Captain Catherine Luna crawled on her belly to the edge of the bluff, breath low and controlled in the close confines of her helmet, and wondered how she managed to get herself into these kinds of situations.
Luna had been placed in command of an entire hunter-cadre of Marine Pathfinders; the division had replaced TechCom I.D. but the purpose remained the same. It never ceased to strike her as funny that she, at her best when working alone, had become responsible for one hundred and forty-four men, Tau, and Terminators. Perry and General Conner believed in her abilities though and she would do her best not to disappoint them. Her best had proven well enough so far to hold the company together but sometimes it was a struggle. I.D. agents had always been notoriously isolationist in their habits and to be assigned partners was hard on them. At first General Conner had tried to institute random selections of teams, resulting in combinations of the three species represented in the ISMC, but that had not worked out well in the end. Former TechCom soldiers found working closely with Terminators, even Terminators nearly indistinguishable from their own, intolerable. Working with Tau provided less friction but the humans still found it difficult to work with the aliens. In the end General Leland, commander of the Pathfinder division, had organized his force to be integrated at the squad level and no further. Each squad was made up of two-man Pathfinder teams of humans, Tau, and Terminators that were always partnered with their own species. In the fledgling battledome, a Tau training facility that General Conner and SkyNet were in love with, this structure had worked the best.
This was Luna's first deployment with her cadre and it was providing two services to the division. Testing the cadre's cohesion out in the field and field-testing the new armor Sci/Tech R&D had come up with. The armor was not a full body exoskeleton but it did have shield systems powered by a backpack power core. Each piece of Luna that was not covered by her armor was protected by an incredibly tough, flexible bodysuit. Her helmet came with a full range of functions; a full dozen only available to shas'ui's and up, and could be sealed up in case she was temporarily exposed to vacuum. There was even a shoulder-mounted tagging device that would automatically take the coordinates of whatever enemy installation she designated and send them to the prototype Pathfinder gunship, the Vegas, in low geo-synch orbit. That would do the cadre little good in their present location.
Hunter-Cadre B, First Ten-Cadre, had been sent into a region of northern Arizona to investigate anomalous energy signatures. The heavy, dark cloud cover that permeated a vast stretch of the southwest portion of what used to be the United States was the reason detailed orbital scans were impossible. High-density radioactive particles in the upper atmosphere prevented scans and life from thriving in the area. SkyNet had avoided the area because there was far too much radioactivity to be sure it wouldn't affect the machine consciousness' legions of Machine soldiers. TechCom had also avoided the area after HazMat suited I.D. agents had scouted it a decade ago. The cadre would be fine as long as they got back to their Orca-class shuttle before the air supply in their armor ran out.
That time was rapidly approaching and most of her platoons had reported nothing out of the ordinary. 2nd Squad, Third Platoon, had not reported in and Luna had sent First Lieutenant Ui'Killjoy, she had almost asked him what he had been thinking when they were introduced, and third platoon to investigate. That had been an hour ago and the platoon had not reported in. Luna had ordered her cadre, it was hard to not think of it as a company, back to the shuttle to refill their O2 tanks. When the remaining platoons had checked in she had ordered them to converge on the last reported coordinates of third platoon from random vectors.
The cloud cover was so thick that Luna could forgive the uninformed for believing it was well past sunset. It was in fact a little past noon. For this reason she at first dismissed the black pit she was looking down into as a shadowed blot on the landscape. A peculiarity about the bowl-shaped depression in the terrain worried her though. The bowl's sides seemed too artificial as though it had been excavated.
"Night vision," she said and a line of green swept down across her visor.
This version of night vision was vastly improved over what Luna had used before the alliance. The detail was incredible at ranges of two hundred meters and she could actually see at distances of up to two kilometers. Everything was still rendered in vibrant shades of green but there were ways to put color into it.
"Add IR; light amp."
Two more lines flowed down her visor, adding infrared and light amplification to her HUD. What she saw was almost too hard to believe. Nestled inside the bowl, which seemed to originate from a fissure in its center, was a vibrant artificial construct. Heat plumes and what little light managed to escape whatever camouflage prevented unassisted visual detection was enough to make her eyes water. She could not make out any details of what lay beneath the shield but Luna could discern enough to make her worry.
"Comm., First and Second Platoon leads," the open air sound that wasn't a sound filled her helmet, "Status."
Luna waited for thirty seconds and received nothing but static in reply.
"Repeat, stat-"
The thunderous echo of multiple Boom-Stick detonations filled the terrain and that was all the answer she needed. Fourth platoon, she had attached herself to them as they were the weakest of her platoons, toggled the safeties on their burstcannons and rail-rifles in anticipation. They were scattered by team and each had selected more than adequate cover as they waited for orders.
"Comm., dropship alpha-dash-five-three-one."
This time the silence was deafening.
"Comm., Toombs."
"Captain?" Toombs answered quickly.
"Hot evac. Send them out by team; fallback point Alpha. Give me an escort, your call, and I'll lead them."
Half a minute later, when more than half the platoon had already sidled away, an incoming comm. icon came to life on her HUD. It was from a Shas'ui named Axle. Sometimes Luna had a very hard time not laughing at the monikers many Tau had chosen. She looked behind her and saw two forms in the minimalist Pathfinder armor. Shas'ui Axle carried a burstcannon and his teammate wielded a rail-rifle.
"Open," Luna commanded and the computer opened up the communication channel, "Follow my lead. Cloaks active but remember to use cover like you're still visible. Comprende?"
There was a moment of silence before Shas'ui Axle responded with a simple, "Yes, sir."
"Captain works better. Let's move."
Luna tapped in a simple code on her wrist pad and the air above her arms rippled. In less than a second her arm was visible as only a slight distortion in the air. Her two guards activated their stealth fields on the move and within a few steps all three were only visible as vague distortions. Their armor was also thermal-shielded and, Luna hoped fervently, would prevent an enemy from getting IR-locks on her team. Luna came to the gentle slope the platoon had climbed to reach the bluff and frowned worriedly as she saw the amount of dust that the platoon was kicking up in its wake. There was nothing to be done about it though and she could only hope that the persistent wind that she could not feel would mask the cloud the cadre would be sure to make as they hustled for the shuttle. Luna and her two subordinates settled into an easy, ground-eating lope with the rest of the squad. Her cadre had relentlessly practiced moving together with their stealth fields on and now it was paying off. The captain had total confidence in her soldiers not to get in each other's way and to make excellent time.
"Incoming," a T-850 broke radio silence in a maddeningly calm voice.
"Comm., all! Cover!" Luna spat quickly and promptly dove into a furrow barely worth the name alongside Axle and Ui'Solan.
Luna watched the skies and tried to still her twitching fingers. She hated being helpless as her people were in danger around her, but there was nothing she could do except watch as brilliant globules of plasma arched beautifully down from the sky. Then the first impacted and washed the world in blue-white light and thunder. Luna's HUD polarized to protect her eyesight. Fear, ugly and unwelcome, threatened to consume her for a few seconds then vanished before it could. She felt clear now and utterly disconnected from everything around her. Luna feared there was something seriously wrong with her mental state, ever since SkyNet had killed her husband, but she would fight whomever General Conner told her to fight as long as she was able. Thunder shook heaven and earth in a long line as some kind of bomber flew by at sonic speeds. The bomb-clusters it had dropped must have been plasma on par with Hegemony plasma rockets because five-meter wide areas of ground were being glassed. Luna was tempted to order all the T-850's in the command to make a run for the shuttle. A T-850, recon variant, could reach a top running speed of fifty-five kilometers per hour. The bombers, or fighters, might go after the running Terminators and that would give the rest of the cadre a chance. If whatever assholes were attacking her cadre didn't then the Terminators might make it back and get reinforcements.
"Comm.-"
The word had barely been uttered when a spectacular explosion created a huge fireball several hundred meters above their heads and maybe half a kilometer to the west. An incoming comm. icon appeared in her HUD and she was surprised to see that it was from the shuttle her cadre had taken from orbit.
"Open."
"I apologize, Captain," Kor'vre Froden said, sounding not at all apologetic, "I became a tad impatient."
An Orca-class shuttle broke through the cloud cover over their heads but it was not the one her hunter-cadre had taken from orbit.
"Maximum magnification," Luna said, knowing that the channel had closed after a silence that lasted longer than fifteen seconds.
Her HUD magnified on the image of the shuttle five hundred meters above their heads and she could see the rear-entry ramp opening wide. Massive shapes, four and a half meters tall, propelled themselves from the shuttle as it came under anti-aircraft plasma fire from the direction Luna and the platoon had retreated from. A squadron of ten Tau fighters, they were calling them Reapers, broke through the cloud cover and commenced strafing runs on targets that were outside of Luna's range of vision. The four humanoid-shaped behemoths had launched themselves out of the shuttle from four hundred meters up and were using heavy-duty anti-gravity thrusters to slow their descent. Luna had thought R&D was still ironing out the wrinkles in updating Crisis BattleSuit technology. Apparently she had been wrong. While in mid-air the BattleSuits fired shoulder-mounted missiles at ground targets. The resultant explosions caused ground tremors that Luna could feel almost two kilometers away. One BattleSuit had an obscenely long cannon mounted on its shoulder that fired a blinding plume of particle energy. Luna did not want to be whatever that BattleSuit was firing at. Behind the BattleSuits came three H/K Tanks with auxiliary a-g units attached to their sides for better aerial control.
Suddenly, and to Luna's great relief, the skies were boiling with Orca-class dropships, Covenant Phantoms and dropships, and Tau Reapers. The Reapers had smooth rounded fuselages and aft compartments but the nose was divided into four prongs that made Luna wince just to look at them. The Reapers maneuvered through the growing assault group with such speed, precision and finesse that Luna could almost have thought that Machines were controlling the craft. There had been rumors that the kor pilots had actually allowed Aerial H/K CPU's to be installed into the fresh-off-the-line fighters but she had always discredited that. Now she had to wonder if there had been some element of truth to those rumors.
The incoming comm. icon appeared again, this time accompanied by a shrill beep, and an officer's insignia.
"Normal magnification. Open," Luna said, prompting her HUD to return to its normal magnification setting and a tiny image of Kor'el Faauj, commander of the Vegas, replaced the comm. icon.
"I have sent word to Trinity Command, Captain. The Rejoice In Freedom and Death To Tyranny have joined us along with their complements of Marines and Armored Cavalry."
Both ships carried several Ten-Cadres of Marines, at least seven thousand soldiers between them, but Luna didn't think that would be enough.
"Apologies, kor'el, but I don't think that will be enough. The enemy installation is huge."
The Tau's almost non-existent lips parted in a slight smile, "I already thought of that."
For a second Luna thought God had been punched square in the balls and was roaring his outrage throughout the skies. The captain looked up and was rooted in shock as the clouds parted before the deceptively slender needle that was a Pathfinder gunship. The Vegas was two hundred and seventy-five meters from bow to stern; fifty from port to starboard; and was composed of three decks. For all of that bulk the vessel looked like nothing more than a huge needle complete with an eye twenty meters from stern. The gunship was supposed to provide orbital support for Pathfinder cadres that suddenly found themselves surrounded by vastly superior enemy forces or if an enemy installation needed immediate liquidation. For that purpose its primary armaments were three capital-class rail-cannon emplacements redesigned for planetary bombardment. Luna had watched the gunship obliterate asteroids with a single volley of the rail-weapons. There was no way for accurate firing solutions with the irradiated cloud cover and so Kor'el Fauuj, in a gutsy move in Luna's opinion, had brought the ship through the cloud cover.
"I've still got platoons unaccounted for, sir," Luna said, doing her best to keep her voice as level as possible.
The rail-weapons were relatively precise but that was a misrepresentation of the effect they could have. A four-meter round in excess of two tons traveling at hypersonic speeds left a very big hole upon impact. The rail-cannons could fire at a rate of a round every three seconds, still an eternity in frenetic space battles so Luna had been informed, and would probably reduce the mysterious fortress to debris in short order.
"We're pulling them out now. We've broken through the comm. blackout. I commend you on your training Captain. Third platoon had some casualties, most in second squad, but they managed to pull back to a secure location in the immediate area. I've sent a detachment of Marines to evac them and we should-"
The thunderous report of a massive rail-cannon emplacement drowned all other noise from area. A virtual cloud of ionized air led to the gunship. The gunship's entropy-shields had taken most of the rounds kinetic force away before it impacted but the round had managed to penetrate the outer hull shield-layer. The energy shield sandwiched between the shield-layer and hull armor had disintegrated the round thankfully. El'Fauuj's image disappeared just as several more rail-cannon blasts impacted on the Vegas' anterior hull. A large section of alloy was visible flung from the gunship. The Vegas quickly rose back into the sky, only to be hit by another trio of blasts, and only just made it into the cloud cover before it could be destroyed. Out of the cloud cover came first one, then another, and then a third rail-cannon round. There were three bright flashes of light from over the horizon but no massive explosions.
A comm. from Killjoy drew her attention away from the spectacle.
"Open."
"Captain, we've lost six men. Eight more are critical and ten others have moderate injuries. What are we doing?"
Luna wanted to spit fury but instead buttoned her erroneous instinct down and concentrated on her cadre.
"Hunker down. Keep them alive until our ride gets here."
"I could get used ta this, captain!" First Lieutenant Laslo exclaimed from her gunnery position.
"Right there with you, Lassie," Major Lucas, newly promoted to head the first company of the Armored Cavalry Division; Trinity Marine Corps, quickly turned to flash a grin at his gunner.
Major Lucas was piloting the heaviest armored vehicle that the division had and he had at first been weary because many of the design features were of Tau origin. The goat-footed bastards had given him a new set of teeth with their technology and for that he could forgive just about anything. The Devastator Anti-Gravity Heavy Armored Vehicle was thirty tons of pure destructive force in a rounded trapezoidal package. Its main ordinance was a top-mounted rail-cannon that could be used to target large aerospace vehicles, enemy armor, or heavily fortified installations. Four batteries of heavy-duty, high-yield plasma rockets lay close to the hull of at each rounded corner. Dual-particle repeaters graced the front and rear side panels. The Devastator had a storage capacity of two hundred and twenty-nine rockets and nearly a thousand rounds for the cannon.
Lucas sat in the center of the piloting array in a combat seat with a reclined back. His feet were inserted into the straps of thrust pedals that controlled the anti-gravity banks beneath the tank. At the end of the seat's arms were contoured control yokes with thumb and forefinger triggers. On either side of him, easily within arms reach in the relatively cramped interior, were two crescent-shaped control boards. There was even a single control board upon which touch-crystals glowed like a miniature night sky. Directly in front of him was a gently curving flatscreen that was currently inactive. Lucas wore a helmet that gave him a first-person view as though he was perched at the end of the turret. His gunner and comm.'s officers sat in the midst of their own stations behind him. The hundreds of softly glowing touch-crystals cast a soft glow in the interior of the Devastator.
"Release the scout-drones."
"Drones away, sir," Second Lieutenant Gianni said, her voice still soft and gentle after years of fighting through hellish battlefields.
Outside the ship four Tau scout-drones, fitted with an array of updated sensor arrays, lifted from their alcoves on the exterior of the hull. Lucas, as well as Gianni, watched four tiny windows at the corner of their HUD's as the machines raced off into the battlefield. Inside the tank it was deceptively peaceful but outside was a different matter. The Devastator sat at the edge of a bluff, the same bluff that Captain Luna and her Pathfinders had used earlier, surveying a dazzling display of light and sound. AA plasma guns seared the night sky accompanied by the intermittent flashes of rockets seeking to smash attackers into oblivion. Reapers, as well as oblong bombers with stubby wings that had yet to be given a common-use nickname, rained their own brands of hell down upon the black mass from which their unknown enemy struck. Unfortunately this enemy had access to SkyNet's entropy-shield technology and most of their orbit-to-surface weapons were absolutely useless against that and the traditional shielding that was the black cap. They had tried conventional ballistic missiles fitted with fusion warheads but interceptor missiles from the enemy base took them out before they got within a hundred kilometers. So, as it always seemed to come to, it was up to the groundhogs to take care of things up close and personal. The entropy-shield was at least two hundred meters wide but was projected two kilometers from the traditional shield. That left a pretty wide corridor for someone to walk up and knock.
That was where Lucas' cavalry came.
Stretched out along a front a kilometer long was his command, four troops of five vehicles each, and they were ready to prove their worth. Each troop was composed of a Devastator, two medium armored vehicles called Dillo's, and light armored vehicles that were the new Tau Hammerheads. The Dillo's had large rounded bodies that humped impressively high. They were missile and rocket platforms that could produce an awe-inspiring amount of destruction in a short amount of time. The Hammerheads retained the original design shape but were significantly lighter and faster while retaining almost all of their former destructive potential. The Hammerheads main cannon was particle in nature and four top-mounted, linked heavy-plasma repeaters provided anti-personnel as well as anti-aerial protection. A cluster-bomb launcher rounded out the Hammerheads arsenal. Behind the primary assault wave was a collection of Covenant Wraiths, Spectres, and H/K Tanks. The third assault wave was a plethora of Devilfish APC's, Orca-class shuttles, Covenant dropships and even Covenant Shadows. Aerial H/K's would provide the escort for the infantry wave that Lucas hoped to lead right up to the enemy's doorstep.
"Scout-drones report possible minefield," Gianni reported.
"Cluster bombs," Lucas ordered, his voice tense and quiet as it always was before a big fight.
"This is Company Lead. Cluster saturation fire at following coordinates. Send back, over."
Once the gunners of each Hammerhead had radioed back the proper coordinates Gianni gave them a go to fire. An aperture opened at the rear of each Hammerhead and a small launch tube extended. A trio of rocket-propelled cluster bombs arched gracefully into the air towards the entropy shield. It was obvious to anyone watching when the bombs entered the shield. All of them slowed down noticeably and some of them began to veer off course. Then they were through and their warheads burst into a hundred plasma bomblets with an impact area of twenty meters. The ground suddenly blossomed into a field of brilliant purple-white light before the mines went off and added their own plasma energy to a mix that turned the barren field into a nightmare of terrible energy.
"Patch me in. Company-wide, Gianni."
"Done, sir."
"This is Major Lucas. Let's go show these bastards who's got the biggest set. Advance! "
Lucas pushed both control yokes forward to the maximum and his Devastator launched itself into the air. The Major pushed the foot pedals down as far as they would go, increasing his a-g banks output, and the Devastator barely even jolted as it finally reached the ground again. It dipped alarmingly at first and would have shot up into the air its maximum height of five meters if Lucas hadn't eased off the thrust pedals. All around him his troop duplicated the maneuver and soon they were fanning out in the company's standard assault pattern. The Devastator was in the center of the formation with the Hammerheads ten meters out front and the Dillos ten behind. Fifteen meters separated each pair of vehicles. The Hammerheads were capable of a maximum speed of approximately three hundred kilometers per hour, the Dillos two hundred and sixty, and the Devastator a mere two hundred, twenty-five. Soon the entire company was racing across the barren plain with Major Lucas's troop in the lead.
When they hit the entropy field it was like hitting a river of glue. The jolt as they lost nearly half their speed upon contact with the field would have pulped them if they had been in Covenant Wraiths but these new vehicles had all been designed with partial inertial dampeners. It was still jarring but Lucas had told his troop captains to expect it. The armored vehicles could still move but only at a fraction of their normal speed and they still had nearly a hundred meters to go. Moving at nearly seventy-five kph they would cross that distance in seconds but seconds was all it took on the modern battlefield.
"Sensor contacts!" Gianni shouted, "Covenant Scarabs."
Lucas magnified on the image before him and felt cold sweat break out beneath his helmet. Emerging from the ground like the insects they were named for, the six Covenant Scarabs all oriented towards his relatively slow-moving company. Lucas and his heavy assault company had taken one down nearly a year ago with far too many casualties. That was partially the reason he had agreed to learn to operate the monster he was riding now. The multi-storied, six-legged monstrosity that was the Covenant Scarab was nearly invincible to conventional infantry. Even SkyNet's H/K, both aerial and ground, had found it difficult to take the juggernauts down. Only inserting a Special Forces strike team into the interior of one or massive aerial bombardment had been a sure way to take down a Scarab.
"All Hammerheads engage!" Lucas shouted, silently cursing SkyNet for inventing the entropy shield while Gianni relayed his orders, "Lassie, get a firing solution on that lead Scarab, the biggest one, as soon as we clear the field. Full load right in her face."
"Yes, sir!" Lassie snapped and then muttered, "You always did know what a girl likes."
The eight Hammerheads of the company shot forward as they increased their thrust output to full. They were still only reaching a little less than fifty percent of their normal speed. Just as the lead element was clearing the entropy field the Scarabs opened up with their main energy cannons. It was particle energy, which was obvious from the way it crackled and spit, and that was a very bad thing for anything in the beams line of fire. Thankfully the pilots of the Scarabs fired the weapons in fairly predictable arcs from nearly a kilometer away and had never gone up against redesigned Tau Hammerheads. The Hammerheads shot forward from the entropy-shield as their ion-thrust engines output soared to one hundred percent. That would have put many of them in the Scarabs line of fire but each Hammerhead spun around in a complete one hundred, eighty-degree spin and effectively halted their forward momentum. The Scarabs could not alter their firing trajectories at that point and would need a few more precious seconds to charge their main guns. At the instant the particle beams dispersed the Hammerheads executed another spin and raced towards the Scarabs. The enemy armor had another surprise though in the form of anti-personnel plasma repeaters that began glassing the desolate landscape around the charging Hammerheads. The Hammerheads juked left and right more like fighter planes than armored vehicles while maintaining close to full speed as they answered in kind with almost simultaneous blasts of their particle cannons.
The beams crackled toward a single Scarab, the diameter of the beam-points was at least half a meter wide, and Lucas waited with glee for them to make contact.
"Sonofabitch!" he spluttered in disbelief as the particle beams met an entropy shield.
"Minimal damage, sir!" Gianni exclaimed, her voice tense.
"Get 'em in close. Inside the biggie's arc. Once we're clear of the shield I want a full-scale missile barrage. One salvo. Devastators, up close, give them a belly full of hate! You hear that, Lassie! Hold the load!"
"I hate it when that happens," his gunner muttered and he pretended not to hear.
The Hammerheads closed the distance to the Scarabs quickly and began a dazzling array of evasive maneuvers to get inside the range of the Scarab's main cannon arcs. Unfortunately that put them in the range of the plasma repeaters and the range was so small it became increasingly difficult to evade the heavy weapons. A millisecond before Lucas' Devastator cleared the field a pair of Hammerheads was slagged by the convergent blasts of a Scarab's underbelly plasma repeaters. The Hammerheads had shields but the power requirements for a particle cannon meant the shields were not powerful enough to stand up to the combined efforts of several heavy-plasma repeaters.
Then the Devastator cleared the field.
Again the main cannons of the Scarabs drew a line in the sand. Lucas saw the beam arcing in on an intercept course and thumbed the bottom thumb-trigger on the top of his right control yoke. A supercharged burst of ion-thrust accelerated the Devastator forward enough that only a small portion of the Scarab particle beam caught the rear of the vehicle. The relatively small entropy-field, only two meters in width, around the Devastator provided adequate protection from the brief exposure to particle energy. Lucas grit his teeth as the control yokes wobbled in his hand slightly. The line of Devastators, in almost the exact position they had been in before entering the entropy-shield, were halfway to the Scarab's when the first of the Dillo's escaped the slow torture that was an entropy-shield. A small barrage of fusion, particle rockets and 'Hellfire' plasma shells was fired at the Scarabs from that one Dillo but were quickly followed by dozens more from the remaining Dillo's. Docking ports, relatively small against the massive bulk of the enemy armor, along the sides of each Scarab opened. Shapes darted from the ports and began to orbit the Scarabs like point-defense satellites.
"They've been tentatively identified as Tau gun-drones," Gianni called, voice slightly distracted as she listened to communications coming from the Troop captains.
"Didn't know they came that big," Lucas murmured as he glanced at the scale reading below his target acquisition reticle."
The gun-drones, apoproximately thirty of them, formed a scrimmage line, and let loose with a blinding display of plasma light and the all encompassing electronic sizzle that plasma weapons made. Flower-like detonations littered the sky as the missile barrage was torn from the air. A single 'Hellfire' plasma shell made it through the barrage but an enemy gun-drone darted in front of it. The plasma shell detonated and unleashed an incredibly large sphere of searing plasma energy. Unfortunately it had been intercepted outside of the entropy-shield and the effect on the Scarab was negligible. Several of the enemy gun-drones had been taken out as well and that was a plus in Lucas' book.
"Release the gun-drones. Company-wide."
Four ports opened up on the outside of the Devastator and oblong spheres burst forth on jets of anti-gravity. In the air their sides opened up to reveal a baleful eye and lethal looking weapon ports in their centers. From the Major's Devastator rose twelve of the upgraded Tau gun-drones though they were only a quarter the size of the Scarabs. The remaining Hammerheads released their own trio of gun-drones but the Dillo's unloaded a full-fledged swarm of them. Streaks of light were all that Lucas could make out as the Tau gun-drones soared to meet their enemies. It was truly a matter of watching wolf-packs attacking a bear but these wolves had high-powered plasma weapons at their disposal. Once the Devastator was a mere three hundred meters from the Scarab he decided it was close enough.
"Fire at will!" Major Lucas shouted the glee clear in his voice.
"Firing!" Laslo answered in kind and the operating lights flickered slightly around them.
Lucas watched the quickly approaching firefight and the rapidly dispersing spears of ionized air. The Tau gun-drones engaging the enemy drones darted out of the path of the rail-cannon blast. The Scarab's drones were not so fast and many of them were obliterated by the kinetic energy of the shell's backwash. There was no noticeable slowdown, the rail-round was moving far too fast for even the HUD to view in real-time, when the round entered the entropy-shield. It was obvious however that the shield had an effect because the conventional energy shield that was projected close to the Scarab's armor flared to life but was not visibly penetrated. A blast that should have rightfully taken the Scarab's nose off barely singed its nostril hair.
"Damnit!" Lassie swore as she acquired a firing solution for another around.
"Hold your fire until we're inside the shield. Gianni, Hammerheads take out the belly guns. Devastators target the leg joints. Dillo's are to hold fire."
Lucas truly appreciated the helmet that absorbed the buckets of sweat that was leaking from his brow as he piloted his huge vehicle through a nightmare of particle and plasma death. His Devastator only partially connected with the edge of the overlapping entropy-shields the Scarab was obviously using, though that assessment came a little too late for the Major, and the sudden loss of momentum caused a sickening crunch that echoed in the cramp confines of the cockpit. Everything spun wildly for a brief moment before the automated systems worked to counter the spin. The tank was stopped before that could happen by the spike-like foot of the Scarab.
Lucas jerked both control yokes to the left and the Devastator obediently darted to the left. Lucas was engaging this particular Scarab alone, as were the other four Devastators, while the remaining Hammerheads kept the remaining one busy.
"Firing!" Lassie shrilled and whatever Lucas had been expecting it was not what he got.
The main cannon sheared off the bottom most two-thirds of the leg farthest from them. Five high-density plasma rockets slagged the knee-joint opposite the first. Warning lights on his HUD told him that all four dual-particle repeaters were firing.
"Maybe we should get clear, sir!" Lassie shouted, but Lucas was already ahead of her.
The Devastator cleared the rear legs of the Scarab as its purple-black posterior crashed ponderously to the ground.
"Find a soft spot," Lucas ordered his gunner.
"Yes, sir," Lassie replied in a 'well, duh' tone of voice that the Major ignored as he punched up vid-feeds from the remaining gun-drones.
The smaller drones had won their aerial battle but more than half of them had not survived it.
"Status."
There were a few moment of silence before Gianni answered.
"All Scarabs have been immobilized."
"Tell them to watch out for dorsal guns. These big bastards had them in the tech-schematics." Lucas opened up his own comm.-line to his second-in-command for the operation.
"This is El'Fanshui," a tiny holo-panel extended from above with the image of a grizzled Fire Warrior with a faded scar across his nasal cavity.
"Move the second wave up. Quick five-klick perimeter, half-klick spread. Keep them away from the Scarab's. Send up a hunter-cadre." Lucas fixed his eyes on the image of the Scarab, "We've got a bug to gut."
The inside of the Devilfish was silent except for the gentle hum of the idling propulsion systems. On the inside of Private Cage's helmet it was another story. He could hear his heart pounding frightfully hard. The mesh underlay he wore against his skin absorbed the cold sweat that he shouldn't have been feeling. Cage was a product of TechCom training and a childhood in post-Judgment Day America. Cage, like so many others of his generation, was emotionally disconnected from the prospects of pain and death. Thinking of either had long ago ceased to rattle him; in fact he had trouble recalling if it ever had.
Why do I feel like I'm about to throw up? He thought disgustedly.
Cage looked to his left and the obsidian faceplate of a fellow Marine. His comrade nodded but Cage was already turning to his right. There he met an identical visage and his heart seemed to skip a beat.
"It was never this bad in training," he spoke softly to himself, a bad habit his TechCom and Marine instructors had been unable to rid him of.
Facilities at the fledgling BattleDome were still under construction and the Pathfinders and Special Forces squads got most of the time in them. Cage had only received Corps. training with his new squad for three weeks. The Terminators had not joined them until a week before their first deployment. Tau and human fire-teams had volunteered to fill their roles during down-time. Cage had been anxious when the trio of T-850's had shown up at the former TechCom training facility but it had been manageable.
Now all he could think about were the stories the vet's always had about Terminators sneaking into bases, insinuating themselves into squads, and wiping everyone out. What if that was their plan? Cage had heard all the rumors about SkyNet. It was not entirely out of the question. What if the aliens were in on it?
As the Private's world slowly began to revolve around the words, 'What if…', his hands slowly tightened on the grip of his KE-10 in its thigh holster.
"Hello, Private Cage," the voice in his ear made the Marine jerk his hand away from his sidearm guiltily.
A tiny window in the lower left corner of his HUD winked open into the blue-grey face of his squad leader.
"Shas'ui?" Cage said uncertainly, as he still had trouble remembering the Tau's caste system.
"Are you nervous, trooper?" the alien asked, though it was hard to tell if he actually cared.
"No, sir."
The sergeant bared his teeth in a vaguely threatening manner, "I may be new to human honorifics, Cage, but I do not believe that is the proper term for a female."
"Sorry, ma'am," Cage mumbled, glad they were on a private line and that the Tau could not see the flush of his olive-toned cheeks.
"You are lying," Sergeant Ui'Dye stated matter-of-factly.
"Ma'am?"
"You are nervous. Are you going to tell me why or do I tell the… L.T. that you are unfit for duty?"
It took Cage a minute to decide and he was slightly amazed the Sergeant wasn't chewing him out for it.
"It's the fakies, ma'am," he finally worked up the spit to speak.
"Ah, the Terminators," she was quiet for a moment before continuing, "Let me guess. You are wondering if, or when, they are going to betray you. Betray humanity in general."
"How-?"
"It is something I was told is very common among Terran Marines. It is hard coming to terms with such a devastating change in your life. Most of the Tau in the Corps. have killed at least one human, if not here than in other Galaxies. Before that we trained with the almost certainty that a sustained conflict with the Imperium of Man was inevitable."
"How can you stomach it then?" Cage asked before he knew what he was going to say.
"We are Fire Warriors. Raised for war, bred to fight, it is our primary function in Tau society. We fight against, and ally with, whoever are Aun's tell us. Some alliances have been… unbalanced, but we serve the Greater Good of our people always."
"What should I do?"
"As I believe soldiers in every army have done since the first group of creatures banded together under a single leader. Believe in your leaders. Believe that they are doing the best thing for your people. If you feel as though you will not be able to function in the squad then say so. There is no shame in it."
Cage took a deep breath and found that his anxiety had subsided somewhat. He looked to his two fellow humans, part of the squad's gun-team, and knew that he couldn't leave them. Most line infantry squads only had a three-Terran gun-team of humans to make up their human component. The three of them were the only ones they knew wouldn't turn on them.
"No, ma'am. I'll be okay."
"Would you like to share in my mediatations?"
"You meditate?"
"It helps to calm me before the missions that make me uneasy."
"Like going into a combat zone with an untested squad. Half of whom you were at war with months ago."
"Exactly," she gave him that unnerving facial expression again.
Then Cage grinned sheepishly as he realized it was a smile.
"Do I have to kneel?"
"No, just listen to my voice," and the Sergeant began to chant in her native tongue.
The universal translator built into his helmet began to repeat what she said but a few commands into Cage's wrist-comp. quieted the program. It was oddly soothing listening to the guttural, melodic sounds the Sergeant was producing. Slowly his tension and anxiety were overwhelmed by the alien chanting. When it suddenly stopped Cage realized more time had passed than he realized when he heard himself softly repeating the Sarge's words.
"Final weapons check, troopers," Sergeant Ui'Dye switched to a squad-wide channel, "The cadre is moving out in two minutes. The cavalry left us half a dozen Scarabs to clean out. Two squads to a Scarab. Assignments when we're on-site."
Cage stood and did a quick check on his weapons. His sidearm was perfect, being a close-tie for best shot in the squad with it meant he took especial care with the weapon, and he didn't even bother. His V4 Plasma Rifle had a full charge and the safeties were in place. Cage lifted the plasma repeater he was responsible for. It had been an unfamiliar weapon to him, based largely off of Tau burstcannon design, but with the added bonus of a pivoting-joint tripod attachment near the end of the barrel. The weapons were good soft-point emplacement weapons as well as being light enough for mobile heavy suppressive fire. Something Cage would never understand about the bad-ass new weapons he had access to, was why they were all pristine, non-reflective silver in color. Even odder a Marine could change the color of any weapon to an obsidian shade with the flick of a switch. The plasma repeater checked out in the green and he set it back into its safety lock.
Cage's incoming-comm. signal beeped and an image of his team leader, Corporal Adams, winked open on his HUD. The corporal himself came to stand over Cage as he was lowering his restraint bars.
"You ready, Cage. This you first tour, right?"
"Yes," he nodded, hoping he didn't sound as defensive as he sounded.
"Don't worry. We'll walk you through it. Right, Stiller?"
"Walk in the park," Stiller cut in over the gun-team's channel.
Adams clapped Cage on the shoulderplate, "You're secure."
Adams took his seat and Sergeant Ui'Dye made sure his restraint was secure. Then the Second Lieutenant, Ui'Tyl'dus, checked the sergeant. Once the First Lieutenant checked his officers and the Master Sergeant checked his sergeants the First Lieutenant opened up the platoon-wide net.
"We move out in ten seconds. Remember that together we are far stronger than apart. We fight for the Greater Good."
"For the Greater Good!" a chorus of Tau voices thundered through Cage's helmet.
The lights in the troop compartment went dark and the red in-transit warning lights glowed to life. There was very little sensation of motion. The only evidence that the APC was moving was the slightly increased hum of the engines. Fifty-six seconds later, he knew because he had checked on his mission clock, the APC lurched. It took a hard hit for the inertial dampeners to overload. For a moment Cage thought they had been hit by enemy munitions.
A loud chime preceded the voice of the Devilfish's pilot addressing the hold.
"Apologies, troopers," the air caste pilot actually sounded sincere, "I should have warned that we would be crossing an entropy shield. We will be exiting shortly so expect another sudden jolt. I will try to minimize it. Ui'Lei, out."
The second jolt was almost undetectable but that was the signal for First Lieutenant Ui'Joyless to open the platoon net again.
"First and Second squads disembark first. I'll take Third. Ui'Tyl'dus has the command with Master Sergeant Numan as second. Intel. says the enemy might try to trigger a containment failure in the Scarab's energy core. We are not going to let that happen. Be quick but safe. For the Greater Good!"
The phrase was repeated and this time Cage gave a 'hoo-rah!'
The light in the cabin switched to a vibrant green. Cage unlocked his restraint and freed himself in a flash. He quickly retrieved his rifle from its slot beside the seat and secured it across his back. It took less than ten seconds for him to secure his plasma repeater from its slot on the opposite side and get into disembarking position with his gun-team. The fakies in the squad were up front. They would disembark first because they were more likely to survive hostile fire. Then the gun-team would follow to lay down suppressive fire if needed. The two fire-teams would follow last. Cage tightened his grip on his plasma repeater when the door began to lower.
"Demo-team disembarking," the monotonous tone of the demo-team's Machine leader came over the platoon-net and the three imposing figures were marching down the boarding ramp before it touched the ground.
The sun had set long ago and the night was utterly black thanks to the cloud cover. Fortunately the cavalry was still there with their powerful search lights that lit up the area for nearly a kilometer. With the Devilfish adding its own light the area was bright enough for sunbathing. Of course Cage had never seen anyone sunbathe but old-timers loved telling stories about America-past.
"Gun-team, movin' out," Corporal Adams led the way with Cage on his left and Stiller on his right a step behind.
Cage's mouth was as dry as the grit crunching beneath his boots as he took his first step as a Marine going into enemy territory. The T-850's were arrayed in a three-point perimeter around the Devilfish's exfiltration ramp. Cage looked to his right and tried to swallow as he thought that there was little point in the squad erecting a perimeter. Hovering not ten meters away was the colossal bulk of a Devastator tank. He had only seen one once in a class on Marine Corps. armor. The tank was suspended a meter off the ground but the tank itself was probably close to three meters in height. One of its edges looked partially melted but that only added to the machine's innate menace.
"Cage!" Adams voice snapped in his ear, "You gonna set up?"
"Sorry. I'm on it."
Cage took his place beside the Terminator on the right. The Marine went to one knee, his elbow resting on his armored thigh, and held his plasma repeater at the ready. The Terminator switched his massive plasma cannon for the slightly more stream-lined particle cannon. In short order the entire squad had formed a defensive perimeter around the Devilfish. Second squad only took thirty seconds to disembark and the Devilfish sped away into the night.
"Second squad take point," Lieutenant Ui'Tyl'dus ordered over First and Second's squad-wide channels. "First, watch the rear and keep alert for surprises."
Before the Lieutenant had finished speaking second squad had formed up towards the smoking bulk of the Scarab. First squad formed up just as quickly without a word from the Sergeant. The Tau fire-teams flanked the gun-team with the demo-team bringing up the rear. Cage's heart only seemed to beat harder the closer they came to the Scarab. Even with its legs sprawled out the hump of the Scarab's back was a least three stories high.
"They opened up an entry point on the port side," the lieutenant began giving out duties, "Master Sergeant Numan and Second have that insertion route. We'll insert through a service corridor midway up the rear starboard leg."
The squads moved at a quick trot and Cage felt as though he was getting a grip on his encroaching anxiety. Then ports opened along the starboard side and an iridescent cloud of gas began to grow over the Scarab as huge plumes of it burst forth from the vents.
"Emergency venting. There's still time. Move!" the Sarge barked and the squad broke into a steady run all the way to their waypoint marker.
"Six-Five-Three, Ten-Thirty, you're up. Search-and-destroy. One live hostile is the secondary. Disregard if it risks the mission. Understood?"
"Affirmative," the senior fakie acknowledged and the two imposing figures in Marine armor entered the service corridor.
"Gun-team."
Corporal Adams contacted them over the gun-teams secure channel, "I'm up front, Cage has the rear."
That was fine with Cage because his heart had almost come out of his chest when the Scarab had vented. An incoming comm. distracted him as the team entered the dark interior of the Scarab. His visor immediately switched to light amplification without a cue so he could divide his attention.
The increasingly familiar face of his Sarge winked onto his HUD.
"Feeling tense, Cage?" she asked, her brow furrowed slightly.
"A little, Sarge," he admitted, ducking beneath a pipe that was head level to the above average height of the gun-team.
"Take a deep breath, Cage." The Marine did as he was told. "Do you remember the mantra?"
Cage was surprised to find that he did, "Yes."
"Then repeat it in your head. You'll be fine, Cage. Follow your team leader's… lead?"
Cage cracked a tiny smile, "Yes, Sarge, I'll do that."
Sergeant Ui'Dye nodded and cut the comm.-line.
"Contact," a fakie's voice stated quite calmly over the squad's channel. "Half a dozen hostiles classified as Machine-Humans. Possibly upgraded with stolen Covenant technology. Requesting assistance."
"Gun-team, double-time! We'll be on you in less than thirty!" the Lieutenant barked and the gun-team leaped into action.
Cage managed to stay with his team as they sprinted for the end of the corridor.
"Down!" Adams barked and all three dove to the floor.
A searing ball of plasma impacted the ceiling somewhere near Cage's position.
"Hump it!" Adams barked and began worming his way over the floor.
Now the two more experienced team members opened up the distance as Cage struggled with the bulk of his plasma repeater. A glance at the end of the service corridor nearly blinded Cage thanks to his light-amplified visor mode.
"Night vision," he commanded and a line of green washed away the bright lights.
Adams set up from a prone position only a meter from the entryway while Stiller watched his flanks with an AR-50 with a K.E. module. Stiller was responsible for carrying the gun-teams extra power packs since they tended to run through them in a hurry.
"This is Unit Ten-Thirty, requesting immediate assistance."
"Cage!" Adams barked as he opened up with his plasma repeater.
The area the corridor had led to looked like the maintenance room. Four pylons covered in shelves of tools and spare parts adorned the ovular room. Large work tables and benches also populated the room. Plasma fire poured into the room from each of the three other service corridors as well as from a ladder well in the center of the room. The two Terminators were pinned down behind an overturned work table that was already halfway slagged. One Terminator was lying supine, absolutely motionless, while its team leader returned fire with its massive plasma cannon. The level of detail Cage had with the new night vision gar never ceased to amaze him.
"Get on the left tunnel," Adams told him as calm as a fakie, "We'll cover the rest."
Cage's legs carried him towards the pylon only two meters from the Terminators before he could think about what he was doing. Turning his back to them was hard but he managed. There was a work table close so he kicked it over to give his back partial cover. Cage went to one knee behind the pylon, closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and leaned around the pylon. He never got a good look at the hostiles. Cage simply pressed the firing stud and hosed the interior of the tunnel with searing plasma fire. Shields flashed but a sudden influx of return fire made him duck back behind cover. A plasma grenade sailed out of nowhere and landed where his head had been seconds before. Somehow the Marine scrambled out of the way so that the concussion merely tossed him across the room. Unfortunately his plasma repeater did not accompany him. Cage landed with a jarring impact onto a workbench. He rolled behind it just as a burst of plasma slagged its surface. Cage numbly unshipped his plasma rifle, undid the safety, and switched the firing mode to electrical plasma. The bench was solid and provided cover as he set his rifle on it. He had been catapulted over the Terminators and had a clear line of sight into the service tunnel. His heart hammered in his chest as Adams lit up the service corridor to on his left.
Hostiles began to emerge from the corridor he was covering. Cage lined his targeting reticule up with the rifle's scope and his HUD changed to the rifle's perspective. Cage magnified on the lead hostile and instinctively recoiled from what he saw. The hostile's left eye and cheek were the only part of his face not covered by metal. Cage reconnected with his rifle and could not believe what he was seeing. None of the cyborgs, it was the only word he could come up with, wore clothing. The vast majority of their bodies were covered in dull, black armor. They wielded what looked like plasma rifles but were easily twice the size of Cage's.
Cage's plasma rifle was capable of fully automatic fire and the Private emptied his entire battery pack into the trio of emerging figures. Their shields sparked and died but each remained on their feet to return fire. Cage ducked behind the bench as he slapped in a fresh pack. This time he leaned out from the right side of the bench and raked fire across their knees. This time the shields flared out quickly and visible, even through the night vision, arcs of electricity made each dance a merry jig before collapsing.
Then the room was practically filled with plasma bolts for the briefest instant. When it was over the fire-teams systematically checked the service corridors while the two fakie's administered to their fallen comrade.
"You did well, trooper," the Sarge complimented him as he stood from cover, "If only I had done as well in my first action." There was a pregnant pause, " Of course I managed to hold on to my weapon."
The Sarge held Cage's repeater out to him and he took it gratefully.
"Won't happen again, Sarge."
The Sergeant nodded and moved away.
"Sarge's really taken a shine to you, Cage. Why the hell are you so lucky?" Adams poked over the team's channel.
"I'm pretty?"
The Lieutenant cut off any other remarks by addressing the entire squad, "Alpha team and Cage, secure this position. Unit Six-Five-Three should reboot in a minute."
Cage got an extra battery pack for his plasma repeater from Stiller while he and Alpha set up a hard-point around the immobilized Terminator. The squad melted a hole through the locked down hatch in the stairwell with a fusion charge. The two-man gun-team dropped down first after rolling an EMP grenade down. Bravo team followed next and then came the remaining fakies.
The next few minutes proved a tortuous exercise in hurry –up-and-wait. Cage intermittently received battlefield updates when someone broadcast over the squad or his gun-teams channel. The fakie rebooted, sat up, and then took position without a word. When the hatch to the control deck opened everyone was a second from firing when Second squad's FOF-icon popped onto their HUD's. Half of Second was on the third deck when Lieutenant Ui'Tyl'dus activated the platoon net.
"Scarab reactor secure. Scarab control room secured. We got our live hostile. Good job, troopers!"
Everyone in the room began slapping shoulder in relief. Neither squad had lost a single man. Cage's thoughts turned to the mysterious installation waiting for them and couldn't help but wonder how long their luck would last.
"Four days, people," General Conner stated, sitting at ISMC Command deep in the Canadian Rockies, "It's been four days and we haven't heard a thing."
The conference room was occupied by Shas'O Kais, Genera Perry, SkyNet's holographic representation, and a Fio'el named Malice.
"We are very close to breeching their shield wall," Malice said a touch defensively.
"That's not what worried me, El'Malice. Once their Scarabs were beaten and their fighters shot down they buttoned up. No response to bombing runs and they only their rail cannons if they are directly threatened. I would think they had given up if I didn't know how fanatical Alex and Gabriel Stone are."
"I believe there is the answer you seek," SkyNet interjected, "These Machine-Humans seem much like the Luddites in their thinking. They wish to wipe both humans, Tau, and Machines from the face of the planet. What would be the most effective way to do so?"
"Bio-warfare," Conner replied tonelessly.
"Nanotech warfare to be precise. It would be the only way to ensure widespread contagion rapidly. It would prove difficult to adapt a nanotech virus capable of terminating the species represented in The Trinity without killing the Machine-Humans."
"I suggest a surgical strike team," O'Kais spoke up quietly, "Neutralize the shield generators and we vaporize the site from orbit as well as from inside the installation. I suggest this could be the Triad's first mission."
"They aren't ready," General Perry said, "I could have a squad of Special Forces ready in less than five hours. I'll lead them myself."
The three military commanders of ISMC voted and General Perry's suggestion won two-to-one.
"Hold on, Perry," Conner caught up with his brother-in-arms on the landing pad where a modified Tau Reaper waited. "I voted for you because I know you want a chance at the Stones, but don't let it jeopardize the mission."
Perry started at his General for a long moment before nodding and climbing into his fighter. Conner wondered if the vengeful General would heed his advice. Alexander Stone had nearly killed Luna during the infiltration of NORAD and Perry had never forgotten it. Conner couldn't help cracking a smile as the Reaper rose unsteadily into the air.
At least his landings have gotten better, Conner mused as the fighter took off into the night.