by Jay Allan
The enemy had been moving to stretch out the line and work around his flank, but then they just stopped the maneuvering and started pounding straight at his positions. Across the entire line, they launched massive wave attacks. They were taking horrific losses, but they were wearing down the dwindling Marine force too. Holm was going to run out of people before they did.
Holm had no idea what had changed to send the enemy into a frenzy of suicidal charges, but he knew his army was on the edge of the abyss. The attackers’ numerical superiority was just too great to overcome. If they were willing to take enough casualties, they could overrun the Marines.
“General Holm…” – it was Sam Thomas, his normally emotionless voice sounding surprised, almost shocked – “…the enemy is pulling back. All across my frontage.”
Holm felt his tension spike. What the hell, he thought, what are they up to now? They had him. They were on the verge of bagging the whole Marine force. Why pull back now after taking 10,000 casualties to get to the threshold of total victory?
“General Holm…they’re retreating. All across the line. It’s a miracle.” There was as much surprise in Teller’s voice as Thomas’. More, even. “I can’t explain it, sir, but they’re running.”
“I can explain it General Teller.” It was a woman’s voice, blasting through on all of their coms. “I’ve got a few Marines with me…and man are they pissed about being left out of the party.
Holm let out a deep breath. He knew the voice immediately. It was Cate Gilson and her Marines, back from the frontier and on their way down to the surface. He glanced at his tactical screen just as a wave of landing craft moved onto the edge of the display. “General Gilson…are you a sight for sore eyes!”
Chapter 12
North of the Sentinel
Planet Armstrong
Gamma Pavonis III
Cain was sitting at his desk. Really, it was just a box, a surplus plastic crate that had once held ammunition. There was a label on the side, partially faded but still readable…2,500,000 hypersonic rounds.
He was wearing his battle armor, but he had the visor retracted, and he was enjoying the fresh air. Protocols called for sealed suits in the combat zone…it was too easy for an enemy to deploy chemical weapons or for a Marine to get too close to a radiation hotspot if things suddenly went nuclear. But there was no one to scold the commander-in-chief, and he’d had just about enough of breathing air that stank of Erik Cain.
Long battles were always a challenge. His people were well beyond the suggested maximums for continuous armor usage. The plutonium in the suits’ reactors would keep them functioning almost indefinitely, but performance would degrade as men and women were pushed beyond their endurance. It was just one more thing to worry about, but there was nothing to be done. There was no sign of any respite for Cain’s Marines, so they were just going to have to tough it out. He knew he’d start seeing psych cases soon, but he’d just have to deal with them the best he could.
Cain knew he shouldn’t be this far up…not now, not when his people were pushed so close to the end of their endurance. He’d ordered most of the staff to withdraw to the new HQ, but he intended to stay at the forward headquarters until Carlson’s people made it back. It was the kind of thing General Holm would have scolded him about. But Holm was lightyears away. Cain didn’t even know where the general was. Isaac Merrick did a good job of filling in for Holm, trying to keep Cain from getting too reckless, but he rarely succeeded. Merrick didn’t outrank Cain like Holm did, and that was a huge disadvantage. It was hard enough to get Cain to follow orders he didn’t like. But simply persuading him was damned near impossible. But now, Merrick was wounded and in the hospital, and Cain was alone with half a dozen junior officers, all too scared of him to do anything but jump a meter in the air when he snapped an order to them.
Cain was on the com with Jake Carlson. “OK, Jake, everybody else is heading south. Let’s get your people moving.” Carlson had been a sergeant on Adelaide and the initial man to confirm that the First Imperium’s soldiers were robots. He’d been part of Adelaide’s militia at the time, but now he was back in the Corps and wearing a major’s insignia. He’d fought in every significant engagement of the First Imperium War, and he’d become one of Cain’s “go to” officers, a stone cold veteran who could be trusted to handle the toughest assignments.
Carlson’s 300 Marines had been given just such a mission. They were the rearguard, trying to slow down an enemy that outnumbered them 50-1 while their comrades retreated and formed a new defensive line. It was hard business, and costly. Carlson had lost a third of his strength, but he’d gotten the job done. The rest of the army had extricated itself from a potential trap and fallen back into the new position. The outlook was still grim, but at least the fight would go on. Now Carlson had to get his survivors out…and no one was holding the enemy back for them while they did it.
“Yes, General.” Carlson’s voice was calm, even. Cain had never seen an officer as cool under fire as Jake Carlson. “We’re trying to break off now.”
“Don’t worry about making it pretty, Jake. Just get the hell out. If you need to bolt and run for it, do it.” Carlson’s people had done a good job of making a lot of noise and convincing the enemy they faced a large force. But the trick had only been effective for so long. The invaders had briefly slowed their advance, but now they were coming hard, and they were right on Carlson’s heels.
A loud blast of static erupted from Cain’s com unit. “Jake?” Nothing but interference. “Jake? Can you hear me?” Nothing. He flipped through the com channels, trying to reach Carlson, the new HQ…anyone. But all he got was static.
He got up and walked through the door and into the open area between the small portable shelters. Captain Claren was coming out of the other building, on his way to report the com failure. Cain motioned for him to open his visor.
A few seconds later, the reflective hyper-glass visor pulled back, and Claren shouted to Cain. “What’s happening, sir? I can’t raise anyone on the com.”
“Somebody’s jamming us.” Cain didn’t know what was going on either, but none of the options he could conceive were good. “It’s got to be an attack coming in. Tell Evans and Barts we’re pulling out. We can’t get a fucking thing done with no com.”
“Yes, General.” Claren spun around…then all hell broke loose.
Cobra sat still, silent. It was motion that usually gave away an assassin who was this close to the target. People didn’t think, didn’t realize how easily a little movement could undo everything the best camo could achieve. It was patience more than anything that separated the great killers from the others. Cobra had stalked targets for months, even years, waiting for that one moment when the victim was exposed. Erik Cain had been his most daunting assignment…but now the great general was vulnerable, in a crumbling war zone with just a few aides around him. It was time.
His rifle was resting on a large root that branched out from the giant tree. He was crouched in firing position, his eye looking through the weapon’s scope. He had a good view of the target area and a perfect line of sight. Now he just needed Cain to show himself. One shot was all it would take. Not even Cain’s state of the art armor would stop a shot from this rifle. And Cobra never missed.
He’d just activated the jammer. That would shake things up in the camp. He didn’t need much…just a second or two with Cain out in the open. There were two large shelters…Cain had to be in one of them. He waited…watching.
Cobra was as meticulous and cold-blooded as any killer who served Alliance Intelligence, a natural sociopath whose inborn tendencies were exploited and encouraged under Gavin Stark’s tutelage. But even he felt a tightness in his gut, a warmth around his neck. Erik Cain was one of the Marine Corps’ most accomplished killers, a man who had taken down hundreds of enemies himself…and led forces who had killed tens of thousands. His legend was one of invulnerability, of almost superhuman ability. Even Alliance Intelligence’s top
killer couldn’t help but feel awed.
He was watching…silently, intently. He saw the door slide open in one of the shelters…and almost simultaneously on the other as well. A figure stepped out of each, both clad in Marine armor. They walked toward each other.
Fuck, he thought…they look identical. His mind raced, trying to choose a target. He could take them both down, but the second target would have a brief warning, a chance to run, to duck for cover. He was almost sure he could take them both out, but there was a small doubt. And trying to kill Erik Cain and leaving him alive seemed like a really bad idea.
He flipped a coin in his head, moving the sight to the figure on the left. “Time to die, General,” he muttered softly as he squeezed the trigger.
Cain stood watching as Claren turned to carry out his orders. The captain had proven to be the best assistant he’d ever had. Claren was smart, efficient, fearless…and he’d mastered the tricky art of handling Erik Cain. Cain knew he wasn’t easy to work closely with, and he appreciated the synergy he had with Claren. The two worked seamlessly together, and that benefitted the entire army. Cain would have promoted the captain long before, but he didn’t want to lose him…not in the middle of a situation like this. He felt guilty about not giving Claren the rewards his service had earned, but he promised himself he’d make it up to the captain. If they both made it off Armstrong, Cain had already decided he was going to bump the erstwhile aide right to colonel and give him his own regiment. He’d need General Holm’s approval for that, but he didn’t think that would be a problem.
But now Cain was thinking about the current situation, not the things he would do if he made it through the battle. He was trying to make sense of what was happening and, no matter how he figured, it just didn’t add up. It took a lot of energy to jam Marine coms over a wide area. A lot…the kind of energy fusion plants put out. There was no way the invaders could be jamming his HQ this effectively. Carlson’s people were still in the field at least 3 klicks away. Could there be another force onplanet, one much closer to his HQ? Did the enemy get around Carlson’s flank? Unless it was a very small area being targeted. But that would mean…
Cain was still looking right at Claren when the aide’s head exploded into a cloud of red mist. His blood went cold with horror. Decades of combat experience shoved the emotions to the recesses of his brain, but he was still sick, nauseous. He felt a rush, no, a double rush of adrenalin - his AI, Hector, injecting a supplement to his body’s own blast.
Claren was dead. He knew it immediately; he didn’t have to check. But there was no time for grief now. His muscles tightened; his body tensed. He knew he would live or die in the next few seconds.
The world was moving in slow motion as he reacted rapidly, effectively. The captain’s body was still falling when Cain’s battlefield instincts took over. He shifted his weight, moving his head down, diving for the cover of the shelter behind him.
Alex prowled through the brush, hiding behind the massive trees whenever possible. She knew she was running out of time, but she needed to stay hidden. Her quarry was better equipped than she was. If she gave herself away, he’d just turn his attention to her. She was a gifted killer too, but she couldn’t match her adversary’s weapons and technology. He could take her down before she got close enough to fight back. Unless she remained hidden.
She’d originally set out to kill Cain herself, but now she was determined to save him. Alex Linden had been eleven years old when her parents were murdered by government thugs. She’d escaped by fleeing into the crumbling ghettoes and, later, into the semi-abandoned suburbs and countryside. Even now, she didn’t like to remember some of the things she’d done to survive, the horrors she’d endured. By the time she ended up at Alliance Intelligence, she was beyond angry, beyond bitter…just the sort of promising young psychopath Gavin Stark’s recruiters salivated over. She cursed the world and everyone in it, and she did whatever she had to do to get her job done. Emotionlessly and utterly without pity. She rose rapidly through the ranks, leaving a trail of efficiently dispatched victims behind her.
Then she found out her sister Sarah was still alive. She’d hated her older sibling for years, blaming her for everything that had happened to the family. That hate had served a purpose over the years, channeling the horrors she couldn’t face, giving her a focus for her rage. A dead sister blamed for all the ills that had befallen her was a useful psychological device. A live one who awakened all kinds of suppressed emotions and memories was far more complex and confusing.
Alex Linden, Alliance Intelligence’s stone cold killer, was buried under a deluge of emotions, memories of a happy eleven year old with a close and loving family clashing with recollections of decades of murder and remorseless scheming. She had struggled enormously with it, descending into drug addiction and despondency before pulling herself back from the brink.
Now, suddenly, she had clarity. She had no delusions about the things she had done, and she wasn’t going to beg anyone’s forgiveness. Atonement wasn’t her goal. What she had done, she had done. But she was going to save Cain. She was going to do it for Sarah, for the sister she’d wrongfully hated for so many years.
She slipped around the tree and moved slowly to the next, carefully scanning the thinning woods ahead. Then she froze. She caught a hint of movement, maybe 200 meters from where she stood. She stared, letting her eyes adapt…scanning every millimeter. Was it him?
She slowly pulled her own rifle off her shoulder, creeping forward as she did. She took each step with care. One small twig, one pile of dried leaves could give her away. She needed to get closer.
One hundred fifty meters, one hundred twenty-five. She paused, taking a deep breath, holding the rifle in front of her as she carefully continued ahead. One hundred meters. She stopped again, scanning the area. She was about to step forward when she heard a loud crack.
A cold feeling swept through her body. She lunged forward, running as fast as she could, bringing the rifle to a firing position as she did. She started shooting, aiming as well as she could at a full run.
She couldn’t hear if her target had fired again over the noise of her own rifle blasting away on full auto. She saw the target move, turning toward her. He raised the rifle in her direction. She pivoted, zigzagging as she ran toward the assassin, still firing.
She felt the pain…a bullet grazing the top of her shoulder. Nothing serious, she told herself as kept running forward. She was almost there…only a few more meters. The assassin was just ahead, his eyes focused on hers. His shirt was bloody…she’d hit him at least once. She lunged forward, reaching around and grabbing the knife hanging from her belt. It was time to finish this.
The hovercraft zipped along just above the ground, racing to the north. The army didn’t have many vehicles left, and the few it did have had been assigned to assist with the relocation of the hospital. This one had been scheduled to move south with supplies when Sarah got Campbell’s message.
She’d run outside and ordered the supplies thrown out of the transport. There were no armored Marines nearby, but she grabbed half a dozen of the walking wounded and climbed aboard. She ordered the pilot to redline the engines, and the craft raced toward Cain’s headquarters.
She spent the few minutes of the trip on the com, desperately trying to reach Cain. Nothing…all she got was static. She tried to get Claren too, but it was the same. No response at all, just heavy interference. She tested the hovercraft’s com, and it worked perfectly. Whatever was wrong, it was on Erik’s end.
She struggled to hold back the wave of nausea that almost overcame her. How could she have been so blind? She hadn’t been able to spend a lot of time with Alex before the First Imperium War tore her away from the reunion with her long-lost sibling. She knew her sister had some troubles…a past she didn’t want to discuss. But the truth was more than Sarah could bear. Alex was one of Gavin Stark’s murderers? It was almost more than she could grasp, and it made her feel sick.
&nb
sp; Oh my God, Erik, she thought…I can’t lose you, not like this. She reached to her waist, feeling around for the sidearm Erik had insisted all rear-area personnel wear. I’m coming, Erik. I’m coming.
The projectile blasted through the air at five times the speed of sound. It had been aimed at Cain’s head, but one of Alex’s rounds hit the shooter just as he was firing. It wasn’t enough to send the round completely off-target, but the shot hit Cain’s shoulder instead of his head. It tore through his armor, ripping through the lean muscle and bursting out the other side.
Cain felt the pain and the kinetic impact, sending his body spiraling down to the ground. There was a rush of relief, even while he was still falling…Hector pumping painkillers into his bloodstream. He hit the ground hard, felt the wind knocked from him. He rolled the instant he fell, reaching around with his good arm, pulling his assault rifle from its harness. Erik Cain was a veteran’s veteran. He ignored the wound in his arm and prepared to fight off whatever enemy had fired at him.
He flipped over onto his belly and crawled behind a large crate, staring toward the forest. He wasn’t sure exactly where the shots had come from, but he had a general idea.
There was nothing. No more shots, no one visible. Wait, he thought. He saw a figure stumbling forward. He pulled up his rifle and took aim, but something held him back. It was a woman, and she was clearly wounded. He could see blood on her now, and she was stumbling, struggling to stay on her feet.
“Don’t shoot…I’m here to help you.” She had her hands in the air, showing him she had no weapon drawn. He was suspicious, but he held his fire. She looked familiar, but he couldn’t place her at first. She resembled Sarah…no, not just a resemblance…she was almost the image of his lover. Then he remembered…Carson’s World…the last battle of the Third Frontier War. He’d seen her there…the spitting image of Sarah.