“Don’t you fuckin’ know how this stuff works?” Cates muttered caustically in her ear. “You can’t figure out a simple blink switch?” Kris shot her a look of pure hatred that was obscured by the helmet visor. She had seen a pulsing red icon on her HUD but it never occurred to her to blink at it. And she did vaguely recall something from the briefing they gave her when she was issued that first ill-fitting suit of combat armor back on Mars, but the suits she was used to never had this shit!
Somewhere—it must’ve been quite close but it didn’t sound like it—Yu was confirming the shuttle’s ETA—fourteen minutes, twenty seconds—and he was talking with someone, probably Huron, about a boulder-strewn ridge to the southwest with a narrow depression behind it before the terrain rose up in the series of scarps and one of them said, “IADS” and she heard Burdette saying something about compound’s sensors being up and the pain was rapidly dulling to a distant otherworldly ache and then Yu was squatting in front of her. “How bad?” he asked Cates brusquely.
“Not bad. Just a fractured right clavicle—dinged the AC joint pretty good too. Fired off a five-burst without a tripod, didn’t she?”
Yu grunted. Then Burdette slid in beside him. “They got people coming out by the fuck-ton over there. No IADS yet and the planetary nets are still clear but they got eyes all over that flat ground to the south. I think maybe we can work down this side the river though, if—Wow!”
“What?” Huron had come over to kneel by Burdette and he and Yu said it almost together.
“The whole compound just went dark. Somebody cut the power!”
“That’s our cue,” the sergeant major said briskly. “Call the shuttle into the dead ground just south of that ridge.” Then louder. “C’mon people! We got a bus to catch!”
“But Fred,” Burdette said low, “they’ve got mortars set up. If they pop off a seeker while we’re crossing that flat—”
“We’re fucked—what of it? We got a klick to cover and three minutes to cover it. Get moving.” He spared Kris the briefest glance. “Rachel, bring her.”
“I got it,” Kris blurted and lurched to her feet. Yu had already sent Tiernan off with Lopez and Gergen flanked out, and the rest of the section was formed up with Huron and Yu at the rear.
“Then go,” he snapped and they all set off at a dead run.
* * *
Kris had no idea how she got across that ground. They’d come under fire half-way there, a distant and ineffectual fire, and as they gained the sheltering rocks at the base of the ridge Kris could still hear the peculiar sound of the bullets—like rapidly ripped cloth—hear them over the close thunder of blood in her ears, over the whooshing rasp in her gullet. The suit’s filtered air tore her throat with iron-tasting fingers as her lungs gulped it in and her cracked collarbone sent out star-like bursts of pain for all the analgesics could do. Marko Tiernan and the two others were already laying down cover fire before she collapsed in the dirt between two boulders. Someone grabbed her belt and hauled her up.
“Not here, goddammit,” a gruff wheezing voice, probably Corporal Gergen, said very close. “Get’cher ass up to that ridge.” A powerful shove in the small of back propelled her forward and now she heard firing on all sides and Yu was saying calmly over her helmet set, “Here they come, people. Let’s show ‘em they ain’t welcome.”
Faltering near the top, somebody else took her arm and piloted her to a niche in the wall of rock that crowned the ridge. She looked up and found herself staring into the bright hazel eyes of Sergeant Lopez. “Stay down, ma’am,” she ordered, her voice incongruously gentle. “Where’s your sidearm?”
Kris fumbled for the thigh holster she’d completely forgotten about with her left hand. She almost dropped the pistol before she got it cocked and then held it awkwardly, squashed under the overhang. Lopez was long gone, somewhere off in the rocks below. The rifle fire intensified and the SAW was chattering away. No one was talking and she couldn’t see a damn thing from where she was. She stood it for about two minutes before crawling out. She wasn’t waiting in some little shithole to die.
Kris saw Yu to the left of the narrow trial they’d climbed up with Benn Gergen, manning the SAW and putting well-aimed methodical bursts into the swarming figures far off on the plain below, while Yu, off-net, calmly directed his fire and picked off targets in the middle distance, between six hundred and a thousand meters out.
To Kris’s right, the bulky form of Marko Tiernan knelt at a gap in the rocks where he was keeping up his own rapid accurate fire. She wasn’t sure, but she thought he was also chuckling on the net. She slithered over next to him while bullets from below kicked dust from the boulders and splattered against the rock behind them. As she propped herself up, he shot her a grin.
“Y’know, these fuckers can’t shoot,” he remarked in a casual tone and squeezed off three more shots at unseen assailants, “but there’s a lot of ‘em.” He dipped his eyes towards the gun in her left hand. “Can you hit anything with that?”
“Let one of those assholes up here and let’s find out,” Kris answered in a harsh brittle voice.
Tiernan laughed and killed another two of their attackers.
“Incoming!” Yu barked over the net and a moment later she heard the two-toned whistle of mortar shells descending. She crouched against the boulder, hearing the first detonations downslope, the sound rendered flat and dull by her helmet’s noise suppression. Then an explosion lifted her and slammed her into the wall of rock. She slid to the ground dazed; came slowly to her knees to hear a savage, almost bestial growling next her. Turning her head, she saw Tiernan, clutching his right leg, which ended in bloody shreds just below the knee. There were holes in the torso of his body armor too and rivulets stained the hands viced around the stump. Yu rolled to him and swiftly applied a field tourniquet while Marko hissed through clenched teeth, “Motherfucker that smarts!” Another mortar shell landed in the rocks behind them—without power to their targeting sensors they were dropping the damn things all over place—and pebbles rained down on them.
When Kris looked up again, Huron was on his knees next to Marko and Yu, his assault rifle poised; Gergen still had the SAW working, with Burdette beside him, her leg darkly wet. Perez, Argento and Cates were just below, covering the trail from there. She couldn’t see Resnick or Watkins but then Lopez vaulted over a boulder and landed by their feet. “Forming up for another rush down there,” she reported. “They got sliders coming up this time and the compound just got power restored to the IADS.”
“Wojo, you copy that?” Huron called out and Kris realized he must have a line open to the shuttle pilot. “Five by five, sir,” came the faint reply. “Don’t you worry none, Commander—we’ll skate this crate in under their noses. Have to put it down a bit shorter than planned though.”
“We’ll meet you. CATs out.” Huron looked towards the rocks guarding the trail and then across Tiernan at Yu. “Grab Marko—we gotta get to the other side now. Bird will never get in here with the IADS up.”
“No fuckin’ way,” Marko snarled, “with all due respect, sir. You’ll never make it luggin’ me—not with them sliders on the way.” He forced himself into a sitting position. “Get me to them goddamned rocks down there. Where’s my fuckin’ gun?” Huron stretched out for the rifle. “No—sir! I need the fucking SAW. And gimme all your grenades.” Huron and Yu stripped their belts. “Now prop me up down there”—he pointed to the gap below that covered the head of the trail—“and get the fuck outta here. With all due respect. Sir.”
Locking eyes with Yu, Huron shook his head. “We can have the bird put some heat on ‘em.”
Yu’s eyes were bleak. “No joy, sir. Marko’s right. Not with those sliders.”
Scanning the plain below Huron saw that was true: they were too many and too dispersed for one shuttle’s indirect fire to hold them back for more than a couple of minutes. Not enough.
“Carry on, Sergeant Major.” His voice was harsh and clipped.
&
nbsp; Yu called over Gergen and Cates. The two of them moved Tiernan into position, swearing steadily under his breath all the while, and set up the SAW.
“Why’d they stop firing?” Kris asked, ears still ringing.
“Chary of their own people,” Yu answered. “Lousy practice.” A message flashed on his visor. “Shuttle in five.”
“Better get ‘em moving, Fred.”
Yu nodded in quick decision. “Peel off by twos! Andie, you and Rachel go first. Toni, you and Kyle follow. Go now!”
Huron did a quick plot, his face still an unhealthy color. Five minutes was about two minutes too long. They had thin ‘em out down there—give Marko a little more time.
Burdette and Cates fell back to the cleft at the top of the ridge with Lopez and Argento behind them, while Kris heard Huron key on his mike. “Wojo, we got bunches o’ bad guys forming up with sliders down here. Can you discourage them at all?”
“I got no fix here.”
“Just lock on this, add six hundred meters northwest and lob in some plasma. I don’t care what you hit—just make some noise!”
“Roger that. Commence noise makin’.”
“Here they come!” Yu slapped Huron’s shoulder and they heard the SAW open up. Moments later they saw the light and heard the hollow whooshing thump of plasma charges hitting the flat below. Huron looked south and saw the trail of the shuttle approached low and fast.
“Gotta move!” He took Kris by her good arm, pulling her to her feet. “Stay low.”
Yu signaled the rest of their people; there were more explosions—Marko using his grenades now—and the team scrambled up through the rocks around the sharp summit to the other side. The assault shuttle came in hot, spun and dropped in the clear space downslope, leaving them a good hundred meters to cover. They sprinted, crouching low as the mortar rounds started falling again—Mankho’s people had seen the shuttle too and were firing indiscriminately—and when Kris stumbled in the last five meters, Yu grabbed her and chucked her bodily through the shuttle’s boarding hatch. She hit the deck rolling and slammed into the far side of the fuselage. A white-hot scream of agony lanced through the painkillers and she lay there curled up and gasping.
“Nice to have you aboard.” The jovial voice rang out terribly loud and she looked up, squinting through tears to see Bodo Wojakowski grinning at her from the pilot’s chair, with Abe Donnerkill next to him. “Where’s your pals? Oh, here we are—” as the others vaulted through the hatch. Yu and Huron waited for the last two, Burdette—limping, swearing and shedding blood from her boot as she propped up Argento, who was coughing crimson foam at every step—boosted them in, and climbed in themselves.
“That’s it!” Huron called. “Party’s over. Take her home.”
Wojakowski brought the nose up and even as the hatch sealed, a mortar round detonating right in front of them. It did nothing against the shuttle’s armor but Wojakowski yelled “Fuckers!” as he gunned the thrusters. “Assholes! Coulda dinged my paint!” He banked hard as they all scrambled to get into harness. “Commander, when we get back to the nest, can I drop a thank-you note on that bunch of fuckers down there? I’ve conceived me a dislike.”
Huron grabbed Kris by the leg to keep her from sliding across the deck and helped her buckle in. “Vasquez?”
“Arrived up top a minute ago. Guess she caused quite a ruckus making her exit there.”
“Then sure. Be my guest.”
* * *
Back on Kestrel, they stowed their gear in the aft weapons compartment. The adrenaline had long since faded; there was a heaviness in their mood and movements, made worse by sending four of their team to sickbay: Kyle Argento, with a bullet through the lung, was the worst though he’d make it; Antoinette Lopez had joked on the way up that maybe she’d get a nice blue eye to replace the hazel one lost when mortar shrapnel shattered her visor, just to freak out her boyfriend; Andréa Burdette’s calf wound was ugly but uncomplicated, and Benn Gergen may or may not need to grow a new left hand—but most of all, by having to leave Marko Tiernan behind. It was a steep butcher’s bill for an op that had gained nothing—and not even Kris counted her shoulder in the tally. No one spoke as weapons were checked, stripped, safed and put back in the racks.
They filed into the locker space to take a quick shower, still silent, and it was not until after they got back into their fatigues and caps were put on and settled, that Huron turned his attention to Kris, and said quietly, “Leave me with this officer.”
As soon as they were alone, Huron pinned her with a look so savage she was sure he was going hit her. She’d never seen him like this—veins swelling in his neck and his face suffused with rage—and when he took a half step forward she involuntarily backed, fetching up against the lockers.
“What the hell were you thinking?” His voice wasn’t loud, not much above a whisper, but it cut. “Don’t you fucking understand we need him alive—his brain intact? If we wanted the fucker dead, we’d have nuked his compound from orbit.”
She flattened against the lockers, squashed by the force of his anger—his completely justified righteous anger—and stared into his dark furious eyes, hating that he was right, and in that hatred ground out, “I need him dead.”
Huron moved back a step, opening the charged space between them. Something condensed in his look, something implacable and terribly cold.
“Then you can fucking well explain that to Marko’s wife and kids. I expect your letter within the hour.”
The words hit her with almost physical force, worse than if he’d actually struck her, and she struggled to remain upright.
“Dismissed, Midshipman Kennakris.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
LSS Kestrel
Rephidim, Outworld’s Border Zone
Fifty-six minutes later, in a fresh uniform, with her shoulder wrapped and her right arm clipped up, Kris pressed the entry pad to Huron’s cabin. The door slid open and she saw him, sitting at his console in fatigues, looking tired. He looked up and she saw the depth of his exhaustion, as if his anger of an hour ago had hollowed him out.
“Yes, Midshipman?”
Kris saluted, left-handed and uneasy, and produced the flimsy she’d printed. “The letter you requested, sir.” He motioned her over and she entered, pacing the few steps smartly and laying the plastic sheet by his console. He picked it up, leaned back and read:
Dear Ms. {__________} Tiernan and family {_______________},
It is with the very deepest regret that I inform you of the death of your husband, Pvt. 1st-Class Marko Tiernan. I must further inform you that it was through my own ill-judged actions that your husband was killed. I cannot adequately express to you the overwhelming sorrow I feel that my failure caused the death of your husband, a very good man, respected by all who knew him, and whom it was an honor to know.
I am sorry I cannot describe the nature of the operation in which he died, but you should know that your husband, although severely wounded, insisted on remaining behind and covering our escape alone, against overwhelming odds, saving my life and the lives of all the rest of his team.
I cannot ask your forgiveness for what I did, nor can I forgive myself, and I know of no recompense that I could possibly offer, but I do pray for you and your children and wish with all my being that someday you may be granted a measure of peace.
With most profound apologies and regrets,
Loralynn Kennakris, Midshipman, CEF
“I don’t know their names, sir,” she said haltingly when he put the flimsy down. “I was hoping you could add them for me.” He looked her up and down, still standing at rigid attention. “And,” she began again, stopped, then gathered herself and went on, looking straight ahead and speaking very formally, “And I respectfully offer my resignation or submit myself to whatever . . . discipline normally applies in such cases.”
“Courts martial for negligence and dismissed from the service is usual,” he said, cool and detached.
“I woul
d accept that, sir.” Still staring fixedly at a point on the wall behind his head.
“If,” he continued, “if you were a commissioned officer. You aren’t. You're a midshipman and you lost your head in your first firefight. You fucked up.” He handed the flimsy back to her. “Let’s not compound that fuck-up by being hasty or by wallowing in it.” He nodded at the sheet she held uncertainly in her hand. “If you want to do something for Marko—for his wife and kids—become the officer they deserve.” He turned back to his console. “That’s all, Kennakris.”
She saluted again and turned to go, but his voice stopped her. “I’ll put their names in it for you.”
Huron’s entry pad chimed for a second time that night and the door opened to reveal the solid form of Sergeant Major Yu. “You wanted to see me, sir?”
Huron closed the document he was working on and motioned him in. “It’s been a bad fuckin’ day, Fred. Would you like a drink?”
“I don’t think I’ve ever turned down a drink, sir—except once.” Huron lifted his eyes in a question as he produced a bottle and two glasses from a little cabinet behind his desk. “That bright-blue lizard piss they brew in Little North Bear, way out in the Trifid. Ever try it, sir?”
“Provo Ice?” He poured a generous amount of smoky amber liquid in each glass and the subtle aroma began to fill the cabin.
“That’s it, sir. Gut just can’t handle that shit.”
Huron smiled and handed a glass to Yu. “Marko.”
“Marko,” Yu echoed and they knocked back the scotch in one. Huron refilled both glasses. “I shouldn’t have done it, Fred.”
“How’s that, sir?”
“Kris. Came close to losing it with her.” He swirled the scotch in the glass. “Never should have put her in that position. Two bad . . . bad calls.”
Yu didn’t offer any thoughts on that, but after a moment asked, “How’s she taking it?”
The Loralynn Kennakris series Boxed Set Page 64