Chapter 123: (Telkan) (2/2)

”GO TO RAPID FIRE!” Trucker called out. ”ALL UNITS! RAPID FIRE! BOLOS, UNLEASH HELL!”

”Sir, at rapid fire we'll...” Stacker/Broadsword started.

”FOLLOW THE FIRE PLAN, PATTON STAB YOUR EYES!” Trucker roared out.

We cannot discern the use in the fire plan, but carry it out regardless. VLS tubes slam open, firing 11 inch rockets into the sky. We admit, working with General Trucker is a high honor for any soldier but as a BOLO it contains an additionally difficulty. While he has never viewed the Dinochrome Brigade as expendable as so many other commanders do, we can feel Trucker at the edges of our shared battle net, his thoughts, plans, hunches, and impulses trickling across it. We have records of the Mark XXVII Command BOLOs and this feels much like what the records contain. It is unnerving, as if another BOLOs awareness is examining our thoughts and our actions even before we do it.

While humans describe serving under Trucker as incredible to a BOLO it is humbling.

The fireplan Trucker has filed with us keeps updating, almost in fits and starts, always minutes ahead of the current data I and my Brigade mates have access to yet it is almost as if reality conforms to Trucker's fireplan not the other way around. I should be out of date within seconds yet it is always correct. Corrections are filed in the fire plan constantly, yet, from what I have witnessed and been told, it only increases combat effectiveness and never breaks apart the cohesion of 3rd Armor Division.

In the time I have been mulling over the disturbance 0.053 seconds have passed and my Battle Reflex Mode disrupts the train of thought.

The logical plan of attack is to go after the massive insects that have left the lakes and have steadily picked up speed until they are moving at roughly forty miles an hour. With their size, mass, and density, a physical hit upon a Mark XXXI Bolo will destroy or at least mission kill it upon a direct head on impact or a direct side impact.

Yet that is not Trucker's plan. Instead he has us firing upon almost random seeming places.

My Brigade-mates share my slight discomfort as we continue to fire according to Trucker's plan.

He is our Commander's commander. We follow orders.

The missiles leveled out just beyond the cloud cover, using inertial navigation to track their target. Their warheads primed, and the eight flights of 11 inch missiles, using solid fuel systems, split into multiple groups.

The Bolos shifted, moving from a head-on fight to fighting their way through the jungle, shifting to get to the side of the massive insects while they shifted to move straight at Trucker, who had gone to rapid fire on the guns. General Ekret was reporting the scout patrol was moving straight at him, moving as if they were on a road rather than through the jungle.

The missiles began detonating in sequence. The first set, with Azidoazide Azide / chlorine trifluoride warheads, hit the lakes that the giant insects had been resting in. The water exploded then caught on fire, the breaking down of H2O into hydrogen and oxygen which then exploded, causing the water to start a chain reaction that kept the conflagration going.

The next set covered the entire brain coral array with orange thermal powder, coating it liberally in powder designed to prevent fire from spreading. The third set exploded next, over the massive set of growths shaped like brain coral. Fire retardant foam spread out, covering the entire area. None of it was caught by the psychic shielding that had come up, all of it coating the coral, the shields, the thick nutrient full veins, all of it.

Finally came the artillery strikes.

The biological array had spun up a psychic shield strong enough to glimmer in the air and every single round pounded the shield, keeping it flared up even as artillery shells pounded at the psychic shield. They had no chance to penetrate, but the biological array kept the shield up.

Trucker poured fire into the forward plates of the bug, mixing smoke rounds that cracked off in front of the bugs. The bug's battle shields flared, throwing burning vegetation away from them as they charged through the jungle toward Trucker's heavy tanks.

Artillery shells that had hung in the air for almost three minutes came dropping down, outside of the array, hitting the pipes and veins. Submunitions detonated, stripping away moss, tree branches, vines. The second layer were penetrators, slamming deep and throwing huge gouts of vegetation and dirt in the air. The third layer, following on the second, was good old fashioned high explosive thermobaric rounds.

The veins feeding the array were blown apart, even the secondary ones. The ground outside of the psychic array was nothing but churned up, smoking, steaming, and in some places, still burning dirt.

The massive bugs put on more speed, heading straight for Trucker, less than ten miles separating them now. The Bolos were being ignored, doing little more than maneuvering and providing limited fire support.

Trucker's plan updates and we hold our breath with our Brigade mates. Long seconds go by as we finally bring up radar, lidar, and even ultra-sonic ranging on the insects, which have accellerated to nearly seventy miles per hour. They are lengthening and shortening to help the tens of thousand of legs beneath them propel them at what is obviously their maximum velocity.

Finally we fire as we all understand as the evidence appears.

We fire, not at the heavy forward or topside armor, not even at the thick bands of armor on the side, but rather the shots impact as the plates are extended as far out as possible. Two shots each before engaging the next one, as fast as we can fire and change targets. It is faster to both turn and change the angle on our main gun, turning as if we are following the giant insects, our shots at a slight angle which punches it through the armor.

Hellbore rounds do not just hit the surface and explode like a nuclear round. They penetrate a significant distance before detonating. They are an anti-armor round, although they can be used for area of effect and airbursts. These rounds slam deep into the insects flanks, punching past armor, connective tissue, and into the internal organs that all living things need to survive.

Trucker watched as the insects swelled slightly, steam and ichor gouting out of the sides. They all slammed into the ground, thousands of tons of bioengineered flesh, and slowly scraped to a halt, their shells pushing up the dirt all the way to the bedrock for nearly a quarter mile before they came to a stop.

He swung the quad-barrel and fired, sweeping glittering winged beetles out of the sky before they could swarm his battle-screens, the whole time calling out orders, updating the fireplan with his implant, and assigning targets as he saw the opportunity.

Vuxten and the others burst out of the jungle, jumping high up. 471 fired his micro-rifle at the moths swarming from the side and 388 riding a Terran Infantry borg behind him threw a micro-missile into the swarm, destroying it in a bubble of fire and soot.

They all landed, caught their balance, and jumped again, this time landing on the hover-tanks of 1 Armored Cavalry Scouts.

Ekret saw the Marine Scouts land, their icons going blue. Each tank, as soon as it had four on board, kicked their fans to full speed and started racing for the logistics base. Infantry cyborgs running smoothly behind, taking advantage of the pureed vegetation making an easy road.

”Last one!” Vuxten called out over his loud speaker, slapping the cupola with one armored hand. 471 flashed -go go go- as he reloaded his micro-missile launcher.

Brentili'ik watched the glowing icons of her husband's unit sweeping toward the logistics base and wrung her hands. She counted the dots.

They were all there.

She closed her eyes, shivered, and opened them again to watch the dot that was her husband's.

She didn't take her eyes from it until she saw him arrive at the logistics base.