Jethro Goes to War (Wandering Engineer Jethro's tale) (64 page)

“
What?”
the captain opened his eyes and then blinked. “Good job!”

“
Yes sir,”
Valenko grimaced as the greyhound medic dabbed at a scab.

“
Did you get
them all alive?”

“
No sir. Three
alive. Nine enemy dead. We've got two KIA, four WIA.”

The captain blinked
and then his jaw tightened as the casualty list registered. “Say
that last part again?” he growled. What the hell had they run
into?

“
We have two
KIA. Private Miles O'Brien, and Private Veraxin Chirby sir. Four WIA,
two moderate, two minor.”

“
How did it
happen?” the captain demanded.

“
Ambush sir.
We had just identified a possible cave at the top of a wooded hill
where they may have been taking refuge when we were hit.”

The captain closed
his eyes. “How are the wounded? Can you extract?” He was
already trying to think of a way of getting some relief to them.

“
We've got
moderate casualties but we're ambulatory sir. Be advised we've
rescued one hostage as well.” Valenko sent him the map
location. The captain opened it and grimaced at the terrain overlay.

“
Wounded,
prisoners, a hostage, gear, and the dead. You've got quite a load to
carry off that hill.” He looked at the Hyena who was looking
worried. Her hand was on her ear listening in. Unlike the captain she
was from F platoon and knew the bear. She could hear the strain in
his voice. Something was going on, something he hadn't said yet. IT
hurt to loose Miles and Chirby. Miles had been good troop, hell both
of them had. But Chirby had a kid. Had. That thought sent a pang of
mourning through her. Her ears drooped.

“
I'll send
second to meet you as soon as possible. They wont be able to get to
you until mid afternoon tomorrow though.”

“
We have a
local posse that will provide support sir until we can medivac sir.
We'll meet them at the base of the hill near the falls.”

“
That is if
you hold still,” the medic growled over the open link. “Plasma
burns are a bitch,” the medic muttered.

Catching part of
that the captain blinked and then stared at the hyena. “Did he
just say plasma burns?”

“
Yes sir,”
Valenko admitted. “The tangoes had one. Pirates sir. Crash site
is on the map.” An icon on the map blinked. “We found it
and scouted it. It's rigged with booby traps so we left it alone so
we could continue hunting.”

“
Who's
wounded; you?”

“
Yes sir,”
the bear rumbled a sigh. “I caught a coronal discharge from the
plasma gun. Cooked my ruck. Lance corporal Jethro took some buckshot,
Private Sergei has a broken collar bone, and PFC Hurranna has an
injured leg. Most likely a soft tissue injury.”

She looked up from
where she was sitting. “Just a sprain. Got it when I fell out
of the tree or when I stumbled coming up the hill I guess.” She
and the gunny were splinting and wrapping the injury.

The captain nodded.
“I see.”

“
The hostage
is in bad shape sir. She's a mess,” the bear grimaced as he
glanced to the girl. “A minor sir. They worked her over pretty
good. Took their time, the whole pirate thing.”

“
Crap,”
the captain sighed, just imagining the details was enough to make him
sick. He was glad the bear wasn't specific. He was also tolerantly
glad the satellite wasn't up for a video feed. “We'll have to
turn the prisoners over to the local law.”

“
About that
sir, ah, I'd hold off. They have... intelligence value. One is an
officer. Implants as well.”

“
Oh? Well, you
do have a story to tell. I'll meet you in port. Tell your people well
done. Red three six out,” the captain said. He grinned, knowing
the news properly presented to the colonists would be welcome.

“
Red one out,”
Valenko sighed, disconnecting the sat link. He shook his head, and
then slumped forward as the medic picked at the skin on his back.
“I've actually preferred rare over being well done.”

“
Funny,”
the medic drawled. “You and me both.”

“
That the
Major?” Jethro asked dabbing at a cut.

“
Captain. He's
dirt side right now,” Valenko sighed. He tried not to move.
Every time he did he could feel his skin crackle and fresh wounds
open up. Blood and puss would dribble down from them. “And yes.
It was.”

“
Oh.”

Valenko looked them
over. “Second is going to try to meet us sometime tomorrow or
the day after. I don't know about you folks, but I have no intention
of playing hurry up and wait. I don't fit the damsel in distress
image worth a damn.” He glanced to the girl. “No offense
miss.”

She gave a wan smile
and then shrugged.

 ...*...*...*...*...

They bagged the
bodies, treated the wounded and then took samples of the enemy gear.
They went over everything else very carefully, making sure to make
full sensor recordings before burying what they didn't want to carry.
Intel might want to come back for it later. At first light they moved
out. Valenko grimaced as Hurranna limped ahead.

“
Some point
you are,” he growled. She snorted, not bothering to look back
his way. She had twisted her ankle either in the fall from the tree
or landing on the one pirate but had insisted on taking point. He'd
given her part of the dead marines' pack loads to lighten things up
for the wounded and stretcher carriers. Unfortunately the grizzly's
ruck had been melted into ruin by the plasma blast.

He grimaced at the
pain in his back. Perhaps it wasn't such a bad thing after all.
Humping that thing back with his back the way it was would have been
a serious taste of hell. He didn't dare mention it to the gunny, the
sadistic little bastard would probably get ideas to inflict on some
hopeless boot in the next class.

“
Posse will
meet us at the falls,” Ox said. Valenko looked round, the giant
Tauren had his usual pack, half of Miles pack, as well as the girl on
his back. He didn't look like he minded in the slightest.

“
It hurts,”
Sergei growled as he stumbled, carrying the litter. Every bounce of
his arm jerked on his collar bone. His implants were dulling the
pain, but only a little. He needed a clear head to keep from falling
in the rough steep climb down the hill.

“
It's just a
collar bone fracture. You've got so much in you plus the nerve block
so it shouldn't bother you at all,” Doc Gusterson said with a
patient sigh.

“
Still hurts,”
Sergei sulked.

“
Tell that to
them,” Schultz snarled, carrying the other end. The Liger
glanced back at the bodies of his comrades and then shut up.

Letanga and Jethro
watched over the prisoners who stumbled along in a line between them.
Asazi grimaced as she hefted Sergei's pack load but didn't say
anything.

...*...*...*...*...

They made it to the
base of the hill and the waiting posse by mid afternoon. The girl
fell into her uncle’s arms the moment she saw him, sobbing
again. He cradled her, tears falling down his craggy face. He stroked
her battered body. The marines had done their best to help clean her
up but she needed proper medical attention. The wounded marines stood
around watching the perimeter as a few of the men touched the
battered child on the face and arm as if to reassure themselves she
was alive.

“
She's had a
rough time. She'll need counseling,” Asazi said kneeling next
to the girl. The girl reached out and grabbed Asazi's hand and
squeezed it firmly. She did the same with Huranna.

“
I'm taking
her home. Her brother's waiting for her there,” the sheriff
said patting the girls back and then getting up.

“
We'll take
them from here,” the sheriff said, looking at the prisoners.
“Sweetz, go get me a rope,” he said coldly, looking over
his shoulder.

“
No can do
sheriff. We need them. We're going to turn them over to the
authorities. Our authorities. Trust me, they won’t enjoy it,”
Valenko said grinning a terrible grin. Most of his lip was still
gone, exposing bloodied gums and sharp yellow teeth. The battered
prisoners shivered a little.

“
Trust me,
intelligence won't be gentle. We'll squeeze them dry then take them
apart piece by piece and not bother putting them back together again.
I guarantee it wont be a
pleasant
experience.”

The sheriff eyed the
burned bear and then looked away. “All right,” he spat.

“
There are
nine other bodies up there. And some gear. We kept the choice bits
for intelligence to go over. Be careful though, they may have booby
trapped the rest,” Ox warned.

“
All right,”
the sheriff nodded.

“
We'll send an
Intel crew to go over the crash site and their last stand. See what
we can get out of it. Who knows, maybe they'll find something
useful,” the gunny replied. He set the pieces of the scorched,
broken plasma gun down. “I for one would really like to know
where they got the weapons from. And if they have more or can make
more.”

The sheriff's jaw
worked as he looked at the giant scorched and melted weapon. The Neo
dog had held it like it weighed nothing. “Plasma?” he
asked after a moment.

“
Yeah. Crew
serviced weapon. On a tripod,” Ox answered.

“
Okay. You
boys have been through hell. I've got an air lorry coming in, a
couple actually. Seems we should go back in style rather than walk.”
He eyed the wounded, then grimaced at the dead.

“
Yeah.”

“
Hell yeah,”
Sergei said rubbing his shoulder.

The Major tossed his
tablet onto his desk and grimaced, turning his chair back and forth.
“This gets better and better.”

“
The
implants?” Firefly asked, swirling into holographic being
nearby. The freighter with the marines on it was still a hundred
kilometers out and closing. Captain Pendeckle had sent out an
encrypted report at light speed the moment they had exited hyperspace
the day before. It was now being digested by the commanding officers.

“
Yeah,”
The Major said eyes closed. He tapped his chin with one end of the
stylus. The loss of two Marines was bad enough. But how they lost
them was disturbing. “Yeah. Two of them have it. The plasma
gunner and the shuttle pilot. But the copilot that had been killed
also had implants. Crude from what doc says, basic unpowered civilian
grade. Better than the pirate girl we picked up here. Way better. The
gunner's implant jack was in his arm so easily overlooked by the
marines. The shuttle pilot's was easy to spot.”

“
Yes. I was
going to point that out. I just got the report of the remains. All
the bodies had ident implants. It looks like someone reworked the
implants for a basic ident package. I checked the serial numbers,
they are identical.”

“
Ah.”

“
So they are
using the same nanites in each person. Either they are reprogrammed
to set up the coding to access the hardware, or the implants are
surgically modified afterward.”

“
Yes,”
the Major nodded. “That crew serviced plasma gun came as a
nasty surprise. It required a higher level of implants than our other
prisoner has. I didn't expect it.”

“
Neither did
Intelligence. Things can be over looked or not taken into account.
Sometimes that happens,” the AI said. They'd been even more
surprised by some of the parts of the weapons. They were new, some
less then four years old. That had some bad implications for the
future.

“
We will have
to update the threat profiles. The pirates are a more serious danger
than we first believed. Much more technically sophisticated with a
logistics ability we hadn't anticipated. So we are going through with
the training base?”

“
Yes. I talked
with Commander Logan on Anvil. The Agnostan's have sent a
representative to do the final lease negotiations. We're getting it
for a steal, they just want us there for safety and security. The
team's actions was good PR.”

“
Exactly,”
the AI agreed nodding. “After the experience they just had I
would think it is an imperative.”

“
Yes. Which
means you'll be going as well. At least for a month.”