by Richard Fox
Lafayette sank to his knees and fell over.
Steuben leaped aside and rolled to his feet. He hit a Toth warrior with a burst from his rifle. Two rounds shattered the warrior’s armor; the third blew through its chest and bounced off the back armor. The gauss round ricocheted through the warrior’s armor, nearly liquefying the Toth.
Kren emerged and ran for the opening double doors at the far side of the chamber.
Elias aimed his cannons at the overlord’s tank, then shifted his aim to the side. He fired a single shot that sheered through half the tank’s legs. Kren tipped over and fell off the ramp, onto a bed of dead menials. His remaining limbs grasped at the air like a crab turned onto its back.
Hale killed the last two menials with his rifle and got to his feet.
Steuben helped Lafayette up and put the cyborg Karigole’s remaining arm over his shoulder. Steuben half dragged Lafayette toward Kren.
“Baelor! Save me!” Kren pleaded. “You’ll need someone to negotiate with the rest of the Toth, please!”
With one hand, Steuben leveled his gauss rifle at Kren and shot the tank. The bullet cracked the glass. Two more shots smashed spider-web fractures into the tank.
Hale got two steps toward Kren before Elias’ hand stopped him.
The Iron Heart shook his head.
“Please! I-I can make you all rich!” Kren’s nerves pressed against the tank, as if trying to ward off the Karigole.
Steuben and Lafayette stood over the tank. Lafayette took his arm away from his battle brother’s shoulder. He raised his fist over his head.
“I surrender! Yes, surrender!” Kren squealed.
Lafayette chopped his fist into the tank. Liquid seeped from the cracks. He struck again, and the glass shattered beneath his fist.
“Anything! I’ll do anything!” Kren’s voice was tinny.
Steuben reached into the tank and grabbed Kren by his tendrils.
“No!” Kren’s scream trailed into distortion as Steuben pulled Kren out of the tank. His brain and nerve endings flailed madly.
Steuben slapped his hands into what remained of Kren’s body and gripped the gray matter with both hands. He dug his fingers into the pulsing mass. The tendrils wrapped around his wrists and tugged weakly.
Yellow blood burst beneath Steuben’s fingers. A roar rose from his throat. He raised Kren over his head and ripped the overlord in half. Steuben looked at the bleeding mass in his hands, tossed them aside and shook blood from his hands.
“Now we can leave,” he said.
Kallen ran over and picked up the two Karigole.
“Elias,” Hale said, “I should be the last one ou—hey!” Elias grabbed Hale by the ankle and tossed him into the portal.
Hale’s entire world became a white abyss. Tiny blue strands of electricity danced across his armor as he felt himself tumbling end over end.
He blinked and found himself floating in space. The great spikes of the Crucible surrounded him. The portal had dropped him in the center of the star gate’s iris. He made out the Breitenfeld, surrounded by construction scaffolds and tenders attached to its hull like moray eels.
The Naga descended toward the moon, trailing smoke and venting atmosphere behind it like a comet’s tail. The flash of exploding fighters and energy bolts sparkled over Hawaii.
“Hello?” Hale asked. “Gunney? Anyone?” He’d kept some momentum from Elias’ throw, gentling spinning end over end.
A new portal engulfed him.
Hale felt the pull of gravity and fell. He glimpsed a dark pool of water and slapped into it. Water flooded over his visor. He thrashed his arms and legs around, desperately trying to swim, but void-rated combat armor was anything but buoyant.
Something yanked him out of the water. He wiped mud off his faceplate and found Cortaro and Bailey on either side of him, their armor caked with dark mud. They were in a swamp full of tall trees, and croaking frogs surrounded them. Hale’s feet sunk into mud and water lapped over his knees as he looked around.
“Where is everyone? Where the hell are we?” Hale asked.
“Sir, you’re a lieutenant. You’re never supposed to say that second thing,” Cortaro said.
“We’ve got everyone but the armor and the Karigole,” Bailey said.
A portal opened over the treetops, and Steuben and Lafayette fell with the snap of breaking branches.
“I’m not climbing another bloody tree, God as my witness,” Bailey said.
“Lafayette is hurt,” Hale said. He sloshed through the swamp to where he saw the Karigole land. He heard the Iron Hearts arrive behind him, hitting the water like cannonballs.
They found Lafayette draped over a branch, black fluid leaking from the stump attached to his shoulder. He slid back and grabbed the branch with his remaining hand, then dropped into Cortaro’s waiting arms.
“That was a most unsettling experience,” he said.
“Yarrow! Medic, get over here!” Cortaro yelled into the swamp.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Lafayette said. “He’s a doctor, not a mechanic.” Lafayette rotated his stump around. A gout of dark fluid spat out and stained the water around their knees.
“You’re not…dying?” Hale asked.
“The pain receptors sent my system into shock briefly, but my squishy parts are just fine,” Lafayette said. He tore damaged tubes and wires from his stump and tossed them away. “Not the first time this has happened.”
Hale removed his helmet and breathed in fresh, humid air.
“I think we’re in Hawaii, sir,” Bailey said.
“We were supposed to go back to Ceres,” the lieutenant said. “Why did Ibarra drop us here?”
Steuben climbed down from the tree, his claws digging into the bark.
“You alright?” Hale asked as Steuben splashed into the swamp.
“Killing Toth will never bring my people back,” Steuben said. “But ripping that overlord to pieces was quite satisfying.”
The rest of his Marines emerged from the swamp.
“Where are we on ammo and batteries?” Hale asked Cortaro.
“We’ve already cross-leveled everything, barely a magazine per Marine and we’re low on juice and air.”
“I can hear gauss fire to the southeast,” Steuben said.
Hale cocked his ear to the sky and heard a distant snap snap snap. The sounds grew closer together as more and more rifles joined the chorus.
“We move to the sound of gunfire,” Hale said. “Let’s go.”
CHAPTER 17
Jared glanced over the edge of the parapet and saw more Toth emerging from the surf. The beach was littered with dead warriors, buffeted by waves and sinking into the sand.
The single second he dared expose himself was enough to draw three shots from warriors charging up the beachhead. He ducked and jumped away from the trench wall before the blasts blew the sandbags on the parapet into gouts of dust and fused glass. The Toth picked him out as a leader early in their attack and had sharpshooters competing to be the first to blow his head off.
There were more warriors on the beach and swimming toward the shore, more than his soldiers could handle.
“This is Gold 6,” he said into the IR net, “any Crimson elements read me?”
Energy blasts snapped overhead, tracing streaks of superheated air. The trench line had partially collapsed. A mound of dark soil and wrecked armor plating half filled the bottom of the trench. Doughboys ducked beneath the parapet and reloaded fresh batteries and gauss bolts into their oversized rifles.
Heavy gauss cannons opened up behind his position. White-hot tracers flashed overhead as the team of Marines and heavy gunner soldiers in a bunker one trench line back opened fire on the attacks. The heavy weapons had remained silent and hidden until there was enough Toth on the beach to risk announcing their presence. The havoc created by the heavy weapons up and down the beachhead might be enough to slow the Toth advance long enough for him to get his troops to safety.
“Fall
back!” Jared tried shouting over the din of battle. The doughboys remained focused on shooting Toth.
Jared grabbed a doughboy by the belt and tried to pull him off the firing stoop.
“Fall back! Damn you!” Jared yelled. He flexed his pseudo-muscles and got the doughboy off the firing stoop. He pointed to the narrow communications trench leading back to the next defense line.
Indigo looked annoyed with Jared, then nodded as the Marine officer repeated the order.
“Everybody!” Indigo bellowed so loudly that Jared’s sound dampeners engaged. “Move!”
Doughboys stepped back from the firing line and hustled past Indigo and Jared into the communications trench.
A war cry rose from the beach, a rumbling ululation that made the hairs on the back of Jared’s neck stand up.
“More coming,” Indigo said.
“Lots more.” Jared watched the last doughboy enter the trench. He looked back and saw dead doughboys lying half-buried in the rubble. A single mottled hand stuck up from the dirt, bent at the wrist like it was reaching for something. One sat with his back to the wall, legs stuck out straight, his head lolled to the side, rifle still clutched in one hand. Blackened flesh marred the neck and shoulders of the dead soldiers. Jared took a step toward the doughboy, but Indigo’s massive hand pressed against his chest.
“Go,” he rumbled.
“What if he’s not—”
Indigo shoved Jared out of the trench and prodded him toward the next defense line.
The report of heavy gauss cannons grew stronger. Jared knew that if the gunners would risk firing the weapons on full cyclic, and possibly overheating the barrels and shorting out the capacitors, then the Toth were making a serious push for the trenches.
A high-pitched whine filled the air. Jared looked up and saw Toth transports flying low toward the trenches. Hatches beneath the transports swung open and a thick crystal cannon arm popped out of the hatch. A focused blast of lightning struck out from the crystal and arced over Jared’s head.
The heavy gauss cannon fire lessened.
Jared switched his rifle to HIGH and aimed at the crystal of the nearest drop ship. His first shot struck the ship’s hull, rattling it from side to side.
“What doing?” Indigo poked at Jared’s shoulder as he tried to get another shot on the drop ship.
“How about you try helping? Shoot the crystal!” Jared’s next shot didn’t even connect with the ship.
“Yes, sir.” Indigo hefted his rifle and snapped off a shot. The crystal beneath the drop ship shattered. Stored energy ran up the gun arm and the drop ship exploded in midair, raining hull fragments all around them.
“Good shooting, Indigo. Keep doing that,” Jared said.
Heavy thumps reverberated through the ground as the drop ships continued their bombardment. Jared turned and ran through the zigzagging trench, Indigo on his heels.
A blast struck the ground to his right, raining rocks and loose soil over his head. Another blast hit so close the concussion nearly knocked the air out of him. Lightning struck in the middle of the trench mere yards ahead of him. The explosion threw Jared hard against the trench wall. He bounced off and slammed into Indigo.
Jared lay in the mud, staring at a burning sky. He fought to breathe, but his lungs refused to work. He slammed a fist against his stomach, trying to shock his diaphragm back into gear. He managed a weak breath, then rolled onto his hands and knees. Something in his chest ached with each new breath. Broken ribs if he was lucky, a collapsed lung if he wasn’t.
“Sir, OK?” Indigo asked, a jagged hunk of stone sticking out from his jawline, red blood dripping from the wound.
The doughboy pulled Jared to his feet and brushed dirt from the Marine’s uniform.
Jared leaned against Indigo. He tried to shout a warning, but could barely manage a weak croak.
A Toth warrior leapt into the trench. A clawed hand swiped across Jared’s chest and sent him spinning.
Indigo hammered the butt of his rifle into the warrior’s helm, cracking it open. The doughboy jammed the muzzle of his rifle against the warrior’s shoulder and reached for the trigger to shoot it at point-blank range.
The warrior backhanded the rifle away from Indigo and whipped its tail over its shoulder. The spiked tip gouged a hole through the doughboy’s armor, then slashed him across the face as the warrior twisted his body away from Indigo.
The doughboy pounded a fist into the cracked helm, breaking it apart with hammer blows. The Toth jabbed at Indigo’s face. The soldier caught the Toth’s hand by a clawed finger and wrenched a digit back against the wrist. The Toth’s finger ripped off with a high-pitched scream of pain from the warrior.
Indigo tossed the finger aside and brought his palms against the side of the Toth’s head with a thunderclap of slapping flesh and breaking armor. Indigo held his grip on the warrior’s head and pressed his hands together.
The Toth scraped bloody gouges across Indigo’s forearms before it started thrashing from side to side like a hooked fish.
There was a creak of buckling armor. Indigo’s hands came together, crushing the warrior’s skull with a pop. The doughboy tossed the warrior aside like child with a broken toy, then scooped up his rifle.
“Sir? Sir, OK?” Indigo found Jared lying on his side, his hand pressed against his chest.
“I’m not sure, Indigo,” Jared said. “Wait, don’t—”
The doughboy pulled Jared’s hand away and frowned at the chest plate. There were deep scratch marks across the armor, exposing ripped pectoral pseudo-muscles.
“Scratch,” Indigo said. He reached up and plucked the rock fragment from his jaw and tossed it aside. Impact from Toth cannons shook the trench walls.
“We go.” The doughboy tossed Jared over his shoulder and carried him away.
****
Durand kicked her Eagle over and dove toward the ocean. Her Gatling cannons ripped hypervelocity slugs after the Toth fighter she pursued. A single round clipped the Toth’s wing and spun it into a wild barrel roll. The fighter plunged into the water and shattered into pieces.
She skimmed her Eagle over the surface, scanning the air around her. Burning Toth ships descended from orbit, casualties of the void fight far above. Red and black streaks cut across the sky like a slow-motion meteor shower.
“Gall! I’ve got one squeeze of the trigger before I’m out of ammo,” Nag said over the IR.
“I can take out two more,” Manfred said.
Durand glanced at her ammo counter: twenty rounds left. Barely a single burst.
“Lothar?” Durand asked.
“I’ve been empty for the last two minutes,” the Dotok said. “Been scaring Toth off Manfred’s tail and herding them in front of his guns.”
“103rd,” Durand said over the squadron’s channel, “break contact and get to FARP sierra.” The construction crews had cut several forward arming and refueling points in the dense jungle around the R&R center, all manned with small teams of robot pit crews that could swap out an Eagle’s empty ammo canisters and drained batteries within a minute.
“That’s north of Loa,” Glue said. “We’re giving them a straight shot to the beaches.”
Durand tracked her squadron as they broke away from the Toth invaders and flew to the northeast. The Toth didn’t give chase. She followed her pilots, down to ten Eagles. She glanced over her shoulder every few seconds. Silver glinted in the sunlight as more Toth landers and fighters entered the atmosphere whole and undamaged from space.
A half-dozen landers loitered off the coastline, dropping more Toth warriors into the sea.
“Feet dry!” Filly announced as her Eagle flew from over the ocean to over the beach. They were minutes away from the FARP.
“Red flight, you’re first in the chute. Top off and get back in the air. White and Blue follows in sequence. We return to the fight as a whole,” Durand said.
A pair of Eagles slowed to a hover over the jungle, then descended slowly. Turb
ofan engines blew through treetops, and branches and palm fronds ripped into the air.
“Brat and Kilo are wheels down,” a pilot announced. “Got bots working us over, should be airborne in ninety seconds.”
“Incoming!” Glue shouted.
Durand banked her Eagle into a roll out of reflex. Energy bolts snapped past her cockpit, scorching a thick streak of permanent smoke into her canopy. Three Toth fighters shot past her, one with red striations around the canopy.
The Toth ace had come for her.
Durand slammed a foot against a rudder bar and her tail swung to the side, pointing her fighter straight at the pair of Toth fighters making a beeline toward the FARP. She gunned her afterburners, feeling the press of acceleration against her body.
“I’m with you,” Manfred said, his Eagle settling next to her wing.
“We’ve got more on the way,” Glue said.
“Knock ’em down and get back to the beaches,” Durand said. The ace was trying to pull her away from the refueling point, leaving it more vulnerable with each Eagle that followed the ace into the volcano’s shadow. She understood, and she didn’t care.
“I’ll get the two on the left,” Manfred said.
“How many pulls you have left?” Durand asked.
“Two. You?”
“Enough. They’re yours.”
A Toth fighter cut its engines. Tiny maneuver thrusters tipped its nose over and opposite to the momentum of the ship’s direction. Energy blasts blossomed from the fighter in a wild arc over the jungle toward Durand and Manfred.
Durand snapped her fighter to the right and rolled over an incoming blast. She overshot the attacking fighter as it fell away from the other two Toth. She glanced back to see Manfred flying straight for the fighter. The Dotok angled his engines as he cleared the Toth by a few feet and flared his afterburners.
The flames torched the Toth’s cockpit and slapped the fighter into a dead spin. Durand turned away before it could crash into the jungle.
“I saw you do it on Europa,” Manfred said, “thought I’d save the bullets.”