandoned mortar and trying to move it out of her sight. She opened fire at once, picking off one of the men and blowing a second man’s leg off with a misplaced shot. The others dived for cover; a second later, bullets started rattling the slats, causing her to duck back with a curse. Someone on the other side had finally figured out where she had to be and was intent on killing her, even if it meant taking the pressure off the rest of the base. A pair of mortar shells screamed down and exploded far too close for comfort, distressingly accurate shooting from untrained men—or were they untrained? It wasn’t as if the Crackers were short of places where they could train their fighters, areas where the Civil Guard never penetrated. The hunting near the Mystic Mountains was supposed to be good … and a hunter of animals could become a hunter of men quite easily.

  Another shell landed far too close to the observation tower and Jasmine reluctantly conceded that it was untenable. She grabbed her MAG and shimmed down the ladder, knowing that the moment they saw her they’d open fire. Snipers were rarely shown mercy in wars, even though they were nothing more than just another kind of soldier. There was something about a sniper that just marked them out for death. Something hit her in the back, just before she got under cover, and she fell to the ground, cursing. Her armour had locked up and taken the brunt of the shot, but she still felt as if she’d gone three rounds with the Marine Corps Boxing Champion, back at the Slaughterhouse. He’d been one of her trainers back during Basic Training and had offered to graduate any of the trainees instantly if they beat him in the ring. Many had tried; none had succeeded. Red icons flashed up in her helmet, warning of all kinds of possible damage, before they faded away. She was intact, if sore. Absurdly, an image of Mandy doing a post-spanking dance popped into her mind and she giggled, ignoring the pain. She was definitely alive.

  “I’m intact, sir,” she said, when the dispatcher realised that she had fallen from the tower. Not a moment too soon, for a mortar shell landed dead on top of it and blew the observation position to flaming debris. She somehow managed to pull herself to her feet and run for cover as the shooting started to intensify again. “I’ve been through worse.”

  The ground shook violently as something exploded in the distance. “Good,” the dispatcher said. “Get to the forward position and meet up with 2nd platoon there.”

  There were seven Marines there, waiting for her. Blake was MIA, of course, but two others had been given a brief transfer to the Army of Avalon and were out of reach for the foreseeable future. Jasmine briefly linked into the general network and was shocked to realise that one of them had been badly wounded, despite everything his soldiers could do to help him. His suit was flashing urgent warnings, having injected him with sedatives and painkillers, but there was no way of evacuating him quickly. Joe Buckley was still living his charmed life, yet Jasmine couldn’t see how even he intended to get out of the trap before his platoon ran out of ammunition. It wouldn’t be long now.

  A roar of engines announced that the first AFV was being moved towards the gate. The enemy might not have seen it coming, for they weren’t even trying to knock it out before it could be moved outside the base. Upon an order from the dispatcher, Jasmine and the rest of her platoon ran forward to provide cover as the gate hissed open, revealing a deserted street. It had been buzzing with life when they’d arrived in town. Now, the civilians had all deserted their homes for safety … or had joined the insurgents. She had to remind herself, again, that this enemy didn’t play by the Empire’s rules.

  She scowled as bullets started to ping off the AFV. The Empire divided insurgents into two categories; those that did their best to avoid civilian casualties and those that gloried in killing as many innocent people in the crossfire as possible, if not actually preying on the people they claimed to be fighting for. The Crackers, at least, seemed to have taken steps to get the civilians out of the way, unless they actually were the civilians and intended to simply drop their weapons when they were tired of fighting, melting back into the civilian population. The AFV advanced slowly, its guns swivelling to engage the gunners that presented themselves as targets, blowing them away with high-velocity rounds. The Crackers fell back into the town, slipping into buildings and hiding from the advancing machine.

  “Get the next three AFVs deployed to corners and into position to
block any egress,” the dispatcher ordered. Jasmine sighed inwardly, but waited as the remaining AFVs were moved out of the base. In her experience, armoured vehicles weren’t as useful as they looked in street-fighting, but perhaps the dispatcher merely wanted to make a show of force. The Crackers seemed to have melted away into the buildings, perhaps even slipping into basements and underground tunnels. How long had they been planning their war? It all seemed too elaborate to have been put together on the fly.

  “Drone reports enemy forces in buildings,” the dispatcher added. A map flashed up in Jasmine’s helmet, showing her the suspected location of the enemy fighters. Perhaps they were hiding, in hopes that the Marines would pass them by, although that wasn’t going to happen. Even if the buildings had been marked as unoccupied, the Marines would have searched them anyway, just in case. It wouldn’t be the first time that someone with bad intentions had managed to spoof a drone. “Clear them out; take them alive if possible.”

  2nd Platoon divided itself into two fire teams and advanced on the first building, with an AFV moving up behind to provide heavy firepower if required. Jasmine looked at the building, made a silent calculation about the likelihood of someone inserting an IED in the doorway, and used hand signals to warn the others that they were going to go through a wall. Doing damage to civilian property was discouraged, but she knew that Captain Stalker would back her up on this one … and, besides, the Marines would pay for it. It would be far better than having a mortar shell plunge through the roof and wreck the entire building.

  “Now,” she muttered, as they placed the shaped explosive charges on the stone wall. Someone had been mining stone from a nearby quarry, she guessed, taking a second to admire the strange patterns running through the white stone. The charges detonated, blasting the wall inwards and allowing the Marines to charge inside, weapons raised and at the ready. A handful of Crackers had clearly been caught by the blast and stunned, but the Marines took no chances and played stunners over them, before searching them roughly and leaving them for the follow-up units to handle. Jasmine found a set of stairs and ran up them, watching for enemy contact. A single Cracker holding an odd pistol swung around to point it at her and she shot him neatly through the chest. He staggered over, one hand pressed to the wound, and collapsed to the floor. Jasmine kicked the weapon out of reach and kept moving.