"Agreed. Let's not look for any more. We have enough to deal with," replied Taylor, "So the dome, any idea what is powering it?"
"Not much, but whatever it is, it's right at the centre. You're gonna have to get right to the heart of it to take it out, if you can."
"Trust me, if I make it there, I'll take it apart with my bare hands if I have to."
"Good luck, Colonel."
Taylor turned back to Wilcox one last time.
"Have your security details on duty around the clock. Ensure all weapons and ammunition are issued. Be vigilant. We still have little idea of what we're dealing with, and the Morohta seem to throw something different at us with every turn. Don't think just because the fight is down there that it isn't up here as well. Stay calm, stay strong, and send for ammo for us. We're gonna need it pronto."
With that, he left, knowing he couldn't be far behind Jones. It felt good to be getting stuck in, but it was far from an ideal situation. As he passed through the ship towards the docking bays, he studied the photos of the canyon passes that were their entrances into the colony. One a hundred metres-wide throughout, the other bottlenecked to just twenty metres.
Perfect place for an ambush, no sensible commander would lead his troops into it, and yet we have no choice.
He looked down at his pad. Jones had already relayed all the commands that were needed. All he had to do was embark. He rushed onto the docking bay floor to find the last of their marines loading up. One of the ship’s security details stood at the entrance and looked rather uncomfortable to see the entire Marine Regiment leaving them to fend for themselves.
"Hey, we're the ones jumping into this fight, so cheer up," he said as he rushed past them.
It wasn't much of a consolation, but he didn't want to be any harsher on them. It wouldn't help anyone. He noticed Jones waiting at the entrance to one of the huge assault craft.
"You know what we are doing?"
"Kind of, we got a plan?"
"Only two ways in, and they're both pretty small. Nothing much we can do than the obvious. I want you to take half the Regiment to the wide eastern entrance, and whatever extra support is going with us with you. I'll take the rest and head to the bottleneck in the west. I'll allocate brigades once we're in the air. Aim is simple, sweep and clear, and make it to the centre of that dome as fast as we can. The Admiral says the dome is powered by something at its very core."
"On the ground?"
"Hopefully."
"That's it? That's all we know? What about the enemy, what kind of things are we facing?"
Taylor shrugged.
"Wonderful."
"Improvise and overcome, Captain. Good luck."
He rushed off to his own craft as Jones stepped back, muttering and shaking his head as he shut the door. The situation was bad, but there was little he could do about it. He rushed up the ramp into the craft that was waiting for him. A seat by the door had been saved for him, by Alita no less. She was in full gear with rifle in hand, the same as him. He looked surprised.
"Why aren't you flying?"
"They already have pilots."
Taylor didn't look impressed. He liked to know he had someone he trusted at the helm, but there was no time to waste arguing about it. He wasn't particularly happy that she would be in the line of fire with him either.
"I guess we can't always have what we want," she said.
"Evidently," he replied as he took a seat.
He punched in a few orders on his pad that split their forces as he saw fit. He'd far rather have Jones with him, but he also needed an experienced combat officer to lead the second assault. The door shut behind them, and they felt the craft rumble as the engines fired up.
"Forgive me for saying this, but this doesn't seem like the best thought out plan," said Alita as she looked at the orders and map on her pad.
Taylor looked around. There were similar doubts and concerns on many faces around him.
"It's a shit situation, no doubt about it, but we just have to make the most of it."
The engines roared loudly and vibrated through their seats as they lifted off the deck and left the ship. There were no windows, and that didn't make Taylor feel good at all. He tapped a few keys on his pad that brought up a video feed from the pilot’s cockpit. He was surprised to see there was no incoming fire at all. It was a quiet approach as though they were landing on any peaceful world.
They got through the atmosphere quickly and soon had a view of their destination. There were swarms of civilians pouring out through both valleys. Taylor opened a channel back to the Resolution.
"Admiral, we've got civilians making their way out of the city. We need boats to pick them up ASAP."
"They are already en route, Colonel. Your assault craft will assist with evacuation once you are on the ground also."
"Gonna be a hell of a lot of people."
"We can handle it, Colonel. You just take the fight to them, and get that shield down."
"We'll do what we can. Taylor out."
"Why even attack this world?" Alita asked, "There is no military installation here."
"Why? Maybe because they want to terrorise our people, or for whatever industry there is, maybe just because they can."
"And what if they are just drawing us out so they can strike some more important target?"
"We aren't the only ones fighting this war. There are plenty more rapid response fleets like ours, as well as what we have on Earth."
"I dunno, the whole thing just sucks."
"That's a fact."
"Do they have any troops in this place?"
"A few hundred local troops, but nothing that can stand for long against what they are dealing with. If they haven't run already, they should have."
"Not always easy to run from your home, though, is it?"
Taylor shook his head.
"Leaving Earth to the enemy was one of the hardest things I ever had to do, but that was Earth."
"And you think the people down there think any less fondly of their world?"
Taylor looked at the images of the surface. It looked barren and uninspiring to him, but then it was hard to ever find anything as beautiful in his eyes as his own homeworld. They were close to the surface now and making their final descent.
"All right, look lively, people!"
He opened a channel to the whole Regiment.
"Priority here is getting to the centre of the dome as quickly as we can, and destroying whatever is powering it. There will be a lot of civilians and some friendlies in there, so mind your fire. And we're approaching from both sides, so keep an eye on friendly fire. Ammunition is low, so choose your targets and shoot smart. Good luck to you all."
They hit the ground just a few minutes later, and Taylor was on his feet before any one else. The ramp went down, and he ran out to find a horde of civilians rushing at them, screaming for help.
"Clear the way!" he bellowed.
There was too much panic and noise for them to hear. He repeated the commands using his mic so that the sound echoed through the canyon ahead, but even then, it was to no avail. They just had to push forward and wade through the people as they fought to get a space on one of the ships.
"This is crazy. What are we gonna do?" Alita asked.
"There's no controlling this. We have to keep moving forward!"
"They'll be trampling each other to death at this rate," she protested.
"Not our problem. This is a fraction of the people of the colony. Let them sort it out. Leave it to the crews Vega is sending."
He pushed onwards. With the power of his suit, he was able to drive through them. Many of them were screaming at him, but he didn't catch much of what they said. A number were covered in blood, their own and others. Some were badly burnt. He felt for them and wanted to stop and help, but he knew he could help them all best by driving on. He looked back. Alita had stopped and drawn out a field dressing kit to help a woman carrying her bleeding daughter. The
girl’s face was partially burnt and bleeding lower down. It was a horrible sight, but he reached down and took hold of Alita.
“We don’t have time for this.”
“We can’t just leave them like this.”
He hauled her to her feet and dragged her onwards.
“What are you doing! Mitch!”
He stopped and turned to face her.
“Get with the programme here. For every bleeding child out here, there will be hundreds more in there,” he said, pointing forward.
“Will you leave them to die?”
She looked confused and conflicted. He smacked the side of her helmet, and she snapped out of it a little. He knew she wasn’t really up to this. She couldn’t turn off her soft side, and he didn’t think any less of her for it. He had become so accustomed to death and destruction that he could walk though it and barely even notice.
“Alita, I need you on this. I need your head in the right place. Are you with me?”
She slowly nodded in agreement, but he wasn’t wholly convinced.
“We have a job to do, now do it!” he yelled.
“All right, I heard you!” she snapped back at him.
It was a dreadful situation to be in. He couldn’t be anything but her commanding officer right now. The scenes around them were having a profound effect on her. He remembered feeling that way a long time ago, and it was hard to try and find an answer to make her feel better. The only way he got through it was with time, but she wouldn’t want to hear that.
“You know what’s at stake here?”
“Yeah, I got it, Sir.”
They went on, but she looked angry. He understood why, but that didn’t make it any better. He was so much happier when she was in the cockpit. She was a great pilot, and from up there she was protected from the horrors they saw on the ground. There was nothing more he could say or do that would make it more acceptable.
Screams of pain and panic were everywhere. Some people rushed past them without even a look, others yelled and screamed at them. So many that it wasn’t easy to understand what they were saying. Mostly Taylor knew that it would just be the cries for help. After a few minutes, they were finally able to push into the canyon, but it was getting difficult. The sheer numbers of people were blocking their path, and they were almost down to single file. They were the only ones trying to get back into the colony.
“Clear the way. Clear the way!” Taylor shouted as he led them forward.
The canyon was tapering towards its bottleneck now. It was the last place he wanted to be.
“Jones, what is your position?” he asked through their comms.
“Two hundred metres from the edge of the colony.” He could hear the same chaotic sounds in the background as he was surrounded by, “Having trouble wading through the civilians. It’s chaos.”
“I hear you,” replied Taylor.
Gunfire rang out ahead, and that only caused more panic. Soon enough, though, the numbers of civilians started to thin out as no more were coming. As appreciative of that fact as Taylor was, he knew the reason why would not be so great. He picked up his pace as it became easier to move. The sound of gunfire was close now. He took a slight turn in the canyon and saw three civilians struck in the back by gunfire. They dropped down dead. The others around them were running for their lives.
He then saw three Gurvs ahead, the savage and primitive creatures that did Bolormaa’s bidding. He took aim and struck one down with a burst. Alita reached his side and took aim, killing the second as he fired on the third. As they fell, he kept moving forward. The bottleneck was ahead, and yet it looked quiet. There were dozens of bodies of dead civilians littering their path, but no sign of life, friend or foe.
“I don’t like this at all,” said Alita.
Taylor agreed but didn’t say a word. He just kept moving forward as he knew they needed to. He stopped at a rock face just before the canyon reached its narrowest point. Slowly and cautiously he peered around the edge. To his amazement there was still nobody to be seen. Thirty metres ahead there was a trail of human bodies.
“Where are the rest, Mitch?”
“Civilians?”
She nodded.
“They must have scattered into the colony after seeing this. Would you run unarmed into a canyon with three of those things on the rampage?”
It was a terrifying thought. They had been butchered with nowhere to run or hide.
“do you think they are waiting for us?”
“There’s only one way to find out.”
“Send a drone in first.”
“No, it doesn’t matter what is on the other side, we are going in. We have no choice.”
He hated the fact they had no other options and doubted that was any accident on the enemy’s part.
“Jones, you in town yet?” he asked.
“Negative,” the reply came with loud gunfire in the background, “We have heavy resistance here.”
“Shit,” said Taylor to himself, “Just keep pushing on the best you can.”
Without another word, he rushed through the bottleneck. He expected to take fire any moment and was ready to activate his shield. He didn’t want to do it sooner as he needed the best visibility he could get. Nothing came. He looked up and around at the edges and every crevice. To his shock there was no sign of life at all, and then as he scanned further, he noticed two rocks tumble down from a crop just ten metres above. He rushed right at it with his rifle at the ready.
He used his boosters and jumped up onto the top with his finger on the trigger. As he landed, he found two teenage girls huddled against the rock. They were both crying, and one was sheltering the other. They looked like sisters.
“Please, don’t hurt us,” one of them pleaded.
“It’s okay. We’re here to help.”
They cautiously got up and looked over the edge to see Taylor’s troops pouring in through the bottleneck.
“Come on. You can’t stay here.”
He leant down and helped them to their feet. They didn’t even want to stand and were quivering wrecks. He bet some of the bodies around them were friends or family, but he didn’t want to ask. He could see the look on Alita’s face. Such sorrow that she was almost crying.
“Just go that way, and don’t stop till you find a ship to take you away from here,” said Taylor.
“We are just gonna let them go it alone?”
“They’ll be safe from here.”
“You don’t know that.”
Taylor strode up to her and whispered in her ear, “Get your shit together. We have a job to do, and the longer it takes us to do it, the more people will die.”
She just looked horrified as Taylor spoke to the two girls.
“Don’t look down, just go. Go on!”
They rushed on towards the chokepoint where their troops were still piling through.
“Let’s keep moving!” Taylor yelled and carried onwards. They were reaching the edge of the dome. It rested on the rocks above them. It looked as though it could close down through the canyon at any time. That was a fear that they all shared, but nobody said it. Taylor went through first. His pulse was racing, but he passed under the edge without incident and carried on as if he hadn’t expected anything else. The canyon soon opened up, but ahead it once again bottlenecked into a small tunnel that was just a few metres wide. It was a worse choke point that the last, something no one had spotted or mentioned previously. He could see the edge of the colony through the hole.
“This isn’t good,” said Alita.
“Nope, but we’ll just have to live with it. Come on.”
He rushed on through without hesitation and burst out the other side to get his first glimpse of the town. It was made of a modular prefabricated series of buildings that looked the most bland and ugly place to live Taylor could imagine. Every structure was white, and with few windows, just small portholes every few metres.
“The place looks more like a prison than a town.”<
br />
“Atmospheric effects mean they have to batten down the hatches pretty often. Doesn’t sound like the most hospitable of places.”
That was the first he had heard of it, and it made him realise that he hadn’t come close to researching the area for their operation, but it was too late now. There were at least two-dozen bodies scattered around the area. They seemed to have come out at the back of a factory of some kind.
“Looks like the canyon isn’t really used much.”
“Guess they’d be no point. Without the dome, you could just fly out of here. I guess they’re probably nothing more than casual walking areas, if people walk anymore.”
“Why would you design a colony with no other way out?”
“They couldn’t have predicted this. No one could,” he replied.
Gunfire rang out, and it was a reminder that they needed to pick up the pace. Up ahead was a broad road that led all the way to the centre of the colony, and the source of the dome shield. They could see the vertical translucent cylinder rising to the dome above. Taylor looked down at his pad to the map of the area. It was made in a simple grid like structure, but their attention was soon drawn to the chaos on the road ahead. Gunfire zipped back and forth as civilians ran from Gurvs that were chasing them down. And further back was a huge armoured vehicle.
“What the fuck is that?” Taylor asked.
A bulbous looking tank seemed to hover just over the ground. It was oval shaped, with a very squat but broad turret on top with two huge gun barrels. It looked to be five metres tall and twice as wide, more like a bunker than a vehicle.
“Can’t be good.”
Just as she said it, the turret turned slightly, and the guns were pointing right at them.
“Cover!” Taylor shouted. They rushed off either side of the road, but many of their colleagues were still trying to get out of the canyon. They saw the flash of the guns, and a moment later two huge energy shells struck their position. Taylor jumped into cover with Alita just in time. The ground shook as they impacted, and Taylor feared to even look back, knowing it would be a catastrophic sight. He climbed up to his feet. There were thirty dead where they had been trying to get out of the canyon, and the cave had completely collapsed, likely killing or trapping many more.
Battle Beyond Earth Box Set Page 69