Stephen Berry - The Battle for Terra Two

"Colonel Griswold," Sutherland called over the radio, "get 'em down now! Don't try for your primary LZ!"

The bulky troop carriers were still eighty yards up, making for the parking lot, when the cannon shrilled. A thick cobalt-blue fusion beam shot out, turning the lead chopper into a fiery ochre ball that hurled blackened bits of men and machine to earth.

The explosion was still echoing out over the Potomac when a second beam detonated another chopper.

Fifty yards above the parking lot, Sutherland saw the cannon lock onto his chopper.

"Shit," said the pilot, pulling the aircraft hard right.

Swooping in and over, the two escorting Apache gun-ships rocketed the cannon. The salvo went wide, small geysers of flame and dirt bursting around the S'Cotar position.

The cannon shrilled again, dissolving the tail rotor of Sutherland's chopper, then tracked right, firing short blue bursts. The Apaches exploded almost together, two flaming spheres touching as they dissolved into a rain of molten debris.

The earth rushed toward Sutherland, slamming him against a bulkhead. Blackness.

What was left of the real Ferris wheel lay between the midway and the cannon-only the motor housing itself, the motor and superstructure long since sold for scrap. Crawling low, McShane reached it just as the gunships were hit. He threw himself flat, hands over his head as flaming metal showered the area. As it ended, he peered cautiously over the rusting metal.

Most of the S'Cotar were deployed at the park's other end. The fusion cannon had only its four warrior crew: one in the gun chair, swiveling with the weapon, the other three maintaining tracking and energy feeds from a gray, all-weather console. Their broad green backs were to McShane. There was no sentry.

Remarkably stupid, thought McShane.

It had taken him five hard minutes to break from the firefight. He was tired, so tired. Sleep, his body told him, sleep. You'll sleep soon enough, he reminded himself.

Crawling along the midway, he'd wanted to stop a thousand times-stop, hide behind some piece of wreckage and close his eyes.

The screams had kept him going, brought him here. The screams of kids hit by S'Cotar fire, the commandos he'd sat with at briefing, joked with on the bus from McLean. The screams of the marines trapped and burning in the choppers' wreckage-high-pitched, keening, inhuman screams that finally, mercifully, died. Kids, all kids.

McShane wanted that cannon. And there it was, no more than one hundred feet away.

Twisting his blaster-cane to self-destruct, he stepped from cover, walking quickly into the clearing between him and the cannon, blaster held loosely at his side, its rising shrill lost in the whine and crash of blaster fire, the explosion of another helicopter as the cannon spat again.

The smoke, bedlam and his own surreal calm reminded McShane of Tarawa, a long time ago, crawling toward that pillbox, a grenade in hand.

At twenty feet he stopped, still unseen. Gripping the weapon by its muzzle, he spun it three times over his head, releasing it to land clanging against the gun console.

McShane had seen S'Cotar warriors in combat before. Their speed still amazed him. Whirling, the nearest three were out of their chairs before the blaster had barely touched the gray-mesh decking.

As the cannon shrilled again, two of them dove after the blaster, now screaming in terminal overload. Pulling his weapon, the third shot an unmoving McShane through the chest. Bob crumpled as a warrior scooped up his blaster-cane, tentacle arching to hurl it away.

Wah-whootnp! The blaster atomized the warriors and triggered the cannon's chargepac, vaporizing the gun. The explosion lit the Potomac Basin, a searing white flash seen from West Virginia to the Maryland shore.

As the cannon went up, Sug-Atra flicked to the surface, blaster in tentacle. Form on me! he ordered, standing at the foot of Xanadu's stairs.

The ninety surviving biofabs rallied, the warriors taking cover along the midway, fronting Xanadu, their last transmute appearing behind them. Beside him stood Sug-Atra.

Why is that portal still functioning? he demanded as the biofabs opened fire on the marines spilling from their choppers.

The portal sentries were killed, said the other transmute. I've sent two more. The one who remains will report when… The M16-round ripped through his thorax, throwing his body across the stairs.

Cursing, Sug-Atra flicked to cover.

You have blasters to their slug throwers! he raged. Cut them down!

They are too many, said the senior warrior. We have no cover. Their infiltrators have our flanks pinned.

Blaster beams and bullets rent the air. Gunfire and blaster shrilling mingled with the screams of the wounded and dying.

The S'Cotar were keeping the infantry at bay, blaster fire raking the marines' position. The Terrans' forward area was a charnel house-the blasted bodies of the point squad lay twisted among the smoldering wreckage of a chopper.

Sutherland staggered from the chopper, pistol in hand, blood oozing from a deep gash in his forehead. Running low, he zigzagged twenty yards to a light machine-gun position. "Where's the CP?" he shouted at the lance corporal feeding the belt.

The kid pointed to a shallow concrete drainage ditch skirting the shattered picket fence. Riflemen were spread along the ditch, raking the S'Cotar line.

Sutherland dashed off, covering half the distance before a heavy fusion beam touched the machine gun, scattering it and its crew like torn paper.

The CIA Director dived into the muddy ditch, azure beams crackling over his head. He looked up into Colonel Griswold's flint-gray eyes. "We got our asses wiped enough for you yet, Mr. Sutherland?"

"What time is it, Colonel?" Sitting, he rested against the concrete wall, breathing hard, pistol across his knee.

Griswold glanced at his watch. "Twelve twenty-eight. We are twenty-eight minutes into this debacle."

"Two more minutes, Griswold," said Sutherland. "Then you can take them."

Four men away, a gunnery sergeant dropped his rifle and fell backward, spasms jerking his body. His neck ended in a charred, smoldering stump.

The PFC to Griswold's right started screaming hysterically. The colonel brought the muzzle of his. 45 down behind the kid's left ear. He crumpled into the ditch, unconscious. Griswold turned him over, getting his face out of the brackish water.

"Why?" demanded the colonel, turning back to Sutherland. "I've lost over two hundred men in this idiocy. Why?"

Sutherland touched his forehead, feeling the sticky clot. "Can't hurt now. That building the S'Cotar are massed in front of?"

"Yes?"

"There's a K'Ronarin commando unit infdtrating it, from the rear."

"Are they taking the bugs from behind?"

Sutherland shook his head. "No. We're going to take them from the front. Those commandos will prevent the S'Cotar from accessing something in that building. Then they have a vital mission elsewhere. They're not to be wasted in this operation."

"And we are?" said Griswold, face pale.

"It's necessary," said Sutherland. "Otherwise, Colonel, in a few months, maybe sooner, you'd be fighting swarms of S'Cotar for this planet. Fighting and losing." He checked his watch. "Time."

Expressionless, the colonel spoke into his handset. "Red Pack Leader to Red Pack Pitcher. Execute, execute. Tango one niner."

From behind them came the dullkruump! of mortars firing.

"Fix bayonets!" shouted Griswold, looking up and down the line. "Fix bayonets!" He cocked his. 45.

"Bayonets…! Bayonets…!'' The command echoed down the line. Drawing his combat knife, Griswold stepped from the ditch, bracketed by blaster fire. "Follow me!" he cried, voice high above the din. "Forward!"