Enemy Lines Ch. 05-06

After a few minutes, Ketri stopped stirring and her sounds moved from purring to soft snoring. Nate lay awake for a while longer, pondering the situation he had found himself in. If someone had told him two weeks ago that this was the direction his life would take, he would have laughed them off the ship. Not that he was complaining; this crash, the rebels, Ketri... especially Ketri, was the best thing that had ever happened to him. Still, he couldn't shake the fear lingering above him. If his company, if the Conglomerate ever caught up with him he'd be executed for sure. And Ketri would inevitably get far worse. He ground his teeth reflexively at the thought of what his old bosses would do to his little mate. Well, it was too late now. He'd made his decision and he would stand by it. If anyone wanted to hurt the little alien dozing in his arms, well, they'd have to get through him.

-Chap. 5 fin-

Captain Thoros was watching the stars from the roof of the admin building. The sky was clear that night, and you could see the galaxy shining brightly through the crisp night air. He took a long drag on his cigarillo and let the cool sahjat smoke waft through his lips. The old thought crossed his mind, as it always did. He longed, for this brief moment, to return to the freedom of the stars. But, again, as always, he realized that that part of his life was behind him. He was a different man now, with a different life. He smiled for a moment as he watched a shooting star burning through the sky. It was beautiful, zooming towards him in a trail of blazing light. With its... four friends? The calm wistfulness in Thoros's mind turned instantly to cold fear as he jumped up and slammed his hand on the alarm button fixed to the post he had propped his folding chair against.

"AIR RAID! AIR RAID!" The old alien bellowed into his earpiece, leaping off the roof and landing sure-footedly in the sand. Klaxons swelled to life across the base as lights came on and soldiers swarmed out of buildings. Thoros barged into the building and made tracks for his office. He found the carefully concealed wall panel and ripped it off. It had been a long, long time, but his hands were still practiced and sure as he slung the old battle jacket over his shoulders, buckled down the chest plate and strapped the belt with it's long pistol and well-worn freq cutlass to his hip. It was heavy, but the weight was familiar and comforting. He pulled on the operating gloves, and connected them to the power supply cables in his sleeves, then yanked the 10 gauge slugthrower off the rack and started loading frag rounds into it as he made for the door.

When he reached the outside again, the chaos had gotten into full swing. His ears flattened instinctively as the base's massive anti-air guns shed their camo nets and lit up, hucking hundreds of blazing tracers into the sky like roman candles. Missiles soared high and made a beeline for the approaching dropships, but it was futile: bright pinpicks of point defense laser fire found the weapons and lanced them out of the air as carelessly as swatting flies. The defenses were too little, too late. The dropships slipped effortlessly under their fire envelope and cruised towards them, skimming the sand at an angle too low for the guns to engage. They opened up with their own weapons, sending flights of missiles and torrents of rail cannon fire into their prospective landing zone. Adobe buildings were ripped apart and blown to pieces before the onslaught, men ducked, scattered, and were thrown about like playthings.

The braking thrusters of the dropships flared as they reached the outskirts of the base, slowing them rapidly until they were hovering less than a yard from the ground. Hatches fell down, and the massive armored bulk of Humans in Overlord suits spilled out of their vessels and into the sand. The Overlord armor was one of the technological marvels that had allowed Humanity to conquer the galaxy; close to two tons of titanium and ceramic gorilla which could operate in almost any environment and mount a wide variety of heavy weapons while protecting the wearer from most small arms fire. They were very intimidating, and very hard to kill.

The enemy quickly moved into the base, gunning down anyone who tried to stand in their path. As they entered his line of sight, Thoros shouldered his slug thrower, placing the dot reticule of its sight on the shoulder of the nearest Overlord as he took cover behind a stack of sandbags. He pressed the program button on the trigger guard, waited a millisecond for the beep, then shifted his aim and slam-fired three rounds in quick succession. The frag rounds just missed the merc's pauldron, then exploded directly behind it. The Overlord lost partial motor control as his suit worked to bypass the circuits damaged by the blast, and fell over on his face. Thoros hadn't pushed the pump forward after the last shot, and quickly slipped an armor-piercing, high-explosive round into the magnetic chamber before doing so. He leveled the weapon and fired, the slug punching through the vulnerable neck area and exploding inside, blasting the Human's head from his body. The Captain chambered a new frag round, but one of the other Overlords had spotted him, and opened up with its own primary weapon: a 20mm chemical-assisted rail cannon supported by an articulating arm attached to the Overlord's hip.

The aging Sha'dee dived into the sand as 20mm explosive rounds ripped his cover apart. He rolled over and fired off a couple rounds blindly, but without time to program the rounds and the element of surprise, the Overlord simply took both blasts directly on the thickest part of its chest plate and shook it off. But it was enough of a distraction to give Thoros a moment to sprint for more cover. Just as the Overlord was about to re-acquire him, he heard a crackle of railgun fire and saw the Tyrant's gun shot to pieces out of the corner of his eye. Reaching his goal, he turned to see Sargent Drane charging the Overlord, hosing it down with fire from his own 12.7mm heavy railgun. Say what you like about Kodo, they could handle recoil. The massive alien slammed into the Human merc, taking him by surprise just long enough for Drane to jam the muzzle of his gun against the Overlord's neck and empty the rest of his magazine.

"You alright, Captain?!" The Kodo barked, straightening up and kicking the empty mag out with a fresh one. Thoros spat, and jammed more slugs into his gun.

"You better not say it." He growled, motioning for the soldier to follow him towards the nearest sound of gunfire.

"What's the point." Drane snorted, keeping close to the Captain and covering him. "It's too late now. We're not making it out of this one alive. Saying I told you so would just be redundant."

"Don't write scripts, Sergeant. I've survived worse." Thoros rounded a corner and fired three airburst rounds into the back of an unsuspecting Overlord. Drane finished him off with a burst of AP rounds into the weakened plates and brushed past the Captain, taking the lead. They moved quickly between buildings, approaching the enemy's landing zone. As they reached the edge and found cover, the Captain saw the final dropship descend, lowering its ramp. The figure that emerged, flanked by four more Overlords, was enormous: his armor towered even over his comrades, standing over 8 feet tall. The massive Human stepped out into the sand, sliding up the faceplate of his helmet and lighting a cigarette. Thoros felt his heart sink into his chest and his blood run cold. Drane was right, neither of them was getting out of this one alive: the gigantic Human had porcelain-white skin and black sclera, sure signs of a Conglomerate Arbiter.

Drane caught sight of the new enemy and roared in anger and recognition.

"THAT'S THE SONOFABITCH WHO TOOK MY OLD LEG!" The Kodo growled, shouldering his rifle and charging.

"DRANE YOU IMBECILE! HE'LL EAT YOU ALIVE!" Thoros bellowed, but he knew it was too late. He had recognized the Arbiter too. Seven of the bastards in the whole Milky Way, and they had to run into this one. Drane opened fire, but the Arbiter had noticed him and shifted his stance effortlessly, sending the bullets glancing off his armor at the wrong angle. He waved the other Overlords back, and turned to confront Drane. The alien leapt at him with powerful digitigrade legs, thrusting down with the freq bayonet on his rifle. The Arbiter was unperturbed, however, and slowly, almost lazily sidestepped, dodging the bayonet thrust and slamming his fist into Drane's chest. The Kodo was sent flying, and toppled head-over-heels into the sand. The Arbiter strode casually towards him, wrapped a massive gauntlet around the alien's head and lifting him effortlessly into the air. Thoros shook his head, but couldn't bring himself to look away as the enormous Human drew a short freq sword and swung it in a wide arch, slicing Drane open from head to toe like a salmon.

Tossing the body aside with a derisive snort, the Arbiter turned and looked Thoros dead in the eye. The old Sha'dee straightened up, stepping out of cover and tossing his slugthrower aside. It wouldn't do him any good against this one. He walked slowly out into the clearing, facing his old enemy in silence.

"Mother of God, it really is you. Oh Captain, my Captain. I thought a pirate like you was supposed to go down with his ship..." The Arbiter sneered, giving his blade a casual flick to rid it of blood.

"Captain Wo'ard did. You're looking at a different man now." Thoros said, coldly. The Arbiter chuckled, and drew a second blade in his other hand.

"What, no taunts? I figured you'd be full of snark after I fell for your trap like an old fool." The alien Captain said sardonically, keeping his gaze locked with the Arbiter as they circled eachother.

"Hah! Trap?! Please, don't flatter yourself by thinking I give enough of a shit about one two-bit outpost to lay any kind of trap for you." The Arbiter snorted derisively.

"Don't insult me. It's bad enough I was the kind of sentimental idiot to believe your man Nate in the first place."

"What man? Nate? Hate to disappoint you old man, but I've never heard that name in my life. My ship's electronic warfare unit found you by tracking your transmissions. You should really tell these rebel trash you've fallen in with to be more discrete on the phone..."

"Well, that's something of a relief..." Thoros gave a half-hearted chirp. "Alright, let's get this over with."

The alien squared off, drawing his sword and squeezing the trigger. The blade began to vibrate and emitted a piercing, spine-tingling screech. The Arbiter bared his teeth and activated his own blades.

"Let's hope you're more entertaining than gills over there." The Human sneered. Thoros narrowed his eyes and pulled back his lips to reveal gleaming teeth and fully extended fangs. The Arbiter casually tossed his cigarette butt aside and spat. As the butt hit the sand, they both charged.

-Chap. 6 fin-