CHAPTER NINE
A DEAD WORLD
March 27, 9:30 AM
UED Flagship Aleksander
Low orbit over Dominion throne world of Korhal
"How pleasant." Rikter was aboard the Aleksander looking out at the desolate and ruined landscapes of the Dominion throne world. He saw endless dunes of sand in fields that seemed to stretch on forever. Cliffs of red chalk hid parts of the land from his view, and his sight was occupied by an unusually large amount of debris and waste. The area below him had been a city a long time ago, before the great disaster brought on by the Confederacy many years ago.
The planet had been a hotbed for anti-Confederate sediments for years when it began to pose as the threat of the Confederacy, the old Terran government. A massive planetary barrage of missiles was launched from Tarsonis to Korhal with intent to destroy. Warnings had seemed to do little for the rebellions. Millions were killed. The great armies were torn apart, and entire cities were erased from the world. The soil and vegetation died in the holocaust of the attack, leaving Korhal nothing but a wasteland. Ironically, this disabled planet was what finally launched the rebellion that would eventually defeat the Confederacy. That successful rebellion's leader, Arcturus Mengsk, is the man who currently sits on the throne of Korhal. But that won't last much longer.
The Directorate has been attacking the planet for two weeks now, dispatching massive fleets of warships and bombing all of the important cities to smithereens. Unlike the other worlds liberated by the UED, Korhal was irrelevant to the plans of the Earth-born government. It was already destroyed, and its cities were of no great value. So far, there had been no need to dispatch militias and teams of standing infantry. Augustgrad is the key to Korhal. It is a city of over four-million that serves as the primary trade and manufacturing center on the planet. Regardless of whether or not other cities continue to exist on Korhal, without Augustgrad, they will falter and their citizens will be forced to surrender to the power of Earth.
Korhal is all the remains of the Dominion government. Augustgrad is the only major Korhalian city that so far remains unoccupied by the UED, and Emperor Mengsk has concentrated what is left of his planet's garrison to the city in a final stand to defend his empire. There are perhaps half a million armed men and women within Augustgrad who are ready to give their lives for their government and empire. They lie in wait not far from the Aleksander.
It seems that the closer to Korhal the UED came, the harder it was to win the hearts of citizens. Amazingly, Korhal itself has stood strong, though no city has submitted without force of some kind. Augustgrad is too well protected to defeat by bombings, and the personal coffers of the Dominion are contained within the city's heart. Instead of destroying it, Admiral Gerard DuGalle has decided that it will be wisest to attack the city from the ground, with support from the air pending on the situation.
He believes that the true power of the UED is in its fleet, and that the war with the Zerg will be far costlier than the war against the Dominion. So he has decided it best to conserve the air forces, regardless of how many losses the UED infantry ranks will suffer in the attack.
"New men can be drafted into action, but fleets take years to construct. I cannot agree, Captain, with the Admiral's decision completely, but I see where he is coming from." Alexei spoke to Rikter from a few feet away. They were standing on the bridge, lights flashing from the keypads to their side. "Many men may die today, I won't deny it. But that is the price we will have to pay to win the city. There is no other way."
"Air attacks have worked so far. We've lost less than a hundred ships in the last two weeks. Hell, you'll lose a hundred men in the first fucking seconds of this. You've got thousands of God damn war toys at your disposal, sir." Rikter didn't like the idea of so many men dying over one city, either.
"Yes, thousands of warships. And millions of infantry, might I remind you. I don't look at lives statistically by choice, but it's all we can do. No matter how many men die, we will still have a strong core of militia when this is done. Militia is expendable."
"Lives are not expendable!" Rikter burst out at Alexei.
"Neither is the well being of Earth and the mission to defeat the Zerg! You must realize this, Captain. A few million soldiers will have died in this war against the Zerg by the time it ends. If we cannot win, there are a hundred billion Human beings who will eventually die, added to the ranks of those who the Zerg and Terrans have killed already. Look past one war. Look at entire civilizations and races!"
"Heh, yeah, are you going to sacrifice these poor men against the Zerg when it comes time to fight them? I don't care what that fucking DuGalle says about this war, I know the Zerg are going to fight us on the ground too. See with your eyes! Half of these men are out here only to make a buck, and the other half have been forced into service because of a bad mistake they made five or ten years ago. And of all the criminals here, some of them were probably wrongly arrested."
"Captain, might I remind you that you are to pay keen attention to RANK when referring to the Admiral, and that if you ever refer to him with a curse again, I will be left with no choice but to declare you a obstruction to our true mission, and have you arrested. Is this understood?"
"Yes, sir." Rikter sputtered out.
"The Zerg are a race that come with a terrible history. One filled with tales of entire civilizations being chewed to pieces and spit out like unwanted food. I doubt that, under the circumstances, we will skirmish with them as we have done with the Dominion colonists."
"Understood."
"Captain, the assault of Augustgrad will commence within eight standard hours. Full mission briefing is documented on your computer. You are to deploy your forces at 24.5.5, and you must take control of the first trench in the Dominion defense. Once you have accomplished this, reinforcements will join you under the command of Lieutenant Duran. Await further instructions once this primary objective is completed."
"Sir, if I might ask, I need a calculation of how many men I've still got, and what I'm up against."
"We don't have specialized intelligence of the situation, but we expect to encounter at least a half million units throughout the entirety of the siege. Specifics are documented in your briefing. You may go now, Captain."
"Sir!" Rikter saluted, turned, and left for his chamber. "Let's go have some fun… eh." Rikter thought to himself as he left the bridge.
12:30 PM
Personal Chamber of Emperor Arcturus Mengsk
Augustgrad, Korhal
It was a shabby, old television. The static was in great amount, and the reception was poor. Sadly, too many were forced to view such disrespected pieces of entertainment. The Dominion had lost everything to this Earth Directorate. Who were they to come endless miles on a journey to cause such havoc? To destroy a man's empire was no game. To steal his people and use them against him was dishonor. To completely surround an Emperor in his very home and kill every single person he provided health and happiness to was inexcusable. And to attack him on his very doorstep was the ultimate embarrassment. Once, there were hundreds of TV stations. Now, there was one. Every other one had been shut down and destroyed. Media did not exist anymore. Instead, Earth was the media. The Directorate was the news reporter, its home planet the office, and its people the workers.
The Dominion was not a colony. It was an empire. These people were not of the Human race. They were Terrans of the Terran Dominion. They were people whose ancestors fled a place that sought to kill them. They were the children of a bright new race. Now this race had been destroyed and assimilated into everything it was not. The UED was like the Zerg – ruthless, ignorant, and careless. Had the UED even thought of what the Dominion wanted? Had it even considered that the Dominion people were proud of who they were? Were blacks told to be white because they stuck out too much? No, they were not. Blacks were who they were – they were important people of their own, simply a part of a bigger picture. How was the Dominion not its own people, simply a part of the bigger picture?
Arcturus himself stood at his window. He was in a small room, one with red carpet and golden lining. Cushioned green chairs were three in number. Then there were the interesting lighting fixtures on the roof. And the wooden walls, assembled in vertical strips, were lovely. It was a peaceful and quiet room. Arcturus was alone. He liked the loneliness of his room. He liked being separate. He liked how his generals would be commanding his troops on the battlefield, and he would watch, alone and undisturbed, from that giant window.
March 28, 4: 02 PM
"The Front"
Outer Trench, South of Augustgrad
The extend of the damnable prison-like hole in the ground which Jesse sat in was as follows: Seven feet deep and as many miles across, a mere six feet wide and littered with debris, ladders, and bodies. Freshly liberated from the Dominion outer guard, the stench of death still filled the trench. Jesse was still perspiring from the battle. His helmet had been removed and was resting on the sandy dirt beside him. His armor greatly enhanced his size, and the look of his head was rather small compared to what one would expect from such a giant soldier. Of course, Jesse was proportioned fairly perfectly, but with all the cumbersome armor he was wearing, he didn't look it.
His bottom was placed on a small wooden box, which Jesse felt was eventually going to collapse under him. He wasn't as concerned about that, though, as he was the beautiful young girl sitting beside him.
Kelly had grown very ill over the last couple of days, and Jesse had become increasingly worried for her. Her face, losing the golden-peachy complexion it once proudly boasted, now seemed to be green. Her hair fell into her eyes, covering her lovely features completely, and she had begun moaning and groaning a little over the last few hours. Jesse was unable to figure out what was wrong with her, and even after multiple visits by several different medical staff, nobody was able to determine what disorder Kelly seemed to be suffering from.
"Has she fought a lot?" The doctor had asked Jesse mere minutes ago.
"Yeah, she's been through a bunch of scraps with us." Jesse replied, thinking of the many close calls and wondering how he even let her run missions anymore without breaking down.
The doctor consulted an associate of his, who was also unable to determine what her problem was. "Give it another few days and leave us alone," was basically what the doctors had all come up with.
Jesse's heart burned. His girlfriend seemed to be in so much pain, and it hurt him too. He stood and kicked the wooden box away, and sat closer beside her. Her helmet was also detached. When he slid an arm around her and kissed her on the forehead, she looked up at him, seeming even worse than before. Jesse almost startled at how badly she appeared.
"It's getting worse…" Kelly moaned.
Jesse leaned his head against hers and nuzzled his nose against her cheek. "What's wrong with you? What the hell is it?" He mumbled.
"Ever had one of those dreams where you can fly?"
"Yeah, sure."
"And then if you try to walk, you can't go very fast, and if you run, you don't move anywhere?"
"Sort of."
"And you feel like there's no gravity?"
"Ahuh."
"That's how I feel. Light and lost."
Jesse found this odd. The gravity on Korhal was stronger than that of Earth. "It's all going to be better soon. I'm taking care of you, and I won't rest until you're good as new."
"I love you, Jesse."
"Love ya too, Kelly." They sat in silence for the next little while. Jesse wondered if what she had was contagious, but he didn't really care if it was. He wouldn't let go of her. The rest of the day saw no action. No fighting. It was silent. Men sat and stared in silence, completely oblivious to what was happening in the trenches ahead.
By nightfall, Jesse and Kelly fell asleep in each other's arms, paying little attention to the stench of the pieces of rotting flesh in the trench.
Jesse was there again. He was strapped into the seat of the massive UED infantry transporter he had come here on. He knew he was dreaming, but he didn't want to wake. He looked around, but it was too blurry to really see anything. He could make out the outlines of a few other soldiers, all strapped into their designated seats, but couldn't tell who they were. When his vision finally cleared a little, Jesse did not recognize any of the faces around him. The seats beside him were empty. To his right is where Miguel had been on the way to the Koprulu sector, and should have been right now. The scene was the same as the first time he had dreamed this dream, back on Braxis, after he had been hospitalized and operated on by Kelly. There was a sudden thud, and the carrier shook slightly. Then there was another thud, this time much louder, and a violent shake that nearly threw him from his seat – and would if had he not been strapped in. He heard a curse come from a man a ways away. Then he heard a voice. The monotone sound was too unclear for Jesse to really make out, but it was definitely somebody calling to him in desperation. "Jesse! JESSE-E-E!!"
"Jesse! Jesse!" At some point during the night, Jesse woke to Kelly's calls. Groggy and disoriented, the young soldier looked up at a seemingly rejuvenated girl. "Jesse!" she repeated, not quite sure if he had waken up yet.
"Ugh, what's going—",
"Jesse! Get your gun!"
"Why? What's goin' on?"
"Troops are coming from the north!"
"How do you know?" Jesse found himself very startled, and quite unsatisfied when he was finally awake enough to notice the movement around him. The huge pieces of moving white armor, which essentially were Directorate infantry, were dashing this way and that, replacing previously removed pieces of armor and shouting things Jesse couldn't hear over the ruckus.
"Rikter just burst through ordering positions and kicking everything around!" Kelly got up on her knees, and anxiously tried to pull Jesse up off the ground.
"Oh, shit." Jesse felt around for his helmet, but couldn't grab hold of it. Somebody had taken it in all the confusion.
"Jesse, c'mon, you can use mine!" Kelly tried handing Jesse hers, but he refused.
"No, put it on and don't take it off!"
"Jesse!"
"Do it!" He moved to an upright position and picked his gauss rifle up off the trench floor. He found himself standing on a battered wooden plank, one of the many that had been placed through the center of the trench as a sort-of makeshift walkway.
"Jesse!" Kelly screamed at him.
He didn't reply as he leaped forward onto a ladder and climbed two steps. His head was poking over the edge, and on the lunar-lit horizon were what appeared to be the shadows of huge formations of advancing soldiers. Since they had come from the north, Jesse automatically inferred that they were under Dominion command. The barbed wire sprawled out across the sandy dunes to his front partially blocked his view, but Jesse could see what was coming clearly enough to know that there were a lot of them. He grabbed a small comm. Device from his side and put it to his mouth. "Squad C, this is commander Jesse Markham. Take positions at the walls immediately, repeat, positions at the walls immediately! If possible, relocate to area 44. Priority alert! Squad C take positions on the wall now!"
Jesse hopped down and stayed close to the side of the trench as a fumbling line of men ran through the center, down the makeshift wooden pathway. When they passed, Jesse closed up to Kelly, who now had a fully armored medic on either side of her, standing ready.
"Kelly," he started, "keep your eye on what's going on if anything happens to me. You know I love ya."
She just sort of stared at him as if he had told her he was pregnant. Jesse didn't wait for her answer as he hoped back onto the ladder and peaked over the edge again. The shadows on the horizon were bigger now, and bouncing up and down. "They're running…" he muttered to himself.
Hordes of men were on the walls of the trench to either side of him. Some also had pieces of armor missing, and others wore no armor at all. Obviously nobody had expected a preemptive attack in the night. "Squad C?" Jesse noted a few hands in the air, and men who had turned to him at attention, but not as many as he could have. "Where the fuck is everybody?" Deciding to go 'off-duty', a good number of men had left their designated area to chat with friends from other squads.
"Sir!" two more soldiers from Jesse's squad hopped from the bottom of the trench and took a place on the wall.
Jesse looked to his behind at Kelly, who was looking back at him. He kept his eyes on her for only a few seconds, but to Jesse, it was long enough to be forever.
"Wheeeeeee, doggah!" Marlon perched himself next to Jesse, and even in the blackness of the night, Jesse could see him smiling.
"Glad you decided to show." Jesse commented to Marlon, fairly angry with him.
"I went for drinks."
"There's booze here?"
"Maybe."
"I'm going to pretend you didn't say that." Liquor had been strictly prohibited. This pissed Jesse off even more. "Where's everybody else?"
"Not sure; Miguel's around here somewhere. Probably got caught jacking off."
"Oh that's real mature, man."
Marlon looked ahead with ambition. "Just a little closer and you're all mine. Well, maybe not all of you in that sense, but as many of you as dare to get into the sight of Super Marlon!" The brute was clearly half-drunk.
Jesse looked away, disgusted. The effects of his deep sleep had yet to wear off completely, and he found himself a little light headed and woozy. Nevertheless, his grasp on the situation was nothing short of stellar. He relayed orders to the men, instructing some of them to squeeze over and make room for new troops on the wall. He ran his tongue across his upper lip and packaged it into the side of his mouth once it had moved all the way across. The soldiers to his left and right laid their guns over the edge of the sand and positioned their heads low to the ground, giving them protection and more correct aim.
"Hmmm…" Jesse was thinking hard and wondering if there was anything else he could do. He repeated his instructions over the intercom once more, hoping straggling members of his squad would hear them and come back into position.
"Heh heh, all set here, Captain." Samir Duran and a mere handful of men lined up sparsely behind the UED trench, some two hundred yards back. They looked onward, almost as if they were idle observers of the fight to take place.
"You have your orders, Lieutenant. I trust you will execute them without hesitation." Rikter entrusted Duran and his men with a special objective that had never been tried before. It was going to be messy at the front.
"Attention!" Rikter's voice came on, thundering over that of the rest of the noisy soldiers. "Soldiers of the United Earth Directorate, this is your captain. Remain in position. Do not retreat, I repeat, do NOT fall back! Guards have been placed behind the trench. Anyone caught moving backwards will be shot and killed without question on my authority and on the authority of Lieutenant Duran. Fight for the Directorate. Fight for Humanity! All other priorities are secondary to victory!"
The sound of safeties being turned off and guns being planted deeply into the sand at the top of the trench wall followed as an echo to that inspiring sentence of discipline made so often by the Directorate captains. The UED infantry was now a solid wall of killers ready to murder every single Dominion soldier that was about to come at them. The Dominion soldiers had the same hopes about their foes.
"Hold fire." Jesse ordered. He raised his gun and fired a small burst forward to try to determine how far away the enemy was. It didn't work. "Set." He meticulously overlooked the men to his sides.
Marlon was silent, as were the rest. When the dying started, silence wouldn't be found for miles. Jesse took this quick moment as a small blessing.
"Jesse," Marlon began, "a hundred yards."
"What? How do you know?" Jesse looked at Marlon.
"They're trying to get over the barbed wire. Look at it, you can see the shadows crawling and jumping. They aren't running anymore." The barbed wire coils began about a hundred yards from the trench.
"You're right. Squadron C," Jesse waited a moment, and then gave the order. "Fire at anything that moves!"
So with that, the sound of death rang from the metal pipes that fired the high velocity bullets at the remains of the Dominion army. The grunts didn't know what was coming at them or what was going to happen to them. They just knew that they had a job, and their job was to kill. And if they didn't kill, then they would be killed. That's how you got fired for doing a bad job in the army. You were killed in cold blood.
Marlon was almost smiling as he let go of an entire clip. Each shot lit up his face, and his eyes were open as wide as was allowable by his body. To Jesse's utter surprise, Marlon was having fun killing these people. Jesse found himself more disgusted with his attitude each day.
After Marlon's show ended and he stopped to reload, Jesse unleashed his barrage at the mass. The men were so far off, Jesse was positive his bullets were flying astray and barely hitting anything at all. But he had enough ammunition to last the night. He pulled his finger off of the trigger for a moment, allowing his gun to cool. Then he squinted, and fired again. He was positive he hit something. Strangely, Jesse felt a sense of satisfaction with the hit, enough to eliminate the guilt that came with it.
Marlon smashed his arms into the sand again, and with his newly filled cartridge, he began play his little game some more.
From the point of view of the Dominion army, the edge of the trench was clearly cut in the sand. It was a solid line of flashing light, popping, and cries of war. The Dominion army seemed to be tripping over the bodies of its fallen members, which made somewhat of a wall of massing dead. The nimble soldiers advanced rather quickly, however, and avoided the oncoming bullets.
Jesse planted his feet more firmly into the sand and kicked some 'toe holes' into the wall, so he could weight himself down. Without his helmet, falling down could be dangerous. After loading another clip into his gauss rifle, he aimed into the darkness and shot some more. He kept this up for several minutes.
By now, the Dominion infantry was well within the range of sight, diving into the ground and crawling forward against the dusty sand. Jesse had found it difficult to aim at any specific person, and thus had been spraying bullets in all directions. Many of the attacking soldiers took quick dives behind dunes or rocks to catch their breath and reorganize their heads. Bullets flew back and forth, exchanging armies fluently.
A man, fully armored and gun-in-hand, jumped up onto the footing on the edge of the trench, directly next to Jesse. Presently he stood in a spot that had once been occupied by a Marine, who was now laying peacefully on the trench floor, drowning in a pool of blood. He was silent.
"What's it look like over there, soldier?" Jesse asked the man.
Jesse was relieved to see Miguel's face as that marine lifted his visor. Miguel, breathing heavily and still suffering from the effects of sleeping, sputtered some words forward. "The entire eastside of the trench is failing. The dominion infantry was just meters from the edge when I left, some several hundred of them are just plowing over the barbed wire like fifty feet east of us. Somebody fucked it all up. The line's breaking, and they're all fleeing this way. Some of our guys tried running away, but Rikter's right, somebody's back there are shooting anything that runs."
"Well what's going on to the west of us?"
"It's looking good on that side, but I can't be sure. They're going to hold it from what I've been hearing on the comm., but I'm worried that the…"
Miguel's voice drowned out of Jesse's head for a moment as he peered back at the floor of the trench. About 5 feet away, Kelly was on her knees, her supplies sprawled out over the ground, as she feverishly worked to heal what looked like a vicious wound on one of the men.
"Er, what?" Jesse said.
Miguel looked at him strangely for a moment, and then repeated himself. "I said, I'm worried that they're going to start using the tanks, Jesse. You need to get a helmet on!"
"Tanks? Why?"
"I saw Rikter, he's been pondering it. He says they're going to pierce the east side of the trench, and flood us out from inside. But everything's a mess, Jesse. He can't even speak to the commanders or anything. Communications are totally cut off, and I think he's going to let the tanks go anyway. There's so many of us without armor, Jesse, the heat's going to totally kill us.
Then the screeching sound of the tanks adjusting the position of their nozzles filled the air. Through the smoke and dust surrounding his head, Jesse was able to see them roll into position and lay out into siege mode, just meters behind the trench.
"Oh, shit, shit, shit!" Jesse hollered. He stumbled backward, falling from the footing of the trench onto a body upon the floor.
"Jesse!" Kelly screamed, dropping her belongings, unsure if he had been shot.
Jesse got up so quickly he could have bounced from the ground. "Helmet! I need a Helmet!"
"Here, take mine!" She hollered in a relieved but surprised tone.
He slapped her hand away from her head. "No, keep it on, Dammt!" He got on the comm. device and gave an order. "Everybody who can hear this, get fully armored and pressurized! The tanks are warming up! Hurry!"
Marlon jumped from the footing, and removed a helmet from a nearby body, placing it on his head. He turned on the suit's atmospheric function, and latched the helmet onto his armor.
Meanwhile, Jesse scrambled on the ground, feverishly searching for a helmet that didn't have a puncture in it. After searching through several bodies, Kelly found one and rushed it over to him.
"Here, hurry, hurry!" She cried, placing it on his head.
Jesse, in his rush, was far too frantic to adjust the helmet properly. Kelly, with her steady hands, quickly completed Jesse's armor. He turned on the atmospheric feature, and breathed a sigh of relief. Moments later, the thunder of screaming plasma rocked the trench, and as the gaseous residue filled the skies, Jesse witnessed several men in the area squirm and twist in pain, screaming and holding their arms over their heads as the flopped upon the ground like fish, their skin slowly peeling from their bodies. Jesse felt a rush of vomit in his throat, and pushed it back down. He touched visors with Kelly, and climbed back onto the trench's wall. A second volley of plasma shot over his head, landing about ten meters in front of him. As they made contact with the ground, rocks, bodies, and pieces of bodies burst through the air in all directions. Hundreds of oncoming soldiers fell, injured or dead, or worse, if that was possible. Jesse wasn't looking at the LED on his combat suit, but it read the temperature as 267 degrees Celsius.
Jesse's comm. had been filled with static for some time now, but he could make out a faint voice over the speaker. The words were muddled. "Forces … made…. –ench … repeat … into … heading …"
Jesse pondered this for a minute. He watched more plasma burst upon contact with the battlements, and more bodies become airborne. Then he noticed his gun had been taken from its spot at the trench's edge. Who the culprit was, he was uncertain. He made a trip to a dead body on the floor once again, and took the gun. Jesse, rushing with adrenaline, took aim at the head of a man peeking beyond a dune of sand, and pulled the trigger. The head snapped backwards, and the body fell over.
"If anybody can hear this, the Dominion special forces have reached the trench!" A Directorate soldier, breathing heavily and desperately screaming over the comm. waves, tried his best to alert his comrades to the ensuing danger. "Repeat, Dominion has reached the trench! The east point has fallen, and they're heading west through the lines. Hurry, stop them, stop them!"
It was at that point that a single bullet entered the boy's skull. Standing behind him was a slim man, holding a C-10 canister rifle. However he wasn't in armor. Instead, he wore the lightweight clothes of the frightful Terran ghost, a psychic unit capable of becoming invisible at whim. The ghosts represented the true evolutionary capabilities of the Human race, and epitomized the height of physical and mental conditioning. They were the greatest single unit that could be deployed by the Dominion, and several of them had entered the Directorate trench.
A solid line of Directorate marines still held the wall of the trench some quarter mile from its easternmost point, standing shoulder to shoulder, their guns were dug into the chin-height sand at the edge of the trench and heads were lowered for personal protection. However, both sides seemed to hold a ceasefire.
"Miguel, any news about the east side?" Jesse turned his head to his left, where Miguel currently fiddled with his receptor.
"I can't hear a thing, Jesse. I don't know what's happening."
Jesse looked at the LED on the side of his gun. 73 rounds. He had no spare ammunition left. "It kind of gives you a feeling of uncertainty, not being able to know what's going on."
"I'm sure it's fine."
"You." Jesse looked one man past Marlon on his right side. "I want you to run down to the east side and see if everything's alright. Get back ASAP and report."
"Sir!" The marine took off, down the trench floor.
Jesse jumped back onto the body-ridden walkway, which flattened the uneven crusty floor of the trench, and stood in front of Kelly. Checking his LED, the temperature outside had cooled to 29 degrees Celsius. He opened his visor, and she opened hers.
"You feeling okay?" He questioned.
"Peachy." Her mystery illness had either taken a back seat, or had left her altogether. "It's almost morning." She reminded. The lanterns in the trench had hardly served to adequately light the shelter.
Jesse looked into the skies. A hint of natural light seemed to brighten the night. "It's been a long night."
Kelly's gloves were drenched in Human blood. She and Jesse learned against the wall of the trench. It was at this point that Jesse noticed something peculiar. Among the silence of the soldiers, a faint rustling sound could be heard in the near distance, uncharacteristic to the armor of any of the men. Jesse watched as the middle of one of the boards at the foot of the trench bent downward, creaked, and then returned to its normal position. Then, one of the dead suits of armor feigned gentle movement. In tandem, the board closest to Jesse bent, only it remained bent and did not creak. Jesse strained his eyes to look at this. Then he looked upward, at about head's height, for a moment. He continued to stare like this for some time.
Jesse heard the sound of falling dirt beside him. Startled, he looked at the wall to his left, to find what appeared to be an imprint upon it. Then, he heard the sound of a gun safety being removed. He jerked his eyes up to the marines on the trench wall, but none of them displayed even the slightest sign of movement.
"Hey, listen." Jesse said to Kelly. "They're understaffed to the west. I've talked with Rikter, he said that we've got to spare as many medical staff as possible. Jesse simply looked at her, with an urgent display on his face.
"Okay. Bye bye, hon." She said, and dashed down the trench. Jesse wondered about Kelly. Every now and then, she did things that he couldn't understand. Lately, she had been doing things almost as if she knew what he wanted before he even had to ask.
When she was out of sight, Jesse climbed back onto the footing. He tapped both Miguel and Marlon on their helmets, and opened his visor. They opened theirs too. Jesse whispered something to both of them, to which they nodded in reply. All three men closed their visors, and Jesse hopped back down to the floor. Testing a hunch, Jesse walked towards the bent wooden plank. The plank bent back to its normal shape, and suddenly a small round imprint, about the size of a foot, appeared in the dirt next to it.
Jesse then walked to where the imprint had been upon the wall, and not surprisingly, more dirt fell to the ground as Jesse moved in front of it. Checking his gun again, his ammunition count hadn't changed since his last glance. He put his finger tightly on the trigger.
Then, Miguel swung around, his leg flailing through the air at barely sub-sonic speeds, until it made contact with something in the dim light. A groan was heard, followed by the sound of something falling, and finally a small uprising of a cloud dust and sand. Marlon, from the footing, released a spray of bullets towards the ground. And from the nothingness, a spatter of blood littered the ground and clearly outlined of a Humanoid creature. Then Jesse lifted his gun to the air and fired a small burst to a place where he believed another of the invisible men had been standing. Blood, and then a loud fall.
Jesse then saw what he had feared. One by one, his men fell from the footing, lifelessly, a single piece of metal the shape of a bullet sitting contently in their brains. He fired a shot down the trench, trying to hit what he couldn't see, but he hit nothing. More of his men fell to the ground. Then, those who still hadn't noticed what was happening opened fire on the field in front of the trench as the Dominion strike force charged forward. More Directorate soldiers fell.
Miguel, a bullet ricocheting off his helmet, fell to the ground in utter shock. Marlon ran out of bullets, and crouched beneath the edge of the trench as he desperately tried to reload. Jesse could clearly see the bright flares of screaming UED guns in the distance, further down the trench.
As Jesse tried desperately to discern the location of the invisible men, he stopped in disbelief. What had originally been a line of marines locked shoulder-to-shoulder as far as the eye could see had been reduced to a staggered, failing line. Spaces two meters or greater could be found separating some of the soldiers. Still firing with determination, the trench defenders threw everything they had at the oncoming militia, while fighting with the internal threat within the trench: The Dominion Ghosts.
It soon became clear that 'everything' wasn't nearly enough, when the Dominion militia began to enter the trench.
"They're inside!" Jesse cried.
"They are!" Another man turned and fired upon those invaders that he could.
Marlon, now reloaded, got up and unleashed hell, sending at least five Dominion troops to the ground. Jesse, wisely using his precious last ammunition, shot at a soldier, who fell to the ground in response. It was now impossible to move in the trench; the Directorate soldiers tried desperately to push back the Dominion attackers as they filled every space possible. Many guns had been abandoned for hand-to-hand combat, as soldiers tackled each other and fought to remove their opponent's helmet. From Jesse's point of view, all that could be seen was arms waving throughout the air, and interlocked fingers as soldiers struggled to subdue each other. He wondered if the same thing was happening in other areas of the trench. He worried about his girlfriend. In the chaos, Jesse couldn't determine who was going to win, or who had more men. Then two soldiers tackled him to the ground. As he struggled to achieve some kind of prominence over the two, he found himself desperately trying to keep his helmet shut. In the hands of one of the soldiers was a knife.
Jesse's fears were put to rest, however, when reinforcements poured over the friendly side of the trench. Jesse had never been so happy so be surrounded by those clad-white militias.
As he struck down the last of the red-armored attackers, Jesse looked up. The trench, now a complete disaster area, was no longer threatened. However the result of the battle was difficult to look upon. The few Dominion marines who had managed to survive climbed over the wall, making a last vein attempt to escape death – but they were all shot before they could escape. Jesse stood knee-high in bodies. Blood flowed through the corpses like a river, staining the hooves of Jesse's combat armor. The ground of the trench was no longer visible, as it was completely covered by bodies. It was simply unbearable.
"Forces of the United Earth Directorate," A booming voice came over Jesse's comm. "This is Admiral Gerard DuGalle. I sincerely apologize for the lack of radio communications between the whole of you. The error was not a mistake on the part of any of you. I have only now been informed of your valiant success in holding the outer trench against the massive Dominion onslaught. I am proud to be able to call you soldiers of Earth."
Jesse was breathing heavily, still drenched in sweat, and his legs were ready to give out from all the physical combat. He slowly removed his helmet as he listened to the Admiral's speech, as the first twinkle of true sunlight shone over the valley of death.
"Humbly, I must ask of you one last thing before you can rest. The heavy casualties suffered by Mengsk's forces may have put his armies into shock. Before he has time to reinforce his garrison, we must make a second advance upon the city. Captain Rikter and Lieutenant Duran will lead you to the second trench, which you must infiltrate and liberate from the Terran soldiers. God's speed to you all."
So the United Earth Directorate advanced further toward Augustgrad. Pushing into the second trench, their arrival saw the retreat of its garrison. Now, with only one trench remaining before the city, final victory over the Terran Dominion seemed assured.
Jesse went back to sleep on the ground of the new trench. This time he was happy to note that there was not a single body tainting the ground. Kelly slept beside him, and Marlon and Miguel, still quite awake, talked livelily while they watched over the cozy couple. Even Paul showed up to celebrate in his own way.
While the Directorate boasted at their victory, Emperor Mengsk sat in his room with the large window. He looked over his last trench – the only barrier separating the Human invaders from total conquest of his empire. He could not sleep this morning.
A DEAD WORLD
March 27, 9:30 AM
UED Flagship Aleksander
Low orbit over Dominion throne world of Korhal
"How pleasant." Rikter was aboard the Aleksander looking out at the desolate and ruined landscapes of the Dominion throne world. He saw endless dunes of sand in fields that seemed to stretch on forever. Cliffs of red chalk hid parts of the land from his view, and his sight was occupied by an unusually large amount of debris and waste. The area below him had been a city a long time ago, before the great disaster brought on by the Confederacy many years ago.
The planet had been a hotbed for anti-Confederate sediments for years when it began to pose as the threat of the Confederacy, the old Terran government. A massive planetary barrage of missiles was launched from Tarsonis to Korhal with intent to destroy. Warnings had seemed to do little for the rebellions. Millions were killed. The great armies were torn apart, and entire cities were erased from the world. The soil and vegetation died in the holocaust of the attack, leaving Korhal nothing but a wasteland. Ironically, this disabled planet was what finally launched the rebellion that would eventually defeat the Confederacy. That successful rebellion's leader, Arcturus Mengsk, is the man who currently sits on the throne of Korhal. But that won't last much longer.
The Directorate has been attacking the planet for two weeks now, dispatching massive fleets of warships and bombing all of the important cities to smithereens. Unlike the other worlds liberated by the UED, Korhal was irrelevant to the plans of the Earth-born government. It was already destroyed, and its cities were of no great value. So far, there had been no need to dispatch militias and teams of standing infantry. Augustgrad is the key to Korhal. It is a city of over four-million that serves as the primary trade and manufacturing center on the planet. Regardless of whether or not other cities continue to exist on Korhal, without Augustgrad, they will falter and their citizens will be forced to surrender to the power of Earth.
Korhal is all the remains of the Dominion government. Augustgrad is the only major Korhalian city that so far remains unoccupied by the UED, and Emperor Mengsk has concentrated what is left of his planet's garrison to the city in a final stand to defend his empire. There are perhaps half a million armed men and women within Augustgrad who are ready to give their lives for their government and empire. They lie in wait not far from the Aleksander.
It seems that the closer to Korhal the UED came, the harder it was to win the hearts of citizens. Amazingly, Korhal itself has stood strong, though no city has submitted without force of some kind. Augustgrad is too well protected to defeat by bombings, and the personal coffers of the Dominion are contained within the city's heart. Instead of destroying it, Admiral Gerard DuGalle has decided that it will be wisest to attack the city from the ground, with support from the air pending on the situation.
He believes that the true power of the UED is in its fleet, and that the war with the Zerg will be far costlier than the war against the Dominion. So he has decided it best to conserve the air forces, regardless of how many losses the UED infantry ranks will suffer in the attack.
"New men can be drafted into action, but fleets take years to construct. I cannot agree, Captain, with the Admiral's decision completely, but I see where he is coming from." Alexei spoke to Rikter from a few feet away. They were standing on the bridge, lights flashing from the keypads to their side. "Many men may die today, I won't deny it. But that is the price we will have to pay to win the city. There is no other way."
"Air attacks have worked so far. We've lost less than a hundred ships in the last two weeks. Hell, you'll lose a hundred men in the first fucking seconds of this. You've got thousands of God damn war toys at your disposal, sir." Rikter didn't like the idea of so many men dying over one city, either.
"Yes, thousands of warships. And millions of infantry, might I remind you. I don't look at lives statistically by choice, but it's all we can do. No matter how many men die, we will still have a strong core of militia when this is done. Militia is expendable."
"Lives are not expendable!" Rikter burst out at Alexei.
"Neither is the well being of Earth and the mission to defeat the Zerg! You must realize this, Captain. A few million soldiers will have died in this war against the Zerg by the time it ends. If we cannot win, there are a hundred billion Human beings who will eventually die, added to the ranks of those who the Zerg and Terrans have killed already. Look past one war. Look at entire civilizations and races!"
"Heh, yeah, are you going to sacrifice these poor men against the Zerg when it comes time to fight them? I don't care what that fucking DuGalle says about this war, I know the Zerg are going to fight us on the ground too. See with your eyes! Half of these men are out here only to make a buck, and the other half have been forced into service because of a bad mistake they made five or ten years ago. And of all the criminals here, some of them were probably wrongly arrested."
"Captain, might I remind you that you are to pay keen attention to RANK when referring to the Admiral, and that if you ever refer to him with a curse again, I will be left with no choice but to declare you a obstruction to our true mission, and have you arrested. Is this understood?"
"Yes, sir." Rikter sputtered out.
"The Zerg are a race that come with a terrible history. One filled with tales of entire civilizations being chewed to pieces and spit out like unwanted food. I doubt that, under the circumstances, we will skirmish with them as we have done with the Dominion colonists."
"Understood."
"Captain, the assault of Augustgrad will commence within eight standard hours. Full mission briefing is documented on your computer. You are to deploy your forces at 24.5.5, and you must take control of the first trench in the Dominion defense. Once you have accomplished this, reinforcements will join you under the command of Lieutenant Duran. Await further instructions once this primary objective is completed."
"Sir, if I might ask, I need a calculation of how many men I've still got, and what I'm up against."
"We don't have specialized intelligence of the situation, but we expect to encounter at least a half million units throughout the entirety of the siege. Specifics are documented in your briefing. You may go now, Captain."
"Sir!" Rikter saluted, turned, and left for his chamber. "Let's go have some fun… eh." Rikter thought to himself as he left the bridge.
12:30 PM
Personal Chamber of Emperor Arcturus Mengsk
Augustgrad, Korhal
It was a shabby, old television. The static was in great amount, and the reception was poor. Sadly, too many were forced to view such disrespected pieces of entertainment. The Dominion had lost everything to this Earth Directorate. Who were they to come endless miles on a journey to cause such havoc? To destroy a man's empire was no game. To steal his people and use them against him was dishonor. To completely surround an Emperor in his very home and kill every single person he provided health and happiness to was inexcusable. And to attack him on his very doorstep was the ultimate embarrassment. Once, there were hundreds of TV stations. Now, there was one. Every other one had been shut down and destroyed. Media did not exist anymore. Instead, Earth was the media. The Directorate was the news reporter, its home planet the office, and its people the workers.
The Dominion was not a colony. It was an empire. These people were not of the Human race. They were Terrans of the Terran Dominion. They were people whose ancestors fled a place that sought to kill them. They were the children of a bright new race. Now this race had been destroyed and assimilated into everything it was not. The UED was like the Zerg – ruthless, ignorant, and careless. Had the UED even thought of what the Dominion wanted? Had it even considered that the Dominion people were proud of who they were? Were blacks told to be white because they stuck out too much? No, they were not. Blacks were who they were – they were important people of their own, simply a part of a bigger picture. How was the Dominion not its own people, simply a part of the bigger picture?
Arcturus himself stood at his window. He was in a small room, one with red carpet and golden lining. Cushioned green chairs were three in number. Then there were the interesting lighting fixtures on the roof. And the wooden walls, assembled in vertical strips, were lovely. It was a peaceful and quiet room. Arcturus was alone. He liked the loneliness of his room. He liked being separate. He liked how his generals would be commanding his troops on the battlefield, and he would watch, alone and undisturbed, from that giant window.
March 28, 4: 02 PM
"The Front"
Outer Trench, South of Augustgrad
The extend of the damnable prison-like hole in the ground which Jesse sat in was as follows: Seven feet deep and as many miles across, a mere six feet wide and littered with debris, ladders, and bodies. Freshly liberated from the Dominion outer guard, the stench of death still filled the trench. Jesse was still perspiring from the battle. His helmet had been removed and was resting on the sandy dirt beside him. His armor greatly enhanced his size, and the look of his head was rather small compared to what one would expect from such a giant soldier. Of course, Jesse was proportioned fairly perfectly, but with all the cumbersome armor he was wearing, he didn't look it.
His bottom was placed on a small wooden box, which Jesse felt was eventually going to collapse under him. He wasn't as concerned about that, though, as he was the beautiful young girl sitting beside him.
Kelly had grown very ill over the last couple of days, and Jesse had become increasingly worried for her. Her face, losing the golden-peachy complexion it once proudly boasted, now seemed to be green. Her hair fell into her eyes, covering her lovely features completely, and she had begun moaning and groaning a little over the last few hours. Jesse was unable to figure out what was wrong with her, and even after multiple visits by several different medical staff, nobody was able to determine what disorder Kelly seemed to be suffering from.
"Has she fought a lot?" The doctor had asked Jesse mere minutes ago.
"Yeah, she's been through a bunch of scraps with us." Jesse replied, thinking of the many close calls and wondering how he even let her run missions anymore without breaking down.
The doctor consulted an associate of his, who was also unable to determine what her problem was. "Give it another few days and leave us alone," was basically what the doctors had all come up with.
Jesse's heart burned. His girlfriend seemed to be in so much pain, and it hurt him too. He stood and kicked the wooden box away, and sat closer beside her. Her helmet was also detached. When he slid an arm around her and kissed her on the forehead, she looked up at him, seeming even worse than before. Jesse almost startled at how badly she appeared.
"It's getting worse…" Kelly moaned.
Jesse leaned his head against hers and nuzzled his nose against her cheek. "What's wrong with you? What the hell is it?" He mumbled.
"Ever had one of those dreams where you can fly?"
"Yeah, sure."
"And then if you try to walk, you can't go very fast, and if you run, you don't move anywhere?"
"Sort of."
"And you feel like there's no gravity?"
"Ahuh."
"That's how I feel. Light and lost."
Jesse found this odd. The gravity on Korhal was stronger than that of Earth. "It's all going to be better soon. I'm taking care of you, and I won't rest until you're good as new."
"I love you, Jesse."
"Love ya too, Kelly." They sat in silence for the next little while. Jesse wondered if what she had was contagious, but he didn't really care if it was. He wouldn't let go of her. The rest of the day saw no action. No fighting. It was silent. Men sat and stared in silence, completely oblivious to what was happening in the trenches ahead.
By nightfall, Jesse and Kelly fell asleep in each other's arms, paying little attention to the stench of the pieces of rotting flesh in the trench.
Jesse was there again. He was strapped into the seat of the massive UED infantry transporter he had come here on. He knew he was dreaming, but he didn't want to wake. He looked around, but it was too blurry to really see anything. He could make out the outlines of a few other soldiers, all strapped into their designated seats, but couldn't tell who they were. When his vision finally cleared a little, Jesse did not recognize any of the faces around him. The seats beside him were empty. To his right is where Miguel had been on the way to the Koprulu sector, and should have been right now. The scene was the same as the first time he had dreamed this dream, back on Braxis, after he had been hospitalized and operated on by Kelly. There was a sudden thud, and the carrier shook slightly. Then there was another thud, this time much louder, and a violent shake that nearly threw him from his seat – and would if had he not been strapped in. He heard a curse come from a man a ways away. Then he heard a voice. The monotone sound was too unclear for Jesse to really make out, but it was definitely somebody calling to him in desperation. "Jesse! JESSE-E-E!!"
"Jesse! Jesse!" At some point during the night, Jesse woke to Kelly's calls. Groggy and disoriented, the young soldier looked up at a seemingly rejuvenated girl. "Jesse!" she repeated, not quite sure if he had waken up yet.
"Ugh, what's going—",
"Jesse! Get your gun!"
"Why? What's goin' on?"
"Troops are coming from the north!"
"How do you know?" Jesse found himself very startled, and quite unsatisfied when he was finally awake enough to notice the movement around him. The huge pieces of moving white armor, which essentially were Directorate infantry, were dashing this way and that, replacing previously removed pieces of armor and shouting things Jesse couldn't hear over the ruckus.
"Rikter just burst through ordering positions and kicking everything around!" Kelly got up on her knees, and anxiously tried to pull Jesse up off the ground.
"Oh, shit." Jesse felt around for his helmet, but couldn't grab hold of it. Somebody had taken it in all the confusion.
"Jesse, c'mon, you can use mine!" Kelly tried handing Jesse hers, but he refused.
"No, put it on and don't take it off!"
"Jesse!"
"Do it!" He moved to an upright position and picked his gauss rifle up off the trench floor. He found himself standing on a battered wooden plank, one of the many that had been placed through the center of the trench as a sort-of makeshift walkway.
"Jesse!" Kelly screamed at him.
He didn't reply as he leaped forward onto a ladder and climbed two steps. His head was poking over the edge, and on the lunar-lit horizon were what appeared to be the shadows of huge formations of advancing soldiers. Since they had come from the north, Jesse automatically inferred that they were under Dominion command. The barbed wire sprawled out across the sandy dunes to his front partially blocked his view, but Jesse could see what was coming clearly enough to know that there were a lot of them. He grabbed a small comm. Device from his side and put it to his mouth. "Squad C, this is commander Jesse Markham. Take positions at the walls immediately, repeat, positions at the walls immediately! If possible, relocate to area 44. Priority alert! Squad C take positions on the wall now!"
Jesse hopped down and stayed close to the side of the trench as a fumbling line of men ran through the center, down the makeshift wooden pathway. When they passed, Jesse closed up to Kelly, who now had a fully armored medic on either side of her, standing ready.
"Kelly," he started, "keep your eye on what's going on if anything happens to me. You know I love ya."
She just sort of stared at him as if he had told her he was pregnant. Jesse didn't wait for her answer as he hoped back onto the ladder and peaked over the edge again. The shadows on the horizon were bigger now, and bouncing up and down. "They're running…" he muttered to himself.
Hordes of men were on the walls of the trench to either side of him. Some also had pieces of armor missing, and others wore no armor at all. Obviously nobody had expected a preemptive attack in the night. "Squad C?" Jesse noted a few hands in the air, and men who had turned to him at attention, but not as many as he could have. "Where the fuck is everybody?" Deciding to go 'off-duty', a good number of men had left their designated area to chat with friends from other squads.
"Sir!" two more soldiers from Jesse's squad hopped from the bottom of the trench and took a place on the wall.
Jesse looked to his behind at Kelly, who was looking back at him. He kept his eyes on her for only a few seconds, but to Jesse, it was long enough to be forever.
"Wheeeeeee, doggah!" Marlon perched himself next to Jesse, and even in the blackness of the night, Jesse could see him smiling.
"Glad you decided to show." Jesse commented to Marlon, fairly angry with him.
"I went for drinks."
"There's booze here?"
"Maybe."
"I'm going to pretend you didn't say that." Liquor had been strictly prohibited. This pissed Jesse off even more. "Where's everybody else?"
"Not sure; Miguel's around here somewhere. Probably got caught jacking off."
"Oh that's real mature, man."
Marlon looked ahead with ambition. "Just a little closer and you're all mine. Well, maybe not all of you in that sense, but as many of you as dare to get into the sight of Super Marlon!" The brute was clearly half-drunk.
Jesse looked away, disgusted. The effects of his deep sleep had yet to wear off completely, and he found himself a little light headed and woozy. Nevertheless, his grasp on the situation was nothing short of stellar. He relayed orders to the men, instructing some of them to squeeze over and make room for new troops on the wall. He ran his tongue across his upper lip and packaged it into the side of his mouth once it had moved all the way across. The soldiers to his left and right laid their guns over the edge of the sand and positioned their heads low to the ground, giving them protection and more correct aim.
"Hmmm…" Jesse was thinking hard and wondering if there was anything else he could do. He repeated his instructions over the intercom once more, hoping straggling members of his squad would hear them and come back into position.
"Heh heh, all set here, Captain." Samir Duran and a mere handful of men lined up sparsely behind the UED trench, some two hundred yards back. They looked onward, almost as if they were idle observers of the fight to take place.
"You have your orders, Lieutenant. I trust you will execute them without hesitation." Rikter entrusted Duran and his men with a special objective that had never been tried before. It was going to be messy at the front.
"Attention!" Rikter's voice came on, thundering over that of the rest of the noisy soldiers. "Soldiers of the United Earth Directorate, this is your captain. Remain in position. Do not retreat, I repeat, do NOT fall back! Guards have been placed behind the trench. Anyone caught moving backwards will be shot and killed without question on my authority and on the authority of Lieutenant Duran. Fight for the Directorate. Fight for Humanity! All other priorities are secondary to victory!"
The sound of safeties being turned off and guns being planted deeply into the sand at the top of the trench wall followed as an echo to that inspiring sentence of discipline made so often by the Directorate captains. The UED infantry was now a solid wall of killers ready to murder every single Dominion soldier that was about to come at them. The Dominion soldiers had the same hopes about their foes.
"Hold fire." Jesse ordered. He raised his gun and fired a small burst forward to try to determine how far away the enemy was. It didn't work. "Set." He meticulously overlooked the men to his sides.
Marlon was silent, as were the rest. When the dying started, silence wouldn't be found for miles. Jesse took this quick moment as a small blessing.
"Jesse," Marlon began, "a hundred yards."
"What? How do you know?" Jesse looked at Marlon.
"They're trying to get over the barbed wire. Look at it, you can see the shadows crawling and jumping. They aren't running anymore." The barbed wire coils began about a hundred yards from the trench.
"You're right. Squadron C," Jesse waited a moment, and then gave the order. "Fire at anything that moves!"
So with that, the sound of death rang from the metal pipes that fired the high velocity bullets at the remains of the Dominion army. The grunts didn't know what was coming at them or what was going to happen to them. They just knew that they had a job, and their job was to kill. And if they didn't kill, then they would be killed. That's how you got fired for doing a bad job in the army. You were killed in cold blood.
Marlon was almost smiling as he let go of an entire clip. Each shot lit up his face, and his eyes were open as wide as was allowable by his body. To Jesse's utter surprise, Marlon was having fun killing these people. Jesse found himself more disgusted with his attitude each day.
After Marlon's show ended and he stopped to reload, Jesse unleashed his barrage at the mass. The men were so far off, Jesse was positive his bullets were flying astray and barely hitting anything at all. But he had enough ammunition to last the night. He pulled his finger off of the trigger for a moment, allowing his gun to cool. Then he squinted, and fired again. He was positive he hit something. Strangely, Jesse felt a sense of satisfaction with the hit, enough to eliminate the guilt that came with it.
Marlon smashed his arms into the sand again, and with his newly filled cartridge, he began play his little game some more.
From the point of view of the Dominion army, the edge of the trench was clearly cut in the sand. It was a solid line of flashing light, popping, and cries of war. The Dominion army seemed to be tripping over the bodies of its fallen members, which made somewhat of a wall of massing dead. The nimble soldiers advanced rather quickly, however, and avoided the oncoming bullets.
Jesse planted his feet more firmly into the sand and kicked some 'toe holes' into the wall, so he could weight himself down. Without his helmet, falling down could be dangerous. After loading another clip into his gauss rifle, he aimed into the darkness and shot some more. He kept this up for several minutes.
By now, the Dominion infantry was well within the range of sight, diving into the ground and crawling forward against the dusty sand. Jesse had found it difficult to aim at any specific person, and thus had been spraying bullets in all directions. Many of the attacking soldiers took quick dives behind dunes or rocks to catch their breath and reorganize their heads. Bullets flew back and forth, exchanging armies fluently.
A man, fully armored and gun-in-hand, jumped up onto the footing on the edge of the trench, directly next to Jesse. Presently he stood in a spot that had once been occupied by a Marine, who was now laying peacefully on the trench floor, drowning in a pool of blood. He was silent.
"What's it look like over there, soldier?" Jesse asked the man.
Jesse was relieved to see Miguel's face as that marine lifted his visor. Miguel, breathing heavily and still suffering from the effects of sleeping, sputtered some words forward. "The entire eastside of the trench is failing. The dominion infantry was just meters from the edge when I left, some several hundred of them are just plowing over the barbed wire like fifty feet east of us. Somebody fucked it all up. The line's breaking, and they're all fleeing this way. Some of our guys tried running away, but Rikter's right, somebody's back there are shooting anything that runs."
"Well what's going on to the west of us?"
"It's looking good on that side, but I can't be sure. They're going to hold it from what I've been hearing on the comm., but I'm worried that the…"
Miguel's voice drowned out of Jesse's head for a moment as he peered back at the floor of the trench. About 5 feet away, Kelly was on her knees, her supplies sprawled out over the ground, as she feverishly worked to heal what looked like a vicious wound on one of the men.
"Er, what?" Jesse said.
Miguel looked at him strangely for a moment, and then repeated himself. "I said, I'm worried that they're going to start using the tanks, Jesse. You need to get a helmet on!"
"Tanks? Why?"
"I saw Rikter, he's been pondering it. He says they're going to pierce the east side of the trench, and flood us out from inside. But everything's a mess, Jesse. He can't even speak to the commanders or anything. Communications are totally cut off, and I think he's going to let the tanks go anyway. There's so many of us without armor, Jesse, the heat's going to totally kill us.
Then the screeching sound of the tanks adjusting the position of their nozzles filled the air. Through the smoke and dust surrounding his head, Jesse was able to see them roll into position and lay out into siege mode, just meters behind the trench.
"Oh, shit, shit, shit!" Jesse hollered. He stumbled backward, falling from the footing of the trench onto a body upon the floor.
"Jesse!" Kelly screamed, dropping her belongings, unsure if he had been shot.
Jesse got up so quickly he could have bounced from the ground. "Helmet! I need a Helmet!"
"Here, take mine!" She hollered in a relieved but surprised tone.
He slapped her hand away from her head. "No, keep it on, Dammt!" He got on the comm. device and gave an order. "Everybody who can hear this, get fully armored and pressurized! The tanks are warming up! Hurry!"
Marlon jumped from the footing, and removed a helmet from a nearby body, placing it on his head. He turned on the suit's atmospheric function, and latched the helmet onto his armor.
Meanwhile, Jesse scrambled on the ground, feverishly searching for a helmet that didn't have a puncture in it. After searching through several bodies, Kelly found one and rushed it over to him.
"Here, hurry, hurry!" She cried, placing it on his head.
Jesse, in his rush, was far too frantic to adjust the helmet properly. Kelly, with her steady hands, quickly completed Jesse's armor. He turned on the atmospheric feature, and breathed a sigh of relief. Moments later, the thunder of screaming plasma rocked the trench, and as the gaseous residue filled the skies, Jesse witnessed several men in the area squirm and twist in pain, screaming and holding their arms over their heads as the flopped upon the ground like fish, their skin slowly peeling from their bodies. Jesse felt a rush of vomit in his throat, and pushed it back down. He touched visors with Kelly, and climbed back onto the trench's wall. A second volley of plasma shot over his head, landing about ten meters in front of him. As they made contact with the ground, rocks, bodies, and pieces of bodies burst through the air in all directions. Hundreds of oncoming soldiers fell, injured or dead, or worse, if that was possible. Jesse wasn't looking at the LED on his combat suit, but it read the temperature as 267 degrees Celsius.
Jesse's comm. had been filled with static for some time now, but he could make out a faint voice over the speaker. The words were muddled. "Forces … made…. –ench … repeat … into … heading …"
Jesse pondered this for a minute. He watched more plasma burst upon contact with the battlements, and more bodies become airborne. Then he noticed his gun had been taken from its spot at the trench's edge. Who the culprit was, he was uncertain. He made a trip to a dead body on the floor once again, and took the gun. Jesse, rushing with adrenaline, took aim at the head of a man peeking beyond a dune of sand, and pulled the trigger. The head snapped backwards, and the body fell over.
"If anybody can hear this, the Dominion special forces have reached the trench!" A Directorate soldier, breathing heavily and desperately screaming over the comm. waves, tried his best to alert his comrades to the ensuing danger. "Repeat, Dominion has reached the trench! The east point has fallen, and they're heading west through the lines. Hurry, stop them, stop them!"
It was at that point that a single bullet entered the boy's skull. Standing behind him was a slim man, holding a C-10 canister rifle. However he wasn't in armor. Instead, he wore the lightweight clothes of the frightful Terran ghost, a psychic unit capable of becoming invisible at whim. The ghosts represented the true evolutionary capabilities of the Human race, and epitomized the height of physical and mental conditioning. They were the greatest single unit that could be deployed by the Dominion, and several of them had entered the Directorate trench.
A solid line of Directorate marines still held the wall of the trench some quarter mile from its easternmost point, standing shoulder to shoulder, their guns were dug into the chin-height sand at the edge of the trench and heads were lowered for personal protection. However, both sides seemed to hold a ceasefire.
"Miguel, any news about the east side?" Jesse turned his head to his left, where Miguel currently fiddled with his receptor.
"I can't hear a thing, Jesse. I don't know what's happening."
Jesse looked at the LED on the side of his gun. 73 rounds. He had no spare ammunition left. "It kind of gives you a feeling of uncertainty, not being able to know what's going on."
"I'm sure it's fine."
"You." Jesse looked one man past Marlon on his right side. "I want you to run down to the east side and see if everything's alright. Get back ASAP and report."
"Sir!" The marine took off, down the trench floor.
Jesse jumped back onto the body-ridden walkway, which flattened the uneven crusty floor of the trench, and stood in front of Kelly. Checking his LED, the temperature outside had cooled to 29 degrees Celsius. He opened his visor, and she opened hers.
"You feeling okay?" He questioned.
"Peachy." Her mystery illness had either taken a back seat, or had left her altogether. "It's almost morning." She reminded. The lanterns in the trench had hardly served to adequately light the shelter.
Jesse looked into the skies. A hint of natural light seemed to brighten the night. "It's been a long night."
Kelly's gloves were drenched in Human blood. She and Jesse learned against the wall of the trench. It was at this point that Jesse noticed something peculiar. Among the silence of the soldiers, a faint rustling sound could be heard in the near distance, uncharacteristic to the armor of any of the men. Jesse watched as the middle of one of the boards at the foot of the trench bent downward, creaked, and then returned to its normal position. Then, one of the dead suits of armor feigned gentle movement. In tandem, the board closest to Jesse bent, only it remained bent and did not creak. Jesse strained his eyes to look at this. Then he looked upward, at about head's height, for a moment. He continued to stare like this for some time.
Jesse heard the sound of falling dirt beside him. Startled, he looked at the wall to his left, to find what appeared to be an imprint upon it. Then, he heard the sound of a gun safety being removed. He jerked his eyes up to the marines on the trench wall, but none of them displayed even the slightest sign of movement.
"Hey, listen." Jesse said to Kelly. "They're understaffed to the west. I've talked with Rikter, he said that we've got to spare as many medical staff as possible. Jesse simply looked at her, with an urgent display on his face.
"Okay. Bye bye, hon." She said, and dashed down the trench. Jesse wondered about Kelly. Every now and then, she did things that he couldn't understand. Lately, she had been doing things almost as if she knew what he wanted before he even had to ask.
When she was out of sight, Jesse climbed back onto the footing. He tapped both Miguel and Marlon on their helmets, and opened his visor. They opened theirs too. Jesse whispered something to both of them, to which they nodded in reply. All three men closed their visors, and Jesse hopped back down to the floor. Testing a hunch, Jesse walked towards the bent wooden plank. The plank bent back to its normal shape, and suddenly a small round imprint, about the size of a foot, appeared in the dirt next to it.
Jesse then walked to where the imprint had been upon the wall, and not surprisingly, more dirt fell to the ground as Jesse moved in front of it. Checking his gun again, his ammunition count hadn't changed since his last glance. He put his finger tightly on the trigger.
Then, Miguel swung around, his leg flailing through the air at barely sub-sonic speeds, until it made contact with something in the dim light. A groan was heard, followed by the sound of something falling, and finally a small uprising of a cloud dust and sand. Marlon, from the footing, released a spray of bullets towards the ground. And from the nothingness, a spatter of blood littered the ground and clearly outlined of a Humanoid creature. Then Jesse lifted his gun to the air and fired a small burst to a place where he believed another of the invisible men had been standing. Blood, and then a loud fall.
Jesse then saw what he had feared. One by one, his men fell from the footing, lifelessly, a single piece of metal the shape of a bullet sitting contently in their brains. He fired a shot down the trench, trying to hit what he couldn't see, but he hit nothing. More of his men fell to the ground. Then, those who still hadn't noticed what was happening opened fire on the field in front of the trench as the Dominion strike force charged forward. More Directorate soldiers fell.
Miguel, a bullet ricocheting off his helmet, fell to the ground in utter shock. Marlon ran out of bullets, and crouched beneath the edge of the trench as he desperately tried to reload. Jesse could clearly see the bright flares of screaming UED guns in the distance, further down the trench.
As Jesse tried desperately to discern the location of the invisible men, he stopped in disbelief. What had originally been a line of marines locked shoulder-to-shoulder as far as the eye could see had been reduced to a staggered, failing line. Spaces two meters or greater could be found separating some of the soldiers. Still firing with determination, the trench defenders threw everything they had at the oncoming militia, while fighting with the internal threat within the trench: The Dominion Ghosts.
It soon became clear that 'everything' wasn't nearly enough, when the Dominion militia began to enter the trench.
"They're inside!" Jesse cried.
"They are!" Another man turned and fired upon those invaders that he could.
Marlon, now reloaded, got up and unleashed hell, sending at least five Dominion troops to the ground. Jesse, wisely using his precious last ammunition, shot at a soldier, who fell to the ground in response. It was now impossible to move in the trench; the Directorate soldiers tried desperately to push back the Dominion attackers as they filled every space possible. Many guns had been abandoned for hand-to-hand combat, as soldiers tackled each other and fought to remove their opponent's helmet. From Jesse's point of view, all that could be seen was arms waving throughout the air, and interlocked fingers as soldiers struggled to subdue each other. He wondered if the same thing was happening in other areas of the trench. He worried about his girlfriend. In the chaos, Jesse couldn't determine who was going to win, or who had more men. Then two soldiers tackled him to the ground. As he struggled to achieve some kind of prominence over the two, he found himself desperately trying to keep his helmet shut. In the hands of one of the soldiers was a knife.
Jesse's fears were put to rest, however, when reinforcements poured over the friendly side of the trench. Jesse had never been so happy so be surrounded by those clad-white militias.
As he struck down the last of the red-armored attackers, Jesse looked up. The trench, now a complete disaster area, was no longer threatened. However the result of the battle was difficult to look upon. The few Dominion marines who had managed to survive climbed over the wall, making a last vein attempt to escape death – but they were all shot before they could escape. Jesse stood knee-high in bodies. Blood flowed through the corpses like a river, staining the hooves of Jesse's combat armor. The ground of the trench was no longer visible, as it was completely covered by bodies. It was simply unbearable.
"Forces of the United Earth Directorate," A booming voice came over Jesse's comm. "This is Admiral Gerard DuGalle. I sincerely apologize for the lack of radio communications between the whole of you. The error was not a mistake on the part of any of you. I have only now been informed of your valiant success in holding the outer trench against the massive Dominion onslaught. I am proud to be able to call you soldiers of Earth."
Jesse was breathing heavily, still drenched in sweat, and his legs were ready to give out from all the physical combat. He slowly removed his helmet as he listened to the Admiral's speech, as the first twinkle of true sunlight shone over the valley of death.
"Humbly, I must ask of you one last thing before you can rest. The heavy casualties suffered by Mengsk's forces may have put his armies into shock. Before he has time to reinforce his garrison, we must make a second advance upon the city. Captain Rikter and Lieutenant Duran will lead you to the second trench, which you must infiltrate and liberate from the Terran soldiers. God's speed to you all."
So the United Earth Directorate advanced further toward Augustgrad. Pushing into the second trench, their arrival saw the retreat of its garrison. Now, with only one trench remaining before the city, final victory over the Terran Dominion seemed assured.
Jesse went back to sleep on the ground of the new trench. This time he was happy to note that there was not a single body tainting the ground. Kelly slept beside him, and Marlon and Miguel, still quite awake, talked livelily while they watched over the cozy couple. Even Paul showed up to celebrate in his own way.
While the Directorate boasted at their victory, Emperor Mengsk sat in his room with the large window. He looked over his last trench – the only barrier separating the Human invaders from total conquest of his empire. He could not sleep this morning.