squirted more shields between us. They were closing in fast.
“It was worth a try,” Gorski said.
I called Kwon. “They are almost on top of us,” I told him. “Looks like the hull will be crawling with tin spiders soon.”
“Yes sir!” Kwon responded happily.
I recalled the stories he’d told me about his sister and how he’d joined up to fight machines. Today he was going to get his chance.
The first one landed about thirty seconds afterward. I heard it clank down upon the hull. It sounded like a brick docking with a steel deck, turning on its metal clamps. It was a solid, ringing sound. Everyone in the engine room looked at the ceiling.
“Turn back into the mass of them. Maybe the turrets will take a few out as they land.”
The ship heeled back into the storming enemy. A dozen more clanking sounds came-growing slowly in number at first then turning into a clattering shower. I was reminded of the slow build of popping sounds popcorn made in the microwave. It built and built then finally slowed to nothing as the last of the roving machines landed on my ship and began crawling around, looking for an entrance. Soon, they decided to make their own.
“We’ve got a breach, sir!” a voice squawked. “Deck four is depressurizing!”
“Fall back to the bulkheads,” ordered Kwon in my headset. “Keep firing as they come. If you can stand your ground for two minutes I’ll have a full company at your position.”
I stepped from foot-to-foot and waved impatiently at Sarin, indicating the external view on our screen. It was still depicting the Helios system. “Switch this off. Give me internal schematics.”
The ship showed up in outline. It was fuzzy in spots, as it wasn’t a perfect mapping. We hadn’t had time to do more than plant a dozen sensors around the vessel. I stared at the numerous red dots crawling over the cruiser. Our ship looked like a dog with a disease. This was the hardest part of command for me, listening to a fight nearby and waiting it out.
“They are in the breach sir! They are pushing us back!”
I didn’t recognize the marine’s voice, but he sounded young. It was probably one of the lieutenants. I jerked my head toward the exit. I didn’t even have a pack on. “Everyone except for the core bridge crew will suit up. Arm yourselves with a generator and projector.”
Startled, a half-dozen staffers hustled to put on generator packs and cradling projectors. I joined them, sealing myself into my battle suit. There was a row of packs against the aft wall. I took a heavy pack as the gravity was light and I wanted killing power when I pressed the firing stud. I soon had a rifle in my hand and it felt good.
“We have four breaches now, Colonel,” Kwon buzzed in my helmet. “Most of them are hitting the big hole we used to board the ship.”
Naturally, I thought. That would be the easiest point of access. The hole was big and there weren’t any welded-shut doors to drill through. He didn’t have to tell me where the other four points of entry were. They were attacking in their classic diamond-formation. They would penetrate at four compass points and converge. I had to wonder what ROM circuit in their heads made them do that.
Then I remembered Sandra. Her comatose body was in the medical brick very close to the breached area. I heard Kwon’s breathing; he’d left his transmitter keyed open. He sounded stressed. The distinctive sound of sizzling laser bolts went off in my helmet.
“Sarin, take the bridge,” I said, heading for the door. “I’m taking a reserve company to the main breach. We can’t let them take our bricks.”
I hit the exit at a run. Assisted by my suit’s exoskeleton, my nanite-injections, low-gravity and good old- fashioned adrenalin, each stride took me several yards across the deck plates. I left my surprised bridge crew behind. I could feel their staring eyes on my back, but I didn’t care.
30
Kwon had a full company in the breach, but it wasn’t enough. He’d had the foresight to set up firing positions inside the ship, but for the most part it was men, machines and blazing lasers.
The enemy marines were tough. They weren’t like the units we’d met up with before. I’d thought of those Macros as marines, but I’d been wrong. I realized now they had only been ship security troops. They might even have been worker Macros with different heads clamped on. These Macros were a different animal entirely. They were longer, taller and had an extra set of legs. Their guns were bigger, and they had three of them. One was a central heavy beam unit in their head section that they used to drill with. They could blow a hole in a deck or a wall as big as their own bodies in ten seconds with that thing. The other two beams were smaller but individually aimed. I quickly dubbed these ‘anti-personnel’ because they were chewing up my men with high rate of pulsing fire. The bolts spat something purplish-I suspected it edged into the ultraviolet and that I could only see the beams due to the properties of my helmet. These anti-personnel weapons were mounted on their sides, about where wings might have sprouted on a flying insect. They swiveled a full three-sixty from there and stitched my men with burning holes.
“Concentrate fire!” Kwon roared. “Squad leaders mark your targets. Everyone beam down your leader’s target!”
It sounded good, but it wasn’t really working out. The Macros were flooding in and scrabbling forward. With three beams each and huge, armored bodies as targets, his men could hardly take them down. I could see the error of our ways very quickly. We were still carrying light beamers for the most part. We’d had to run from Helios in a hurry and hadn’t been able to rearm. Most of our heavy beamers we’d converted into laser turrets, which hadn’t done much other than give the Macro invaders some target practice out there on the hull. They’d popped like a hundred-odd light bulbs.
There I was, running onto the scene with one of the few heavy beamer kits on my back. The light beamers weren’t quite enough to take these armored Macros. They were a different breed-not as bad as the building-sized Macros I’d fought back on Earth-but much more dangerous than the Asian-car-sized enemy we’d been dealing with lately.
“Kwon,” I barked. “Put every man who can fire on one target. You lead, you are packing a heavy kit.”
“Colonel Riggs? How’d you know that?”
“‘Cause I’m standing behind you.”
He craned his head around and threw me a wave. Then he turned back and relayed my orders over the command channel. One of the Macros popped up on top of a sleeping-brick next to me. Kwon lit him up and we all joined in. He still got off enough pulses from those purple automatics to tear up one of Kwon’s boys. Then he melted with thirty-odd smoking holes burned through his armor.
We burned down the next and the one after that. Things were looking pretty good. Then the bugs figured out where the organizers were.
There was a tiny blip of a pause while they all thought together. I could see it. I could see them all think and then come to a group decision. In unison, every last cursed one of them turned and rushed our position.
There was a buzzing in my helmet. I tried to ignore it, but finally responded. “Say again?”
It was Captain Gorski’s voice: “sir, all other positions have pulled back. Repeat: the enemy are all heading over the hull to your position. All of them.”
I got it then. The Macros had made a decision. Maybe-just maybe-they’d caught my transmission and heard my voice. Or maybe they’d heard Kwon call me Colonel Riggs. I had the feeling they didn’t like Colonel Riggs by this time.
“Fall back!” I screamed, ignoring command protocols. “FALL BACK!”
Two marines went down under a storm of incoming fire. I saw them coming right at me. At least eight of them crawled forward urgently. It was dinner time in the spider cage and someone had dropped me inside. Kwon stood up, blazing fire at the advancing enemy as he retreated. He got between me and the enemy, but they came on, heedless of their own safety. I was ducking away by this time, heading for a bulkhead where I could see my men escaping.
