John Carr - Siege of Tarr-Hostigos

Verkan took one trooper out with a slash to the eye, another with the heel of his left hand and the third with point of his blade into the armpit, where there was only thin chainmail. Before he could disengage, he saw the barrel of the biggest pistol barrel he'd ever seen, and then an explosion. He fell to the ground with a thud. I'm fine, he told himself, as a searing, tearing pain ripped apart his chest. Someone's booted heel gouged his cheek and then the wave of troops passed over him. He heard shouts of "Down Styphon!" and screaming cries of "Kill Kalvan" and then it all faded into oblivion…

Verkan awoke to someone slapping his face. "Chief, can you hear me?"

He groaned, which was answered by a sigh of relief that he recognized as coming from Dalon Sath. As Kalvan would have said, it looked as if the Marines had landed after all…

"Don't pass out on me, again, Chief. This is going to hurt." Verkan could feel him struggling at the straps on his back-and-breast. He couldn't catch his breath and his chest hurt worse than the infected tooth he'd gotten back on Alexandrian-Roman when he'd been stranded there for three years…

"How are my Rifles?"

Sath shook his head. "We can talk when you're feeling better."

That was not the answer he'd wanted to hear. Verkan felt his head swim and moaned. Then a pain, like that of a tomahawk striking his chest, jerked him back to reality as Sath tried to un-hook his breastplate. Looking down, he noticed a strange rip in the metal of his chestplate, with pieces of steel bent every which way. He saw a red bubble and almost fainted. No time to pass out, old boy, Verkan told himself.

He exerted his First Level mental controls to pinch off the flow of blood to his left pectorals. Unfortunately, while he could also dampen the stabbing pain of ripped lung and broken ribs, he could not make the wound go away. "Medpack!" he stammered.

"Quiet, Chief! I have it right here, disguised as a lead bullet mold box. Every trooper should carry one…"

"Now, who's panicking?"

"Sorry, Chief-I'm not used to this. And if I screw up, I get to tell Dalla! Besides, this damn breastplate doesn't want to come off, not without taking two of your ribs with it."

Verkan winced. He felt a stinging hypospray shot in the arm. Moments later the pain disappeared and his head began to clear.

Finally Sath ripped the breastplate off; it had been caught on the flak jacket underneath, which was supposed to protect him from this kind of wound.

"I don't know what kind of big game gun you were shot with, Chief, but it tore the Styphon out of this plastisteel!

"I saw it, just before it went off-the biggest pistol I've ever seen, twelve-bore, maybe bigger."

"You're lucky that breastplate was reinforced with plastisteel, or he would have put your breastplate through your spine."

"Thanks for the comforting words, Sath!"

"Sorry, Chief. This is going to hurt. Here's another shot for the pain. Now, I've got a single-cell membrane bandage and I'm going to lay it over your chest. First, I'm going to put this stick between your teeth. It'll take about a minute before the membrane joins with your skin."

The mono-skin was an import from a Second Level world where the emphasis had been on biological science rather than the mechanical arts. Suddenly Verkan felt a searing pain, as if a pot of hot oil had been tossed on his naked chest. Nothing he'd ever felt had prepared him for this kind of pain! His teeth sank into the wood and he was covered in a cold sweat by the time the sheer agony receded, but he noticed that he could breathe easier.

"What happened?" he asked as soon as the pain was at a tolerable level, using self-hypnosis exercises to calm his adrenalin-charged body.

"The Styphoni rode right over us, Chief. We took a lot of them with us, but in the end they passed over the crest and right now they're chasing what's left of our friends."

"What about my Rifles?"

Dalon shook his head. "Sorry, Verkan. It doesn't look good. I'm sure some of them will get away, but most of them died right here." There were Hostigi and Harphaxi bodies three deep all over the ridge. "It was the dragoons who broke-not that I blame them! When you're out-numbered ten to one, out-sabered, out-gunned and facing the Investigation if you surrender-well, running seems like a pretty good option."

"How did you…?"

"Make it?" Sath finished. "I got this cut," he pointed to a superficial blade slash over his eye. "Which put me out for a few minutes; when I came to there were half a dozen dead Styphoni and Hostigi covering me. I saw a couple of scouts cutting throats and stripping the dead so I kept quiet. Some Temple Guards came along, the Red Hand with those bell mouthed muskets and pole arms of theirs. They chastised the looters. Several of them were shot right where they stood. Seems the Red Hand doesn't believe in stripping the dead until after the enemy is defeated. First time I ever felt like saluting those bastards!

"They left a couple of Harphaxi soldiers behind as observers; I managed to use my needier to good effect and took them all out-it took a while though. Mostly re-shooting their corpses with muskets so they looked like 'typical' battlefield casualties."

Verkan nodded. "Good thinking under pressure. We don't want to contaminate a battlefield which Kalvan might possibly visit. Did you find the bodies I left-"

Dalon Sath nodded. "I prettied them up, too. Then I went looking for you, Chief. You had me worried there for a little bit. At least, till I saw you were still breathing."

"We're still not in the clear. We need to find a place to hole up until nightfall."

"I agree. Think you can walk now? I can help."

Verkan groaned, but made it to his feet. Not even the drugs could keep the stabbing pains in his chest at bay. "Let's go. Have any plans?"

"Yes, according to Kirv there's a small cave three ridges over. I've got a global nav on me and he's given me the coordinates. We should be able to hole up there until nightfall when Kirv can bring a lifter in."

Verkan felt a wave of pain-either physical or mental, or both. His bloodstream was filled with too many drugs to tell. Whatever happened, he knew he wouldn't forget this battle for the rest of his life-no matter how long he lived. What would Kalvan and Rylla think? No one had anticipated the Grand Host tossing a small army this way. Kalvan was going to have to sink or swim on his own for now…

The stabbing pains in his chest were hitting him like blades every time he lifted his right leg. Something was wrong with his leg, too. "Sath, I need more support!"

"Here, put your arm around my neck. I'm not big enough to carry you, but that should take some pressure off your right leg. I forgot to mention, someone shot you there but it's only a flesh wound. I bandaged it while you were out."

A cavalryman with a bloody sword in his hand rode out of some bushes. "Kill the Hostigi! Prepare to meet your comrades in Hadron's Hall!"

"You talk too much," Sath replied, as he calmly shot the trooper out of his saddle with his needier.

Verkan felt his head begin to swim from loss of blood.

"Chief, pull yourself together! You're too Dralm-damned big for me to carry!

After that all he remembered was the steady rhythm of one-step, two-step, three-step, four-

Sirna found herself mindlessly pacing back and forth before the locked metal door that led to the Hostigos Paratime Transposition Depot.

"Stop that infernal pacing, Sirna," Professor Lathor Karv said. "You're going to wear ruts in the floor stones! How will we explain that to the Foundry workers?"

Sirna bit back a sarcastic rejoinder. She wasn't sure in her own mind why she was so concerned about Chief Verkan, except that she liked him. To her he'd always been the most competent and strongest man in any room. To know the Chief was lying in the depot with a sucking chest wound only demonstrated how vulnerable all the timeliners were, trapped in the middle of a war, on a time-line millions of parayears from First Level. Not only was outtime work hard and messy-but dangerous, too.