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CHAPTER 20




“I’ve got eyes on.” Mason kept one shoulder tight against a thick tree and slid his carbine along a root arcing up from the dirt. He was on a hilltop with an elevated position over the intersection leading to the void port. Taking up the most obvious observation point on the key terrain was a poor tactical decision, but he didn’t have time to find the perfect solution.

His optics zoomed in, and he sent pic captures back to Corre and Rochelle. The other Flanker sergeant and his two men were on the downward slope behind him, waiting to bound forward.

“No activity,” Noah said from a few feet away. He was prone, only the top of his helm and eyes peeking over the crest. “How’d we get this tasking? Thought we were supposed to be cycled back.”

“Shut up,” Mason hissed. “We’ve got the local Flanker in our squad. Guess the chain of command wants his experience up here. What’re you going to do, write our Hegemony congressional rep?”

“Maybe I will. I’ve heard that can—oh wait . . . right,” Noah said. “Felix, what’re we looking at?”

Felix was further down the steep hillside. He was propped up on his side, breathing hard. Without the exo-skeleton to provide strength augmentation he’d been running off pure muscle power.

“It’s . . . it’s . . . a road. God damn I . . . shouldn’t have thrown my exo away,” Felix struggled to say.

“So glad you’re here. Very value-added.” Mason shook his head. “Rochelle, we’ve got overwatch. Bound up and get the scans in on the road, make sure it’s not mined.”

“Moving,” Rochelle sent over the radio.

“You see tank tracks anywhere on the road?” Noah asked. “I can’t see any.”

“Road’s paved at the intersection. Way too much foliage in the way on the unpaved part,” Mason said. “No Wolverine’s moving off-road through here.”

“So, then where’s that other tank?” Noah asked. “Because we didn’t see any sign of it coming up here.”

“We weren’t on the road either. You think it’s hiding under a bush somewhere waiting to jump out and say ‘boo’? Just watch your sector.” Mason shook his head.

His visor superimposed the position of Rochelle and his Flankers, Herve and Saluan, as they crept through the underbrush toward the intersection. Mason took a long sip from his water nub all the while trying not to think about how many times his suit had recycled his sweat and other waste to make it. The slightly salty taste was supposed to be an electrolyte compound added to the purification process, but anyone that had been in a Flanker in the field had doubts and suspicions of that claim.

The icons over the three other Flankers stopped moving.

“Rochelle, problem?” Mason asked.

“Saluan tripped a wire . . . don’t know what it was connected to,” Rochelle sent back. “Might be an old booby trap. This something the Flags use?”

“Usually just a frag grenade,” Felix said. “It was shin-level, right?”

“Negative. Chest. Strung up between a bunch of branches,” Rochelle said.

“New one.” Felix shrugged. “Maybe hunters. There’s some of those big dogs with horns on ’em out here that used to bring off-world tourism. They’d kill ’em and keep the heads.”

“You mean ‘deer’?” Noah asked. “Maybe elk or hirvi?”

“Big enough you can ride them. Dogs with hooves instead of paws. I’m a spacer and I don’t know all the animals you dirtsiders deal with,” Felix said.

“Rochelle, continue mission.” Mason slapped his thigh twice to quiet the other two.

“But if this planet has big dogs with antlers . . . I don’t know if that’d be awesome or horrible,” Noah said. “Wasn’t there some planet in the Deseret sector with rabbits like that? Jack-a-whomps or something?”

“Just regular rabbits here,” Felix said. “Flags love them in a stew.”

“Will you two shut the—”

An electromagnetic detection alert blinked on Mason’s visor. He sent it back to the Cataphracts as flash traffic and turned his attention to the skies. Something dark zipped between treetops near the intersection.

Flocks of birds took to the sky, squawking and screeching.

“Rochelle hold.” Mason lowered himself against the crest. “Radio silent. I think there’s a drone.”

The three icons for Rochelle’s fire team blinked off. A sudden buzz roared up behind them. Mason tensed up but didn’t move. The Shrikes launched by Corre and Boyle were there to intercept any enemy drones, but they were protecting Mason’s team and not Rochelle’s.

More birds were startled out of a treetop.

“What kind is it?” Noah whispered loudly.

“Not sure,” Mason said. “If it was automated the Shrikes would’ve nabbed it by now . . . might be first-person control, those are a bitch to intercept. I’m going to lure it out.”

“Say again?” Noah turned his head sharply to Mason.

Mason leaned back onto his feet and raised his carbine. He fired a single shot at the last tree that had any movement and sidestepped away from Noah. Something jumped out and landed on a thick branch. It scuttled towards the trunk.

Mason shot again and blew off a hunk of bark, exposing white wood beneath.

“Tell them to run! Tell them to run!” Felix shouted.

“Rochelle! Fall back, now!” Mason ordered as he and Noah both opened fire on a dark green shape moving down the tree trunk. It crawled to the other side, protecting itself from fire.

“Going manual,” Corre sent over the radio. The Shrike drones overhead flew forward.

The enemy drone leapt off the tree and took flight. It arced up and dove at Rochelle’s last position. The two Shrikes darted at it, but missed. Both burst into brief domes of flame and shrapnel in the undergrowth.

The enemy drone exploded with a crack like lightning. A wall of overpressure slammed into Mason and knocked him back. He careened off a tree and landed hard on a carpet of sharp rocks. He rolled down the hillside, his ears ringing and head aching.

Felix grabbed him by the carry handle on the back of his harness and stopped his descent.

“Ah! Ahhh!” Noah threw his helmet away and sank to his knees, hands over his ears.

Even with the protection from his helmet, the thermobaric explosion had rendered Mason’s ears nearly useless. His eardrums rang painfully, an unending ‘reeeee’ stabbing into his brain.

Felix pulled Mason’s arm away from his head and mashed a button on his forearm screen. There was a sudden pinch against Mason’s neck and the pain in his ears died out. Mason flipped his visor up and retched out a thin green line of mucus.

He fell to the hillside, breathing heavily for a few seconds. He raised his head and found Felix with Noah, patting him on the back as his brother spat out his stomach’s contents.

“Roche . . . Rochelle come back,” Mason said over an open channel. No response.

“Mason, you hurt?” Corre asked. “We’re moving up.”

“Got our bell rung by a thermobaric.” Mason crawled up the hillside. “We weren’t the target. No word from Rochelle. Senomis administered to me and Noah . . . and the new guy.”

His muscles went to rubber as the Senomis drug coursed through his system. The drug would counteract the concussive effects but had awful side effects as adrenaline subsided from their bloodstream.

Mason rolled to his back next to Noah. His legs twitched and kicked of their own accord. Noah had to hold one arm against his chest to keep it from flopping about.

“Why aren’t you—why aren’t you all fucked up too?” Noah asked Felix.

“Did you know you can build up an immunity to Senomis?” Felix asked. “I don’t recommend it. Not everyone’s brain rots from it, but some do. Enough do.”

Corre and Boyle stomped past them lower on the hill and moved toward Rochelle and his team’s last known position.

Mason rinsed his mouth out with water as his legs stopped twitching. His feet still felt like they were being stung by pins and needles by the time Corre returned. The sergeant had three bloody dog tags hanging from a cord on his armor.

“We hold here,” Corre said. “Perrin’s working up a new plan. Felix, there any other surprises out there for us?”

“The poppers . . . I heard about them being used up north, not out here. Sorry,” Felix said. “Those things are rare and expensive. It costs the Flags less to just lose fighters than use those drones.”

“Alright, we squat and hold,” Corre said. “Saint receive and protect our brothers. May they rest.”

“May they rest,” Noah said.

Mason rolled to his side and retched again.


“Then find me another route to the Fort Triumph.” Perrin put his hands on his hips and scowled at a holo projection off Roux’s pack. Most of the battalion was spread out along the road. Squads and fire teams grouped up for maintenance and to eat in one of the few pauses they’d had since leaving Tabuk City.

The comms soldier cocked his head to one side, his brows furrowed.

“Message for you, sir.” Roux held up a handset. “It’s pinging through the repeater network. It can’t be traced back to us.”

“How do you know it’s for me?” Perrin took the handset.

“It’s for ‘Hegemony commander southeast of Fort Triumph.’” Roux double-checked his forearm screen. “Just a recording. We won’t ping back.”

“Play it.” Perrin put the handset to his ear.

“Hegemony man,” a locally accented voice said. “Or one-time Hegemony man. No Hegemony now. I have Fort Triumph under my control. The last commander didn’t want to surrender, but he’s not in charge of anything now. I follow General Bonifacio. He says give you to nightfall, I give you to nightfall. You come closer with weapons and no deal. You come with empty hands held high and you’ll be better off than the crabs who wanted to fight. Come quick or I’ll come find you when time runs out.”

The message clicked off.

“Well . . . fuck!” Roux tossed his hands up. “Just can’t get a break, can we? We land on this shithole and immediately get thrown into the fire. Then we get hit—”

Perring grabbed him by the front of his flack vest and gave him a hard shake.

“What if the men see you like this?” Perrin hissed. “Like it or not, I am the commander now and if it looks like I am panicking—or letting anyone’s discipline slip into panic around me—then what will happen to everyone else, eh?”

“S-sorry sir.” Roux swallowed hard.

“Panic is like shit. It gets worse as it rolls downhill,” Perrin said. “Forgive the vulgarity. The men look at me and see an officer that’s calm, cool and collected and what will they think?”

“You don’t understand the situation?” Roux’s brow furrowed.

“Yes, exactly—wait, no.” Perrin let him go. “If they see me as a point of calm, hear reasonable and well-articulated orders over the radio, then they know their chain of command has the situation well under control. No matter how truthful that belief may be. Now, this enemy commander’s handed me something of a wrinkle to the plan, but the plan can change. At least we’ve got until nightfall until the enemy reacts, which means we have the initiative!”

Perrin gave the handset back.

“I need some reconnaissance. How many Pigeon drones do we have left in the battalion?”





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Framed