Forged by Battle (WarVerse Book 1) (19 page)

***

Doc slammed his fist in the dirt as the soldier he had been working on rattled his final breath. He spat out the needle cap he had removed with his teeth and pushed all feelings away. He would deal with them later, when there were no more wounded. The regular infantry didn't have the experience to bring melee weapons into battle like the Condemned did. They were attacking the creatures with rifles held like clubs, and with the straight blades they kept on their kits. The casualties were staggering.

He looked in front of him at the dozens of wounded lying across the floor of his hastily established casualty collection point, with far too few medics. They didn't stand a chance without technology. Doc bent down to help the next one, knowing he was only prolonging the inevitable. As he reached back for his med bag he cursed—a cougar analog was attempting to sneak through his position. Doc could just make out its outline; it was mostly camouflaged by magic.

"I see you," Doc muttered, then without a moment’s hesitation, he dashed forward and slammed the syringe into the cougar’s head. He got lucky—the needle slid into the monster’s eye. He depressed the plunger, partially blinding it, then dropped it just in time to avoid the wild swing of Snowball's sword, which sliced through the creature’s neck.

"Monsters to the front, monsters to the rear, today isn't going well," Snowball said as he squared his shoulders and held his sword at the ready. He looked back across the CCP. "How many did it kill?"

"Too many."

***

Desperation and anguish screamed out of Doc and Snowball. Exile’s platoon had kept a tight lid on their emotions so far, allowing only small sparks of fear or doubt to escape before they were quickly covered with resolve and determination. But the pain those two felt after so much silence rocked Exile out of her Web and left her panting and clutching her horn. Swiftly, she went through her mantras:
A calm center, a clear mind.
She unsheathed her knife.
Emotions kill swifter than any blade.
She pressed her thumb onto the tip, releasing a rivulet of blood, along with the tension pent up in her mind.

She replaced the knife in its sheath and steeled her resolve. She had been tortured by monsters that made the elves seem tame, and she would not allow two men's revulsion for a necessary task interrupt her. She didn't have time. Without another thought she pushed her Web back out to encompass her platoon. Two minds flared. Locksmith had fixed his radio.

When Killswitch reached Locksmith, he was brandishing a bloodied wrench like a sword as he defended his undesired charge.

"Never again," he snarled at Killswitch. The sergeant ignored him.

"This is Condemned Actual. Any station on the net, this is an emergency broadcast." Killswitch released the switch and bent low to hear the reply. The radio shouted static back at him, which Locksmith responded to with a resounding whack from his wrench.

Killswitch roared in anger, but immediately shut his mouth when a garbled transmission broke through.

"Condemned, this is Reaper One, I read your traffic. Sitrep, over," a voice crackled.

"We are pinned down by a battalion-size element of ferals. Break," Killswitch said, letting his finger off the mic out of habit—the gnome tech com units didn't need breaks. "No gnome weapons remaining, low on ammo, we've lost most of our brigade. Break. We need reinforcement immediately. How copy, over?"

The staticky pause stretched on for an eternity. Killswitch tried to turn a deaf ear to the screams and roars of close combat.

"That's a good copy, Condemned Actual. Close air support inbound, coming in hot. On station in five mikes. Hold on, over."

"Roger that, Reaper One. We'll be here."

Killswitch twisted the dial dangling from the box.

"Condemned Four, Condemned Five, anyone, this is Condemned Actual, do you copy?"

"Roger that, Condemned Actual, this is Condemned Four. You guys look like you could use some help down there." Killswitch looked up at the familiar crack of a rail gun; another feral’s head exploded.

"What's your location?" Killswitch demanded.

"Above you on the mountain side. We climbed up as soon as we could escape their scouts." Killswitch looked up through the holes in the dome towards the mountain range and saw a glint of light. Klepto was signaling him.

"The bird’s going to be here in—" His transmission was cut short as a spike slammed into the ground beside him. His reflexes kicked in, and he rolled to the side, coming up with Ka-Bars in hand. His darted his eyes back and forth in search of the feral.

"Sergeant, there," Locksmith shouted, pointing at what looked to be a spiny ball rolling towards them.

"Shit! I need to get back on the radio."

"I've got you." Locksmith brandished his wrench. The hedgehog ceased its roll, popped open, and bent forward. Three more spikes came firing from its back at Locksmith. He dove low, missing two, but yelled out as the third sank deep into the meat of his left shoulder. He tore it from his skin and threw it to the side. Without the shield to destabilize, however, the spike did not explode.

"Sergeant, I've..." He dropped to his knees and stared blankly at his legs.

"Doc! Locksmith’s hit!" Widget screamed as he ran over. He gripped his rifle with white fingers, and swung it wildly about as he stood over his teammate.

Doc looked up from the man he was treating and swore. He slapped a bandage in the wounded man’s hand. "Hold this tight, I'll be back." He grabbed his pack and raced towards Locksmith. As he reached the fallen man, another spike skittered into the ground beside him, sending dirt into his face.

"Shit, Widget, shoot it!" Doc yelled, then turned away. Widget looked at the spiked monster with wild eyes.

***

Exile felt a sense of unhinged terror growing in the soldier. His thoughts flowed like water as the fear consumed him, pouring out without any of the discipline the others had shown. Nothing could have prepared him for this. None of the training scenarios had felt this way, been this real. He couldn't survive this...

Widget sited down the barrel and lined the shot. His hands shook uncontrollably as he took a deep breath. Fighting to keep from closing his eyes, he squeezed the trigger like he had so many times before. Nothing.

"It’s jammed," Widget said to himself.

"Then fix it," Doc snarled around the syringe he was holding in his teeth. He probed Locksmith's wound with his fingers, then shook his head as he heard the rail gun fire. He didn't bother looking up; he already knew the creature was dead. No one escaped Trigger.

"Drop the damn rifle and help me," Doc said as he finished the injection. He hoisted Locksmith under his arms and started dragging him back towards the others. If he could get him to Blackout, then he would be safe—well, safer. Widget tossed the old M-4 to the ground and lifted Locksmith's legs. Together they managed to run him back to where Blackout was fighting.

All the while, Killswitch was yelling commands into the radio as he readied his team for the Reapers’ air strike. There would be almost no way to mark the targets with all of their tech down. The best chance they had was to stay within the buildings when the fighters passed. If they could thin down the ferals streaming in, they would at least have a chance.

He looked down at his watch. Too little time. Killswitch hoisted the radio and ran back to his men. Snowball and Blackout were standing together on one edge of a rough square with Cowboy and Beast on the other; the four of them held off the enemy while Doc worked on Locksmith. Daredevil's 240 continued to keep the airborne at bay.

"Air support incoming," Killswitch yelled as he ran over. Blackout acknowledged him with a grunt as he slammed his axe into the head of a cougar.

"What about the birds?" Cowboy yelled, ducking beneath the claws of an overly brave hawk feral. Daredevil dropped it dead with a burst of fire.

"I'm sure they can handle them. We just need to worry about staying alive," Killswitch called, then looked out through the nearest hole towards the portal.

A roar cut through the battle as a snubfighter erupted from the portal, its nose towards the sky. It seemed to hang motionless for a moment before its screaming engines slammed it forward and into the air. More engines joined the first as more fighters warped through.

The sound of the engines was nothing compared to the chain gunfire that followed.

Chapter 42

Vincent

Commander Belford had provided specific order for how the Reaper would enter into the breach—orders that would have gotten them all killed. Vincent made sure those orders were not followed, and had a few choice thoughts of what he would like to do to Belford. He pushed those thoughts away though, he was already skirting orders as it was; best not to have treasonous thoughts while he did it.

As it stood, when the
Inferno
had swung low enough to kiss the gravity well, Vincent was at the rear of the Reapers’ deployment. As his pilots slowly twirled down through the layers of atmosphere, trailing bright colors from the excess heat on their shields, he moved to the front of the pack.

They hadn't been able to launch until the
Inferno
nearly beached herself. Their atmospheric package couldn't maneuver in a vacuum. The fighters were airtight, but were basically rocks until they had air beneath their wings. Vincent had anxiously flicked his multitool open and closed as he waited for launch, knowing the ship would only be able to hold position for a few minutes.

His heart pounded as the transmission for close air support came in and they dropped towards the planet. Vincent’s stomach pushed into his chest as he allowed his fighter to fall towards the portal with the grav prop off.

Portals were hard to understand for most soldiers, though the way Rodrom had explained it to him made the most sense. The portals were like a three-dimensional door, if you could picture a curved door. If you took a flexible bowl and poked a needle through it, the outside curve of the bowl was where you entered. Turn the bowl inside out so the convex became concave, and that’s what the other side looked like. So in order to come out going straight up on the other side, Vincent had to dive on this one. The trick of doing it in atmosphere was to come out at an angle so the air could catch his wings and keep him aloft.

Distances being what they were on planets (compared to open space), Vincent didn't have a lot of time to consider what he was doing before the portal loomed in his viewport and he passed through to the other side.

In the heartbeat that passed between one side and the other, Vincent had the vague notion of being both surrounded by popping soap bubbles, and his stomach filling with razors. Before he could appreciate either sensation, however, he was through, and his world shifted from the diffuse hazy outline of a portal to a sky full of chaos.

Monstrous birds swarmed on his view port, coming in and out of sight from behind ink-black storm clouds, and warning tones sounded as his AMI crunched the enemy numbers. Vincent maintained his composure long enough to slam forward on the throttle and key his afterburners, his engines screaming as they recovered from the near dead stop in the air. Any other snubfighter would have torn itself apart, but the Chimera was built for these sorts of missions. Vincent climbed past the danger point and into the awaiting swarm of ferals above.

"Multiple airborne hostiles," the AMI warned uselessly. Vincent had already begun firing. Two ferals, unrecognizable from the plasma burns, fell from the sky when Vincent's first two shots connected. His guns cycled, and another two followed. There were so many targets in the sky that Vincent would have a harder time hitting clean air. His friend-or-foe tag began to blink more reassuring colors as the rest of his squadron followed him. Lightning flashed close by, illuminating the hostiles, and Vincent spun his ship to avoid a direct collision.

"Reapers, spread out. Engage targets at will," Vincent ordered. The AMI would put the transmission on automatic delay so his voice reached each pilot as they entered. "Stay with your wingmen. Steel, take your wing on a bombing run, we need to cover those ground forces."

Vincent's board flickered eleven times as his pilots entered the fray over the next sixty seconds and acknowledged his order Their incoming messages were filtered by AMI to keep the net clear. His orders given, Vincent concentrated on making it through the swarm and into open air beyond. A fledgling might make the mistake of thinking the Chimera would make short work of flesh and blood, but Vincent had seen the aftermath of enough battles to know claws and beaks could tear through a fighter’s armor like paper. And the ferals had unpredictable abilities to boot.

Not even his own considerable skill as a pilot would allow him to avoid all of the ferals littering the air, so Vincent let his AMI plot him a course by the fewest number of the monsters. They were deceptively quick, and given the chance, they would latch onto his ship and tear it apart. But he had no time to think on it; the computer had already altered his course, and he was racing through the cloud of flesh and feathers.

He didn’t trust the computer's automatic safety on his weapons, though. Vincent glanced at his squadron's position in relation to his own, and finding none forward of his location, he depressed the plasma cannon’s triggers once more. The rhythmic whine and chug of the cannons as they displaced air and enemy was oddly soothing.

A kill counter tallied each visible strike, ramping up a number in the corner of his viewport. Vincent released his grip from the left stick to swipe it away—fighting was one thing, but keeping score was another. Just as swiftly as he’d entered, Vincent found himself beyond the mass of ferals and flying low over the canopy. Banking in an arc far too wide for a vacuum pilot’s liking, he brought his fighter and those following him back for another attack run.

"Condemned Actual, this is Reaper One. I am on approach, setting missiles for drop. We'll clear a path, over." Vincent keyed up the data gleaned from the first pass. Steel's wing had already done some damage to the ground forces, though it was nothing compared to the destructive power of an entire squadron.

"Copy that, Reaper One. We'll duck."