'I'm hanging on to the rocks just over the edge of the escarpment just about two hundred meters form you, sir. That is why I can still receive your transmissions. If you will wait I'll reroute your AIC through the infrastructure uplink through the big ship in orbit back down to the appropriate ships. I certainly hope little Deanna is all right. Although I do see two vehicles at the bottom of the ravine with my optical sensors. If you leaned over the edge you could probably contact them. But please be careful, sir.'
'Thanks, BIL.' Moore waited impatiently for what seemed like forever and wasn't sure he wanted to decide it was safe to get up yet, especially since they were out of ammo. All of them were out of ammo.
On the other hand, he was getting more and more worried about his daughter and his wife. Had they made it to the bottom safely? Had they been evacuated out?
I'm sure they made it, sir, Abigail said. BIL is connecting me now. I'll let you know in a few seconds.
'Sergeant Clay!'
'Yes sir, second lieutenant?'
'As we are completely out of ammo and for all intents and purposes out of this fight, why don't we see about finding those evac ships and see if we can find any surviving wounded out there,' Second Lieutenant Thomas Washington said. Moore approved of the young lieutenant and thought to himself that he would watch him closely and maybe even see what he could do to help the young Marine's career.
The second lieutenant stood and ran a quick sensor sweep over the battlefield and could see no immediate threats. Since they had reset their software Moore suspected that the Marine would trust his suit's sensors. Washington whistled in amazement and horror as he looked across the battlefield at the dead mecha and soldiers and pockmarked and bloodstained Martian landscape. Moore decided to give it a few seconds to see if the Marine was shot down, and when he wasn't, joined him.
Moore rose to his feet cautiously beside the second lieutenant. The sun was beyond the overhead point and was beginning on its way into evening. The evening sun glinted off the hundreds of fragments of torn-asunder mecha and armor suits. Moore whistled at the site.
'Hell of a fight, hey, Lieutenant?' Private First Class Vineat 'Kootie' Kudaf said.
Abigail? the senator asked his AIC.
I'm communicating with them now, senator. The evac ships set down at the bottom of the escarpment. They have your wife and daughter and Reyez Jones safe and sound, sir. Apparently Deanna would like to jump off the cliff again as she thought it was a lot of fun.
That's my girl.
Yes sir. Acorn didn't fall far did it?
Humph.
But the battle still rages in orbit and the pilots of the evac ships tell us that they have no place to return to so they are staying put for the moment.
What about the naval base to the south? Can't we go there?
For right now sir, they say their instructions are to stay put out of harm's way.
Then tell them that we are clear up here and could use help with wounded.
Yes, Senator.
Timmy! Captain Jefferson wanted to avoid a suicide run with the Madira if at all possible but things weren't looking good at the moment. The DEGs had bought them critical minutes that the fighter squadrons put to good use and in a heroic last effort one of his Marines had ripped the weapon of mass destruction from the bowels of the Seppy hauler and rocketed it out to detonate harmlessly in space. But that goddamned hauler was still falling on a collision course toward Mons City and would hit in minutes if they couldn't break it up. Or at least push it out of the way.
Aye sir?
Get the vulnerable attitude control point of that hauler transmitted to the squadron AICs! Get all the firepower available focused on that spot to push the hauler off course.
Aye, sir! Uncle Timmy had already analyzed the Seppy haulers and discovered the best places to concentrate fire in order to make its attitude go unstable or push its trajectory an arc second to the west so it would miss Mons City—or at least the main dome. Since the Marine FM-12 pilots had gone on board the enemy ship and taken out the guidance and control power-plant stabilizers, it was now a matter of just pushing the ship hard enough to make it tumble. If they couldn't make it tumble and burn up on reentry then they'd push it over some. But it was a big ship with lots of forward momentum and worse was that just as the Marines were entering the ship the Seppies had put a roll on it so that it was spinning about its axis of travel, giving it gyroscopic stability. Therefore the concentrated firepower at the nose of the ship was causing it to precess about its axis just like a tilted planet does about its poles or a top does before it falls to the ground. It would be hard to push it over. It would be hard to move. And if they didn't, millions in Mons City were about to have a very bad day. A. Very. Bad. Day.
'CO Madira! CO Thatcher!' squawked over the command net.
'Go, Thatcher.'
'Wally, we've got propulsion and that's about it! Life support is failing rapidly and I'm ordering all hands to abandon ship. I don't think the Thatcher is salvageable after this. She's been a good boat,' the CO of the Margaret Thatcher informed the fleet commander. 'But I've got an idea.'
'What do you need, Sharon?' The CO was now down to three supercarriers and most of them had only missiles and cannons and were limping along at half normal space propulsion. The DEGs had overheated and fused on all of them and they were all venting life support into space. The Separatists' attack on the fleet had been brilliantly
