Ephialtes (Ephialtes Trilogy Book 1) (57 page)

From his
position in the control centre Kostovich was scanning the horizon.  There
were high resolution cameras on the
Parry 4
battery allied to radar
and thermal imaging cameras.

“Eyes on the
skies,” he said to Walton.

“On it,” came
the reply.

“There’s a
heat signature flowing upwards and backward and somewhat to the right of that
outcrop,” said Baldwin.  “It’s doesn’t look right to me.  It’s very
subtle, could be geothermal or even the sun heating a rock maybe, where the
sand has been taken away by the dust storm.  Or it could be enemy forces.”

“Yes, it
could be,” said Kostovich.  “Keep trained on that region.”

As he
watched, Kostovich saw Bobby’s troop carrier streak off towards the left side
of his screen.

“Karjalainen,
keep an eye on that outcrop.  We believe the enemy may be positioned
there.”

“Roger that,”
said Bobby.  “Any chance of a pre-emptive strike?”

“Negative, we
don’t know what we’re dealing with yet.  If you can get eyes-on, or
even in a good position for ground radar, we’ll know what we can do. 
Please proceed as planned.”

“Foveaux here,
we can call in fire from you if we have coordinates, right?”

“Correct,
Commissioner.  If you can tell me where to fire, I can fire.”

Bobby turned
to the trooper next to him in the cabin.  “Have you used one of these
before?” he said, indicating the controls for the plasma cannon.

“Sure,” came
the reply, “in IVRs.  Hell,
Mech Azimuth 4
is my favourite game.”

“Could you
scooch
along and let me take over?”

The man
looked at him.  “I don’t think I can.  I don’t even know who the hell
you are.”

Bobby nodded,
tight lipped.

A voice came
over the com.  “This is Commissioner Foveaux.  Give Commander
Karjalainen the goddamned cannon, that’s an order.”

The man
begrudgingly shifted seats and Bobby took the controls.  As soon as he
held them a video feed from the cannon appeared in his HUD.  He selected
‘Aim Assist’ and swung the cannon around to face the outcrop.

“Listen,
Kostovich,” he said, “can you pick up my cannon’s video feed and follow
it?  The moment I see anything at all I want fire support.  Rockets,
missiles, lasers, anything.  Can you do that?”

“Baldwin,”
said Kostovich, “follow Karjalainen’s video.  If he starts shooting at
something we start too, okay?”

“Okay,” said
Baldwin.  “I’m picking up the video now.  Looks good.”

“You’ve got
it, Bobby,” said Kostovich.

“I’m turning
back in toward the outcrop,” said Foveaux, “I’ll be there in about four
minutes.  Do you have anything, Kostovich?”

Kostovich
glanced at his battlefield model.  He had data and video feeds from
Parry 4
and both troop carriers and all the helmet cameras from the troops. 
All the data fed into his three dimensional model so he had an overview of what
was going on with as much information as the sum of all friendly players. 
Right now he had a lot of information about terrain and the position of
friendly troops.  The one thing he didn’t have was an enemy.

“Negative at
this time,” he said.  “Proceed as planned, I’ll feed information back to
your
battlecoms
as soon as I have anything.”

“Shit, that’s
it!” said Baldwin.  He saw the two mechs moving and instantly released
missiles.

Bobby saw the
mechs.  “Mechs!  Two o’clock!”  He fired the plasma cannon.

The mechs
implacably fired lasers at
Parry 4
as the plasma bolts hit. 
One collapsed in a cloud of dust and debris, momentarily obscuring the second
one as Bobby turned his fire to where it had been.  He wasn’t convinced he
had managed to hit it.

“Get back
into cover!” Bobby shouted at the driver.  She swerved the troop carrier
and tried to take them across the front of the outcrop, but before she could
put it between them and the remaining mech it had fired its missiles.

“Brace!” said
the driver.  Bobby swung the cannon around and flipped it to full
auto.  The mech remained out of sight but the sound of screaming missiles
and cannon fire filled the cabin.  There was a series of loud bangs.

“Are you
okay?” said Bobby.

“Still here,”
said the driver.  “Where are the mechs?”

As she spoke
Parry 4
’s
missiles streaked past them.  They heard two loud explosions.

“One’s still
there, I think,” said Bobby.  “Care to take a peek?”

“Commander
Karjalainen, are you hit?” said Foveaux over the com.

“Negative,”
said Bobby.  “We have contact with the enemy and are pursuing.”

“I’m coming
round the back,” said Foveaux.

“Good,” said
Bobby.  “We can take them from both sides at once.”

The driver
reversed the troop carrier and lined up for another attempt at the edge of the
outcrop.

“Kostovich,
lay some more missile fire on the southern edge of the outcrop.”

“Negative,
Commander.  We’re blind.”

“We’ve lost
all contact with
Parry 4
.  I think they hit us,” said
Kostovich.

“What about
the other batteries?” said
Bobby

“We can try
that. 
Gonna
take a little longer to get the
missiles to you.”

“Stay here,”
said Bobby to the driver.  “What’s the ETA on those missiles?”

“Just
launched from
Parry 3
.  Twenty seconds, I’m using the last
good coordinates I have.  They may have moved, can you keep them pinned
down?”

“We’ll
try.  Keep those missiles away from us.”

Bobby looked
at his plasma cannon display.  “Edge us forward,” he said.

The driver
began moving the troop carrier forward.

Foveaux first
saw one mech as her troop carrier rounded the outcrop.  Her plasma cannon
fired immediately and struck the mech before it had time to get its missiles
away.  The cloud of smoke the plasma strike generated partly obscured the
second mech, but the cannon’s sensors picked it up and fired.  The third
mech, reacting to data from the second one, fired a full volley of missiles
before Foveaux had even seen it.  With the carrier moving at full speed
the sensors did pick out the mech once it was clear of the rock and the plasma
cannon fired two bolts to the centre of its body mass.  Its missiles were
already away.

The troop
carrier continued its curve around the rock with the cannon remaining trained
on the three smoking mechs.  The missiles the third mech had fired had
gone directly upwards and were now coming down at a variety of angles.

“Switch
defences to auto,” Foveaux said to the gunner.  She hesitated for a moment
on the new equipment before she switched the cannon to auto.  Once
engaged, the cannon took out four of the five missiles raining down on the
troop carrier.

“What was
that?” said Kostovich.

“Foveaux’s carrier
just went dark,” said Baldwin.

“What about
individual coms?” said Kostovich, somewhat
desperately.

“Nothing,”
said Baldwin.  “They could be rerouting if the carrier’s relay is out of
action.  Could be switching to direct transmission.”

“Where are those
missiles?”

“Seconds to
impact,” said Walton.

“How about
the coms?”

Baldwin
stared at his terminal.  “I have one.  Two, three.  All twelve
individual coms are back on line.”

“How’s their
vitality data?”

Baldwin
looked down at the feeds.  “I don’t know.  A couple look pretty
bad.  Could just be instrumentation.”

“Foveaux, do
you copy?” said Kostovich.

-

“Foveaux, do
you copy?”

There was a
flurry of explosions in the air and on the ground around the corner. 
Bobby gestured for the driver to wait.  “I like this,” he said to
Kostovich, “send more missiles.”

“Are we
hitting anything?” came the reply.

“Probably,”
said Bobby.

“Let me know
what we’re hitting.”

“We were
counting on waiting here until you’d hit it,” said Bobby.  “What’s
happened to Foveaux?”

“Her team is
good.  Carrier is out of action, though.”

As he heard
the words Bobby saw a commander mech run from cover in front of him.  He
pressed fire on the cannon controls but even as he did so he saw a red line
shoot from the shoulder of the mech to a point above his cabin where his cannon
was mounted.  He heard a muted creak above him and as he pressed down on
the fire button nothing happened.  The mech moved from right to left in
front of him.  As it passed it didn’t even look back.

“Kostovich,
missiles!  Can you see this?  Put some missiles on that mech!”

“Launch
missiles from
Parrys
3 and 2,” Kostovich said to
Baldwin.  “Commander, we’re launching now but you need to keep that mech
in contact or we won’t know where we’re firing.”

“Decompress
the cab and hit that mech,” Bobby said to the driver.

Foveaux
coughed.  “Everyone okay?” she said.  She could see from her HUD that
the cabin was decompressing and the troop section was fully decompressed. 
She quickly bought her visor down and sealed her suit.  She was dizzy from
the blast and it took a few seconds to register that the troop carrier was on
its side.  She assumed that the main section was breached.  That
would explain the decompression.  In the cabin the cannon operator and
driver were slumped but stirring.  The cab was filled with a thin grey
smoke.

“Are you
okay?” she said to the driver, shaking her.

“
I .
 . . I think so,” said the driver.

The cannon
operator stirred.  “I’m good here,” she said, unconvincingly.

“Good,” said
Foveaux.  “We have to get out.”

The driver
looked at her, unsure.

“We’re
sitting ducks in here, we have missile launchers in the back, let’s go.”

The driver
heaved the door over her head and pulled herself out.  Foveaux
followed.  She glanced over and could see the three mechs smoking in the
Martian dusk.  They did not move but stood upright like futuristic wicker
men being offered up to some great metallic god.  She could see the scorch
marks around the carrier where the remnants of missiles had struck the ground,
and behind her she could see smoke rising from her own carrier.

“Foveaux,”
came Kostovich’s voice over the com, “do you copy?”

“I copy you,”
said Foveaux.

“Please
advise
of your situation, over.”

“Carrier is
down.  Possible casualties.  We’re continuing the pursuit on
foot.  We’ve destroyed three enemy mechs.”

“Foveaux!”
Bobby’s voice cut in.  “We need your support.  We have a mech
proceeding towards the space port, we have no cannon.”

“Roger that,”
said Foveaux.  “We’re on our way.”

Bobby’s
driver gunned the engine and took off in pursuit of Steiner’s mech. 
Steiner was striding as fast as he could across the open scrub between the
rocky outcrop and the spaceport.  He had exhausted his supply of missiles,
but knew that his laser was a formidable weapon and enough to take control of
the port.

That he had
managed to get away from
Ephialtes
and land on the planet seemed
remarkable enough.  That he had fought off two armoured vehicles and
further missile attacks was remarkable, too.  All that remained was for
him to make it across the scrub and secure the port and he would have done it,
against all the odds.  He would be the last man standing, the last
survivor of his mission, and he would have achieved what he, and all the rest
of them, had set out to do.  This was to be his final push to glory.

“Kostovich,
put your missiles down in front of the mech.  Stop him from proceeding
forward and we can take him down,” said Bobby.

“You’re too
close, hold back and leave him to me!” came the reply.

“He’s out in
the open, he’ll take out any missile headed toward him.  Send them short,
make a trench.  Slow him down.”