Eric Rama took a deep breath, adjusted his grip on his weapon, then took a step forward to take aim around the towering wheels of the multi-loader he was taking shelter behind.
“Steady for fire.” He said calmly into the squad-net, waiting for the clicks that signified everyone had heard him. “Rome and Serra, you’re up.”
Gunfire erupted forward from his position, steady and coordinated, causing the thick orange smoke that covered the contested ramp landing to swirl in complex vortices. Distorted shapes, backlit by strobing emergency lighting, moved through the space. A red targeting reticle appeared as one of the shapes staggered back, the personal shield it was wearing sparking as bullets slammed into it.
Eric squeezed his trigger.
His target jerked up and back, falling backward as its head disappeared in a mist of blood and bone fragments.
As the target fell, two of Eric’s Hexguard moved out of cover, pausing only to throw grenades, before charging forward to take positions behind the pillars that flanked the bottom ramp. The dull crump of grenades exploding was followed by quickly cut-off screams.
Suddenly, a stream of bullets coming from the open gate leading higher up into the research complex spattered over the top of the ramp, blasting fist-sized holes from the permacrete.
Hellfire, the invaders had a shattergun!
“Abort Assault.” Eric commanded. “Cease cover, switch to guard.”
Eric’s squad stopped shooting as he stepped back behind the loader, the echoes of gunfire dying out as everyone settled back to wait for him to come up with a plan.
With a thought, Eric called up an AR overlay map before him, noting the positions of his men relative to the invaders. As a Hexguard officer Eric’s encrypted security key allowed his personal AI to control the monitoring cameras set into the walls of the supply depot, providing a panoramic view of the large space. The thermal smoke grenades the attackers had used limited the effectivity of those cameras though, a move that Eric would have approved of, had he and his crew not been at the receiving end of it.
The invaders were clearly professionals, moving with a surety of purpose characteristic of elite special forces. Their planning, precision, and coordination gave their caliber away. These weren’t your typical pirate outfit or Corporate raid-unit: These guys were military, stellar nation military, which meant Eric had a very small margin of error to turn things around.
We need to get that gate closed.
“How we doing against that jammer Doc?” Eric asked on a private channel, turning his combat-helmeted head to his left. From his position he could see the squad’s tech kneeling on one knee with his back to a pile of permacrete sacks, his lined face illuminated by the screen light of his combat comp-unit.
“Outside comms are still a no-go Cap,” The veteran operator answered without looking up from his work, his deep voice calm and controlled as always. Eric heard the staccato tap-tap of the man’s fingers over the small keyboard, its rhythm somehow reassuring despite the situation. “I’ve opened up a two-way to Command at the topside bunker but no one’s picking up on their end.”
Hellfire.
The entire Halden-Xiao Corporation research base had been caught unaware by this sudden attack by unknown hostiles. First there had been a massive explosion from somewhere topside, and then the power had cut off. Disoriented and understandably unnerved by these events, many of the base’s scientists, researchers, and other personnel had fled to the Lower Lab, leaving Eric and his personal Hexguard Corps squad, now reduced to twelve able operatives, to defend the large supply depot that contained the only exit from the lower levels.
“I need you to get through, Doc.” Eric said conversationally.
“Nag all you want Cap,” Doc returned laconically. “Isn’t gonna make this go any faster.”
A burst of gunfire from the invaders crackled out, making Eric duck his head involuntarily as a couple of bullets slammed into the side of the loader, further defacing the black-and-white Halden-Xiao logo that it sported. His troopers fired back in carefully timed intervals, just like they’d drilled in their training sims, their fire-patterns designed to hold off invaders until backup could arrive.
Or our ammo gives out. Eric thought grimly.
“Give me a time, Doc.”
“For god’s sake, Eric.” Doc grumbled. “Two minutes tops.”
“I’ll hold you to that.”
Satisfied for the moment, Eric pulled up his squad status screen through which he, and more importantly Pig, his built-in AI, could monitor the condition of his troops. Two of the fifteen blocks of data were blacked out, although the rest ranged in color from green to orange.
“How we doing, Pig?” Eric subvocalized. The AI could review and interpret data faster than Eric could blink, and for the sake of brevity Eric often relied on Pig’s reports. After all, he already relied on Pig to keep all of his bio- and cyber-mods working properly, what was one more thing right?
< Personal systems are solid green, sir. > Pig’s voice was low and unobtrusive. < Squad ammo is at fifty-two percent with no effectivity-affecting injuries. >
“Tozer and Gaunt?”
< Dead sir. >
Hellfire.
The two casualties had been assigned to guard the corridor beyond the depot gates. Naturally, they had been the first to bear the brunt of the invader’s attack.
“We can take them, sir.” Eric’s head snapped up as someone from his crew broke radio silence. “They’re bunched up near the entrance like a gaggle of cherlings on a terry-nob.”
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
“Can it, Jakobin,” Eric growled, not understanding the reference but recognizing the only female assault-specialized trooper he had on his crew. Serra Jakobin was a spacer from one of the Outlier Clans, hard as they come with a bit of a chip on her shoulder for being kicked off the Service for ‘trafficking in non-standard goods’. She was loud, outspoken, and probably one of the finest shock-and-awe operators Eric had ever had the pleasure to work with. “Wait and let Doc do his magic.”
Serra mumbled something incoherent but obediently shut off the channel.
Halden-Xiao almost exclusively preferred to recruit its Hexguard operatives from the castoffs of the Union’s Civil Armed Forces. Not only were these men and women already trained, but many of them were also ‘accepting of the realities of volatile situations.’ Just the type of people a multi-stellar Corp with a reputation for ‘non-standard asset acquisition practices’ wanted on the payroll. Unfortunately, that also meant H-X Security didn’t have the best of reputations with regards to their professionalism and discipline.
In fact, they were widely regarded as thugs, barely a step up from criminals.
It was a reputation that Eric had been working to change ever since he was recruited as an action team lead five years ago. Sadly, it was also a decision that had forced him to cut ties with many long-time friends and comrades.
To many servicemen in the Union’s Civil Armed Forces, taking a job as a Corporate Security officer, especially to a Corp as infamous as Halden-Xiao, was tantamount to spitting on the Union Constitution itself. In their eyes, Eric was nothing less than a traitor.
Eric wasn’t bothered by the label. Not anymore.
As far as he was concerned the only difference between a filthy, money-grubbing, back-stabbing corporation like H-X and the Union Government was the fact that H-X didn’t try to hide its motives. If H-X wanted something, it took it, then sat back to let the lawyers argue possession and the law. It was true that in the end he might just be sacrificed as a pawn for some big-shot’s meaningless power-play but how was that any different from serving in the CAF? Life as a dog of war was the same everywhere; at least here the pay was good, the work was often challenging, and the benefits packages only got better as he worked himself up the ranks.
He even had time to take up cooking as a hobby, which the Service, judging by the chow they served, did not view as a valuable skill.
< Access to the base surveillance and control system has been regained, Sir. > Pig’s announcement cut through Eric’s musings just as Doc chimed in with, “I got us back some eyes and ears, Sir!”
Suddenly the strobing emergency lights stopped and the normal arc lights blinked on, flooding the entire area with harsh, bright light. The ventilation system also kicked in, sucking up the obscuring smoke and exposing most of the area.
“Good job Doc!” Eric exclaimed, giving his tech a thumb’s up.
“Pig, can you close the ramp’s blast doors?”
Instead of an answer there was a loud rumbling and the sound of tons of metal slamming down onto reinforced permacrete. Shouts of alarm and quickly cut-off screams erupted from the top of the ramp.
“Looks like you caught one Pig,” Eric said as he glanced at the map window. Pig’s improved control of the base’s systems allowed it to place red-colored dots indicating the enemy in their relative positions on the map. Currently, all except two of the enemy dots were on the other side of the door, and even as he watched one of those inside blinked out of existence.
Eric opened up the squad-net.
“Bull, take Rome and Serra and zero that fucker that got through.”
“Roger that Cap.”
A tall, heavy-set man stepped out from the shelter of a crate of spare parts, joined soon after by the two troopers from behind the pillars. The three of them then cautiously made their way up the ramp, weapons ready. A few moments there was a brief burst of gunfire and the sound of a body hitting the floor.
“Hostile zeroed Captain.”
“Excellent work! We hold the floor.”
Leaving the loader, Eric jogged up the ramp, letting his auto-rifle swing freely from its sling as he adjusted the sheath of the heavy boarding blade at his side. The rest of his men followed after, sensing what was about to come next.
At the top of the ramp, Eric took a moment to survey the carnage.
Xenoforms in dark blue battle-armor littered the cracked floor, their dark blood splashed everywhere. Eric counted seven bodies as he made his way to the front of the blast gates.
He and his squad had bought themselves a little time by closing the depot gates but Eric knew the controls could just as easily be overridden by the other side. Something he had no doubt their attackers were very capable of doing.
The assault force had been quick and amazingly well-equipped, almost overwhelming the entire base before the defenders were even aware of their presence. Down at this level the invaders had announced their presence with an explosive launcher aimed at the gate, killing Tozer and Gaunt instantly, but creating enough noise that Eric’s crew had been able to mount an effective defense, preventing the attackers from rushing in and overwhelming them. Despite that failure the invaders had shown they were precise, highly-competent, and seemed to know an awful lot about H-X’s security measures. That was troubling, since Eric could only think of a few outfits, military or otherwise, with that level of skill and capability.
They should have rushed in and killed us all, Eric thought, his bloodlust rising. Keeping a tight rein on his burgeoning temper, Eric kicked at one of the dead invader’s bodies, flipping it over.
A squat, gray-skinned xenoform with broad, hairless features was revealed, armed with an astonishing array of guns and bladed weapons. Sharp fangs gleamed from behind its shattered helmet faceplate. Almost immediately tags and multi-colored outlines glowed as Pig flooded his personal AR overlay with information.
“Do you have a positive?”
< Yes Sir. >
Pig’s speech mode was designed to be brief and concise; a trait Eric had insisted on soon after his corporate handlers had Pig installed. Combat was confusing enough as it was, no need to have his own AI droning on about non-essential matters inside his own brain.
< Load-out specs and species ident make it highly likely that our attackers are Dovan Alliance commandos. >
“Dovans?”
Surprise made Eric blurt out the word over the open tac-net. There was a stunned silence for a moment as the rest of the squad absorbed the news, and then the curses and questions began to flow. Occupied with working out the implications of Pig’s revelation, Eric ignored his squad’s uncharacteristic histrionics and focused on contingency plans.
“…Shut up before I do it for you!”
Eric finished his preparations and raised his head in time to catch that last exclamation from Bull. Good man.
“Okay, listen up.” Eric kept his voice calm as he mentally commanded Pig to send a newly-formulated battle schema to everyone over the squad-net. “We know what we’re up against and what they’re capable of. Doesn’t mean we can’t bloody them bad enough that they back off.”
There were a few grumbles over the ‘net but none of his men objected.
Eric smiled to himself as he went over the finer points of his plan. He had hand-picked and trained each and every one of these people, making them go through endless cycles of training and certification interspersed with high-intensity missions. By this time Eric was willing to bet on them against any regular military squad the entire galaxy could send against them.
“Focus!” Eric’s use of both his command voice and his favorite motivational word immediately stilled everyone. “There are exactly sixteen Dovan commandos behind this door, with Satan-knows how many more coming to reinforce.”
A few of his soldiers murmured at that, but most just waited.
“We need to hold this area until our guys up top can storm down the levels to get us out,” He emphasized the corridor outside on the battle schema he had created, highlighting several points on it.
“We retake that outside corridor we get an additional buffer for our defense: Serra and Rome can booby-trap the shit out of the area while Doc and a tech detail repair the defense turrets. But first…”
Eric’s smile was cruel as he unsheathed his boarding blade.
“Let’s clear the board.”