Star Crusades Nexus: Book 05 - Prophecy of Fire (20 page)

“Your friend, he’s something else,” he laughed.

Jack could only nod in agreement. They added their own fire to that of the other marines, but it was the great bulk of the Jötnar and Vanguards that stood out most. They looked like Titans, battling some kind of demonic horde around them. The marines were dug in around four hangars, each of which was protected by low meter-tall barricades. There was an under strength platoon protecting the site from their prepared positions. Most were lined up in front of the two central hangars while the others were grouped on the roofs of the structures where they had the perfect view of the battlefield. In front of them moved the rest from the lander that had attacked Jack’s group, plus the warriors from another of the craft.

“Look!” said Riku.

She pointed off to their right where the petal door of another lander had opened. This time, instead of the living monsters, a trio of large metallic war machines climbed out. They were six limbed and the size of tanks. They scuttled like bugs and moved right into the battle, cutting down marine or Biomech if they blocked their paths.

“What the hell are those things?” asked Callahan.

“Large versions of the warriors they used on Hyperion. Aim for the center mass!” said Jack in a calm and reassuring voice.

The three marines took aim with their carbines while Riku pulled her L48 rifle into her shoulder. With each pull of the trigger, they sent precise shots at the nearest machine. The explosive rounds of the L48 blew chunks of its torso armor, but it was the high-power shots from the carbines that did the real damage.

“Riku, put explosive rounds on the smaller ones. We’ll deal with the big one.”

She turned a few degrees to the left and continued shooting. Her projectiles were substantially larger than those used by the carbines, and on this occasion used the inbuilt proximity sensor to explode them as they came close to the targets. Even with this weight of fire, the Biomech warriors were now at the low wall and fighting the marines in a deadly close range fight. Gun and his comrades cut their way into the flank of the force and toward the massive machines that were still further at the back of the horde.

“Come on, bring one down!” said Lieutenant Elvidge desperately.

Between them they put a dozen high power rounds into the thing’s torso, achieving little more than annoying it. Two plowed onward with one heading for the hangars, another off to the right where it vanished behind plumes of smoke. The third stopped and looked at its tormentors and then trampled down half a dozen of its own side as it rushed toward Jack and his comrades.

“Great, I think it heard you!” he said bitterly.

Another squad of a dozen marines arrived and deployed around their position while a Ram moved right behind. It dropped down next to them, lowered itself to the ground, and deployed its turret mount system. A dozen more carbines added their fire to the small group led by Lieutenant Elvidge. Jack tracked to the right, looking for a weak spot on the machine. The center torso was the size of a Bulldog vehicle, but its limbs were much longer. Something extended from the side and short multiple barrels pushed out. One flashed and then another.

“Incoming!” cried out one of the corporals.

Jack was already in cover, but the newly arrived marines were not as well dug in. The withering barrage of gunfire that came in from the machine’s sponsons hit two full on, and then it was on them.

“Fall back!” cried Jack, but most of the marines chose to ignore him. He took three steps back and found Riku and Callahan doing the same. The machine halted three meters from where they had been hidden and struck at the ground with four articulated arms. The mass and power crushed anything it is path. In seconds, the marines had scattered. A dozen of the bipedal creatures rushed out through and chased after them, each hacking and stabbing at them as they came.

“LT!” cried Jack, spotting his officer being chased by two of them.

Jack lifted his carbine and fired a shot that missed by a narrow margin. Then they were on him and hacking away with the cruel blade. One struck the Lieutenant in the shoulder, and the second connected with the armored gorget section around his throat. He dropped to one knee, now just seconds from the end. Jack’s heart pounded as he watched from the relative safety of a broken wall. Riku leaned against the rubble and took aim with her L48. The round exploded over a meter away from the Lieutenant and sent shards of hot metal into the two creatures as well as their officer. All three fell to the ground, and Jack had his chance.

Do it, do it now!

He burst from cover and ran directly into one of the creatures. He didn’t hesitate though and pushed passed, leaving his life in the hands of Riku. It turned to give chase, only to receive an L48 round in the back of the head. Jack slid down next to the wounded officer and grabbed him under the armpits. They made it two meters before Callahan arrived and helped him drag the wounded officer back to where Riku had made her stand. A dozen more of the creatures fell around them by the time they made it back. Callahan helped him rest the man on the ground, checking he was safe before lifting their own weapons back to their shoulders.

“What’s happening?” asked the Lieutenant with a catch in his throat.

A handful of the marines from the squad that had arrived to help dropped down into cover around them and boosted their number to nine, but at least two showed signs of damage to their armor.

“The frontline at the bunkers has been overrun. The machine is moving through the base. The right has held, and the machine that hit us is on its way to the vehicle pool.”

“Dammit, is there anything that can stop them?”

Riku looked off to her right and thumbed in the direction of the machine.

“I see the machine and about sixty of those things heading for the pool. Everybody else is moving to the outer walls. The rest of the Biomechs will be here soon. Look at your drone overview.”

Jack already had and was doing his best to avoid looking at the red arrows marking the advance of the enemy. According to the dozens of drones circling overhead, there were now over twenty of the massive machines, and most less than a kilometer away from the walls.

“Riku, look, it’s Gun!” he explained upon seeing his friend.

She twisted to the right and spotted Gun, along with his retinue of bloodied Jötnar and Vanguards. They’d been joined by two platoons of marines and were formed up in ranks behind the storage tanks and machine parts of the vehicle pool. There must have been crew inside the waiting Bulldogs as well because four of them turned their turrets toward the advancing enemy and opened fire. The weight of fire was terrifying to behold. The large machine lost a leg and an arm in seconds; two-dozen of the creatures fell under the avalanche of gunfire.

“Jack!” Callahan shouted.

There seemed to be trouble in every direction, but the marine was now pointing off to their left. He moved his eyes and spotted the shape. There was a large group of the Biomech creatures creeping through the ruins of the barracks and moving in on the flank of Gun and his defenders.

“I see them.”

He looked back at his commander who had now lifted himself up and leaned against the rubble with his carbine in his hands.

“Private Riku, you stay here with me. We’ll watch your backs. You need to take these marines and help Gun before he gets himself killed. I’ll let him know you’re coming.”

He then beckoned to the other marines.

“Private Morato is your temporary sergeant. Now stop those things!”

Jack looked at Elvidge and then to Riku. She looked pained, presumably because she was being forced to stay behind. Jack could understand, but he did feel a lot happier at having her expert marksmanship watching them from a distance. He looked at the other six marines, including Callahan that he now commanded.

“Okay, they don’t know we’re here. Follow me, and keep your heads down!”

He moved off with Callahan right on his flank. The other five followed in a staggered line and with their carbines at their shoulders ready. Once out from the cover, they moved along the side of the collapsed barracks and toward the open ground near the vehicle pool. Their line of sight was partially obstructed, but already they could see the group of Biomech warriors moving in on Gun’s position. Further in the distance, the vast shape of the metal war machine clambered on; its great arms smashing into parked vehicles and its weapon sponsons pouring fire into any marine that dared show his face. Jack’s nerves were on edge, but the adrenalin pumping through his body gave him that feeling of recklessness, even immortality that he only felt in these situations.

“Fix bayonets,” he said quietly.

Two had already done so, and it took only a moment for the rest to do the same. The blade on the end of the weapon only marginally increased their effectiveness as a weapon at close range, but Jack knew too well the psychological edge it gave a warrior when carrying such a device. He looked at them and was thankful it was so hard to see their expressions through their smoked visors. The last thing he needed to see was doubt or fear. He had enough of that himself. Jack turned back toward the enemy, took a single deep breath, and then cried out.

“Attack!”

He leapt from cover and ran as fast as he could to the rear of the group. The others charged alongside him, all with their carbines held low and the razor sharp blades extending outwards. None fired until they were on the back of the enemy unit. Jack stuck his blade between the shoulder blades of the nearest creature, and the others piled in behind him. Callahan opened fire first, and then all hell broke loose.

The Black Rift was an often-confused title for the region of space controlled by the Narau control facility. Apparently, the term was created by the Helions, as an insult to their Great Enemy during their banishment from the Council of the Great Powers. Only the massive starbase originally constructed by the Biomechs in the distant past could create and manage the Spacebridge to their homeworld. Now under control of the Narau, it could be shut down permanently or even worse, used to despoil the area of space around it so that no Rift could stabilize. It was the ultimate deterrent to the Biomechs ever attempting a return from their remote home.

Accounts of the Prophecy of Fire

The shuttle moved to its final docking phase at it approached the gleaming shape of ANS Dreadnought, the latest warship to move into position around the capital world of the Alliance. As one of the Conqueror Class Battlecruisers, her design was incredibly flexible, and it had been boasted by the Naval engineers that the universal design ships could be refitted in less than two months from a battleship to a carrier, or even as a dedicated marine transport. This particular model was new to Teresa though. Her mind was elsewhere, but she tried her best to show some degree of interest in her temporary home.

Another ship and more people I’ve never met before.

She tried to swallow, but her throat was dry, almost making her cough. Teresa noticed a few changes from the last ship of this type she’d seen, and for a moment was able to concentrate on it. Now it was becoming more obvious that Dreadnought had been fitted out differently to the popular carrier variants being built throughout the Alliance. She pulled out her secpad and selected the schematic for the ship. It listed the weapons and configuration, as well as the current commander and her command staff. Although structurally the same, she was one of only a few that had found her mission modules reduced in size to accommodate the large flank weapon modules. With a pair on each side of the ship, she would have forward facing railguns, as well as the standard fitment of particle beam emitters. Teresa looked up from the display and back out of the small window from the shuttle. The warship filled most of her view, but she could also see the twinkling light reflecting off scores, perhaps hundreds of other vessels.

So, the fleet is getting ready for war…again.

She gazed at the glinting shapes; none of them proved particularly reassuring. They might be ships, but she knew the disposition of the Alliance Navy well enough to know that almost every vessel out there was a civilian craft. Most would be large transports, haulers, and refinery ships while a smaller number would ferry people to the moons or to larger ships. Thoughts of ships brought her right back to her family and their scattering through the stars. Spartan was stuck in Sol somewhere, Jack fighting on Eos, and her other two children, Matius and Ingo had been split up to serve on different ships in the fleet.