Marines (Crimson Worlds)

by Jay Allan

  Chapter Eight

  AS Bearclaw

  Task Force Delta-Omega

  Gliese 250 system

  "Quiet, Hector...I'm trying to think."

  I'm not sure what possessed me to give my suit's AI a name, but that's what everyone else suggested, so I just did it. I have to admit it was a bit more intuitive than calling it PNOV3168, which was the designation it had when I got it. As to why I chose the name of a doomed Trojan hero killed by Achilles, when I myself had survived our own Achilles, your guess is as good as mine.

  "I am simply trying to provide you with the information flow required to make informed decisions" The reply was predictable. Hector had a very calm and slightly hushed tone of voice, sort of what you'd expect from a therapist. It was hard to get used to; the trooper AIs had a very robotic sounding voice, and they didn't have all that much to say anyway.

  The new officer AIs were the state of the art in quasi-sentient computers, and the designers had decided that giving them a soothing, human-sounding voice and an active personality would reduce stress on officers in the field. I can't speak to the psychology of the officer corps in general, but the damned thing creeped me out. And it talked too much.

  "Hector, shut up! If I need something I'll ask for it!" Can you feel a machine sulking or was it just my imagination?

  Graduation had been amazing, not just because I was first in my class and was decorated twice, but also because of one extra surprise. Doctor Sarah somehow managed to be there. I don't know how she did it. We'd stayed in touch while I was at the Academy, but war in space is not conducive to scheduling personal get-togethers.

  Even better, she had three extra days, and I had two weeks of leave, so we got to spend some time together, some time where she wasn't my doctor and I wasn’t her patient. It was amazing, but three days went all too quickly, and the parting was hard. The war was still not going all that well, and I was heading back into the meat grinder. It was a real possibility we'd never see each other again, and we were both all too aware of that fact. But duty called for both of us, and we had to answer.

  Now I was back in the fray, and I had my hands full. Commanding a company was overwhelming. I'd led a couple dozen troops before in some very desperate circumstances. But the force under my command now was almost incomprehensible. I had 140 troops, including a heavy weapons detachment and a cache of nuclear warheads. I had more firepower at my beck and call than an army commander in the Unification Wars. I had four other officers under me, each of them as fresh out of the Academy as I was.

  Over 100 of the men and women of my company were on either their first or second mission. I managed to fill most of the squad leader slots with experienced sergeants, but there was no question about it; we were a green company. They were well trained, all of them. But training and experience are two different things. When things started to deviate from the plan it was the veterans who held a unit together. During Achilles, and later on Columbia, I'd seen it happen. This time I wasn't at all sure we had enough seasoned troopers to pull us through if things got really sticky.

  The mission had me worried. I would have preferred a straight out planetary assault, but that's not what we'd drawn. We were in the Gliese 250 system, and we'd snuck in through a newly discovered warp gate on the far side of the primary star. Gliese 250 was a binary system with a couple of gas giants and nothing much of value except its location and its collection of gravitational anomalies, otherwise known as warp gates. The system was a major choke point for the Caliphate, with six (now seven) warp gates, four leading to Caliphate systems and two out to barely explored areas on the Rim. The seventh, the one we'd found, connected the Gliese system with 12 Ophiuchi, which was our main outer base.

  With no decent real estate in the system for a colony, the Caliphate had constructed a massive space station to serve as a refueling depot and transit facility. I can't even imagine what it cost them to build something this size with no in-system population or even a rocky planet for ores, but Gliese was a hugely important nexus for them, and they needed something that could handle the traffic coming through.

  The system was buried well within their territory, or so they thought, and the station was only lightly armed. Our deep survey of the 12 Ophiuchi system redrew the strategic map in an instant, and it gave us a highway right into the heart of a major Caliphate sector. Once they became aware of the new warp gate, Gliese 250 was also potential launch point for a Caliphate invasion of 12 Ophiuchi and our systems beyond. In our hands it was a dagger thrust right into a previously secure sector.

  The war had slowed to a stalemate as both sides licked their wounds and struggled to replace lost ships and soldiers. But now we had a chance to launch a major surprise attack and throw them back on the defensive. Step one - take that station.

  We wanted it intact, so the idea of just sending in a battlegroup to blast it to rubble wasn't an option. Instead, the plan was to knock out its defensive array with a pinpoint bombardment and then board the thing. My company was supporting two teams of SEALs, who were going to do a deep space entry and secure a docking portal. After that, my men and women would swarm onto the station and take it deck by deck.

  Intelligence had provided us with a fairly detailed analysis on the specifications and capabilities of the station. It was a white metal cylinder about ten kilometers long and two wide, and it slowly rotated along its central axis, producing artificial gravity for the outward sections. It's otherwise smooth surface was dotted with long, slender protrusions - umbilicals for docking spaceships. The station could handle at least twenty large vessels docked at one time, but when we hit it there were only three freighters and no warships.

  It orbited the outer gas giant, a massive world twice the size of Jupiter, and we were able to mask our approach by coming in from the far side of the planet. Our entry point was clear across the system from any of the known warp gates, so there was no sensor grid to detect our arrival. Shielded by the magnetic field of the enormous planet, our squadron whipped around in orbit and got off the first shot, knocking out the station's sensors and main batteries.

  We had four ships - two heavy cruisers and two fast assault ships. After they blinded the station and knocked out its weapons, the cruisers, Washington and Chicago, took up a defensive position in case any inbound enemy ships turned up. Then it was up to us.

  The Bearclaw launched two assault shuttles carrying the SEAL teams while half my people buttoned up into the other two. The rest of the company was on the Wolverine, suited up and loaded onto two of her four shuttles. There was another company of reserve troops on the Wolverine, scheduled to board after my people and garrison the station after we'd captured it.

  I was bolted in place in my assault shuttle, but my suit was powered up, and my AI was locked into the ship's battle computers, so I was able to follow the SEALs as they began the assault. Their shuttles stopped and hovered just a few hundred meters from the target, and the bays opened and released the SEALs into space. These guys were trained for insertions from space, and they were some of the craziest sons of bitches I'd ever met.

  The SEAL armor was bigger and bulkier than ours, with propulsion systems to allow them to maneuver in space. I had Hector project an image of the teams approaching the station, and I watched as the first of them manipulated their thrusters to make contact with the station without slamming into it. I was impressed by the fine control these guys had, as SEAL after SEAL impacted gently and went right to work.

  The first team's mission was to blow a precision hole in the station's hull to get inside and defend that position while the second team fitted a portable docking collar that would allow our shuttles to connect and offload my people, so we could take the place deck by deck.

  The SEALs worked quickly and confidently, and within five minutes they'd set their charges and pulled back to what the computers insisted (but I doubted) was a safe location on the hull. Thirty seconds later the Bearclaw's computer triggered the series of charges,
ripping a neat, nearly circular four meter hole in the station's hull. A few seconds later the SEALs were climbing over the lip and disappearing inside.

  The second team was approaching the station, almost in position. Six of them had hold of the docking collar, and they skillfully guided it into position around the gash in the hull. Setting the collar took a little more time than placing the charges, and it was about fifteen minutes before our shuttles got the go-ahead to begin the approach.

  The SEALs inside didn't run into any resistance at first. The area beyond the insertion hole was now vacuum, so any security personnel on the station would have to suit up before they could try to respond. By the time they got organized and attacked the foothold, our first shuttle was inbound, and the SEALs only had to hold out for ten minutes or so.

  Although outnumbered, the team was well-trained and equipped, and they were able to beat back two assaults with relative ease and minor losses. Before the third attack came my people were swarming aboard and launching our own assault that wiped out the entire security force threatening the landing area.

  My first shuttle had landed in vacuum conditions, but after we'd secured the area we took the time to pressurize the now-sealed off section. The second group came aboard in a much more orderly manner, and I organized my sections to move out and begin to secure the station.

  The area we were in was a storage facility, large and connected to what we believed to be several main arteries through the station. We'd entered through the "top" of the station, and we were close to the axis, where there was low gravity. Our intel was far from complete, and battleops had given me discretion on how to proceed. I sent one section through what I believed to be a maintenance conduit with instructions to find and take control of the main power plant. They had our best guess as to where it was, and I sent my most experienced junior officer, Lieutenant Frost, to command. Frost had been in Achilles too, and afterward he fought at Sandoval, which wasn't the bloodbath Columbia had been but was no walk in the park either.

  The SEALs were too heavily armored to move quickly through the station, so I ordered them to stay and defend the landing area and act as a mobile reserve. They didn't like staying behind, or they didn't like taking orders from me. Or maybe both. But they were pros, and they were under my command, so they followed orders.

  I took the rest of the company up through was appeared to be the main transport tube to the surface areas. The entrance to the tube was 60 meters above our position, but in this gravity all we had to do was jump and be careful not to smash too hard into the ceiling. It took about ten minutes to get everyone through the hatch. We had a couple of people jump too enthusiastically and inflict some light damage to their suits, but no major problems.

  There was a single large tube, which lift cars normally traversed, flanked by two smaller passageways with metal ladders. I figured they'd have shut down the lifts, so we split into two groups and started to climb up the ladder. Every fifty meters or so we'd get to a landing with hatches leading to other storage and work areas. We ran into a few maintenance bots and a couple station workers, but no organized resistance.

  As we got higher, the climbing got a bit tougher, though of course it was not really very difficult in armor. The gravity increased the closer we got to the surface, and now you could really fall if you lost your grip, and maybe take out a bunch of your comrades as you did. I reminded everyone three times - or maybe four - to be careful. The decks got much closer together as well, and now there were landings every ten meters. When we got to the level we thought housed the main data center we got into our first real firefight.

  The landing here was fairly large, with four doorways leading out. There were security personnel at each of these, firing at us as we emerged from the transport tubes. The security officers had light energy weapons, very effective at short range against lightly armored targets, but it took a direct hit at very close range to do any significant damage to an armored marine. We were close. In fact this was knife-fighting range for us, and since we were at a big positional disadvantage, instead of conducting a lengthy exchange of fire I ordered a charge against all four entryways.

  "Charge and take the enemy positions as you emerge. Tube one, alternate. Odds take the north portal, evens the east. Tube two, odds to the south, evens to the west. Now!" North, south, east, and west were pure constructs, of course, familiar reference points assigned to directions by our battle computers.

  I was about halfway down the transport tube in the middle of our formation where my training told me I was supposed to be. My gut told me otherwise, and I couldn't wait to get off this ladder and into the fight. Hector projected a schematic of the battle inside my visor. I could see my people, a series of blue dots, moving quickly from the platform into the corridors beyond the hatches. I could see red dots - the enemy - falling back slowly.

  The fight was over quickly. This was the first time in all my assaults I'd seen true hand-to-hand fighting. We didn't often get this close to the enemy, but these confined spaces were very different from the usual battlefield. The station security troops wore body armor, but it was no match for our powered suits. My troops were also armed with close quarter blasters - our mag-rifles would have torn the station structure apart, and we wanted to capture the place, not turn it into rubble. The pulse laser blasters were powerful weapons, but their intensity dropped off quickly in atmosphere, making them at best good for short-range work.

  Our weapons were far more effective against their unpowered armor than theirs were against our powered suits, so we were able to charge into their fire, taking only a few casualties. Once in hand-to-hand range we finished the job with our molecular blades. The blades were a sort of bayonet that retracted into the arm of the fighting suit when not in use. About 30 centimeters long when deployed, the blade was honed down to an edge just one molecule thick, which could cut through virtually anything, especially with the enhanced strength of our suits behind it. In a few cases the troops didn't even bother with the blades. A nuclear powered fist was enough to take out a lightly armored defender, and there were a few crushed skulls among the casualties.

  By the time I got up to the platform it was all over. We had three casualties, two minor wounds with some suit damage, and one KIA, hit by a lucky shot that burned through the armpit of his suit. Our armor was tough everywhere, but it was weakest at the joints, where mobility required some concessions from protection.

  I walked over to the northern corridor to check things out, and I found a blood-soaked slaughterhouse. There were a few charred bodies, the victims of our blaster fire as we came in, but most of the work here was done with the blades, and that worked was effectively done. There were severed limbs, bodies sliced in half, or nearly so, and bloody, unidentifiable bits of flesh everywhere. The walls were literally dripping with blood, small rivers of droplets slowly sliding down the smooth plasti-steel. Further down the hallway there were at least half a dozen bodies, victims of blaster fire as they tried to run. The other corridors were similar, and the south was worst of all, with the body parts piled so high we had to drag them out onto the platform so we could get past and head down the corridor.

  It was the south corridor I expected to lead to the data center, and the heavier enemy presence there seemed to confirm my suspicions. Taking the data center was a primary objective on its own, but I had my own tactical plan as well that required its capture.

  I left a squad at the platform to protect our rear and took the rest of the command down the south passage. We moved slowly, carefully. This was like urban street fighting, but even tighter. We passed numerous doors, each leading to another room or corridor. Every room had to be checked - I wasn't about to leave an enemy platoon unmolested in our rear.

  We had a canister of small charges that were just powerful enough to blow open the hatches without causing a lot of other damage. The majority of the rooms were empty, but we did run into a few occupants, mostly techs of some sort at work. War is a harsh busine
ss, and we didn't have time to deal with prisoners, so we did what we had to do and moved on.

  Suddenly an arc of electric-blue light ripped into our front rank, practically blowing one of my troopers to pieces. I ordered return fire, but the corridor was just wide enough for three people abreast, so it was hard to bring too much firepower to bear. About ten seconds later another blue bolt hit Corporal Wells, boring a neat10cm hole through his chest.

  "Open up the rooms, and take cover," I barked.

  There were six rooms along the stretch of corridor we occupied, and we dispersed into them. I stayed in the corridor and directed everyone near me to the closest room. The blue beam continued to fire about every ten seconds, and it took out another one of my troopers and then just missed my head before I dove into one of the rooms.

  I assigned two troopers to each doorway to return fire from cover. The enemy began to return fire as well, but it was all pretty ineffective. I think we took out two of them, and one of my guys was grazed in the arm.

  This wasn't going to cut it. We were pinned down. My whole plan was based on speed and now we were sitting here stuck in the mud. I was pretty sure that was a portable particle accelerator out there, probably drawing directly from the station's power core, and Hector confirmed my analysis. The thing could fire every ten seconds or so. We could rush down the corridor, but we'd take a lot of casualties. The weapon was powerful enough to take out two or three targets each shot at close range.

  "Hector, connect me with Lieutenant Frost."

  "Frost here, sir."

  "Lieutenant, give me a report. Have you reached the power core yet?"

  "No sir. I'm pretty sure we've located it, but we have heavy resistance. I can expedite, but it will cost."

  "Negative. Continue your plan for now, but if you aren't in there in fifteen minutes then take it at all costs."