Merkiaari Wars: 03 - Operation Oracle Read online

  Gina’s eyes widened. Cragg had aborted his own hibernation. That might kill him, but a beacon might well bring Merki right to him. He hadn’t chanced it. Merkiaari cloaked by stealth field was a new tactic. Stealth in space was standard, but on the ground, it was usually pointless. It was only good for static defence. The equipment was cumbersome and the nature of the field meant it had to be stationary to be effective.

  Was doing the job, all good. No surprises. I detected a Merki trooper on his own. Think what the hell, why not? I kill it, will just say found it wounded ma’am. Couldn’t let it suffer could I?

  Gina grinned, that was a good one. She typed that for him and nodded. Cragg nodded back and typed...

  Went to check him. Found it. Fallen building hiding it. Completely hidden from satellite observation and my sensors. Totally fooled me, stealthed even under the rubble. Still can hardly believe it.

  She cocked her head in question.

  A troop ship, Gina, an intact troop ship buried deep. Not sure it crashed. If it didn’t...

  Her eyes widened. Five Marauder class transports had been committed by the Merki to this incursion, and each one carried detachable troop ships or landers. There were typically a hundred thousand Merki troopers aboard a Marauder when fully loaded. A hundred regiments or fists as the Merki called them, ready to awaken at the touch of a button. Marauders could not land; they were too huge. They landed their fists aboard the detachable landers where they slept in stasis dreaming and awaiting battle. Twenty landers per Marauder—they really were monstrously huge ships—meant a maximum of five thousand troops aboard at launch. That didn’t mean Cragg’s ship had five thousand aboard now. They could all be dead, or half of them dead, or any number above or below. It wasn’t a lander anymore. It was a base! A stealthed base. There was no way to know how big this disaster was.

  I was trying to scout for a way in. The General will order us in there, I just know it. Didn’t see the patrol. They got me good. Lost my arm and my damn rifle first thing. I beat feet, they chased me. Lost them near here but I think they’re close. They split into groups of two there at the end.

  Gina nodded. Cragg was leaving out a lot. His injuries told her there had been a running gun fight. His armour was burned and scarred all over, and cracked on one side. Busted ribs there for sure. Probably what caused the punctured lung. The Merki splitting their force was interesting. They would only do that if they wanted to cover a wider area, and that meant they were actively searching for Cragg. Or had been. No way to know for sure if they still were, but if she had a stealthed base to protect, she wouldn’t give up until certain the threat was neutralised.

  Gina typed... Ok. We need to exfil, get you some help and report in.

  Cragg shook his head. I’m totally messed up, Gina. Leave me here. I’ll lay low.

  It was the right thing, she knew, but she wasn’t going to be sensible this time around. She had abandoned Kate when the General insisted, and her friend had barely survived even with Stone’s help. She never wanted to feel that helpless rage ever again. She even had her excuse ready to go. General, she would say, Cragg was too damaged to download the data to me. It might even be true for all she knew. General, I’m sorry but I had to bring him and the data he contains. No choice, sir. That would work, right?

  She didn’t bother to explain her reasoning. She just pulled Cragg up onto his feet and then put him over her shoulder ignoring all protests. She about faced and retraced her route through the building. She figured it was more than likely the safest way out. She had made it in after all. Luck did have its part to play no matter how often Richmond derided the notion. Luck is not a factor, Richmond would say. In one way, Gina could sympathise with that view, but she knew soldiers of any flavour were superstitious creatures and she was no different. She believed in luck, but believed even more that she made her own luck by being paranoid and good at her job.

  Paranoia made her cautious when Gina reached her entry point. She might have just leapt down and run, but something whispered in the back of her brain. Don’t go down there, don’t you do it. Go up, not down. Not down this time.

  She reversed course and found the access ramp to the upper floor and roof. Shan didn’t use stairs, it was something to do with the way their legs worked, and most of their buildings were two or three stories above ground with the same below. She wasn’t sure they had ever invented elevators, not that she would chance using one even if she found one operating. The ramp spiralled up gently making it very easy to carry Cragg and she had her pistol out, leaving her rifle thumping her back.

  She emerged onto the roof cautiously, and paused. Cragg’s warning not to run a sensor sweep held her back. She ramped up the gain on her hearing, listening for Merki breathing, and turned her head slowly, panning around to listen intently. She deactivated light amplification mode for the moment, and tried infra. Infravision or infrared detected heat emissions, and there were a couple visible to her, but they were part of the building’s infrastructure. The shape told her. Long straight lines like these were pipes. No Merki-shaped heat sources appeared. She switched back to light amplification mode and holstered her pistol.

  Gina whispered so low she wasn’t certain Cragg would hear. “I’m going to throw you to the next roof. If I try a jump with you on my shoulder, I might bust something or break through the roof. Then we’re screwed.”

  Cragg nodded.

  She lowered Cragg into her arms and carried him like a child despite his size. Vipers were strong. She ran toward the edge and at the last moment spun around and let go. Cragg flew into space. Gina winced; she had overdone it. He flew high over the other roof and crashed down. The noise and pained groan was very audible. She backed up and then ran at the edge. Her leap was more conservative and she would have made a nice running landing if she hadn’t needed to turn it into a dive to avoid incoming fire.

  The quiet dissolved, replaced by the hammering of Merkiaari cannon fire. Those huge gauss cannons were slug throwers not plasma, and although hand held like a rifle, they had more destructive punch than an Alliance AAR (Anti Armour Railgun). The noise was deafening. Definitely more than two firing, she realised. Cragg’s pursuers had found them.

  Gina sprawled and rolled across the abrasive surface avoiding the Merki fire. The edges of the roof dissolved, slugs chewing it away, but they didn’t have the angle. They must be on the ground, but that might not be so for long. If they gained just a little elevation, the Merki would have them both dead to rights.

  She scrambled away from the danger, more toward the centre of the roof where Cragg lay. Thank god, she was still wearing her shooting gloves. She might be a viper, but losing skin still hurt. As it was she wore holes in the palms of her gloves, but her uniform was tougher. All alliance uniforms used nano-processed materials to toughen them against impact forces, and were heat resistant to give the wearer a precious second or two of time against plasma fire. Hers was more than a match for the abrasion, especially with her armour on.

  “No point worrying about detection now,” Gina muttered and used her sensors. She swept the entire area around the building and swore. The Merki had her surrounded. “Oh crap, we’re screwed.”

  “Arty,” Cragg croaked. “Rather die to friendly fire.”

  “Screw that, no fire is friendly.”

  Cragg’s diagnostic data had multiplied and its colour was definitely reddish. He had internal bleeding and his bots weren’t dealing fast enough. She quickly searched his webbing, but found his medikit on his hip. Everyone had his or her preference. He had chosen to store his medikit on his utility belt next to the case containing spare power cells. She had seen others do that. Gina used hers for power cells and bayonet, but not much else. Everything she needed hung on her webbing attached to her armour.

  She grabbed his nano injector and pumped the entire magazine into his thigh, right over the artery. She reloaded it with his spare mag, and hammered the entire thing into his other thigh. Cragg didn’t seem to notice.
He was looking around in a daze.

  She grabbed his head and forced him to look into her eyes. “Martin, I want you to let yourself go into hibernation now.” He blinked at her, but didn’t respond. “You hearing me, Martin? Remove the block on hibernation. That’s an order.”

  Cragg blinked and blood frothed on his lips, but nothing changed.

  She didn’t have time for this. On her sensors, the bright red icons of the Merki death squad were manoeuvring. She was sure some of them would enter her building and come up to the roof eventually, but she was more afraid of the other possibility. All it would take is one or two troopers climbing high enough to cut the angle. There were a few trees in the streets, but more likely, they would just use another building.

  As his commanding officer, Gina had access to Cragg’s diagnostic data, but she had more than that. If he still had his wristcomp, she could have instructed his IMS to perform some basic medical procedures and some not so basic. A thing like introducing pain relief into his bloodstream was a simple matter that any Alliance soldier relied upon. Everyone, military or civilian, had a wristcomp connected to IMS, but Cragg’s wristcomp was gone along with his forearm.

  She had another option, but she hesitated to use it. All of them feared outside forces taking them over. She couldn’t do that, no one could, but she could order his processor to perform a new diagnostic. She didn’t think Cragg was aware enough of his situation to block it if his processor decided to put him into hibernation when the results came in. She had no doubt it would. He was in a bad way. If not for his earlier order preventing it, he would already be asleep.

  Computer: Access Cragg, Martin 501st Infantry Regiment serial number ALZ-119-910-159.

  Connection achieved

  Computer: Access IMS

  IMS: _

  Gina took a deep breath. This had better work. She stared into Cragg’s wandering eyes and prayed it would save him. Prayer was all she had right now.

  Computer: Run full diagnostic.

  She held her breath...

  IMS: Working...

  Diagnostics: Full system scan in progress.

  Her breath whooshed out. She broke her link to Cragg and checked her sensors. She had her rifle up and hardly had time to realise what she was doing when the first Merki head appeared. TRS had taken over. The Merkiaari trooper edged onto the roof, TRS noticed, evaluated, targeted, and blew its head off in milliseconds. Control returned to her body and limbs, with the dead Merki trooper still falling.

  Gina gasped, feeling the pain in her muscles receding. That happened when TRS moved a viper at computer speeds. It happened when she went from combat mode to melee mode as well, but at least she knew it was coming. TRS did it without warning.

  She kept her rifle up and aimed at the ramp as she ran to the body in a bent kneed stance. She kept her eyes on the ramp and kicked the monster, but her sensors had it right. It was dead. She took TRS offline and edged forward. Two more Merki were halfway up the ramp. She took two grenades off her webbing, depressed the triggers, and rolled them down the ramp.

  Whump! Whump!

  She jumped forward and emptied her rifle into the Merki already reeling from the twin explosions. Both died without returning fire. She didn’t go down to make sure. She ran back to check the other side of the roof. Sensors reported a single Merkiaari there. It saw her first and fired. The impact on her torso armour was sudden and shocking. The mass of the slug caused her armour’s nanocoat to react and harden, but that didn’t reduce the force of the impact. She flew off her feet snarling at the pain, and landed on her back. She rolled to avoid two more shots. Her target reticule was locked on to the sniper and pulsing redly as it spun. If she’d had a rocket launcher she could have fired right then and forgot about it. The rocket would have found its own way to the target, but she didn’t have one. She did have her rifle and its integrated grenade launcher. She had chosen to load hers with all HE (High Explosive) rounds. She remembered Sergeant Rutledge telling her class of recruits that he preferred all HE himself. Good for taking out armoured vehicles and Merkiaari troops, he had said back then. Gina agreed and used the grenade launcher. As soon as the decision was made, the targeting reticule morphed and an arcing line connected her to the target.

  She adjusted her aim and fired.

  The grenade followed the arcing line as if physically anchored to it. It wasn’t of course. The line was the projected trajectory needed to kill the target, which it did moments later when it exploded. The building shook and rained debris into the street below. Pieces of Merkiaari fell with it, and the red icon on her display faded.

  The steady blue icon close behind her blinked out of existence and Gina froze watching where it had been. It reappeared and started blinking steadily. Cragg was in hibernation, sleeping the little death. She quickly checked her sensors and scurried back to her friend. She patted his cheek.

  “Sleep well,” she said and went to war.

  Gina reactivated TRS and added melee mode to the mix. The world slowed around her as she stood tall over Cragg. That attracted enemy fire as she knew it would, but the Merki had to reveal themselves to hit her. The moment they did, TRS took over and threw her bodily over Cragg, not to protect him; TRS didn’t care. It was just an auto-targeting program after all. It threw her down to avoid damage, and then fired back. She let herself go, and screamed her rage at the enemy trying to kill her. Grenades flew faster than human thought. TRS switched to full power and full auto on her rifle as the Merki died and her launcher emptied itself.

  Impact!

  Damage assessments flickered onto her display, but quickly parked themselves to one side out of the way. Gina watched like a spectator in her own body. She took a moment to check that IMS was dealing with the damage. Lower right leg, bone bruised probably, but not broken. IMS was already on the case flooding the area with nano assemblers and pain blockers.

  Her body kept firing and reloading with no wasted motions. Fire to the left and then spin to fire the other way without pause. Her body killed and killed and killed as she spun and danced across the roof. Her body did, not her, not with TRS engaged and Merki in range. It was just a conceit. This was her now. She was the machine, and the machine was her. She had seen Eric like this when they first met. She had compared him to a mindless sentry gun on auto, but he hadn’t been mindless, and neither was she. She could take control away from TRS at any time, but she didn’t. It could target the enemy faster than she could even in melee mode.

  Factory default for melee mode shunted all resources to combat and left none for defence, but as with most things viper related, parameters were adjustable. Gina had kept back a little something. Not much. Barely anything really, but enough that IMS could work even at its currently starved for resources level. Back in the classroom when the recruits were taught the hows and the whys of viper design, she had decided that leaving melee mode at its default settings would be a bad idea. What point in killing her enemies and then dying from blood loss, she had thought. Not everyone agreed. Eric didn’t, and she knew most of the veterans didn’t. For them all that mattered was the mission, but she was still new enough that her life meant something to her. Besides, it was a waste to die if it could be prevented. If she could survive to fight another mission, surely it was worth holding back a single percentage point? Gina had thought so. Of course, she would look pretty silly if she died because she hadn’t committed that final one percent, but a girl couldn’t have everything.

  More damage reports added themselves to the list. Right shoulder, left hip, left hand, left leg... she spun to the left and fired. Another red icon faded. The fucker had done a number on her left side, but she was still fighting.

  Suddenly TRS went offline and Gina staggered to one knee panting and in pain. TRS had quit on her, was she damaged that badly? Diagnostics said no, she was just out of targets. She remained in melee mode, too scared to lose even a fraction of a second by dropping back to combat mode only to realise she needed the speed boost
of melee mode again.

  A sensor sweep showed hostiles near but not near enough for TRS to keep fighting. There was time to reload, exchange power cells too, which she did. She was running low. She ruthlessly searched Cragg’s body and scavenged his ammo and cells, transferring it all to her own webbing. She ripped open her medikit scattering its contents in her haste, her hands a blur. She let the aerosols roll away, and didn’t bother with the sterile self-sealing bandages. She was only interested in the nano injector. As she had with Cragg, she hammered the entire mag into her thigh. Barely running with the resources she had left it, her IMS needed the help.

  Another sensor sweep. Merkiaari were gathering but not closing yet. She made a decision, and slung her rifle on her back. She grabbed Cragg’s body and threw him off the roof. As long as he didn’t land on his head, he would survive. Hell, for all she knew he would survive even that. In hibernation, his resources were being used in the exact opposite manner to hers. Everything he had was dedicated to survival and repair.

  His body thumped onto the ground on its back and bounced a little to settle face down. He had hit the ground, as a corpse would have, all slack-boned and unflinching. The little death was indistinguishable from true death until wake up time.

  Gina checked her sensors again noting positions of the enemy and Hiller’s position, the closest viper. She looked down three stories, and jumped. She crashed down and melee mode did little to help the impact. She didn’t feel the pain though, so maybe melee mode did have other uses than pure combat. Pain response was suppressed, but damage still occurred, and another entry appeared on her list; left hip again.

  She limped up to Cragg and lifted him onto her shoulder. She took a deep breath and ran into the open street. The moment she did, red icons swarmed. She grinned. That had surprised the buggers. They had been setting themselves to assault the rooftop. Gina chuckled and then laughed hysterically. Melee mode was doing weird things to her self-control. Her legs became a pumping blur. She barely felt Cragg’s weight.