Conquest of Earth (Stellar Conquest Series)

by David VanDyke

  “Good. That’s why we have to be gone before they show up. Ben Tauros out.”

  Chapter 43

  Lieutenant Victor Cheng tugged nervously at a spot-weld on the bracing of his fire control console, unsure it would hold. Earth’s orbital fortresses were old and had not been well maintained throughout the fifty years of the occupation. Indifferent techs and officers had manned the planet’s defenses for five decades against a threat that never materialized – until it did. The most conscientious ones like him had been sent to Jupiter.

  Now he was back, commanding a bank of lasers on this enormous but deteriorating station. At least he had gotten a three-day leave to visit Brenda and her gorgeous legs. Even better, she had received his advances with unabashed enthusiasm, and after a whirlwind courtship, they had gotten married. There was no Council on Mating and Breeding to give approval anymore. It had been that moment when he decided he really liked his newfound freedom of choice.

  He’d realized he also had the freedom of choice to desert EarthFleet, to run away with Brenda and hide somewhere, but he discovered his freedom’s reverse side: responsibility. After many tears, Cheng had left his new wife there in the tiny York apartment, trying to explain why he had to do his best to defend her and everyone else on Earth.

  He and the other skilled cadre brought back from Jupiter system had worked like dogs to get their laser bank back in shape, but things still tended to fall apart at any moment, requiring frantic searches for the problem. Then, even if the glitch was identified, getting spare parts was a crap shoot.

  Cheng sighed and pushed a comm button. “Hassan, have you got the COP working yet?” Sergeant Hassan was supposed to recon a cabled conversion module to get their Common Operating Picture display functioning, otherwise they wouldn’t get feeds of the overall battle.

  “Got something better, sir.” A moment later Hassan entered the control center dragging a beat-up hunk of machinery the size of a dinner table while the weapons controllers watched from their seats.

  “What the hell is that?” Cheng asked, waving at his people to help out.

  “Holotank, sir. An old Mark 1 from before the Empire came. It was just sitting in a pile of junk in the salvage room.”

  Cheng and two techs grabbed it and helped Hassan set it upright in the middle of the floor. “What makes you think you can fix it?”

  Hassan grinned. “I grew up fixing pre-Empire stuff, boss. Trust me.”

  “What about our COP cable?”

  Hassan shook his head. “No luck. Everyone’s keeping a close eye on their spares. Now please, sir, let me work.”

  As Cheng paced, frustrated that he could see nothing of the battle beyond his targeting sensors, Hassan dumped a bag of parts out on the deck and began to fiddle with the thing. In just a few minutes he had assembled the device and spliced the fiber optics into the COP’s intel feed. Wiping his hands on a rag, he ran the holotank’s power cable to the nearest outlet. “Cross your fingers and Alhamdulillah.” He pressed the power button.

  Amazingly, the holotank lit up and immediately ran through its boot sequence. “They knew how to build to last back then,” Hassan boasted, smiling. “Not like the dreck today.”

  “We’ll make things better now that we’re free again,” Cheng declared.

  Hassan shrugged. “A poor man is never truly free. I’m just glad EarthFleet pays well.”

  You might not be so glad in a few hours, Cheng thought. “Will it work?”

  “Of course it will,” Hassan said confidently. His quick fingers flew over the controls and keyboard, and in moments a view of the Earth-Luna system appeared, showing the moon laser called simply “The Weapon,” the four superdreadnought-sized orbital fortresses – one of which held him and his bank of lasers – and the several hundred hastily fortified asteroids circling the planet.

  It also showed the tiny mobile fleet consisting of a dozen old frigates collected from around the solar system. These were the largest naval vessels the Empire had allowed their underlings. Now, along with six wings of brand-new StormCrow fighters, they waited on the far side of Earth, a wholly inadequate force to challenge three million Scourge vessels.

  The fact that “only” about half a million of those were aerospace control fighters or gunships was not heartening. It still left the human defenders at a hundreds-to-one disadvantage.

  Based on combat performance statistics only recently available from the intelligence teams, one Crow, with its cyber-enhanced pilot and multiple point defense systems, was worth at least ten of the enemy’s fighters. That was good news, but the quality edge only made the ratio fifty to one. Cheng wondered who was going to get screwed the worst – the fortress defenders or the hopelessly outnumbered aerospace jocks.

  Hassan fiddled with the display, getting the hang of controlling it. “There’s no voice recognition module, sir, so I’ll have to change the view manually.”

  “I guess that’s your new job,” Cheng replied. “Now show us the enemy.”

  Hassan shifted the view, moving it toward the sun until it approached the cloud of Scourge ships. The closer it zoomed in, the more enemy craft seemed to appear. Several laser controllers got up from their seats to crowd around the holotank. Cheng did not forbid them. The range was long yet.

  “Oh, hell,” the lieutenant breathed. “There must be millions of them.”

  “More than three million,” Hassan said, peering at a stack of numbers within the holotank. “The Jericho Line must have polished off a couple hundred thousand. See here? Wreckage.”

  “Time to engagement?”

  “Twenty-two hours until the Weapon ranges. About twenty-three until we can fire.”

  Cheng pursed his lips. “All right. We go to half manning right now. Four-hour watches, and back to full manning in twenty-two hours. Get some rest, some food, or go get laid, but if you’re not back on time, I’m sending the Skulls.”

  Several of his people shuddered. The fanatical Skulls had become Lord Spectre’s political police, rooting out Empire loyalists, and they were only too happy to hunt down deserters. Not that there was anywhere to run on an orbital fortress. They were sitting ducks. Cheng wondered if the orbitals’ mobility was so limited precisely in order to stiffen the resolve of the defenders. Fight or die.

  Or both, in that order.

  Cheng threw himself into his seat and fixed his eyes on the holotank, trying not to think of Brenda.

  Chapter 44

  From the inside of her Avenger battlesuit, Command Sergeant Major Repeth closed her eyes and sent up a prayer. She’d gotten out of the habit lately, but now seemed like a really good time to start again. The last assault, the one on the Io base, had gone worse than expected, and one niggling part of her mind believed it was because she had neglected these conversations with God she used to have.

  Maybe talking to Him would remind Him He’s supposed to be on the side of humanity. Right?

  She’d found faith long ago in the aftermath of the guilt she felt at turning a key and pushing a button, a button that sent nuclear missiles raining down on two hundred million men, women and children. Sometimes it still amazed her that she’d forgiven herself for that, no matter that she didn’t realize the warheads were targeting people and not satellites.

  There are no atheists in foxholes, the saying came back to her. She couldn’t answer for others, but it was true for her. After “Amen,” she felt a whole lot better.

  “One minute,” Krebs called from the cockpit. The wisecracking warrant officer was a pain in the ass, but like all Conquest’s stick jockeys he knew his shit, so she made sure he was at the controls of her sled.

  Repeth brought up her HUD and looked at the topmost level of detail: battalions and companies. As brigade command sergeant major she had more to keep track of. Five thousand Marines sounded like a lot, until she contemplated the numbers in a swarm.

  The Meme intel had provided next to nothing on what awaited inside a mothership core. She knew there were facilities
for breeding more Scourgelings, and presumably the usual sections of any advanced tech ship – spares, repair shops, training, feeding, command and control – but beyond that it was all speculation. This raid might be a walkover, a simple bug hunt, or it might be an impossible slog if the interior of the core was as dense with enemies as the swarms in space.

  Repeth was glad each assault sled had been equipped with four Recluse battle drones this time rather than just one. This was possible because they were setting down on a cold, prepped LZ. No one should be shooting at them at least until they were disembarking, so the extra armor had been stripped off the sleds and they were only half-fuelled for the short trip. Two thousand spiders at least doubled the combat capacity of the brigade.

  Even better, Conquest would remain close enough for the AI to run all the excess drones and to help coordinate the battle. Top cover like this was a luxury she wasn’t used to, but she applauded Absen for committing everything he had to the effort. Capturing enough information and equipment from the Scourge FTL system was worth betting all the chips. Too bad they couldn’t just take the mothership core as a prize, but a swarm of half a million small craft was due to return in four hours.

  No way even Conquest could hold against that, so it was smash and grab, in hopes that the science teams could reverse engineer what they got.

  Repeth felt the retros kick in. Sleds had minimal gravplating, so the passengers were not spared the bigger bumps. A few seconds later she felt a heavy shock, and then heard, “Short trip. We’re down, Reap.”

  Her suit became her own again as Krebs released the safety locks. “Up and at ’em, Massimo,” she said. As usual she rode with her favorite heavy weapons team.

  The forward quad clamshell opened, Krebs in his cockpit swinging up and out of the way with one petal, and Repeth jumped out first, pulse rifle at the ready. The sled was held fast within a resin bulkhead of the core like a cork in a bottle, but Krebs’ breaching missiles had done their work and given them a hole to ingress.

  Behind her, Massimo got his people releasing the heavy weapons from the floor. Above her she saw the forward Recluse unfold itself from under the clamshell that protected it, and immediately begin cutting at the Scourge resin with its laser to free its three jammed comrades.

  To her left and right she saw several more sleds in their holes. One had scraped all the way through and lay embedded sideways against a far wall, which allowed both the front and rear to open and its line doggies to spill out, aiming their weapons in all directions before their squad leader got them working to free the craft. From their motions, they were in zero G.

  The interior of the enemy ship was dim and filled with wisps of vapor, but not for long as the tenuous atmosphere rushed out the breaches, creating a stiff breeze. “Bull,” she commed, “there’s no gravity where I am.”

  “Me neither,” Bull replied. “I’ve already passed the word. Not much ferrous metal, either, so it’s zero-G protocols, thrusters and grips.” He referred to the crampons all suits could extend in order to get traction on slippery surfaces.

  As she stepped off the sled, her own grips popped from their niches and her stabilization jets kicked in. “Come on, people, we’re on the clock!” Marines and Recluse battledrones were spreading out by squads. The troops looked pretty ragged in the zero G, as most of them had been ground defense troops just a month ago and had only a couple weeks of battlesuit training. At least they were infantrymen at heart, and the suit stabilization systems helped a lot.

  Repeth glided over to the nearest company commander, marked as “Stinson” on her HUD. “Sir, you need to get moving.”

  “I don’t need you to tell me what to do, Sergeant,” the man replied. “I’ll go when I’m good and ready.”

  “Hmm.” Pulling Colonel ben Tauros onto the channel, she said, “Bull, Captain Stinson here would like to explain to you why he’s already sixty seconds behind schedule because he’d rather argue with the brigade CSM than do his damn job.” She cut herself out so that Bull could ream the man in private and then bounced over to the company’s First Platoon leader. “Lieutenant Rostov, your company commander is talking to the Colonel so it’s up to you to get your people moving. We’re already a minute and half behind, so I respectfully suggest you get your ass in gear. Ma’am.”

  “Sure, Smaj,” the woman said coolly. “Smits, Dekamp, Umbeke, get your platoons moving now. Routes of advance are on your HUDs.” Then she turned to lead her own platoon at the double toward a spot on the wall where Recluse drones were using their lasers to cut.

  Repeth turned back to see Captain Stinson’s suit shut down, floating frozen like a manikin. “Shit, there’s always one,” she muttered, “and I seem to get them.” She sighed. “Better me than someone else.” She punched back into Bull’s channel to hear, “…and if you ever give crap to my command sergeant major again, I will personally rip your head off and piss into your body cavity. Am I clear?”

  “Yes, sir,” the man gasped.

  “Now take charge of your company and get on schedule in five minutes or I’ll have your ass. I’ve never decommissioned someone on the battlefield but there’s a first time for everything, and if I do, you’re going to be the brigade’s newest private and permanent point man on the leading element of this assault. Ben Tauros out.”

  Stinson regained control of his suit and staggered. Repeth grabbed him by the shoulders, spun him around and launched him toward Rostov.

  Turning, she said, “Massimo –”

  Repeth’s words were cut off by a confused babble on the channel and she turned back to see Scourgelings pouring through the breach in front of Stinson’s First Platoon. Clearly, the Recluses had just cut the resin wall, but the enemy had been waiting on the other side, so instead of Marines assaulting forward they now fell back, firing frantically.

  Loosing a long burst into the mass of bugs pouring into the chamber, Repeth retreated to the heavy weapons team. “Get those semis locked down!” she yelled, but Massimo was already slamming the mountings into the deck with his bolt gun. As he did, Repeth saw Stinson and several line Marines rolled under by a wave of insectoids. The rest of the armored figures pulled back, some turning to run, some coolly withdrawing up and pouring fire into the mass. The Recluse spider drones held the line long enough for most Marines to get clear, losing two more as they were overwhelmed.

  Repeth cursed, wishing these troops were all real Marines rather than jumped-up militia in suits, and switched to her grenade launcher. Lobbing a stick of five above the firing line, she yelled, “Come on, Massimo. We’re supposed to be attacking them.” The most vulnerable time for any amphibious assault was on the beach, and the principle held in space. Some clever Scourge bastard was trying to wipe them out before they got organized, and it just might work.

  “Bull,” she commed, “we’ve got bugs counterattacking us here and ten percent casualties already. I think we can hold, but we’re not going to be making any progress for a while.”

  “Roger, Reap. We’re being hit all up and down the line, but there are some gaps and we’re pushing in between to flank. Bull out.”

  Just then Massimo’s heavy railgun came up. The gunner with his chest and shoulders shoved into its controls brought the gimbaled mechanism around and stroked the trigger, sending a stream of one-gram bullets into the wall breach at fifty thousand meters per second. Scourgelings exploded everywhere the projectiles impacted, and when the heavy orange beam of the semi-portable laser joined in the creatures stopped up the entrance with hundreds of bug corpses. Pressure relieved, the firing line stabilized, armored figures firing steady bursts that cut down all who approached while the Recluses zapped leakers with their turreted lasers.

  Repeth was about to declare a win and tell Massimo to get ready to advance when the mass in the breach exploded, flinging bug parts and gore in all directions.

  Nightmare creatures followed, two huge warbots like larger, uglier cousins of the Recluses, big as heavy tanks. Correction, R
epeth thought. Not warbots: cyborgs. She could clearly see a Scourge of some kind embedded in the center of the thing, controlling its super-sized limbs with its own.

  Scourge Soldiers with small arms crawled and hopped between the things’ legs, and big and small, they came through firing, not at all discomfited by zero G. The cyborgs launched plasma packets, fireballs that kept their shape until they struck and then exploded, blowing whatever they hit to bits even as the targets cooked. The Soldiers added in lasers and bullets, and several Marines fell.

  “Take cover,” Repeth called to the greener troops who seemed to want to stand in the open and deliver fire. That was all well and good when rushed by Scourgelings, but now they faced enemies comparable to themselves, and the battle turned into a bloodbath.

  “Krebs,” Repeth called, “put a breaching missile into that opening, now.”

  “You got it, Reap,” he said. The sled pilot closed the clamshell front petals and kicked his thrusters, lining the craft up on the hole. Breaching missiles were unguided, aiming straight forward. A blast of rocket exhaust obscured the nose, then another, and the chamber shook as the heavy weapons, intended to blow holes in capital ship armor, detonated near the cyborgs. The explosions flattened everything around them and the enemy fire slackened.

  At that moment Recluses skittered forward, lasers slicing the stunned Soldiers. Behind them, some of the better Marines stood up and advanced to support. “Massimo, finish off those cyborgs.” Repeth pointed, directing the crew-served laser and railgun to blast and burn what was left of the heavies.

  As often happened in battle, stark screaming terror turned to eerie calm like shutting off a light. Slapping Massimo on the shoulder, Repeth leaped forward to dig for the wounded with the rest of the line doggies. So many bug parts lay strewn around and piled up that she had to use her HUD to find suit transponders. Those still alive she and others carried back to the sleds, where medics went to work on triage.