Titan's Fall (14 page)

23

We blazed through the thick atmosphere of Titan like meteors, heat shields cherry red from the fireballs around us. Inside the jumpship, metal popped and creaked, the hull changing shape due to the intense pressures as the pilot shifted the angle of reentry.

“Helmets,” Ken shouted.

I looked up and down the platoon as their faces were obscured by faceplates, suddenly anonymous except for the small nameplates.

Everyone was strapped in.

Everyone quiet, determined.

“Incoming!” the pilot, Gennadiy, warned on the common channel.

“I thought they took most of it out from orbit?” I leaned forward to look up toward the front. The nitrogen clouds flickered, lit up from inside by what looked like lightning.

“The Accordance heavy contingent stopped laying it down and moved out fifteen minutes ago,” the pilot said. “Only the CPF carriers are in orbit now.”

“What the fuck?” That wasn't supposed to happen. The fireball around us had faded. The pilot shuddered us into another curving turn down into the flashing clouds. “Where'd they go? Is it a retreat?” What were we flying down into without orbital support?

“No, not at that speed. They're repositioning,” the pilot grunted.

“Where?”

“I don't know” was the annoyed answer. And then we banked hard again, knocking the breath out of me as the jumpship kept turning. We flipped upside down and the engines lit up. “They were supposed to knock out the anti-­orbital weaponry, but we're getting a lot of fucking energy in the air.”

We were pointed straight down at the ground and going all out.

“Holy shit!” Vorhis shouted.

“No point in dallying around!” Gennadiy shouted back.

Energy danced across the clouds, hopping from point to point and seeking us out. A dot far below us flared and then faded away in a cloud of debris. A concussive wave slapped the side of the jumpship, punching it twenty feet to the side and denting the hull. The craft began shaking hard enough that my vision blurred.

What sounded like rain pattered against the jumpship. We were diving through the remains of someone else.

Then came the flare-out. My armor kicked in to compensate against the sudden crushing force of the jumpship reversing thrust to prevent us from becoming a stain on the ground; it gripped my body and squeezed to keep blood up near my brain. My vision blurred, a rib cracked, and painkillers rushed in from the armor.

We struck the ground and slid for several hundred feet
through hydrocarbon-rich mud before coming to a stop.

My eyes wide, panting, I yanked myself out of the restraints. “Ken, Shriek, check the platoon status.”

“We're way out of our LZ,” Amira reported.

I was looking at the map overlay on my helmet already as well. “But we're inside the bowl.” The pilot had just pointed down and done the insane thing of running all the anti-­orbital weaponry in a straight shot. Pips and information from everyone else showed most of the CPF coming down on the other side of the hills. Or getting shot down on the final approach.

“Anyone else insane enough to try the direct approach?” I asked Gennadiy.

“A few of us decided on it when we realized the anti-­spacecraft came back up,” he said wearily. “They were getting shot down on final approach as well as in the deorbit. We figured, roll the dice, come in on rails, and skip the fancy dancing. We knew it was just a numbers game.”

“Everyone's accounted for,” Ken said.

“I'm looking at the maps and seeing heavy fire from these points. Those are the anti-orbital cannons we put in place; the Conglomeration moved some of them around,” I said. There were smoking gaps in the hills where we had originally placed them. So, the Accordance had not taken the time to verify that they were melting actual emplacements. Just used the old coordinates and moved on. We showed up and were sliced and diced. “Amira? We get those knocked out, we create the space for any CPF trying to come over the hills to retake Shangri-La.”

“Well, sitting here is going to be a bad decision in about a minute,” Gennadiy said. “We have incoming. I need to get the hell out to safety.”

I thudded my way forward. “Troll.” Tons of gray armor plated hide came careening down the nearby slope toward us. “Everyone out!”

“We don't have artillery support here by ourselves,” Ken said as I spun around. “Mortars aren't going to slow it down. Or hit it. It's moving too quickly.”

“Move out!” I shouted, impatient. “Gennadiy, get out of here, I'm jumping. Amira, give orbital our position and bring in a laser, danger close.”

I didn't have to ask twice; as the last of the platoon tumbled out, Gennadiy lit up and took the air. Ken and I jumped out, last of the group, and we were already a hundred feet off the ground in the seconds it took for Gennadiy to take off.

As I fell, I looked over at the approaching troll.

Big alien fucker. Multiple eyes. Something out of a bad dream. All sharp armor plates under that rhino-thick skin. Serrated claws.

“Run!” Ken shouted as he hit ice and dirt to find a squad waiting for us.

“Incoming in three . . . ,” Amira said calmly on the common channel.

We bounced out like fleas, straining to push our armor to its limits.

“. . . two . . .”

I was in midair and flying.

“. . . one.”

I curled into a ball and looked back behind me. The orange clouds above us split. Energy lanced down from above instead of leaping upward. The beam of focused energy boiled the ground where it struck, just to the left and forward of the troll that had skidded to a stop in an explosion of gravel. The world hummed and spat.

The beam adjusted course, Amira no doubt whispering instructions. It moved inexorably over the ground, leaving a great scar in its wake. The troll ran, but there was nowhere to hide. The beam of light swallowed it up with a sudden lurch of motion and then kept on moving.

There wasn't even a shadow.

I hit the ground in a sprawl and skidded to a stop on my belly. The orbital energy cannon snapped off. “How long for upstairs to recharge?” I asked.

“Ten minutes,” Amira said.

I'd known that we wouldn't be able to walk up the hill behind an apocalyptic finger of energy from the carriers' anti-ship weapons being pointed downward, but I was still disappointed. At least, I thought, they were able to give us support and weren't under attack and needing their energy weapons for survival.

For now.

“Who else made it down into the bowl with us?” I asked.

“First Platoon, Charlie Company,” Amira said.

“I saw some other pips scattered around on the tactical when we hit; did they link up with them?”

“No,” Amira said.

They'd gone silent. I closed my eyes for a second. “Let's get to First Charlie.”

+  +  +  +

We crunched across a field of dead crickets and toward a twenty-foot-long structure of cricket pieces that had assembled themselves into the form of a robotic worm. Half of its body was stuck inside the hole it had dug to try and surprise First Charlie from below ground.

The platoon had crash-landed in their jumpship and then
dragged it around to the front of the crater to use as a hasty shield as they'd dug in behind it.

“I didn't realize you guys were calling yourselves the Groundhogs,” Zizi said on the common channel after we scooted in to join them behind the blackened remains of the canted jumpship. “You dig in any deeper here, you'll have a warren.”

“Says the platoon hopping across the basin like fleas on crack to hide with us” came the annoyed retort.

“Zizi, shut up,” I ordered. The atmosphere was still dancing with light stabbing out from the hilltops around us. The skyscraper-sized anti-orbital weaponry that the Accordance had built here in Shangri-La was now being turned against them.

I used the live tactical map on my helmet to find the command pip nearby. Sergeant Natalie Cunningham sounded tired as she leaned in to look through helmets at me. She grabbed my shoulder. The armor-to-armor contact kicked in, giving us a secure line.

“Sorry about the chatter,” I said.

“We're actually relieved you're in the shit stew with us,” Cunningham said. “We thought we were going to be alone here. What's the plan?”

“Upstairs says we don't have to make a run uphill,” Amira said. “It's still clear in orbit, so they can keep pointing down. We point out the new coordinates, they'll melt. Then we see what comes scurrying out. Anais is moving toward Shangri-La; they've rounded up a full company's strength.”

“So, where are the Conglomerate ships? The Trojans? And where did the rest of the Accordance ships head to?” I asked.

“Lots of theories, lots of bullshit,” Amira said.

I briefed Cunningham, picked some spotters, and sent out a squad each. Zhao took Bravo squad out. The basin had
quieted. And the Conglomeration hadn't turned any heavy weaponry on the hills down into here.

Yet. I had Smalley take Alpha squad around our perimeter and start mining it.

We were keyed up, looking around, waiting for another wave of ground assault. But so far, it wasn't coming.

“Incoming,” Amira muttered. The slopes behind us lit up. My helmet struggled to compensate as the anti-ship ­weapons from orbit reached down to the ground. The alien energy weapons under the beams of energy exploded, tortured matte-black and green shards flying across the basin.

No one had to be told to get low as debris larger than a jumpship struck icy gravel.

The light faded. “They're recharging,” Amira said. “But that's a third of their capacity, easy.”

The jagged tips of the hills were now soft and runny.

“Anais gives us ten minutes before he gets up the neutralized hill,” Amira said. “Titan's cold enough, a crust will already be formed on the top. We'll have backup shortly.”

“And we're going to need it,” Zhao reported from cover against a ravine in one of the hills they'd dug into instead of coming back. “They're coming out of the ground.”

I turned. Shielded covers were being blown off tunnel access points. Raptors moved out quickly to establish fields of fire. Then behind them . . . humans in surface suits. Hundreds of them boiled out.

“They're not in armor,” Tony Chin said mournfully over the command channel. “All they have to fight with are small arms.”

They were going to get slaughtered. I got on Shangri-La's civilian common channel. “This is Lieutenant Devlin Hart,” I sent. “Please, you are unprotected and barely armed. Get
back into the tunnels. The Colonial Protection Forces have come to ground to rescue you and take back Shangri-La. Remain below.”

“The last thing we want is to go back to sitting under the thumb of Arvani lackeys,” the response came. “Shangri-La is a free zone for humans. We've held elections, we've built a militia. Now we're going to make a stand.”

“What is all that about?” one of Cunningham's soldiers asked.

“Conglomerate propaganda,” Ken said with distaste.

“They're willing to die for it,” I said. “Look.” A wave of blue surface suits ran toward us.

“Lieutenant?” Cunningham asked on the common channel.

“Wait,” I said.

The blue line grew larger. Bullets started to smack and splinter nearby rock. One pinged off my shoulder pad.

Someone, Rockhopper or First Charlie—it didn't matter—fired back. A clean shot, center mass. Blood exploded out of the back of one of the many blue suits and hung in the air as the figure stumbled and fell forward. The line continued to run right at us, more and more figures dropping, until they hit the mines.

Dirt fountained up, the ground thudded, and the wall of blue shattered. The dust settled to reveal them taking cover or turning back. Sixty bodies lay still in the scree between us and the main body of blue.

“Do you see that they're willing to die for freedom?” a familiar synthesized voice said on the common channel. “Do you understand what you can all get from the Conglomer­ation? Something the Accordance will never give you. Self-determination. Which means they're willing to face thugs like you to fight and keep it.”

“Zeus,” Ken said, voice dripping acid.

“I am willing,” Zeus said, “to negotiate with the Conglom­eration on your behalves. You can end further bloodshed. You don't have to keep cutting down so many, when you should all be sharing a common cause. The freedom of your kind.”

“Where's the asshole?” I asked. “Zhao? What do you see? Do you see any Arvani out on the surface?”

“Spot five raptors, one Arvani in the mix at the center of all the blue. They're hanging close to the tunnels,” Zhao reported. “Need us to punch in from the side?”

The moment they did, that I had a feeling Zeus would rabbit down into the tunnels. Somewhere, there'd be a plan to hole up for a siege. “No, this is an opportunity,” I said. I looked around. “We need to lure him farther out.”

I looked at the hole with the cricket boring machine slumped half out of it. A few of us could cram down in there with armor, right down the damn thing's gullet. “I have an idea,” I said on the command channel. “To kill Zeus. But it will take just a few of us and leave us pretty vulnerable.”

“I'm in,” Ken said quickly.

“Me, too,” Amira said.

“Okay, Zhao,” I said. “I need a distraction to keep them looking your way while we get up to no good. Don't push too hard, just get Zeus's attention and then get holed up somewhere. Got it?”

“Yes sir!” she said enthusiastically.

24

We ripped our way through the heart of the cricket worm, wriggled our way deep inside, and then pulled the mechanical guts in after ourselves. Zhao was busy moving her squad around the back side of the attack, gaining their attention as she, Li, Chen, and Vorhis leapfrogged around, trying to get in a shot at Zeus or his raptor bodyguards.

“See the solar system,” Amira said. “Visit exotic moons. Dig your way into the heart of a giant mechanical worm.”

“Zhao? Break it off and get to safety,” I ordered. “Smalley, tell Cunningham we're go.”

“You sure?” Smalley asked.

“Do it,” Ken snapped.

We listened to thuds as Cunningham and the rest of the Rockhoppers moved around the mines to engage. “You're right,” Chin reported quickly. “Zeus is rushing us and moving them around behind us through the mines.”

“Fall back,” I ordered. “Don't forget to pass through the jumpship.”

“We got it.”

More thudding from around us as the two platoons stampeded back to their bolthole. Then more as they abandoned it and began to slowly retreat back toward the slagged hill. The sound of the firefight lessened as it moved away from us.

“Yeah, several of the raptors are clearing the jumpship,” Zhao said. “He's not going to go himself, but he's moved farther away from the tunnel entrance. Think I spooked him.”

“That's okay,” I said. “We have the tunnel coordinates fixed. The moment Amira calls in the strike, we go all out for Zeus, okay, Zhao?”

“We're ready.”

“Okay, Amira,” I bit my lip. “Now.”

I kicked clear and broke out of the cricket worm, pieces flying out as we ripped the entire thing apart in our haste. A nearby woman in blue fell to the ground writhing, a metal shard in her stomach. The blazing beam of light we'd called down from the sky was just fading away, and a puddle of lava boiled where the tunnel Zeus walked out of had been.

“There!” Ken shouted. I followed his armored finger and saw the scuttling form of the Arvani in armor running all out for the next nearest tunnel and then pulling up short as Zeus saw Zhao's squad cutting the escape off.

Amira and Ken were off, and I followed a second behind. Long arcing leaps through Titan's misty air, ignoring Zeus's hasty shots in our direction. The energy rifle could melt through our armor, but there were too many of us, moving too quickly, for Zeus to target. It sizzled and spat energy near me, but scored no direct hit.

“Ah, shit,” Amira gasped.

“You okay?” I shouted. We were all locked on, firing in quick bursts. There was satisfaction in seeing the bullets strike
and spark against Zeus's armor as we closed in, both squads converging. One of his legs cracked and leaked fluids, dragging behind him. Then another. Zeus slowed.

“I surrender,” Zeus shouted on the common channel.

“Anais says capture only. No kill. We
cannot
kill Zeus,” Amira said. “Direct order.”

“I surrender!” Zeus shouted again on the common channel.

Ken slammed into Zeus, knocking the energy rifle away. Another shot and more of the alien's legs were immobilized.

“Raptors,” Zhao said, sprinting right through us in the other direction.

But they too were skidding to a halt. They threw their weapons to the ground and froze. “They surrender as well,” Zeus said.

Up at the top of the slagged hill, an entire company of CPF had crested and was pouring down the slope toward Shangri-La's basin. Over near the foothills, the blue surface-­suit army straggled along but lost momentum as it saw the CPF numbers.

Two minutes later, it was done. The battle was over.

Ken dropped to his knees.

I couldn't hear anything; he'd cut his mic.

He started punching the ground, turning rock into gravel, and then gravel into dust.

+  +  +  +

“This,” I said seven hours later, “is utterly ridiculous.”

I was in an untouched jumpship just down from orbit. Ken, Amira, and I had gotten on; now it was flying a very quick thirty-second loop around the basin and coming right back toward where we had taken off. All the while, it was pursued by spherical camera drones.

“Cunningham should be in here. Chin, Zhao, and Smalley should be here,” I muttered.

The jumpship flared out, smacked dirt, and someone kicked the side door open.

“Do it smartly,” Anais ordered.

The three of us stepped up together and then hopped down to the ground. Our boots smacked Titan soil, and we marched toward the cloud of drones. The jumpship took off rapidly, mimicking clearing out of a hot LZ. Much like Gennadiy had just hours ago.

We burst out of the cloud, and Anais held up a hand. “Okay, that's all we need. The heroes of the Darkside War have done it again.”

He walked with us down into the tunnels and cycled through. We all flipped our helmets back. “They're still going room to room down there,” I said. “Couldn't this have waited?”

“No. Ninety percent of the base is cleared. And because we're going to run that clip out, with an announcement to those hiding in the rest of the base. They'll know who's arrived. And they're going to think twice, Devlin. This'll save lives.”

“And boost recruitment back on Earth,” Ken said.

And raise Anais's profile in the CPF, I thought.

“We've taken the corridor leading to the destroyed entrance of the weapons foundry,” Anais said, switching the subject away. “The Conglomeration was drilling through the debris we left in the way to get to it. Another half a day and they would have broken in and been able to arm people here against us. That attack on the surface would have gone a lot differently. These people might even have been showing up as our enemies elsewhere in the solar system, maybe even Earth. There are a hundred thousand people, here, Devlin. This was a great victory. We've retaken Shangri-La.”

“And what are we doing with all those people?” I asked. “They were willing to die for the Conglomeration up there.”

“Not all of them volunteered to go topside. We detained those who did. The hostility is under control. Everyone else, we will have to monitor and build new understandings with,” Anais said. “But we did it. We're back. We're here. Now, level three has a mess set up and some food dropped. Get fed, rejoin your platoon, and go get some rest. We have a lot of work ahead of us, Devlin. You and I will be talking to a lot of the leaders and people here. Regaining their trust.”

Anais clapped me on the shoulder, armor smacking armor, and then turned down a corridor.

“I should have accidentally shot Zeus,” Amira said. “Think Anais would be this cheerful if I'd done that?”

“PR wins the war,” I said to her. “And he has his PR win, right? Let's go eat. And sleep.”

+  +  +  +

I snapped out of my half-sleep and reached for my rifle. The distant explosion still echoed through the corridors, bouncing from wall to wall. Small arms fire chattered for a few seconds and then fell silent. My armor was on its back, ribs splayed, maw wide and patiently waiting. I lay next to it, head on a blanket against the armpit.

“What is it?” I asked, rubbing my eyes.

“Bomb.” Amira was standing by the door in armor, on watch with Delta. “Good to know ‘the hostility is under control' still,” she said.

“We abandoned them here. The Conglomeration promised them freedom and seemed to give it. Then we came back. I don't think this is going to be easy,” I said, voice scratchy from exhaustion.

“We're the assholes,” Amira said.

“We're the assholes.” I lay my head back down. Two more hours off watch. Then I'd be at the door by the bulkhead in full armor, waiting for something to happen.

“This is what they do,” Shriek said, speaking up.

“What?” I asked.

“Divide you. Get you to fight against each other. Give some of you freedom and riches beyond imagination to turn on yourselves. You'll still lose it all. They'll take it. Just like they did my world. You won't rest until it's time to flee between the worlds again. It's nice out there in the dark. Quiet.”

“Like the Accordance did when they took Earth?” I asked.

“Shut up,” Amira said. “We can argue about which group of aliens is worse when we've had some sleep.”