Stephen Berry - The Battle for Terra Two

"Tactical three," said K'Raoda into his communicator. "Remember," he said softly, his voice heard only by the thirty-man honor guard a few meters behind him, "when it starts, fall back to the lift access corridor and take out any who get through."

Z'Sha was watching K'Tran, now about two hundred meters away. "There's a Fourth Dynasty painting, Commander, in the museum ring on K'Ronar. It's done in old style-paint on spun plant fiber. The artist's name doesn't survive, but it's a brilliant work, 'The Assessor comes to T'Gan.' Do you know it?"

"No, sir," said K'Raoda, hoping K'Tran wouldn't notice the unfastened safety strap on his holster.

"It depicts a man at the head of a column of Imperial Marines, striding down the street of this squalid Agro town-you can all but taste the dust and smell the manure. The few people about are scurrying fearfully away. The artist's perspective is from the end of the street, watching the Assessor come. The Assessor is well dressed, handsome, with an assured, intelligent look. There is something cold and ruthless about the man's face, Commander, that holds one. It's the sort of face that comes toward us now."

The deadly parade halted, grounding arms with a crash that rattled off the distant ceiling. K'Tran covered the twenty meters to K'Raoda and the Ambassador in a few seconds, halting before Z'Sha and snapping a brisk salute. "Captain T'Ral, Task Force One-Seven-Five attending, Excellency."

"Welcome, Captain."

K'Tran turned to K'Raoda. "I await your salute, Commander."

K'Raoda nodded, looking into the other's pale blue eyes. "You're fronted and flanked on two sides, K'Tran," he said. "Surrender or die."

A brief flicker of surprise crossed the corsair's face. "Point one to you, Commander," he said, smiling faintly. "Point two to me." His hand a blur of motion, he drew his blaster and fired point blank at K'Raoda.

"He's going for the bridge," said D'Trelna, bringing the shuttle out from underImplacable, racing toward her top hull.

"The lift access?" asked McShane.

"Yes." Reaching the top hull, they leveled off, DTrelna keeping the shuttle so low that it barely skimmed the top of the highest turrets.

"What are you going to do?" asked McShane.

"Kill them," said the commodore, "before they kill us."

"Push that red button to your top right. Yes, that one," he nodded as McShane reached out.

A targeting overlay appeared on the screen, five concentric phosphor circles surrounding the familiar cross hairs.

"There!" cried McShane.

A line of space-suited figures were moving carefully toward the bullet-shaped pod lift housing, magnetized boots keeping them on the hull.

DTrelna fingered a touch pad, sending a stream of tracking data across the bottom of the scan.

As the shuttle swooped toward them, all but the corsair nearest the bullet-shaped lift pod stopped and opened fire.

Oblivious to the red blaster bolts, DTrelna waited till most of the corsairs were within the two smallest rings of the targeting overlay, then pushed the firing stud, twice.

Two small silver missiles shot out from the shuttle, flashing along the hull to explode silently among the corsairs, twin bursts of blue sending thousands of suit-and-flesh-rending flechettes into the corsairs.

The shuttle slowed, drifting over the carnage. McShane shook his head at the sight of torn bodies, severed heads, limbs and perfect spheres of blood slowly scattering into space. "What were those?"

"Anti-personnel missiles," said DTrelna. "Crude but effective." He frowned at the screen readout. "Almost effective."

"What's wrong?"

"The pieces down there equal twenty-nine corsairs. One got on board." He punched into the tactical network. "Bridge. D'Trelna. 'Ware boarders, top forward lift access."

K'Tran whirled as a pneumatic hissing filled the hangar. The sides of the assault boats had dropped-three hundred warsuited crew stared down their M32s at the corsairs.

"Lay down your arms!" The command boomed across the deck. "Lay down your arms!"

Orders filled the air as the corsair column split down the center, forming two double lines facing each row of assault boats.

"You can't win against warsuits," said K'Raoda, picking himself up from the deck, the silver gleam of a warsuit visible through the blaster holes in his tunic.

K'Tran glanced at K'Raoda, coolly surveyed the long lines of grim-faced crew, then turned back to K'Raoda. "Commander, I can do anything.

"S'Halir," he said, his voice carrying over the commnet to one of the shuttles, "fire!"

The red fusion beam snapped from the center shuttle's turret, tearing into the ceiling. Sparks showered the deck as the hangar's primary power nexus shattered.

"Fire!" shouted K'Raoda as the lights died.

Over six hundred blasters opened up, turning hangar deck into a battleground lit red by millisecond bursts of massed blaster fire.

"Engineering!" shouted K'Raoda over the din. "Light!"

"Hold on," grumbled N'Trol over the commnet. "There's a glitch in the nobreak."

"Identify and authenticate," said the bridge security station.

Ignoring computer's challenge, A'Tir slapped the black wedge onto the nearly invisible seam dividing the armored doors. She waited directly in front of the explosive, pistol in each hand, knowing if there was any blowback they'd have to scrape her off the bulkhead.

With a loudwhoomp! the shaped charge punched a man-size hole through the doors. It was still sounding as A'Tir plunged through the smoldering opening, blaster in each hand.

"Hangar deck's gone black," said D'Trelna, bringing the shuttle in toward the dark rectangle. Gone were the green-and-orange guidelights rimming the opening, gone too the warm wash of yellow that greeted incoming shuttles. Red lightning flickered from within.

"Blaster fire," said McShane.

"Lots of it," said D'Trelna. "Flight control doesn't respond. Have to go in on manual."

"You're not taking us into that?"

"Of course I am."

Straddling K'Raoda's chest, the corsair squeezed harder, teeth bared, basking in the pleasure of another life throbbing desperately between his fingers.

Vision blurring, lungs bursting, K'Raoda felt his grip slipping from the killer's thick, hairy wrists.

The blaster bolt sheared off the top of the corsair's head, tumbling his body to the deck, teeth still bared, eyes wide with amazement.

Z'Sha appeared, MK 1A in his right hand. "Are you all right, Commander?" he asked, bending over K'Raoda.

Nodding, K'Raoda caught his breath for a moment, then took the hand the ambassador extended, climbing to his feet. "Thank you," he said hoarsely, rubbing his larynx.

The blaster fire ended as the lights flared on. K'Raoda pulled himself up the side ladder of the shuttle. "Hangar deck," he said into his communicator. "General address.

"You can't win, v'org slime!" His voice boomed across the deck. "Down arms!"

Able to see again, the turret gunner in the corsair shuttle swung her twin-barreled cannon right, raking a packed commando boat with a double stream of red bolts that found the power cells.

Exploding in a pillar of orange-red flame, the boat became a pyre for forty-two crew. High, inhuman screams filled the tactical band as the cannon tracked left, locking on the next boat. Crewmen leaped for their lives as the turret fired again.

Using the confusion, the surviving corsairs broke for their shuttles.

The hangar rocked as the second commando boat and a corsair shuttle detonated, a double explosion tumbling corsairs and crew to the deck. The destruction continued as the remaining corsair craft exploded in quick succession.

"What…?" said K'Raoda, trying to see through the smoke and flames obscuring the shuttles.

Silent on its n-gravs, a single shuttle flew out of the smoke, firing warning bolts near surviving corsairs. Dropping their weapons, the corsairs surrendered, fingers locked behind their heads.