I put my hands behind my back. “Each comm has the ability to set up, store, and encrypt two secure channels. I’d suggest we daisy chain beginning from you. Your orders go to Sergeant Powell and me, and then we send down the line of command until it reaches the end.”
Wraith considers this for a moment. “Good. Let’s go with that. I’m setting up at the center of the line. You may as well stay in this sector and oversee the AP fire. You stay linked to me and then pick out your other line. Have them link to Sergeant Powell. He’ll be set up farther down.”
“Yes, sir.”
Twenties and Maldorn scrape up the rock onto the ledge. They both look banged up. Twenties’s eye is a flaming, pus-lined ball of pink, and Maldorn’s arm is in a sling, with a splint replacing the sleeve of battle armor that was destroyed. Maldorn is struggling to make the short climb one-handed, so I reach down and pull him up.
“Specialists Denino and Maldorn reporting for duty, sir.” Twenties gives Wraith a sharp salute.
Saluting back, Wraith says, “That eye looks pretty bad. You sure you’re okay to shoot?”
“I’ve got another eye, sir.”
“Actually…” I pull out the vial of antibiotic and hand it to Twenties. “Doc Quigs wanted me to give you this. I brought it down from O-Z. It should clear up that eye in a few hours.”
Twenties takes the vial and gives an appreciative nod.
“Don’t suppose you brought back any bone-binders?” Maldorn asks.
“No, sorry. Your arm will have to heal the old-fashioned way until we can get you off-planet.”
“Permission to set up, sir?” Twenties begins to unwrap his N-18.
Wraith steps out of the way, sweeping his arm toward the forward portion of the ledge. “Be my guest. Lieutenant Chhun, let me know when you’re in position. I don’t anticipate the koobs arriving before nightfall, but it could be any time after dark. Set up some sleep rotations along your section of the line.”
Twenties is already on his stomach, the now-empty vial placed neatly to one side. He extends his rifle’s bipod and looks into the scope. “Let’s make sure we’re ranged in for when the koobs come.”
Maldorn drops to a knee and looks through his spotter’s macro. “What’s the high end you’re looking for?”
Keying the preprogrammed adjustments on his scope, Twenties says, “I don’t want to waste blaster charges, so let’s not try for a new record with the N-18. How about three thousand meters?”
Maldorn sweeps his macro over the field, then stops and holds his finger over the spot-share button. “I see a group of three rocks at about that distance, a few degrees west of your position. Sending now.” He presses the button, sending the info to the scope; Twenties will now be able to see the direction he needs to adjust his weapon inside the scope itself. With this spot-share technology, a comfortable spotter/sniper legionnaire team can wreak havoc on enemy forces, dropping targets from extreme distances almost as fast as they can pull a trigger.
Twenties slowly moves the rifle. “I see it. Lieutenant, will you call out my test fire?”
Usually this would go out over the L-comm, but orders were to shut the frequency off, so I yell down to the soldiers below, “Range fire!”
“Range fire!”
“… Range fire!”
The warning carries down the line. Twenties waits until the calls die down, then fires at something so far away I can’t even see it.
“First try,” observes the spotter. “Nice shot.”
“Thanks.”
“Good shooting as always, Twenties.” I key in my comm to open a secure channel with him. “I want you to send me reports of whatever you see. I’m also going to have Sergeant Powell link up with you. If I give you any company-wide orders, you relay them to him.”
“Understood, sir.”
***
I walk beneath the stars, just finishing up my inspection of the line. It’s another freezing night, and I’ve been moving as quickly as possible in an attempt to get my limbs warmed up. But now I stop and crane my neck upward to stare into the brilliant Kublaren night sky. There’s nothing out here. No flashing holo ads, no buzz of lights. Instead of the constant din of noise you find on most populated worlds and city centers, there’s just… silence. I can hear soldiers roll over in their sleep. It’s striking how spending time where it’s still and clear and wild impacts you. I’d put nights like these—minus the gathering army marching our way—right up at the top of the list of what’s best about serving in the Republic military machine. You can barely find places like this in the Mid-Core, and with a few rare exceptions, the Core worlds only offer an escape from metropolises for those with enough credits to afford it. But if you become a legionnaire, you get to see pristine beauty without having to make a single transaction.
Though you might pay by a blaster bolt through the head.
I stare at the stars a moment longer, wondering which one will be the point from which our relief comes. Wondering if this is the last time I’ll get to take in a majestic view like I’m enjoying now.
“Comin’ in,” I whisper before dropping down into my trench. I pull out my mags and sweep the horizon. Still no sign of koobs.
Masters pushes himself up to a sitting position, his back against the trench wall, and adjusts his blanket.
I turn to look down at him. “Your watch doesn’t start for another fifteen. You can go back to sleep.”
The legionnaire pours water from his canteen and drops a caff-tab into the cup. The water darkens and bubbles, heating in an instant to two hundred degrees. “No thanks, Lieutenant. If I go back to sleep now I’ll just be even more tired when I really do have to wake up.”
He offers me the cup. I take it and let the steam warm up the tip of my nose.
He prepares a cup of coffee for himself. “Any sign of the koobs?”
“Not so far,” I say, setting down my field mags so I can hold my warm cup between both hands. “The ETA we calculated for them passed a few hours ago.”
“Maybe they got lost.”
I laugh, sending ripples through the black coffee. “It is pretty dark out.”
My comm chimes with an incoming message. “Hang on,” I say to Masters. I turn on my headset. “Go for Chhun.”
Twenties’s voice comes to me in a whisper. “Pretty sure I see movement through the scope. Didn’t want to wake up Maldorn if I don’t have to. Will you take a look?”
I pick up my mags and search beyond our lines.
“Are they here?” Masters whispers.
“Maybe,” I answer in a hushed tone. “Okay Twenties, where am I looking?”
“Focus in on the lone peak. North-northwest.”
The mags sweep across the barren landscape until a lone mountain comes into view, pointed like a wizard’s hat. “I’m oriented.”
“Continue west another thirty degrees.”
I do as Twenties says, and I’m looking at a series of boulders—not exactly the sort of terrain an armada of trucks would drive through. I watch in silence, involuntarily holding my breath, waiting for something to happen. There are no vehicles… no anything.
“There!” Twenties calls calmly over the comm. “Did you see that?”
I did. Or at least, I think I did. I focus my mags in. We’re not exactly alone on Kublar—there are a number of nocturnal predators and prey. Twenties could have seen a jaghound loping along a game trail, or one of the many rodent-like insectoids scurrying for shelter from some unseen threat. I purse my lips, ready to set my mags down, when from behind one of the boulders I see a humanoid form peek out.
“Yeah. I see it. Looks humanoid.”
The figure slowly reveals more of its body, until it’s clear of the boulder. It’s walking in a crouch, carrying something in its arms. A blaster rifle. Soon more humanoids emerge, imitating the lead creature’s stealthy motions.
I save the field position in my mags. “Twenties, hold fire. I’m going to call this in to Captain Ford.”
<
br /> I key my comm to Wraith’s direct channel.
“Go for Vic-1. You see something, Lieutenant Chhun?”
“Yes, sir.” I tell my mags to transmit the image and position through the secure channel. “Just sent you a still and the spot. Twenties has them on overwatch.”
“That’s them all right.”
I nudge Masters with the toe of my boot. He’s already primed, his rifle ready and the blanket stowed. “Start waking everyone up,” I say. “Keep them quiet.”
Masters hops out of the trench and moves slowly, shaking basics and leejes awake.
Wraith’s voice comes back over the comm. “Let’s get everyone primed.”
“Already on it.” I’m looking through my mags, following the enemy movement. More silent commandos are shuffling toward us, though they’re still well out of blaster fire. Twenties is probably the only leej who could dust them at this distance.
“Good. I’ll transmit the location to all the leej HUDs. Good thing Kreggak wasn’t given a bucket, just an L-comm.”
“Tiny blessings,” I say dryly. “Should I have Twenties identify targets and take some of them out?”
There’s a pause before Wraith answers. “Not yet. As good as Twenties is, he won’t dust more than a dozen before they retreat behind those rocks. Let’s see if they get close enough for the sleds and blaster rifles to eat them up. I’d like to take as many as possible in round one.”
I nod, though Wraith isn’t there to see it. “Understood, sir. I’ll have the men ready to fire on your command.”
“On your command,” corrects Wraith. “You’re going to have a better position. The line will wait for your section to open up, and then we’ll join.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Vic-1, out. KTF.”
Masters hops down into the trench, causing me to jump back and reach for my pistol. “Oba, Masters. Don’t do that.”
The kid rubs the back of his helmet. “Sorry, sir. I got the word out. Everyone’s up, waiting for orders. What do you want me—” He stops suddenly, listening.
I look at him. “What’s up?”
“Orders just came in. Text string since there’s no L-comms. We’ve got the spots on our HUD, and we’re to hold fire until you give the order. How will the men know when you give the order?”
“They’ll hear you start shooting.” I key Twenties on my comm.
“Go for Twenties,” comes the quiet voice of my sniper.
“Okay, Captain Ford wants us to take the first shots once they’re close enough that we can do some damage with the sleds and rifles.”
“Yes, sir,” whispers Twenties in reply. “Maldorn was just reading it to me from his HUD. Are you watching them right now?”
“Not yet.” I pull up my mags. “What’s up?”
“See how there are two waves spread out and coming our way?”
Through the night vision, I see a fanned-out force creeping steadily closer. A second wave moves behind them, keeping its distance. “Yeah, I see it.”
“Well, it looks to me like that second group are humping mortars. They’re grouped in threes, two of ’em carrying something, the third with what looks like a rucksack on. Probably the bombs.”
“They’re gonna try and soften us up before that first wave attempts an overrun.”
“That’s my guess,” Twenties says. “I can start picking ’em off. Maldorn says the other snipers in the unit each have a mortar crew painted on the HUD. We can dust ’em right now…”
A deep breath escapes my lungs. “Keep your focus on them. But don’t dust them yet. I want those other koobs in closer before we let them know that we see them. Wait until the last possible second.”
“Yes, sir.”
I watch as the first wave gathers closer. They begin to slow down and look back through the darkness in the direction of their counterparts. I tear my eyes away to look up and down the line. The turrets are manned, and every soldier present has his weapon aimed and ready to fire. I’m sure if my bucket was on, I’d see which legionnaire was painting which koob so that as many targets as possible go down with the first trigger pulls.
I go back to the mags, my elbows resting on the edge of the trench. Masters stands next to me, following his own target through his N-4’s holographic sight. “Masters,” I whisper, “I want you to open up the moment Twenties shoots.”
“Copy.”
The three-koob mortar crews stop moving. Each group begins setting up their base plate, unrolling their cache of bombs, and fixing their firing tube’s bipod. But the front line continues to inch closer, rifles held at the low ready. I’m chewing the inside of my mouth so furiously that I can taste blood.
The mortar team I’m watching—the one Twenties spotted for me—finishes setting up. One of them grabs a mortar round and holds it above the tube. Its air sac inflates, and a sharp, piercing croak fills the night air. The advancing koobs halt, and the alien I’m watching grabs hold of the tube with its free hand to load the mortar.
An explosion of gore plays out on my field mags as the koob’s head explodes. The round tumbles harmlessly to the ground. I hear the krak-bdew from Twenties a microsecond later.
“Open up!” I scream.
Masters is shooting before I’ve finished my sentence, and then every legionnaire is firing his N-4. The snipers are multiplying this overwhelming force with their N-18s, picking apart confused mortar teams still desperately trying to get a round launched toward us. Then the sled gunners catch up.
Dat-dat-dat-dat!
The dark veil of night is lifted as brilliant light from the blaster bolts illuminates the battlefield. My mags immediately adjust for the light source, protecting my eyes from being dazzled.
The first wave of koobs, the entire advance line, is taken completely by surprise. Within sixty standard seconds they’re cut down and out of the fight. Maybe one hundred fighters, and most of them never even had the chance to shoot back.
KTF.
It’s a different story with the mortar crews. The snipers picked them apart and sent them running, but not before they had the chance to get a few rounds off.
“Incoming!”
We brace ourselves against our dugout walls, then return to the surface upon hearing the rounds land. Koob calibrations were off, and the mortars impacted behind the line of the dead koob wave. Maybe they were just panicky. It would be hard not to be when everyone in front of you dies in the span of a minute and the buddies to your left and right are exploding before they can even hear the blaster round that hits them.
Broken and routed, the last of the koob mortar crews turn and run. Our snipers drop them with pinpoint accuracy, rounds tearing through their backs. At last, only one remains, still a long way from the protection of the rocks. The calls for a ceasefire travel along our line, as he’s out of most of our ranges. So we watch.
The koob stops, turns, and sees the trail of righteous judgment behind it. He stands there, as if stupefied—then falls over sideways after an N-18 round blows off his left arm at the shoulder.
“Holy strokes,” Masters says, vapor rising from the barrel of his rifle. “Those koobs just got wrecked. Man, it’s gonna stink tomorrow. I hope the wind blows the other way.”
My headset chimes, and Wraith’s voice comes online. “Lieutenant Chhun, nice work. Tell the men to reactivate the L-comms.”
“Copy.” I relay the order to Masters, then climb out of my trench. Fast-walking along the line I shout, “Turn on your L-comms!”
“Turn on your L-comms!”
“… Turn on your L-comms!”
The order is sent down the line, traveling faster by word of mouth than my two feet could hope to move.
“Excellent work, men,” Wraith says over the L-comm. “The entire enemy probe is destroyed. Chieftain Kreggak, I assume you’re listening in. Your Kublarens aren’t coming back. Consider this a courtesy call so you don’t stay up too late waiting for them. I suggest you refrain from any further attacks, unless yo
u’re looking to rule over a tribe of graves.”
The chieftain growls out an answer. “K-k-k… We will see, leejon-ayer. Maybe you big die?”
“Maybe,” Wraith concedes, his voice calm and even. “But you won’t see it. My snipers have visual scans of you and all your accompanying elders. Our battle tech will find you out of a sea of ten thousand koobs. Their orders are to blow your heads off the moment they spot you.”
Kreggak must’ve had Wraith set to external message, because a hubbub of koob croaking erupts in the background. I think our captain touched a nerve.
A new voice comes over the comm. Human. “What is your designation, legionnaire?”
“LS-33,” Wraith replies. “I take it you’re with the MCR?”
“I am,” the voice confirms. “General Vantage Poll.”
“The Republic does not acknowledge military rank among insurgents. That said, you will be given the most lenient terms deemed reasonable by me should you surrender your force now.”
“And what terms might those be?”
“The Kublarens will disarm and return to their villages. All non-Kublaren species not claiming the rank of officer will disarm and surrender. They will be tried as insurgents by a court of the House of Reason. All self-proclaimed MCR officers will be executed by legionnaire firing squad. Should you refuse, your entire force will be destroyed.”
Poll laughs into the comm. “Legionnaire, I think you overestimate your strength. It is I who should offer terms of surrender, not that the MCR has any such intentions. We have, after all, destroyed your planetary base as well as your Capital ship. You are in no position to dictate terms to the Mid-Core Rebellion.”
Wraith is unfazed. “I need an answer now, or the offer will be retracted.”
“I’m afraid I must decline. I am, however, willing to—”
“Acknowledged,” Wraith interrupts. “Legionnaires, prepare to destroy the insurgents and their koob allies at the first opportunity. KTF.”
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