The Siege of Ikanam

The Bridge Burners: The Planetside Legacy
The Amerish Zerg, Part 1: The Siege of Ikanam

The Flagrance of Cyssor had been one of the bloodiest moments in the war that had spread to cover the world of Auraxis and the vast caverns beneath it’s surface, but it was not to be the worst event in the planet’s history. Shortly after the New Conglomerate forces were forced from the continent a violent firestorm erupted on the NC held continent of Oshur when the Terran Republic captured a VS listening post and used it as a staging area for an assault against the NC. The Vanu Sovereignty rushed to reclaim it’s last bastion on Oshur whilst the Conglomerate mobilised to resecure it’s territories and drive back those whom they considered to be the most vile race of man.
The fighting was fearsome, the NC defending themselves with the same ferocity as had been demonstrated by the VS less than a month before, the TR forces found themselves being driven back to the warpgates under the onslaught. As the Vanu prepared to abandon their offensive an earthquake shook the land and meteors rained from the heavens, some bizarre twist in the warp field drew material from the asteroid belt towards the embattled world.
As hell came to Auraxis the ground of Oshur cracked and split, tendrils of warp energy snaked out of the broken land and wrapped themselves around the world, the sky seemed to bend and distort as if it had became a giant lens. A green light washed across the world and suddenly there was darkness.
Coming to in the spawn rooms of their respective Sanctuaries the soldiers of the Auraxian War found that everything was changed, the skies were different, they’re warp links only functioned to certain continents, and Oshur was completely blown apart, what remained in it’s place were four small islands. The Terran Republic had been the first to realise the true extent of their situation, the star maps of the heavens above TR Home didn’t align to any known constellations, and on their home continent of Forseral the constellations were radically different from those even seen from TR Home. It wasn’t until they saw not one but two moons rising above Forseral that they finally accepted the truth, Auraxis hadn’t just shifted in known space but had actually separated into at least twelve different worldlets in different parts of the galaxy. One world had somehow become many, but in a war where death has no meaning the reconfiguration of the planet did little to stem the bloodshed. There could still only ever be one master of Auraxis.
This shifting event that tore apart the world, that reconfigured the warp network and set the factions down their new paths became universally known as The Bending, the day of new light.
*****
Amerish had been a dream target for the New Conglomerate since the early days of the War, if they could take the Vanu Sovereignty’s home continent they might find a way to reactivate the warp gate that linked directly to the VS Sanctuary. It was the kind of thing that NC wet dreams were made off. If they could take the VS Sanc they would have access to the Vanu labs, all their technology, all their research on the Ancients, and finally they could take the Terran Republic Sanctuary with full force and wipe them off the face of Auraxis. To the New Conglomerate Amerish is the key to their imagined freedom.
*****
Since the days long passed the 4th Black Guard had long favoured Amerish to Sanctuary as a place to call home. On Sanc you could become complacent because there was no threat of attack, and at the same time you could never get any peace for the HART shuttles arriving with noisy regularity. Amerish was the place to be, here the 4th could train in a place were they had to keep their wits about them because there was every chance that the NC brutes or the TR fools would try to make a show of force. When the Prince Regent charged Staceh with reforming the 4th Black Guard he granted them exclusive use of their former training centre, Ikanam, knowing well that it would always serve to remind Staceh of what he was fighting for. And indeed it did. Staceh remembered well the good old days running security for the old DSRC in nearby Cetan, getting to play with all the new Vanu toys. Then the wormhole collapsed. The DSRC was disbanded to later reform as the NC. The TR chose a path of genocide against the Vanu in an effort to quell the rebellion. The Vanu fought back. The VS ruled that stability needed to be imposed upon Auraxis. And then came the Flagrance of Cyssor. Yes, Staceh remembered exactly what he was fighting for, purity would come when the NC were brought to justice for their crimes, and the TR would then repent for their treason and see the light of the Vanu ethos.
Today, almost a year to the day since Cyssor, Staceh smiled with a delightful irony, the new unit, the Amethyst Lancers, were fire training in the courtyard. They were practising the Lancer pinpoint accuracy drills that they would need to take down one of the Battle Frames that had recently began appearing on the battlefield, and whilst this was happening he was walking the walls. At least his TR days had left him with a sense of caution he thought, with just the slightest hint of nostalgia.
*****
In the lower levels of Ikanam many of the senior officers sat in the lounge next to the primary spawn room. A few days ago, during the annual ‘Pong’ tournament, Triplex had accidentally managed to tune into a porn channel, much to the joy of many of the enlisted ranks. As it was Dekov, Triplex, Shrikeh and Bazon were now pushing 96 hours without sleep, and a maintenance crew had to be called in to replace some deck plating which bore scratch marks from Vastian’s fingernails when Sultan had dragged him out, feet first, for Lancer training. Vastian had resigned his commission several times before Sultan finally had him out of the room.
HoaX and Latex were working hard in the control room, in the process of manufacturing a new security protocol to prevent a recurrence of the TR hack that had resulted in the capture of the spawn matrices of the Bridge Burner command echelons. Although under the command of Painted Target the outfit had pushed back the TR ‘Bugger Battalion’ and the EWO’s under Latex had resecured the stolen matrices, they still had no secure failsafe to prevent such an event from happening again.
Latex, although technically retired from active service, still headed up the Electronics Warfare Division she had created within the Bridge Burners, Staceh had been very convincing when he approached the Major about staying.
“How’s it going guys?” Staceh entered the control centre and knelt by the primary holo console.
HoaX slid out from under the holocon to reply, “Well, we think we can protect Ikanam from protocol cracks, but unless we upgrade every base on the planet to optimal B/S Q97.2fm VS9 tech level, there isn’t much point.”
“We can load a proactive antiviral program into the sanc registers, something that scans for DDS.874.NN97 code, but that would only be a temporary measure. Whatever we come up with would need to involve a permanent hardwired solution, with intelligent proactive/reactive antiviral generators and system wide A7 access protocols.”
“Well,” Staceh said after a second, “I’m not exactly sure what either of you just said, though it did appear to be in the common tongue, but keep on it.”
It was then that Staceh’s eyes were drawn to a red dot floating on the holocon above HoaX, another dot appeared, then another….
The General ran to the primary command console and hit the red alert. Klaxons blared throughout Ikanam, status panels over the biolab’s walls changed from their standard purple to a deep, glowing red.
“Bridge Burners, get kitted up,” Staceh’s voice echoed throughout the hallways, “this is not a drill. The New Conglomerate zerg has just arrived on Amerish, and they’re heading straight for us.”
*****
Within minutes the 4th Black Guard were mobilised, the Combat Engineers were laying so many mines that the NC couldn’t even hope to get within the Ikanam SOI, meanwhile Deuldiebob had the Outriders lining up their magrider hover-tanks to soften up the enemy armour. Sultan organised the Amethyst Lancer Gold Squad around the roof of the facility whilst Vastian and Indigo Squad got organised along the walls to go over and take down the BFR shield generators.
“HoaX, I want you and the Sabres out in the woods, standard Medusa orders.”
“Cut off the head and the body dies, got it Boss.” Code Medusa, the Sabre’s term for CR5 assassination ops, a HoaX favourite.
Another alarm blared and the holocon switched to an overlay of Amerish, Cetan had just turned green. The officers could only watch in horror as one by one their bases went neutral.
“Dear God,” Latex muttered, a sense of dread welling up in the pit of her stomach, “they’ve drained them all!”
“Can we hold back that many Battle Frames?”
Staceh stared at the image in silence, formulating some sort of strategy or counter offensive.
“Deuldiebob, take the Outriders into the field,” he said at last, “hit and fade attacks, scythe across their forces and try to soften them up as best you can.”
“Roger that, boss,” Deuldiebob replied, his magrider already gliding towards the Northern Gate. “Staceh, I would recommend that you stack all of our def rails along these gates, that way you can have a physical barrier to back up the shielding.”
Staceh had considered that option, and given the circumstances it didn’t seem like a bad idea, but it meant cutting off any armoured forces not already within the compound, “What about you guys?”
“Boss, you know as well as I that we aren’t bringing any of these mags back. The best that we can hope for is to take as much of their armour with us as we can.”
Staceh thought about that for a moment, “And then some.”
*****
The troops set to work immediately, fortifying the gates and walls like the great besieged cities of millennia past, and given that such fortification was an alien concept in the day and age of ray shielding the Bridge Burners did a remarkable job. Behind every new wall they deployed a spitfire, within every new trench they deployed a minefield. At each corner of the base they deployed auroras as manned turrets, at every door they deployed boomers.
In the lobby the outfit stood assembled, looking up to Staceh who stood at the lobby console on the first floor, flanked by Dekov on his right and Shrikeh to his left.
“Well Bridge Burners, we’re in the shit again,” he began, his voice filtered over the comms for those not in the assembly, “as it stands the NC have drained all our bases on Amerish. Ikanam is the last bastion of the Sovereignty and we are the only VS forces available to defend. The entire New Conglomerate zerg is here, they’ve managed to lock out the continent, we won’t be getting reinforcements, it’s just us and them.
“This is a pretty bleak picture I’m painting, but I want you to be under no illusions, these are the worst odds a VS force has faced since the Cyssor Meat Grinder, but back then we were a ragtag band. Today we are one of the most respected units in the Sovereignty, we are renowned for going up against some of the worst odds and coming out on top. Today will be just another notch in the sword for us, or maybe another notch isn’t good enough? Maybe we should do to the NC what they did to us at Cyssor, maybe we should give them nightmares for a change.
“Today in the old Earth Calendar is the 29th of May, a day synonymous with-“ Staceh paused his speech there. He realised that only a few of the Bridge Burners had served in the TR, and of them only a handful would have studied Earth History, “Do any of you know the events of that date?”
There were a couple of hushed murmurs throughout the crowd, but no one seemed to have an answer. Vastian knew, though he didn’t know how he knew, it was another one of those things that seemed to resurface in his mind from the black hole that was his past. Regardless he was keeping it very much to himself.
“Well, its probably for the best,” Staceh continued, “Bridge Burners, we are going to kick ass today!”
The outfit cheered in unison, eager now to make with the killing. They would get their chance sooner than expected, for their cheers were cut short by the roar of flail artillery fire overhead, the zerg had arrived.
*****
The minefield held up the NC armour and as yet only Dekov and his snipers had a target, but they were edging closer to the Ikanam sphere of influence. A wing of reavers shot overhead, firing missiles randomly into the base, followed by two liberators tasked with carpet bombing the facility. Weddup led a group of starfire MAXes through the courtyard, ignoring the reavers in favour of the more dangerous libs.
Bags and his corps men were arranging piles of medkits, NTU canisters for the glue guns and canisters for the medical applicators about the lobby, best to be prepared in case they lose the gen. He was just arranging a pile of replacement medical applicators when Staceh strolled through with some of his squad leaders, a lot of the veterans of the outfit.
Aven was first to deliver his report, “Weddup reports the air units are down, no sign of gals or lodes.”
“”Dekov’s taken out three BFR pilots who were stupid enough to get out of their frames.” Shrikeh followed.
“”Deuldiebob just checked in,” Bazon reported, “he’s just lost four of his mags but the NC are now short ten BFRs, seven Vanguards and an AMS.”
Staceh took all the reports in with a cool casualness the 4th had come to expect, “What about AMSes within our range?”
“No reports as of yet,” Vastian replied, “MrSubliminal is out in a prototype Phantasm, but all he’s found are a couple of cloakers.”
That wasn’t good, until they could lock down the locations of the enemy mobile spawns the attack could come from any quarter.
“Did he say anything else?”
“He said he’d destroy their medical terminals.”
“Guys,” Bags called, grabbing a handful of medical applicators and running over, “take these with you, just in case.”
Being fully kitted out the troops didn’t really have room for the offered med units, so Bags got inventive in finding places in their REXO armour to shove them.
“Bags,” Vastian half moaned, “man, I’ve no idea how to use this thing.”
“Oh don’t be such a whiner, its easy,” Bagdh Dearg whipped out an applicator, twisted a few knobs, flicked a couple of switches, twisted the same knobs back, twisted four different dials which Vastian hadn’t even seen and finally clicked the trigger three times.
“Aw gee, and there was me thinking it would be difficult.”
“Just don’t try to resi anyone and you’ll be fine.”
A silence fell about the room, the only thing you could hear was the pop of bolt drivers being fired. Bazon touched the comms unit in his ear, “Deuldiebob reports enemy flails destroyed.”
“All right Bob,” Shrikeh cheered.
Mashed ran into the room, “Sultan, Vastian get to your squads, the NC are through the minefield.”
*****
Vanguard heavy tanks rolled down over the plains, wasting no time in launching fire over the walls. Two columns of Peregrines came over the brow of the hill, that was four lances or twenty BFRs they would have to deal with. Ten Thunderer armoured transports sat on the brow of the hill flanking the BFRs, waiting for the armour units to draw the Vanu fire, then they’d try to get to the back door, not knowing that at that very moment Damius was laying charges to collapse the tunnel.
“Vastian, change of orders,” Sultan called over the comms, “tell indigo squad to hold their position. Mashed take orange squad out of the CY and assemble along the west wall, Vas, spread indigo along the east.”
“Roger that.”
The two Amethyst Lancer squads reorganised along the walls whilst gold squad picked their targets from the roof, on the ground far below they could see Vanu Combat Engineers moving into the courtyard.
“Sultan, this is Staceh, we’re mining this yard into kingdom come, can you get your boys to push that armour out of effective range?”
“You heard the boss, guys, let her rip.”
The air above Ikanam came alive with lancer fire cutting through the vanguard armour like it was butter. The BFRs opened up, peppering the walls with a hail of lead, but they were still too far out for their weapons to be anything other than annoying. Vanguard drivers began abandoning their damaged vehicles beneath the walls, running along under the overhang, and through the gateway shields only to come face to face with the def rail barricades. The ALs drew their lasher plasma rifles and hanging them one handed over the wall they turned the dust beneath the walls to glass.
“GALAXIES!” MrSubliminal called as he bailed the damaged Phantasm over the base, “three Conglomerate galaxies incoming!”
“On it,” Weddup reported, his MAX squad bringing their starfires to bear.
“Those thunderers are rolling in,” Mashed reported.
“Damius, how’s that back door?” Staceh enquired as he strolled through the lobby, dust fell from the ceiling as another tank round connected, “We secure?”
“Not yet, boss, no point in wasting perfectly good bombs.”
“What?!”
“They’re at the walls! THEY’RE AT THE WALLS!!”
“Shit, indigo squad get ready to go over.”
“Damius, control says the back door is being hacked. Blow it now!”
“They’re in! THEY’RE IN!!”
“Lancers in 3, 2-“
An explosion shook the ground beneath their feet, a great puff of dust and smoke blasted out through the back door, the shock wave destroyed two thunderers parked too close to the door.
“Back door secure,” Damius said as he kicked away the gloved hand of an NC that had landed on his foot.
“TWO BFR’S CHARGING!!”
Two Battle Frames came running down towards the base, jumped the walls just as the Galaxies passed overhead. The ALs turned their fire on the BFRs only to see them blown to pieces by the mines. Weddup’s starfires lit up against the bulbous dropships as they emptied their payloads over the base, which included three lightnings.
“The Lancers aren’t the only one’s who can take out a BFR,” Staceh quipped, “Engineers get into your sapper gear, we’ve got Smurfs onsite.”
The lights in the base flickered.
“WTF?!” Shrikeh cursed, “How could they be at the gen already?”
Staceh stared in disbelief at the command console, only to have his thoughts interrupted by another alarm flashing on the holocon- RESPAWN TUBES: D E S T R O Y E D
“Get to the spawns immediately, sappers get to the gen. Tomskiii, do we have an AMS?”
“Negative, the lightnings have found it.”
“I have one behind the vehicle bay,” Painted reported, and as if on cue a hum of static build-up was heard.
“OS on the vehicle term!” Vastian shouted as he watched the troops run for cover, “A big one!”
Vastian could feel the hair on his arms stand on end as the air filled with static, small sparks jumped randomly in the sky before the clouds parted as a blast of superheated plasma tore through the heavens from one of the orbital defence satellites. It hammered against the ground sending up a wave of dust and heat that knocked the lieutenant from his feet, looking up he could see a column of smoke rising from behind the protecting wall to the rear of the vehicle bay, the console itself was completely blown to pieces.
“There goes the vehicle terminal.”
“How did they know the AMS was there?”
“Either the base is overrun with cloakers or they’ve hacked our comms.”
“Is it true that you have to give all the NC Command a high level of ‘oral gratification’ in order to reach CR5?” Painted asked mockingly, in case anyone had beat his communications protocols.
“I’ve heard that a good degree of submissiveness also helps,” Mikey1 replied.
Then all the consoles in the control room went dead and the room was left in darkness. Red emergency lighting flickered on.
“The generator’s down!”
“Lancers to the gates, the shields are offline!”
But it was too late, the barricades blew apart as vanguards rammed through. The Lancers and sappers opened fire on everything that came through the gateways. Whatever mines were left soon went off under the continuous roll of NC armour, the spitfire turrets were of little use against the sea of metal.
“Lancers, pull back to the base,” Sultan ordered, “sappers, try to get some CE down on the walls and entrances.”
Indigo squad and orange squad met up on one of the walkways to the upper levels, each squad firing in opposite directions at the waves of armour approaching. The NC troops began pouring over the wall, firing at the retreating Vanu forces, Staceh came running down with a group of sappers opening fire on the invaders. Fayeski took a shot to the leg and fell with a yelp of pain.
“Faye!” Mashed called, dropping his lancer and kneeling to pick her up.
“Mashed, get her out of here,” Staceh ordered, leading the sappers down to and along the walls.
Mashed helped Faye to her feet before staggering and exhaling softly.
“Mashed?” she asked, a small drip of blood ran down his cheek and she squealed.
Vastian turned and gasped as Mashed collapsed, a hole in his head that you could put your hand through.
He lifted Faye and passed her to Kamikazejay, “Get her inside,” then he kneeled down and looked at his friend. No operational spawns onsite… and no amount of NTUs would rebuild that hole, “Rest easy man, see you at Sanc.”
The NC were climbing over the ruins of their vehicles, pouring over the walls around the sappers.
“We could use some Gun Kata monks over here,” Staceh’s voice broke over the drone of gauss fire.
Vastian handed his lancer to TheDuddd, “That’ll be of more use to you, man,” and with that he was running back down along the walkway, where he met with Shrikeh, Aven, Bazon and Damius. They drew their lashers in one hand and their swords with the other, the fine curved blades glinting in the afternoon sun.
“Don’t forget to keep score,” Aven said as they jogged along the perimeter wall to the fighting.
“What about a little fight song to keep our spirits up,” Bazon suggested as he slashed across an NC’s back and blew another off the wall with his lasher.
Vastian ducked low knocking an NC to the ground with the butt of his lasher and spinning to slash across the fallen body, “Ah-weemba-wep ah-weemba-wep ah-weemba-wep ah-weemba-wep.”
“In the jungle, the mighty jungle,” Shrikeh sang as he loped off the head of a REXO’d soldier.
“The lion sleeps toooonight,” Damius continued as he put his lasher to an agile’s face and fired.
“Iiinnnn the jungle, the miiighty jungle,” Aven dived through a pair of REXOs and slashed across their backs.
“The lion sleeps tooooniiiight,” Bazon beat an agile over the wall with the butt of his lasher before flicking it over his shoulder and frying another behind him.
The four sang a loud “Ooooooooohhhhhhweeeeeeeeeeee, ah-wee-um-bumba-way” to the sound of Vastian’s “ah-weemba-weps”s, all the while they hacked, slashed, ducked, dived, lashed and fried every Conglomerate soldier around them. The Gun Kata fighters left a trail of blood, limbs and fried flesh as they worked their way across the wall to Staceh, all the while singing out of tune. With the Gun Kata tactics the NC just were not able to get an accurate shot in, the ancient martial art of the Free Colonies was nigh on unstoppable, it was also the reason the colonies were free in the first place. The warriors reached Staceh’s group, which was by now running dangerously short on ammo.
“Boss, this place is overrun,” Shrikeh shouted as he hacked off a blue armoured arm, “we’ve got to pull back and make a stand from the facility.”
An enemy soldier clambered over the wall only to get knocked straight back down when Staceh kicked him squarely in the face, “Sappers, pull back. Put down whatever CE you can, but get inside!” Two of the sappers took shots to the chest as Staceh spoke, and those who fired were replied with a hail of lasher fire.
Meanwhile Imp and Chutney fought hard at the doors to the generator room, the NC droppers were holding it well, gauss fire pocket marking the doorway. Over the steady roar of their pulsar rifles they didn’t hear the MAX coming up behind them until it was too late. Chutney collapsed forward, using his last ounce of strength to push Imp out of the way, for all the few moments of time it bought. Imp spun on the ground and in a roar of anger flicked his pulsar to armour piercing and emptied the cartridge into the MAX.
The bastard MAX pilot savoured the moment with a laugh, “You’ve got zero chance against me.” And as he leaned forward to make the kill suddenly there was a pop and the inside of his faceplate was splattered with blood.
As the MAX fell forward Imp saw Dekov lowering his bolt driver as he came running over, “Chutney, shit! You ok, Imp?”
“Fine, Dek,” Imp said, getting slowly to his feet and looking forlornly at his brother’s body, “As good as I’ll be.”
Maccaria and Magnex came running out of the upper exit of the facility and joined the others outside the generator room.
“This is Armageddon,” Magnex said as he glanced to the walls, he saw Aven take a round to the chest and fall in slow motion to the courtyard below.
“We need to get that generator up,” Maccaria raised his lasher.
Dekov holstered his bolt driver and drew his lasher, “Right Imp, how many are there in there?”
“We counted two gauss users, and at least two jackhammers.”
“KK,” Dekov stood with his back to the wall, lasher raised, “single file, lashers first, pulsar users behind. We go left, right, left, right. Got it?”
“Roger that,” they replied.
Dekov charged into the generator room, followed by Maccaria, then Imp, then Magnex. Breaking to flank they easily cut down the NC soldiers, and as the doors closed the last thing that anyone saw from outside were the two NC MAX units walking out from their hiding places in the corners.
Damius saw it, as did Bazon, and before anyone could stop him Damius had taken off up the walkway toward the generator room.
“Damius!” Bazon shouted, “Where are you going you crazy bugger?!”
The MAXes slowly turned as Damius charged into the room, but by that stage he already had a boomer stuck to each of them, and diving behind the monitoring console he detonated the explosives. The explosion brought down whatever was left of the generator around whatever remained of the mobile armour.
Over the TS channel they heard MrSubliminal shouting, “Lobby has been breached, repeat, the NC are within the facility. We are sealing the inner doors.”
“Get back to them,” Staceh ordered the others as he punched a soldier in the face and threw him over the wall.
“Roger that,” Shrikeh said as Staceh’s eyes went wide. Everything after that seemed to happen in slow motion. Vastian and Bazon turned to see Shrikeh standing in shocked disbelief. Staceh slowly dropped to his knees, a small bubble of blood at the edge of his mouth, a red smear appearing through the armour in his chest. An Conglomerate soldier standing behind the Bridge Burners leader stared at the knife handle in his hand, the blade had broken in Staceh’s back. Bazon shot the NC in the face as their leader drooped forward his eyes meeting with Shrikeh’s before they finally glazed over, and then one of the Sovereignty’s finest commanders was dead. It had taken only a matter of seconds, but to the three veterans time had stretched to eternity as their leader and friend died in front of them.
“Staceh…” Shrikeh said softly in disbelief.
Bazon kneeled down and gently closed Staceh’s eyes.
Vastian placed his hand softly on Shrikeh’s shoulder, “We need to get to the others.”
“We can’t just leave him here.”
“Vastian’s right,” Bazon stood, “the nanites will deconstruct him in time enough, in the meantime we need to help our forces.”
“We can’t-“ Shrikeh said dumbly, searching for something, “He wouldn’t leave us.”
Saying nothing Vastian kneeled down and with the help of Bazon he hauled Staceh’s body onto his shoulders and with more than a little effort rose into the air, the REXO armour weighed half as much as the body again.
“Just make sure that I don’t get shot,” he said as he started up the walkway, Bazon trotted ahead to take point whilst Shrikeh provided cover. Gauss rounds whistled through the air around them yet somehow they made it to the facility door in one piece. A grenade bounced of the wall and landed next to Bazon who wasted no time in picking it up and throwing it back, to the response of an NC’s “Oh SH-“.
The doors slid open to reveal Damius, obviously dying as blood spurted out through shrapnel holes in his armour, “That bloody grenadier… who’s that? Is that?”
The sorrow in the soldiers’ eyes said it all, but before anyone could speak Shrikeh collapsed against the doorframe, blood arcing out of a hole in his neck. With one last great push of strength he shoved himself off the doorframe and opened fire in the direction of the sniper.
“Shrikeh!” Vastian yelled as another three bullets tore into his oldest friend in the outfit, and since he had no memory of his time before Auraxis, Shrikeh was probably his oldest friend.
“Go,” Damius said as he raised two lashers in his bloodied hands, his face was starting to pale from the blood loss.
Bazon led Vast into the facility, turning they saw Damius jump onto the top of a BFR in the courtyard, and as he fired all around him the doors slid closed.
Coming to the steps to the lobby Bazon put his hand on Vastian’s arm, “Wait Vast, you and I both know that we can’t bring Staceh’s body down there, it’ll crush whatever morale they have left.”
“You’re right,” Vastian sighed, the weight on his shoulders wasn’t just that of a dear friend but of the strength of the entire outfit. Looking around he spotted the primary control room, “We’ll put him in there next to the upper console.”
The primary data trunk was wide open, the console downstairs had been hacked, the place must have been swarming with cloakers. They carefully laid Staceh next to the console and whilst Bazon crossed his arms Vastian placed a penny on each of his eyes, an old Earth custom rendered obsolete by respawn but a symbolic gesture for their leader nonetheless. Bazon closed Staceh’s hands around the hilt of his sword and laid it on his chest next to his lasher.
“See you soon, Boss,” Bazon turned and looked at the CC, and at Vastian who was looking at the REK in his hands, a big bullet hole right in the middle of it. “No resecure?”
“Not unless you’ve got one,” Vastian tossed the destroyed hack kit into the corner.
“Let’s get to the others.”
Entering the corridor again they saw the exterior door slide open, and dropping to a crouch they raised their lashers in anticipation.
A blur or shimmer moved through the air followed by two others, cloakers. As the lashers were brought to bear one of the cloakers spoke, “We’ve got to get to the others.”
“That’s a massacre out there, is there anyone left?”
“HoaX,” Vastian called, he recognised the two voices, “Painted.”
The 3 Sabres uncloaked before them, HoaX, PaintedTarget, and Mikey1.
“Shit guys,” Mikey said, “good to see some of you are still alive.”
“Where are the others?” HoaX asked, “And what the hell was Damius doing on that BFR?”
“The others are downstairs, the lobby has been breached but they’ve sealed the doors, for now we’ve got them held at bay.” Bazon reported, “And Damius was just being Damius, he went out the way he wanted to I suppose.”
“He’s not dead yet,” Painted added with a hint of glee, “he took out the BFR, and last I saw he’d pulled a gunner out of a vanguard, destroyed the last BFR with it and was running through the courtyard dropping grenades into the other tank drivers.”
“Crazy bugger,” Bazon mused.
*****
In their makeshift command centre outside the CC Bags was pacing, Deano was taking inventory of what few weapons remained, whilst Sultan tied a bandage over the wound in Fayeski’s leg. Bags had tended it well, now it was only a matter of time for the skin to heal fully. Phog and Shinya had gone to the spawn chambers to place a few surprises for the NC.
“Did somebody hear something?” Bags said softly, then he felt a hand grip his neck and a touch of steel, “ARGGGH.... its a, a, arrggh!”. Bags choked on his own blood as he collapsed at the feet of the cloaker.
“Darklight on, NOW!” Deano ordered, his eyes glowing green as the implant initialized.
In the green haze of Darklight the Bridge Burners could make out the digitized images of men all around them, everywhere, the room was full of cloakers.
*****
Coming down the steps HoaX suddenly stopped as the sound of pulsar fire mixed with the blasts of boomers and the pops of scatter pistols.
“Shit!” Vastian and Bazon cursed in unison as they charged down the corridor, lashers raised. Gauss fire erupted behind them and spinning they saw the Sabres drop dead, Mikey lying half in half out of the doorway, the NC had broken through the lobby doors.
Entering the makeshift command centre nearly brought tears to their eyes, there were bodies everywhere, Bridge Burners and cloakers alike slaughtered.
“Freeze!” A familiar voice ordered to the sound of a lasher charging up, and then it spoke with relief, “Baz, Vast.”
Fayeski came round from behind the crate, hobbled over to the two soldiers and threw her arms around both of them, and in the comfort of the group hug she sobbed, “They were everywhere. Bags, oh God!”
“It’s ok,” Bazon patted her on the back, “sssshhh, we all see something like this eventually.”
“Is there anyone else left, Faye?”
“Just me, Vas,” Sultan said, pulling himself from behind a crate. His armour was pocket marked by scatter fire, “Don’t worry, it looks worse than it is.”
Vastian helped Sultan to his feet, “What do we do now, Major?”
“We can’t win this, we can’t deconstruct back to sanc without the spawns, and I am not one for hara-kiri,“ Sultan stood tall and raised two lashers, “I say we give them hell and go down fighting.”
“We owe it to Staceh,” Bazon said.
“And Shrikeh,” Vastian added.
“I owe it to Mashed,” Fayeski added.
“We owe it to the Outfit,” Sultan finished.
Vastian went over to the crates of weapons and threw extra lashers to each of his compatriots before lifting a second for himself, “You know what they say about dead heroes.”
“Yeah,” Faye replied, “they’re dead.”
“But in this war, they’re just heroes,” Bazon added.
“Take what ammo you can carry and lets move out,” Sultan walked towards the doorway, “Lets burn some bridges.”
*****
The NC poured into the corridor to be met by a blaze of lasher fire, purple ribbons of plasma cutting through their armour like it wasn’t there. The four moved down the corridor with ease, killing every NC at first sight. At the junction to the spawns they encountered NC coming from the birthing chambers, Bazon and Faye handled them whilst Vastian and Sultan took the NC coming from the stairwell.
“I’m out,” Vastian shouted, and he spun behind the others and dropped to a crouch to reload, and as he switched back into place Sultan dropped behind to reload.
“I love this shit,” Bazon shouted as he slammed a cartridge into place when it was his turn to reload, and as he swung into a rise he was knocked back down by a weight, pushing it off he found the weight to be Fayeski’s very dead body. “Fayeski’s bought it,” he shouted over the lasher fire, firing back at the direction of the spawns.
“What?!” Sultan glanced momentarily and as he did a gauss round caught Vastian in the shoulder and another entered his chest.
“Vas!”
Trembling on the ground, gasping for breath as one of his lungs filled with blood, Vastian tried to rise using one of his lashers for support, “Go… make for the lounge, if the spawns are-“
Sultan caught him as he fell forward, “Vas.”
“If the spawns are boomered,” he choked, “you can set a trap for the bastards.”
“Man, we can’t leave you here,” Bazon said, firing a shot towards the spawns.
“Heh,” Vastian gasped, “I’ll see you back at sanc.”
And with that the lieutenant rose unsteadily to his feet and staggered off towards the stairwell.
“See you at sanc, mate,” Sultan said as he tapped Bazon’s shoulder, “lets go.”
The spawn room doors opened to reveal a MAX guarding the far door, the lounge doors were open to reveal a full NC squad.
Sultan spotted the boomers clipped under some of the grid plating, the MAX was turning, “Ready, buddy?”
Bazon raised his lashers and pointed them in to the squad, which panicked upon realising there was a VS in the spawns taking aim at them, “I was born ready.”
Sultan drew a frag grenade as Bazon opened fire on the NC, he could hear more of the enemy soldiers coming down the corridor behind them. He threw the grenade and everything went white.
*****
Vastian knelt at the stairwell, his armour stripped off, his hands and feet bound, blood pouring from his wounds. An NC Sergeant stood over him, laughing mockingly as each Conglomerate who walked by kicked the wounded officer or bashed him over the head with the butts of their jackhammers.
Somewhere up the stairs a scream could be heard, a yell of someone in incredible pain.
“You hear that?” The Sergeant knelt beside Vastian, grabbed a handful of his hair and yanked his head back, “That’s your friend Damius. He cost us a lot of men and materiel today, so we’ve given him enough nanomeds to keep him alive and the boys are going to work on him, slowly.”
“You bastard!”
“Ah ah aah,” the NC smirked, pushing Vastian back down and plunging a knife into his guts, “play nice.”
There was an explosion upstairs followed by an eerie silence, “That was my friend Damius,” Vastian quipped, “maybe you want to go upstairs and check on your boys.”
The sergeant scowled and twisted the knife, “You know, I’d rather be doing this to that leader of yours. I owe that bastard one, but I guess you’ll have to do, for now.”
Vastian screamed in pain as the NC continued to turn the blade.
“Sergeant!” A voice barked from the stairs behind the torturer, and looking past him Vastian saw a New Conglomerate CR4 coming down the steps.
“Remove your blade from that soldier, we do not ill treat our prisoners, we aren’t barbarians.”
“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.”
The CR4 sighed, as if in resignation, “Go secure the control console.”
“Sir. Yes, sir.”
When they were alone the CR4 removed his helmet, revealing tousled brown hair slick with sweat, “You’ll have to forgive him, old habits die hard, former Tau Unit.”
Vastian said nothing, he looked once at the NC officer, but his vision was starting to blur.
“You don’t recognise me. Do you?”
It was coming on faster now, a wave of dizziness was washing over him, he was getting weak, but still Vastian managed to look the man up and down, “I don’t make it a habit of associating with the NC.”
“Oh this is long before Auraxis,” the CR4 replied, “Do you remember the penal world Halo 7?”
“Never heard of it.”
The officer looked at Vastian for a moment, unsure if he was being sarcastic or had no memory, the escape from the falling hull had been precarious, “What about the probe ship, DSRC Farcry?”
“Nope.” He was starting to fall forward, he could barely keep himself upright anymore.
“Do you have any memory of how you got here?”
“Nothing before waking in the Sovereignty Medbay.”
The NC stood and walked behind Vastian, “You may not remember me, sir, but my name is Dumas, or Bluestar. I was your second officer aboard the Legacy of Truth, then I after that we were prisoners on Halo 7. You helped myself and some others escape aboard the Farcry. You saved my life, and now I am going to do the most humane thing that I can for you.”
Vastian heard a click and felt the cold steel of a scatter pistol on the back of his head, “Bluestar.”
“Yes?”
“Don’t miss.”
Vastian heard the click of the trigger and he fell to the floor of the spawn rooms in sanctuary, a cold mist washing about him. He struggled and kicked for a second as he felt hands over him.
“Vastian, Vastian!”
It was Sultan and Bazon, “It’s alright, relax. You’re back in sanc.”
“Sultan…?”
“It’s ok, Damius was the same. It’ll pass.”
The disorientation was passing, “Is everyone ok?”
“Yeah, we’re all back now,” Bazon replied, “Faye’s in shock, and Bags is getting twitchy about his neck, but other than that everyone seems fine.”
“Staceh is off meeting with Enrico, Kimber and Thunderhawk. They’re planning a counter offensive. We’re going back to Amerish.”
Vastian lay on the ground staring at the ceiling for a few seconds, “If you see Staceh before I do, tell him that today worked out about the same as the last May 29th.”