The War Across the Stars (29 page)

It was then that I noticed one of the Praetorians seemed to have more elaborate armor and be absorbing many of our rounds using both hands to catch them.  Perhaps it was some sort of leadership figure.

“Ryan, I think that one’s the leader,” I said, popping off a few rounds at the Praetorian in question.

“Might that be… Messor?” Nevin proposed, looking up from his firing position.

“The one the Beholder mentioned?  I guess it’d make sense.  Let’s bring him down and maybe we can put a halt to the Praetorian escape,” I returned.

Many of us shifted our targets to Messor in an attempt to bring him down, though with incredible skill and agility he kept us from securing many hits.  To make matters worse, the few hits we could get were unable to pierce his powerful armor. 

“Prex,” I heard Nevin mumble as we continued to barrage him to no avail.

“This guy is certainly good, if nothing else,” Ryan called out over the constant sounds of gunfire. 

I paused, my rifle empty, dropped a mag, then reached down for another.  As I did so, I saw two Praetorians moving in from the side, crouched down, weapons raised.  In a rush I pulled the new magazine up quickly, missing the slot and fumbling it to the ground.  Thinking fast, I drew my pistol with my left hand and fired a few loosely aimed rounds in their direction, trying to prevent them from closing in.  The one in front took a bullet to the chest, but the other dove to a prone position in response.  From there it immediately opened fire on me, so I pulled back behind my cover. 

I holstered my pistol and scooped up the fallen magazine.  I then locked it nicely into the gun before peeking out again.  The Praetorian I had been firing at was dead, one of my teammates having nailed it in the head.  A quick glance at Messor confirmed that he still wasn’t down.

“I don’t think we can take this guy!” Nevin yelled.

“Let’s board the elevator, we can evade him if we’re fast,” Phil suggested.

Ryan looked back at Boone, who nodded.  Four of the Praetorians were left, two of them armed with the defense mechanism. 

“I’ve got point,” I said, hoping to use my superior speed to dodge incoming fire, while still drawing as much as possible from my allies. 

I then bailed from my cover point, sprinting across the open room toward the elevator.  Messor and the remaining Praetorians were close to the far wall, giving us some space to get in and activate it before they boarded as well.  Behind me I heard Nevin and Ryan, all three of us firing rounds toward the Praetorians to minimize their ability to fire at us. 

I reached the elevator first, swinging in and taking cover behind the edge.  Within a second however I was exposed again, laying down a blanket of SF-42 fire by rapidly pulling the trigger.  In a quick motion I switched it to full-auto, allowing a devastating flurry of bullets to be unleashed.  One of the Praetorians went down as the final group, the Marines, made their way into the elevator. 

Messor released the tremendous amount of bullets he had amassed and removed a sizable rifle from his back.  With only one hand on it, he opened fire with a mighty stream of fusion rounds, multiple striking the Marine in the back of the formation. 

Out of instinct I stepped forward to help, but then Boone appeared in front of me, slapping the elevator’s activation.  Without delay a doorway sealed us in, several light taps being heard as the fusion rounds melted into the other side.  The elevator began its ascent.

“It had to be done,” Boone stated, perhaps as much to himself as to us.

No one said a word, each of us truly exhausted of the sorrows of war.  I didn’t even know the name of the soldier left behind, but still it bothered me that he had been lost.  I shook my head lightly, trying to clear my thoughts before we arrived at the top.  We were nearly out of the Capital, just a little further to go. 

It wasn’t long before the elevator reached the top, opening its doorway.  No sooner had the doorway opened than we heard gunfire.  Moving forward slowly, guns raised, we neared the sound of the gunfire.  The light swish of fusion rounds could be heard amongst the hard cracks of rifles.  When we reached the bend in the U-shaped hallway we encountered the rear of a UED unit.  It was a mix of soldiers and scientists, possibly some of the men from the encampment we had found near the Bastion. 

They were exposed and with little cover from our direction, so our entire team opened fire.  Men ducked and rolled, trying anything to escape our hail of lead.  The purple glint of fusion rounds could be seen soaring by at high speeds from the other direction, indicating that the UED forces were completely surrounded. 

“We need to punch through these guys, we only have so long before Messor and his team get up the elevator behind us!” Nevin called out.

His statement reminded me of the pressure of the situation.  While we had the upper hand over the UED here, we would still have to get through more Praetorians quickly, or else we’d be pinned in with no cover, just like the hapless UED were at present.  Two of the scientists, apparently unarmed, sprinted toward the Praetorian fire and out of sight, perhaps attempting to simply run the gauntlet. 

Then the last visible soldier dropped and immediately we began our advance, well aware of our limited time.  As we turned the corner, we could see the light and snow pouring into the large opening.  We were so close.  Unfortunately, I also saw at least fifteen Praetorians in firing positions on the far side of the hall, having come from the direction in which my team had initially descended.  I emptied the mag on my SF-42 before clicking it to semi-auto once more, and loading my last magazine.  Now each shot had to count.  I crouched and slowly took shots at the line of Praetorians, enemy fire missing me by mere centimeters at times. 

As I lined up a shot for my third Praetorian kill of the engagement, I felt an impact on my left arm, near the shoulder, knocking me back.  I then felt two more across my chest, stumbling me from my crouched position onto my back.  I had been hit three times, the incredible heat of the rounds melting away parts of my armor.  While I did have an incredibly warm sensation in the affected areas, I realized they didn’t get through, and I wasn’t hurt. 

“TREDECIM!” Phil exclaimed, pointing toward the Praetorians. 

I rose again to see a sizable force of Tredecim smashing through the Praetorian line, slashing them apart as they moved. 

“Now’s our chance, let’s move!” Ryan ordered.

I took off running toward the Tredecim with the rest of the team behind me.  When I reached the light I immediately swerved to finally escape the catacombs of the Capital.  As I turned though, I saw a single Tredecim, quite tall in stature, and a large scar across its right eye.  I paused for a moment, realizing it was the one I had met earlier, also making its escape from the capital that had so long held it prisoner. 

“Thanks!” I called out, seemingly at random to the others in my squad.

Then I carried on past the metal barricades and crates left over from the UED’s earlier chokepoint.  Upon reaching the top of the ramp I saw the Paladin tank in view of the ramp, as well as the two Corsairs, both having landed a short distance from the entrance.  All of us darted toward the two Corsairs, presuming it to be Malum’s location.  When we reached one, we knocked twice on the back hatch and it lowered, revealing Captain Malum leaned back in one of the seats, his usual stern, uncaring look about him. 

“Sir,” Ryan said plainly.  “We’ve searched the facility.  No Korth, no Elonians.  Just some UED, Tredecim, and now a whole new enemy in the Praetorians.”

“The who?  Is this more of your detective mumbo-jumbo or is this something I can actually work with?” Malum asked. 

“It is a real threat.  They’ve been released and now their leader, Messor, is on his way out.  I advise we bug out before we have to fight him again,” Ryan suggested.

“Again?  You mean you lost against him?”

“Sir, with all due respect, we lost more than just the fight.  We lost several good soldiers down there.  We lost a Ranger.  We cannot stay here.”

“Sounds like we have a challenge.  If these Praetorians are a real threat, we shouldn’t merely flee.  Let’s stop them here before they intrude our mission later.  Perhaps if you did your job you wouldn’t be losing all of these soldiers.  Look Lieutenant, leave the big jobs to the professionals.  We’re stopping this… ‘Messor’ before he even gets started,” Malum said, finality in his voice.

“Captain, we finished your objective,” Boone started, stepping up.  “May we send at least ONE Corsair to get Epsilon?”

“Boone, Boone, Boone… You said it yourself… Epsilon is already dead.  We need to stick together and kill Messor.”

Boone surged forward, appearing as if he was about to strike Malum, though Ryan’s arm shot up in a second and seized Boone’s.  Slowly Ryan lowered Boone’s arm.

“Soon,” Ryan said plainly, trying to soothe Boone’s anger. 

“Now, let’s get focused and stop Messor from escaping this place,” Malum said.

“What about Korth?  Should we break off to go try to finish the real mission?” Ryan inquired.

“No.  No, no, no, no, no.  We are killing Messor, THEN we’ll finish the mission,” Malum replied bluntly.

I then looked back toward the Capital’s entrance nervously.  Messor could be there any minute.  When I saw movement I mentally braced myself, but then saw that it was not the lanky, silver-skinned Praetorians emerging, but rather large, brown creatures.  The Tredecim were making a run for it themselves.  Several of Malum’s Marine’s opened fire on the Tredecim.

Without a thought I ran toward them, hoping to stop the bloodshed.

“Stop!  Wait, hold you fire!  They are friendly!” I yelled out. 

The troops stopped, looking toward me.  Then I heard another voice.

“Don’t listen to him!  Kill them all!  No monsters leave here!” Malum screamed.

An earsplitting roar followed as the tank began gunning them down as well.  I ran toward them again, wanting to place myself in the line of fire.  I grew nearer to the stampede, bullets and tank shells flying past me. 

“They are on OUR SIDE!” I screamed, my throat dry from watching them be massacred. 

I then saw what appeared to be the scarred Tredecim.  I moved near it, but as I was closing in, within meters, a tank shell collided with its torso.  The explosion was great enough to knock me back over, Tredecim blood spattered over my visor.  I eased myself back up out of the snow only to see a massive cavity dug into the chest of the scarred Tredecim who had represented to me all that was civilized about their species.  He expressed their true beauty and ability to be more than mere savages.  And yet it was us who ruthlessly killed them unprovoked. 

“He killed them,” I murmured to myself as I brushed the snow off my armor. 

Gazing around the desolate field of snow, I saw blood and bodies strewn from the Capital’s entrance nearly to the broken hole in the wall.  Not a single Tredecim was standing.  I could hardly believe what Malum had done. 

Disgusted by Malum’s actions, as well as the soldiers around me who had blindly followed his lead, I walked back toward our group.  When I once again neared the group, Ryan raised his hand and called out.

“Rangers, on me.”

We obliged, all four of us following his lead as he walked outside of earshot of Malum.  When he stopped, he turned around sharply, a grim look on his face.

“James, Nev, Phil, Cass… I… I wanted to say that it has been an honor to serve alongside every one of you.  We’ve been through thick and thin, and through it all we’ve always been a team… inseparable.  Invincible.  These conditions we’ve been faced with here on… Marzoc… they are beyond anything we’ve experienced before.  They have cost us one of our own.  I know you’re all tired.  I know you’re all hungry.  I know you are all ready for this mission to end…” Ryan paused, looking each one of us in the eye before continuing.  “But just like that first mission on Enphuerzo, we can’t bug out whenever we want.  We are stranded, and we have to earn our way out.  We did it then, most of you untrained and unprepared for the situation we were in.  This time we are as ready as we can be.  Malum hasn’t made this easy on us, but we’re going to follow his command.  We’re going to stop Messor.”

“Those Tredecim were on our side… they could have still helped us,” I said quietly. 

“I know James.  As soon as I saw them I knew they had to be the ones.  But we can do this,” Ryan responded.

We all nodded, acknowledging what had to be done.  Cassidy still looked distressed, holding her gun loosely and having yet to say a word since the incident. 

“Check your ammo and let’s make it count,” Ryan said in conclusion, walking off toward the entrance to the Capital. 

Phil and Nevin both reloaded their weapons, and I simply checked on how many clips I had for the H-81 and SR-4, knowing my supply of SF-42 rounds was drained.  Then we each followed suit behind Ryan to await the engagement.  Though we didn’t have long to wait.  No sooner had we reached the Paladin I saw Messor and another team of Praetorians making their way up the ramp.  I heard the roar of Malum’s Corsair taking off behind me to prepare for the fight.  The supporting Praetorians opened up, tearing into Malum’s Marine support.  Messor had his weapon on his back once more and his arms raised slightly from his sides. 

Then I heard the distinctive sound of the Paladin’s 100mm cannon firing.  A second later the sound repeated.  What I then witnessed left me in awe.  Messor’s arms, now fully extended, had each caught one of the tank shells, holding the sizable warheads in midair in front of him.  As he did so his unit charged forward, quickly gaining ground on us.  I rapidly regained my senses and swung my rifle to take a few shots, trying to drop a few of the Praetorians before they reached the tank.  Messor casually dropped the two tank shells, neither having struck a target with sufficient speed to trigger their detonation.  Several Praetorians were already to the tank and had jumped onto it, some firing toward us while one or two concentrated fire on the cockpit.