by Terry Mixon
The horde fighter’s second most dangerous option was retreating back the direction they’d come. If they did try to reverse course, Kelsey and Julia were back there with bows to make certain they didn’t get anywhere, with the admiral and Commodore Meyer backing them up with swords.
That left any survivors of the initial attack the option of fleeing directly into the cul-de-sac. That’s where the majority of their people were waiting. They had the swords that they’d captured, though they weren’t skilled in the use of them. Still, quantity had a quality all its own.
There were six riders with this group, so with any luck, their initial shots would take out at least two. The follow-up arrows might take out another one. That would leave three figuring out which direction to flee.
If they tried to go past Talbot and Chloe, the archers would take a toll on them. He didn’t think the enemy riders had a great chance of making it past three skilled shooters. If they retreated, that was going to be more problematic. The admiral and Commodore Meyer had no skill with swords to stop them if they directly engaged.
Commander Cannon was in charge of the force inside the cul-de-sac. The redheaded tactical officer had basic hand-to-hand skills, as did most Fleet officers. Hopefully she and her team wouldn’t have to deal with more than one or two riders, while the main fighting team raced in to cork the bottle behind the enemy.
Well, this was either going to work out or it wasn’t. Worrying wasn’t going to change the outcome.
Talbot glanced over at Chloe and found her watching him.
He raised an eyebrow. “What?”
“I’m just trying to figure out how you do it,” she said softly. “It seems like disaster after disaster is falling on top of us, and you’re handling every blow like it’s no big thing. How do you stay so calm?”
He chuckled. “It’s getting to me too, but I’ve got more experience at keeping my worries buried. It’s all my time as a noncommissioned officer, I suspect. Officers could run around with their hair on fire, but the noncoms had to be steady.”
She smiled slightly and shook her head. “They frown on officers running around with their hair on fire because it’s bad for morale. At least that’s what they said at the academy. I think most of us do okay, but you’re a rock. No matter what happens, you’re there doing your part to make things work out.
“I’ve learned a lot by watching you. If I survive this little adventure, I think I’m going to be a better officer because of it.”
“I think you’re a fine officer as it is, Chloe. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if you get bumped to major once we get off Terra. Hope you’re ready to command a company.”
She blanched a little at his words. “I’m not ready to command a company. I think I need more seasoning.”
“This may surprise you, but you’re getting that seasoning right now. There’s an old saying, ‘good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from poor judgment.’
“While I haven’t seen you exercise any poor judgment, you’ve certainly seen everything that can go wrong, and that’s almost the same thing. Most officers never consider how bad things can get until they’re in over their heads.
“After this mission, you’re going to be thinking about all the curveballs that life and combat can throw at you. That’s where success lies in our line of work. Preparing for all the possibilities, good and bad. If you’ve considered the good breaks, you can capitalize on them. If you’ve gnawed over the unpleasant surprises, then you can try to mitigate them.”
“I’ve been thinking about that, actually,” she said. “We’re about to get into one of the most important fights we’ve been in since we landed on this damned planet. There are so many things that could play out badly, even though this is only a small action. If even one person gets away, we’re screwed.”
He reached over and put a hand on her shoulder. “Planning out the things that can go wrong doesn’t mean we let them paralyze us. Sometimes you just have to trust that the dice are going to come up in your favor. If they don’t, well, to mix metaphors, you’ll just have to play the cards you’ve been dealt.”
“You really need to work on your motivational speaking, Colonel.”
Before he could respond, he heard the sound of horses approaching in the distance. It was time. They’d either stop the enemy in their tracks and move on to the next phase of their crazy plan, or they’d blow it and go from the frying pan into the fire.
He watched and waited until the caravan came into view. What he saw was like a blow to the side of his head. There were more riders than Julia had indicated. At least a dozen, possibly a few more.
That was going to make carrying off this ambush significantly harder. The chances of some of his friends being killed in the process also went up significantly.
Well, he’d just told Chloe that one had to learn to roll with the punches, and he’d been worried that this sounded a little too easy. There wasn’t much they could do to improve their odds, so they’d just have to fight harder.
This was all Kelsey’s show now. As soon as she gave the word, they’d kick this party off and hope for the best.
31
Kelsey watched the horses as they began riding past and felt her heart sink. There were more people than Julia had said there would be. At least double the number, in fact. The one group her doppelgänger had seen must’ve met up with a second group. Now, with their numbers bolstered, taking them all out went from challenging to seemingly impossible.
That sucked, but there was nothing she could do about it now. They were going to have to carry off the attack just like they’d planned, because there was no way to make any changes to it.
She waited until the group had ridden past her hiding place and then kicked off the party by shooting one of the trailing riders in the back. The woman she’d targeted screeched and fell off her horse to writhe on the ground, her arms futilely reaching for the length of wood that had plunged into her back, which was just out of reach.
Julia had been waiting for that and fired moments after she did. Her arrow struck one of the men on the far side of the caravan, taking him in the torso. He didn’t fall off his horse, but he didn’t look like he was in very good shape either.
The three archers positioned with the forward group opened fire, taking down two of the riders directly ahead of the caravan, potentially killing them both. The third shot must’ve missed because Kelsey saw no sign of anyone else being inconvenienced by an unexpected impalement.
Even as Talbot and Chloe were running out in front of the group, Jared and Sean were doing the same on her end. Jared had her blade, so he was going to take the brunt of the hand-to-hand fighting. Her worry now was that there were too many enemies to stop them from retreating back past her. She had to make it her mission to stop that from happening.
“Target anybody running back our direction,” she told Julia. “If they’re not running, shoot anybody that goes for a bow.”
Julia’s answer was to fire another arrow even as Kelsey was tracking her next target. The other woman’s shot flew right past one of the warriors as he jinked his horse to the side. Unfortunately for the other team, there was a second man right behind the first, and that rider caught the arrow in the throat. He pitched backwards off his horse and fell to the ground, lying there unmoving.
Kelsey’s next shot caught one of the trailing riders as they turned to retreat. The arrow struck the man in his chest but must not have penetrated very far. Though he staggered in the saddle, the experienced horseman kept moving forward. She had to rush her third shot, but it did catch him in the side before he could get past her.
While he didn’t fall out of the saddle, the way he was sagging to the side led her to believe that he was dead or critically injured. They’d have to catch up with his horse before it got too far, assuming they won this fight.
The archers up front had been just as busy as she was, so all three of them were peppering the vanguard of the caravan wi
th shots. Kelsey had no time to count how many people went down, but it was at least two more.
Several of the riders raced toward Talbot and Laird, even as two more turned and bolted toward Jared and Sean. With the speed of their horses, they were on her friends before Kelsey could fire again.
Sean proved unable to strike at the man racing toward him. It was obvious that he meant to strike the horse, but the rider was very well trained. His mount seemed to leap to the side, and in a flash, he was past the officer, striking down with his sword as he passed. Thankfully, Sean blocked the strike even though it knocked his sword out of his hand.
As the escapee blazed past their blocking force, Julia fired an arrow into the man’s back.
Or rather, she tried to. He dodged, not even seeing the first one until it flew past him, but her follow-up shot struck him in the spine, and he fell off his horse.
The one that attacked Jared found out immediately that that was a bad idea. Jared had paid attention to Talbot’s instructions about her sword and so he struck from the side at the descending blade, seemingly aiming to break it off just above the hilt.
His aim was off, and he ended up taking the man’s hand instead.
Well, that worked, too.
The pure shock on the man’s face at what had happened to him didn’t slow him down from trying to escape, though he was having to use his knees to control his mount as he tried to staunch the flow of blood from his severed limb.
That slowed him down quite a bit and made him an easier target. Kelsey’s next shot took him in the side, and over he went.
Up front, Talbot and Laird had done their part to stop anyone from getting past, and the three archers had put down everyone on that side. Kelsey saw that their side was doing just as well, with a couple of people on the ground wounded, and two wounded men that had ridden out of sight around the curve of the forest.
She raced out of concealment and leapt on the nearest horse that she could catch. It gave her some grief, but she firmly put him in his place. All those years of riding were paying off now as she was able to get the recalcitrant beast headed after the people that had retreated.
As she came around the bend in the forest, she saw that one rider had fallen off his horse and his mount stood nearby, looking nervously toward Kelsey.
The second mount was standing a little further away, but Kelsey couldn’t see any sign of his rider. It was possible the other man had fallen off his horse as well, and that his body was hidden by the grass, but she wasn’t going to assume that was the case. This could be some kind of ambush.
A quick glance up the open area between the tree lines showed no sign of the man running, so if he wasn’t lying in the grass somewhere ahead of her, he was in the woods somewhere to her left. The trees on her right were too far away for even an unwounded man to make it to them in the time that he’d been out of her sight.
Since the man in the open was between her and the second horse, she dismounted, drew the local sword she’d appropriated, and approached him carefully. He was still breathing but was only twitching sporadically. He tried for a knife at his belt, but she planted her boot on his wrist to stop him.
Kelsey considered finishing him but wasn’t sure she had that in her. She’d hunted men down and killed them, but the idea of killing someone she’d already defeated turned her stomach. She settled for kicking the knife a short distance away and stepped clear of the dying man.
That’s when the man hidden in the grass nearby chose to strike. He seemingly rose out of the ground less than a dozen meters away and rushed toward her. He had his long blade out and was already slashing it toward her head.
He was huge, taller than Talbot and much more muscular. He outweighed Kelsey by more than three to one. Without her Marine Raider augmentation, he was significantly stronger than she was too, and he was also a trained warrior. The scars on his face proved that.
His first slash, though powerful, was a little high. He was probably used to fighting people that were significantly bigger than her. For once, her short stature was working in her favor.
Kelsey managed to duck and used her blade to nudge his over her head with a loud clang of metal on metal. That put her near the man.
Seeing an opportunity that likely wouldn’t come again, she jumped inside the arc of his blade, drew the marine knife from her belt, and plunged it through the armor on the side of his torso. The armor was thick and scarred from other blows, but it didn’t even slow the almost monomolecular point of the hull metal blade.
The wound didn’t stop the man from jerking back and pulling the knife’s grip right out of her hand. He brought his blade back around, and it smashed into hers hard enough to knock it out of her grip. It went flying somewhere off into the grass on her left.
Suddenly disarmed and knowing that she didn’t have time to search for her weapon, she went on the attack. If she’d just had her body and no skills, she’d be dead in the next five seconds. Thankfully, the Art gave her something to work with.
Lacking any strength to go along with the moves she was going to execute, she wouldn’t be able to do any throws or body checks. She was going to have to bring him down to her level as quickly and efficiently as possible without any of that.
Even as he was drawing back to strike at her again, she lashed out and connected with his right knee. There was an audible pop, and the man’s leg gave way. He didn’t fall, but he staggered to the side like a drunken sailor.
Following up quickly, Kelsey ran two steps forward and launched herself into the air. His blade was already in motion, coming to strike at her—low this time—and she used her armored forearm to slap it away as it slid beneath her flying body.
She planted both her feet right in his face. The impact was sufficient to send him crashing to the ground with blood spraying from his nose and mouth. Momentarily stunned, he seemed unable to figure out how to move for just a few critical seconds.
Kelsey hit the ground a bit off-balance, but continued her roll forward, grabbed the knife still protruding from his side, and plunged it back into his throat.
Even mortally wounded, he tried to hit her with his sword one last time. She was far too close for the edge to hit her with any force but ducked close to him just in case.
The pommel of the weapon struck her leather helmet hard enough to throw her to the side with her head ringing, but there was no follow-up. The man gurgled, writhed beside her, and died.
Kelsey stood, her legs momentarily unsteady. Her face was covered in blood, but it wasn’t hers. The foul iron stench made her want to throw up, but she managed to control her stomach.
That was of course the moment the man she’d spared stuck his recovered knife into her left calf.
The sharp, bright pain made her yelp as she hopped away from him. He lay there unmoving, his hate-filled eyes already starting to cloud over.
She knelt and looked at the wound. The puncture wasn’t bad. The knife had probably only penetrated a couple of centimeters. Not enough to cause her more than inconvenience. It was bleeding freely, but there was no bright-red arterial blood. She’d live.
This damned fight reminded her far too much of the battle at the Imperial Retreat where she’d stalked and killed the assassins associated with her dead brother. It had been just as brutal and bloody. Thank God that her experience there had hardened her for what was happening now.
Kelsey staggered toward where her sword had fallen. She didn’t have time for weakness. The fight might still need her.
Even as she searched for it, she made a mental note to practice fighting with her augmentation turned off. She’d been very lucky this time. The next fight might kill her.
A moment later, she had her sword in hand, had mounted her horse, and galloped back toward the fight.
Which was over by the time she came back into sight. Talbot and Laird had almost made it to the bend of the open area closest her, and Julia—now mounted—was also headed her way.
Kelsey slow
ed and made a gesture for the others to slow down. No need to rush now.
Their reserve force had come out of the cul-de-sac, and it seemed that all of the enemy was accounted for. After making sure no one else seemed badly wounded, she made her way over to Talbot and Laird. His torso was liberally coated in blood, though his posture didn’t speak to any serious wounds.
“Are you hurt?” her husband asked with a note of worry.
She shook her head. “I was just a little too close to someone having the worst day of their life. Did we get them all? Are you hurt? Is anyone else?”
“All the enemy is down, and no riders bolted, other than the two you chased. We’re okay. Did you get the two you were after?”
“I finished them off,” she answered grimly. “We’re going to have to hide the bodies, though thankfully we won’t have to worry about them being discovered until tomorrow. It’s already late in the day, and the horde warriors won’t have time to become concerned about any birds, if they see them at all.”
He nodded. “The archers took care of most of the ones here, but there were a couple that were still alive. They weren’t going to survive, so Captain Beauchamp finished them. It makes me sick to my stomach having to do something like that.”
She pulled him into a hug. “Harsh times call for harsh measures. It’s not like we killed them out of hand. They fell in battle, and she made certain they didn’t suffer. After what they did to the rest of our people, I don’t have much sympathy for them.”
He shook his head slowly. “Just because they’re monsters doesn’t give us a right to be monsters as well. I agree that she did exactly what needed to be done and that it was a mercy. We just have to be careful that we don’t become hardened to this kind of thing. I’m a little worried about Julia on that front.”
She looked over at her doppelgänger. She’d joined the captain in killing the wounded back at the campsite where she’d rescued them, and she’d been cold-blooded and methodical about it. Not cruel, but still something to watch. If they survived the day.