“Nearly there,” Reyes said. “Where do you want me to put it?”
The tac boat was bumping over the ground. It would make a mess of the trench if it went over it and into the hangar. Also, the tac boat was in danger of a catastrophic failure any moment. It would be a bad idea to put a potential antimatter detonation inside the hangar.
“Drop it in front of that trench,” Jack said. “Can you turn it so the open door is facing the entrance hangar?”
Reyes began tapping the control panel. “I can try.”
The tac boat lurched again. Jack was pitched forward. The tac boat turned violently to the side and skidded to a halt. Dust came flying into the tac boat hold and cockpit.
Jack wiped the dust away from his helmet face plate and jumped out of the cockpit to find himself only five meters from the trench. The Marines in the trench were punching the air.
Jack ran around to the side of the tac boat and looked for the Marines he had left on the surface in hostile territory. The two squads of Marines were running for the relative safety of their trench, a hail of plasma spears slicing through the dust cloud thrown up by the tac boat’s unorthodox maneuver. Jack counted—all his Marines were coming back. Some were wounded and being assisted by their squad-mates. Some were stopping, turning and returning fire. Jack opened a channel to the two squads.
“Get back here. On the double.” And then, over a company channel, Jack said, “Give those Marines covering fire. It doesn’t need to be pretty, just aim at the flashes from those plasma spears and give them a blast.”
The Marines in the trench and the Marines on the roof fired into the white dust cloud with a terrifying intensity. Jack jumped into the trench and grabbed a couple of Marines. “Unload those supplies,” he said. The Marines slung their pulse rifles across their backs and jumped to it.
“First Marine to find a fixed position blast laser and set it up next to the tac boat. Make it ready to fire as soon as possible.”
The plasma spears began to die down. Then the pulse rifle fire subsided. The dust cloud thinned and drifted away. The deep furrow plowed by the tac boat ran across the surface of Brecon away from the facility. And further away, Jack saw the movement of Chitin soldiers moving into cover.
Sarah Reyes stepped into the open doorway. The drop was only a couple of meters, but Reyes looked unsteady. Jack stepped over and helped her down as she half-climbed and half-fell. Jack steadied her fall by wrapping his arms around her and led her away from the tac boat, over the trench, and away into the hangar.
Sam Torent jogged over to Jack. “Don’t ever do that again, Jack,” Torent said.
“Do what?” Jack said.
Torent took hold of Reyes and helped Jack walk her to the rear of the hangar.
“Don’t ever go running out of cover,” Torent said.
“I’m the commander, Sam.”
“Commander or not, you expose yourself to that sort of danger again and I’ll punch you on the nose.”
“They’ll hang you for that.” Jack stopped in front of the rotating airlock leading to the inner complex.
“It’d be worth it.” Torent said. “Krav it all, Jack. What are you doing putting yourself in danger like that? Who’s going to control this lot if you get hit?”
“You,” Jack said. He put a hand on Torent’s shoulder. “Get those supplies organized, Sam. Set up any heavy weapons the moment you find them.”
Torent nodded, then looked at Reyes.
“Hi there, Sarah,” Torent said. “You picked a bad time for a social call.”
“You look like you’ve got things under control,” she said weakly.
“Always doing my best to make Jack look good,” Torent said.
Jack pushed open the door to his makeshift command center. He moved Reyes toward the low, soft chair and lowered her into it. She groaned as she went down. He pulled off his helmet and dropped it on the desk with a cloud of pale Brecon dust. Then, kneeling in front of Reyes, he detached her helmet and carefully pulled it off.
Reyes’s hair tumbled out and fell around her bruised face, a large purple bruise on her forehead and red contusion on her left cheekbone.
“Hey, gorgeous,” Jack said. He smiled and looked in to Reyes’s deep, dark eyes.
“Hey, you,” she said, wincing in pain as she adjusted her position in the chair. “Nice place you’ve got here.”
Jack nodded, taking her hand. “If I knew you were coming, I’d have done something special.”
Reyes gave a small laugh.
Jack kissed her. He kissed her gently so as not to aggravate her many bruises. He sat at her feet, her hand in his, and looked up at her soft features.
“Shouldn’t you go and organize those supplies?” Reyes said. She winced in pain again.
“Sam can handle it for now. What’s the news from the Scorpio?”
“Chits boarded,” Reyes said. “Adder Company is defending vital systems. I only just got away with the supplies.”
“Why did you bring them?” Jack asked.
“Right place at the right time, I guess.” She put her hand on Jack’s cheek.
Jack accessed her suit’s medical package and checked her over.
“I’m okay,” she said, “just a bit battered.”
The med check came back in the green. Apart from a few bruised ribs and a slight concussion, Reyes was fighting fit.
Jack stood up. He grabbed his helmet. “Rest up here. I’ll look in on you when I can.”
Reyes stood up. She moved awkwardly and winced again. She stood in front of Jack and kissed him deeply. She pulled away slowly and lowered herself back into the chair. “Listen to Sam,” she said. “Stay out of danger.”
“Wouldn’t that be nice,” Jack said. “Unfortunately, Sarah, there isn’t a single place in the system that is safe anymore.”
Major Griff moved along the side corridor and followed the Chitin soldiers heading toward the aft engine and reactor rooms. They would come up against the barricade and the Marines of Adder 8th squad. Griff would engage the Chitin soldiers on the rear flank and finish them. He moved silently, keeping his distance.
He felt alert and awake, more than he had for days, or even weeks. The office of battalion major was tiresome. Harry Griff was a Marine, a good Marine. This was where he was at his best, stalking the enemy, preparing to finish them with bullets and blades.
The sound of pulse rifle fire leapt up suddenly and echoed along the corridor. Griff moved into position. It was the Chitin soldiers firing at the barricade blocking their way to the reactor chamber. The Chits were pressed to the sides of the corridor and some were clinging to the ceiling panels. All were firing their plasma spears. The composite material of the corridor walls, floor, and ceiling fizzed under the plasma weapons’ attack. The pulse rifle fire was accurate, but it was broken and stuttering. The Chits were advancing slowly. Griff broke cover and pumped a half-dozen rounds into the back of the rearmost Chitin. The creature fell, its tentacles thrashing wildly.
Another Chitin turned and spotted Griff. It moved in. Griff loosed another couple of rounds before falling back. The plasma spear struck the corner that Griff had just ducked behind.
Griff moved quickly to the next junction. He saw a shadow of a Chitin soldier moving along an adjoining corridor. He followed, stalking silently.
The lone Chitin was moving away as he rounded the corner. Griff stepped into the corridor quietly. He raised his pulse pistol and fired three shots into the back of the Chitin’s head. The enemy soldier turned, its plasma spear launcher glowing and ready to fire. Griff fired another couple of rounds into the Chitin’s head. The Chitin fell. A lucky shot stopped it in its tracks.
He heard the scurrying of a Chitin soldier in the corridor behind him. Griff moved quickly, leaping over the body of the fallen Chit and running around the next junction.
The three Chitins in the corridor were still and silent, and facing Griff. The small round mouths opened to show a wide ring of white teeth.
>
Griff fired and fell back around the corner. He fired up his pulse pistol’s electron blade and made ready for the three Chitins to rush him. He had taken on Chitins before. He wasn’t afraid of them. He could kill them all.
The rigid tentacle burst out from his shoulder, just underneath his collar bone. Griff looked down at the black spike sticking out of his suit, his own blood dripping off the pointed end. Griff turned to look over his shoulder. A Chitin solder was looking down at him, slime dripping from its round mouth.
The three Chitins came around the corner slowly. They stood in front of Griff. Griff fired two quick shots, aiming from the hip. A tentacle slapped the weapon from his hand. And the Chitins moved in to surround him.
The voice of Captain Pretorius came over his suit’s communicator.
“Major Griff. Come in, Major.”
Griff looked at the tentacle sticking out of his suit. His breath was lost, his voice gone. The Chits moved in closer, and all was black.
15
Walking out from the inner complex, Jack saw the hive of activity at the hangar entrance. Torent was directing the setup of two big, fixed position blast lasers. The massive guns were being built at the sides of the main entrance. The makeshift barricades had been moved to give the big guns and their crews extra cover.
The supply crates were being taken from the tac boat and stacked neatly. The small ration crate held enough of the heavy ration blocks to maintain a company of Marines for a week or two. The massive stack of pulse rifle ammunition, power cells, and grenades was enough for a week of hard fighting. The barrel power cells for the blast laser would keep the heavy weapons firing constantly for a year.
Jack knew it was all necessary. The Chitins weren’t going to give up and melt away into the black. They had been engaging and harassing the human settlers for almost two years, ever since the first encounter with them at their gas giant home world of Zelos.
If the fleet hadn’t visited that world, maybe the Chitins would have been unaware of the human presence in the system and the two civilizations might never have met. Now that they had, the Chitins showed no signs of interest in human affairs, or in the early human diplomatic approaches. The Chitins were bent on destroying any and every human craft or settlement they encountered.
There was no reason to believe the Chitins would leave the humans alone now. They were cornered, cut off, isolated. The humans were reliant on supplies of energy and material that they had been sourcing from the wider Eros system. Cut off from their supplies, it was only a matter of time before they were spent, exhausted, depleted, and entirely at the mercy of the Chitins.
Jack had encountered the Chitins on many occasions and there was one thing he was sure they were lacking, and that was mercy.
Torent looked completely at ease as he directed the Marines. A small group had unpacked an entrenchment kit and they were rapidly building up the crude trench into a much more substantial defensive system.
Torent had incorporated the crashed tac boat into the defensive trench system and had created a forward command center, right in the middle of the defenses. The power systems were inoperable, but the hull was still a solid defense. The tac boat’s cannon was being stripped out. It would make an excellent addition to the defense. Jack was impressed with Torent. He had been in command for a little over half an hour and he was making an impact.
Jack stepped up next to Torent and watched the work.
“Excellent idea to make the tac boat part of the trench, Sam,” Jack said.
“I wish it was operational,” Torent said. “I’d be out of here in a shot.”
Jack smiled. “You wouldn’t leave me to manage all this on my own, would you?”
“Why don’t we just run?” Torent folded his arms. “We have been getting beaten at every turn for over a year. I’ve had about enough of it, Jack. If that boat was operational, I’d be out of this system and on route to another. There are a billion star systems in this galaxy alone. Why do we stay here and get our kravin butts kicked day after day?”
Jack had never heard Torent sound so defeatist. This was not the pugilistic, aggressive old squad-mate he once knew. Torent had never backed away from a fight before, but the constant pressure was making everyone a little anxious.
“Maybe if we had left after the first attack, we could have all gotten away.” Jack shifted his weight from one foot to the other. He was battered and bruised. Standing was painful. “The fleet could have just about carried the populations of Eros and Eras, but not now. There are too many people and too few ships. Besides, I don’t think we would make it past the orbit of Zelos before the last ship was lost to Chitin attack.”
Torent stepped forward as the tac boat cannon came free of its housing. “Deploy that cannon to the middle of the trench line,” Torent said. Then he turned to Jack. “If that’s okay with you, sir?”
Torent’s tone was respectful. And his tactical understanding was developed after a year of combat with the Chits.
“Good call, Sam,” Jack said.
“Hook up the power. And keep those big guns silent. I don’t want to let the Chits know we’ve got heavy weapons support.”
“Good thinking, Sam,” Jack said. He slapped his old squad-mate on the back. “You know, you’d make a pretty good officer yourself.”
“What have I been telling you? Ever since boot camp, I told you they should put me in charge.”
“And what would you do if they did put you in charge? Run?”
Torent turned toward Jack. “You know I am no coward, Jacky. You know I’ll fight them.”
Jack nodded. Torent wouldn’t run. He was too proud to run from a fight. But Jack didn’t know if Torent could lead a company. A squad was one thing, a company was another entirely different set of problems, but from what Jack had seen, Torent was developing.
The message from Pretorius came through to Jack alone. He watched the busy company of Marines as Pretorius told him the news.
“Expect another attack, more Hydras incoming. Thousands of them. The Scorpio is falling back. We’ve got Chits in every corridor. Good luck, Jack.”
The hairs on Jack’s body stood up and the dust became sticky as the defense cannon discharged. Somewhere out in space, a Chitin craft was annihilated.
Jack looked out at the surface of the moon beyond the hangar entrance. The pale surface stretched away to the black horizon and the planet of Eros hanging high in the black sky.
“We’ll hold them off, Captain. I’ve got an exceptional company down here.”
Jack saw the engine flare in the black sky as the Scorpio turned back to Eros and the safety and support of the fleet.
Jack sighed as he thought of the fleet, cowering behind the planetary defenses. It had been a magnificent fleet once, but now it was a shadow of its former self. Half of its most powerful ships had been lost to enemy attacks and the remainder were badly in need of repairs.
A squadron of Blades flashed across the moon’s surface, several of them performing barrel rolls and end over end flips. More flamboyant flying just to show the Marines on the ground that the Blades were still in this fight.
Jack dusted off his sleeve and activated his wrist-mounted holodisplay. The range was not good but already it was picking up the first wave of Chitin craft.
“To arms. To arms.” Jack spoke calmly and with authority over the company channel. “We’ve got more incoming.”
16
The Hydras began landing beyond the horizon. Jack watched their landing jets sparkle in the black sky above Brecon. The Blades flashed in and amongst the Chitin craft, flashes of light bursting over the dark sky as the Blades destroyed one Chitin craft after another before they could land and deploy their soldiers to the ground.
Jack stood on the stairway at the rear of the hangar and watched. All he could do was watch and wait. The dust cloud rising on the horizon told him what he feared. Thousands of Chitin soldiers were rushing toward his position. The same attack was probably taki
ng place on the southern pole and the cannon located there. Jack hoped the new commander of Boa Company was managing. Jack was hopeful that Laidlaw could do the job he was assigned.
“Hold fire, Cobra,” Jack said over the company channel. “Set those blast lasers on wide planar beam. Hit them with pulse rifle fire when they are in range. Let’s bring them right on top of us before we fire the laser. We don’t want to show all our cards at once.”
The dust cloud grew higher and came closer. Eventually, Jack could see the dark smear on the horizon as the Chits came on. Thousands and thousands of them, each focused on the single objective to destroy the planetary defense cannon. Only then could the Leviathans approach Eros and finish the job of killing the human population of that planet. Jack was in their way. Soon the Chitins would know that it took more than numbers to beat Jack Forge.
The first volley of pulse rifle fire sounded as every rifle fired a well-aimed round. The distance the enemy was at meant the Marines required accuracy not rapidity of fire to make an impact.
Jack watched through his field scanner. The Chitins at the front of the horde were taking fire, every shot a hit, smashing chunks out of the shell-like skulls. But as the front rank fell to the ranged pulse rifle fire, another rank of Chitin soldiers rushed over them to continue the relentless surge forward.
“Commander Forge,” Taku Folau messaged Jack. “I’ve got Chits advancing on the rear of the facility. Hundreds of them.”
Jack knew the entrance to the rear of the facility was too narrow for a meaningful attack. The narrow entrance and the long, narrow corridor that led off it would negate the Chitin numbers. Soon, those corridors would be filled and blocked with the bodies of Chitin dead.
“Hold them, Taku,” Jack said, watching the massed frontal assault moving ever closer. “Stand your ground, is that clear, Squad Leader?”
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