“Roger that,” said Branco. There was no reply from the commander of the scout team. Pak had already melted back into the swamp.
Branco picked his way to the edge of the clearing without incident, laying his wire all the time.
The sight before him couldn’t be better. A squad of ten enemy CASPers was assembling in open order at the southwest edge of the clearing, where the road ran west to the town. No prizes for guessing where they were headed.
Judging them about to head off at any moment, he heeded the sergeant’s instruction not to delay, even though the rest of his scout team would be caught unaware.
He hooked the cable he’d been laying up to his wrist slate and used pinplants to activate the targeting software.
At the last moment he hesitated. It was one thing to empty a MAC cannon into a squad of Besquith trying to rip your head off, or to assassinate a political figure, knowing full well the evil they’d done to innocent victims. But those men and women in the CASPer suits were human mercs, same as him. By the way they’d stopped their patrol and assembled in the clearing, they looked like they were the victims of an order-countermand cockup, and he knew what that felt like.
Albali had warned him he might feel this way and given him the means to deal with it. Branco gestured away the targeting software from his wrist slate and replaced it with an image he’d taken of Juliana Keiko. It was a habit he’d been developing for a while, photographing people and places that were important to him, in an attempt to build up a picture of who the hell Saisho Branco actually was.
The picture showed Keiko in the hold of the Arashi Nova after the fight against the Condottieri. Guilt lashed him – he’d only ever thought to photograph her after she was already dead. Her skin was unmarked by wounds, though a skillful tattooist’s needle had painted a rose that rambled up her neck, dripping beads of blood-red ink from its sharp thorns. She looked peaceful, and that typically Keiko twist to her lips made it look as if they were about to issue one of her trademark quips. But the resonance weapon the Condottieri fired had superheated the liquid content within her skull, and the high pressure mix of brain matter and blood had found an outlet through her nose and one of her eye sockets. Both eyes had burst, tearing away her eyelids. After he’d wiped away the resulting mess from Keiko’s skin, Branco had forced himself to neatly curl the optic nerves back in her sockets, the milky sacs of the drained eyeballs still attached.
Those people out there in that clearing. They’d done this to Keiko.
He brought back the targeting software and fired.
* * * * *
Chapter 57
Of the hundred Alpha Contracts offered to the first human merc outfits, only the Four Horsemen made it back alive, and barely that. Humans, it had seemed, were outmatched by other mercenary races. Until the CASPer suit evened the score.
These days the mecha suits were manufactured by Binnig, but there were other human military innovations and other companies who developed them.
Vital as they were, the CASPers were not optimized for every role, and Branco considered it to Major Sun’s credit that the Javelin dropships had been stocked with more than CASPer spares and support gear.
As part of the reconnaissance equipment, each dropship carried a pair of GrW–N17 light mortars. If Binnig was famed for building heavy, Daimler-Koch had gone the other way, specializing in light and portable. Four of the mortar units, complete with 40 boxes of micro-nuke shells, were nailed to the upper branches of trees four klicks northeast of the landing strip.
He wished he were safely inside his CASPer, spotting the barrage through an external camera, as one of the Condottieri CASPers jerked in surprise and pointed up at the incoming bombs.
Branco was impressed at how something so deadly was so inoffensively quiet. He couldn’t hear the incoming strike, and he could barely track the incoming salvo by sight. Not until the bomb caps burst open and the nano-bomblets rained down.
Two CASPers were quick enough to engage their jumpjets when the miniature thermonuclear ordnance went off. The salvo landed short, but the shockwave was powerful enough to send the airborne CASPers pinwheeling through the air before smashing them against the trees to the west. The others lay still on the cleared ground.
But the mortar strike was short.
Half the remaining CASPers ran for cover in the trees to the west of the clearing. Those left behind were most likely still alive, but their suits were disabled by the electromagnetic pulse. Thankful that his helmet on maximum polarization allowed him to observe this without burning his eyes out – and trying not to think of how many rads he was picking up – Branco recalibrated his aim and fired again.
This time, half the rounds landed directly on the prone CASPers – melting their metal and ceramic armor into steaming puddles of silver – and the others landed in the trees to the west. Branches splintered, sending wooden shards flying like flechettes. Trunks were uprooted, wood shattered, the canopy collapsing down to rest in a heap.
The swamp caught fire.
He launched another round into the ruined trees, but as this new salvo sailed through the air, so too did the Condottieri CASPers from the south and north of the clearing, who burst from the canopy in an explosion of shredded foliage.
Shit. They must have detected the mortars.
Two SAMs arced out of the swamp to the west, a warm welcome for the airborne CASPers from the rest of Sergeant Pak’s scouts.
Two Condottieri detected missile locks and dove down into the safety of the trees, pursued by the missiles.
Pak’s fire wouldn’t be enough.
With time running out for his miniature mortar battery, Branco rapidly triggered all three remaining salvos, aiming to rain them down two klicks to the west of his position, in the heart of the town. Simultaneous with the final salvo arcing out from the canopy, he heard Condottieri MAC fire from the vicinity of the battery site.
The targeting software went off-line. Signal from battery lost.
To the north he heard the rest of the scout team open fire. Lacking the strength of the CASPer mecha bodies, they were lightly armed, but had prepared hypervelocity rifles, handheld lasers, and machine guns braced in the trees. They would be running from position to position, pouring fire on the landing strip clearing.
Whether they’d hurt the enemy was unlikely; that wasn’t the point. Major Sun was playing mind games. It was the classic tactic of making the enemy imagine you had forces that weren’t really there.
But would the Condottieri buy it?
* * * * *
Chapter 58
“What the hell is going on?” screamed Captain Fellini. “My position is under heavy bombardment.”
In the privacy of her CASPer interior, Lieutenant Garcia rolled her eyes at the idiot pig of a company commander. “That’s what I’m trying to establish, sir. We’ve lost 6th Squad and Second Lieutenant Sharma. I’m sending—”
“How many?”
“Excuse me?”
“How many of the enemy are we facing?”
Garcia took a deep breath. “That’s what I’m trying to establish now, sir. The bombardment was from a light mortar position remotely triggered by an observer. We’ve destroyed the mortar battery. We’ve also seen temporary firing positions, hastily abandoned. It looks like a raiding party tasked with harrying and then fading away.”
“Idiot,” snapped the captain. “We’re under heavy bombardment here at the main settlement. Abandon the landing strip. I need you here to bolster the defenses at the town. Now!”
“I repeat, sir. With all due respect, we’ve been hit by a raid or a feint, but it’s not an assault.”
“Saying with all due respect is not a free pass for such insubordination, Lieutenant. Order your two surviving squads to the base. And I need them now, so send them via the path, not through this nightmare jungle.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Any more attitude, Garcia, and I’ll be forced to report your disloyalty to the colone
l. You’re a Four Horsemen sympathizer, aren’t you?”
“No, sir. I’m loyal to the colonel.”
“Red Lancers. Your name tells all. It’s obvious you idolize the horseman outfits that have brought the human race into such disrepute within the Union. Am I going to have trouble with you, Lieutenant?”
“No, sir. My squads are as good as with you now.”
“Along the path,” he said. “Fellini out.”
“Asshole,” Garcia shouted at the trees.
Garcia opened a channel to her squad leaders. “Golinski, Orchirbal, you’re to withdraw to the base immediately, and you’re to move via the road.”
She noted with satisfaction the brief hesitation from both before they acknowledged her command.
“Captain wants us moving swiftly,” she explained.
“You want jumpjets?” suggested Golinski.
“In this jungle?” countered Orchirbal. “The troopers I sent up to take out those mortars took a battering smashing through the trees, and a worse one on their descent. One of them lost a servo for his arm and another took a mild concussion. That’s just the trees. We had SAMs too that we barely dodged. Even so, if we use the road and the Midnighters have prepared an ambush…”
“Which is why,” said Garcia, “I want you to set flank guards while using the road as your axis of movement.”
“I understand,” said Orchirbal. “If we use our entire squads to watch the flanks, we won’t have spare personnel to use the road.”
“Until shortly before we’re in sight of the captain,” added Golinski. “By which time we’ll no longer need to guard our flanks and can all crowd together on the road.”
“Gentlemen,” said Garcia, relieved that at least her squad leaders were professionals, “I believe you’ve read my mind.”
* * * * *
Chapter 59
A thick pall of smoke rose from the burning jungle canopy to Captain Finn-Holt’s left. Even without their CASPers, the scout team sure packed a punch. More smoke rose a klick to his right, where the town was aflame.
“That’s the signal,” he told his command. “Move out!”
His unit of twenty CASPers was tasked with sweeping south toward the road, then east to cut off the enemy at the landing strip, and pin them there. Meanwhile, Major Sun would advance from the south side of the road, heading north and then west to take the town. In theory, any Condottieri between town and landing strip would be caught and sliced between his and the major’s wheeling attacks. But Finn-Holt had experienced too many operations that had succumbed to chaos and confusion to put much store in that theory.
As they advanced to the south, he kept his squads bunched tighter than he’d prefer, to maintain cohesion and a secure tight-beam battle network. If they spread out, troopers would soon drop off the grid, their suit-to-suit comms succumbing to this devilish jungle.
“Kilo, tango, alpha,” said a voice nearby. “Captain. It’s Pak, reporting in.”
Finn-Holt couldn’t see the scout leader, and so risked an active sweep with his suit sensors. Even though the voice sounded like Pak, and the recognition code was right, this could be a trick.
“I’m in the tree, above you. Coming down.”
A man-sized shape slithered down from the trunk above, although its ultra-grip gauntlets and boots made its movement anything but human. Damn, these scouts were like chameleons.
Only when the sergeant dropped down to the branch above Finn-Holt’s head did the captain see him clearly, his HUD changing the targeting brackets around Pak’s outline from red to blue.
“Report,” ordered the captain.
“Branco struck lucky. I think he took out an entire squad with his mortars. The perimeter guards discovered the remnants of our demonstration; I think they decided we were a harassing party – as intended – but instead of remaining at the landing strip, they’re heading west, through the trees either side of the road. There are twenty-one in total, and their right flank will pass a hundred yards south of your position in approximately two minutes.”
“Thank you, Pak. Your empty CASPers are waiting for you where you left them. Thompson’s guarding them and expecting you. She’ll join your squad once you’re suited up. You’re to approach the main settlement from the north and join in the assault as you see fit.”
“Roger that, Captain. See you in town.”
The scout scampered back up the tree and disappeared from Finn-Holt’s HUD. He admired the scout’s optimism. Taking the base wouldn’t be easy.
“Contact!” came a shout over the comm.
Finn-Holt shuffled back to the north side of the tree, using it as a shield while he expanded the tactical display and studied the unfolding situation. Blue Squad had stumbled across a group of four – possibly five – Condottieri headed west. Half the squad was holding position in cover while the other half were pushing forward around to the Condottieri rear.
“Ultra-V Squad,” he ordered, “advance fifty yards to your south and get ready to give those traitors a surprise. Blue, keep them pinned. Red, you’re the reserve.”
He brought back a partial view from his external cameras and hurried off to join the reserve.
Ten seconds later, with half his mind trying to figure out precisely when he’d bought into the idea that the Condottieri were not merely a rival merc outfit, but traitors to the human race, he yelled in shock all over the general comm channel.
“Captain, you okay?” asked Senior Sergeant Gretchen, who led Red Squad.
“I’m—” he started to reply, but that was all he had time for before his CASPer smacked headlong into the mud. Despite his harness, he cracked his skull against his Tri-V bank. “Oww! Okay.”
He picked himself up. “I tripped,” he explained to everyone. “Too busy looking ahead and not enough at my feet. Remember, everyone, this is a three-way fight. Us, the traitors, and the planet. Stay alert to stay alive.”
* * * * *
Chapter 60
When the first line of Sun’s force caught up to the rear of the Condottieri half-squad trying to outflank one of Finn-Holt’s squads, the firefight was brief and brutal.
Caught from behind by a superior force of CASPers, the Condottieri went to ground, crawling for whatever cover the trees could provide.
The eight-foot mecha made inviting targets, but the trees were broad enough, and the undergrowth and water deep enough, to make them difficult to pick off.
Until Sun’s second line rolled up the enemy’s flanks and wiped them out.
She urged her mercs on mercilessly. North and south of the road, they were reducing the enemy to pockets of resistance, but the Midnighters couldn’t afford to slack off now.
As she skirted a dark swampy pool at the scene of the last firefight, she heard the buzz of a stuttering motor and a splash, followed by a CASPer arm reaching out of the pool and pointing its heavy machine gun her way.
But its movements were slow, the motor damaged.
She stepped away from the machine gun’s arc of fire until she was behind it. The CASPer tracked her until it reached the limit of its shoulder’s travel and was forced to adjust its hold to fire behind.
Sun didn’t give it the chance. She sliced through the arm with a long burst from her Mark 509 chemical laser rifle.
But there was plenty of fight left in the Condottiere.
The enemy rolled onto its front, ready to spring up. But Sun was waiting for this and leaped onto the prone mecha. She jumped up and down on its back a few times, in an attempt to stun the driver, then she drilled a hole with her laser through the back of the suit where the driver’s head should be.
* * *
One of her command section troopers came crashing through the trees to her defense.
“A little late, Alessandro,” said Sun as she ceased firing and was rewarded with the sight of red arterial spray through the hole she’d burned, like a hell-whale’s blowhole.
“We’re facing CASPers, not Flatar,” she reminded h
er command. “If they’re down, make absolutely sure they stay down. Permanently.”
She opened a direct link to Alessandro. “Where are the others?”
“Sorry, ma’am,” said the trooper supposed to be guarding her. “I sank through the mud. Kelling hauled me out but took a rocket in the back. I’ve lost contact with Havering.”
“Keep closer in future. I can’t afford for anyone to die until we’ve taken the town.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Sun led the way back into the trees to reestablish contact with her command. Suddenly, three Condottieri broke cover from the northwest. They took out Alessandro in a long burst of fire. One hesitated, probably only just spotting Sun, who was partially hidden by the trees.
She unloaded her shoulder pod, sending all five remaining EMP rockets slamming into the enemy trio in a shower of sparks. With any luck, their view from inside those suits would be filled with enough fizz and hash to blind them. With a lot of luck, she might have disabled their suits.
Sun got to work with the MAC cannon and laser to make sure the view inside those CASPers would never clear.
But the flash and sparkle in the air receded, and Sun saw that although she’d downed two CASPers, a third was stumbling away through the thick undergrowth.
Heeding her own advice, Sun lobbed an L-Bomb at the downed CASPers and tried to head off the fleeing enemy.
* * * * *
Chapter 61
“Corporal,” warned Private DeSilva of 8th Squad, “I think I heard a noise behind me.”
“My HUD’s reporting possible contacts ahead,” added Private Castillo.
“Merde!” He thought they’d broken out of the encirclement, but the Midnighters hadn’t finished with them yet. Corporal Pierre instinctively bunched his legs and looked up. Boosting into the sky was a risky move that would present himself as a wonderful silhouette, but he was surrounded. In a trap about to be sprung. Jumping out of the shit was a gamble that had saved his life before.
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