Retribution (Shaitan Wars)

by Sudipto Majumdar

  Lt. Odoyo was not finished with his instructions. He connected with Sgt. Omondi. “Kairu, how many of the six wounded can walk?”

  “Sir, two are completely immobile, while two can definitely walk since they have wounds in their arms and shoulders. The other two I am not sure. They have upper body wounds.” Sgt. Omondi replied.

  “Instruct the ones who can walk to start walking towards the exit and make sure that all of them are wearing their suits. I don’t care how badly they may be injured, they have to have their suits on. The Mules are running towards them as fast as they can. They don’t have any load and are going downslope, so they should be able to make it in good time. Let’s hope that it is not too late by the time the Mules reach the ones who cannot walk.” Lt. Odoyo said grimly, and then added almost as an afterthought. “And Omondi… make sure that if the Mules reach there unmolested, then they pick up as much supplies as possible, especially the food that we had dumped there.”

  Lt. Odoyo had started jogging towards the exit of GC-1 even as he was speaking. He didn’t want to rest too long. Other than the difficulty to restart his running rhythm, he needed to be out there directing whatever needed to be done. He was already feeling bad that he had been unable to lead from the front. He put on some pace to his running as he covered the last few kilometers of his Marathon.

  “Sgt. Awiti reporting, sir! We are under sniper fire. There are guards or engineers or both right on top of the dam, in some kind of a guard tower or control room. I have inspected the sluice gates and they can be taken out, but it will be hard to do it under fire. That control tower needs to be taken out, sir.” Jata reported back to her CO.

  “PFC Onyango reporting sir. I am with the sergeant. She has been hit, although not critically. The armor took most of the hit, but her left arm is going to be numb for some time. I have assigned Pvt. Michieka to keep a lookout on her, knowing how critical her task is. We recced the entire place sir, the only high ground is that control tower high on the dam. There is no other place that would be safe from flooding. Like it or not, we have to take that high ground, sir.” Tuwile reported back.

  “Understood Private. I am just emerging from GC-1 so I can see the layout, but I have to wait for the Mules to catch up with my armor and weapons before I dare come any closer. In the meanwhile send out spiders to explore all the routes up to the top of the dam. I want that control tower mapped properly before we decide how we proceed.” Lt. Odoyo said to Tuwile and then added Jata to the line. “Sergeant, how is that arm?”

  “I will live, sir. The arm hurts like a bitch, but it is still functional, sir.” Sgt. Awiti responded.

  “Good, for we need you here at the mouth of GC-1. I need you to rig up this sluice gate, such that it jams but stays open. I don’t want this gate shut. Repeat I don’t want this gate shut, but I want it jammed open sergeant.” Lt. Odoyo said.

  “Can do sir. It is fairly trivial. I will simply sabotage and jam the mechanism. May I ask though, what is the objective in jamming the GC-1 sluice gate, sir?” Sgt. Awiti asked.

  “Did you not wonder Jata, why the Shaitans did not shut the sluice gate of GC-1? If they had done that, they could have easily trapped us inside the canal and then finished us at leisure.” Lt. Odoyo asked.

  “No sir. I must admit, it didn’t strike me.” Sgt. Awiti confessed.

  “That is because the Shaitans didn’t want us to be attacking the GC-1 sluice gates in our desperate efforts to escape. The sluice gates of the canal are too critical for the Shaitans to risk in a battle. They would rather let us escape the canal, and let the Shaitan warriors handle us. The sluice gates of the canal and those of the dams are the multiple level of protection to prevent the canals and hence New Babylon from flooding.

  Even if we were to blow the dam right now, New Babylon would be protected. We have shut the opening to GC-2 ourselves, and GC-1 is blocked at the point where we entered due to the cave-in. If I had been the Shaitan commander, I would have let the cave-in be. It provides a buffer of protection from flooding.

  For reasons known best to the Shaitan commander, he has chosen to be aggressive. He is opening up the cave-in to attack us. I intend to make sure that he pays the price for that mistake. When the bloody dam blows, GC-1 sluice gate should be disabled so that there is nothing that can stop New Babylon from getting flooded.” Lt. Odoyo said with a new found determination.

  Lt. Odoyo realized that Sgt. Jata Awiti had switched over to a private channel. “Sir, you do realize what that means for the 6th Company?” She asked in a somber tone.

  “Yes I do Jata. Do you hold out too much hope of ever seeing home or the surface again, as it is?” Lt. Odoyo asked sadly.

  “No sir.” Jata replied in a glum tone.

  “Look at the bright side of it sergeant… may be they will name a Mushroom or an Asparagus after each one of us. If we humans can settle here permanently, they might even name a few high schools after us.” Lt. Odoyo said, and despite himself could not help laughing and empty laugh.

  As Sgt. Awiti returned back to the GC-1 sluice gate, the Mule carrying the armors and weapons had arrived. Lt. Odoyo pulled rank and got his armor first and hurried to the point where Tuwile and the other Marines were taking cover from the intermittent sniper fire.

  “The spiders are almost there, sir. There is an easy winding ramp running along the wall on both sides of the dam. The problem is that the ramp is a kill zone. Anyone trying to run up that ramp would be dead meat for the snipers on those control towers… and these are not your run of the mill lousy Shaitan shooters. I suspect that these are mounted guns with electronic targeting similar to what they have on their plasma guns. Watch what I mean sir…”

  Tuwile said as he held out an empty plastic bullet cartridge box, stuck to his gun over his head. The box was immediately shot with a violent force and flew many meters behind their cover position. “That was too quick even for Shaitan reflexes. It has to be an automated target seeking program. It shoots at anything that moves. Even the Shaitans are not that stupid to shoot at empty boxes.”

  “Any RPGs launched from the enemy position? I am assuming that the Shaitans would not be crazy to have any missiles in this enclosed space.” Lt. Odoyo asked.

  “None so far, sir. Doesn’t mean they don’t have any.” Tuwile replied.

  “Well let’s give them a reason to fire one. I need to know for sure that they don’t have any RPGs for my strategy to work. I need two volunteers to stay here with me, one with an RPG. The rest please clear this area.” Lt. Odoyo ordered.

  For the next few minutes they fired their guns towards the control tower continuously along with a few RPGs targeting the same place. It was not expected to hit anything, and it didn’t but the firing was meant to show the Shaitans where the entrenched position of the Marines was. If they had any frag explosives like RPGs, then this would be the best time to fire one at the Marines’ position.

  There was no return rocket or missile fire, which assured Lt. Odoyo. He called a meeting of his Non-com officers and told them what strategy he intended to take. “This is a very lightly guarded post. I don’t think that the Shaitans ever expected to have to defend this place. The only heavy gun is this one.” He pointed towards the picture of the mounted gun on the armored turret of the dam.

  “The spiders have counted a grand total of only 11 Shaitans out of which only 4 are the Type-B warriors. The rest are most probably engineers or other maintenance personnel. Beware though, all of them will fight to the death. I suspect there to be a few more Shaitans which the spider has not seen yet. The Shaitans don’t do anything in odd numbers.” Lt. Odoyo said and assigned each of the Marines their individual tasks.

  One more Mule had reached the end of its run. This one was fully loaded, and the Marines had to hustle to empty the Mule. This Mule was not going back to help evacuate the injured Marines, it had a special duty. The Mule was essentially a 3x1.5x1.5 meter lightly armored box on legs. It had compartments inside, but all of them could be rem
oved to fit two armored Marines inside completely, or four of them sideways if they didn’t mind sticking out a bit.

  The Mule was reprogrammed to walk with its legs slightly squat. This ensured that three more Marines could walk behind the shadow of the Mule without their legs being targetable. The procession of the Mule and its riders along with the Marines walking in its shadow came out in the open, heading towards the ramp on one of the walls. A continuous barrage of bullets started hitting the Mule.

  Despite being lightly armored, the Mule was fully dented on one side in a matter of minutes and a few holes opened up, allowing a few of the bullets to enter the container. The bullets did not pierce the Marines’ armor but did wallop them at a great force. The Marines below tried to send suppressing fire towards the mounted gun hidden behind a concrete tower with just a slit for firing.

  An automated turret gun did not get intimidated with suppressing fire. It just kept firing. The only benefit of the suppressing fire was that some of the fire of the automated gun was taken away from the Mule that was climbing up the slope painfully slowly, having to carry the weight of 4 fully armored Marines. The real relief to the Mule came when a second and then a third Mule arrived and were immediately unloaded and more Marines were sent up the ramp.

  The machine algorithm of the gun, now divided the fire between the three Mules equally making it completely ineffective on all of the Mules. When the lead Mule was almost on top of the ramp, the four Shaitan warriors came out of their cover and made a frontal attack on Marines. The rushed in at a great speed with their guns blazing.

  By this time the Mule had gone out of the firing arc of the main gun, and all the four Marines had dismounted. One of the Marines was shot and wounded and he went down, but the rest six Marines were able to outright kill two of the Shaitans with their guns and grappled with two more of the Shaitans who had taken bullet injury.

  Eight of the Type-A smaller Shaitans joined in the melee trying to stab and crush the Marines. The Mules behind had not yet reached out of the firing arc of the main gun, but they tried to fire at the smaller Shaitans whenever they got a clear shot. By the time the third Mule had been able to reach the top, the melee battle had come to an end. All the twelve Shaitans were dead. The Marines had lost two of their own and out of the five wounded, two were critical.

  The gun was silenced and the Marines had finally taken the Lake Emmanuel dam. Sgt. Awiti immediately got on to performing the most demanding demolition job she had ever done in her life, with non-specialized explosives meant for combat demolition rather than busting a dam. Even as she was finishing her plant, Lt. Odoyo got a call from one of the wounded Marines.

  “Sir the Shaitans are breaking through now. I can see the hot tip of their drill through IR. It is a matter of minutes till they come through. There is no way the Mules can reach us in time. I would recommend that you go ahead with what you intend to do, sir. We will make sure we take a few of the bastards with us. It has been an honor serving with my comrades of the 6th under your command, sir.” The sentence was punctuated by the loud chatter of gunfire.

  “The honor has been mine Mowele… the honor has entirely been mine.” Lt. Odoyo sat down in the corner of the control tower. He was thankful that no one could see his tears through the helmet. One by one they saw the IFF signals of the 6 injured Marines wink out. Lt. Odoyo took a minute to compose himself and ensure that his voice was no longer cracking. The he ordered. “Order the Mules and the Predators to return back to the top of the dam at the best speed possible. Sgt. Awiti, expected time?”

  “Five more minutes, sir.” Sgt. Awiti replied.

  “All right, I want every piece of equipment carried along with the Mules up here to top of the dam. This place is going to be very wet soon. Double time Marines, I don’t care how tired you all are. I want everything and everybody up here in 20 minutes.” Lt. Odoyo was back into his determined self. He was going to make the bastard Shaitans who had slaughtered 6 injured Marines, suffer.

  Sgt. Awiti first detonated the small charge that she had placed on the sluice gate of GC-1 and then went near it to inspect and ensure that the gate had jammed for good. Then she made the run up to the top of the dam along the ramp. When she was three fourth the way up, she stopped and informed Lt. Odoyo that she was as ready as she would ever be.

  “You don’t want to get to cover sergeant?” Lt. Odoyo asked.

  “This place is good enough. I don’t expect the blast to come up till here. The water will take hours to fill up the valley, and would most probably not come up till here anyway. I need to see the blast to ensure it worked the way it is expected to.” Sgt. Awiti said.

  “All right then sergeant. Go ahead.” Lt. Odoyo gave her the permission. Sgt. Awiti pulled the trigger, and a loud explosion happened at the base of the central sluice gate. A large amount of concrete chunks were throws across the valley, but there was no breach in the dam.

  Lt. Odoyo looked down at the dam with his heart sinking. He realized that he had pinned too much hopes on Sgt. Awiti working a miracle. She was not a specialist demolition expert, and she did not have the tools and explosives to blow out a dam of this magnitude. It was not really her fault, she had tried her best. Still hoping against hope he asked Sgt. Awiti.

  “Jata, talk to me. What happened? Do we have any hope?” Lt. Odoyo said in a despondent tone.

  “Give it a minute sir!” Awiti replied in an impatient, nervous and irritable tone. “We didn’t have enough explosives to outright breach the concrete. I have fractured the weak seam of the dam near the sluice gate. We will have to let the enormous pressure of the water do rest of the damage.” Sgt. Jata Awiti may have had her theory right, but she was not feeling very confident at that moment. It was not the conviction of her engineering knowledge, but her hopes and prayers that she was hanging on to.

  A flanging sound of a crack emanated from somewhere near the base of the dam after nearly 30 seconds, which was followed by a deep and low rumbling sound. The rumble was immediately followed by another louder flanging sound as the sound travelled through the water to reach the Marines. It was the sound of the first breach, as a small chunk of concrete rocketed out of the dam with tremendous force and banged into the opposite wall, where the two canals were embedded.

  A tremendously fast spray of water extending more than a hundred meters gashed out of the face of the dam. From there on, the small crack in the dam spread out at a very fast rate and within a minute there were multiple breaches with multiple sprays of water. Soon a whole section of the dam collapsed under its own weight and the massive deluge began as millions of liters of water started pouring out of the dam every few seconds.

  The Shaitans had descended from aquatic ancestors, and had retained some of their aquatic habits. Their tolerance to water was analogous to that of amphibians on Earth. The Shaitans could stay submerged for a long time, but they eventually drowned just like most frogs. Most experiments on captured Shaitans indicated that they drowned after an hour.

  The combat armor worn by the Shaitans had a breathing apparatus, but on Jehannum, they did not carry a large supply of air. It would not be known how many Shaitans were drowned inside the canal that day, but it would have been in the hundreds if not the thousands. The large counterattack force of the Shaitans had effectively been foiled and the humans had attained their objective of flooding New Babylon, but at a terrible price.

  The surviving Marines of the 6th Company, 17th Regiment were now effectively marooned in a large but enclosed cave. Their only exit route blocked by a 100 kilometer canal flooded with water. After the high of the victory, came the terrible realization amongst the Marines as they stared at their slow and agonizing death from starvation.

  Despite the vehement denials by the Marines and USC top brass and their PR machinery, rumors persisted throughout history that when the first spy bot managed to swim the 100 Km through the flooded GC-1 and float to the surface of Lake Emmanuel, the surviving Marines had turned cannibal. By the time a
swimming bot could be rigged to send emergency food and supplies for the Marines, it had been 22 days of starvation for the Marines.

  A line was rigged and the Marines used the extra oxygen tanks sent to them on their suits to go underwater, where the line would pull them towards the exit hole. Only 54 out of the 100 Marines who had entered the canal, emerged back alive. One of the unglamorous facts about the Marathon was that more Marines died of starvation than in combat. Sgt. Jata Awiti was one of them.

  Chapter 25

  Stopping the unstoppable

  Solar System

  July, 2116

  How do you stop the unstoppable? That was the challenge the Shaitans had thrown to the humans with the use of the Kinetic Kill ship that caused the ‘Great Kinetic Holocaust’. Just like the previous Holocaust 150 years ago, humanity had said ‘Never again’. However it was easier said than done. The physics was against it being stopped. The Kinetic Kill ship was literally an unwavering and unstoppable bullet when aimed at a planet like Earth.

  Sure one could try to put a heavy enough object like a large ship in front of the KK ship, although it would be an incredible feat of targeting to be able to do so. Even if you managed to do so, it would make no difference to the speed of the incoming KK ship, because the momentum of the KK ship is so many orders of magnitude higher, that even a thousand such heavy ships on the path of the incoming KK ship would not change the momentum measurably.

  If anything, putting a heavy solid object in front of an incoming KK ship would make matters worse, for it is likely to break the incoming ship into tens of even hundreds of parts. This would make no difference to the outcome because the incoming KK ship was in any case designed to break into many pieces to spread the destruction. Now however it would be impossible to target and stop those smaller pieces individually.