Salvage Marines (Necrospace Book 1) (10 page)

Errol was part of the Augur Corporation, though, unlike corporations such as Grotto or Helion that had somewhat homogenous internal cultures, the Augur Corporation consisted of many cultures. Augur’s official stance was that multi-culturalism bred innovation. Though most other corporations disagreed with this sort of approach, the products created by Augur were of considerable quality and very advanced in nature, so their system seemed to work.

Augur’s primary security forces were recruited from all across Augur space. Thanks to the warrior Errolite culture, the Augur military was staffed with many Errolite soldiers. They were too few to upset the balance of the universe by making Augur’s military intrinsically stronger than other corporations, but the Errolite prowess in battle was common knowledge. Though most warriors of Errol fought under the Augur banner, there were some who still chose the life of an independent mercenary, contracting through the mercenary guild called the Merchants Militant. Such warriors fetched high prices, and from the stories told about them, it was apparent that they earned those wages.

Mag turned her head towards Samuel and kicked his boot, snapping Samuel out of his awe and reminding him of the present moment.

“No offense given,” he replied sheepishly.

“Wargir, you must forgive Hyst for his curiosity, the Reapers are carrion birds, and we are not accustomed to front line duty, much less being in the presence of independent elites,” said Mag in a voice heavy with formality. Samuel knew ‘wargir’ to be Errol slang for mercenary.

“Taggart Magir, if we are to fight and die together I would disperse the notion of your soldiers that we are anything but human beings underneath this armor, despite appearances to the contrary,” said the wargir with a palpable mirth in his voice. “Our employers have determined that we elites inflict far too much collateral damage and must be given guidance by Reapers, so as to reign us in. To my thinking that makes us equals in this endeavor.”

“Sounds good to me. I hate formalities anyway,” said Mag as she leaned back in her seat. “These marines are a good bunch, just keep an eye on them while you’re out there kicking ass, and you’ll get an idea of what not to blast. We both know that things happen in the thick of the fight, and it’s likely that the Reapers will fall behind your advance. So my advice is if it looks expensive, try to avoid destroying it.”

“You are a very forward speaker, Taggart Magir, it is appreciated. Our employability rests in our ability to execute in accordance with our contractual specifications, so you may trust that we have been briefed on the technical elements of the mission, though as you’ve said, things happen in the midst of battle, and we are prepared to submit to your judgment should the occasion arise,” spoke the wargir as he settled back into his launcher tube.

“Well, we’re gonna get along just fine,” said Mag as the warning klaxon rang and the lights in the speeder cabin went red to indicate that the assault was seconds from beginning, “Okay, marines, it’s time to earn our hazard pay.”

“
This is the job!”
called out five Reaper voices through the com-bead as the combat speeder engaged its thrusters.

Over a dozen combat speeders ignited, filling the valley with the roaring sound of their engines. Samuel could see below that the Helion forces had erected several mobile hardpoints that looked to be made of stacked drop-containers with hasty fighting positions dug into the ground so that infantry units could cover multiple angles.

The drop-containers had likely been ejected from a low orbit, made planetfall several miles away, then were recovered and brought back to the colony. Once emptied of their cargo, which likely consisted of an assortment of foodstuffs, ammunition, fuel, and building materials, the containers were utilized as the building blocks for defensive positions. Though Samuel had never seen such a thing in action, there had been several old battlefields the Reapers had scavenged over the years that contained such defenses among the decayed ruins.

Once the speeders were clear of the ravines they spread out in a loose formation to avoid being hammered by the mortar rounds that immediately began sailing towards them from behind the enemy positions.

The Grotto forces had not dared to fire mortars or rockets, much less employ air strikes, against the colony for fear of damaging the valuable hard assets. Helion undoubtedly knew this, and had drawn their forces into the colony itself to prevent their enemies from being able to employ bombardment tactics. Helion did have a battle tank visibly rolling down main street, but the Grotto forces would have to engage the armored war machine without the help of field artillery.

The
Folken
tank wasn’t even part of the initial assault, from what Samuel had gathered, but was more of a deterrent against possible counter attacks in the event that Grotto pushed Helion out of the colony. Both Helion and Grotto forces knew that this fight was going to be an infantry brawl.

Samuel was impressed by the skill and bravado of the
Folken
combat speeder pilots as they threaded their way through the valley floor, using the dunes as partial cover against the fusillade of enemy fire. The bass crump of an explosion came from ahead of them on the right, and Samuel saw that a combat speeder had taken a direct hit from the mortars. The vehicle’s left thruster had disintegrated and as the marine watched, the speeder began tumbling end over end as it bled flaming fuel and scrap metal. The elite troopers launched from their tubes, and while two of them sailed skyward, one was launched directly into a dune. Samuel wondered if the warrior’s dropsuit would protect him from the impact or not, then was startled as the speeder finally exploded.

“That was Lamda Platoon,” growled Mag, as their speeder left the wreckage behind and continued towards the target, “Reagan Ander’s mob, good marines.”

The rest of the Reapers remained silent, keenly aware that at any moment mortar fire could rip them to shreds just as easily. The speeder’s turret guns coughed and sent semi-automatic stub rounds toward the enemy positions.

Stub rounds were low velocity, high mass rounds that were designed for maximum impact, but minimal penetration. The turret guns of all the speeders had been outfitted with stub rounds so that they could engage the enemy effectively without overly damaging any hard assets.

Samuel had noticed when he first boarded the speeder that each gun had a small reserve of armor piercing rounds in a backup magazine in case they engaged enemy armor. The stub rounds from several speeders raked the enemy gun emplacements and mortar stations, chewing apart the cheap flak-board that the Helion troops had erected to protect themselves from small arms fire.

The combat speeder was moving too quickly, changing directions every other second, making it difficult for Samuel to get an idea of how their approach was going. The constant barking of the turret gun overshadowed any other sounds while the hard banking of the speeder as they circled the colony, looking for a good place to launch the elites and then disgorge the marines, made hanging on a priority.

A small yellow light began blinking above each of the launch tubes and Samuel could see the three mercenaries make a final check of their tubes to make sure they were slotted in properly, and then they poised and waited.

“Luck in battle, comrades,” said the wargir just before the yellow lights went solid and the tubes released, sending the three mercenaries upwards and out of sight.

Samuel and Patrick, the only ones seated so that they could see out of the viewports, watched for the elites, but they had been launched so high in the air that no visible sign of them could be found.

“They’ll drop on Helion and give ‘em a bloody nose don’t you worry,” said Mag as she rolled her shoulders and popped her neck. “Everybody get ready. As soon as the pilot finds an opening we’re going to get dumped quick. Be ready to tuck and roll and come up shooting.”

“Boss, is it a bad time to point out the fact that we’ve never trained for rapid combat insertion?” laughed Patrick as he looked around the cabin of the speeder, “That we haven’t trained for any of this?”

Everyone, even Mag, laughed along with Patrick’s gallows humor for a few moments, then the yellow lights above each of their seats began blinking. The marines went silent as each of them watched the lights. Samuel couldn’t help but tap his boot in time with the light, as if counting out the rhythm to a song he could barely remember. Then the yellow lights went solid and a klaxon wailed as the combat speeder tilted slightly to the side. The hatch slid open in the blink of an eye and the straps holding the marines in place automatically retracted even as their seats turned and began catapulting them out of the hatch and onto the ground.

The combat speeder had thrown on its engine brakes and the back blast had retarded its forward momentum long enough for the five marines to be hurled to the ground.

Samuel did his best to land on his feet and then tuck his head and shoulder in so that he could roll the next several meters to slow his velocity. It worked for the first somersault and then he didn’t quite stick the landing, ending up flailing into the dune helmet first. He scrambled to pull his head from the silt dune and recover his weapon, only to find that his combat rifle had flown from his hands and was easily two meters ahead of him. Rising to his feet, he sprinted towards his rifle as small arms fire erupted all around him. Samuel didn’t dare look at anything but the rifle, knowing that the moment he witnessed the madness of the battle he would lose precious seconds in recovering his ability to participate and survive.

Hard rounds sent up plumes of silt as Samuel was fired upon and he began zigzagging as he ran before diving for his weapon. In a feat of dexterity that surprised him, he snatched the gun as he fell and managed to tuck his shoulder to the ground so that he somersaulted end over end as he twisted his body around. He came up from the roll facing the enemy with his combat rifle raised and began squeezing the trigger. Samuel’s aim was true and he watched as a Helion trooper staggered backwards, falling off of a firing stoop of the barricade in a spray of blood and sparks.

Samuel finally dared to take a moment to assess the battle space and found that he was not the only marine to flub the landing. Ben was only now managing to get to his feet and shake the silt from his heavy gun as Patrick dug with his hands to unearth his fallen combat rifle. Mag and Bianca, however, were both in an aiming crouch and pouring on suppressing fire as the squad pulled itself together.

“
Let’s go marines! Push through! Push through!
” bellowed Mag as she turned to see her people finally getting to their feet and preparing to engage.

Samuel and Patrick rushed past the two women and sprinted towards the sheer side of the barricade under cover of the suppressing fire.

Ben finally got his heavy gun up and spinning and was able to begin picking targets and shredding enemy positions while Bianca and Mag reloaded and rushed to join the vanguard. Once they joined Samuel and Patrick, the group penetrated the enemy line through the gaps that had been punched through the flak-board barricades that connected each of the container defenses. Ben kept up his high rate of fire as he began to advance, not wanting to get caught out in the open when he inevitably ran out of ammunition, which, at this speed would be very soon.

Samuel and Mag broke left while Patrick and Bianca broke right, each pair seeking to engage the defenders that held the container hardpoints. Samuel fired several rounds through the leg of a female Helion trooper who darted out and attempted to flank the marines and then Mag put a round through the woman’s faceplate.

Rushing up the staircase behind the container as Mag covered him from below, the marine stopped just before the top of the stairs and pitched a frag grenade over his head. As expected, a cry of surprise went up from the defenders and one of them attempted to rush down the stairs, only to be riddled with bullets and fall over the side of the stairs as Samuel squeezed the trigger. The grenade exploded and sent pieces of at least one more trooper flying in multiple directions.

He low crawled to the top of the stairs just to make sure there weren’t any troopers left. As he surveyed the grisly remains, he saw the wargir standing on the top of the next container over. The mercenary had slain the defenders and was hurling rail gun rounds into an alleyway that led into the colony. Return fire pinged off of his armor finally forcing him to leap off of the container to the ground. As Samuel watched the mercenary kept firing, charging into the alley and out of sight.

“Hyst, get back down here, we need to start taking and holding urban ground!” shouted Mag as she, Bianca, Patrick, and Ben converged on the alley that was nearest them. “We need to get in tight where we’re comfortable. Reapers aren’t meant for war on open ground.”

Samuel hurried back down the stairs and joined the squad as Mag led them into the colony. They emerged from the alley to see the mercenary gunning down several more Helion troopers before leaping back into cover. More troopers began firing on him from behind a barricade they’d built to bisect the small colony’s main street.

The barricade was made out of the burned out shells of what appeared to be civilian transport vehicles and irregular scraps of flak board that had been left from the primary wall construction. The marines emerged from the alley and began firing on the barricade. Mag hurled a frag grenade that rocked the barricade and displaced one of the vehicles enough that someone could fit through it.