He did a head count as Marines emerged from behind whatever cover they’d managed. He got up to 12, then started again. It was still 12, one short.
Antman caught his attention, waving an arm for him to come forward. With a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, Hondo pulled himself to where Corporal Marasco was pulling Diva Jorgenson from under some wrecked bunks. Round red balls of blood, beautiful in their deadly message, rose around her, sent spinning like tiny planets as Marasco pulled her free.
A chunk of Diva’s left side was gone with only tatters of flesh remaining. Hondo grabbed Antman, pulled him close faceplate-to-faceplate, and told him to find Doc. He helped Marasco and brought Diva into the open.
Her face, white and serene, gazed unseeing out of her faceplate.
Doc Leach pushed past him, took one look at Diva, then shook his head.
“We’ve got to get her zombied,” Hondo said, pulling him in to speak.
“All the zip-locks are in storage. We’ll have to get to her later.”
Hondo kept his hold on the Doc for a moment, trying to put his thoughts together.
“I’ve got to go help with them,” Doc said, gently pulling Hondo’s hands off of his harness and pointing at the rest of the compartment.
From what had been the upper aft corner, Hondo shifted his gaze across the ruined berthing. He could see six dead Brotherhood soldiers, but his eyes locked on the Marines. With Diva, Hondo counted eleven bodies and four wounded Marines. Four more Marines were positioned at the larger breach, weapons outboard. They’d managed to throw the Brotherhood back, but at a high cost.
The lieutenant raised one hand, then twirled it in a circle, his forefinger and thumb making a C. He wanted the squad leaders.
Hondo pushed off, took a midcourse correction off the bulkhead, and came to a stop beside her.
Cara joined him, and he looked around for Falt. When Corporal Tesseret joined them, realization hit. Falt was KIA or one of the wounded.
He took a deep breath, slowly exhaling as his hood struggled for a moment to scrub the CO2.
“We’re not repressurizing. There’s too much damage. Sergeant Riordan, help Staff Sergeant Rutledge and secure the KIA in place, then take the wounded back to the galley.
“Sergeant McKeever, come with me. The Brotherhood has established a foothold on the port side. We’re going to see what we can do to stop them.”
“What about me, sir?” Corporal Tesseret asked.
“You’re coming with us. We move out in one minute.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” Hondo said, but as he turned, the lieutenant grabbed him by the arm.
“And give that nineteen to someone else. You’re a squad leader, not a damned rifleman,” he said.
Hondo automatically started to protest. He’d been the one who braved the fire to take it, and he’d shot four of the host with it. He was feeling quite good about that in the post-rush of the fight, and now the lieutenant was chewing his ass?
He closed his mouth with a snap, his protest unvoiced. The lieutenant was right, he realized. He was a squad leader, with emphasis on the “leader.” His job wasn’t to shoot the bad guys, but to lead his Marines so they could work together to kill the bad guys. There was a huge difference between the two.
“Aye, aye, sir,” he said.
With a jump, he cleared the open space and rejoined the squad. He handed the GG-19 to Pickerul, whose eyes opened wide, a smile almost cracking her face in two. It hurt a little to let it go, but it was better in her hands than in his.
With hand-and-arm signals (he’d thought they were useless and antiquated when he’d been taught them at Camp Charles, but he was grateful for them now), he gathered his Marines and headed to join the lieutenant and Corporal Tesseret’s fire team as they headed for the hatch all the way back near the squad’s berthing space.
They may have stopped the host from boarding in their space, but the bastards were aboard the Zrínyi, and it was up to them to push them back into the black.
Chapter 14
Hondo
Hondo fell to the deck with a thud, his right arm underneath him. To add insult to injury, Killdeer’s leg swung around and hit him on the side of the head.
“I guess we’ve got gravity again,” First Sergeant Nordstrand said, pushing himself up from where he was on top of RP.
It would have been nice to have a warning.
One moment, the Marines were pulling themselves along the 14 corridor, and the next, the artificial gravity kicked back on, painfully giving them an up and down once more. It was for the best, though. Marines worked better with their feet on the ground. They’d all been trained in null G, of course, and they could hold their own, but they were not Navy “nullers,” the trained commandoes skilled in null G operations.
Lieutenant Abrams stood and ran his hand across his throat, telling them to shut up. They didn’t know exactly where the Brotherhood troops were, and there was no reason to broadcast their own position.
It took a moment to reorient themselves to the pull of gravity, but with First Team leading, they started back down the corridor. Hondo was behind the team, feeling naked with only his Ruger. He still wished he had Pickerul’s GG-19, or even Haus’ Oxar.
The lieutenant grabbed his shoulder. Hondo turned to see him holding up a single fist to halt, and Hondo grabbed Killdeer, giving her the same signal. Within a few seconds, the squad-plus had stopped while the lieutenant listened to the voice coming over his earbud. For the hundredth time, Hondo wished the emergency hoods had comms so he could listen in, but only the lieutenant and the first sergeant, who, along with Sergeant Yelci, had joined them, had what were two of the ship’s crew’s earbuds.
The lieutenant nodded at the unseen voice, then motioned Hondo closer.
“The skipper says the main Brotherhood force is still at the breach site.”
The “breach site” was the Charlie Company berthing, where most of the Marines there had been killed by the missile strike.
“She wants us to go back to B-12-6-32 and link up with the XO,” he said as the first sergeant joined the two of them. “Let’s turn this around get back to the G-ring, then come back down 12.”
“We don’t need to go all the way back to G,” First Sergeant Nordstrand said. “We can go up to seven, then straight across to twelve.”
“We can hit seven from here?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I don’t know that route. Can you lead us?”
A smile came over the first sergeant’s face as he said, “No problem, sir. I’ve got it.”
Hondo was a sergeant, still with the squad, but he chafed at not being a “gunfighter” anymore. The first sergeant hadn’t been at the point of the spear for much longer, and he had to be welcoming a chance to get back in the thick of things.
“Do it,” Lieutenant Abrams said.
The first sergeant made his way back down to Second Team, which had been pulling up Tail End Charlie, and with them now on point, the squad headed back five meters before climbing a ladder and up to the seven corridor. They moved through what looked to be service spaces, then down another ladder to six at space 28, just four spaces from the rest of the Marines.
I guess that’s why he’s the first sergeant, Hondo thought to himself.
That little shortcut saved them ten minutes at a minimum.
Less than a minute later, he was rapping at the hatch to 32. After a short pause, the hatch opened, and a Marine motioned them inside the space, which was a communal head. Fourteen Marines waited for them, weapons at the ready.
“Where’s Lieutenant Flores?” the lieutenant asked, his faceplate flipped open.
Sergeant Nelson, one of the squad leaders, pointed back to the corner of the shower stall where three bloody bodies were laid out side-by-side.
After a quick glance, Lieutenant Abrams said, “Tell me what happened.”
Nelson gave the lieutenant the quick down and dirty. Led by the XO, what was left of Second Platoon tr
ied to surprise the 24 host who were in Charlie’s berthing. After cutting down several of the enemy in the first few seconds, the Brotherhood’s weapons superiority began to make itself felt, and the tide turned. Ten of the Marines were cut down, including the XO and Staff Sergeant Lormander-Norris, and Nelson ordered the rest of them to retreat, bringing the XO and two other Marines’ bodies with them. He holed them up in the head until he could figure out what to do next.
Gordy Nelson was a good Marine, but Hondo thought he was very relieved to have Lieutenant Abrams take over.
“I’ve linked up with Second Platoon,” the lieutenant passed to his throat mic. “There’s Sergeant Nelson and thirteen others.” There was a pause as he listened, then, “One Oxar, ma’am.” After yet one more pause as he listened to the skipper, he said, “Roger that. I’m on it.”
He turned back to the waiting Marines and said, “A Brotherhood frigate can carry a contingent of fifty-two host. We’ve accounted for twelve of them, the best we can tell. That leaves forty. There are twenty-one aboard the Zrínyi at the moment, and the skipper believes that as per their SOP, they are keeping at least twelve back at their ship. That leaves the seven that retreated from our berthing spaces. The ship has lost track of them, but we have to consider that they can pop up anywhere, and to a lesser extent, so can the remaining dozen.
“Here on the Zrínyi, they’ve got us outgunned, so we need to canalize them to where they can’t concentrate their numbers.
“Sergeant Nelson, are your Marines ready?”
“Fucking A yeah, sir,” Gordy snarled, his voice full of venom.
“OK, then, I want everyone to gather ‘round here so there’s no confusion.
Hondo motioned his Marines to crowd in. He wasn’t sure how twenty-nine Marines and two ship’s crew armed with side arms, four Oxars, and a GG-19 were going to evict 21 entrenched and well-armed enemy, but if the lieutenant had a plan, he was eager to hear it.
Chapter 15
Hondo
This is eliminating confusion? Hondo wondered.
The lieutenant had gone over his plan in detail, saying he wanted to eliminate any confusion, but Hondo wasn’t sure that had been successful. He knew what he was supposed to do, but he didn’t have a clue if the entire thing was going to come together or not.
He looked over at the first sergeant, waiting for the word to go. With only the lieutenant and first sergeant having ear buds, Hondo was blind, and the lieutenant’s plan relied on synchronizing the two groups.
Splitting the Marines had been a tough decision, particularly as they were already outgunned, but as the lieutenant had pointed out, they were relying on constrained spaces anyway, so it didn’t matter as much as it could have.
First Squad was packed inside C-22-4-24, which had the advantage of two hatches, one leading into 4 and the other to 6. Pickerul, Antman, and Hanaburgh were crouched by the main hatch, weapons ready. Haus had given up his Oxar to Gordy Nelson’s squad, so he was back to his Hastert.
This isn’t going to work, he told himself again.
With the entire ship to roam, the host should be heading straight to the bridge to try to take it over. They should not be enticed to go rushing down inconsequential corridors.
“Stand by,” First Sergeant Nordstrand said. “Our rabbit may have caught the attention of the foxes, and they’re heading our way.”
Maybe this will work after all, Hondo thought, lifting his eyebrows in surprise.
The “rabbit” was one of the two sailors who’d linked up with the Marines. She’d volunteered to be bait, and once she proved she knew her way around an Oxar, the lieutenant agreed, saying that the host might be more inclined to chase down a sailor than a Marine. She’d been led to where the Brotherhood force was moving, fired a couple of rounds from her Oxar, then ran towards the space where the other Marines were lying in wait. The host hadn’t followed, so she bypassed them and fired from another position. This time, the host took chase, and now it looked like she was leading them down the 4 corridor.
That switched the missions between the two teams of Marines. Hondo hoped that the lieutenant had his team moving, as they now were the maneuver element.
“It’s a go,” the first sergeant said.
The muffled report of an Oxar sounded from right outside the hatch. MA3 Nikolaidis had made it that far, at least.
There were still too many things that could go wrong. If the host could pick up the waiting Marines, and the damaged Zrínyi’s countermeasures weren’t able to spoof the frigate’s surveillance, then they’d know exactly where Hondo and his Marines were positioned. Almost as bad, if they’d split up and sent only a few host after Nikolaidis, then this would have been a wasted exercise in futility.
“It looks like it’s all of them,” the first sergeant said, his voice low in a whisper. “And they’re hot on her trail.”
Stupid, Hondo thought. How can they be that dumb?
That didn’t mean Hondo planned on cutting them any slack. It was their grave they were digging, after all.
Unless they’re playing us somehow.
Hanaburgh, Pickerul, and Antman were crouch by the hatch, looking back at him for the order to go. Antman’s hands were rhythmically squeezing the Oxar’s stock, and Pickerul had a wry smile on her face that frankly gave him the creeps. All three were ready to jump into the fire, just waiting for his word.
He hoped they wouldn’t regret it.
“Now,” the first sergeant told him.
Hondo flipped the manual lock and recessed the hatch. As one, the three Marines stepped out, Pickerul kneeling, Hanaburgh crouching over her, and Antman standing. All three opened up, firing three rounds before ducking back.
“I got the sucker!” Pickerul shouted as a series of rounds dinged along the corridor in response.
“Two,” Hanaburgh told Hondo. “I’m pretty sure of it.”
“Now!” the first sergeant yelled, and Hondo slammed the hatch shut.
The first sergeant ran back to the hatch leading to the 6 corridor and held it open as Second and Third Teams ducked through and disappeared toward midships. Corporal Wolf and First Team held back at the hatch.
“You ready, McKeever?” the first sergeant asked.
Hondo nodded, then at the first sergeant’s order, he undogged the hatch and gave it a tiny push as if it hadn’t been properly dogged and was swinging open a few centimeters on its own. He immediately bolted to the other hatch and got behind First Team while the first sergeant left them to join the rest of the squad.
The four Marines crouched in the corridor, peering into the compartment, waiting to see if anyone was going to try and follow. After a minute or so, the hatch to the 4 corridor slid open, and something was thrown in. Haus pulled their hatch closed and held it until it was rocked by an explosion. He immediately pushed it back open, and when two figures burst in, firing their weapons, Pickerul opened up, dropping one of them before the second was able to dive back out of the space and into the safety of the 4 corridor.
“Get that weapon,” Hondo told Haus, who scrambled in, sidestepping the growing pool of blood and grabbed it, then rushed to get back out.
“Well, one isn’t bad,” Hondo said, looking at the body.
“I should’ve got them both,” Pickerul said. “Sorry.”
“You did good, Tammy,” Hondo said, putting his hand on the younger Marine’s shoulder. “You’ll have more chances.”
The far hatch was now open to 45 degrees. If Hondo and First Team left their present position, that would be an obvious access point for any host to cross over and come up the squad’s rear.
If he were on the other side of the hatch, he’d have someone poised beside it, ready to toss in another grenade the moment someone else entered. It was an obvious course of action, so the host leader in the 4 corridor had to have thought of it, too.
This was where “eliminating confusion” was making things more confusing. Hondo knew that he should rejoin the rest of the squad,
but that would leave a big security gap. If he had comms, he could simply ask the lieutenant for orders. Without comms, he had to figure out what the lieutenant would want him to do.
“Give them a few minutes. If they don’t try again, we’re going to dog that hatch and move on.”
Then he realized that comms weren’t just made with Marine Corps equipment.
“Private Killdeer, I’ve got a mission for you. Run up the corridor and find the first sergeant. Tell him the hatch to the 4 corridor isn’t secured and ask him to find out what the lieutenant wants me to do: secure or bypass it. Tell him I think there might be more host on the other side.”
Killdeer nodded, then took off towards midships. It shouldn’t take her more than a couple of minutes to get back with an answer.
Something, maybe the slightest of sounds, caught Hondo’s attention. He stepped back in the middle of the corridor and looked around, trying to figure out what it was. Try as he might, he couldn’t hear anything else.
It’s nerves, McKeever.
Still, something didn’t seem right.
“Did you hear anything?” he asked Wolf.
“Nope. Nothing.”
Hondo looked back down the passage towards the hull. The sterile passage showed no signs of anything.
Wolf, Pickerul, and Haus were focused on the compartment. That was almost overkill, three Marines with two solid weapons between them in such a confined space.
“Haus, come with me,” Hondo said.
“Where’re you going?” Wolf asked.
“Just checking something out. You watch that hatch. Anything comes flying in, and you shut this hatch.”
“Roger that.”
“What’s up, Sergeant?” Haus asked as the two slowly advanced down the corridor.
“Probably nothing. But better be safe. This corridor hasn’t been cleared.”
The two Marines advanced to the second hatch, and nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Hondo paused, peering over Haus’ shoulder, wondering if they should go any farther, but aware of the fact that he didn’t want to get separated.
The Price of Honor Page 9
