Chapter 254: (Hesstla) (1/2)

Ralvex looked at the rest of his squad, sitting inside the striker. They were all immobile, still looking, and he knew some of them were probably asleep. They were nine in all, led by Sergeant Kuplo, a dedicated veteran of the First and Second Telkan War who had been a Telkan Marine since before the Telkan Marines had been a thing. He looked down at his cybernetic arm, the warsteel scratched, pitted, and in a few places, bubbled and pebbled.

The smartlink was a warm trail of honey through his arm.

His greenie, a tough little green mantid by the name of 525, was safely tucked away in the clamshell 'hump' on Ralvex's back, on top of the autocannon ammunition hopper that had a nano-forge in the center that could spit out hundreds of rounds a minute for hours.

Ralvex knew just how far you could push a 20mm autocannon ammunition pack.

He looked over his Telkan 20mm Carmex XM-4811e3 autocannon, a massive beast capable of spitting out up to a thousand rounds a minute if he overrode all the safeties and interlocks and had 525 help him out. Technically the maximum effective firing rate was 450 rounds a minute and the standard Telkan Marine Corps firing rate was 250 rounds a minute, which the Telkan Heavy Scout Armor XM-393e5 smart harness and the ammo pack could hand both supplying ammunition and bleeding off the heat the weapon and the nano-forge created.

His own harness and ammo pack had additional heat sinks, more than he had possessed two months ago during his defense of the Hesstlan town of Nemarlie.

Two cases were locked in front of him, carrying Stampy and Tiny Tim, both of which had been repaired with additional field modifications done over the last two months.

A Terran had told him that it was normal for a military force with all new untested equipment to have to make on the spot modifications to increase the effectiveness.

Ralvex went back to reading the text being displayed on the inside of his faceplate.

The words of the Digital Omnimessiah.

The rest of the bay all prayed, whispered encouragement to themselves, or talked to their battle buddies, hidden behind their black faceshields. The two Terrans, each manning a heavy mounted gun, watched their assigned firezones, eyes burning red in fury, their hands on the massive guns that mixed neural pulses with 7.62mm endosteel armor penetrators.

In cockpit Mukstet yawned, shifted slightly, and went back into his nap, the timer keeping track of the countdown, set to wake him up in ten more minutes to give him five minutes to get ready and wake up.

In Foxtrot-Niner-Four Fultenx checked the status of his cargo in his troop bay and shuddered. He only had two passengers, both motionless, their hydraulics and pistons hissing now and then as pressure released. Clad in ornate graven warsteel from the Telkan Forgeworld, the two massive war machines were actually silent.

Known only as Zeta and Theta, they were two Telkan who had given all during the frantic final defense of Telkan-2, who had consented to be sealed inside massive sarcophagi hovering on the moment of death, in order to continue to fight for Telkan and her allies by the strange forces that followed the Dark Crusade of Life.

They gave Fultenx the creeps, to be honest.

He checked his timer.

Ten minutes.

Frees looked through the binoculars, not using anything more than optical lenses. The day was snowy, something he absolutely hated. Mantids weren't built for frozen precipitation, and the snow on his adaptive camouflage uniform was still chilly to him since he didn't want to risk running power to the warming coils.

The two mile radius area of churned mud still looked empty. He saw some slush spray up in the telltale roostertail of a wheel spinning and nodded.

He couldn't see them, but they were there.

Frees lowered the binoculars and checked his equipment. It was almost time. He turned to Strides Behind the Dark Horseman and nodded.

The other black mantid lifted up the laser designator, using passive optics to sight in the middle of the muddy area. He saw the hint of purple as two psychic shields rubbed against each other and twitched his antenna in eagerness.

The cold, the wet, the muck, and the damnable snow would all be worth it in a few moments.

--MARK-- came over his datalink as the microwave receiver he carried on this thorax got the signal from 227 Field Artillery.

The rounds were on the way.

Thirty seconds...

Mukstet feathered the graviton engines, staring at the burnt out twisted cars just out from under the bridge overpass. The charges were rigged to them to throw them away from the overpass, to explosively create a breach in the wall of burnt wreckage. He could feel his guts clenching as he habitually reached out with his senses to check his weapons. His cannons were loaded, no more energy weapons all kinetic now, his missile pods were loaded and the warboi VIs in the missile guidance systems had been hashed to be even more crazed than normal, using an injured Terran's angry PET scan to base the random numbers off of. His doorguns were fully loaded, the dedicated nano-forges warmed and deslushed, ready to keep the munitions hoppers full. His dismount crew was all ready to go, all green.

Above him the artillery rounds, heavy 11 inch rounds and 24 inch rockets, all fully stealth coated, used chemical reactions to provide thrust to rotate, orient, and make final terminal guidance adjustments. The graviton booster had burnt out and been ejected miles prior, the shells just non-reactive stealth coated lumps of chemicals.

Mukstet tabbed up a piece of stimgum and leaned forward slightly, his hands on the stick, feet on the pedals, ready as the light went amber.

Ralvex saw the light go amber and used his datalink to send a message to Stampy and Tiny Tim to get ready.

The two doorgunners doublechecked their ammo-belts, the weapons depowered but ready to go at a moment's notice, the big Pontiac Vindicator miniguns just waiting silently.

The human's eyes were all red, burning softly in the light.

”GRAV EDDIES! HERE THEY COME!” Commodore NGwark shouted. ”Three, six, nine, twelve! Many many point sources! Mix of new signatures and previous!” She turned toward Admiral Thennis, the seam on the left side of her tunic giving out with a near-silent purr of parting thread. ”This is a big one, ma'am!”

”Hold fire! Guns, update the Tiamat's warplan!” Thennis snapped. ”Hold off on Thunderpunch, let them finish getting through the wormhole.”

”Sneaky-Snake's made an appearance, staying with the enemy fleet,” Scan-Nine said, brushing a lock of gray hair out of her eyes, clearing it off the cybernetic lenses that had replaced her age-ravaged eyes.

”They're going all or nothing! Contact groundside!” Thennis snapped.

”Communications are down, temporal resonance and fracturing is gaining strength,” Commodore Navtreen snapped, one hand on her round belly. She put her hand to her ear. ”Ma'am, signal from our own ship!”

”Ma'am, temporal wormhole detected, connection to original arrival!” Commodore NGwark called out.

”They think this is it. If they beat us here, they beat us back then,” Thennis snarled, rubbing her aching knuckles. ”Leggint, stand by to execute Ozymandias. Activate the dead man's switch.”

”Aye aye, ma'am, standing by,” the technician said, pressing down on the big red button. He had wired it all up, prepared it all, done the math over the course of... of... years? He couldn't remember any more. The button clicked as it slid home.

If Leggint took his hand off of it, it would fire.

”They're dropping ground forces, ma'am! Orders?” Gunnery Officer Valnteck asked.

”Groundside can fight their own fight. We're going to end this here,” Thennis said. She half-turned. ”Status of Sucker Punch?”

”Online and in position,” Lieutenant JG Greely said. He'd taken his mother's position when she had died of heart failure sixteen years ago.

”When you're all in, you might want to make sure the enemy's cards are bad,” Thennis whispered.

Her knuckles hurt, the joints swollen with arthritis. The ship's med-bay had been stretched to the limit, some of the crew dying of natural causes as the timer on their bodies ran out.

It's the Ninth Millenia and we're dying of old age fighting this battle, she smiled. She glanced over where her son was paying close attention to his instruments, having replaced the Rigellian who had passed away from old age last year. Except we don't die, we just fall back to Hell to regroup.

”Enemy forces breaking into three distinct groupings, designating Tango-Alpha, Tango-Bravo, Tango-Bravo,” Valnteck said. ”Twenty-one exiting, eighteen exiting, fifteen exiting.”

Here it comes, Thennis thought to herself.

”Wormhole collapsing!” NGwark called out.

”SUCKER PUNCH ACTIVE!” LT JG Greely called out. ”Backdraft gravitational eddies have pulled Sucker Punch through the wormhole,” he leaned forward. ”They have lock! Targeting solutions locked in!” he looked up. ”The wormhole closed, ma'am.”

”No grav eddies detected, either they aren't going to try again or Sucker Punch was a success, ma'am,” NGwark said.

Thennis looked at the display attached to her chair. It was easily ten times the amount of ships that had come through previously, massive troop transports dropping shoals of parasite craft into the atmosphere of the planet or driving hard for the surface.

So far, Thennis's ships had just drifted, surrounded by what appeared to be debris.

”Fleet at ready, ma'am,” NGwark said.

”Execute Ozymandias,” Thennis ordered.

”Aye, aye, ma'am, executing Ozymandias,” Technician Leggint said and pulled his hand back, holding it over his head.

The switch popped up. The signal went out to every ship in the Task Force.