“We're inside, sealing the doors behind us but I don't know how much time that will buy us,” Ayan was saying in his subdermal earpiece, out of breath.
“All right, we're coming,” Jake replied as he looked into the clearing dust. “What do you think Alaka?”
“They don't consider us much of a threat,” he said as he lowered the long protective visor on his improvised helmet. The face protection had been welded together using whatever material the hull of the starfighter he had taken his beam weapon from one could assume. The colour and metals were a perfect match. “They're concentrating on getting that door open.”
“Let's rush them,” Jake suggested as he mentally counted at least three squads of soldiers filling the tunnel. “I doubt they know how well armed we are.” He brought the power level of his rifle up to maximum, he would only get nineteen shots before he'd have to reload but each one would cause a small explosion as the superheated energy struck solid material.
“You're crazy, go ahead,” sneered Vernen.
Alaka burst to his feet with a roar, followed by Jake and everyone else who carried a weapon. The air vibrated as his beam cannon cut across the soldiers, super heating the metal rail ties that they used as cover and mercilessly cutting down a dozen West Keeper troops who were caught completely off guard. Jake and the rest of the rebels opened fire as well, doing their part to push the enemy back and do enough damage to represent four times their number. Surprise was on their side, the West Watch commanders had underestimated or had somehow neglected to notice them at all.
Within seconds the tunnel ahead was littered with corpses and the recall order was given by the other side. Alaka drew a rifle with each great paw as he gave his beam weapon time to regenerate its power reserves and fired at the retreating soldiers. “Everyone break for the entrance!” he called out loud enough for the civilians to hear him without the assistance of a communicator.
“Everyone move up! We're heading into the station!” Jake relayed through his subdermal comm.
The rebels ran as hard and as fast as they could, and as the broken wall came into view they could see that the soldiers were moving out of the open space of the abandoned transit station, taking cover and not offering much resistance. Jake's visor picked up small electronic devices as they came to the broken double doors leading into the spaceport. “They dropped proximity mines behind them so we can't press them down the tunnel,” Jake said. “They may have dropped more inside the spaceport entrance, I'll do the sweep.”
“Be careful,” Alaka said from behind him as he watched the relative darkness of the tunnel beyond the wall. They had ceased firing back altogether, having taken cover from the rush of rebels.
“Don't die or nothin',” Vernen added. “Don't know what I'd do if you blew your own fool ass up,” he snickered.
Jake turned the electromagnetic sensitivity to his command and control unit up and watched its small screen as he moved forward at a respectable pace. “Start letting refugees inside, just tell them to stop as soon as they can see me,” he said after sweeping the space up to the first step. “This place must be old, I don't see a lift or any ramps.”
“This tunnel was probably put in with the first colony a few hundred years ago, they didn't use much automation for the city then since most people here were still farmers and the bots were in the fields,” Alaka replied.
“All right the first two flights are clear, I'm seeing a light on up there.”
A bold of energy flashed by Jake's head and scorched the wall behind him. He ducked down low, taking several steps backwards.
“Be careful, some of those soldiers probably made it inside, we already took out about half a squad,” Oz said over the communicator.
“Hi Oz, great timing as usual,” Jake said, smiling to himself and creeping up around the next corner of the stairwell, rifle muzzle first.
“Already spotted them?”
“Well, they spotted me, but I'm all right,” Jake caught sight of one of them, crouched low, his right side just exposed enough. He took aim and fired, blasting through the soldier's armour in one shot. One of his comrades leaned out just a second later and returned fire.
Instead of taking cover Jake took his shot and as the crude head's up display showed that the sight was lined up perfectly with the soldier's head the trigger made a resounding, empty click. Narrowly ducking under several deadly shots himself, he almost fell back down the stairs but instead splayed out, bashing his knee hard against the concrete stairs. “God dammit!” he shouted as he hurriedly loaded his last cartridge into the stolen rifle.
“Everything okay?” Ayan asked.
“Just a chaos minute, I'm fine,” Jake tried to shoot back and watched the connection between his rifle and the fresh energy cartridge fail. He smashed the butt of it against the wall, forcing the cartridge to make the connection and watched the indicator flicker from red to green. “What I'd give for a good armoured vacsuit and a replacement sidearm,” he said as he peeked around the corner, saw the leg of the fallen soldier he'd shot and rushed forward.
The attack was an execution of training and instinct. He was up the next flight of stairs in three steps, rolled onto the landing and opened fire on the four soldiers who were waiting for him. He caught one of them in the hip, the next fully in the face, shot the third in the chest and before he could shoot the fourth an energy bolt caught him in the shin, burning the flesh clean through.
His next shot missed entirely, striking the ceiling instead, but the following one caught the last soldier in the chest. The pain of his framework body regenerating and repairing the dead tissue of his shin and calf forced him to grind his teeth together in a grimace that brought on tears. After a few seconds the regeneration was complete. “Surrender and I'll put you in stasis so your people can treat you,” Jake said to the soldier who held one hand to a grisly open wound in his hip while he tried to hold his sidearm up in his general direction.
The West Keeper soldier's shaky hand dropped his sidearm; “Just take the pain away.”
As the fierce itching and wrenching pain in his calf faded Jake stood up and set his command and control unit to administer a dose of emergency stasis medication. He picked up the man's sidearm and injected him. In seconds the soldier sighed and passed into deep stasis.
“The stairway is clear,” Jake said as he holstered the sidearm, picked up a rifle and took four clips from the bodies of the fallen soldiers.
Alaka was right behind him in seconds, his great bulk moving with surprising grace and ease up the stairwell.
“We've come under fire from the outpost they set up here! They have reinforcements. We can hold the way to the Clever Dream but I don't know for how long,” Ayan informed him over the sound of weapons' fire.
“We have to get moving, everyone ready?” Jake asked.
“Ready,” Alaka answered flatly.
They pushed on the metal door that the West Keeper soldiers had almost completely cut through and with a ear piercing creak Alaka, Jake and a few other resistance fighters managed to pry it open enough to get through. As they entered the oldest section of the spaceport they were greeted by the lights and sounds of an active firefight nearby. “Through there! Get everyone through there! There's someone down the hall who'll direct you!” Jason directed Alaka before seeing Jake. He and two other refugees were waiting by the double doors to help Alaka's group.
Jake caught sight of Jason as Alaka and he helped people through the doorway. “I promised your wife I'd get you back to the Triton, are you packed?” he asked with a grin.
“Oh my God, it's good to see you!” Jason exclaimed in surprise. “We need help holding them off! This way!”
Jake, Alaka and several of the fighters from their group followed Jason down a grey and green hallway marked by the passage of millions of feet, the metal floor had a permanent dip where the material had been worn down. Generous archways led into an old grand foyer that was gilded with scrollwork and old fashioned wooden facades over top the metal and concrete structure. The more recent addition of scorch marks and evidence of small arms explosions made the contested space look more like a ruin than an old section of the port.
Ayan, Oz and their comrades had taken cover behind the archway supports and the walls behind it. The enemy were in a similar position across the grand foyer.
The exchange of fire was fierce, and Jake could see there were already two wounded being carried out as
