Earth Space Service Space Marines Boxed Set

by James David Victor

  “I don’t know, Thomas,” Andy said, shaking her head. “I am hoping soon, though. It has been pretty nonstop since they declared war and even before that. One day off on that starbase didn’t seem like enough.”

  “Probably because that base didn’t have anything worth doing on it. One lousy bar that played bad music, had no dancing, and only served synthetic liquor,” Dan muttered. “What kind of a day off is that?”

  Jade chimed in, kneeling on the ground with her scanner. She didn’t even look up when she spoke. “I have to agree with him on that one, Major,” she said. “I wouldn’t have minded it being just one day if we’d actually had somewhere with things to do. Time off in one’s bunk is all well and good, but when you want distraction, you want something...distracting.”

  Of course, this brought a laugh from Dan that hinted at vaguely inappropriate thoughts, but Andy silenced him with a look.

  “I would love to have leave time long enough to go home,” Roxanna said, almost wistfully. “It’s been a long time since I set foot on Seler. I miss the oceans.” She moved along the building wall, scanning. “Earth has some lovely water, but it’s still nothing like the deep glittering black of the waters on Seler. To visit the city of Unaria.” She glanced back at them with a light in her purple eyes. “It’s entirely underwater, you know.”

  “Really?” Jade asked with almost cheerful curiosity. “Like Atlantis?”

  Roxanna blinked back at the younger human. “Like what?”

  Andy chuckled and shook her head. “Atlantis,” she said. “It’s a mythical city on Earth said to have sunk beneath the waters.”

  The Selerid nodded with understanding. “Like that, but not mythical nor sunk. It was built underwater, and it is one of the most beautiful places in the galaxy.”

  It never ceased to amaze Andy how people could be. They were on a planet, setting up defenses against an enemy that would be upon them in hours. There would be combat, and injuries and maybe fatalities. They could die. No one knew what would happen, and it would be their first wartime combat on a planet. Defending a city that none of them had seen before this moment...

  And yet, they were not morose. They spoke to one another, working hard, like they always did. Treating one another like a unit, like a family, like they always did.

  When the fight came, they would fight hard.

  Like they always did.

  11

  “Major, the Star Runner has arrived and is establishing orbit.”

  That was good news. Andy acknowledged and said, “And the Arkana?”

  “Both ships are still directly en route for Baccem. They will arrive in approximately forty minutes.”

  That wasn’t good news.

  Andy closed the comm channel from the ship and turned to the rest of her squad. They were loosely arrayed around where they would be stationed once the Arkana reached the planet, but hadn’t taken up formal positions yet. Although they had been fairly loose earlier, now the tension was starting to settle in and silences were lasting longer.

  While she waited, she checked over her gear for the fifth time.

  “Sir, I’m pretty sure that nothing has changed in the past five minutes,” Dan commented from where he was leaning against a wall. There was tension in the tightness around his brown eyes.

  “You can’t be sure of that,” Andy replied, managing a half-smile in return.

  “Whatever you say, Major.” Dan shook his head with a small smile of his own.

  It took another twenty minutes for the ESS 21st Marine Detachment to get on the ground, and Andy didn’t want to waste any time. She used the communications system to send them where she needed them to go. Knowing that they would have the least amount of time to get ready, she put them where they needed the least intense coverage.

  The 21st was led by Major Canar, a Ronnor who had been one of her instructors during her years in training. Now he was serving in the field again, having re-upped when the threat first became clear but before war was declared. He was technically the senior between them, but she had been on the field first and set up their tactics. He ceded to her and she was grateful that his wisdom overrode his ego.

  “We are in position, Major Dolan,” Canar called in just a few minutes after their shuttles had touched down. “The Star Runner is reporting an ETA of fifteen minutes until the Arkana are in range to launch their shuttles and potentially board our ships.”

  “Acknowledged, Major,” Andy replied, trying not to grind her back teeth at the thought of the enemy being so close.

  She gestured to her squad and they all moved into more entrenched positions around their section of the city’s outer limits. Anallin was the company’s best shot and took up the highest location, with both cover and a clean shot of all directions the Arkana could come from. This happened to be a tree growing at the edge of the building. There was a swath of “nature” leading straight up to the edge of the buildings, undoubtedly by design rather than natural occurrence. Either way, it worked in their favor.

  Now, no one spoke.

  Andy quietly checked in with Valentine again, and then with each of her squads. Everyone reported they were at full readiness, and now...they waited.

  It was the moments of waiting, when there were no more tasks to be completed, that were the worst. These were the times when there was nothing to do but think. Her body had to remain still, so her mind made up for the difference.

  Every moment of combat was difficult. It forged a deeper conflict within her each time she came face to face, toe to toe, with Arkana soldiers. It wasn’t that she was conflicted by a desire to go with them. That ship had sailed far off into the stars and was not coming back. Why would she want to be part of a group like this just because she happened to be related to them; that wasn’t her fault.

  However, she knew that she was related to them. She knew that the genetically manipulated blood that flowed through their veins also flowed through hers. It was a conflict to know that she was related to people like this; who would wage a war based, basically, on xenophobia. She had been raised on ESS values, and grew up around these allied species. She considered Roxanna and Anallin as much her family as Dan and Jade.

  There was also the question of her father.

  She knew what he was, but not who. Even at war, she couldn’t help but wonder who he was among the people. Had she already met him and not known it? Had she possibly already fought, and maybe even killed, him? How would she know? It wasn’t like he would be wearing a nametag or something.

  And then, even further back in her mind, was the question she couldn’t escape.

  Why me?

  Until this past year, there hadn’t been anything special about Andy. She was a bright woman who did well in school and training, moving on to be a competent Marine and a solid leader, but it was nothing that put a spotlight on her. She was perfectly happy with that too, because the spotlight was not anything she sought.

  To the ESS, she was the half-Arkana woman helping them fight a war.

  To the Arkana, she was a half-breed traitor.

  If that wasn’t enough to put a brain into conflict, what was?

  Andy blew out a breath and tried to get her mind back under control. Those thoughts may have been inescapable, but they were also useless. Nothing about any of her thoughts would help her to fight the battle that was before her. The conflict inside her head would do nothing for the conflict she was about to throw her body into.

  She closed her eyes for the briefest of moments and pushed the thoughts aside. They would come back again, but not now.

  Now, she had to focus.

  It was just a few minutes later that the Star Chaser called her.

  “The Arkana ships are in range. We have intruder alerts. The tactical team is handling it. Shuttles are on their way to the planet. Be ready.”

  12

  If the waiting had been bad before, it grew increasingly intolerable once they knew that not only were the big Arkana ships coming but t
he shuttles were heading directly for them. Of course, which point of entry they would choose was still an open question, and if it would be one or multiple locations.

  The Star Chaser didn’t have time to give them too many details, since they had their own problems to deal with.

  Seconds ticked down to the rhythm of heartbeats. Even with the faint sounds of a city behind them, like the automated systems that were not disengaged or the few people that remained and could be just barely heard in the distance, Andy could hear the steady breathing of her squad. And, of course, the eye clicking. That was a cadence which bordered on the comforting for her now.

  They were all well-trained. She made sure of that. They had also been through more than their share of tough spots during their time together. Everyone’s adrenaline would be rushing—Roxanna’s skin swirling and Anallin’s eyes clicking—but they were calm, and ready. They were not shaken.

  Every pair of eyes roamed from one side of their field of vision to the other, but saw nothing. All ears were straining at every sound, but they heard nothing. Andy knew that her earpiece could ignite with sound at any moment, but still nothing...

  They waited.

  Just when she began to doubt that the shuttles were heading for the surface, her earpiece chirped and she heard the voice of Captain Valentine.

  “We have a visual,” he said, pitching his voice low. She could hear the tension. “They are on approach to our location. They do not look like they are here for tea and a chat.”

  Andy would’ve laughed, but the situation really wasn’t that funny.

  “Confirmed,” she replied. “Stick to the plan. Engage as necessary. Squads will remain in position unless ordered otherwise, but call if you need help.”

  “Yes, Major.”

  The channel chirped again as it closed.

  They still had no signs of Arkana landing in their area, which made the impulse to move from it and join Valentine a very strong one. But she knew better than that. Unless it was for reasons of emergency, they could not leave their own post unmanned. It was just as likely that the Arkana would be showing up in front of them at any moment, and they had to be there to greet them when they did.

  It didn’t take too much longer.

  They heard them before they saw them. There was a low rumbling sound, like something rolling over dirt and grass and rocks. Roxanna was the first to pick up on it, and that was before the sound could be heard. She sensed them, using her empathic Selerid senses. She could tell when there were new minds in her area, generally well before they could be either heard or seen.

  “They’re coming,” she said quietly.

  Everyone straightened up just a little more, and held their weapons ready.

  Then, they heard the sound. The rumbling started quietly at first and grew louder as the...whatever it was moved towards them. In just a few minutes more, they saw it. It looked like some sort of vehicle on rolling treads. It was boxy and looked metallic, but with an odd pale sheen to it from a metal that no one in the ESS had ever seen before. It reminded Andy of the tanks from old Earth that she had read about, although it didn’t quite look the same. There was more than just a...feeling of similarity.

  There were Arkana troops, armored and well-armed, walking to all sides of it. Just like their enemy counterparts, they had their guns up and were ready to engage.

  Definitely not there for tea.

  Alpha Squad held firm to their positions, but any orders of waiting until fired upon were unnecessary. The “tank,” for lack of a better term, opened fire almost as soon as they saw it. The shot was an energy pulse, broad but imprecise. It flew over the heads of the Marines on the ground and hit the building behind one side of them. Andy and Jade moved fast out of the way of falling debris, but they didn’t take their eyes off the enemy for more than a moment.

  “Thomas,” Andy ordered.

  Dan swapped his projectile rifle back on its sling and brought forward the second gun he carried. This one was a large Arkana rifle that had been taken from a casualty on their ship. Only humans could fire the Arkana weapons. This one was of a size for Dan to carry, at least as a second weapon.

  The tank fired again, this time forcing Dan to move, but still without hitting a Marine directly. He shifted his position, but quickly took aim again with the Arkana rifle.

  He sighted down its length at the glossy white vehicle and pulled the trigger. The bright light of its energy fire flew from it and hit the ground just to the left of the tank, at the feet of some of the soldiers. They returned fire, but the other Marines provided cover. Anallin took the key sniper shots from its position in the tree, but it seemed that every Arkana who went down was replaced by one from behind the vehicle.

  Dan’s second shot was delayed as he was forced to again change position, between the ground troops’ fire and the tank’s third shot.

  He hit one of the rolling treads, breaking the seams between them. It stopped working abruptly as the treads lost cohesion, and for a moment, it almost began to turn—like it would move in a circle. Whoever was driving it brought it to a halt fast, letting it sit in place but still facing the same direction as it had been.

  Its gun still faced the Marines and city.

  Dan didn’t waste any time before firing another shot, which hit the tank’s side. It didn’t damage the material of its body, but part of the shot hit the other side’s treaded wheel and that lost its cohesion as well. The tank was now effectively dead in place.

  Its guns, however, remained entirely live.

  It punched another hole in the building while the ground troops fired at them. Dan shot at the tank, but the rest of the body was not as vulnerable as the wheels had been. His further shots couldn’t do anything to pierce its armor.

  “We need to get that gun out of commission,” Andy said between shots. “We need to get inside that thing.”

  13

  It was like trying to split one’s brain in half, while making sure that both parts still functioned properly. Andy continued to engage the enemy, since they certainly weren’t going to stop and let her think, but she had to look over the scene before her and try to make a plan for getting to that tank and disabling it.

  Weapons were not penetrating the armor of the tank itself. All they had done was ground it...which was good, just not good enough.

  If this tank was anything like ancient Earth ones, there would be some sort of hatch on the top. Looking at the design of the thing, it seemed likely that that was where the opening was. On the ground, she could see soldiers to either side. There were a couple to the front and reinforcements coming from behind it. She couldn’t see the numbers of those behind, but she knew that there had already been several who had needed to come forward and replace those taken out by Alpha Squad’s shots.

  Her squad was only five, and she wasn’t going to bring any of the other squads in for this. She didn’t want the whole group to attack the tank, and part of it couldn’t take on either side on their own. Not with things as they were.

  “Anallin, Thomas,” Andy called over the sound of gunfire and energy discharges. She had to wait as the tank fired another shot that sent debris at their backs, but it was small enough to not damage them. “Focus fire on that thing’s left side. See if we can draw them to that side to return fire. Keep it coming hot. I want them to think more than just you guys are shooting at them. Thomas, continue with the Arkana rifle.”

  Two voices acknowledged her order. She would have crossed her fingers had they not been busy holding onto the rifle. After a moment, she told Roxanna and Jade to cease fire, so it really looked like they were focusing on the one side.

  She ground her back teeth together, refusing to give in to anxiety. This wasn’t the best plan ever, but she knew that it was the best one she could manage under the circumstances, in the grand total of thirty seconds she had to make it. Her dark eyes roved back and forth to either side of the tank and for too long, she didn’t see any of the Arkana moving to cover the
side being blasted to hell.

  Andy was just about to change her orders and scramble for a new plan when she saw soldiers from the right side of the tank back away, going around behind the large gleaming vehicle to emerge on the left side and add their fire to the rest. Thomas and Anallin kept it up, but she could see from the corner of her eye that Thomas was being forced to move to avoid enemy fire.

  As he moved, his weapons fire became more erratic. She worried that the enemy would think they had moved again, but he picked it right back up to full speed as soon as he was in position again. He moved fast, efficiently, and she allowed herself that briefest moment of pride to, once again, see her squad performing at their finest.

  Now was not the time for such things, however, and she had to move on.

  She turned her full attention to the right side of the tank.

  The Arkana weren’t stupid, so they hadn’t abandoned that side completely, but the number of soldiers guarding the downed vessel were fewer than before. What Andy had previously estimated as over fifteen to twenty, she now saw was closer to six. At least from what she could see.

  Andy gestured for Roxanna and Jade to follow her, and the three began to slowly slide toward the right. They kept their eyes sharp and their guns up, using some of the decorative greenery that wasn’t shot down to obscure the view of them as they moved.

  The six—now she was sure—Arkana soldiers weren’t watching the direction they were coming from, too busy trying to determine if they were missing all the action on the other side.

  The three Marines moved as quickly and silently as they could. Andy waited until they were about halfway between where they had been and the tank before gesturing that she and Roxanna were to open fire. She knew that this had to be fast and precise, or those soldiers would get the warning out to their compatriots. Of course, the wealth of noise and light coming from the exchange would cover many things.