Shaitan Wars 2: Wrath of the Shaitans (41 page)

The Gurkha were nothing if not emotional beings. When emotionally motivated, they were known to abandon all care for one’s own life and do things no human being would normally do. That is what made them so ferocious and scary to the enemy. That is what impressed the British so much that they invited the entire clan to move to Britain to serve in his majesty’s army.

“Gurkha! Your brother marines came to your assistance to save your lives. They have drawn half the enemy to their sides so that you can fight and live. Now the enemy has surrounded them 6 to 1. They are now fighting for their lives. Let us not be the first Gurkha in history to live with the burden of our Brother’s blood. Let us not be the first Gurkha who watched his brother bleed to death from far and did not go to bleed along with him.

Gurkha, we need to reach our brothers fast. We need to end this here and now. We need to say the name of ‘Durga’ and shout ‘Ayo Gorkhali’. Leanna added an extra note and quiver of emotion. She invoked the name of the goddess of war ‘Durga’, which in Indian culture when invoked by a woman is an especially potent call to war.

The effect on the Gurkha marines was electrifying. It wasn’t as if they fought harder or braver. They just fought madder. They stopped bothering to evade, and abandoned any attempt at caution. It probably resulted in a few more casualties than would have happened otherwise. Even though the Shaitans did not have a face which could express surprise, their body language said it all.

The Shaitans on the plateau were surprised, puzzled and shocked at the same time. They had never experienced humans launching themselves headlong at them with their guns blazing and their bayonets thrust out, when there was a high probability that they would get shot or skewered by the Shaitans.

The net result was that in 10 seconds, while there were many Gurkha lying on the ground, every Shaitan on the plateau was dead or in its death frenzy. The Gurkha still alive were seen running down the path screaming like mad men.

The Gurkha who actually reached the US Marine position first though were the ones who were perched on the niches. They had expertly rappelled down when they could no longer target from top once the Shaitans reached the US marines. The two platoons of US marines were in a grim fight for survival, as they were overwhelmed by 300 Shaitans. Every Gurkha who reached the fight and attacked from behind increased the life expectancy of the US Marines a bit.

Despite the seeming slaughter of humans on the plateau, only 50 humans had actually gone down, many of them civilians while killing 300 Shaitans; proving once again that humans were superior fighters even when they fought as crazy as a Gurkha.

Thus within a minute of the rousing speech delivered by Leanna, over 200 Gurkha had reached the US marines’ position attacking the Shaitans from the rear, while the 60 marines fought in the front. When Humans and Shaitans are roughly evenly matched in numbers, the Shaitans have little chance of winning or even causing casualties.

The US marines survived with 5 casualties. The Gurkha actually took more casualties. 9 of them went down in the skirmish, but they killed each and every Shaitan. There was a deafening cheer that went through the public channel. Shouts of men who had faced and cheated death once more.

Leanna however could not let the men rest yet. She had to send them to face death once more. There was a brave platoon or whatever might be left of that platoon, which was fighting and running desperately for its life from a force which was nearly 20 times their size. They had succeeded in their mission of keeping the Shaitans on the plains occupied. It was now time to go to their rescue.

Chapter 26

Storming the enemy base

Mars

September 2083

Ed was so tired and his heart was beating so fast that it felt that it would burst any time. The marines were some of the fittest human beings, but even the fit had their limits of endurance. They had been now running continuously for almost 24 hours. They had jumped from space and flown a quarter the length of Mars.

Then they had hiked 5-10 Km to contact Kormas base. Then they had hiked another 20 Km to reach the descent point. Had made a treacherous descent down a 5 Km high plateau overnight. After a half hour rest, they had hiked another 10-15 Km to sabotage the shuttle. Since then the marines have been continuously running. Fighting, retreating and running, occasionally losing a comrade, which did not help morale.

They were now down to 15, half their original number. They had been running in circles literally and taking the Shaitans along with them in a merry chase. They had now reached the limits of their endurance. Yet it was not the endurance of the Marines that was worrying Ed. It was the endurance of their suits that was the cause of his disconcert.

The suits were rated for 24 hours of use in combat conditions. His display showed that they were coming up on that 24 hour mark very fast in less than 15 minutes. His battery level was showing low, but not critical yet. Ed however knew that battery capacity display was notoriously unreliable.

Even after centuries of use of batteries, no one seems to be able to fix the problem of getting a precise and reliable measurement of batteries. The batteries may show 24% for a long time and suddenly jump down to 10% directly without going through any intermediate value. Then as suddenly it will initiate a shutdown at critical 2% without getting to any intermediate value.

Ed wondered why humans would spend billions of dollars on battery research to increase capacity but not spend a few million dollars to reliably measure the capacity. Ed’s grandfather used to complain that his childhood computers and something called cell phones which were similar to com equipment would face the exact same problem.

So Ed could not rely on the battery reading. If a suit failed in the middle of a skirmish, it would not be possible to evacuate that marine and he would die. It was best to end the mission now. It would no longer be possible to continue it much longer anyway, so there is no point endangering any more lives.

They had a good run so far, although they had paid a heavy price with the lives of their marines. The shuttle had been the lynchpin of their strategy so far. It was perhaps the only thing that had kept them alive so long, and it would be what would save them from death now.

After the marines had been driven away from their fiery ghosts, and then rescued from certain death by the arrival of the shuttle. Ed had devised a strategy to keep harassing the Shaitans without taking inordinate risks. The marines would leave one of their spiders as they ran.

The Shaitans would eventually reach the spot or close by tracking them from the heat of their foot prints on the cold Martian surface. The spider would be controlled by the marines from nearby. They would sneak the spider as close to the Shaitans as possible and then emit a loud radio squawk and then scoot. Occasionally the Shaitans would detect the spider and kill it, but it didn’t matter. Each marine carried a spider. They had plenty of them.

The shuttle would be sitting somewhere close by within a few Km conserving its fuel. The radio squawk from the spider would act like a beacon. The shuttle could not see the Shaitans through the dust storm, just as the Shaitans could not see the shuttle. The shuttle would home in on the position of the radio squawk at high speed. As it approached the position the Shaitan heat signature on the IR would become visible through the dust for a few moments.

The shuttle would strafe the Shaitan position and buzz off at high speed before the Shaitans had a chance to let off a shot at the shuttle, which would also become visible on the Shaitan IR sensors. The machine gun strafing did not kill too many Shaitans. Some passes failed to hit even one, but it kept them disorientated and on guard. Most importantly it kept them pinned here on the plains, pursuing the marines believing it to be a much larger threat that it really was.

They had succeeded in their mission as far as Ed was concerned. The 30 of them had destroyed the most potent weapon of the Shaitans – their shuttle. They had kept over 500 Shaitans busy for nearly 10 hours. They had now circled back to the point where they had left their fiery ghosts, some of whom were still mildly warm on the IR sensors. It was time to get his marines still alive back to the safety of the shuttle.

“Eagle 2 do you copy?” Ed called out. “Repeat Eagle 2 do you copy?” Ed had to wait a few minutes continually calling out before Eagle 2 replied. They must have strayed out of the limited range of the radio. When the shuttle responded, Ed continued. “Eagle 2 it is time to get the boys into the shuttle. The suits are on the edge. Please find us a suitable extraction point to march towards immediately.”

“Copy that Major. Give me a moment please.” Eagle 2 replied. Eagle 2 however started speaking almost immediately again in an excited voice. “Major we have good news and we have good news. The siege has been broken and the Shaitans killed there. We now have a home to go back to. Eagle 1 buzzed pass us to give the news. They have marked out an extraction point for you, which should be coming to your display now. Eagle 1 is waiting there to take your boys home. Eagle 2 is proceeding back to base to refuel and airlift the next batch of Marines for the final assault. Eagle 2 out.”

There was a cheer that went through the tired marines. It was the best news they had heard in 24 hours. “Well you heard the man. What are we waiting for? Double time to the extraction point marines, I don’t care how tired you are.” Ed shouted out good naturedly. His mood had become lighter and there was a sprint in his steps as he ran towards the extraction point despite his tiredness. The marines didn’t need any further invitation either.

As the marines were embarking on to the shuttle, their suits started giving critical battery level warning. Many of them had to plug on to the shuttle’s emergency life support to stay alive. The marines had really cut it thin and just made it back alive. When they reached back the plateau of the base where the shuttle landed, they were shocked to see the devastation of the base on the plateau. Fortunately half of the infrastructure of the base was inside the tunnels.

It is not known whether Shaitans feel tired, and whether their performance decreases with that tiredness. It was thought that any biological creature after exertion would require some recuperation time. The shoe was on the other foot now. 200 Gurkha marines and 50 US marines from the second and the third platoon descended on the plains to fight about 350 Shaitans remaining on the plains.

The Shaitans were the ones now who had been running and fighting for the last 10 hours. While the marines had also been in a major battle, but they had not been running continuously. The assault plan of the marines was dead simple. The simply landed next to the Shaitan camp on the plains. The main body of Shaitans pursuing Ed and his marines had strayed far from the camp.

The marines surprised and quickly killed the few Shaitans remaining at their camp, and took up positions waiting for the Shaitans to come towards their camp. The Shaitans had no option but to try and rescue they camp. They would run out of oxygen sooner or later. They had to come towards the camp.

The camp that the Shaitans had built was similar in design philosophy to the one they built on Titan, but on a smaller scale. It was circular and sunk in the ground. It had 4 exit, where marines were placed just in case anyone came out from behind them, otherwise they made no attempt to go inside.

When the Shaitans assaulted the marines, it was from 360° all-round the camp. The Shaitans had taken the time to spread themselves in all direction and attack simultaneously. It was a clever tactic from the Shaitan commander since he must have thought that the marines were small in number. It would have worked if the marines were fewer in number.

Leanna did not have to anticipate this tactic. She had placed the marines evenly all around anyway, since she had no idea where they Shaitans would assault from. The thing that gave the marines the advantage though were the two shuttles which had brought a few of the infrared lamps from the Kormas base, hooked them to their power supply and the gunner was moving the lights in a slow arc as they rested next to the Shaitan camp on either side. The marines nearby used the shuttles as shield as well.

When the Shaitans attacked, the marines did not suffer from a visibility disadvantage. Thanks to the IR lamps, the marines saw them before the Shaitans saw the marines. The shuttles leapt up to the sky and pumped copious amount of lead into the charging Shaitans, while the marines got down on their knees to lower their profile and engaged in precision shooting.

Only about half the Shaitans were able to make it to the marines for a melee fight. They did cause casualties with their plasma guns and their frenzied attack with their claws. The Shaitans managed to injure many marines, but thanks to the shuttle a lot of them could be evacuated immediately to the base and their lives saved. In the end only 12 marines lost their lives.

The marines in turn were not just able to kill most of the Shaitans, but took three of them alive, all of them were type B warrior Shaitans. They also took four more type A Shaitans prisoners from inside the camp. For all the blood that the marines had bled, these prisoners would be more valuable than they realized at that moment.

Space wars are quick, efficient and absolute. Ground wars are long and messy with sometimes ambiguous results. It is however ground wars that win you valuable intelligence. You cannot understand a war and gain from it unless you fight on the ground. This was the reason USC had put so much effort into building up the space marines. A single enemy soldier captured is worth more than a spaceship destroyed in terms of intelligence.

When Leanna returned to the Kormas base, the civilians had already started the task or repairs and salvage on the base. Yusuke approached her and said. “Congratulations Colonel. You managed to wipe off the Shaitans from the face of Mars.”