Corpsman

by Jonathan P. Brazee

  “The Sunlight City? What the hell?” Warden said.

  It was inconceivable that a Federation cruiser could be damaged by a diplomatic shuttle, of all things. The Sunlight City might have been old, but still, she was a Navy cruiser. This was too hard to fathom.

  Liege and Warden turned towards each other at the same time. There were a little over five thousand Marines in the MEB. There were over 50,000 soldiers in the PIP Army. The Marines had the edge in weaponry and experience, but without the Sunset City watching over them, that might not be enough.

  “I think the shit’s about to come downhill,” Warden said.

  Liege simply nodded, then brought up her binos. Down below, PIP soldiers were just now scurrying around in motion, like ants in an anthill that had been kicked open.

  “Yeah, I think you’re right, Stein. I think you’re right.”

  Chapter 33

  “Organic surveillance has been compromised. Seventy-three percent of Class Six assets are no longer functioning,” the operator passed over the CLN.

  “Organic surveillance” meant the MEB’s armada of nano, micro, and full-sized hummingbirds, dragonflies, and high-altitude drones. Nano-drones were hard to spot, but if an enemy had large reservoirs of power, they could simply sweep the airspace, knocking the tiny drones out of the air like so many no-see-ums. The high-altitude drones were slightly easier to locate, but much harder to knock out of the sky.

  The mere fact that they were now in direct comms with the MEB was a pretty good indication that things were getting serious.

  As if the attack on the Sunlight City wasn’t indication enough, Liege reminded herself.

  MEB had launched a chatterbox, which was in low synchronous orbit over the AO. Using that, they could relay through the Cognitive Light Net back down to units. The CLN was perhaps the second-most secure form of active comms, right after meson, but meson comms were far too expensive and logistically convoluted for small unit use. If—when—the PIP forces knocked the chatterbox out of orbit, the Marines would revert to normal tactical comms, but until then, the CLN gave them a slightly stronger security blanket.

  No longer in the dark, the team was now faced with a sobering reality. The Sunlight City had been heavily damaged by a suicider. The diplomatic shuttle had been cleared for landing, and its explosive cargo had somehow passed by the ship’s scans. It had detonated inside the hangar with tremendous effect, killing over 100 sailors, damaging the fire control and shielding systems, and knocking the bubble-drive navigator off-line. Without the bubble-drive navigator, the ship could still enter bubble-space, but there would be no way to know just where she would emerge back into real-space. The ship, accompanied by the smaller FS Bongo for security, had retreated from the planet, and her crew was feverishly trying to repair what they could. They estimated it might take 35 hours, which was also about the earliest the Marines could expect reinforcement from the Navy’s Second Fleet. Meanwhile, the PIP forces were in motion, and no one thought they had 35 hours to spare. The inevitable clash would occur long before that.

  “The best we can tell, and I’m sorry we can’t give you better intel, is that there are two divisions advancing down Route Grape. We estimate their ETA at your pos in seven hours.

  “We need both Granite-Three and Granite-Four to take action to deny passage through Grape at your pos. We need the road knocked out, but don’t initiate anything until the main elements are at Licorice. You will have air support at that time.”

  That made sense to Liege. “Licorice” was the Marine designation of the PIP checkpoint at the waystation below them. If the team—both teams; they would be working in tandem with the captain’s Team 1 coming in from the east side of Grape—closed off the highway too early, the advancing PIP forces would simply angle off Grape and go around the range of hills. The Marines needed to stop the column, turn it into a clusterfuck, and force the enemy to “un-cluster” it before changing direction and going cross-country to get around the hills. Infantry wouldn’t be stopped, but the armor, which was the bigger threat in their AO, could be delayed half-a-day at least.

  Of course, “closing off” Grape, which was a major highway, was easier said than done. The teams had some pretty serious assets, but this was a big task for a single recon platoon. They would have to have lots of help from the Wasps and arty. The MEB had seven Wasps: five that were attached and another two the CO of the Sunlight City had detached before retreating. They wouldn’t be particularly effective in damaging the roadbed, but they could take out a shitload of armor. Arty, though, even if the south side of the pass was at the very limit of the tube’s range, had a few munitions which could be helpful.

  “We will update you as we know more. Keep comms to a minimum, but we want half-hour progress reports.”

  Liege looked at Warden, who rolled his eyes. “Keep comms to a minimum” and “half-hour progress reports” were pretty much diametrically opposing commands.

  “Good luck”

  “Roger that, the captain answered from somewhere to the west of Grape. “Granite-Three, out.”

  Liege sat there for a moment, gathering her thoughts. This was a heavy mission, she knew. And despite her confidence in her platoon, 15 recon Marines and one gung-ho Navy corpsman would be hard-pressed to hold back two divisions of enemy armor.

  “Well, Doc, I guess it’s go-time,” Warden said.

  Chapter 34

  A Tonya rumbled past, creaking and squeaking as it went. Liege hugged the dirt as the behemoth shook the ground.

  The tank was made by Gentry, the source of cheap munitions and equipment for a good chunk of humanity. That didn’t make the Tonya any less of a threat. It hadn’t been in production for over 30 years in its various forms for nothing. It couldn’t stand up to the best the Federation (or any of another six or seven militaries) had to offer, but against ground troops or less-advanced armor, it could more than hold its own.

  Liege clutched the Kelpie in her hand, ready to use it if she was spotted, but knowing she only had a 30% chance of getting a kill with it if it came to that. Recon was the elite of the Corps, and they had lots of cool toys to play with, but they were only human, and without PICS or other strength-augmenting means, they could only carry so much into battle. And their mission was to gather intel first and foremost, but even when it came to offensive ops, their missions tended to the more clandestine, so what they carried was designed with that in mind. A recon team was not set up to take on armor.

  Still, they had to be able to protect themselves, so they had Kelpies to use against armor and powered combat suits. The Kelpie was a slimmed-down version of the venerable Banshee. The range was shorter, the warhead less powerful, but it was significantly smaller and lighter to carry. It should be able to take out any combat suited soldiers, but against a battle tank, things got iffy.

  The Tonya never hesitated, though, and kept rolling down Grape. Liege didn’t need to recover the siesos to know that there had been a steady stream of vehicles moving down the highway. The PIP forces were setting up another position on the south side of where the highway came out of the hills. She guessed that someone on the other side had finally realized that they had to keep the route open.

  Liege raised her head from the ground and spotted Moose ten meters in front of her. He looked back, caught her eye, and gave her a thumbs-up. Liege warily got to her feet, and along with Warden and Fidor, started forward again. They’d been able to parallel the road from a good 40 meters in, but as the canyon narrowed, they were getting pushed closer and closer to the road itself. They were losing their cover, and as they placed their charges, they would be totally exposed.

  Thinking of being exposed, she looked back, but she couldn’t see the other four Marines. They were going to be placing the cratering charges where the highway crossed the small creek about 200 meters from the pass, but they were out of her sight. That was good, though. If she couldn’t see them, then hopefully no soldiers could see them either.

  The roc
ky face that made up the Seagull kept edging closer to the highway, funneling them closer as well. They would soon be out of cover entirely.

  Just to her front, Moose stopped and took a knee. He pointed up. Liege flipped down her monocle, and let her gaze travel up the rock wall. Sixty meters up, at the top, she saw movement.

  Shit. I guess they’re not so stupid after all, she thought.

  Liege had been somewhat surprised that they hadn’t run into any ground troops. With their divisions on the way, it was extremely obvious to her that where Grape crossed the range was a natural chokepoint. Yes, they were putting positions at either end of it, but they had to know that Marine teams were in the area. This was rather old military science.

  But they had put at least a team on top of Seagull where it abutted the road. Liege could see three from her vantage point, and there could be more up there. Her monocle’s night vision capability wasn’t great in the passive mode, but she could still see enough. One soldier was crouched beside a crew-served weapon of some kind, and he was glassing down the road. Liege had spent the last few days observing the Seagull as well, but from the east. This was the first time she’d seen it from this side. But she knew what was on top. She knew the soldier would be able to see Dannyboy when the staff sergeant led his team out onto the roadbed.

  Warden was motioning Liege and Moose to where he was up against the side of the hill.

  “How many are up there?” he asked quietly when they got there.

  “I could only see one,” Moose said.

  “I saw three. And they have to have full visuals on the bridge,” Liege added.

  “Shit! Well, we had to have expected something like this,” Warden said.

  He craned his head to look up, leaning out from the wall, then looked back at the other three.

  “I don’t think they can see us down here this close to the wall. I’m going to halt Dannyboy, and we’re going to continue on with our mission.”

  “What? With them right up there?” Liege asked.

  “If they can’t see us, then they can’t do much about it, right? So no reason to change our plans, at least as it pertains to the pass.”

  “And after that?” Moose asked.

  “After that, I think we need to do some hunting.”

  Liege didn’t need her NVDs to see the smile take over Moose’s face as he heard that.

  Warden went active comms and told Dannyboy to hold up his team. Then, the four of them edged forward, hugging the rock face. As they got closer to the road itself, while those on top might not be able to see them, anyone coming down the road couldn’t miss them. Liege strained her ears to catch any sounds of an approaching vehicle.

  The gods of chance were with them, though. The four stepped onto the roadbed with no vehicles in sight.

  For almost 40 meters, the rock face ended at the edge of the road on one side, and with only a small stream and a less-shear face rising up from the other side. From the base of their wall to where the other side started getting steeper was less than 30 meters. If they could bring down the higher rock face, they knew they could block the highway.

  Liege knew something about collapsing walls, and she knew how effective they could be as a weapon of war.

  Taking down a solid rock face was not as easy as it sounds, but recon was built for sabotage, and they were well trained. The effort would be a two-step process. The first would be to place molecular compressing charges along the bottom of the excavated edge of the rock face, right alongside the edge of the road. The second step would be to place explosive charges at the sides of the face where it curved back from the road. The compressor charges would make the molecular structure of the wall collapse in on itself in several broad swathes, maybe five to seven meters deep. With the collapse of the molecular space, huge chunks of the rock would essentially disappear, causing a collapse of support.

  A split second later, the explosive charges to the side would detonate, penetrating the rock and expanding it. With a “pull” from the bottom and a “push” from the sides, the entire face of the wall should shear off and collapse onto the highway. The Seagull might not be comparatively large as hills or mountains went, but it was plenty big enough to do the job.

  With Fidor providing security, Liege emplaced the compressor charges while Warden and Moose set the side charges. Just after setting the second charge, a small rock came tumbling down the cliff to hit the road and bounce across. Liege froze, but nothing else followed, so she finished with her final two charges. She’d have liked to have had three more, given the length of the face, but that was all she had. Dannyboy had taken two more that he’d use on his mission.

  She was making her way back off the road when the sky lit up to the north in a brilliant flash. A fireball had appeared, 20 or 30 klicks away, but still bright enough to light the area. It quickly faded, surrendering back to the darkness. Not everyone was waiting for the imminent clash. For some, combat was already joined. Liege hoped that the flash of light represented a Federation win, not a Wasp being shot down.

  As the four of them gathered, all three looked to Warden for guidance.

  “Look. We know what the top of the Seagull looks like. Our friends up there, they’re on the beak,” he said, naming the lower of the two ledges. “I think it’s time we went up the lower trail. I think we can get to the head and gain not only the high ground, but the element of surprise. We’ve still got four hours, so we’ve got some time, but not enough to waste it down here. We ready to take it to them?”

  “Damned right,” Liege said, joining the other three, the low volume of her voice not reflecting her enthusiasm.

  “OK, then, here’s what we’re going to do. . .”

  Chapter 35

  Ninety minutes later, and breathing hard from both the exertion and the relative lack of oxygen, Liege lay prone on the top of the Seagull’s head, looking down at the five soldiers on the beak, about 70 meters away. They had taken longer than they had thought it would take. At first, while they knew where the lower trail came out on top of the Seagull, they couldn’t find the entrance down on the canyon floor. Second, the trail switched back and forth more times than they had figured. In the distance, dawn was already reaching the plains, and dust was visible, signaling the approach of the two PIP divisions.

  From their hides back on the far hillside, it looked like it was smooth rock from the head to the beak of the Seagull, but the head itself had blocked part of the view. What they hadn’t seen before was a line of thick brush that had gained a foothold at the base of the head at the juncture where the ledge that made up the beak jutted out. The five soldiers might only be 70 meters away, but the four team members couldn’t reach them quickly if need be.

  “Which is why we need to be on point the first time,” Warden reminded in a whisper. “Do we all have our targets?”

  “Left guy, the fat one,” Liege said.

  “Mr. No Helmet, on the crew-served,” Fidor said.

  “The NCO,” Moose said, eagerness evident in his voice.

  “And I’ve got the other two. Check your weapons. I want this to be in unison.”

  Liege turned her M91 over to check the safety and round selection. She’d decided on a three round burst. The 91 was merely the carbine version of the M99. She was comfortable with the longer weapon, so unlike many recon Marines, she’d stuck with the 91 as the shorter variant of the 99. Moose was carrying a New Budapest F-2. The weapon was decidedly ugly, but it packed a powerful punch.

  “Just like you,” Liege regularly told her friend.

  Both Warden and Fidor carried the M114, a bullpup .3002 squirt gun popularized by the SEALS. It was short, thanks to the bullpup configuration, and it could put out a lot of jacketless rounds quickly, but Liege thought it a little hard to control. Her 8mm darts might not pack the same shock value, but she had thousands of rounds to their hundreds.

  “OK, on three,” Warden said.

  Liege brought her M91 to bear, then centered her cro
sshairs on the heaviest soldier’s back.

  “One. . .two. . .three!”

  Liege squeezed the trigger just before Moose’s F-2 sounded beside her ear. With the dart-thrower’s low recoil, the three darts impacted within a few centimeters of each other, shredding the soldier’s uniform in the middle of his back. He dropped bonelessly to the deck.

  She shifted her aim, but all five of the soldiers were down or going down. Mr. No Helmet lurched forward, and when he hit the ground, he bounced once, then slid over the edge of the drop-off.

  “Shit!” Fidor said, his accent making it sound like “seet.”

  Liege knew the body wouldn’t stop until it hit the ground level. It should land among the bushes, but there was a chance that it would be visible to anyone travelling down Grape.

  “Hold your fire,” Warden said. “See any movement?”

  Liege clicked her monocle to 3X and checked her victim for movement, but he was motionless, one leg bent back underneath his large body—and it suddenly hit her. She’d just killed a person, probably for the first time. She’d fired her weapon in anger before, but she knew that it took about 10,000 rounds fired for each enemy killed. She’d always just assumed that her rounds going downrange were part of the environment, no more consequential than mosquito. But this time, there was no doubt. She was a Navy corpsman, dedicated to saving lives, but she’d just snuffed out the life of another human being.

  Liege lowered her M91 in surprise. She felt, well, not much, and she knew she should feel something: elation, sadness, whatever, but something. She was hyped, for sure, but that was the adrenaline of the fight still coursing through her.

  Maybe I’ll feel something later, she told herself.

  “Fidor, Moose, go check them. We’ll cover you,” Warden said.

  The two Marines nodded, then slid down the rocky scree to the bottom.

  “Nice shooting, Doc,” Warden said matter-of-factly.