Starfist: Firestorm (9 page)

Half a kilometer in, they began to see fleeting images of camouflaged vehicles moving toward the fields. Flett sent MacLeash to orbit his dive area, then dipped below the canopy. UAV 1 had to go lower than Flett anticipated; seen from the top, the canopy looked like it spread horizontally with plenty of air between the leaves and the ground. But that wasn’t the case below; the foliage was thick and bushy halfway to the ground, so Flett had to drop his UAV down to less than ten-meters’ altitude to see more than directly below the airborne vehicle.

And had to dart right back up bare seconds later when fire from multiple crew-served weapons began to converge on the UAV. Flett had to maneuver the UAV violently to avoid crashing into branches, and to keep from being hit by the streams of fléchettes that pursued it.

UAV 1 might have been below the canopy only seconds, but it was long enough for the bird to scan an arc of almost 120 degrees of the land under the trees in visible light and transmit its findings. Flett made sure the data stream was saved as he climbed to five hundred meters and ordered MacLeash to do the same. As soon as the two UAVs were at that altitude and circling with their infrared detectors trained on the forest below, Flett transmitted his brief view of what was on the forest floor to Captain Conorado. He took a few seconds to scan the images himself, then went through it again in slo-mo, comparing it with what he saw in his and MacLeash’s infrared views. What he found made him swear softly: more than a hundred vehicles were heading toward Company L’s position. Half of them were troop-carrying lorries. The other half were armored combat vehicles. The infrared views from the orbiting UAVs showed even more vehicles behind them.

CHAPTER TEN

Captain Conorado glanced at the brief visual UAV 1 had acquired under the canopy, and at the infrared feeds from the orbiting UAVs, juddering as the UAVs maneuvered to avoid the streams of fléchettes that speared out of the canopy. The armored vehicles he saw were smaller than the Teufelpanzers 34th FIST had faced on Diamunde, and had no main gun turrets. Instead, their fronts sloped sharply backward to a flat top; their sides also sloped, though less sharply. Three weapons poked out of the front glasis: a small-bore cannon and two fléchette guns, all on flexible mounts that allowed them a great range of fire. Another fléchette gun was gimbal-mounted on the top; most of the vehicles had a soldier standing in a hatch on top, manning the gimbal-mounted fléchette guns. Conorado almost instantaneously saw the implications of the display.

“Lima One, Lima Two, this is Lima Six Actual,” he said into the company command circuit. “Look alive. Bad guys, six hundred meters into the trees. Lima Three, the bad guys are headed toward your flank, shift squads as necessary to repel. All Lima Actuals, patch into UAV feed.” Then he reported the vehicular movement to battalion headquarters.

“It looks like you’ve done everything you can to prepare with what you’ve got,” Commander van Winkle said when he got Conorado’s report. “If I decide you need it, I’ll try to divert a platoon from either Kilo or Mike to reinforce you. In the meanwhile, I’ll contact FIST and request air support.” He didn’t mention that he wished the three FISTs had brought along their artillery batteries and Dragons. But then, nobody had expected the amount of force the Coalition was bringing against the Marine raid-in-force. What he did say was, “The prisoners are being boarded on hoppers for transit to the landing beach. As soon as the hoppers return, we’ll be able to begin withdrawal.” He signed off.

Commander van Winkle hadn’t had to mention the lack of artillery or Dragons to Captain Conorado; the Company L commander was fully aware of the lack, and the sound reason for leaving the heavy equipment behind. The raid was supposed to be a quick in-and-out, and artillery—even towed by the Dragons—would have slowed things down. Conorado also knew that Kilo Company was helping 17th FIST, and thought Mike Company was fully involved with evacuating the captured members of the Coalition government and other prisoners. So, unless some of the Raptors of the FISTs’ air squadrons could be diverted from their current operations, Company L was on its own against the rapidly approaching vehicles and the infantry half of them carried. He wished he knew what kind of armor the fighting vehicles had; his company didn’t have any armor-killer weapons. If the armor wasn’t too heavy, the guns of the company’s assault platoon, even the guns of the blaster platoons, should be able to kill them. If the armor was light enough, the blasters could do the job—not quickly and cleanly, but they’d kill the beasts nonetheless.

Lance Corporal Schultz listened intently on the platoon circuit when Ensign Charlie Bass gave orders for the platoon to redeploy to meet the new threat. Schultz didn’t bother to nod or give any other sign that he agreed with Bass’s repositioning of the squads and the attached assault gun section; he knew Bass would shift second squad to meet the threat—just as he knew that Sergeant Kerr would arrange second squad so that he, Schultz, would be on the end of the squad’s line. As far as Schultz was concerned, that was the natural order of things—only a fool would think otherwise, and Charlie Bass wasn’t a fool.

First squad and one gun team remained in place to make sure the Coalition soldiers that third platoon had pinned down stayed pinned during the coming action. The other gun team and the entire assault-gun section shifted to face the threat from the forest along with second squad. The threat wasn’t long in coming.

The forest facing third platoon suddenly erupted with massed cannon, fléchette streams, and small-arms fire all aimed in the platoon’s direction. Charlie Bass hunkered as low as he could to stay below the incoming fire, and examined the download from the circling UAVs displayed on his UPUD. The infrared images weren’t smooth, as the UAVs were still jinking to evade the sporadic fire aimed at them, but they were clear enough to show the Coalition vehicles forming two lines inside the forest, infantry interspersed among them. The pattern of movement along the second line told him those were the troop-carrier lorries, unloading troops for deployment into assault formations. That left the front row as the armored vehicles.

The pattern of fire coming at the Marines told Bass that the enemy knew approximately where third platoon was, but not exactly, which was why none of the Marines had been hit yet. Still, with the amount of fire coming their way, casualties
were
going to happen—and sooner rather than later.

“Kerr, Kelly, DaCruz,” Bass said on the platoon circuit, “stand by for a HUD transmission.” He pressed the appropriate code into his UPUD and transmitted the current UPUD image to the comps of the squad leader, the gun squad leader, and the assault section leader; three adjacent vehicles in the front row were marked. “Can you see where they are?”

The three leaders looked at the image on their Heads-Up Displays and correlated them with what they saw of the fire coming from the forest.

“I’ve got mark three,” Kerr reported. He couldn’t actually see the vehicle, it was too far back under the trees, but his infra screen showed its location.

“I see mark two,” Sergeant Kelly said. He also used his infra to locate his target.

Staff Sergeant DaCruz, the assault section leader, was the last to reply. “I’ve got all three spotted,” he said. Again, the infra screen showed the precise location of the targets.

“Second squad,” Bass ordered, “kill target three. Guns, kill target two. Assault, kill target one, then shift fire as needed to assist guns and second squad. Questions?”

All three leaders understood their orders.

Kerr said into his squad circuit, “Second squad, on my mark, concentrated fire on my spot. Use your infras.” He sighted his blaster on the infra glow of target three and pressed its firing lever. Before his bolt had time to reach the enemy vehicle, nine more bolts were on their way. “Fire,” Kerr whispered to himself as he squeezed the firing lever again. “Fire, fire, fire.” To his flanks, the nine Marines under his command were doing the same, sending hundreds of plasma bolts downrange at their designated target.

The target vehicle didn’t cease its firing, but within seconds after the deluge commenced it began to move in an attempt to get out of the concentrated fire. But the Marines were looking at it through their infras and saw it move; they moved their aiming points to keep hitting the vehicle.

At the same time Kerr gave second squad his orders, Kelly told Corporal Kindrachuck, “Watch my spot, then kill that bastard.” He aimed his blaster at the vehicle he saw through his infra and fired. First gun team, with Lance Corporal Tischler on the trigger, sent a lengthy stream of plasma bolts at the armored vehicle Kelly had marked. The target’s cannon stopped firing almost immediately, but it wasn’t dead; it went into reverse and tried to run from the gun’s fire.

DaCruz gave his orders and sent his spotting round at target one. A second later, all three assault guns under his command struck the armored vehicle with plasma streams, each much heavier than the stream from the gun of third platoon’s gun team. The target bucked and split at its seams from internal explosions. Satisfied that his initial target was killed, DaCruz shifted his attention to the other two targets. “First squad,” he ordered, “add your fire to the gun team’s fire. Second and third squads, add your fire to the blaster squads’.”

The three assault squad leaders didn’t reply with words; they saw where the gun and the blasters were firing and shifted their aim to assist. In seconds, all three targets Charlie Bass had designated were killed, and there was a gap in the line of enemy armor.

But the Coalition officers and sergeants had seen the Marine fire and began adjusting the fire of their own men, bringing them to bear on the Marines’ locations. Bass wasted no time ordering his men to change position, and the weapons of the Marines of third platoon and the attached assault section fell silent while they moved out of what was rapidly turning into a killing ground.

Captain Conorado listened in on third platoon’s orders, and saw the results of the fire on his UPUD.
Good
, he thought,
the assault guns can kill the armor
. As soon as Charlie Bass’s men stopped firing and began to move away from the incoming fire, he got on the company circuit.

“All Lima elements except third platoon, fire on bandits in the forest. Assault guns kill the armor quickly. Blaster squads, use volley fire on the infantry. Fire and move before they can get your range. Third platoon, resume fire when you are clear. Do it now.”

Almost as one, the Marines of first and second platoon opened fire into the forest. The blaster squads used volley fire; the squad leaders selected aiming lines short of where the Coalition infantrymen were, so the plasma bolts would deflect off the ground and skitter deeper into the trees, increasing their chances of striking targets. Not all of the bolts were deflected by the ground; some ignited vegetation and started small fires. The four guns of the two platoons added their fire to that of the blaster squads, and the combined fire looked almost like a tightly woven fiery fence slicing through the trees. The three squads of second assault section began firing at the armored vehicles, and each gun killed its target within seconds of first striking it. Third platoon’s second squad, gun team, and the attached assault section reached their new positions and joined in the fire.

But before Company L’s massed fire had time to do serious damage to the reinforced regiment in the trees, the remaining Coalition armored vehicles all began moving and plunged out of the trees—straight at third platoon.

Captain Conorado didn’t need the UPUD display from the UAVs to see the armored assault on his right flank. “Lima three,” he snapped into the company circuit, “use everything you’ve got to stop that attack. Assault platoon, use all assets on the advancing armor. First and second platoons, shift your guns to help repel the armor—maintain blaster-squad fire into the trees.”

In seconds, all the weapons of third platoon and the assault platoon, along with the guns of the other two platoons, were firing into the charging armored vehicles. Some of the armor stopped abruptly, dead in its tracks. Some died, but continued rolling forward from inertia. Many had to maneuver to avoid dead vehicles, yet on they came, too many for the Marines to kill them all before they closed the gap.

“By fire teams,” Sergeant Kerr ordered as soon as he realized the guns and assault guns weren’t going to be able to stop the armored column, “concentrate your fire on the treads. Stop those fuckers before they reach us!”

“You heard the man,” Corporal Claypoole shouted over the fire team circuit.

“This one,” Lance Corporal Schultz growled, and fired at the treads of an approaching vehicle.

Claypoole and Lance Corporal MacIlargie saw where he was firing and joined their fire to his. All three of the Marines fired as rapidly as they could, but the vehicle was moving too fast and the three of them couldn’t concentrate enough heat steadily on one spot to damage the treads.

“Up!” Schultz barked, and shifted his aim to the gun mount on the front of the vehicle.

Claypoole and MacIlargie followed Schultz’s example, and in an instant the three of them were pouring fire on the thin armor where the vehicle’s gun barrel protruded through the thicker front armor.

“Got it!” Schultz yelled into the fire team circuit, and began firing at the gun mount on another vehicle bearing down on them.

Claypoole and MacIlargie were a beat slow on following him, they hadn’t immediately seen what Schultz had—the metal holding the gun barrel in place weakened and gave way under the weight and jerking of the firing weapon.

The heat of the plasma bolts that struck the faceplate also weakened the barrel so that it bent a couple of degrees off true, enough to jam fléchettes and shatter the barrel. Fragments of hot faceplate, barrel, and bits of plasma flew into the crew compartment, wounding the gunner and driver, and the vehicle slewed violently into the path of a charging mass of armor and weapons. The second vehicle slammed into the first, tipping it over. The second vehicle’s driver wasn’t able to reverse direction quickly enough, and his vehicle rolled up the side of the first at an angle. The two vehicles’ tracks hooked into each other, so when the driver of the second finally reversed the tracks, they bent and snapped; the second armored vehicle slid off and fell to its side with a bone-rattling
crash
!

When the armored vehicles broke out of the trees, Corporal Dean realized that the greatest immediate danger they presented to the Marines was their cannon fire. He ordered his men to zero in on his aiming point and keep firing at it until he told them to stop. He picked a vehicle and aimed at its barrel, about halfway down from the muzzle. Dean, Lance Corporal Godenov, and PFC McGinty poured fire onto the middle of the barrel, and in seconds the barrel overheated and bent. When the gunner didn’t see the growing red spot in time and fired another burst, his fléchettes tore through the softening, bending metal and the forward half of the slagging barrel gave way. Streams of dripping metal solidified in the mouth of the remaining half of the barrel. The armored vehicle spun about and retreated back into the forest.