‘Yes,’ the NCO agreed, frowning deeply. ‘This is not good.’
I studied the NCO. He didn’t appear frightened by the notion of crossing the obstacle in clear view to the enemy below, but rather deeply concerned by it.
‘Only I can control the gun,’ he explained, patting his chest. ‘None of these men know how to. If I die, the gun dies.’
‘You could just stay here,’ I suggested. I wondered if the NCO was trying to find an excuse to remain behind whilst his men risked their lives.
He shook his head. ‘No. They do not know how to assemble the gun. Only I know.’
The NCO turned away and began jabbering instructions into his net, speaking so fast my headset couldn’t translate.
I looked back at Wildgoose, who knelt beside the gun.
The sniper raised an intrigued eyebrow. ‘That’s interesting …’
Myers jerked a thumb toward the Guardsmen behind us, who watched us nervously whilst they clutched at the remaining parts of the gun.
‘Them lot are gonna do some proper stupid shit as soon as we run out,’ he said over the section net.
‘Probably,’ I agreed. ‘Hopefully this guy will keep a grip on them. So long as they follow us, drop off the kit, and then get out of our way, I’m not bothered.’
He nodded. ‘Fair one.’
The Guard NCO patted my shoulder, just as the platoon ahead of us increased their rate of fire dramatically.
‘We have cover!’ he shouted.
With that, he leapt up onto the rubble of the bunker entrance, clambered over it and into the crater beyond.
I quickly glanced back at my section. ‘The Guard are providing covering fire! Let’s go!’
Automated gun teams practiced carrying their guns over obstacles constantly, with teams even taking part in organised races against each other, but even they would have been impressed at how fast we managed to get our gun over the collapsed entrance. Scrabbling over the rubble like men possessed, we quickly passed the gun out of the trench and back into the crater beyond it, the fear of death spurring us faster as we stood in clear view of the battlefield below. Out of the corner of my eye I could see flames licking across burning buildings and soldiers running through the streets. It looked as though a battle was already being fought inside the village - which didn’t make sense, because the FEA were still fighting on the outskirts …
The Guard NCO reached up from within the crater, snatching the gun from my hands as I tried to help carry it down. His massive muscles bulged through his combats as he took the entire weight of the gun in his arms, placing it down against a slab of scorched concrete beside him.
‘Come down and help!’ he shouted at me, and I obeyed, leaping down into the crater to help receive the rest of the gun’s components.
The NCO took the lead, organising the construction of the gun. More troopers and Guardsmen dropped into the crater, assembling the weapon under his direction whilst the others ferried the remaining parts. It took us less than a minute to complete the task, transforming the collection of items into a fearsome weapon.
‘Stand back!’ he ordered, as the last ammunition box was attached, and we snapped backward as he hit a switch on the gun, activating it.
The monstrous weapon sprang into life, rising on its tripod as it began to scan for targets. Within seconds it opened fire, causing us all to jump with its mighty roar.
‘Push back!’ I ordered, sweeping my arm back toward the trench.
We quickly used the opportunity to withdraw, knowing that the gun could draw fire from the Militia. The Guard platoon cheered as we landed back inside the trench with great splashes of water, the gun behind us hammering the enemy below.
The Guard NCO was last back, landing awkwardly and having to place his hand against the far wall to stop him from falling into the water. He cursed at his own clumsiness, and I smiled.
‘I must give the weapon some commands,’ he said, tapping at a datapad similar to the one I wore on my arm.
He appeared engrossed in something he could see in front of his face, and I assumed that he was navigating through a system on menus similar to that which we used to control our saucers and artillery.
‘I am meant to give these commands when the weapon is being put together,’ he explained, continuing to tap against his datapad, ‘but I must do everything.’
I flicked my head toward his men. ‘They don’t know how to use the gun at all?’
‘They know nothing!’ he spat vehemently, surprising me. ‘They are stupid zombies. The FEA are better.’
I presumed that the word “zombie” was his best attempt at an insult in English.
He calmed down again, saying, ‘I had a good team. They should not be taken away from me.’
I was about to ask why his men had been replaced by inexperienced Guardsmen, when he finally lowered his datapad, satisfied that his work was done.
‘It is good that I am finished,’ he said. ‘The weapon can kill our soldiers if it does not know where to shoot. It is clever, but it can do wrong things sometimes.’
‘Like shooting at Union saucers?’ I suggested.
He shrugged indifferently.
‘OK,’ I said, deciding against causing an argument - despite his guns having attacked our saucers, I rather liked him. ‘I’m going to take my men to see if there are more guns to help with.’
‘I do not think there are any more to move,’ he said. ‘Your friends have helped us too.’
I listened, and realised that I could hear more guns firing along the edge of the hill, taking over the fire fight so that the Guard could stand down. Now all they had to do was keep replenishing the ammunition boxes on the guns, ferrying them up through their supply chain. Supposedly a large supply of ammunition had arrived along with the FEA battalion tasked with clearing the warren, allowing the Guard to sustain their firepower for longer.
The NCO then did something that I hadn’t expected. He offered me his hand.
‘What is your name?’ he asked.
‘Andy.’ I replied, slightly shocked as I took his hand and shook it.
He squeezed my hand so hard I feared it might break. ‘My name is Rusakov. It has been good to work with you.’
‘Thank you,’ I answered, taken aback by his praise. Perhaps Yulia wasn’t the only member of the Guard that appreciated good soldiering.
The two of us regarded each other respectfully, and then I picked myself up and led my section away.
Once the automated guns were in place, the battle changed dramatically. With the Loyalist having left them behind, and unable to defend against the hail of steel darts raining down upon them, the Militia were trapped inside the buildings of Cellini, forced to wait until the FEA came for them. Occasionally a cluster of missiles was fired in an attempt to destroy the robotic weapons, but they were shot out of the sky before they even drew close. Without artillery, aircraft or railguns, the Militia simply didn’t have an answer to the overwhelming firepower of the automated guns.
Our platoon formed up close to the edge of the hill, selecting vantage points from which we could watch the battle as it drew to its conclusion.
I had my section form up along a shallow trench that offered a view into Cellini, and we watched as the FEA battalion poured into the village, capturing objective after objective with increasing speed.
The troopers in my section were shivering again, their body temperatures falling during the sudden period of inactivity, so I ordered them to pull their thermal sheets over the trench to form a makeshift shelter. Once under cover, Puppy had them remove their sodden gel armour and combat shirts and place on their thermal jackets – Eden-specific items of kit that could stuff easily into a webbing pouch and contained microscopic heating elements that kept the body warm. I was glad that we had brought them – it was a wise decision. We had used them so little in the past that I had been tempted to leave them behind to make more space in our daysacks, but Eden was one of the wettest colonies in the k
nown galaxy, so I was told, with a ‘wet’ season several Earth months long, and the endless rain easily soaked through our combats, water-proof as they supposedly were.
Thankfully now the rain had subsided into a light drizzle, with hints of light just visible through the dark blanket of cloud that hung above us.
Satisfied that our men were under cover, Puppy and I found a spot to huddle within the trench.
‘Are the lads alright?’ I asked him, as he pulled his thermal sheet over us, blocking out the rain. I was slightly concerned by the shivering troopers tucked under the sheeting. Some of them had removed their thermal bags, laying them over their legs like blankets. It had been raining for hours, and there was a good chance that the cold itself could deliver us our first casualty if the weather didn’t improve soon.
Puppy propped his rifle against the trench wall, using its bayonet to lift the sheeting so that we could see toward Cellini.
‘They’ll be OK,’ he said reassuringly. ‘Most of them saw worse weather than this - before you arrived on Eden. I think they’ve just got used to the summer weather. They can heat their rations now, so they’ll soon warm their guts up.’
‘Fair one,’ I agreed. Our ability to heat the food we stored within our daysacks was a godsend.
‘I swear it could rain forever here,’ Puppy said, leaning out from under our sheeting to peer at the sky.
‘Apparently the planet was dryer than New Earth a few hundred years ago,’ I replied, engaging in idle conversation to keep my mind off the cold.
He laughed. ‘I don’t believe that for a minute.’
‘Seriously. I mean there was water, obviously, but not much rain. The first settlements like this would have been built where there was water. Maybe there’s an underground reservoir here or something, or maybe that pipe we saw was built to bring in water? It was the terraforming project that got the rain going.’
Puppy pouted his lips, unimpressed by one of mankind’s greatest achievements since leaving Earth. ‘They might as well have left it how it was. Look at the mess they’ve made.’
I mused over Puppy’s words. I was sure that he was talking about the rain, but he was right in other ways too. Unlike on all the other earth-like worlds, Eden’s forests - engineered to thrive in and support the toxic atmosphere as it was artificially filtered by hundreds of ‘air factories’ - gave its inhabitants the ability to move freely, and caused borders to blur. But rather than creating a peaceful society, over a period of a hundred years this new freedom of movement had led to conflict as the colonial powers began to argue over the changing landscape, and new factions rose under the cover of the thickening forest canopy. Things probably would have been better as they were, with Eden remaining as a dry, barren planet with clearly defined borders … and without political autonomy.
Mr Barkley spoke up over the net, abruptly ending our conversation as he briefed us on the events across the battlefield: ‘The Guard have finally managed to lay down an effective fire support base, albeit with some significant influence from ourselves, and now the Loyalists and the Militia are in full retreat. They appear to have already abandoned the warrens beneath us by using tunnels that connect to the village, and they are now withdrawing toward the northeast, as expected. There appears to be no sign of any further counterattacks, though we shouldn’t rule the possibility out at this stage. I think it is more likely that the Loyalists will withdraw completely, and the Militia will dissipate into the forest to lick their wounds, at least for now, since they have next to no support from the rest of their army across the border.
‘The Guard themselves are now consolidating on Hill Kilo, but they are also sending one of their companies to assist the FEA in the village. Incidentally, you may have noticed that the villagers appear to have mounted a small rebellion of their own, attacking the Militia before the FEA managed to break in. The resulting chaos had a significant effect on the Militia’s ability to fight, and is probably the main reason why the FEA succeeded in gaining entry to Cellini, despite virtually no decent fire support until the last moment.’
So, I had seen people fighting within the village whilst we were placing out the gun. I marvelled at the bravery of the villagers within Cellini, standing up to face their oppressors, but then I remembered what the Guard did to those who didn’t fight against the Loyalists. With their village about to change hands, the population would have been anxious to appear “on-side” with the victors.
‘In a minute we will split the platoon into its traditional two multiples, with the sergeant major holding the high ground with One-Three and One-Four whilst I take the remaining sections down to investigate the village. All call signs, acknowledge.’
We answered one by one, confirming that we all understood what was happening. The battle was virtually won, and we finally had the time to rest for a moment and reflect upon the past two hours.
‘I wouldn’t pack anything away yet,’ Puppy warned me, after the transmission finished.
I shook my head. ‘No. The blokes are freezing. We’ll wait until the last safe moment before preparing to move.’
We sat in silence for a moment, listening to the gunfire echoing across the village.
‘That was an epic,’ Puppy said finally.
‘Yeah,’ I agreed. ‘It’s a miracle nobody got killed.’
We had been very lucky. The shock factor delivered by our initial assault had kept us free from harm, and the Guard had absorbed most of the brunt from the battle that followed.
Puppy frowned angrily. ‘It’s even more of a miracle with all those mistakes the Guard were making. We might as well have been fighting with the FEA! Why were the guns programmed to attack saucers in the first place? The Loyalists don’t have any, and their Militia certainly don’t. Then they put them in the wrong place, and their CO doesn’t even know where his companies are!’
I nodded slowly. ‘It was pretty bad …’
The section 2ic sighed. ‘Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?’
I raised an eyebrow. ‘Wonder what?’
‘Anybody would think they wanted to lose ...’
11
Cellini
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The FEA were already sweeping through Cellini by the time we descended the steep, rocky eastern slope of Hill Kilo to reach its outskirts. Encircled by razor wire fences and ravaged by battle, the village was anything but pleasant to behold. It looked more like a prison camp than a place where people lived.
Gunshots rang out from across the village, as did the shouting of jubilant soldiers and fearful civilians. The haze that had originally shrouded Cellini had turned into a thick black cloud that reduced visibility to less than a few hundred metres, blocking out the sky. Flickering red and orange as the buildings around us burned, the smoke was like the backdrop to a vision of hell.
Glass cracked beneath my boots as I stepped onto the wide paved street that ran eastward into the heart of the village. Cellini had once been covered by a glass dome, much like the city of Paraiso, and in war, domes were always targeted, if not to terrorise the inhabitants they protected then to reach a more valuable target beneath them. Now the village dome had been reduced to a carpet of tiny glass shards.
With a gesture of my hand, I spread my section out across the street, and we advanced into the village cautiously, weapons raised and safety catches off. We had no idea how far into the village the FEA had cleared, or how thorough they had been.
I checked behind me to ensure that Mr Barkley and Two Section were following, and then looked to my left and right, studying the village outskirts. It was composed mostly of garages and warehouses, tucked right up to the foot of the hill, and most of the buildings had been transformed into defensive positions by the Militia, circled with razor wire and fortified by walls of sandbags. Many of those buildings had been reduced to rubble during the attack, and some of them billowed with black smoke, adding to the dark cloud that grew above us.
Several dropships had tucke
d themselves in amongst these buildings that lined the outer edge of the village, hovering just high enough to allow their turrets to scan toward the north, and crates of ammunition were being offloaded from their open compartments - enough to allow the FEA to continue the fight once they had gone. Soldiers were spread amongst the buildings, providing the dropships with protection against any remaining Loyalists or Militia who might be brave enough to sneak forward with a smart launcher. The soldiers watched us cautiously from their positions amongst the rubble, and gunfire continued to ring out across the village, reminding us that it was far from safe.
‘Exercise restraint,’ Mr Barkley ordered over the platoon net, his message relaying to everyone. ‘I am informed by our allies that the gunshots you are hearing are mostly celebratory fire. Remember not to appear too aggressive. There will be some nervous young soldiers in the village, and you charging in like a death squad could easily excite an itchy trigger finger.’
Myers snorted as he passed behind a burnt out vehicle. ‘Celebratory fire? Yeah, we all know how much these people like to shoot for fun …’
‘Yeah,’ Skelton agreed from behind me. ‘They’re probably busy shooting up their own people as we speak.’
‘One-One-Charlie,’ Mr Barkley continued, this time transmitting only to me and the other commanders. ‘Continue to lead us into the village. Keep tight control of your section, and do not - I say again, do not - allow yourself to be drawn into anything. Weapons are to be fired in self-defence only. Acknowledge.’
I bristled at the way the platoon commander had delivered his instruction, as if he was talking to a child. He didn’t trust me amongst the FEA at all.
‘One-One-Charlie, roger,’ I acknowledged, gruffly.
The sporadic gunfire continued as we advanced slowly down the street, weaving through piled rubble and charred vehicles. Many of the buildings around us were crawling with FEA soldiers, apparently searching through the wreckage for survivors. I doubted that any Loyalist survivor would last long, though, especially if they were Militia - the brutality of the Militia was worse than that of the Guard, and the FEA would almost certainly want to make an example of any of them that they captured.
RECCE (The Union Series Book 4) Page 17