No Mercy (Blood War Book 4)

by Rod Carstens

  Monnetal turned to Kat and said, “You will be my point person on this as soon as the war is over.”

  “Sir, you said you wanted me here because I would speak the truth to you. With all due respect, these economic and breed divisions run too deep. We’ll never get everybody on board. There will be systems and planets that will just refuse to accept something like this.”

  “Then they will no longer enjoy the protection of the Confederation.”

  “You can’t do that, sir!”

  “When we win this battle, the Xotoli will leave, but they will be back, and we have to start to prepare for their return the day after we’re victorious. I will have a mandate like no one in history, and I intend to use it to bring together those who are willing. If others can’t be convinced, then they will be left to themselves.”

  “Sir, this is all moot if the Xotoli win. Shouldn’t you be concentrating on what’s happening above us, and not some future that may not happen?” Usiche said.

  Monnetal looked at Usiche for a moment, then said, “Admiral, you’re a military leader. Your job is to worry about the battle. I’m not about to discuss tactics, so I’ll do what any political leader in this situation has to do. I’ll worry about what comes after the war. If we lose, there is no future, but I don’t think that is going to happen. So I’ll do my job, and I suggest that you stick to yours right now.”

  Usiche exchanged a glance with Kat. She too looked shocked at Monnetal’s words.

  “Now everyone, listen. Your job is to win this battle so we can prepare to defeat the Xotoli once and for all. We will kill this Askars and they will leave, but they will be back. According to our Lieutenant Netis they have never been beaten before, so the next Xotoli leader will want to return and defeat us. My job is to think past the moment, no matter how dire it looks, and to plan for the future of the Confederation. Now get back to your jobs while I worry about what I’m supposed to worry about, and you worry about winning this battle.”

  He motioned for Kat, and the two walked away from the others, deep in conversation. He was right, of course. If they won this battle, the Xotoli would leave. But they would be back, and the next time they would understand their foe better. The better you understood your enemy, the better your chances of defeating them.

  Usiche stared at the tactical display as the individual Raiders raced down streets, headed for the defenses above. It reminded her of Rift and the stand Sand and the Legionnaires had made to save the day. It looked like he was going to have to pull off another miracle.

  Her practical mind could see no way he could do it and she had lost the initiative in space. She could only hope that Monnetal was right.

  Chapter 57

  City-State of New York

  Phase Line Red

  Fenes had heard the call to fall back to the Alamo positions. His tactical display put them in a line of Megas on 44th Street. The Megas in this part of the city were connected at a number of heights by walkways. He was standing on one between two Megas, forty stories above the ground. He had hybrids at his front and Times Square at his back, with Xotoli trying to get there through the tunnels.

  He wasn't sure how to place his people, given the situation. Would the Xotoli emerge from those tunnels and attack his rear? Or was his biggest threat from the hybrids to his front? He decided to fight the fight he knew. The hybrids had been trying to find a way through their lines, and he knew they wouldn’t stop. Fighting the Xotoli was the Raiders’ job. His was to hold this position.

  The tactical showed Ardan and his platoon below and to his right flank, him in the middle with first platoon, and Minga to his left. Bravo, Charlie, and Delta Companies joined Alpha to create a line along 44th Street—long enough that he didn’t think the hybrids could outflank them. But he didn’t like this complex of buildings. There were just too many ways to move around in this 3-D environment. The hybrids could be above, below, or on the same level. He decided to occupy his portion of the line with his own little 360-degree perimeter.

  He pulled up his schematic of the area and saw that there was a cache twenty floors below. He would pull Ardan and Minga in and form their own little Alamo while keeping in contact with his flanks.

  “Ardan, Minga.”

  “Yeah, boss.”

  “Go.”

  “Do you see that cache on the thirty-third floor? That is going to be the center of our own Alamo. We’re going to establish a perimeter around it and make our stand. Ardan, you stay on the right, and Minga, you stay on the left. We’ll bend your flanks back until we link up.”

  “Roger”

  “Roger.”

  “Holman, you hear that?”

  “Right, boss.”

  “Let’s get them moving.”

  “I’ve been scouting around, and the emergency stairs might be the best way. They’re in the middle of the building and away from any outside walls.”

  “Sounds good. Lead on.”

  Fenes fell into line near the rear of his platoon as Holman led the way down the stairs. She had grown into a good NCO, even if she didn’t want to be. He’d had a feeling back on the Tarawa that she would be a handful. Some of the best fighters in the conscripts were turning out to be the ones with the most checkered pasts. She certainly fit that bill.

  They had been moving steadily down with no problems when Ardan came over the comm. “Contact, contact!”

  Fenes glanced at his tactical. Since Ardan had been below him, he was closer to the cache, and sure enough that was where the fight was going on—right next to the cache with all the ammunition and weapons they would need. Ardan was facing a large number of hybrids, with his back to the cache. The hybrids were coming from their left flank. He couldn’t just go down the stairs. The best thing to do was get over the hybrids and drop on them.

  “Minga, reinforce Ardan. I’m going to drop in on the fight from a floor above.”

  “Roger that,” Minga said.

  “Holman, find us the best spot to drop in.”

  “Check, boss.”

  They jumped down a floor at a time, trying to get close enough to cross over and drop in.

  Holman stopped and said, “Here, boss.”

  “We’re three stories above Ardan.”

  “We’re not going to make those last two floors without the hybrids detecting us. We need to do it here.”

  “Check.”

  Fenes reached the thirty-fifth floor and found Holman standing in the middle of a large apartment, staring down. Fenes double-checked their position, and she was right on the money. He could see Minga almost at Ardan’s position. The hybrids were pressing them hard.

  “Okay, by twos. Holman and me first. Hand-to-hand weapons.”

  “Two holes, boss. Or it will take too long for all of us.”

  Holman organized the rest of the platoon while Fenes checked on the firefight below them. Ardan’s platoon was falling back, even with Minga beginning to take up positions with them.

  “Right Holman. We gotta go,” Fenes said.

  Holman threw the first two shaped charges onto the floor, and they exploded with a huge blast, throwing debris downward into the apartment below. He threw his shaped charges through the holes to the floor below. Again, the explosions and two holes in the floor.

  He immediately stepped through into the void and fell two stories to land on top of a hybrid. It flattened under his weight, and he rolled off of it and was on his feet. Holman stayed right behind him, followed by the rest of the platoon. The explosions had done more damage than he could have hoped. The hybrids were staggering around, blood streaming from numerous wounds. They were all spike troops, and their light armor had not protected them from the blasts. Fenes faced one whose face was a bloody mess. He put his pistol to its head and blew it off. He caught another with his ax through the back of its head and turned to find a third trying to stand. He killed it with a shot through the faceplate. Then were none. It was over that quick.

  “Holman, get a head count.”<
br />
  As Holman did a quick head count, he turned to link up with Ardan and Minga. That was when he saw that Ardan was down, and his suit was blinking between red and black. Fenes ran to the next room, stepping on hybrid bodies. Ardan was down, and Minga and some of his troops were standing around him. There were three dead hybrids laid out in front of him.

  “He told me to link up with Minga, and he would hold the rear,” one of his troops said.

  “I should’ve stayed with him,” another said.

  Fenes had to fight back tears. They had been together since they were both arrested, through boot camp and Chika. Now this. It wasn’t fair. He was the nicest guy. His suit blinked red, then turned black. First Striker, now Ardan. Who would be next?

  With that thought he remembered that he had a company spread over half a floor. He cleared his throat. “You two take his body to the cache. Minga, Holman, get the perimeter set. The war is not going to stop because we lost a friend. Now move.”

  Fenes hoped that his voice didn’t let his emotions show. Tears streamed down his face as he moved the troops into their new positions. He was glad his helmet was down so they couldn’t see him crying.

  Chapter 58

  North Subway

  South Line

  Car 98

  Ciao Bach pushed the ancient subway car to its limits as he headed south toward the southern end of his line. He had to pick up another load of offworlders and get them to safety, away from the battle that was going on overhead. Ciao was a Procyon who had been sold by his family to a Sol family as a servant when he was a child. He’d run away from them as soon as he was old enough to take care of himself. He hated the arrogant Sols, who’d used him to do the most menial and degrading jobs they could find. The oldest son used to hide and jump out and hit him as hard as he could as an amusement. The parents had only laughed and said how clever he was to hide and scare the help.

  After several years of this, Ciao had gotten as big as the oldest son. When the parents were away, he had been tormenting him all day until he had enough. The next time he jumped out to scare him, Ciao caught him in midair and smashed him against the wall.

  “No more, ever!”

  The older boy with his feet dangling in the air all he could do was shake his head. That night Ciao packed what little he owned and went below ground. He never returned above ground. He found ways to grind out a living among the other offworlders who had chosen to live in the old subways. Law enforcement looked the other way or was paid off, because it benefited the Sols for their hired help to have a way to get to work.

  After years of saving and working on the trains, Ciao had been able to buy his own car, and he had lived and worked in it until he now had two cabs one northbound and one southbound with three passenger cars. He was one of the biggest train owners in the subways.

  But now all of that was at risk. The aliens were invading, and he feared and hated them more than the Sols. Even in the subways, the news of Rift and the other battles had filtered down. Now they were here, and the battle was above them. He knew they had landed in Central Park and were pushing south toward his home station. Offworlders knew what was happening better than most Sols. If you didn’t, you didn’t survive.

  The Sols had evacuated, leaving the offworlders to fend for themselves. He had been making runs as far north as the tunnels would let him and dropping people off—he hoped far enough away to be safe. He knew about the fighting in and around Central Park. He could even feel the vibrations when he passed under it. And the word was the aliens were all over Long Island, so he couldn’t go south.

  He pushed the throttle forward, going as fast as his car could move. The offworlders had long ago tapped into the power lines, and he had all the power he could use, but he had been saving for a refurbished motor and the train was showing her age. He stood at the window of his train staring down the track, the two levers in his hand. He had painted the Procyon flag on the flat front of his car under the number 3682, which had been his number as a servant. He approached his home station and found hundreds of men, women, and children crowded into it, waiting for his train. Offworlders knew one thing if they knew nothing else: they had to depend on each other because they had no one else. So the hundreds of people had organized themselves into lines with women and children first and the males behind.

  Ciao slowed to a stop in the station and opened the doors. People began to move in an orderly fashion onto the cars. As they were boarding he saw something south down the line. It was vague at first—the headlights in the southbound cab weren’t as good as the ones in his northbound cab. The light was more yellow than white. Something was moving down the line, something big. The faint light reflected off something black. People were still pouring onto the train when he thought he saw what looked like a human body hanging limply from something he still couldn’t make out. There was more movement, things in the dark. They were all big.

  Something threw the human body against the wall, then emerged into his headlights. It looked like something from a bad video—eight feet tall or taller, covered in black armor. Its head looked like someone’s nightmare of an alien skull, all angles and edges. Ciao realized he was looking at an alien, and his heart about came out of his chest.

  The alien held a small girl’s body by a foot, casually. When it saw Ciao’s car, it threw her against the wall, killing her if she was not already dead. It appeared to be covered with human blood. Its huge rifle was slung across its back, and it carried a large, axlike weapon. More and more aliens slowly came into view. They all looked alike. His nightmare was growing larger.

  As they slowly moved toward him, Ciao glanced back and saw that people were still boarding his train. They had not seen the aliens yet, and they were almost to the station. Ciao could count at least eight of them in the darkness. He heard a scream as someone else finally saw them.

  “Aliens!”

  The organized boarding of his train turned into a flight for their lives. Those in the station ran for the steps leading to the surface. Those on the train pushed and shoved their way off back onto the station’s platform as they desperately tried to get away from the aliens. One alien then another jumped faster than Ciao had thought possible onto the platform. They began swinging those axes, cutting men, women, and children to pieces. They would pick someone up by a limb and casually throw them against the wall to kill them. They were slow and methodical as they did this. Eventually all eight had weighed in on the massacre.

  Ciao crouched in his cab, shaking with fear and helplessness. He put his hands over his ears to try and keep the screaming out, but it didn’t work. Then he remembered that he was a Procyon. If they did this to the Sols, what would they do to Procyon when they finished with Sol? If he had learned anything from being around Sols, it was that they were humans, and these aliens seemed determined to kill off the humans no matter where they found them. He was witnessing the horror they wanted to bring to the whole human race.

  Blood was running in streams off the platform. They had killed almost all of the people trapped there. He was about to die, he knew it. Suddenly a calm came over him. There was no way out, but he could choose how he did die, and he chose to die fighting. He peeked over his console and saw more aliens walking down the tunnel. He noticed that they were careful not to touch the third rail. Even aliens couldn’t stand that much electricity. Ciao reached up and hit the magnetic release for the cars behind him. Now the motor only had to push his cab. He switched on the motor and stood at his controls, then rammed his throttle forward, and the cab raced toward the aliens. They too had their rifles slung over their backs, and axes like those that had just jumped onto the platform.

  Ciao was not a warrior. Hell, the only time he had put hands on someone was when he stopped that little piece of shit from picking on him. But he was human. He felt what men in his position must have felt for thousands of years as they faced a foe—rage and fury that he hadn’t known he was capable of until now. He had read history in his o
ff time, and he knew about the berserkers who had run into battle naked, screaming for blood. For the first time in his life he felt that ancient fury rise through him. He would avenge the men and women he had just seen slaughtered.

  “Ahhhhhhhhhh!” he screamed as the subway car gathered speed. He had never seen it go so fast. It was as if it too understood what was happening.

  The aliens seemed caught by surprise. They stood there for a couple of seconds as the subway car raced toward them. Then they realized this thing actually was a threat. They began to scramble to get out of the way. One stumbled and its foot touched the third rail. Its armor glowed, and it twitched as electricity coursed through its huge body. The others were too big to completely get out of the way of the cab. The car hit the first alien in the arm, tearing it off, then slicing through its leg. The cab stayed on the tracks as it hit more and more of them, knocking them down or crushing a leg or arm beneath its wheels.

  Ciao couldn’t believe it. He had survived the first line of aliens and was still alive, racing down the track. As he approached the next station, there were many more aliens on the platform and a large number gathered on the track. The car gained speed. They turned as one when they heard it approach. One fired that huge rifle, but the round missed him and just went through the length of the car. He was too close for them to stop him or get out of the way. There were so many that it was like he was driving into a crowd. He struck the first and the car left the tracks. Ciao could hear grinding and crunching as it ran over alien after alien. His cab crushed in on him and Ciao was trapped as the metal mangled his legs and finally his torso. Blood streaming from his mouth, he looked up into the face of an alien who was looking down at him. He couldn’t tell what it was thinking. Its armor hid any emotions if it had them.