Jay Allan - Tombstone

I was a newb, so the sergeant positioned me between the team leader and an experienced private. There were only three raw recruits in the platoon, so it was pretty easy for the lieutenant to make sure we were looked after. Years later, when I got my own lieutenant’s bars, we were in the middle of the Third Frontier War and getting our asses handed to us. My first platoon command had 36 recruits out of 50 total strength, and there’s no doubt in my mind we suffered heavier losses because of that.

The terrain was surreal, jagged exposed rock as far as the eye could see. Nothing could live on Tombstone, at least not beyond some exotic and highly dangerous bacteria. As far as the eye could see there was nothing but sulfur-crusted rock and bubbling pools of fluorosulfuric acid, heated to the boiling point by subterranean lava flows. The atmosphere was hazy, with dense green clouds of corrosive gas floating close to the ground.

We were moving up toward a long ridge where we could get a good look at the low, rocky plain below. Normally, we’d be able to detect any enemy within 50 klicks, but between the radiation, the unstable atmosphere, and the almost constant magnetic storms, our scanners were unreliable. The two sides had been fighting here a long time, and both had figured how to calibrate their ECM to maximize the cover offered by the planet’s unique characteristics. The captain wanted us to scout the old fashioned way, so we were heading for the high ground with the best visibility.

You could say we were scouting, but it was really a search and destroy mission. We were out here to find any enemy troops who had come into our sector and wipe them out. That was the reality of the fighting on Tombstone, lots of scattered actions aimed at taking out as many of the enemy as possible. The war – excuse me, “situation” – was almost purely attritional. Neither side had enough strength to win conventionally or the willingness to risk massive escalation, so the idea was to break down the other side’s will to fight, primarily by inflicting losses. Only an idiot could have embraced that kind of strategy…precisely the kind of idiot that ran the governments of both powers.

I didn’t think too much about why we were there, at least not back then. I’d gotten my blood up for the landing, and I was scared to death on the way down, but once we’d made it to the ground the tension subsided. We marched right to the firebase and we’d spent the last week sealed in, my biggest concern the inadequate number of showers and the consequent fallout on the livability of the place. We were bored stiff, and we played cards or hung out in the media center to pass the time.

Now I was out in the shit, armored up and tramping through the alien landscape looking for enemies. Enemies I was supposed to kill. Enemies who would try to kill me. That adrenalin that had faded after the landing was back. I was edgy and tense, imagining someone hiding behind every rock we passed, just waiting to take a shot. I had to force myself to focus on my training and what I was supposed to do. I knew my best chance to stay alive – and help my comrades do the same – was to do as I had been taught.

Tension can be good in a combat situation; it keeps you focused and attentive. But it can also be dangerous. If you step too aggressively in powered armor you may find yourself jumping three or four meters in the air, offering some enemy sniper a juicy target. Move forward too quickly and you end up out of position and ahead of your team…alone and exposed. The suit does so much of the work, it you aren’t paying attention you can lose track of how far or fast you’ve been walking.

We were moving forward slowly, carefully. The lieutenant was a pro. He’d been a private who came up in the Second Frontier War, and he’d fought in the Battle of Persis, which was a bloody mess that, more than anything else, was the climactic event of the war. His unit ended up cut off, and all the officers and non-coms were killed or wounded. He was the senior private, and he took command of the remnants of the company, maybe 40 troops in all. They’d been given up for lost, but when the Alliance forces finally broke days later through they were stunned to find 23 survivors, starving and exhausted, but still holding out – and tying down enemy forces ten times their strength. That got him his sergeant’s stripes and, later, his invitation to the Academy.

My suit’s AI controlled my internal climate perfectly, but I was still sweating. I could feel the slickness of my arms sliding against the cool metal sleeves of my armor. I was a little lightheaded – I still wasn’t used to the oxygen-rich mix my suit fed me during combat operations. We’d used it a few times in training, but I think I was a little sensitive to it, and it was taking me longer to adapt completely. The suit had given me the standard pre-battle stimulants which, combined with my own adrenalin, really had me on edge.

We’d just reached the ridgeline, and my com started beeping. It wasn’t any of our communications; it was something else my AI picked up. I was just about to report it to Corporal Clark when his voice came through. “Everybody down.” He was in control, as always, but his tone was excited, urgent. “Now!”

My body responded to his command before my conscious mind had processed it. I’ll never know for sure, but I’d wager the stimulants they give us before battle saved my life that day, because an instant later the spot where I was standing was raked with fire. I was behind a spiny rock outcropping, maybe two-thirds of a meter high…just enough to duck behind if I lay very flat.

I was the lowest rung on the chain of command, so I didn’t have a data feed on the rest of the platoon or squad, but I could tell from the chatter on the com that we had some people hit. Getting shot on Tombstone was especially bad, because if the breach was more than your suit’s auto-repair system could handle you were as good as dead. A scratch on the arm could be fatal.

The armor does have a significant self-repair capacity. The AI will respond to any breach in a hostile environment by increasing the air pressure to keep toxic atmosphere from leaking into the suit. The climate control adjusts, attempting to minimize the effects of any excess heat or cold. While these systems are keeping the Marine alive, at least for a few seconds, the suit deploys nano-bots to attempt to patch any breach with self-expanding adhesive polymer. It is an extremely workable system, as long as the hole isn’t too big.

They’d laid a trap for us. The beeping was coming from a series of transponders they’d set along the ridge, powerful enough to send a signal through the dense atmosphere, giving them a precise firing solution. Now we were caught in interlocking fields of fire – they had heavy auto-cannons hidden in multiple locations. It was bait and destroy instead of search and destroy, and we were the targets.

The heavy auto-cannon rounds tore into the rock wall that was shielding me, sending shards scattering in all directions. My body was pressed down against the front of my armor, an instinctive but pointless effort to get farther away from the deadly stream of fire just over my back. My mind raced…what should I do? I looked for a spot where I could get a view out over the ground in front of the outcropping, but I couldn’t find anything. I couldn’t move up and fire over the ridge; I’d get cut to pieces before I got a shot off.

I just lay there, thinking, I’m going to die here. Six years of training so I can come here and get killed in my first skirmish? I was scared for sure, but even more, I was angry at the waste of it all. But I couldn’t think of any way out. I was starting to panic, to forget all the training. Then I heard the lieutenant’s voice on the com.