Brink of Destruction, page 36
He pivoted back toward their breach point, where the bulk of Abbott’s Second Squad had taken up defensive positions on the first layer, fanned out in a concave formation that used angles and the pylons that held the reactor in its central position in the chamber for cover. It was less than ideal, but that had been a given since they’d first planned this lightning thrust at the heart of the station, without even knowing where exactly the reactor was.
There was movement in the breach point, and Corporal Combs fired, his CR-196 barking and sending a bulbous head snapping back with a spray of blue droplets. Several small lozenges floated into the opening, and Bannon shouted, “Blank!”
It was a rare adversary that tried to use the equivalent of omnibangers against Corvanites, but it did happen. The Zolarians had their own version, and though the two major powers had not yet directly clashed except in a few brief skirmishes, those devices were common on dozens of worlds that were willing to pay for them. The Corvanites did not sell their weapons, and they disdained those who did, but there had been a few insurgencies that had gotten the Zolarian distraction devices. That was why they had the “Blank” command in their helmets, momentarily silencing everything but comms and dimming their visors so the disruptive flash wouldn’t hit their optic nerves.
The lozenges weren’t Zolarian disruptors or Corvanite omnibangers. They filled the opening with a crackling, blinding corposant that writhed and lashed out with fingers of sparking plasma, like a lightning storm in zero gee. Julon and Frye were too close, and lightning bolts snapped out of the glowing cloud to strike both of them. Julon convulsed, his maneuvering unit sparking and firing randomly, sending him careening into the wall. Frye got less of a dose, or else he was harder than Julon, because while he stiffened, he was able to maintain control, jetting away from the opening and putting himself far enough away to get clear of the plasma.
Tassandas was already jetting toward Julon, his med gear prepped. But before he got halfway through, the main assault came bursting through the glowing, writhing cloud.
It was one of the spiderlike mechanoids, just like the one they’d faced at the docking bay. And they didn’t have the CRC-335s this time.
Bannon had been expecting more of those things, though, and he’d been planning in the back of his mind for how to deal with them. Hauling the recoilless rifles through the corridors hadn’t been practical, even in zero gee, but the special tasks warriors had some other tools that were nearly as potent, if requiring a bit more up-close engagement.
“Scatter! Get fire and omnibangers on that thing!” He was already matching actions to words as he punched his thrusters to push himself “up,” firing at the bulbous thorax, trying to hit one of the energy weapons but mostly just putting fire on it in the hopes of either forcing it to pause or even disorienting it if he managed to hit a sensor.
Two omnibangers sailed straight at the mechanoid, set for impact detonation. One missed, sailing past it into the still-writhing cloud of plasma in the breach. That one remained inert, while the second smacked into one of the mechanoid’s limbs and detonated.
The flash and the concussion probably wouldn’t do much if the thing’s armor and sensors were at all hardened, but Bannon hoped the sudden, viscous cloud of conductive mist might at least slow it down.
He was altering his trajectory radically every couple of seconds, trying to keep on the move to avoid those devastating bolts of energy and charged particles. All the while he kept pouring bullets into the murky haze of obscurant that was still clinging to the mechanoid. The mist wasn’t nearly as active as the plasma storm that was finally dying away in the entry portal, but there was still a faint shimmer about it that made it hold its shape and disrupt most electromagnetic sensors.
He was starting to close in on the beast, reaching for the breaching charge strapped to his hardsuit’s thigh plate, while Aten and Serkios did the same, when a couple of things happened at once.
The entire chamber reverberated with a hollow boom as another of the mechanoids burst through a second portal halfway around the compartment, leading with a storm of energy bolts, one of which took a Corvanite warrior’s head off. Bannon was too occupied to see who it was.
At almost the same instant, the armored monster that Bannon was moving toward attempted to fire one of its energy cannons.
The omnibanger’s obscurant cloud flared brilliantly, coruscating with displays of lightning as the charged particles collided with the conductive mist. For a moment, the creature or construct was enveloped in a terrifically violent bolt of ball lightning, the crackling fury of the energy bolt suddenly diverted and vented through the cloud.
Bannon braked, unwilling to fly right into that hellish cloud of plasma and lightning, and Aten did the same, though the younger private was still pouring rifle fire into the cloud.
Serkios, however, tried to take full advantage of the disruption to get close enough to plant his charge. Abbott was already moving, trying to get to Serkios before he flew into that tempest of plasma, but he was a little too slow. A massive spark leaped from the writhing corposant surrounding the mechanoid and sent Serkios tumbling away, as inert as Julon had been. Abbott darted toward him, while Bannon closed in with Rivera and Aten.
Serkios had had the right idea, but his timing had been bad. The blast of energy had neutralized most of the omnibanger’s cloud, and it was now dispersing, the lightning dying away, to reveal a badly wounded mechanoid. It was still moving, but there were deep scars burned into the armor, and at least one pit that might have been an optical sensor was smoking. It was easy enough to see which weapon had fired, as it was a twisted, melted lump atop the construct’s thorax.
The second weapon was still in action, however, and its blast took Aten’s leg off just below the hip a second later. Aten screamed as the explosion of energy sent him spinning in the opposite direction, out of control and trailing a stream of smoking blood.
Rivera jerked sideways with a burst of his thrusters, spraying bullets at the weapon and tracking hits along the thing’s armature, though he didn’t seem to be doing much damage. The cannon pivoted toward him, even as his burst of fire went past the construct and toward some of his fellows.
Bannon didn’t have time to reprimand Rivera for his desperation. Not even to worry too much about whether or not he’d hit another Corvanite. They had to kill this thing, and fast. He jetted underneath the construct’s thorax, putting most of it between him and that cannon, hoping there wasn’t a duplicate weapon underneath. He already had the charge in his hand, his rifle locked under his armpit with his firing hand.
The crackle of gunfire filled the chamber as Summ and Hern fought the second construct somewhere else, but Bannon’s entire focus was on this target, right now. As an officer, some might have argued that he should have stayed up at the zenith of the reactor, coordinating the defense, but this was a knife fight in an airlock, and there wasn’t much coordination to do. He needed to fight, not try to direct the fight.
Ducking beneath the hesitant sweep of one massive limb, the claw scarred and shedding fragments of blackened armor, he punched his rifle’s muzzle toward the joint and fired. Two of the rounds seemed to simply be absorbed, but the third hit something important, and the limb spasmed, crooking inward violently before freezing.
Unfortunately, that movement put the construct into a tumble, and Bannon had to reach out and grab hold of the claw before it rotated away from him. It twisted as it careened through the open space between the entryway and the reactor, and Bannon pulled himself closer, almost hugging the thing as it tried to lash out at him.
A glancing blow slammed into his side, and he gasped for air as pain lanced through him. If not for his hardsuit, that hit would have crushed his ribs, he was sure. He held on for dear life, his fingers locked into the exposed tubing or cables inside the wounded, frozen limb, glad that his rifle was still on its sling as it bounced off the construct’s thorax and struck him in the stomach.
Pulling himself closer, he slammed the breaching charge against the thing’s hull and pulled the activator strip.
Still holding on, acutely aware of the thunder of weapons fire and the fact that the fuse on that charge was already burning, entirely too close to him, Bannon twisted and tucked his legs, narrowly avoiding another swipe from one of the construct’s other limbs. He realized that it was flailing its remaining legs to try to fend off the rest of Abbott’s squad, who were hammering at its damaged joints with bayonets and boarding tomahawks—otherwise there would have been nothing to keep it from folding in on itself and crushing him.
Barely planting his boots on the thorax, he pushed off, hard, adding his maneuvering thrusters to the impulse as he went, barely avoiding yet another strike from one of those clawed limbs. He sailed away from the construct as it twisted around, that cannon coming to bear on him despite the damage that one of Abbott’s boys had already done.
The breaching charge detonated just before it came close to him. Not one of the careful cutting charges, that charge had been set up for sheer brute, explosive force, though still focused along a single line. A sheet of flame cut through the middle of the construct’s thorax, though it wasn’t quite enough to bisect the thing. Its spine held together as it twisted away, still thrashing and twitching like a dying organism, but as the smoke cleared and the cloud of glowing fragments drifted away, followed by what looked like crumbling black clods of dust, he could see blobs of blue blood trailing out of the massive rent in the carapace.
Gasping, every inch of his body in pain, Bannon arrested his backward movement and took stock, already moving toward where Hern and Summ were battling the second mechanoid.
The second fight wasn’t going as well. They might have gotten an omnibanger or two onto it, but the mechanoid’s pilot must have seen what had happened to the other one, and it hadn’t fired while it was still inside the conductive cloud. It was far less damaged, and it was very much still in the fight. Baddlet, Fisher, and Starr were drifting away from it in various stages of dismemberment, their corpses still trailing smoke as they tumbled.
Hern and Summ were keeping up heavy fire on it, while their surviving squadmates dodged between the pylons, never staying in one place for more than a split second, their vectors constantly changing as they tried to stay ahead of those cannons. They weren’t just spraying the thing down with bullets, though, he saw as he came over the “top” of the reactor and got a better view; Adamas was lobbing the occasional thirty-seven at it, and his aim was dead-on. From the looks of things, he’d hit one of those cannons at least once. It looked faintly warped, and sparks were jetting from the articulation joint every time it tried to traverse it. The other was less damaged, but it didn’t seem to be moving on its joint very smoothly. The Corvanites were targeting the weapons every chance they got.
Without another breaching charge, there was no reason for Bannon to try to get in close, except to draw fire, and the remainder of both First and Third Squads were closing in. Even as Bannon checked on the third entry door, dreading the thought of yet another of these constructs breaching through while the bulk of the phalanx was still occupied with the second, Alexius lobbed another omnibanger as hard as he could at the thing as he darted in behind the less-damaged gun’s firing arc.
The shimmering cloud enveloped the rear half of the construct as it tried to thrust itself away from the concussion, but it was just enough to let Alexius get close enough. He stopped just short of a scything claw and threw his already armed breaching charge at the thing, then reversed thrust and jetted away again, still firing as he jinked from side to side.
The cloud of ionizing smoke and the twisting, frenetic movement of the fight kept Bannon from seeing whether or not the charge had hit and stuck. But a second later, the detonation that ripped off one of the cannons and two of the clawed limbs answered that question.
Tumbling out of control, trailing smoke and debris, the construct looked for a moment like it was too badly damaged to function. Adkins and Summ closed in on it, weapons ready, Summ already prepping a second charge.
It wasn’t dead yet. Its tumble took it close to one of the pylons, and it suddenly lashed out with one remaining limb, sank its claw into the dark surface, and twisted around toward its tormentors.
Its first shot took Adkins dead center in the chest, the bolt blowing straight through his chest plate and sending what was left of him spinning away.
Adkins’s arm struck Summ as his torso essentially exploded, and that blow, coupled with a last-moment course correction, was the only thing that saved the squad sergeant’s life. As it was, the rapid follow-up shot still took his arm off, sending the breaching charge flying away.
Hern was coming up from the opposite side, using the pylon as cover. Bannon was already moving, skimming the surface of the reactor, taking the construct under fire as he flew. His bullets weren’t doing much, but if he could get that thing’s attention before it finished Summ off…
The third entry portal blew open and another of the plasma storms erupted inside it. Seconds later, the other two crackled with the same clouds of ionization.
Enemy reinforcements had just arrived.
CHAPTER 45
Gritting his teeth, Bannon closed in on the wounded construct, praying that the next wave would need to pause a few moments for the plasma to dissipate a little. He just didn’t dare leave this thing, which had already killed Adkins and seriously wounded Summ, without neutralizing it.
“One thing at a time” was rarely a luxury available in combat, but sometimes it was a necessity nevertheless.
Disdaining braking thrust, he slammed into the construct, bayonet first, punching the blade into one of the damaged joints of the limb holding the thing to the pylon. The high-strength composite held for a moment as the limb flexed, and if he hadn’t still been using his thrusters to hold himself in place, the force would have flung Bannon aside like a ragdoll. Even as he held on, his arms aching as he ground the bayonet into what he hoped were vital components, the joint bent suddenly and snapped the bayonet in half as the construct twisted, trying to get him within reach of a claw or within the firing cone of its surviving cannon. The thing wasn’t moving as well as it had been—it had taken a lot of damage—but it could still kill him.
Bannon launched himself again, realizing at the last moment that he was about to pass into the cannon’s line of fire. He braked desperately, pouring full power to his flank thrusters and pushing himself hard toward the pylon.
Then Hern’s breaching charge detonated.
With the construct focused on Bannon, and its sensors seriously damaged by the first charge, it must not have noticed Hern as he slipped around the pylon and slapped his charge onto a more central part of its thorax. The second detonation ripped the thing open along its entire length, and Bannon was knocked tumbling by the impact of one of the large fragments as the shock wave washed over the pylon and the surface of the reactor with a tooth-rattling boom.
Alerts flashed in his helmet’s visor, but he ignored them as he hit his stabilizers, arresting his tumble, though he was still flying toward the outer wall of the reactor chamber.
That he was still moving saved his life, as a storm of energy bolts crackled through the dissipating plasma storm in the third entryway and a dozen of the long-necked aliens swarmed through on maneuvering units of their own.
Pivoting as he flew, he leveled his CR-196, checking it as quickly as he could, hoping that the torsion that had broken the bayonet hadn’t bent the barrel. The metallurgy of the Corvanite weapons was far in advance of anything even dating back to the Newlander Wars, but at a certain point, force was force.
Trent was already pouring autogun fire into the oncoming aliens, punching through their relatively thin armor and sending half a dozen of them spinning back toward the entryway in sprays of sapphire gore in as many seconds.
Bannon killed two more as he steadied himself, breathing a sigh of relief that his rifle didn’t blow up in his hands. The first took his double-tap high in the torso. It jerked under the impacts, but kept moving forward, though it went limp in its maneuvering harness. The second took a round to the side, spinning it halfway around, before the second shot went through its elongated, sinuous neck.
Another plasma storm erupted ahead of them as the aliens paused their rush, and Bannon’s visor fuzzed and jumped with the amount of ionization in the air. He fired the rest of his magazine through the obscuring storm of ball lightning, though the glare and the heat haze made it next to impossible to pick out discrete targets.
More gunfire thundered through the chamber, and as Bannon put a pylon between himself and the rallying aliens, he glanced toward the other entries.
The rest of the phalanx had fallen back to other pylons, taking what cover they could, but while the Corvanite assault team was considerably reduced, there really wasn’t much cover to be had in that chamber, as the aliens controlling it had found to their detriment. They were still putting enough metal on the enemy to hold their own for the moment, but it wouldn’t last.
And with comms all but silenced by the construction of the station, they couldn’t call for help.
The aliens that had come through their initial breach had taken the brunt of the Corvanites’ fury. Some were still drifting away from the opening in attitudes that suggested they’d been caught in an explosion, with one actually severed nearly in half, trailing blue-tinged ropes of entrails behind it. One of his men must have been surprisingly precise with a breaching charge.
Bannon reloaded. He only had four magazines left. Enough to kill a lot of the ghost ship aliens still. Until they were relieved, they couldn’t let the aliens get to the reactor controls.
A series of crackling detonations sounded behind him, and a new maelstrom of plasma and lightning erupted from the entryway he’d just been shooting into. Something kept him focused on the initial breach, though. There was too much sound and fury back there, and after the destruction that the first construct had brought on itself by firing within the omnibanger’s conductive cloud, he didn’t think the aliens could fire their energy weapons through that corposant. Which meant the real attack was coming from somewhere else.
