The Fate Of Nations: F.I.R.E. Team Alpha: Book One (38 page)

              The auto-med system of his IBOS was doing its best to stem the torrent of blood coming from both of his wounds, but the wounds were massive. He would bleed to death before the auto-med stopped the bleeding.
I’m done,
he thought, feeling the pool of blood beneath him grow despite his auto-med system’s best efforts.
The Boss might have a chance, though,
he reasoned
.

             
His rifle ammunition expended, he began firing with his sidearm. The Mark 23s pilots had been somewhat cautious in their attack, having seen what Burgett had done to their squad mates; preferring to remain outside his rifle effective range in hopes of hitting him with another cannon shot. But now that he had been reduced to defending himself with his handgun, they became bolder. They advance toward him, firing their cannon as they moved. With great effort, Burgett crawled the few yards into a shell crater. He took cover there, firing his pistol intermittently as the Mark-23s lumbered toward him.

              Firing one handed, Burgett charged at the leading Mark-23; weaving to avoid volleys of cannon fire. His pistol’s magazine empty, he discarded the weapon as he ran and drew his combat knife. With his other hand, he armed an incendiary grenade from his harness. He leapt at the armored trooper and jammed the knife through the thinly protected neck articulation and into the base of the operator’s neck up to its hilt; using the handle as hand hold to prevent the powered suit from flinging him away.

              Burgett could hear the wounded pilot screaming as he used hydraulically augmenting muscles to try to dislodge Burgett. Burgett not only held on; he but held the thermite grenade directly against the armored suits faceplate. It detonated just as another Mark-23 attempted to pull Burgett off of his frantic comrade.

              The white-hot chemicals erupted in a localized inferno; covering Burgett and the Mark-23 he was clinging to in fire and splashing globs of the hellish flames onto the other armored suit as it reached for Burgett. The ammunition in the Mark-23’s cannon magazine exploded as the suit melted around the pilot, the other armor pilot abandoned his suit before the flames could penetrate it fully.

              Burgett’s body was a pillar flame. It was totally engulfed in fire. Unable to draw breath enough to scream he dropped to the ground and flailed helplessly about. The protection offered by his IBOS and his more than human endurance serving only to prolong his agony as his flesh was scorched and his lungs were seared by inhaled thermite and super-heated air.

              Carter shot the pilot of the abandoned Mark-23 seconds after he exited the suit, then he saw Burgett’s flame-covered body as its limbs flailed about in a hopeless, instinctive effort to escape the deadly heat. Carter crawled forward to the corpse of an enemy guard, braced his captured rifle across its torso, and shot Burgett in the head through the melted remains of his helmet and hood; ending his pain.

              Attracted by Carter’s fire the last Mark-twenty three began firing at the FIRE team leader. Carter fired back; knowing that the ordinary rifle had no hope of penetrating his target’s armor. When he had expended the last of his ammunition, he tried again to get to his feet. To his surprise he was able to stand. The auto-med system has begun to treat his wounds and restore part of his strength. The system, he knew, could not mend broken bones, but it could stop bleeding and stimulate adrenaline production. He could feel the adrenaline in his veins coercing his muscles into action. With none of his team left to defend, he tried to retreat.

              His feet were unsteady under him as he attempted to evade the pursuing Mark-23. He tossed his last grenade over his shoulder; hoping, probably in vain, that the debris and concussion of the explosion would momentarily confuse the armor’s targeting system.

              “Hit the dirt, Boss!” a voice from his radio said.

              Carter dropped and heard bullets whizzing over him. His team mates had had returned after seeing Team Foxtrot to Renner’s position. As McNamara and Nagura poured fire into the Mark-23’s front armor; Williams appeared at its rear. He leapt onto the armored suit’s back and attached a hockey puck-sized device magnetically to the suits head. Williams jumped off of the armor’s back, rolled beneath a flailing, backhanded attempt to strike him in retaliation, and then, sprinted away from the upcoming explosion. The detonating charge seemed to disintegrate the Mark-23; leaving a crater three feet deep and twice that in width.

              “Burgett is dead,” Carter said as McNamara helped him to his feet.

              “We need get out of here, Boss,” McNamara replied.”How bad are you hit?”

              “I’m not shot,” Carter said. “My left arm is useless, I have some broken ribs, and I’m pretty sure a lung is punctured. The auto-med is keeping on my feet, though.”

              “You’ll need these,” he added, handing Carter a pistol and three magazines. “There are more Two-threes coming and we’re out of missiles.”

              Williams lingered a few meters behind the group; watching for attack from the rear as the group and they moved toward the perimeter gap that Renner’s unit was still holding.

              “What did you use on that last Two-three?” Carter asked as Nagura put is uninjured arm over her shoulder; helping to remain standing.

              “Team Foxtrot had a breaching charge left over,” Williams replied as the team moved as quickly as Carter’s injuries would allow.

              They were one hundred fifty meters from Renner’s position when Williams went down, a spray of blood bursting from his left leg. Nagura dropped next; spinning violently as she fell. A shot had pierced the side of her helmet, creasing her forehead ripping the helmet from her head, and spinning her body around violently to land on her back. Carter fell on top of her; instinctively shielding her from more anymore gunfire. McNamara’s sub-machine gun spat back in fully automatic fire in response to the attack.

              “Sniper!” McNamara shouted, changing magazines. “He probably has a gauss rifle. I didn’t see a muzzle flash,” he added knowing that a gauss rifle used hi-powered magnetic fields to propel hyper dense projectiles instead of gunpowder; meaning they produced neither a muzzle flash nor an audible report. “He has a thermal shroud too, because I can pick him up on thermal!”

              “Dancer is unconscious but alive,” Carter said, as he examined Nagura. The gauss rifle round hand opened a large gash on her forehead as it ricocheted off of her skull. “Harvard, sound off! Report your status!”

              “I am hit through my left leg,” Williams responded in a pain-strained voice. “The femur is shattered. I cannot walk!”

              “Get to cover if you can,” Carter advised. Williams rolled painfully over and drug himself to the questionable protection of the concrete base of a nearby lighting poll.

              “I can’t see the bastard,” McNamara said.

              “He’s out of range anyway,” Cater observed.

              “Why didn’t he go for the kill shot on Harvard?” McNamara wondered.

              “He wanted one of wounded.” Carter said. “He’s hoping to draw the other teams out in the open. I think he meant to kill Dancer, but she ducked a little faster than he thought she would.”

              Carter quickly oriented himself; assuring himself of his position in the compound. “Gambler might have a shot,” he said, keying his radio.

              “Prowler for Gambler!” he said into his microphone.

              “Go ahead Prowler.” Roth’s voice replied.

              “We’ve got a sniper,” carter said. “He should be somewhere about fifteen hundred meters in front of Renner’s position. Do you have a shot?”

              “Wait one,” Sains’ voice injected.

              Sains reached out without his psychic abilities; searching for a particular enemy mind. He searched for a mind with the unique concentration and laser-like mental focus of a sniper. “Got him,” he said after a few seconds and switched his spotting scope to thermal imaging mode. He touched Roth on the shoulder where she lay in a prone firing position. “He’s on the fifteenth floor of the executive office building, twenty degrees to your right, third window from your left.”

              He peered through his ballistic computer equipped spotter’s scope, as Roth found her target. “twenty-seven hundred, three meters,” he said, reading Roth data from the scope. “Wind is from the east at point two-five miles kilometers an hour. You’ll be shooting through six inches of reinforced concrete so you’ll need to go thermal.”

              “Roger that,” Roth confirmed.

              Sains advised her of more environmental factors that would affect a shot fired from such great range. Roth compared his readings against those of the ballistic computer integrated in her own rifles scope.

              “On target,” Roth advised.

              Sains made a final check to insure that the condition had not changed. “Send it,” he said.

              Roth’s bullet punched through the buildings concrete wall and struck the enemy sniper in his right temple; passing through his head in a diagonal line. The man’s head seemed to disappear from her scope in spray of orange and red color in the thermal imaging display. Her next shot found the enemy spotter’s chest as he knelt beside the dead sniper; leaving a basket-ball sized exit wound in his back. A third shot went through the gauss rifle’s back pack power source; rendering the weapon inoperable.

              “Your, Clear prowler,” Sains radioed. Sniper is down.

              “Harvard, we’re coming to you!” Carter shouted. “Grab Dancer,” he told McNamara.

              The Canadian moved to hoist the fallen woman onto his shoulder, but her hands batted his away as he reached for her.

              “I am alright,” Nagura said, grasping her machine-pistol, and trying to reorient herself. The left side of her face was covered in blood, bruised, and beginning to swell.

              “The sniper’s dead, but Harvard is down and non-mobile.” Carter told her.

              “Right,” Nagura said, her head beginning to clear.

              “Grumble, go to Harvard, we’ll cover until you get there and then follow,” Carter ordered.

              “On it!” McNamara confirmed as he sprinted toward Williams.               A new storm of gunfire came from behind a line of parked vehicles that lined a road in front of were where Williams had fallen. McNamara returned fire as several conventional rifle bullets imbedded themselves ineffectually in his body armor.

              He threw himself prone near Williams. Switching his weapon’s scope to thermal imaging, he could see through the bodies of the vehicles his enemies were using as cover. He used the ultra-dense rounds of his sub-machine gun to kill four enemy troops with single aimed shots that passed through the engine blocks of the vehicles that would have provided good protection from ordinary small arms. He and Williams maintained a coordinated covering fire to keep the enemy at bay. Nagura and Carter fired on the run; advancing behind a curtain of fully automatic gunfire and finding a kind of shelter in a shallow drainage culvert that paralleled the enemy line. They were ten feet to the left of Williams and McNamara.

              “There is at least a platoon of infantry in front of us!” McNamara reported.

              “How’s the leg, Harvard?” Carter inquired.

              “The bleeding has stopped, but the bone is shattered,” Williams answered.

              “I’ll carry him, Boss.” McNamara said.

              “Alright,” Carter said.  “We do a peel. How are we on grenades?”

              “I’ve got one left,” McNamara said.

              “I have one,” Nagura said.

              “Get them ready,” Carter said. “When you throw, we peel right and rally at that burning vehicle,” Carter ordered, pointing at a flaming armored personnel carrier behind them and to the right. “I’ll lead off. Grumble, you follow me with Harvard. Harvard, give me your PM-58 and your ammo.” Cater ordered, knowing that, even firing the machine pistol one-handed, he could make better use of the weapon than the immobilized Williams. Williams complied and then drew his sidearm.

              “Go!” Carter ordered and ran behind his teammates as they, lobbed their grenades and laid down another curtain of coordinated covering fire.

              Carter ran diagonally to the right for several yards until he was to the right of his team mates, and slightly behind them. He threw himself prone and again began firing at the enemy line.

              Carrying Williams, McNamara moved around Carter to his right and dropped into a firing position just behind the colonel Williams rolled away from McNamara and into a firing position of his own. Both men began firing along with Carter to cover Nagura as she ran behind the three men and positioned herself several meters behind them and to their right. She too laid herself prone and began firing at the enemy.

              Carter then ran behind his team mates and positioned himself to begin firing again a few meters to behind them and to their right. The team repeated this leapfrog tactic five times; executing a fighting retreat that allowed them to break contact and get their rally point without giving their more numerous enemy their backs. When the enemy troops tried to pursue, they were discouraged by sniper fire from Sains and Roth, who killed the first two troopers that move toward the retreating operators.