Part One
Theyre coming again!
Gunnery Sergeant Forger could hear the poorly disguised terror in the rookie lieutenants
voice manning the internal monitor screens... and swore. Two corridors away in the rusty old
space border station, a full company of Coalition Speznaz assault commandos starting moving
towards the hanger bay where his team lay.... The start of what History would later call the
final assault on the last day of the hundred-year Alliance-Coalition War.
Stay cool,
L-T Forger spat quietly at his nervous 20-year old Platoon Commander on private channel.
Remember to keep an eye on external scans too. You never know, the navy could arrive and
save our asses yet, heheheah. The young man, face streaked in dirt and sweat, squeezed out
a nervous smile at his mentor. The words were a source of strength to the lieutenant,
although realistically they both knew there would be no rescue.... Because in this last
desperate phase of the war the Alliance Navy only existed as blasted, twisted wrecks manned
by their long-dead crews.... spinning slowly in the dark and cold of space: The debris of
an utter, all-encompassing defeat. The only Alliance military still alive were in
out-of-the-way forgotten outposts such as this one, places the Coalition contemptuously
ignored until all other targets were eliminated. Perhaps this one, Murdock Station in the
Sol outer Dark Matter Belt, was the last... No communication with other Alliance forces had
been made in the month since the remnants of the Ranger Company had arrived at the deserted,
moth-balled base... huddled and shivering in a assault craft-turned lifeboat; nearly out of
power, air, and water.
Thanks Gunny, dont know what Id do without
you...
Ignoring the words, Forger subliminally vocalized Switch to Squad to his AI
comm, and at the same time flipped his rifles sight screen to IR with a smooth, practiced
motion. Team Five, dont fire your rifles until they come through the blast doors in
strength, save your ammo. Sammy, keep the pulse laser on the center of the doors and just
keep blastin down the corridor. Jamu, as soon they break through start pumping 40 mm HE
straight at em.
The hulking figure of Lance Corporal Jamu Hyderbad laying on the
dirty steel deck waved his grenade launcher slightly in reply... His normally smiling
features screwed up in nervous concentration, staring at the massive double steel
doors.
Two minutes passed; the remaining fourteen men of Marine Rangers Death
Battalion D Company, Third Platoon thinking of their lost homes, of dead comrades,
friends, and family. Or simply waiting in mute silence to kill... and then be killed in
kind. A few could be heard muttering prayers quietly. Most were veterans of at least a dozen
fights, and knew that Alliance Marine Rangers were not taken prisoner by the Coalition:
Deemed too dangerous to have around and not worth their meager value as mine slaves. Since
there was no longer a Geneva, Switzerland.... there were no longer any conventions to
uphold. Forger spent the time counting spare rifle clips, each 10 cm. long magazine holding
500 deadly, razor-sharp fleshette rounds that when accelerated to hyper-mach speed by the
rifles magnetic rails, would cut through almost any armor a man could carry... and shred
and explode his flesh into unrecognizable horror. Enough ammo to repulse one good assault he
mused... After that ? He grimly quirked a smile at the thought... Not likely to matter.
Suddenly the tense stillness was shattered by a blast wave of heat and ultra-bright
light, as the Coalition assault engineers fired their mini-nuc cannon at point-blank range
into the interior docking bay blast doors, instantly turning an oval 3-meter area into
molten slag... The armor-cast steel a brilliant white at the center and then going yellow
and orange out towards the edges. Forger watched in fascination as the steel sagged and
flowed to the deck like a scene from hell... The soldiers armorsuit and face shield
protecting him from the worst of the heat and intense light. He called out on the all-squad
channel:
Ahright, here they come. Kill them, just kill them... We got nothin to
lose so give 'em everything u got.
Forger aimed his rifle at the at gaping hole in
the doors and pulled the trigger.
