Prime Alpha (Planetary Powers Book 1)

by Joshua Boring

  Kra-BOOM!

  The nearest machine gun nest exploded into the air, throwing saltbrick, demolished weapons, and dismembered body parts everywhere.

  Then the Yew realized they were under attack.

  There was a cry to arms in high-pitched Albiac as the Stelkans all screeched at the other races. Then the Yew within the crater made the mistake of running toward their entrenchments and weapon's emplacements at the far side of the crater, where the War Hive would have come from… away from their actual attackers. Nathen took aim as the Pennington re-chambered its second rocket and fired again.

  The rocket flew down into the crater and struck a mobile fuel pod, igniting the ion cells in a brilliant white explosion that flash-incinerated anything within a ten-foot radius. One Stelkan ceased shouting orders long enough to follow the smoke trail of the rocket back to Nathen's position. There was a sharp crack next to Nathen's right ear as Trent took the Yew’s scalp off with a well-placed shot. Nathen dumped the Pennington off his shoulder and snatched up his Coyote, pointing it over the edge. A Vorch officer was kneeling next to the body of the Stelkan when Nathen expertly put a three-round burst through his body. The Vorch dropped just as the next mortar arrived, taking out an enemy gun pit.

  Then the bullets started to fly from all directions.

  Things became even more chaotic on the platform as Yew started dropping in their tracks, dead or dying as they were shot from the edge of the crater. Guards in the bunkers near the top ring of the crater ran to the inside, wondering how anything could get inside without their noticing. The Flogs and Golos in the upper bunkers tried to signal their brethren to the location of the threats by waving their arms and weapons in their air, but their efforts had the opposite effect. Panicked return fire, both energy bolts and projectile, plucked away at the interior of the crater as the Yew on the platform mistakenly thought they were being fired on by their own ridge guards.

  Nathen tapped the side of his brow.

  “Blow the bunkers,” he said, calmly.

  Across the way, three seconds later, four machine gun and cannon bunkers positioned near the top of the ridge exploded in rapid succession as frag grenades detonated in their midst. Several Golos staggered out of the bunkers, skin and uniforms shredded and dripping black blood before confusedly falling off their platforms and dying. Nathen shot to his feet, swinging the Pennington onto his back and thrusting his feet over the ledge, sliding down into the crater.

  “Alphas! Commence assault! Go!”

  Across the crater to his left, Jonathan and Calico sprang over the edge and charged down the slope. To his right, Helen and Doc burst over the smoldering bunker they'd just fragged and headed for the platform. The Yew response was utter chaos, with random fire shooting in all directions even as the attackers made themselves known. Nathen slid down sideways, balancing himself and opening fire on a trio of Flogs that were rushing to engage him. The Coyote burst twice as it pierced through the shorter aliens and ricocheted off the ground. The one Nathen missed reared up and was about to fire its cell blaster when a flurry of .45 caliber rounds caught it in the chest, knocking it over dead. Just as Nathen started to slow his slide near the bottom, Phillip dashed past him and leaped ahead onto the platform, Casper in hand.

  “Hurry up, Knight!” he shouted, bursting ahead. “Or all the good ones will be taken!”

  Nathen jumped off the slope and hurried after his technician, silently aware of the entire team closing in together from all directions. The commander skidded to a stop next to the ramp to the lower platform and pulled out a Halberd anti-personnel mine and ripped off the flaps covering the adhesive nipples on the back. Leaning inside the archway, Nathen slapped the mine against the duracrete wall and activated the proximity mode, then turned and took off after Phillip.

  Across the way, Doc dropped onto the platform in his green armor and was greeted by a hail of gunfire from a Slugfest machine gun pit. He ducked his head low and weaved his way to cover as powered slugs pounded at his heels. The medic found relief when he threw himself behind a parked microtank, which was just armored enough to withstand the barrage. The Flogs manning the Slugfest let up for a moment as a Stelkan ran forward, directing a mixed squad of Flogs, Vorch and a single Golo to wrap around and flush the intruder out. The Yew leader turned and squawked something to the Slugfest pit, then drooped with what could only be described as deadly disappointment when it saw Helen Platner standing on the corpses of the Flog team, proudly pointing her new Slugfest in its direction.

  The Stelkan shrieked and flared its wings, drawing its squad's attention. Helen politely waited until they were all facing her before cutting them down with their own machine gun. The weapon rattled like a jackhammer as it pounded sizzling lead out like a rain of pain. Two Flogs got to cover. The rest died. The Vorch were screaming battle cries even as their bodies folded in against their sucking, singed wounds. The Golo roared, outraged as it watched its smaller Flog brethren falling around it, and patiently soaked up Helen's Slugfest punishment until it came into clobbering range. Suddenly its head rocked forward and the horned, muscle-bound biped slammed to the bloody platform as the sniper round from the ridge top turned its brains to mush.

  Doc emerged from behind the microtank and approached Helen, who held her stolen Slugfest aloft as she eyed the still body of the Golo.

  “Weapon's depot!” she shouted, motioning with her free hand.

  Helen turned and ran before Doc could respond. The medic followed, leaping over a dying Vorch who tried to grab at him. Doc turned and put a burst from his sub-machinegun in its back, ceasing its suffering. With each burst, the disposable typewriter clip popped out the top, breaking apart.

  On the other side of the entrenchments, Jonathan strode calmly through the smoke, looking about at the chaos with a cold stare. He merely kept walking forward, turning his head from side to side, waiting to see what would come at him. Calico followed in his shadow, duck walking behind the stealthist and turning left and right, snapping the Casper up and down like her standard Infantry training told her to. Another mortar struck nearby, sending chunks of burning debris bouncing around the black and red ESCs. Jonathan flinched as the explosion died down, then he lowered his Coyote and touched the side of his head with his middle finger, turning it toward the far end of the crater.

  “Suck a frag, Sharps,” he snapped, bitterly.

  “Behind you!” screamed Calico.

  Jonathan spun and rattled off a heavy burst from his assault rifle as a five-Flog team burst out from behind a stack of crates, firing their cell blasters as they went. If Jonathan had been a hair slower, they'd have been all over him; Flogs could be very fast when needed. The Flogs charged fearlessly, straight into the Human's cone of fire like a pack of mad wolves. Three fell dead, the other two tumbled and howled at their wounds as their weapons clattered from their arms. Calico skipped over to Jonathan, who looked down at her with his Coyote muzzle pointed at the sky.

  “Next time, shoot the rats yourself, or-”

  Jonathan cut off as a Flog landed on his back, wrapping one arm across the stealthist's chest and trying to press the muzzle of its hand blaster under his jaw. Calico danced back in alarm and trained her Casper on the stealthist, trying to decide whether to shoot. She didn't have to. Before the Flog could trigger the hand blaster, Jonathan pitched forward like a bronco and threw the Flog off him as he rolled over his shoulder and back onto his feet. The Flog landed, flipped over on all fours, and growled, swearing in Gralyyk as its back bristled. Jonathan started to draw his knife as it charged, but the Flog landed in a heap at his feet as Calico caught it in the side with her rounds. The stealthist scooped up his Coyote and jogged toward the nearest Yew tank, Calico hurrying behind him.

  Near the center of the platform, Nathen was busy wreaking havoc, pinwheeling back-to-back with Phillip as the two steadily cleared the area. Mortars rained down infrequently as Trent took turns between sniping and targeting for the Meteor outside the crater. The sniper
paused to look up from his scope, tilting his head sideways at the silent giant beside him. Kyler simply sat there, resting his chin on his deployed Blitz, watching the action taking place in the pit. Trent glanced down at the boiling action and cleared his throat.

  “Are you going to participate sometime today?”

  The oversized Aussie chuckled, sitting up and levering the Blitz into position.

  “Aye. Commandah sed no goin gun crazy. Just following ordahs.”

  The hunter shouldered the stock against his arm and sat there as the battle went on without him.

  Down below, Nathen finished cracking in a new mag. They'd reached the charging pads for the armor, and Phillip was whistling a song to himself as he primed charges under Nathen's watchful eye. Not thirty feet away, Helen and Doc ran up to the heavily reinforced bunker. Helen flattened her back against the door frame as Doc took up his position on the other side. Both ESCs scanned their engagement zones before proceeding. Doc took a knee and leaned over, carefully looking around the edge into the interior.

  Not carefully enough.

  The doorway erupted with a hail of spearing energy bolts as Doc jerked back, a hot, warped boil on the temple of his helmet. The firing ceased a second later as Doc held a hand instinctively to the damage.

  “Son of a-!” he swore, tapping the bolt blast with his glove even as the helmet slurped up the damage like a drop of water in a lake. On the other side of the doorway, despite the deadly situation, Helen laughed out loud.

  “Yeah, I think we found the weapons depot! Too bad they got here first! They really don't like you, don't they?”

  Doc rubbed the spot where the bolt had struck him and reached into the ammo bag around his shoulder, pulling out an Arcane grenade.

  “Yeah? Well, let's see how much they like this!”

  Doc lit the incendiary grenade and dropped it on the ground, then kicked it through the doorway, listening as it clattered across the floor toward what they both hoped was a large pile of combustible ammo. Doc and Helen ran, and were well away from the bunker before the fuse expired.

  “Fire in the hole!” yelled Doc, throwing himself behind the dead body of a Golo. Helen elegantly leaped like a gazelle over a microtank and took cover. From the bunker, there was an eruption of multilingual screams, and two Flogs appeared in the doorway making a mad dash to escape.

  The weapons depot blossomed into a brilliant pillar of flame and ash, pluming upwards more than thirty feet before dispersing into a vacuum of wind. The Flogs blew clear like they were shot from a cannon, bodies bouncing across the duracrete. Fire spilled from the bunker as ashes fell from the sky. Several Vorch somehow survived the fireball long enough to stagger flailing into the outside, screaming in agony as the fire grenade consumed their leathery skin. Doc stood up, took aim, and finished the job with several well-placed kill shots. Up on the lip of the crater, Trent whistled at what he saw through his scope.

  “That got 'em fired up,” he said, tracking for targets.

  Nathen was looking up at the dispersing fireball when an explosion behind him sent pulpy shrapnel flying over his shoulder. The commander turned in time to see the detonation from his Halberd mine billow from the ramp way. He turned on his heel and snapped his Coyote up to his armpit and angled it back, reaching forward to the grenade launcher. A second later a Flog wandered out of the smoke into the daylight, hacking and blinking as the smoke stung its eyes. Sticky ash caked its writhing tongue as it opened its razor-toothed mouth, coughing up pussy black blood. Nathen fired his rifle grenade through the smoke into the ramp archway. The explosion from the 30 millimeter grenade burst out of the enclosed structure, killing whatever reinforcements that had survived the Halberd mine. When nothing else emerged from the ramp, Nathen tossed his Coyote into his other hand and started shooting left-handed for a while.

  Meanwhile, Helen was just prepping her first charge when something ran past her. She realized what it was too late to track it herself.

  “Crap! Doc! The Stelkan! Get the Stelkan!”

  “I'm on it! I'm on it!”

  Doc raced past Helen as she dropped her charge and scraped up her Slugfest to follow.

  Stelkans weren't built for running. But in this one's case, when its life depended on it, it was pretty fast. Still, it couldn't outrun Doc for long. The medic leaned into his run and picked up speed, chasing the avianoid over bodies and debris. The reptilian bird realized it was being chased and screeched, whirling around and flaring its wings as it drew two hand blasters from hidden sheaths. The Stelkan beat its wings hard and shot sideways, changing momentum instantly. The medic turned, trying to find his feet, just as the Stelkan emptied both his energy weapons into him. Doc caught three shots in the midriff, registering the sting even as the dermasuit spread the damage out evenly.

  The medic tucked and rolled, coming up in a stiff guarding position as the rest of the Stelkan's shots either impacted the dermasuit or reflected off the Zen alloy, harmlessly. The next second, the shots stopped and Doc heard the clatter of two spent hand blasters hitting the ground. The medic looked up and saw the Stelkan dashing away. Doc cringingly resumed his chase. He rounded a stack of freight crates and caught sight of the Stelkan ducking into a hatch, just inside the camouflaged lean-to tent. The Casper snapped up and the trigger depressed, but too late, even for Doc's fast hands. The hatch was shut, and the rest of the shots bounced uselessly off the door as his sub-machinegun clacked empty.

  “Blast!” yelled Doc. Then, as he was fishing out a new clip to reload, an engine purred to life under the tent. A very big engine. Doc stopped as he realized what the Stelkan had just gotten into.

  “Oh no,” he said as the Yew gunship powered on its repulsors.

  At that moment, halfway across the platform, Nathen suddenly looked up, the warning in the back of his head alerting him to something. He heard the whine of powered-on engines and grimaced.

  “Gunship on site!” he yelled.

  “Heads up!” Phillip screamed behind him. “We got company!

  Nathen spun just as an entire platoon of fresh Yew forces arrived from the lower crater onto the platform, piling through the East side ramp. These Yew were organized, fully armored, and primed for whatever battle was waiting for them. Nathen counted at least thirty Flogs, ten Stelkans, twenty fully armored Vorch warriors, and a good fifteen heavily armed and armored Golos, all charging up the ramp into the action. The gunship would have to wait.

  The commander gritted his teeth and took a shooter's stance as Phillip automatically knelt so Nathen could fire over his head. Both ESCs opened fire together, strafing the oncoming enemies with everything they had; Nathen with his Coyote and Phillip with his Casper. Several enemies fell, but the Golos had the lead and were carrying massive shields in front of them, taking most of the fire. Then, once the Humans' weapons ran dry, the Flogs took the frontlines as the Vorch opened fire with their wrist rifles.

  “Cover!” Nathen shouted, slapping Phillip on the shoulder. The technician ducked away as Nathen dive-rolled out of the line of fire behind the wreckage of the antenna, dumping his spent mag and fumbling for a new one as a punishing amount of fire came his way. The incoming fire tapered off just enough for Nathen to hear the telltale wail of the Stelkans signaling the charge. The Flogs, Golos, and most ferociously the Vorch all charged, snarling, bellowing and crying as they bore down on the pinned Humans.

  Then they all died.

  The platform suddenly became a hotplate of exploding firecrackers as a hailstorm of thundering lead tore the Yew ranks apart from the sky down. The charge to victory turned into a race to the grave. The platoon never saw the Blitz machine gun waiting for them on the ridge. Now, as the charge broke and the soldiers staggered to their deaths, Kyler Jeston expertly unloaded two hundred rounds of specialized magnetic accelerated explosive rounds that chopped apart their armor. The giant held down the trigger, working back and forth with the thirty cal until his belt-fed rounds stopped coming. The final blow to the reinforceme
nts came when a mortar fell right in the middle of the Stelkans; the only ones able to take cover from Kyler’s barrage.

  Nathen and Phillip both popped up at once, weapons reloaded and searching for survivors, but there were none. Kyler had unloaded enough firepower to kill them all twice. Nathen looked up at the ridge and circled a finger once through the air over his head. On the ridge, Kyler Jeston, smiling pleasantly to himself, picked up his drum mag of normal rounds and crunched it into his Blitz, where it proceeded to hungrily eat up the belt in automation.

  “Bonus points,” the gunner said, leaping over the edge to join the battle below. Trent gave no reply except to load his third clip into his sniper rifle.

  Meanwhile, Jonathan and Calico were working on planting their charges. Jonathan was setting his explosives while Calico watched their right-hand side for enemies. And she kept getting them. Her Casper stitched up the twelfth Flog in a minute as the speaker swallowed, eyeing her slowly depleting ammo. If something bigger came around the corner right then, she wouldn't be able to stop it.

  “I'm running low!” she said, having to pause to shoot up another Flog that unwittingly came around her corner. The alien gargled and dropped next to a pile of its dead brethren as Calico shouted again. “I need to reload soon!”

  “Just hold them off for a few more seconds,” Jonathan said, powering on the detonator. “I just need-”

  Jonathan slammed against the side of the tank as a power pulse pummeled him right in the spine, barely missing the charges he was carrying. The stealthist coughed and braced himself up as Calico spun around.

  “Fiend!” she cried.

  Suddenly a Vorch shock trooper appeared out of the flames and smoke, carrying a Xazzler pulse thrower in its hands. The Vorch was out of armor, wearing only a basic trooper's uniform that was only sloppily put on, likely in response to the surprise attack. Jonathan twisted around with a strained grunt, reaching for one of the Sachlars on his thigh. Too late. The trooper charged the round, vortex-shaped weapon and fired again right into Jonathan's stomach, slamming the stealthist out flat. The stealth expert hit the ground and didn't move.