Wait. Given the silence of the vacuum he could practice: he could fire a few shots at that rock twenty or thirty meters behind the five PKs and zero in based on that.
He breathed deeply, pushed the rifle out to tighten the sling, and adjusted his body with small movements until the cross hairs slid onto a rock behind the PKs. What Kentucky windage did he need? Lower gravity meant that the bullet would fly higher than expected. He wiggled one hip forward and watched as the sight picture dipped. When the rock was three tick marks up from the center John moved his index finger off of the receiver and onto the trigger.
A squeeze.
The shot didn't hit the rock, but he did see a splash of dust: the bullet had hit the ground just a few meters in front of his target. Good. John adjusted his aim-point, putting the rock four tick marks up from the crosshairs, and one tick to the left.
Another shot. This time there was a splash of rock fragments near the center of the rock, almost exactly where he'd aimed. This was good. Really good.
It was time.
John twitched his hips, and the sight picture swung imperceptibly and the PKs came into his view. They were still walking east, halfway back to their ship.
John slid the reticule over the helmet of the leftmost figure, who lagged behind the others. His ad hoc windage had been four tick marks down, one left. He adjusted his scope and squeezed the trigger.
The figure dropped.
The other four men kept walking.
Time to adjust his aim. He relaxed his left bicep a bit, the sling loosened a hair...and the cross hairs moved over another helmet. He adjusted his windage again.
A squeeze.
And the figure dropped to the ground.
And then, over the radio: "What the fuck! My suit! I've got a hole in my suit!"
A hit - but he'd winged the guy, not taken him out. Did he need another shot? No, the PK's air would be gone soon enough.
Through his scope John saw the three remaining figures turn.
Their backs were to him now.
John adjusted his aim a hair, putting the crosshair on another PK, slid his finger onto the trigger -
And then the man he was aiming at bent over to help the one with the bullet hole in his suit.
His helmet was barely visible, hidden behind the shoulder mounted life support gear. Should John switch to another target?
He thought for a moment. No. He didn't need headshots. In spacesuits, any hit was a good hit. Sure, it might be a bit less elegant than Carlos Hathcock would've preferred, but it would work.
John put his crosshairs back on the PK, aiming at the back of his suit, and squeezed.
A miss.
And then radio chatter got more frantic: not only were the three untouched PKs trying to patch the suit of the second target, but they had noticed the first downed PK.
John held his breath for a moment and took another shot. The third suited figure went down.
"Fuck! Ah! There's something in my back - something hit me - and I've got a rip!"
Two PKs left standing.
John aimed at the fourth figure and squeezed.
A miss.
Tudel's voice came over the radio. "What's going on out there?"
One of the men yelled. "Major! Shit! We've got three men down!"
"Down? What do you mean 'down'? What the fuck is happening?"
"The suits are ripping - these fucking suits don't work -"
Another shot - the fourth figured fell to the ground. "Shit, my ass! Something shot me in the ass!"
"Shooting? Who's shooting? Are there expats on the scene?"
The last PK stood straight up, looked around for a second and broke into an awkward run toward the ship.
"Wait, Fred, don't leave us here!"
Fred ignored him and leaned forward as he ran.
"Fred, you mother fucker! Get back here, man!"
John tried to follow him with his scope, but the man bounced in and out of frame.
Shit.
And then Fred, clearly not used to lunar gravity, tripped and pitched forward.
John slid the crosshairs over the PK's helmet - and the man recovered and got back to his feet.
John tried to follow him.
The PK tripped again. As he pushed himself to all fours John's reticle slid over the man's mirrored face plate.
John squeezed.
Dust splashed a hand's breadth from the helmet.
"Fuck! Major! They're shooting at me!"
The man was on his feet and running again.
"Get back to the ship, right now."
"I'm trying, Major!"
The PK tripped for the third time. The man caught himself with both arms and was starting to rise when John squeezed the trigger.
The faceplate shattered and the PK fell back into the dust.
Tudel's voice: "There he is, on the crater wall! Near the top of the landslide."
John's breath caught. They knew where he was. The cold shock of adrenaline flashed through him.
Should he run?
No.
The PKs were armed, but if they had the same uncalibrated scopes on their rifles he did, he was safe.
OK, so who was Tudel talking to? The troops who'd headed East into Zhukovskiy?
He looked - no, they weren't back yet.
John swung his sights back to the five PKs in the western group. There. Two of the men he'd shot were standing. One was struggling to apply a patch to the suit of the other. "Hurry up! Hurry up!"
Tudel again: "Is anyone listening to me? He's on the crater wall! To the south. Engage the target!"
John smiled. There was no way they were going to hit him.
And then he remembered that the downed ship had chain guns mounted on the deck.
Shit.
He'd better finish this off before this Major Tudel remembered it too.
A shot. A miss.
Another shot. Another miss.
Damn it. He was nervous. He breathed in and out and willed his heartbeat to slow.
A third shot, and the PK holding the patch went down.
A final shot. The last PK pitched forward.
John shimmied backward from the edge. A meter. Two. Four. A moment later he felt the ground shudder. A spray of rock chips exploded ahead of him, right where he'd been lying.
Jesus. It looked like Tudel had remembered the chain guns.
John crawled back another few meters.
OK, the western team was taken care of - but that still left the eastern team. He'd need to relocate to a new position, then find them, then take them out. But first things first. He glanced at the rifle. The magazine readout had started at 40 and was now down to 23. He hadn't realized he'd fired that many rounds. John rolled to one side to reach his magazine pouch -
- And saw the boot aimed at his face.
He flinched, but too late - the kick landed on the side of his helmet. His head bounced painfully off the side of his helmet.
His head rang. He fumbled with his rifle but his left arm was caught on something - the sling.
Another kick. His head bounced painfully off the helmet interior again. There was something in his eyes - blood. He tried to raise himself on his left arm and again the sling got in his way. He gave up on his rifle and groped for the knife with his right hand.
God damn it, he wasn't going to die like this! His right glove landed on the hilt of his knife just as another kick caught him.
He saw the crack marks in his faceplate.
Another kick.
He tried to roll; yet another kick landed. The world went black.
* * *
Blue scanned the horizon. Nothing.
He was about to call up the clock in his overlay when Duncan said, "John's taking too long. Something must have happened. Let's call him."
Max shook his head. "We have to stay off the radios. But I can go there and -"
"No. We're unarmed."
"We've got rocks."
"Rocks?"<
br />
"Yes, rocks. John killed two of them with a knife. They're weak, and we have the will to win. One Dog with a sharp rock can -"
"No. Let's let Rex finish his coding."
Max growled. "You're not in charge." "Actually, I am. John said so, remember?"
Max growled again and stared at Blue. Blue refused to turn away and stared back. After a long moment Max looked away.
* * *
The fucking expat had killed five of his men - and now he was splayed out unconscious in the dust, his faceplate cracked.
Tudel said, "Nice work, Nelson."
Sergeant Nelson grunted.
Tudel looked at the expat and smiled, but then his gaze drifted to the crater and the Oswaldo Aranha. His smile faltered and slipped away.
His flagship was fucked. The paint on one side was blistered and burned and half the AG units were out, and the other ship had been shot down by the expats' guns in Zhukovskiy proper and the scuttling charge had destroyed what was left.
He let the full situation sink in. He was stuck on farside. One of his ships was destroyed and the other one disabled. He'd lost half his troops in the crash, and now this stupid expat fucker had taken out almost half of the remainder.
Damn it. It wasn't fair. He'd tried to tell General Opper that the two small experimental ships and a handful of infantry wasn't enough, even for a quick recon like this, but, no, that incompetent bastard had brushed him off: "schedules,” "operational tempo.”
Shit.
And now he was here: his ships dead, his scouting mission fubared, and him stuck here until the fleet sent someone out to rescue him.
He swore. The worst part was that he wouldn't get to participate in the Aristillus invasion. No, he'd be stuck here, camping in his wrecked ship. The message from Washington, relayed through the lunar minisats, had been clear about that - no rescue until the invasion fleet arrived.
Damn it. His career had been fubared after the Wookkiee, and then it had been plucked from disaster when he'd been given this scouting mission. And now it was a disaster again. He was fucked. He was going to be RIF-ed, if not court martialed.
He looked down at the expat at his feet.
This was the bastard who had done it.
He brought the rifle to his shoulder, flipped the selector to single shot and aimed it at the center of the faceplate.
He paused.
No. Tudel flipped the selector back to safe. This bastard didn't deserve something that clean. A head shot was a soldier's death. Honorable.
The expats were traitors and deserved to be treated like it.
Tudel pulled his right leg back and kicked. The expat's head snapped back. Wake up, you bastard. Tudel kicked again. Again the head snapped back, but there was still no other motion. Shit. It would be better if the expat fucker was awake.
Tudel swung his leg back for a third kick - and noticed that the cracks in the man's faceplate were growing. He paused. The cracks spread further, and then the dust around the man's helmet began to jump and swirl. Tudel smiled and watched the show, hoping for something more - maybe the entire faceplate would blow out and he'd get to see the expat's blood-covered face.
After a minute the streams of air slowly petered out and died.
Tudel prodded the expat's body one more time.
Nothing.
Shit. Not satisfying. Not satisfying at all.
But so be it. He had work to do. "East team, any airlocks or bunkers?"
The response was staticky and jumbled. "Not so far. It looks like just a mining facility. Maybe automated. Lots of wrecked robots and conveyor belts, but no bunker, no windows, no doors. Major - we don't have Geiger counters or anything, but it's got to be pretty hot around here. Can we come back now?"
The men were being pussies, but if there were no expats there, the smart move was to bring them over. Especially as the bootprints near where he stood showed that there were more expats lurking.
"OK, pull back. Meet me on the south rim of c-177. We've got some expat activity out here. They took out Ting and Al Farran. I took one of them out, but there are more."
Nelson looked at him when he'd said that he took out the expat. Whatever. Fuck him.
"OK, Major, we're coming right now!"
Tudel looked to the south where the footprints led.
Nelson looked at the tracks. "Looks like they've got something with them. Robots - and maybe some midgets or something."
Tudel looked at his clock. It shouldn't take the men more than ten minutes to get here. He looked at the corpse again. The expat had had two rifles.
Two?
He picked one up and examined it. Government issue with the arctic mods. This wasn't an expat rifle - he'd taken these off of Ting and Al Farran after he'd killed them.
Tudel looked around the body. There were no other firearms. That didn't make sense. He and his buddies must have had guns when they'd killed Ting and Al Farran. So why had this one left his own gun and taken Ting's and Al Farran's? It made no sense.
He shrugged. Just another mystery. Screw it.
What he needed now was hard data. He called up an overhead view from one of the minisats. The timestamp on this one said that it was just minutes old, it was the same bullshit data they'd been been seeing all along - no facility at Zhukovskiy, nothing. When he got back to Earth his career might be fucked, but he was definitely going to fuck the techs who were behind this - he'd let the brass know that the techs were faking the minisat data instead of sending the up-to-the-minute updates. A few heads would roll over that one.
He turned back to the map. It didn't show his men or the expat forces, but he could still get a feel for the lay of the land. He zoomed in and dragged the map around, memorizing features.
He closed the map and looked to the south where the bootprints disappeared over a ridge. Wait - what was that? Movement? He looked again. The tip of something - maybe an antenna - bounced into view on the far side of the ridge, then disappeared.
Or had it? Were his eyes playing tricks on him? "Nelson, did you see that?"
"See what, sir?"
Tudel shook his head. "Tai, move your ass. I need you and your men up here ASAP".
"We're almost there, Major - look behind you."
Tudel turned and saw Tai and his four troops approaching. Good.
He waited till they reached him, and then gestured. "See the tracks? I think I just saw movement off to the right. Five or ten meters past that ridge. Sergeant Ting, move your team up using over-watch, and flank to the left of that boulder." He pointed. "Yell if you see anything, but otherwise continue past the boulder, then turn right."
Tudel remembered the kinds of idiots he was dealing with and decided to add a clarification that he shouldn't have to make. "Pay attention to the tracks - but don't just pay attention to the tracks. I want situational awareness - keep your eyes moving. Nelson, you go with them."
The men divided into two groups of three, and took turns bounding forward. They were awkward in their spacesuits, but Sergeant Tai kept correcting them, telling them to form up, making them scan the area.
The fire teams disappeared over the ridge.
"Major, we've got two bodies. RFID says it's Ting and Al Farran. Telemetry says they're dead."
"Keep moving."
A minute later Tai said, "Major, there's a lot of churned up dust here. I see some weird footprints. Circular indentations; it's gotta be some sort of robot. And those small bootprints? Major - I don't think these are midgets." He paused "Do you remember the news story about the Dogs from six or seven years back?"
"Dogs?" What the hell was Tai going on about?
"You remember. Capital 'd'. Dogs. The genetically modified ones?"
Tudel pursed his lips. "Yeah."
"Well, remember there was a rumor and videos about how they'd been smuggled to the moon - only this is before we knew that there really was a moon colony, and it all turned out to be some viral marketing for a video game? What if that video game
story was bullshit, and not all of the Dogs were euthanized? What if some of them really did get smuggled to the moon?"
Tudel raised one eyebrow. Huh. It was a weird theory - but it made some sense. These fucking expats were crazy in so many ways - no government, no schools, living in fucking caves, refusing to pay taxes. He wouldn't be surprised if they had a bunch of rabies-infected animals up here with them. But out on the surface? In space suits? He shook his head. Jesus. These people were idiots.
"Dogs, humans, it's all the same. If you see them, kill them. Now: where do the tracks lead?"
"Off to the right."
"Follow them. But tell me what you see. Any dropped equipment? Anything?"
"We're rounding a ridge now... and, yeah! There are three - I don't know what you call them. Some kinda spider-shaped cargo robots. They're carrying solar cells, cargo lockers, that sort of thing. There are robot tracks everywhere - it's crazy, the tracks run in circles, loop behind boulders."
"Are the robots doing anything? Mining? Building anything?"
"No, they're just crouched down. I think they're powered off."
"OK, fine. Anything else? Any human boot tracks?"
"Nope, just Dog tracks and robot tracks. The Dog tracks loop back toward that big spur by you."
Tudel had been staring off to the south at the low ridge where his men were, but at this he turned to his right. The tracks circled back behind that outcropping?
"I'll take the spur. You and your men investigate those cargo robots."
"Roger that."
Tudel flipped the selector on his rifle to 'fire.’
He walked toward the spur, and the ground dropped away to his right. As he got closer, the base of the outcropping crowded against the crater edge, but didn't meet it - there were several meters of fairly flat ground between the two. Perfect: more than wide enough to navigate safely, but the expats and their Dogs wouldn't be expecting him to come from this direction.
Tudel kept his trigger finger alongside the receiver as he advanced. How many expats were hiding behind the outcropping? And how many Dogs? Two? A dozen? He remembered pictures of them from back when the project was shut down. Weird fucking things with their black-gray-and-beige fur, and their creepy staring brown eyes. Genetically engineered abominations.
The Powers of the Earth (Aristillus Book 1) Page 43