Sergeant Grays
“Shit! I’m dry!” I shouted into the comms as I heard the all too familiar clicking noise of my bolter running out of ammo again. I took cover behind another building as a hail of plasma came sailing my way from the line of Yalayans that pushed forward with reckless abandon.
“Request received, standby for resupply,” came the voice of the head of the armory.
While I was waiting for the resupply drone to make its way from the armory to the fight, I looked at the camera feed of the battle. Considering how badly we were outnumbered; it was extremely satisfying to see our forces at the very least holding back the hoard of aliens that were hellbent on taking the ship. The fighting had been going on for two minutes now, and several more pods worth of soldiers had made their way into the engagement, while all we had for reinforcements were artillery and tanks made for human sized crew, and human sized ground forces.
While the tanks and artillery didn’t pack the same punch as a bolter, they were a valuable asset to have for the simple fact that they were small, hard to hit, and had similar armor capabilities that mechs had. I watched in fascination as a squad of Yalayans tried desperately to gun down a group of ten tanks that refused to back down, allowing one of the meched combatants to put a well-placed bolter round in three of them while the tanks finished off the last one. On another camera I saw a group of artillery guns bombard a particularly stuck in group of aliens. Their body armor may be the best that they’ve come up with, but high explosive armor piercing anti-tank rounds are high explosive armor piercing anti-tank rounds. Doesn’t matter who you are, you’re probably going to die.
And all of this didn’t even account for another facet of our forces, the ground troops that weren’t lucky enough to get a mech to drive were given all manner of explosive weapons and armored vehicles to get them close enough to start sabotaging things. I looked at another feed of a soldier peeking around a corner long enough to fire a rocket at the face of one of those damn xenos. It was quite satisfying to see the alien’s head explode into a shower of gore that covered the others around it. They tried to shoot the human, but they ducked into the building itself before they could get shot. I saw another human soldier on the top of one of the apartment buildings throw a crate’s worth of explosives off the roof and at the feet of another squad of aliens, painting the block they were standing in a sickly green, like a toddler that found the paint bucket.
Come to think of it, the only reason us mechs are here is to give the enemy something to shoot at that isn’t the people doing the actual damage. I shrugged to myself as I finally saw the resupply drone flying towards me. It was large and bulky, with enough ammo to keep me going for another couple of minutes or so if I was lucky. I ejected the spent ammo pack on my back and prepared for the docking procedure. I was so preoccupied with getting more ammo, that I didn’t even notice the Yalayan that managed to sneak up on me.
I was shoved into the wall of the apartment building that I was taking cover behind, crumbling the building partially as I fell to the ground with the Yalayan on top of me. The rubble obscured my vision as the sensors on my chest reported a heavy weight being put on it. I couldn’t tell if it was more rubble or the Yalayan that thought it was a good idea to get on top of me. I made to get up when the mech reported damage in the left shoulder, right where two plates of armor met, and a sickening, chittering voice said, “You Terrans think that you can stop what’s coming? I am going to enjoy this.”
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Horror flooded my system as I tried to move even more, only to find myself pinned down by the rubble and the enemy on top of me. I shook the head of the mech from side to side, desperately trying to get rid of the rubble and see my attacker, but to no avail. I tried to throw off the attacker by flailing the arms but found to my horror that the left one wasn’t working at all. The damage reports kept getting longer and more urgent. “I need fucking help NOW!” I shouted into the mic.
This can’t be how I go out. My mech pinned down underneath rubble as it is slowly pulled apart by a single combatant in what is essentially the home base for humanity outside of the Sol system. While I could guarantee that my name would go down in history for several reasons, I did not want this to be my end. I flailed around with my right arm until I had the handle. I was pulling it out of its sheath when I heard a loud gunshot somewhere above me and heard the slump of a body hitting armor.
The knife was removed from the shoulder blade, and I suddenly saw the rubble being swept off me until I finally saw the face of Collin’s mech. He offered a hand to help me up. “You broken yet Sarge?”
“The left arm’s nonfunctional, but I only need one to fire a bolter, so I’m still in this fight,” I replied as I took his hand and got hauled up.
He let go of my hand and picked up the resupply drone. It looked like it got shot to hell, with several plasma blasts creating craters in the scarred metal. That didn’t change the fact that it was still functional. “Here you go Sarge, you’re going to need it, unless you’re planning to take on the whole force with a pocketknife.”
“Quit it with the damn quips and get that shit going Collins, that’s an order,” I snapped, still shaken by my personal encounter with the enemy. I turned around and felt the familiar weight of the ammo drone settle and click onto my back. I gave a sigh of relief as I heard rounds being funneled into the gun mounted to my wrist. I heard the familiar sound of a round getting funneled into the receiver. “Now who’s ready to kill some xenos bastards?”
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Elias
OhGodohshitohfuck.
That was the only thing on my mind as I tried desperately to huddle in the corner of my apartment, flinching at the slightest noise. I had to admit, though, that I felt the explosions more than I heard them, as so many had taken place that I barely heard anything. Tears ran down my face as I looked down at my phone. I had desperately been trying to reach my wife and kids since the attacks had started, but I couldn’t reach them. After thirty minutes of arguing with my boss that I had to find out if they were ok, I had finally made it to the apartment before everything went to shit, but before I could get out, everything just started happening at once. I could hear the chittering of alien speech outside of the window, and I knew it was only a matter of time until they either found me, or demolished the building that I was in.
As I closed my eyes and began to sob more and more, I resigned myself to probably never seeing my family ever again.
That was until I heard the door break down and footsteps enter the living room. I looked up in curiosity as I saw a soldier with a rocket launcher go to the window, open it, aim the rocket at what I presume was an alien, and fire, deafening me more than I already was. As he slung the rocket off his shoulder to load another, he happened to spot me in the corner of the room. He did a double take, before crossing the room over to me, gripping my shoulder. I couldn’t hear what he was saying very well, but I managed to hear him the second time through the ringing. “What the fuck are you still doing here?”