by JR Handley
Every death will be avenged become her mantra as Sashala alternated among her carbine, assault cutters, and secondary bladed weapons. Whenever the enemy gave her the breathing room, she unslung the carbine and began sniping every insurgent she could see. She preferred getting in close, ducking under the reach of the larger insurgent Marines and cutting into the weak spots on their older combat armor. Since the dawn of warfare, the neck, groin, and joints were susceptible to targeted strikes. While she stuck by Lance’s side to protect him, she’d frequently dart out into the enemy lines to kill another enemy. Immediately after the insurgent went down, Sashala would pull back into her own lines.
The 6907th was fighting to break out of the buildings and make towards the walls of New Detroit when the enemy counter-attacked. The unexpected charge by Spartika’s insurgents pushed the 6907th back towards the sally ports. Pacing up and down the line, Sashala guarded her commander as he urged his Marines to stand their ground. Just when she began to fear the worst, with the line pushed back towards the open field in the center of the city, the enemy charge began to wane. Inspired by the slowing enemy presence, the 6907th charged back over the ground they’d lost. Many of the wounded shambled back to their feet, staggering forward to rejoin their brethren, and the Spartika’s forces began retreating towards their walls.
With renewed vigor, the Legion pushed onward. They pressed the enemy through several streets, towards the walls. Their charge often caught the insurgents oriented in the wrong direction, as the regiments of the task force operated independently to take their assigned sections of the walls. The shock of the Legion’s unexpected appearance within the city was gone, but it seemed to have demoralized the defending forces.
Even with the enemy’s stout defense and valiant counter-attack, Sashala knew the 6907th had it easy. They were aided by Task Force Justice pushing into the enemy from the other side of their shared front. The enemy on their front was weakened by assaults from both sides. The other regiments in her own task force, Task Force Vengeance, were fighting an enemy without that benefit. Their death tolls told the story of how difficult the fight was.
“Lance, they’re weakening on our front. Send out the battalions on our flanks to support the other regiments.”
He didn’t answer her directly, but she listened to him issuing orders on the command channels on the LBNet. Almost instantly, their flanks began pushing outwards, and the remaining two battalions at the center of the regiment’s lines started spreading out. The battalions pushed outwards to pick up the slack, leaving Lance with only the two squads of empty combat suits to protect him. They were still synched and controlled by Xena, and there’d been no attempted cyber-attacks.
Worried about Lance’s smaller protection detail, Sashala ordered Jade to keep her updated on his combat armor shield wall. Jade had the information displayed before she completed her request. The empty combat suits were slowly thinning out, and the insurgents were again attempting to push through the weak spot on their line of battle. Sashala jumped into action, dodging and weaving among the enemy as she stabbed with her knives. When she’d cleared the enemy from the immediate vicinity, she sheathed her bladed weapons and unslung her carbine. A quick flick of her right thumb activated the assault thrusters, and she began sending sabots downrange. The entire command staff was attempting to create a wall of deadly sabots to protect their commander. It didn’t seem to be making enough of a dent; the enemy’s armor did too excellent a job protecting them. It took multiple hits to bring them down, while the unarmored enemy died in the opening salvo. The insurgents that remained were as heavily armored as they were, albeit in older models.
Sashala continued firing her carbine, raining sabots into the enemy charging towards them. They seemed to be abandoning the walls to attack the 6907th’s position. Maybe they’re running from Nhlappo, she thought to herself. She fought on until she saw Lance sling his carbine and grab his frakking blade. Not again! He took off before she could yell at him to stand his ground and not do anything stupid. Another wild countercharge into the enemy ranks. Cursing to herself, she started to follow him, but her path was blocked by an insurgent looming over her.
Sashala tried to dodge left, but the enemy lunged forward with his assault cutters, rebuffing her attack. She barely moved out of the way in time, the blue glowing monofilament fibers leaving marks on her combat armor. Given their sheer size difference, she knew she couldn’t let this fight drag out. She quickly feinted to the left again, using her forward momentum to stab through the enemy’s foot. She couldn’t pull her carbine out, so she abandoned the weapon and pulled out her blades while she continued forward motion.
Sliding between the enemy’s legs, Sashala repeatedly stabbed up into the unprotected groin before she came out behind him. She jumped to her feet and used her blades to stab the enemy’s throat, taking advantage of the weak neck joint in the ACE-2 Combat Armor. While the enemy died at her feet, Sashala began scanning the field for her commander. She saw him, surrounded by the surging enemy, and rushed to help.
It was easy to keep track of Lance this time, as he stood next to Major Kaden Roy. The strange man wore his brilliant white armor, which seemed to reflect light and shine like a beacon. They stood back-to-back against one of the wall’s gray polycrete guard buildings. They kept just enough space between them to allow them to maneuver against the enemy, who recognized the rank beacon Lance hadn’t turned off. Sashala pushed through the swarming enemy, desperate to reach Lance in time to save him from himself. She screamed her frustration into her helmet as she watched Kaden get stabbed in his gut, falling to the ground. The two of them had made it to the walls but couldn’t get up the ramp to walk the defenses.
She ran harder. She ducked, dodged, feinted, and weaved, desperately using every trick she knew as she danced a deadly path into the heart of the enemy seeking to overwhelm the two stranded Marines. Sashala fought harder than she’d ever fought before, struggling to reach Lance and protect him. It started as merely a job, one assigned by Field Marshal Marchewka, but the more she fell in love with Lance, the more seriously she felt the compunction to keep the frakker alive.
Ducking to avoid the butt of an enemy carbine that almost hit her in the face, Sashala felt the burning sensation of a sabot cutting into her flesh. It had penetrated her weakened flank, a gift from the insurgent who’d tried skewering her with his cutters. He’d managed to weaken her armor before she killed him. Now Sashala had to roll under the last insurgent, coming into the circle where a few other Marines from the command staff were fighting to pull Lance and the wounded Kaden back to their lines.
Sashala kept firing her carbine until it began clicking. Frakk, it’s empty, she thought. She bent down and grabbed a replacement off the last dead enemy, and debated reloading. She was out of sabots, and leery about letting her guard down long enough to reload. Deciding to risk it, she quickly dropped to one knee and began the steps to swap out the ammunition carousel on her SA-71 carbine. While she was distracted, and not protecting Lance’s rear, an enemy managed to get in close to her commander. He was about to thrust his assault cutters into the neck of the wounded Kaden when Sergeant Major Thorn pushed through the enemies encircling the 6907th’s command staff. Diving forward, Thorn took the thrust meant for Kaden in his chest.
Fearing the loss of their beloved commander, the rest of the regiment rushed in to push the enemy back. Safely behind their regiment, Lance dropped to a knee next to Sashala and held his mentor’s hand. After Lance removed Thorn’s helmet, Sashala saw Thorn was coughing blood.
Sash, he isn’t going to make it, said Jade. Do what you can for his final moments, but then you have a battle to finish.
Knowing he’d willingly made the sacrifice for his fellow Marine brought Sashala a little relief, but it wasn’t enough. She reached over and took Lance’s helmet off, giving him a moment to say his goodbyes to Thorn. She ordered Jade to record the conversation, in case Lance or Thorn’s daughter wanted it, as she quickly fini
shed swapping out the ammunition carousel. She didn’t want to be left unprepared, so she kept her weapon at the low ready. She missed much of the first half of Lance’s conversation with Thorn but caught the ending.
“Mate with my daughter. Protect her,” the dying Thorn said, coughing up blood. “Tie Cristal’s star to yours,” he urged.
What surprised her more was the solemn assurances Lance offered him, promising to do just that. What the frakk is he thinking? she fumed to herself. He could’ve given the dying man some non-committal assurances. He most assuredly did not have to emphatically agree. I certainly won’t stand for such garbage occurring right in front of my frakkin’ face.
— Chapter 81 —
Early Afternoon, Post-Revival Day 220
New Detroit City, Baylshore
Commander, Task Force Justice, Human Legion
The explosion that blew the gate off the hinges and opened a way through into New Detroit City was massive and took a portion of the surrounding wall with it. Field Marshal Nhlappo took no pleasure in the update from Gabrielle that insurgent Marines had died, crushed under the weight of the gate as it landed on them. This was war. It wasn’t one she would’ve chosen, but she wasn’t prepared to lose, either. They had to breach the walls to claim the city, and the sooner, the better.
Taking a look around, she momentarily regretting building the city to be so easily defended by relatively small numbers. The walls were meters thick, constructed of dark stone from the nearby mountains and reinforced with polycrete. Then she’d surrounded the outer walls with interlocking layers of trenches, creating a defense in depth. The only way into the city, besides from old Detroit, was through the massive doors, which were designed to fall onto themselves if they were blown, preventing them from falling open. It wasn’t perfect, making the gates the weak points. But the angles had to be right, and her engineers had to be on their game when they planned the controlled detonations.
The breach hadn’t occurred where they’d planned to enter the city, and the first attempt to blow the gate in their assigned sector had gone wrong. The mishap caused the gate to fall in on itself, preventing access. When the engineers suggested breaching their secondary gate would be quicker, Nhlappo took the advice, and the survivors of her task force ran several klicks to the next entrance. That attempt worked precisely as intended, and their path into New Detroit City was clear. With the gates down, she strode calmly into the city, her army following her like a triumphal procession of old.
Nhlappo chose to ignore the sabots that flew at her from the clustered enemy, standing resolutely in the face of her foe. She roared her triumph when she finally re-entered the city she had built. She silently dared the enemy to try killing her. Inside her helmet, she was screaming curses until the veins on her forehead popped. Once the moment passed, she began directing Task Force Justice units towards where she saw clustered insurgent forces. She occasionally felt the ping of sabots ricocheting off her armor, but chose to ignore it. Her zealous desire to crush Spartika’s forces once and for all was too strong.
She kept turning her head, scanning the battle that played out in front of her as she looked for new weak points. Noticing a pattern, Nhlappo saw the enemy was contracting inwards. Her task force had just completely entered the city and was forming up near the open space between the walls and the buildings that made up the city. Her forces began linking up with smaller units from Scipio’s task force, and Nhlappo happily assumed command of them. She wasn’t sure what regiment they were in, but she could tell they weren’t the 6907th and put the thought out of her mind. All of the Legion Marines in Tranquility were hers, as far as she was concerned. When her force pressed into the city, she saw clusters of the enemy huddled behind the buildings in front of them. They were hugging whatever cover they could find from the relentless Legion sabot fire.
“Surrender, and you’ll live! Spartika isn’t worth dying for,” she roared at the insurgents.
Her AI, Gabrielle, repeated the message on a loop as they kept pushing the enemy back. Slowly, it began having a positive effect, and small groups of enemies started surrendering. Not sure what to do with them, Nhlappo turned the processing of captured enemy forces over to her senior NCO.
“Anderson, don’t let them sucker punch us, but save all of them you can. If they can be put to work for the Legion, I want them.”
After she received an acknowledgment to her orders, Nhlappo was shocked by his specific plans.
“Roger, Field Marshal. I’ll just strip them naked, take away their weapons, and have them hoof it to the collection point at the Alabama Depot.”
“But we didn’t leave any Marines at the depot,” she countered.
There was a moment of brief laughter that followed before it was cut off. It was the only answer she received. Not wanting to waste any more time on the issue, she focused on keeping up the pressure of the assault. They were clearing the city, rounding up the remaining isolated clusters of insurgents. She and her task force fought desperately to keep the pressure up, preventing them from regrouping. Nhlappo knew that as long as the Legion kept the battlefield chaotic, they’d win. She had to win. Her son’s soul demanded it of her.
She knew her task force was benefiting from the pandemonium Task Force Vengeance was creating inside the city. Wanting to maximize the dual front, she began coordinating with Colonel Scipio’s AI, Xena. Nhlappo needed both task forces to keep the carnage up, and she knew they needed to use their digital intelligence to do it. Times like this made her regret some of the frailties of the human body and mind.
Targets assigned, the Legion winnowed down the remaining pockets of resistance. They finally broke the enemy and put them on the run. Maximizing the enemy’s retreat, Nhlappo urged her Marines to keep up the momentum. Scanning the field, she realized Spartika’s forces weren’t just on the run from the battle, they were in a full-scale rout. They seemed to have lost all unit cohesion, with every man looking out for himself.
“Let them run. Take the city,” she yelled over the open Legion LBNet.
With the enemy on the run, Nhlappo began to fear that Spartika would escape justice. Confident her subordinate commanders could handle the wrap-up, she grabbed the nearest squad of Marines.
“Sergeant Colchester, grab your squad. We’re hunting Spartika. I’ve notified your chain of command. Let’s move.”
Nhlappo was confident that her new escort would follow her, allowing her to focus on hunting down her nemesis.
“Grab any NCO from Spartika’s forces that you find,” she told the Colchester. “I need to know where that traitorous sakra is. The planet can’t be officially secured until I hold her beating heart in my hands!”
The order seemed to motivate the massive NCO, leaving Nhlappo thanking the ancestors that the sergeant was on their side. She began pushing into the fleeing enemy. She was using their non-lethal munitions, one of the few types of rounds they had in abundance. Her Marines were overly enthusiastic, inadvertently killing some of the enemies they were attempting to capture.
“Frakk it, Colchester!” Nhlappo roared at him in her drill instructor voice. “I need them alive to answer questions.”
Her tone got the message across, and the squad accompanying her became more precise. They continue to push through the fleeing remnants of Spartika’s broken army, shoving the confused insurgents to the ground. Her Marines disarmed the fleeing personnel while searching them for rank insignia. Nhlappo knew the average carbine wielder wouldn’t have the information she needed, so she focused on disarming those they encountered. She pointed them towards the walls, where Anderson was sending prisoners to the Alabama Depot. Their diligence paid off, and they finally got lucky. They found a fleeing enemy senior sergeant.
“Where is she? Where’s Spartika?” demanded Nhlappo.
She could barely constrain eagerness and rage as she shook the man. While Nhlappo questioned the prisoner, her escort squad began stripping him of his carbine and armor. The corporal assigne
d to patting down and search the enemy for concealed weapons felt a moment of pity for the NCO. He pulled the Marine’s AI out of the abandoned combat armor and handed it to him. Grateful that his AI and longtime friend would survive, the NCO began talking.
“She ran the moment it went sideways and vicious killers popped up in our lines. I was the senior sergeant for one of her regiments. She’s smart. She knows you’ll hunt us all down eventually. Bet my grok ration on her making a run for the shuttles. They’re on the far side of the open area in the center of the city.”
Biometric scans of his face indicate that he is telling the truth, Gabrielle told the group.
Not wanting to waste a second, Nhlappo got on the comms with the shuttle pilot who was providing continuous overwatch in the skies above.
“Attention, all Legion Storks. Destroy any bird taking off,” Nhlappo ordered over the LBNet.
Nhlappo gave an order to Colchester as she took off, picking up speed as if daring them not to keep up.
“Follow me to the landing pad!”
— Chapter 82 —
Midafternoon, Post-Revival Day 220
Shuttle Pad, New Detroit City, Baylshore
Commander, Task Force Justice, Human Legion
The fight to the New Detroit City shuttle pad was surprisingly intense, causing Field Marshal Nhlappo to lose a few of her escorts. They’d made it through the various streets that ringed the open expanse in the center of the city. Her Marines were about to charge across towards the distant shuttle pads when she stopped them. She suspected Spartika was using her most loyal followers as a shield wall to buy her time. Nhlappo knew Spartika would leave most of them behind, their lives meaning little to her. Spartika had already left a long trail of bodies in her wake, and Nhlappo had lost her only biological son to that traitor’s capricious nature.