by M. D. Cooper
“I’m going right to take out the guys behind the fountain. Concentrate your fire on the left side; your scan can’t see me and I won’t show on combat net—don’t want to give off a signal.”
“Aye, sir,” Williams said and made sure all the Marines knew what to do.
Carefully slipping over the jagged edges of glass in the train car’s shattered windows, Tanis cursed softly, wishing that the stealth suit provided some amount of actual safety. Even though she was invisible, the notion of being effectively without protection in a firefight was unnerving.
A scream came from the catwalk and one of the attackers toppled over the railing, courtesy of Cassar’s heavy repeater. Tanis caught sight of the heavily armored man as he crashed to the ground. It was similar armor to what the attackers had on the night of the VIP party, only a few revisions newer. Specs showed few weak points and Tanis would have to make the best of them.
Slipping around the fountain she saw four attackers, not two. This would be a bit more challenging than she first thought. Carefully observing them, she planned out her moves.
An initial kick to the back of the man on the left would send him sprawling out into the open, where with luck Joe or Williams would finish him off. A rather spirited woman was cursing loudly as she tried to place her shots through the shattered windows of the train car. The other two women were calmer, and consequently more precise in their shooting.
Having worked out the best moves, Tanis took a running jump and slammed her feet into the man’s back. Sure enough, he slid out from behind the cover. Without looking to see if he had been targeted by the Marines, Tanis glanced at the two more controlled women. One had already noticed her compatriot being struck and was looking frantically for the perpetrator. Tanis stepped past her, slid a blade out from her forearm and sliced the throat of the third, more vocal, woman.
Now both of the remaining two were alert, and the screams to her right told Tanis the Marines had taken out the man.
The two women started firing around themselves wildly. Just barely avoiding being hit, Tanis stepped between them. Quickly sliding out the other blade, she reached out and slit both of their throats at once.
Blood fountained across her and she went from being invisible to being the red sticky outline of a person. A cry rang out from the catwalk and shots rained down around her. Grabbing one of the rifles on the ground, Tanis dove for cover in the fountain, the action having the dual purpose of washing the blood from her and giving her some protection.
The red tint left her vision and she peered around the splashing water trying to get the man overhead within her sights. As it turned out she didn’t need to since when he leaned over to get a bead on her someone else filled him full of holes.
Another few shots rang out and a scream came from Jansen’s target, followed by a gun being thrown over the counter and a cry of surrender. Tanis, invisible again, stepped quietly over to the concession stand only to see the final attacker hiding under a candy machine of some sort, a rifle trained on the opening. The weapon he had tossed over the counter must have been that of his dead companion.
Tanis raised her arm and flung a blade at him attempting to hit the creases on his armor’s neck. She missed and it bounced off, clattering to the deck. He spun and started shooting wildly in her direction, forcing Tanis to hit the deck.
“Surrender for real or we toss a grenade in there to do the job for you.” Williams called out.
“You wouldn’t,” the man replied. “Station would throw a fit.”
“I’m a Marine staff sergeant. Do you really think that I give a monkey’s ass what this station thinks? You’ve got five seconds.”
The man didn’t even think about it for two. He was out and on the ground so fast, he nearly landed on Tanis. Williams was securing him when one/two arrived, looking worn, but triumphant.
“Heard you guys needed a hand,” Corporal Taylor said.
“We did,” Jansen said. “What took you so long?”
“Just ran into a few folks who wanted to turn us into sponges.” Taylor grinned. “We showed them how that goes when they try to take on Marines.”
The fireteam gave an “Oo Rah” to that and Tanis couldn’t help but grin. She walked back to the train to retrieve her armor and weapons.
“Good work,” Williams commented. “Make sure all these folks are dead or secure and wait for station security to arrive. We’ll be rolling out as soon as the major’s ready.”
“They’re actually right behind us,” Taylor said and turned around. “You guys can come through, looks like everything’s taken care of here too. Good thing you were around to not help us.”
“We came as fast as we could,” the man in the lead said. His shoulder patches identified him as a lieutenant in the MSF. “We’ll take over this scene, but we’ll need statements.”
“Those can wait.” Tanis stepped from the train car, once again clothed and in her armor. Trist was in her wake casting uneasy glances at the large body of police officers. At least thirty of them had streamed into the atrium.
“Major Richards?” the MSF lieutenant asked.
“Yes…” She waited for him to identify himself.
“Lieutenant Folsom. I’m going to have to ask you and your forces to lay down your weapons and surrender to us.”
Tanis wasn’t certain she’d heard the man correctly. “You want us to what?”
The Marines had snapped into action the moment Folsom spoke. Raising their weapons they began to ease into positions to cover one another.
“By the authority vested in me by the Mars Protectorate, I am placing you under arrest on the charge of harboring a known terrorist.”
“What known terrorist would that be?” Tanis asked.
“The woman with you: Trist. She is wanted by the Jovian government.”
“Last I heard, we weren’t in Jovian space,” Joe said. “Why don’t you boys pack up and head out before we place you under arrest for interfering in the prosecution of a federal case.”
Tanis saw that Cassar had reached a position offering decent cover. He slowly eased to a knee, switching his weapon to full auto. He had one eye on Williams and the other on the MSF squad. One word and he would have at least ten of them down and out of the fight. Tanis assessed the other Marine’s positions through her recon probes while Angela furiously queried Mars 1 databases, trying to find the origin of Folsom’s orders.
Tanis said.
“It appears we have a situation.” Tanis scanned the MSF unit. Most of them were arrayed behind Folsom, though a few were slowly easing into flanking positions. “You see, I can’t find any validation of your orders. And there is no way I’m just going to surrender to you without them. You’ve got to know there is no way these Marines will surrender to you under any circumstances.”
A few of the cops looked uneasy at that and the stone-cold looks from one/one and one/two only solidified the knowledge that these Marines would go down fighting. Even death here would be more preferable to the Marines than going back to their platoon having been arrested by civilian cops. Especially since they were only outnumbered two to one.
“Nevertheless, you will surrender,” Folsom said. “We have reinforcements on the way. You’ll be subdued.”
“Like hell we will,” Williams grunted. “I’ve faced more threatening odds on my own. You station fairies are going to die today if you get in our way.”
Tanis grinned; there really was nothing like having a sergeant put it in the simplest possible terms. Several of the MSF men and woman were looking a lot less certain and she decided to push it home.
“You have ten seconds to stand down before I log this as an official violation of the Federated Space Treaty, Section 4.2—TSF Charter, paragraph 9. Such violation authorizes T
SF forces commanded by an officer ranking commander or higher to respond with lethal force against anybody, official or otherwise who is interfering with TSF actions.”
Folsom still looked resolute and Tanis began to count.
“One.”
“Two.”
“Three.”
“Four.”
Several of the MSF men and woman put down their weapons and slowly began stepping back, out of the line of fire.
“Five.”
“Six.”
A couple more left, bringing the MSF numbers down to twenty.
“Seven.”
“Eight.”
No one else moved. Everyone tensed.
“Nine.”
Tanis waited the space of a second and then dove to her right, knocking Trist to the ground while raising her rifle and taking aim at Folsom. He ducked as well and her shots cut through the air where his chest had been.
Cassar opened up and in moments six of the MSF were down and several more were stunned by the rapid fire of his weapon. Perez, one/two’s heavy gunner, was less than a second behind in releasing his barrage, and Williams, taking his pissed off look to a whole new level, leaped through the air, horizontal and low, taking out the legs of several MSF officers.
Five seconds later it was over. Taylor had been hit point blank center mass, but his armor had absorbed the impact, leaving him merely sore and embarrassed. Murphy had taken a shot in the shoulder, where his armor creased to allow flexibility. The limb hung stiffly, already suffused with med-nano stemming the bleeding and stitching his sinews back together.
“I’m five by five, Sarge,” he grunted. “Can shoot just fine with my other arm.”
“Never doubted it for a moment,” Williams said. “You keep to the back of your team, though.”
“Aye, Sarge.”
“I’ve reported this to the station and local Terran Space Force. A unit is on the way to clean this mess up. As much as I hate to split up, we can’t leave all this hardware laying around. One/two, you stay here until the TSF arrives. Don’t let any station security in until our people have the scene. Provide your recordings of the event and take up your positions for return route beta; we won’t be coming back this way.”
“Sir, yes, sir!” came the course of responses.
“One/one, let’s move out.”
Their route moved into more populated and public areas, an unfortunate necessity. Tanis could see station security forces shadowing them here and there. She was also paying half attention to the web of reports, accusations and threats that was flooding the nets. The MSF was claiming ignorance of Folsom’s actions and simultaneously accusing the TSF of assaulting its personnel. The TSF for its part was opening inquiries and launching inquests into the MSF faster than even an AI could read the orders. Someone’s head was going to roll for this and Tanis just hoped hers would still be attached by the end of the day. Sanderson was most likely going to want to take it off himself.
The public had gotten wind of what happened, and leaked security vids were already circulating the nets. It didn’t take long for people to figure out where Tanis and her entourage were going. From there speculators posted probable routes, one of them being the actual route Tanis was using. The upside was that those areas started to clear out. Some oblivious folks still wandered past, but for the most part Tanis’s group had a very clear path to the federated buildings.
“Coming up on the second projected ambush point,” Williams observed.
“What do we expect here?” Joe asked.
“Previous set was Trent’s boys. I expect we’ll get more of them, or perhaps some other STR special ops unit of some sort. Two/one and Two/two are in position in the buildings I’ve lit up on your HUDs. We have a safe room in that building across the concourse there and there is a weapons dump hidden in that trash disposal across the street.”
“Not expecting much here, I see.” Cassar chuckled. Tanis wondered about him. He hardly spoke, except when he was expecting to kill someone.
The space was an open square. It was the intersection of two broad thoroughfares—a long stretch with nothing but three small vertical conduits for cover. An ambush here would be hairy. Tanis gave the signal and Jansen and Lang moved over to the left side of the corridor, while Cassar and Williams moved ahead. Murphy stayed back with Trist, Joe and Tanis.
“You guys take me to all of the best places,” Trist said. “Why don’t we just take a car?”
“Too risky down here,” Tanis replied. “Too many things we can’t see when we’re moving that fast; that and we’re bunched up, we get attacked and we’re sitting ducks. This way we can approach each danger zone carefully and with the appropriate cover.”
“Somehow I really don’t feel covered,” Trist muttered.
Joe smiled. “But just think; you’ll have the most interesting stories to tell your children.”
“I don’t plan on children.”
“Well…then you can tell them to your cats.”
They moved slowly and carefully through the square. A few civilians had been approaching from their left, but upon seeing the Marines slowly creeping along the passage, they found another route. The hum of the station seemed to fade until they heard was slow breathing and the sound of boots rolling across the deck.
Tanis cocked her head as they reached the middle of the area with no cover.
“Something…” She didn’t get to the next word before an invisible blade whistled toward her; only her augmented sense of smell notified her of the shifting air currents and gave her the split second she needed to take the blow on her shoulder plate and not in her neck creases.
“Stealthed attackers!” she cried out as her vision was overlaid with the ghost of the person who had nearly killed her. Other figures danced in and out of her olfactory range, like shadows slipping in and out of visibility.
“Fall back to a wall,” Williams yelled, and the Marines complied quickly, not firing, but fingers on their triggers. Tanis pushed Trist back behind her as she ducked a blow and fired a shot with her pistol, catching her attacker in the chest. There was a grunt and he hit the ground, his suit failing in that spot as blood spurted out.
“How many?” Joe asked.
“I can’t tell.” Tanis’s head swept side to side. “I think there are at least a dozen of them.”
“Fuck!” Murphy spat. “Nothing in my suite is picking them up. I can’t see a goddamn one of them! How do we take them out?”
Williams grunted as something struck him and blood sprayed out of his left wrist. He didn’t say a word, but his right arm whipped out, swinging the butt of his rifle into something that made a sickening crunch, that sound followed by a pained grunt. A second blow was followed by the sound of a body hitting the deck.
“A flesh wound,” Williams said regarding his own injury, and proceeded to randomly send out pulse blasts, hoping to catch the enemy or at least keep them pinned down.
Trist knelt down and felt for the body that Williams had dropped. She located it and extruded a probe from her left index finger. It disappeared into the cloaked form and her brow furrowed.
“Their suits are like yours.” She glanced up at Tanis, who was doing her best to put holes in the shapes she could see flitting in and out of her vision. “They’re one of the latest revisions, but it looks like we’re in luck, they’re based off the fashion silsuits that are all the rage back in Callisto. That’s a poor choice in base technology.” She grinned and extruded another probe, this one into another location on the fallen form.
“One of the neat features of the latest silsuits is that they can download new designs and when they’re in demo mode can even have the designs loaded without user interaction.”
“I think I know where you’re going with this.” Joe grunted
as his armor absorbed a blow from an invisible blade. “What’s the ETA?”
“Minute or two.”
Tanis put a slug in the attacker that had hit Joe. “Go faster. Jansen and Lang are taking a beating over there.”
“Working on it.” Trist’s brow furrowed.
Across the square, Lang went down and Jansen let out a primal scream, rapidly sending pulses out where she hoped there was someone to hit. At that same moment two/one and two/two showed up and took in what looked like a scene of absolute madness. Marines were firing at nothing and yet seemed to be taking casualties.
“Got it!” Trist cried out. She removed her probes from the dead body on the deck and grinned triumphantly. “Wait for it…”
And then it happened. Several human outlines flickered in and out of visibility across the square before the suits reset and every attacker became fully visible. Trist had chosen a bright red covered in bulls eyes for the attacker’s new look.
“See them OK?” she asked.
“Plenty OK.” Tanis grinned and in less time than it took to say the words, every attacker was down.
Joe looked at Tanis and coughed back a laugh.
“Uh, Trist? Major Tanis is looking a little red around the collar.”
Trist looked up at Tanis to see red showing at the edges of her armor where the stealth suit showed.
“Oops, passing Angela the info to fix it.”
Tanis had an unreadable look on her face for a moment and then smiled at Trist. “Good work, that could have been messy.”
Williams was already halfway across the square to check on Lang. Tanis raced after as the two new fireteams secured the area and the attackers.
She arrived as the sergeant knelt beside the fallen Marine; Jansen looked on, her eyes misting.
“Cut halfway through his neck…armor went into stasis, but I don’t know…he lost a lot of blood, it may have been too late.”