“Thanks, Private. Your left!”
Two more of the machines were heading for the side of the bunker and managed to catch one of the marines. In one swift stroke, the young man was decapitated, and the second man took a swipe that left a gash from his stomach to his collar. Jana screamed as she fired her own weapon at the machines and then turned back to help the badly wounded man.
“What do we do, Corporal?” Jack asked.
He slid in yet another magazine while watching the shapes moving all along the eastern wall. It was now breached in a dozen places, yet less than half of the enemy troops were able to make it through. He took aim and fired again, and again.
“We keep fighting!” said the Corporal through clenched teeth.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The Zealots of the Uprising were an odd mixture of religious organizations and individuals. One thing they all had in common was a religious zeal, built and encouraged by the influence of the Biomechs. Even after the Fall of Terra Nova, it was never entirely clear how the machines had been able to influence so many different peoples. In time, the last dark days of the ancient Great War would give up pieces of information, one of which was the pact, signed in blood between the vanquished leaders of Carthago and the mysterious group now known simply as the Sons of the League.
Origins of Echidna and the Zealots
ANS Titania, near Helios Prime
The ship had been dead in space for an hour now, and still the fighting raged on inside. This was no conventional boarding action though, as there were no valuable systems still functioning inside the warship. The battle was over the very bodies of the crew, and they were making the enemy pay for every soul they took.
The port gunnery deck was a mass of twisted metal, yet the crew of six had managed to construct a primitive barrier in just minutes. The lack of gravity meant they had been forced to jam equipment and containers amongst the wreckage to deny access through the three breaches into the rest of the ship. Just as before, the machines attacked, but this time the Decurions took their time. Three of them approached and began carefully pulling and cutting at the barriers.
“What now?” asked ensign Harris.
The young officer almost choked as he asked the question. Lieutenants Matius and Ingo Morato looked at each other and then to the young man. Ingo spoke first.
“Use any weapon you can. We’ll get to the weapons locker.”
He turned and pushed away back into the darker section of the deck. Two of the lockers had already been raided but right at the back where a gun-loading mount had been shattered, lay another. Ingo pulled on a grab handle and drifted silently through the ship to the unit. He crashed into the metal frame without a sound and yanked on the handle. It pulled open to reveal two magazines and a single thermal pistol.
“That’s it?” Matius asked, landing alongside him.
Ingo pulled out the pistol, checked its slide operation, and pushed in the thermal clip. He tucked the second into his utility belt and then looked back. Both of them were dressed in their Navy Personal Defense Suit, a much lighter variant of the gear used by the Marines Corps and now used by a small number of frontline crew. It was designed to function as a basic protective layer against fire, flash burns, and the vacuum of space for short amounts of time. Unfortunately for the crew, it was completely unsuited to the rigors of combat with Decurions, as was made evident by the countless mutilated corpses floating about the ship.
“Lieutenant!” screamed one the crew defending the barricade.
Ingo was already heading back when he saw the machine punch through the metal and stab one of its arms into the ensign’s torso. Metal extended out of his back, and then with a vicious yank, the thing pulled his still living form through the broken metal barricade. Another machine approached and grabbed the body. There was no attack or mutilation; it simply turned and moved away as if taking some wondrous prize from the ship.
“Lieutenant!” cried out the man once more.
Ingo felt his throat go dry, but he knew what he had to do. Locking his left arm onto the nearest grab handle, he lifted the weapon and took aim. It was a short-ranged pistol, but the howling man was not far away. Lights flickered along the grip, and he squeezed the trigger. A blast of super-heated metal rushed out and struck the man in the arm before embedding in the metal limb of the Decurion. The crewman barely noticed the impact, and Ingo fired three more times before hitting his comrade in the back of the head. Heated blood, brain, and tissue splattered against the bulkhead. Then the machine was gone, still pulling the shaking body with it.
“Animal!” shouted Ingo, even though the sound went no further than his helmet.
Another Decurion appeared and a pair of Thegns. Their special hide was either resistant to a vacuum, or it was resilient enough to allow the warriors to fight for a time in the shattered remnants of the vessel. One lifted its arms, and they flashed white. Two crewmen were killed by the burst. The next Thegn took aim and Ingo again lifted his pistol. He pulled the trigger until the magazine was dry and one of the Thegns spun about dead. The remaining warrior looked at him and then threw himself at the remains of the barricade.
Matius grabbed Ingo and pulled on his shoulder.
“Brother, we have to go. One pistol won’t stop them!”
* * *
ANS Conqueror, near Helios Prime
Admiral Lewis watched the video feed being transmitted from the robotic squadron. The mood in the CIC was as silent and somber, as it had been since the failure of the mission. The four X57 drones were spaced apart in a wide formation and still accelerating toward the scene of the vicious battle. Their optical scanners were able to provide a grainy, yet surprisingly detailed view of the remains of the Knossos Orbital Platform as well as the shattered hulk of ANS Titania. Dozens of Biomech ships waited like predators around a carcass. The view sickened him to his stomach.
“How much longer?” he asked.
“Three minutes, Sir,” answered his tactical officer.
It wasn’t long, and the thought of the poor few still trapped inside the ship made him want to retch. He forced his body to cope and watched the video. Instead, it came to the XO to change the subject.
“Sir, we have forces ready to move in on Helios.”
He looked to Captain Marcus and nodded.
“Very well. Give the order. We’ll do what we can for the General. This assault of theirs is taking up most of their ships. The plan’s simple, and that’s why it should work.”
“Yes, Sir,” said Captain Marcus, “We’ll move in low and fast and provide ground support for the General.”
“Exactly. One sweep, though, that’s all we can risk. We are outnumbered, and they know it. One run, and then we come down low and take as many off the surface as we can. We get only one shot at this.”
His XO saluted and moved to the tactical display to help with last minute arrangements for the strike. Admiral Lewis looked back at the footage of the four drones. They seemed to be moving at a snail’s pace, yet the numbers on the screen showed otherwise. Soon they would reach their target, and he could only hope it would help the crew of Titania.
Gods save them.
* * *
Lieutenants Matius and Ingo Morato pulled themselves past the three dead crewmen and toward the port gunnery escape hatch. It led directly out of where they’d been hiding and further into the shattered interior of the warship. The final remaining crewman pushed past them, ignoring their cries and vanished through the gap. Matius looked toward Ingo and spotted the shapes of the remaining Thegn and the other two Decurions. Both were now almost through the barricade of broken cases, ammunition boxes, and equipment.
“Follow him!” Ingo said nervously.
Matius went through first and activated his helmet-mounted lamp. The dull yellow device bathed the dust-filled interior with a wide beam. Though it enabled them to navigate through the ship, the light also exaggerated the shadows and silhouettes to create an even more terrifying enviro
nment than the blackness had been. Ingo moved to the hatch, turned back, and took aim. He pulled the trigger and nothing happened.
Last clip, you fool.
He reached down, found the final magazine, and snapped it into the pistol. He took aim once more, firing shot after shot. The first hit one of the Decurions, and four slammed into the Thegn, opening up a deep wound. With its outer skin breached, it seemed to lose consciousness as quickly as any other creature in an airless environment.
Just that machine to go.
The last rounds bounced off the hardened metal of the machine, with just two managing to burn through into its torso. Although it continued to move, something else caught its attention. In a few seconds it had scuttled away, using its eight limbs to pull and drag its weightless form into yet another section of the ship. The last bullet from the pistol embedded in the bulkhead just half a meter from the machine as it disappeared.
“Dammit!” he snapped.
He spun about, lost his grip, and found himself spinning out of control. Then he was grabbed and pulled him into the blackness. He kicked out and struck something hard.
“Hey, watch your feet, Ingo!”
He stopped spinning and found himself face-to-face with his brother. Both of their Navy PDS suits were covered in a mix of dust and splatters of blood. Ingo noticed a globule of something foul on the side of his brother’s visor and could only hope it was from the Thegn.
“Which way now?” Matius said nervously.
They were inside one of the long passageways that served multiple sections of the ship. It was wider than many of the other sections and had clearly been a primary escape route during the battle. Bodies were drifting about, along with spheres of blood moving in a myriad of directions, many of which left their mark on walls. Even worse were the sights of crew members torn apart by the hundreds of kinetic shells that had ripped through the vessel.
“This way!” Ingo answered.
He pointed further inside the ship through the blackened corridor and toward a pile of wreckage. Part of it moved away, and from within it a single Decurion moved. One crewman opened a hatch and looked at Ingo before seeing the machine. He tried to get back though the hatch, but somebody else behind pushed him and into range of the machine. It reached out with a pair of razor sharp limbs and stabbed at the unfortunate soul. Two puncture wounds appeared, followed by a third, but by then the man was already dead. The hatch clamped partially shut, but the machine was on it in a flash. With a quick tug, it pulled open the piece of metal and gave chase.
Matius tried to move, but Ingo pulled him back.
“No, it’s too late for them. It’s too late for all of us.”
They looked at each other for what seemed like an age. The ship was slowly being torn apart from within, and one crewmember after another ripped apart literally limb from limb; or even worse, they were being dragged off to the Biomech ships. Then Ingo’s face lit up.
“The port launch bay. There’s a pair of unarmed drones still there.”
“So?”
Ingo smiled and struck his brother on the shoulder.
“We can program it to travel back to the fleet. There’s more than enough stowage space to hide inside. We have enough air to make the journey.”
“Are you sure?”
Ingo shrugged.
“Do you want to stay on this ship and wait for those things to find you?”
Matius should his head, and the expression on his face told his brother everything he needed to know. They’d been in scrapes all their lives, but never something as terrifying as this.
“Good, let’s do this, then.”
Matius nodded quickly, almost too quickly.
“I know my way around the ship, and I know a few shortcuts that might help. We want to keep away from the main access shafts as much as possible. Remember the boarding training we did that week after meeting Jack?”
The mention of his half-brother appeared to make Ingo look even more miserable and depressed than he had been during the machines’ attack.
“I remember the fight we got into. We would have made him pay if it hadn’t been for that moron of a sergeant.”
Matius frowned at the mention of the fight. It seemed like so long ago, but none of his memories of his brother were good. They’d been forced to live with him for some time as children, and although he was the youngest of the three, there had never been any kind of love between them. The Morato brothers were inseparable, and Jack Morato; well, he was seen as nothing more than an imposter. A child from that monster of a man called Spartan, a man unlike their father who they had never met.
“What was Mother thinking?” Ingo grumbled.
Matius smiled at his brother.
“Are you armed? Tell me you’ve got something.”
Ingo pulled out a knife from the utility belt on his armor and held it up in front of him. He tried to strike his twin brother playfully with it, but it was neither the time nor place for such frivolity.
“What’s wrong with you, Ingo? We have to get out of here!”
His brother looked back over his shoulder as if expecting another of those dreaded machines to appear. The dark interior was barely lit now, with nothing but sporadic light from the damaged red lighting still functioning. Their suits were still equipped with external lamps on the helmets, but even with them on full power, much of the ship was hard to make out. The loudspeakers still working attempted to operate, but only those in the parts of the ship that hadn’t been opened to the coldness of space would have heard them. The sound crackled inside the brothers’ helmets.
“This the XO. All sections are breached. The Captain is dead, along with most of our officers. Do not attempt to evacuate the ship. We are surrounded, and enemy ships are taking the lifeboats. Do not let them take you! We have a team heading for…”
The sound of the officer’s voice vanished and was replaced by screams from inside the ruined warship. A dozen gunshots blasted out, and the clatter of metal on metal. Finally came the sound of heavy breathing, and the man was back.
“The CIC is losing air. Fight them, kill them, but do not surrender.”
Once more the sound of gunshots overwhelmed the microphone, and then a high-pitched squeal of the compartment depressurizing. The Morato brothers could only hope the XO was wearing his PDS suit, or else he would be dead in seconds.
“Well, what now?” Matius asked.
Ingo had no idea and just looked down at his blade as if it might offer him some kind of valuable insight. As he might have expected, it did nothing other than reflect the light from his brother’s lamp. Finally, he looked up, his eyes bloodshot and his expression stern.
“We do what the XO said. We find whoever is left alive and fight back.”
“With what? How?”
Matius noticed the odd look on his brother’s face. It was the expression that usually meant they were about to get into trouble.
“We get everybody still alive, all the weapons we can find, and then we get the hell out of here.”
Matius still looked confused.
“Uh, you do realize the ship is gone?”
“Oh, yeah, but I know where we can find more.”
Matius pulled back a few centimeters in surprise. For a second, he thought his brother was referring to a lifeboat or Captain’s yacht. It was only the expression on his face that gave away his intention.
“You crazy fool, brother. You want to take one of theirs?”
Into lifted his blade between both of their helmets.
“They are working through this ship, a methodical harvesting of what we have left. I doubt they even have guards posted on the nearest ships. We’ll board one and take it as a prize, just like we read about in the Academy.”
Matius didn’t seem convinced, but it was a plan, and anything was better than waiting to die.
“What about the drone? I thought you wanted to escape to the fleet?”
“You heard the XO. They are attacking cra
ft leaving the area. If we do that, they’ll probably destroy us as we leave. No, we’ll leave this ship the way they are boarding us.”
He thumbed toward where he thought the exterior of the ship was.
“We’ll leave through the breaches using EVA belts and take the nearest ship. Are you with me, brother?”
For the first time in hours the two nodded in grim unison. Ingo looked to his left and then to his right, making sure there was no sign of the enemy. Then he activated a wide-band transmission on the open channel.
“This is 1st Lieutenant Ingo Morato, acting gunnery officer. Are there any surviving officers? I repeat, are there any officers still alive?”
They waited but not a sound came back.
“Maybe they’re hiding?”
“Maybe, Matius.”
Ingo looked at his brother and contemplated what might happen if they were the only ones left. He tried to remain calm, but it was almost impossible with the situation they were in.
“This is Seaman Apprentice Bevan; I have two more survivors with me.”
Ingo closed his eyes with relief.
“Get any survivors you can find near the port side passageway, and grab what weapons you can find. Meet us at the port drone launch bay. You have four minutes. Don’t be late!”
* * *
Ingo and Matius arrived in the drone launch bay to find the craft smashed in a dozen places and wedged into one of the smaller hatches. A broken body lay between the metal, and blood covered both sections in dark gore. Holes in the outer skin had ripped open the vessel to the elements and anybody that might have survived the bombardment. Even so, there were another five crewmen and a single Marine corporal. All six wore their sealed suits, and two carried thermal shotguns. Only the marine carried an assault weapon in the form of an L52 carbine.
Star Crusades Nexus: The Third Trilogy Page 39
