Eternity, Book 1 - "Queen's Gambit"

Chapter 4 London Calling

"God… They're all gone."
"Did we get anyone to the beam?"
"Negative. Their entire force was decimated."
"It's too much. We need to regroup. Fall back to the buildings."
"Hammer's wiped out. All forces! Retreat! Pull back! Pull back!"

The Colonel

"Sir, that's not… quite… right."

Coats turned back to the reporting sergeant. "What isn't right?"

The sergeant looked up from her spotting camera. "They weren't wiped out, though they were more than decimated, Sir. But I see movement by a flipped APC."

Coats ran over to his ancient .50 bipod sniper and quickly checked out the indicated area. It was nearly four hundred metres off and the image was washed out by the glare of the transit beam, but in fact one or two "corpses" were still moving. One had propped himself up and sat back against the upturned armored shell; the wounded man rested a pistol in the crook of his elbow, taking careful aim, at an approaching Marauder. Coats took the long shot… "Nailed you, you bastard git of a machine."

An exclamation from the comm team jerked his attention away. Three destroyers and the capital ship – Harbinger? Were taking off again. Must think that the forlorn hope can be dealt with by ground troops.

Well, let's see about that. Coats turned back to his sniperscope. Pulled back again.

The sitting soldier began to get up, shot at something else outside his field of view. He began moving painfully towards the beam.

"At least one's about to make it inside, sir. I think he's maybe twenty metres from the beam." Cranking up the magnification on the scope and dropping filters, Coats panned right, saw a raggedy-ass limping man, shedding bits of – armor?

"Yes, I see." Coats pulled back the magnification; "Sergeant, drop polarizing filters, cast an eye on the right hand side."

"Copy that, Sir."

The glare was still intense, but there were husk bodies around the beam and another marauder taking a potshot at the limping man. He zero'd the sights and was about to take the shot but the rag doll must have beaten him to it – the head jerked back seven times and it collapsed. Couldn't have been the officer on the left side of the beam, that was too far for a pistol.

Pan right again. That dead-eye dick was running now, sort of. "Go, go, go" he muttered, willing the pistoleer on till he stepped into the beam and vanished.

"Sergeant, did you catch that?"

"Affirmative. Sir, that other one in the naval cap, he'd gone very slowly from the upturned Mako on the left that nearly made it to the beam. I thought he was done for, but I just checked back and he's not lying there. I think he's gone up too."

"Max, get a message off to Hackett, Forlorn Hope has breached."

"Sir." And a little while later: "Incoming fleet comm, Sir."

"This is the admiral. We've got reports that someone made it to the Citadel. We need to give them time to get those arms open. All fleets, Converge on the Crucible. Protect it at all costs."

Now it was a waiting game. They still had to defend against ground troops, but with the big Reapers distracted the remnant marines had a chance. Coats began planning.

"Max, tell Fire Teams Dog through Foxtrot to dismount six men each, and advance in two leapfrogging skirmish lines on foot, one APC per team for fire shadow. Mission is wounded rescue but jump the beam if opportunity presents. Be ready to pick them up if the big reapers come back or you see something like Brutes. Call back to Ben for troops."

Fifteen minutes later, Coats began to move. Twenty minutes later, he was about to lead his men in… when the beam went out.

Destroyer of worlds

The rear observation post on Big Ben was even more dark now.

"Any word from Hackett?"

"Crucible has docked sir, and there's some kind of major circulating plasma flow from the core to the Citadel, but nothing's happening yet. Latest update is he's in contact with the Forlorn Hope that opened the arms… wait, there's a disturbance in the docking point… Jesus –"

The tech pulled off his headphones which erupted in static. The world turned a lurid red; suddenly, visibility was not a problem.

Jacob

"How many are dead, Coats?"

"In Greater London? Can only estimate. Five million. Several tens of thousands converted into husks. More transported. Similar pattern in the other major conurbations. Total losses? Forty million or so. The funny thing is, that actually helps in some ways."

"How!?"

"Supplies. Best guess is, two months worth in the warehouses has become five months worth, post-war. Much of the remaining population is rural. The place still can't feed itself, but by the time it becomes a problem the NAS Veep says the automated subyards will be making dracones again. It's going to be a thin time of it for a year or so, though. Anyway, you won't be here to see it. Hackett's re-entered the system. He wants you."

"Well dayum." Jacob thought for a moment. "Do I get to see Brynn first?"

Wrex

"This is no fun. They're all dead."

"Yeah. Can't stomp them into the ashes, they're all disintegrating. Not even a nest to burn. Can we go find the nest?"

"You're a Krogan after my own heart, Grunt. But no. We have to go back to Tuchanka first and get you laid."

"Heh, heh, heh. Hey, how do we get off-planet? I don't see any ships around, except the broken ones."

"Oh." Wrex looked around the shattered remnants of Whitehall. "On the other hand, there are worse places to be stranded."

"Like Tuchanka?"

"Bakara hasn't been nagging me that much."

"Hey, I know. Let's make nuisances of ourselves! They'll send us home so fast."

"Bad idea. One, no-one's going anywhere till they make more ships. Two, we can't smash things up any more than they are already. Three, do you see that hatchet-faced bastard Coats with that sniper rifle? And that guy with the shotgun coming up?"

"Jacob. What about them?"

"This is an entire planet full of embryonic Shepards."

"Oh. Right. Where is our crappy battlemaster?"

Detection

All because from you alone, silky ashes,
Duty breathes its last where none will say: at last.

Michel had the body to herself for about a minute while Tactus fussed and Hannigan dragged herself over the parapet into the rubble, grabbing a sip from her bottle. She had needed both hands, so clipped the gun to the small of her back.

"Oh, my… did he burn to death, Chloe?"

"Blood loss, sweets, the heat came post mortem. Bullet to the abdomen, somewhat palliated by his vest but he's bled out. Fichtre, this is strange, he's been burned badly and his clothes are cut up, but it's a ranking flag officer."

In a lower voice, she muttered as she checked for identification, Mais qu'est-ce que tu veux bien faire dans cette galère, mon brave?

Hannigan sat up. EM spectrum back up now, chatter showing a minuscule portion of her flock was finding a haven on unidentifiable vessels. Thrusters glowed as diffuse lights in the fog, dust, and mist of disaster in a low-gravity environment. Michel had estimated as much as half of the ward areas might have survived, sheltering those who avoided processing husks. All right then. Something technological still lived. Her spirits rose a little.

She clambered over to Michel, gasped, "Chloe, this is Anderson! Used to be Shepard's boss." She placed a hand against the cold cheek.

Tactus looked up with interest from his perch. "No shit? The Councilor?"

"Yes. Not for long, though."

"We can't carry him with us. Just make a note, check the pockets. But didn't he lead the local military? Any other Alliance here?"

Michel looked puzzled. Then, sharply: "Yes, where's his staff? There must be others."

"There's one over the top ledge and that guy there–" Tactus indicated another blob five meters away– "But it's in civilian clothes."

"Expensive though. This is no franc-tireur. Black alpaca, linen." Michel made her way there to check for life signs. "Hannigan, give me a hand here. Turn and lift. Right. Hey, this guy's shot himself I think…"

At this point Hannigan shrieked again, louder this time. "Kid, will you stop that? You're getting on my nerves."

"Tactus, those eyes. Michel, this is the Illusive Man–"

"What!"

"I'm telling you, that jacket, that face, it's him. Chloe, please tell me he's really dead!"

"Felicia, look here…"
Michel turned the head. There was a great gaping exit wound. Half the brain shot away.
"… but that's odd…"

There were little blue lights in the brain tissue. "Cerberus implants," declared Hannigan grimly, breathing hard.

"I'm really not following this, but–"

"Tactus, shut up. No, wait, didn't you say there's another one?"

"Yes, but that's not important. We've got company. Look up there."

Hannigan cast her eyes up to the remains of the control platform. In the silence of vacuum, a shuttle was approaching the retention field. "Oh crap, Cerberus– "

"NO." Tactus was suddenly in front of her face. "It's been painted over. White and black but no yellow and no insignia. Someone's repurposed an old Cerberus tug. But come on, they'll be looking for these guys!"

"Then let's get to the last one before they do!"

There followed a mad scramble; Tactus got there first:

"This ones breathing!"

Tactus felt a little put off by the way Michel pushed in and squirted her sipper over a blackened arm.

"Hold this bottle, I've got to get IV in. Felicia hurry up with the alcohol, I need a vein–"

This time Hannigan SCREAMED.

– Next chapter will be #5, "Coming in from the cold" –

Wednesday, July 15, 2015