“Get them sorted out,” Mark told the standing Trooper, pointing at the one with the nasty wound in their side.
“Sir,” the Trooper panted, helping the other to the ground and opening up their med kit.
“Ortiz has pushed back the Chosen. Bloodied them good, but our lines are fucked. He’s pulling us back to the second lines,” Hughes said.
Mark checked the map. The Chosen left in the trenches were too far away for Mark to get to them in time.
“Let’s give them a parting gift,” Mark said, jogging to a turret. Hughes moved to the closest one, and fired at the retreating Chosen.
Mark put his blade on the trench, clearing his throat in a growl as he drank from his water.
He found a group of Chosen running for cover and sent twin streams of death through them.
“Mark, what’re your orders?” Alexis asked, out of breath.
“Get the Troopers back up and firing; shoot the bastards in the back.”
“With fucking pleasure. I’ll pass the word. Nguyen and Yule are dead.”
“Shit,” Mark said, shooting at more Chosen.
There was nothing more to say and she closed the channel.
He moved his turret to shoot at more of the fleeing Chosen. The auto-cannon noise went off and the Chosen were turned into fine mist.
Mark traced the noise.
The plants that had been in the planters were now lying around them. Auto-cannons, turrets, and missile launchers were out and shooting at the surrounding towers.
Trucks were trying to pull back, to destroy the automated systems.
Missiles ripped through them and cannons holed their armor.
Chosen that hadn’t advanced were firing on the weapon systems even as the Troopers fired back at them from on high.
PACs, burning vehicles, casings, and weapons covered the square.
The trenches were torn up with what was left of vehicles stuck in them. Cermite had been cratered and left with black burn marks in the wake of the Chosen’s bombs.
Mark let the turret go as the Chosen hid behind their defenses and he couldn’t see anything else to kill.
“Sir, we need to get you some medical aid,” Hughes said.
“Yeah,” Mark said, drinking from his water tube again. It was like he was walking through his haze as he started to feel his injuries. He grabbed his sword, flicking it a few times to clean it.
He put it away as Hughes helped guide him backwards.
“Do you need aid, sir?” a medic asked as they came up from the second line.
“There are people worse than me. I can get myself to medical,” Mark said, feeling like he hadn’t slept in a month.
“Let me have a...” another medic started.
“Piss off, there’s others that need your help more,” Mark said, walking on with Hughes guiding him by the shoulder.
“Don’t like medics much?” Hughes asked.
“Fuckers always put a bazillion fucking needles in me,” Mark said, stumbling. Hughes caught him and kept him moving.
“Thanks,” Mark said, letting Hughes guide him out of the trenches and to the medical bay.
Mark didn’t really feel anything but pain.
Someone was making a lot of noise though.
“Will you please shut the fuck up?! Feels like I went on leave and Tyler got tequila shots,” Mark rambled. The words brought back memories he didn’t want to deal with.
The noise continued.
He was about to hit them when a hand held him down.
“Your armor is locked up, they have to cut you out, shouldn’t take long,” Hughes said.
“Fine,” Mark sighed, relaxing. He might have fought with Hughes only once, but he seemed like the competent sort. Not many made it past master corporal if they were an idiot.
Plus, they had fought together and saved one another’s lives.
That counts for something.
“Shit,” someone said as the helmet came off and the rest of the armor opened up.
“You mind, I’m trying to sleep here,” Mark complained. He didn’t get what the big idea was.
“How much of your combat aide did you use?”
Mark opened his eyes, finding a medic over him. She didn’t look happy. “All of it,” Mark grinned, and his face hurt.
When did I hurt my face?
“Well it explains how he’s conscious,” another medic, a guy said, shaking his head.
“We’re going to give you something so that we can get to work,” the woman medic said.
“My Troopers need me,” Mark turned serious, and started to rise.
“We’ll have you up and functional as soon as possible,” she said, holding her hand above his chest but not pressing. She made a face that made Mark think she didn’t want to press.
Ribs hurt, side hurts, shoulder fucked, hip wonky, knee, that’s weird. Mark frowned as he went through his injuries.
“Get me fixed as soon as possible,” Mark said, lying back down into his armor.
One of them came around with a shunt.
Mark caught Hughes’ eye.
“See what I told you, fucking needles,” Mark sighed. The medic was good, they got the vein in one try, then decided to put another into his ventricle.
I wonder if I bit her hand if she’d fuck off with that fucking bastard of a needle?
He thought about it but he felt something cold go into his arm. It warmed up and spread through his body.
“Fucking drugs,” Mark said.
Chapter 77
Freighter 12EF9X4
Earth, Sol System
8/3349
Legionary Asaul was reminded of a much younger man as he watched Mark Victor fight through the Chosen like a man possessed. It had been a lifetime since he had last seen the man.
Mark Victor didn’t look a day older, though he looked like he was finally stepping past the bounds that Asaul had seen in Legion veterans.
A thought made his NIAI show him Mark’s vitals, directly linked from the medical instruments.
The man was a mess. His body was broken and busted, though he would survive and once again be back out on the battlefield.
His latest exploits were already the talk of the rich and anyone else who had screens to watch the fighting happening on Earth.
His division had been cut down but they had held out long enough to draw the Chosen into a forward charge. Ortiz suckered them all in and turned on the citadel’s hidden defenses.
The weapon systems hiding underneath the planters had cut down or blown up anything Chosen.
Killing even five Chosen was an almost impossible feat in close combat. Mark had killed thirty with his actions, possibly more.
Asaul looked at the citadel’s cameras, showing Mark’s newly attached limbs and the various needles pumping his body full of things to heal him.
Asaul sighed and walked through the room that he was in. On the outside it looked like it was a freighter. Inside it was stuffed full of Troopers in trucks and Stealth Shuttles.
Troopers had been collected from all over Earth. They lay in healing trucks or were stored in cryo-pods. Once they were filled, then the freighter would move out of the system and disappear, they’d engage their jump drive, moving to the nearest Legionary station to offer the Troopers a new life in the Legions.
Nearly every Trooper that was on Earth had been selected for recruitment. As Asaul’s freighter departed, another would take its place and registration. When the Legion could hack through Earth’s security and firewalls with a thought, they could easily change records and tell sensors that they hadn’t moved.
Asaul wanted to see the end of the battle. The end of Earth and Her Colonies’ little war. Here it would be decided if the Chosen would rule, or if things would continue in their old ways.
Asaul turned on music with a thought, trying to take his old mind off it.
Chapter 78
Citadel
Earth, Sol System
8/33
49
Dominguez tried out her new arm. She had scars down her side from a Chosen blowing themselves up; she’d been knocked out and her arm had gone missing.
Five days later and she was a whole woman again, with new scars from her head down to her hip on the left side.
“Alright, it looks like you have full mobility. I’m clearing you for service,” Medic Durand said.
“How’s Mark?” Dominguez asked, knowing that Durand was working on him as well.
“We replaced his legs and arms. The bones were broken and screwed up. Faster to print them than let them heal naturally. His other breaks were glued and screwed together. We’ve refilled his augments, so he can keep repairing himself. We should be waking him up in a day. Ortiz has been telling us how much he needs him back on the lines.” Durand didn’t look too pleased.
“We lost the trenches and now they’re knocking on the front door. Mark might be a big meat-head but when he puts his mind to it he can really fuck someone’s day up. The Troopers saw the videos, they know what he did and, from what Hughes said, the man’s not done cutting Chosen up,” Dominguez said, her eyes unfocusing as her new hand curled into a fist.
“Make sure that you look after that arm and try to see that Mark doesn’t mess himself up too much more,” Durand said.
“I’ll put in a good word when we’re done,” Dominguez smiled, tapping Durand’s shoulder.
“Huh, what?” Durand asked, confused.
“Well you like him, right? He might charge in in fights, but he’s a complete idiot when it comes to women,” Dominguez said.
“Oh, uh, well,” Durand blushed.
“Don’t worry ‘bout it, we’ve still got a war to survive,” Dominguez said, waving at the citadel’s windows, encompassing the Chosen.
“You are a ray of optimism.”
“I’m a realist, it’s in the sergeant major handbook.” Dominguez grinned, heading out of the medical area, which was really a cafeteria with medical computers and carts everywhere and Troopers laid up on tables recovering or being worked on.
“Move!” someone yelled.
Dominguez, even being a division sergeant major, flattened herself as medics rushed in hauling wounded and dropping them on tables, hauling them out of their armor as medics in just their basic armor talked and worked on the new patient.
“Fucking bloodbath,” Dominguez shook her head.
***
“You’re still too good looking, must still be alive,” Mark said, through half-closed eyes.
“You’re even uglier. I made sure that they kept the scars,” Tyler said.
“Thanks,” Mark said, lying there for a few more minutes. “Well, that’s enough sleeping; how long’ve I been out and what the fuck happened?”
There was the rumbling of artillery fire, and Mark cocked his head.
“Chosen destroyed the automated defenses, paid for it though. They overran the first and second line of trenches. We don’t have the Troopers to hold them any more. We blew the tunnels, guns, ammo, everything outside of the citadel. Artillery is hammering Chosen, though the little bastards are inventive and they found some Screamers. Been hitting us right in the barricades,” Tyler explained.
“Sounds like a shitty pun,” Mark said, looking at all the machines he was hooked up to.
“And you look like a fucking pincushion,” Tyler managed a weak smile.
Mark gave him a dirty look and rubbed his arms.
“Good to see that you’re awake!” Medic Durand smiled.
“Am I free to go?” Mark asked.
“Yeah, we want to do some check-ups later, but it can wait.”
“Sweet.” Mark started pulling out needles, and Tyler helped him.
“You might want to put some clothes on,” Tyler said.
“Who’s the older brother here?” Mark asked.
“Who’s the pincushion?”
“Get my pants.”
Tyler laughed.
“Make sure that he doesn’t move his upper body too much, he’s got a lot of broken ribs and his collarbone is a mess. We sealed it back together but…” Durand shrugged.
“I am right here,” Mark complained.
“Which is why she’s telling me instead of you,” Tyler said, grabbing pants and throwing them at Mark.
He got up, pushing himself off the sheet. Durand found something else to be interested in, her cheeks coloring.
Tyler watched in interest as Mark took his pants and got his legs into them.
“Gonna have to work these noodles up again,” Mark sighed, looking at his much thinner arms and legs. He looked like he had trained only his back and chest, without working out any other part of his body, for his entire life.
“Yeah, you look unsymmetrical as shit,” Tyler agreed.
“Thanks, dick,” Mark said, pulling on a shirt and his boots.
“Look after yourself, I don’t want to see you in here again,” Durand said.
“Thanks,” Mark said, giving her a smile.
“I think she likes you,” Tyler teased as they walked out.
“So?” Mark asked, walking awkwardly and moving his hands and fingers.
“So, it’s possibly the end of the world, might want to go talk to her sooner rather than later,” Tyler suggested.
“We have Troopers to lead and battles to fight; I don’t have time to go mess around.”
“Look, you could’ve easily died out there. So, what if you live a little before you die?” Tyler asked, anger working its way into his voice.
“We all go out at some time,” Mark shrugged.
“Look, you almost died being a fucking idiot, I can’t handle that shit, man. I can’t handle you dying. Fuck I thought I lost you and Alexis,” Tyler said, stopping.
Mark stopped as well. “Alexis...?”
“She’s fine, back on the line, still.”
Mark rested his hand on Tyler’s shoulder.
“I made a promise to Caroline, to Ko, to Yule, Nguyen, Haas, Wen, Dooks, everyone that died because of these Harmony bastards. I’m going to end them no matter what. I will make sure that their sacrifice wasn’t in vain. We’re going to defeat these fuckers. Maybe, when this is all over, I’ll look at getting a girl. Till then,” Mark raised his hand. “I’m going to do everything I can to kill just one more of these Harmony fucks.”
They stood there for a while. Tyler knew the pain that Mark had been through, that he tried to hide in front of everyone else, to appear like the perfect Trooper. He didn’t even know that he was doing it. After Caroline, he didn’t share his feelings.
“Hey, boss, looks like you finally got the set,” Dominguez said, looking Mark over.
“Ha ha, yeah, all of the limbs. Feel like a fucking stick figure,” Mark growled.
“Ah, it’s all part of the fun. Gave me a new hand, swear they grew it from one of the generals, it’s ‘bout as useless as shit,” Dominguez said opening and closing her left hand.
“I swear that they could make a whole ‘nother person out of what you two have lost,” Tyler said.
“Probably, and it would have more brain cells,” Ortiz said.
“What is this? Ambush the man trying to leave the medical ward?” Mark asked.
“Just coming and checking up on you – was told that you were getting out today,” Ortiz said.
“Same, and I knew that you’d want to be up to date,” Dominguez said.
“Okay, well I need a shower, to get back up to speed, and food. Cafeteria in thirty?” Mark asked.
“Good with me,” Tyler said.
Ortiz and Dominguez nodded.
“Dominguez, I need to know how we’re looking, you’re with me,” Mark said.
“Urgh, briefing in a shower?” Dominguez protested.
“It’s not anything you haven’t seen before,” Mark sighed.
“Yeah, plus those chicken legs must be fucking hilarious!” she agreed.
Mark held his face, shaking his head.
“See
you in thirty,” Tyler said.
Mark turned and started to walk away, and Dominguez followed him. By her tone and the way they walked, she was already back into division sergeant major mode, giving him the most relevant information.
“Those two?” Ortiz asked.
“No, she’s as close as a sister, and Dashtund and her were closer than most thought. Would probably have married if they weren’t in the Troopers,” Tyler explained.
Ortiz clapped him on the shoulder. “We’ve lost too many good people, and we’re going to lose more. Seems that the Chosen are content with wearing down our defences and testing us, so let’s get some food.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Tyler said.
Ortiz’s eyes went unfocused as he read something. “Hall, you beautiful bastard.” A smile spread across his face, and he looked back at Tyler.
Chapter 79
EMFC Fearless
Moving from Mars to Earth, Sol System
8/3349
Being given Nivad Selvra’s ear meant that Admiral Hall’s orders worked on everyone. Meaning that instead of weaving through traffic, he could tell it to get the hell out of his way.
He could also demand their sensor data so he knew exactly what was in his way. That kind of thing was important when one unfurled their solar sails to accelerate at speeds that were not meant to be used inside of a solar system.
Hall was looking at reaching Earth in just eleven days.
The security contractors thought that they were insane. Hall could see it on their faces. He didn’t care, his people needed him and by damn he was going to do everything in his power to make sure that he was there for them.
They might be scared of us, but they also respect us for that.
In the beginning, the security contractors had tried to show off how tough they were. When they got put down by engineers that focused on weapon systems, they started realizing that Troopers weren’t the only ones trained to fight.
After Masoul, Hall and Conti had got the Troopers to train their people up so they weren’t completely defenseless if they were attacked when the Troopers were in cryo.
“We’ve been able to shave off a few hours with flight control, be a bit riskier but everyone agrees it’s the best plan,” Yeltsin said.
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