Gunship (62 page)

Chang made another note and sent a quick message to Tiny asking her to take a look at the Vervian cache.

“Now, what did you have for me?” Reilly came back around and leaned on the front of her desk as Chang keyed up some forms on his handheld and then holo-projected them for the Captain to see.

“We have supplies to keep us well into the next month with appropriate rationing. Water isn’t a problem, since the filtration system is still running and all backup reservoirs are full. But food will become an issue. We will need to plan for supply runs every few months. Or we can try to take down some of Welch’s transports along the nearest transit routes.”

Reilly squinted at the numbers. “I’d like to do some supply harassment anyway, but we’ll have to plan ahead. Welch will only let us get away with a few of those before he tries to turn it into an ambush. Talk to Duv. He set up the plan we used last time out here, and we had some pretty good success with it. We’re going to need some new tactics, too—we can’t afford to be predictable.”

Chang flagged the item with Duv’s name and slid it aside. He continued reviewing medical, ammunition, parts, fuel, and on until Reilly had been completely updated on the status of the base. They discussed a final few items and then said goodnight. As Reilly closed up her hatch and crawled into her bunk, dousing the lights, her mind wandered back to the old log book. The memories were still fresh. She sighed and closed her eyes anyway. In the dark the wind howled, and she was back walking patrol. Off in the distance, she could see the small form of a little girl in a red dress with pigtails looking down on them through the sleet. A voice whispered under the wind.

“You can’t change what you are. Blood is your heritage.”

Reilly put her head down and walked on in the frigid sleet, waiting for the shadowy figure of the soldier in front of her to disappear like he always did right before everything turned into a fine pink mist.

—————

Life had taken a turn for the worse. It had become a pattern. Wake up. Work out. Eat. Patrol. Clean gear. Test gear. Clean weapons. Eat. Sleep. Somewhere in there were minor variations that included some card games, business with a guy who had set up an illegal still, fights, training, and a few practical jokes. And lots of guns. It was a battle zone, after all. But patterns were dangerous, they could become comfortable, safe, make you believe everything was okay when it wasn’t. Ty despised patterns.

He finished securing his tac-gear and slung his battle rifle. A few minutes later, he and Tiny were leading a platoon through the tunnels to one of the remote sectors for patrol. They had been on the ground for four months now, and except for the build-out of the bunker complex, not much had changed. The war was going slowly.

Duv had seen the majority of the action. He had led the first successful supply interdiction against Welch’s ISU run transports. After luring several of the ships into a nearby solar system, he sprung a gate on them, killing the implants and seizing the ships. The cleanup had not been pretty, but they had been glad that the gates had been strong enough to almost incinerate the bodies. That way the faces were unrecognizable. None of them wanted to think about fighting against old friends, although they all knew it was coming. Thankfully, the supplies they got would run them for another six months if they were careful. The Captain was planning to send out a few ships on a normal supply run, too. If they could avoid killing implants, they would, until it became necessary.

Ty held his place at the back of the formation. Today there was a new lieutenant leading at the front. Cochran. Young, cocky, a bit mouthy, but had potential if he would just learn to listen. The real problem was he was complacent. In fact, a lot of the newer soldiers had begun to slack. Ty had roughed him up that morning in close-quarters combat training to make a point. The lieutenant had fallen for a simple trick because he had gotten lazy, and Ty had made him pay for it by taking him to the mat. He had gotten their attention, but he wasn’t convinced that it had made an impact. The problem was that war was a patient creature. It would wait you out. And then it would kill you in an instant. Ty knew. He had seen it happen. He didn’t want to see it again.

Tiny slid into the middle of the formation, her small stature disguising her incredible skill and strength as a warrior. Ty had been training with her regularly, patrolling with her, and at night sharing a room and sometimes a bunk with her. The relationship hadn’t progressed beyond a platonic one of two wounded warriors helping each other to get through the pain. They knew each other well enough now that a simple look took the place of words, a hand signal or touch provided the necessary guidance for action. Where nightmares had kept him awake in the past, confusion and indecisiveness ate away at Ty now. He had never known anybody like her before, and what they had was something that had become deeply important to him. The problem was he had never been in or wanted to be in a serious relationship before. Now that he was considering it, he was terrified of driving her away. So he kept his thoughts to himself and waited, hoping that maybe she would be the one to break the ice.

His earpiece crackled as the command post sent out a report. Suspicious activity had been reported in the sector they were headed to. Some interference and strange signals had sprung up and then disappeared. Tiny glanced back to meet his gaze. They had had comms issues before in the remote sectors, but signals were a new development. Not a good sign. Cochran looked back down the line, giving the signal to suit up. As one, they donned their black rubber masks and turned on their re-breathers, checking pressures and adjusting flows before giving thumbs-up to signal they were ready to head out. The masks gave off an eerie orange glow from the internal HUD that worked off of the ballistic-tempered composite forming the eyepieces, while the black, ridged hoses hissed to life as they disappeared inside tundra gear and under body armor, snaking around each soldier to the air tanks hidden in their tactical patrol packs.

Instead of checking the camera feed before hitting the door release, the lieutenant mashed the button and stepped out into the blizzard. Ty growled a curse to himself, noting Tiny stopping to check the feed and then checking it himself before he locked the entranceway behind them. It was a stupid move to walk out into an area without even a look to see if anything was waiting.
So much for the lesson on complacency.
Ty reminded himself to make a point to bring it up in the mission debrief.

The snow and ice swirled around them under the dark gray sky as they moved out. Ty listened to the crisp snap of ice under boots, wincing at the tremendous noise it made in his mind. They plodded on, keeping their spacing even as they moved up towards the ridgeline. Several of the younger guys began to lose interest in their surroundings, staring at the ground instead of scanning. Ty wanted to scream at them to get their heads screwed on right, but this wasn’t the place. If there were enemies nearby, talking would bring in bullets and lasers faster than anything. He scanned left and right again, then looked straight up the line. Tiny had stepped out to the left and was looking at something. She turned towards him and signaled she was going to check it out, then disappeared into the drifts. Even though he knew she could handle herself, it still drove him nuts when she did that. Ty watched the lieutenant continue on along the narrow switchback that would bring them to the next pass and down into the valley as the others followed. As he came up to the spot where Tiny had diverted, the hairs raised on the back of his neck: marks in the snow, angular, like slats moving back off the trail before disappearing again. Ty had seen this before. An alien scout had been there before them, and not too long ago, since the wind and snow hadn’t hidden the sign yet. His gun came up automatically as his flipped the selector to burst. The private in front of him looked back and reacted as well, bringing his gun up to burst after seeing Ty’s stance. The kid was smart enough to know that if the sergeant was concerned about something, he should be too.

Ty was still fifty meters from the sharp turn at the top of the ridge when he heard the first explosion. The newbies crouched along the pathway, looking up towards the smoke as Ty sprinted past them, breathing hard into his mask. He slowed and knelt, sliding out to look around the corner. A laser blast shot past him as he engaged the first alien he saw. He dropped it and continued to methodically push out, engaging and killing a second before gaining a position from which he could see the attack zone. A proximity mine had been buried in the snow just past the first checkpoint. Five soldiers lay scattered like rag dolls around the crater, some still conscious and returning fire, others blackened and unmoving. Beyond them, Ty could make out an alien landing craft and a raiding party. Several aliens fired back at him and the others. He knew what was coming next. Radio silence was no longer necessary.

“Viper Thirteen to Rime Command, we are troops in contact! Enemy raiding craft at grid Alpha Twelve, Delta Twenty-Six.”

“Copy, Viper Thirteen, we have you Tango Indigo Charlie at Alpha Twelve, Delta Twenty-Six. Status?”

“Five wounded or killed. Securing the attack site now—wait one.”

Ty had been joined by the other seven soldiers, who had set up a rear guard and begun to engage the aliens. He keyed his mic over to them.

“Fraggin’ listen up! Do not go forward unless I tell you to. They will try to draw you in—stay here until we have the site secure, or I swear I will shoot you myself!”

Ty switched back to the command post as he continued unloading at the aliens. He watched the snow banks around them and the area in front of the blast zone. They were moving. Another one dropped with a squeal as the private took the thing out with a half a clip of tantalum laser rounds. Ty watched as Cochran slowly rolled to one side and unloaded a clip into another alien that had appeared out of the snow. The area went silent. Cochran struggled to reload, his right side badly mangled with shrapnel from the blast. Then suddenly he was gone.

“What the hell?” One of the newbies leaned forward, trying to see through the blinding, wind-driven whiteness. “Did you fraggin’ see that? That thing pulled him under!”

Ty cued back to the platoon. “Watch your areas! You see anything moving, you shoot it. They’ve gone underground. Hold the line!”

A second soldier was pulled under, emitting a brief yelp before he disappeared. Ty could see that only one of the remaining three at the blast site was still alive. He fired as the snow erupted in front of him, taking down the alien who landed on him, spewing purplish liquid across the snow. Frantically, he pulled himself out from under the creature, eyes wide as he looked around for more.

A loud pop and a series of shots rang out behind him as Ty looked back to see Tiny dash through their rear perimeter. She gave an all-clear and spoke as she moved up next to him.

“They sent three to flank us and catch us from behind. That craft is maxed at fifteen.”

“We took out another four, but they’ve gone under. That leaves maybe eight more. We’re on hard rock here, but if we move up, our flanks will be vulnerable. He’s the only one left.” Ty nodded at the lone living soldier below them, lying on the edge of the crater. His leg was bleeding, but he was still alert and watching the snow in front of him.

“I’ll get him. Cover me.”

Before he could say anything, Tiny was making her way calmly down the ridge to the soldier. Ty cursed and watch her through his holosight as she reached the survivor and threw a tourniquet on his leg. Two aliens launched at once out of the snow at Tiny, but she didn’t even look up as Ty brought them both down cleanly, his bullets whizzing past her as she worked. She pulled the man to his feet and then unceremoniously dumped him over her shoulder while pulling her blaster. She began walking back towards them up the incline. Another alien shot up to her right and she engaged it without looking, turning the creature into a bloody purple mess. She struggled momentarily on a bit of ice before pushing on, but it was enough to get the pointman on Ty’s formation to step forward to help her.

“Dammit! Hold the line!” Ty shouted.

But it was too late. The soldier’s next step landed on a second proximity mine. The blast rocked them all back, raining debris and shrapnel down with the snow. Tiny had dropped, covering the soldier she was carrying, when she heard Ty’s yell and saw the man forward of the line. That distraction was enough to create a window of opportunity. The aliens massed on her position, the snow spraying up around her as they surfaced. The nearest ones swung the bladed weapons they favored as they moved in rapidly to neutralize her and the soldier. Ty saw it all in slow motion as Tiny shoved the wounded man behind her. He brought his gun up but didn’t dare to shoot. She was in among them, moving fast. The staccato of a string of fire, the steady rhythm of a blaster, the screech of metal on metal as Tiny reeled out of their reach. Two fell behind her. As she came back up from a kneeling position and raised one of the sharp alien blades, a third appeared over her shoulder, limbs grasping for her, mouth open, aiming for her throat like a wild beast as she plunged the weapon up through its upper body and out the back of its head. The creature screamed and landed twitching in the snow, turning in slow, angry circles until it died. Tiny helped the soldier back up as they continued towards the safety of the group. Ty watched, waiting for any movement, any sign that the last two aliens were present. A small trickle of snow off to Tiny’s left was enough to prompt him to fire. The alien fought to dig out, but Ty pushed it back down with a steady hail of bullets. Tiny walked through their forward line as the roar of gunships echoed in the valley. She set the wounded man down carefully before turning to walk back to where Ty stood. Slowly she looked over the valley, scrutinizing the landscape. She traced her path up the hill with her eyes, pausing at another soldier’s feet. Impatiently she waved him back a few steps. He looked at her, confused.

“I missed one,” she said apologetically as the snow shifted and she and Ty both blasted the spot. The snow turned purple as the soldier stared down, a horrified look on his face as he realized just how close he had come to death.