Three Square Meals Ch. 100

Whirling around in her chair, she said, "Faye, take us back through the Kintark lines again!"

"After wrecking all those cruisers, we're down to just 24% shields," the purple sprite warned her. She took one look at the determined expression on the Latina's face. "Okay, setting course!"

Irillith gave Calara a quizzical frown. "We're inflicting massive damage with the Hera... but I'll have to break the connection if we fly out of range."

"We haven't got any choice," Calara replied, a pained expression on her face. "We need to help protect the Terran capital ships from those bombers..."

The Maliri hacker shrugged. "No problem, I'll disable the dreadnought until we can return."

"Please can you sow some chaos through the Kintark fleets on our way?" the Latina requested, turning back to look at the battle group interface.

"Are you looking for mild confusion or utter anarchy?" Irillith asked airily.

Calara managed a wry smile. "I'll leave that at your discretion."

Irillith laughed, a twinkle in her violet eyes. "Oh, this is going to be fun..."

***

Ducking under another withering hail of plasma fire, Sergeant Gibbons heard a tortured scream to his left and realised someone from his squad hadn't been so lucky. A quick glance at his HUD showed that Corporal Zhao had been the latest casualty, the man's image having vanished from the holographic display. He steeled himself and turned to check on the man, just in case there was anything he could do to save him. When he saw Zhao's contorted body he immediately wished he hadn't... The corporal's power armour had been blasted open and the bubbling plasma that had hit him in the chest had seared the flesh from the man's bones.

Gibbons swallowed down his rising bile, then poked his head over the battlements, looking for targets. He fired off a long burst at a green-armoured lizardman who was clambering over piles of corpses, the orange laser bolts hitting the Kintark soldier square in the chest, and melting fist-sized holes through his body armour. The alien pitched over face-first, dead before he hit the ground.

The Kintark were getting very close now, having overrun all but the last defensive wall. All of Commander Wessex's power-armoured squads had retreated to the final battlements, but they'd lost well over 50% of the company. The casualty rate amongst the regular soldiers was far higher and the few survivors who had managed to flee all the way back to the Citadel were barely coherent, cowering in fear behind the safety of the ferrocrete wall.

It wasn't just the infantry who'd taken a beating. The tank units had simply been outnumbered by the Kintark and worn down in a battle of attrition, their burning wreckage littering the battlefield. The Emperor himself had ravaged the artillery units, permanently silencing their guns with those ghastly Plasma Cannons strapped to his back. Gibbons didn't need to be a tactical genius to realise that they were quickly approaching the final stages of this battle and that the Citadel defenders were looking at a very deadly final stand.

He glanced at the temperature reading for his Gatling Laser and frowned with worry. The weapon was taking longer and longer to vent out heat, the red temperature bar seemingly taking forever to drop. It might have been damage to the weapon, but he couldn't really tell without getting outside his armour to check the heatsinks. He had been firing almost non-stop since acquiring the gun, so he realised the heatsinks might have just burnt out from overuse. Whatever the reason, he was essentially left with an almost inoperable primary weapon.

"Fuck! More incoming lizards!" Brannigan yelled, his autocannon swinging around to the left.

Gibbons heard the high-pitched whine of Wessex's Gatling Laser, her more heavily upgraded weapon quickly denuding the closest of the three Royal Guard of their shields. Brannigan's autocannon pumped out its 20mm slugs, blasting chunks from the closest enraged beast. The Kintark armour was tough and robbed the autocannon rounds of much of their strength, making the incredibly resilient creature even harder to take down. Other men on the wall saw the huge lizard clambering up the battlements and joined in the fusillade, eventually knocking the creature down just as it hauled itself over the parapet. It collapsed in a heap, sprawling amongst the other battered corpses lining the fortifications.

The heat on Gibbons' Gatling Laser had finally dissipated enough for him to fire too and he opened up on the second lizard assaulting the wall. Wessex had switched to that one too and under their combined fire, the laser bolts took out the Kintark's shield and tore into its chestplate. Steaming rivulets of melted armour ran down the beast's torso, dramatically weakening the armour's effectiveness. When Brannigan switched targets to join in too, he quickly took the lizard apart, his slugs blasting deep into its chest and gouting yellow blood in all directions. It toppled over backwards and fell off the wall, the fifteen-foot-long corpse landing amongst the charnel house at the fortification's base.

A red light flashed on Gibbons' HUD next to the temperature gauge for the Gatling Laser, warning him of a critical failure. When he glanced down at the weapon, he saw that ominous black smoke was pouring off it, the barrel starting to melt in several places. Realising that his Gatling Laser was useless, Gibbons dropped it on the ground and darted over to pick up the autocannon he'd previously abandoned.

A horrible scraping sound made him whirl around and he was shocked to see that the first Royal Guard he thought they'd killed was still very much alive. Somehow its wounds were closing before his eyes, the yellow streaked flesh sealing up and the scales reforming where the bullet holes had once been. Gibbons quickly raised his autocannon to finish it off with a headshot, but when he squeezed the trigger, nothing happened... He suddenly remembered that he hadn't yet had a chance to hook up the ammo feed to his Sentinel suit.

"Brannigan, look out!" he yelled in alarm.

"What the fuck?!" the Staff Sergeant blurted out, just as the Royal Guard dragged him down, slashing at his legs with cruel claws.

The scything blow dug deep into Brannigan's titanium plating, ripping a broad gouge through the man's thigh. He screamed in a mixture of pain and fear, his cries turning into a sickening gurgle as the lizard drove its claws into his torso.

"Clint!" Gibbons cried out in anguish, then leapt forward and smashed his autocannon over the Royal Guard's head.

It lashed out at him with a backhanded swipe and opened its broad jaws as it hissed with feral outrage. Gibbons winced at the force behind that blow, his armour crumpling with the impact. From the sudden sharp pain his chest, he was certain that a couple of his ribs were broken. Jamming his armoured fist into the lizard's mouth, he opened up with the 10mm minigun underslung beneath his left gauntlet. The shocked lizard convulsed violently as he blew its brains out the back of its skull, leaving a gaping tattered hole in its smoking head.

Wessex gunned down the last of the three Royal Guard that were trying to storm the wall, taking the time to decapitate each of them. Certain that they wouldn't be rising from the dead, she turned to look at Brannigan, a look of anguish on her face. "Not Clint too..." she murmured, her voice thick with emotion.

Gibbons saw her grief-stricken face on the holo-interface, but before he could reply, the battlements were showered in plasma bolts. Wessex's piercing scream shook him to the core and when he darted his frantic gaze her way, he saw her black-suited body pitch over backwards. That was when he noticed that her right arm had fallen at an odd angle, green plasma fire wreathing the armour. She continued to scream in agony and as he ran to her side, he realised she'd been hit in the right bicep, the plasma blast melting off her arm below the shoulder.

"Oh God... Madison!" he gasped, putting his arms around her body to drag her away from the wall.

She stared in horror at her melted limb and sobbed, "No! Not like this... I was so close!"

Kintark soldiers had been scaling the fortifications and begun hauling themselves over the ramparts, plasma rifles held at the ready. Gibbons aimed his left fist at the first Kintark over the wall, then sprayed it with a whirring stream of bullets. It jerked spasmodically with every round that hit, staggering backwards and collapsing with yellow blood pumping from a dozen bullet holes.

He darted a fearful glance at Wessex's holographic face, his heart lurching when he saw her eyes were closed, colour leeched from her skin. Praying that she was only unconscious, he kept pulling her back from the battlements, ignoring the shooting pain in his chest that he felt with every tug. Gibbons had to pause a couple of times to fire his minigun again, shooting at the Kintark troops that poked their heads over the fortifications. Unfortunately, the stub-nosed multi-barrelled gun was only intended to be used as a last resort, so he churned through the limited ammo in no time. He managed to kill his last Kintark with a short burst before hearing only whirring clicks as he ran out of bullets.

The buckled Sentinel suit was digging into his chest and making it hard to breathe, every movement jarring his broken ribs against the protruding metal. Although he didn't want to leave its protective embrace, Gibbons reluctantly opened the rear hatch and clambered out, wincing at the pain in his torso. He took a moment to steady himself, then glanced down at his Commander's Sentinel suit. There was no way he could haul her to safety while she was still wearing the cumbersome power armour, so he found the emergency evacuation panel by her right hip and tapped in the override code. There was a hiss as the panel at the rear cracked open, and he pulled the door wider so he could haul Wessex out.

She looked in bad shape. Aside from the ugly plasma-charred remains of her right arm, Madison was very pale, so it was with shaking hands that he reached for her neck to feel for a pulse. He sagged with relief when he felt that steady beat, overwhelmed with gratitude that she was still alive. Putting one arm around her back and the other under her knees, he started to scoop up her limp body, until the needle-like stab of agony from his ribs convinced him otherwise. When he was sure he wasn't about to pass out, he held her under the arms and dragged her clear, doing his best to ignore the pain in his chest.

The last of the Federation defenders were fighting desperately to hold the walls, leaning over the battlements to shoot at Kintark that were trying to scale them, or lobbing grenades into their serried ranks. He could see more enemy soldiers hauling themselves over the top of the wall, only to be shot point blank by Terran troopers that had ducked behind the parapet. There were lots more behind them though, and several Terran soldiers attempted to surrender, only to be shot without hesitation by the merciless Kintark marines. Gibbons knew he had to get Wessex away to safety and he pulled his Commander's body towards one of the ramps that led down from the battlements.

He glanced back at the section of wall Sentinel Alpha had been defending and was shocked to see that all the Terran troops there had been slain. As he was watching, a trio of Royal Guard clambered over the wall, and his heart skipped a beat when one of them stared in his direction, hissing at him and baring rows of sharp fangs.

***

The Valkyrie raced across the upper hull of the Larmak'tok, while all around Sakura, green explosions rippled across the Kintark vessel's armoured hide. It had taken the stunned Kintark a while to react to her furious assault, their crews unsure how to deal with an opponent fighting within their shields. In their desperation to stop her, the Larmak'tok had been the first battleship to try dropping its shields, finally letting the other Praetorian capital ships bring their guns to bear. Two of those huge craft were firing wild Plasma Cannon salvos at her mech, but so far, all they'd been able to do is mutilate their sister ship. They had left a haphazard trail of glowing plasma craters snaking all the way across the Larmak'tok's topdeck, but so far none had come close to actually hitting her.

A wing of four heavy fighters swooped low on a strafing run, spraying a curtain of plasma bolts at Sakura's sprinting mech. Due to the sheer volume of incoming fire, dodging everything would have been impossible, but she was moving quickly enough to avoid the worst of it. The few fluke shots that did manage to land on her nimble Valkyrie were easily absorbed by her reinforced shields, the Brimorian technology doing an admirable job of mitigating any plasma damage. As those fighters chased after her, the mech's shoulder-mounted Pulse Cannon turrets burst into life, ripping through the Kintark wing and destroying them all in a sustained stream of blue laser fire.

Sakura had already destroyed seven of the battleships that had bombarded Unity City, leaping from one to the next and tearing them apart with her four Photon Lasers and Heavy Quantum gun. Considering the horrific destruction she'd already inflicted, Sakura had expected them to start running, but perhaps the egos of the High Prelates commanding these vessels prevented them from considering that option. Not that it would have done them much good anyway, the Valkyrie was much quicker than the slow-moving Kintark capital ships, and there would have been no escape from her justice.

Running up to the edge of the deck, she jammed her sword into the Larmak'tok's hull, using her blade as a brake so that she could easily flip over onto the starboard flank. Out of sight of the two battleships trying to kill her, she glanced at the targeting overlay, trying to get an idea of where the Larmak'tok's Bridge would be located. Her Quad shoulder-mounted Photon Lasers pivoted to follow her retinal targeting, the ice on the barrels gleaming in the sun's bright glare.

Squeezing her trigger fingers on both hands, the Valkyrie blasted a glowing pit in the battleship's flank, pumping a relentless storm of pulsed beams into the disfigured vessel. Armour plating melted away in streams of liquefied metal, exposing the internal superstructure of the battleship to the ferocious power of those energy lances. She slashed back and forth with her Photon laser fire, doing a crude but effective job of gutting the Larmak'tok and executing its Bridge crew.

Sakura was about to kick off from the now-derelict battleship when the hull beneath the Valkyrie's feet bucked violently. She waved her arms to try and keep balance, when her mech was suddenly engulfed in a colossal explosion. One of the poorly-aimed Plasma Cannon shots from the accompanying battleships had hit the Larmak'tok in the top deck, directly above its Plasma Missile launch tubes. The burning plasma from that friendly fire melted through the armour covering and ignited those volatile warheads. The Valkyrie was blasted clear, tumbling end-over-end and throwing its dazed pilot around the cockpit.

*Sakura! Are you okay?!* Alyssa asked in a rush.

When her head stopped spinning, the Asian girl held out her arms to try and stabilise herself. *Yeah, just a bit dizzy...*

"Warning! Your shields are out," an automated voice calmly announced, Dana's dulcet tones ringing around the cockpit. "You've also busted the upper actuator in the Valkyrie's left thigh and the armour on both legs is fucked up..." There was a pause, then the recording continued, "Sakura, if you're hearing this damage report, John's probably not going to be happy..."

Sakura winced, knowing how true that was. *Can you tell Dana: Thanks for the message...*

*I'll pass that on,* Alyssa replied drily, but her concern was palpable over their empathic bond. *I'm leaving it at your discretion, but don't get yourself killed trying to take down a bunch of Kintark battleships. Bail if it's too dangerous, Sakura.*

Shaking her head to clear it, Sakura twisted around, retro-thrusters assisting the Valkyrie's turn as she rotated to face the last five battleships. *I'll be alright... Besides, I can't run, there's too many people counting on me to protect them.*

The mech jetted towards the remnants of the Praetorian fleet, with Sakura sending it spinning and weaving through space to avoid the deadly green barrage heading her way.

***

The Invictus rolled to the right, narrowly avoiding a Kintark cruiser as the battlecruiser dove through the enemy formation. Heavy Quantum guns on the underbelly opened fire, knocking out the Imperial vessel's shields and punching huge holes in its flanks. The side of the cruiser seemed to ripple as explosions inside the hull shook the ship, until a large section on the upper deck blew clear, the superstructure fragmenting under the strain.

Now that the Invictus was right in the middle of the Kintark armada, Faye was able to unload with every weapon she had, viable targets available in every direction. Staccato flashes from the Photon Lasers sent pulsed beams lashing into Kintark cruisers and battleships alike, knocking out shields in seconds and melting huge holes through their targets. Anything still intact was fair game for the Heavy Cannons and the five high-calibre howitzers pounded the Kintark capital ships with huge shells. The Invictus' defence grid fired without pause, unleashing a curtain of blue laser bolts into strike craft and destroyers, obliterating everything that crossed their path.

Faye suddenly pulled up the white battlecruiser's nose, so that they were flying perpendicular to the main Kintark battle line. That was when she unleashed a blast from the Nova Lances, boring through the densely packed formations of ships, and catching 8 cruisers, 6 destroyers, and 2 battleships in that spectacular column of destruction. Before the light had begun to fade away, Faye changed course again, heading towards the relative safety of the Terran battle line.

On the Tactical Map, the leading edge of the targeting arcs for the Invictus' Pulse Cannons finally caught up with the rear of the bomber formations, and Faye let rip with a tsunami of blue laser bolts. That deadly wave crashed over the Kintark strike craft, picking off one wing after another as the battlecruiser bore down on them. In her rush to intercept those bombers and protect the Terran Federation ships, Faye had no choice but to expose the Invictus to the vengeful fury of the Kintark armada.

"We've lost our shields," Faye advised Calara, back to her flat delivery now that she was focusing all her avatars on the raging battle.

Plasma bolts were peppering the Invictus' hull from all directions, ugly plasma burns marring the sparkling white armour. While their elfin pilot was doing her best, she didn't possess Jade's lightning-fast reflexes, or Alyssa's telepathic connection to Calara where her Prescience could guide them through safely. The Latina wouldn't have been able to help regardless, as she was fully immersed in trying to save as much of the Terran fleet as possible from the Kintark.

Irillith thinned the herd of attackers by repeatedly hacking the biggest capital ship in their path. Her approach was similar every time: blast through their firewall, throw open every door on the ship along with the airlocks and vent the crew into space. Once she'd eliminated them as a threat, she'd target another Kintark ship and hit it with a Plasma Cannon broadside, then increase engine power to maximum and charge forward to ram the nearest enemy vessel. At that point she pulled her mind back to the Invictus, so that she could begin the hacking process again on her next victim. To the Terran observers, it looked like the Kintark forces had gone completely berserk, their ships inexplicably firing on each other then smashing together in devastating collisions.