Chapter 16, part 2
“Clear, all hostiles down!” Sergeant Antares reported a few moments after the last bug was torn apart.
“Sounds like the rest of them are on the way!” Master Sergeant Anderson added.
Marine Lieutenant Josef Allerberger didn’t have any choice on the matter, he hoped that the Loroi would be able to last long enough for them to find them and extract them but the fact that they couldn’t hear any explosions or energy weapon’s fire must have meant that the Umiak had finally got them.
He glanced around as he made the decision to quickly retrace their steps to the Loroi airlock; the relatively open intersection they were currently in must have been where the bugs hit them after they unleashed the ‘Shout’. There was plenty of blood, some dead bugs and even some Loroi limbs but no Loroi dead who must have been dragged away in a hurry if he was to judge by the blood trails that lead deeper into the dark corridor from which the unmistakable ruckus of battle was being heard just a few moments ago.
They were going to run straight towards the noise when a small group of bugs literally run into them from another of the intersection’s corridors; their MD-45s tore them apart in seconds but two more small groups followed suit and they found themselves locked down in a firefight. Thankfully there weren’t any of the heavily armored variants who by the looks of things were akin to cyborgs which would explain the toughness and dogged determination in the face of death that they showed back at Matveyev. Still, even the normal bugs wasted enough of their time by the time they finished them off.
“We were too late…” He said angrily
“Sir, the Loroi medic doesn’t look well!” Private Hood said and he turned to see what the matter with her was. Doranzer Needle was on her knees, visibly shaking and unable to stand up.
“I am sorry Doranzer Needle but we have to go.” He said and offered his hand in order to help her to stand up.
“…No…Shout…Strong…Close…” She replied as she shooked her head violently.
“Are you certain?”
“Yes…Shout…Feel…Close…”
“Can you tell me which way?”
“I...Hard…Shout…Focus…” It was plainly obvious to see that she was worse off now than she was when they first entered the ship. If close proximity to the ‘Shout’ affected them more then it should make sense that they were close to it. He wonder how any Loroi managed to survive if this ‘Shout’ affected them in such a way but then he realized something and he had only a few moments to decide on a course of action.
“Alpha and Charlie, defend this point. Beta you are with me!” He ordered as he grabbed Doranzer Needle and forced her to stand up. “Anderson, hold this point at all costs!”
“Sir? What’s the plan?” Master Sergeant Anderson asked.
“It’s all or nothing now, we must be close to what the Loroi were after and the Umiak don’t want us to have it.” He explained as he half carried the Loroi medic who could barely stand even as she used him as a support. “Doranzer Needle, I need you to tell me when we will be getting closer to the ‘Shout’, do you understand?” He said in Trade as he walked towards to corridor from which the first group of bugs came from.
“…Yes…”
“Beta, we try this corridor first.” He said as he pointed forward with his weapon and the squad immediately formed around him with Sergeant Antares and two of his men on point while the remaining two brought up the rear. They had barely managed to take a few steps into the corridor when the first few bugs rushed into the intersection and the marines they left behind opened fire.
“Another small group!” Master Sergeant Anderson reported. “Nothing we can’t handle!”
“Hold the fort marine.” He replied.
“Don’t take too long or you will miss all the bugs.” Anderson joked.
“I have a feeling that bug hunting will become an honored tradition in the future sergeant.” He replied with a chuckle as he half carried the Loroi medic.
“…Close…” She managed to say as she obviously became less and less lucid with each passing step.
“Just keep yourself focused.” He replied but she didn’t say anything.
The screeching in his head had gotten stronger as well but even with it numbing his mind he didn’t have any trouble connecting the dots which led to the mess they were now stuck in.
The Loroi really wanted something from this ship, they wanted it so bad that dropped everything and launched an attack on their own despite the situation they were in. What they wanted was surely telepathic as well, there was no other explanation to everything that had happened up to that point; telepathy was the greatest advantage they had in this war and they were in the precipice of losing this advantage.
The problem was the human immunity which had to be real from the way the Loroi acted towards them when they went to investigate their ship. The Loroi actions made even more sense now that they knew about the Umiak telepathic abilities; it was easy to deduce that the Loroi attack and inherent hostility towards them wasn’t just because of the human immunity to telepathy but because of the new telepathic abilities of the Umiak. The Loroi who attack Gomez didn’t do so because of fearing the unknown but because she must have believed that they were enemies.
The Loroi had known in advance that the Umiak had found a way to hide themselves from their telepathic sensing and this Umiak ability explained why they were surprised to learn about the Umiak ship. The Loroi couldn’t sense it and they had assembled and activated the emergency generator by that point; which meant that they had the necessary power to activate any equipment they needed.
The Umiak hiding themselves gave them an advantage since the Loroi own history clearly stated that they had a greater industrial capacity than the Loroi; them having telepathy however would affect humanity sooner or later because of the human immunity. The Umiak had learned the hard way how advantageous telepathy was and now that they had some short of telepathy of their own they wouldn’t look kindly to anyone who had immunity to it.
With both sides actively employing telepathy the human predicament was greater than ever; Humans were now a threat to both sides, a threat that sooner or later would force either of the two to act against them. With one swell swoop the human vested interests were shifted from picking the winner who would protect them, to making sure that the lesser evil would come on top in the end.
For better or for worse the lesser evil was the genocidal Loroi Union; the Umiak Hierarchy wasn’t just an expansionist entity, they were an entity that was driven by the monomaniacal goal to eliminate all potential threats. Many of Matveyev’s crew, himself included, had managed to skim through the Loroi history of the war that they were given. It was not what they expected; the expected propaganda and skewered narrative were evidently there but their war history had far more in it than that. There were plenty of somber self-reflections, critiques and outright admittances of fault; something that anyone who read history would never find in any official history of a still running war.
The telepathic Loroi who couldn’t lie to each other had actually maintained their truthfulness even in their wartime histories; they wrote down the truth as they knew it and the realization was sobering to everyone who read it, despite the fact that it was hard to read at times. The Loroi admitted that they were partially responsible for that incident that started the war, some short of a minor skirmish in a contested border system. The Umiak response that the Loroi presented was initially unbelievable in its scale, some even said that it was an obvious fabrication when they first went through that part, but as they raced through the accounts they all realized that it was the truth; there was no other way to explain the extreme losses and conquered territories.
Both the Orgus and the Loroi accounts depicted the Umiak in the same way; as a force that would stop at nothing to attain an advantage and their own run in with the Umiak didn’t do anything but reinforce what they were told. A monomaniacal state that forcefully expanded onto others couldn’t be trusted not to take radical measures against those who nullified their newfound telepathic advantage; they already enslaved anyone in their path, it wasn’t hard to imagine what they would do to someone whose very existence threatened them.
This didn’t mean that the Loroi could be trusted, they proved themselves genocidal but their history was rife with internal politicking with alien members of the Loroi Union and their other alien allies; over exaggerated accounts or not, the Loroi looked like they were willing to cooperate and negotiate with aliens, they had to be wary of them but so far they were arguably the lesser of the two evils.
He had to make a choice with what he knew in mind and what he chose was that the Loroi had to get their hands on the telepathic apparatus of the Umiak; Humanity as a whole didn’t know where to start in order to make heads or tails about it but the Loroi who so desperately wanted it would certainly gleam something from it.
He didn’t know if Shadowcloud or anyone else from her team were still alive, he didn’t even know if Anderson would be able to hold back the Umiak crew long enough from them to secure whatever the Loroi were after. What he did know is that even if a single marine was left alive with the Umiak telepathic equipment still intact then humanity with have something valuable to offer.
“I hear movement up ahead… it’s another intersection.” Sergeant Antares reported from a dozen or so meters ahead of them.
“Hold on.” He said as he gently pulled the Loroi off him and sat her on the floor with her back on the wall before telling her to stay there in Trade. She didn’t reply, she just looked at him and blinked.
The firefight back the way they came from reverberated throughout the ship, they couldn’t see that far back due to the turns they had taken but it was obvious that the others were still holding on, despite the fact that they couldn’t contact them anymore probably due to some short of Umiak ECM.
He stacked with the others and did a last moment check of his weapons before giving the signal.
“It’s all or nothing now Marines.” He said and Sergeant Antares through a flash bang grenade which went off a moment after several bugs cried out in their clicky language and fire several particle slots at the mouth of the corridor which lead into the intersection.
“Go!” The momentarily blindness of the bugs allowed them to rush through the fire as they fired wildly throughout the intersection. “To the right!”
The Umiak had barricaded a corridor to their right, a couple of them were behind the makeshift barricade, carrying some short of particle blaster pistols which the fired blindly into the intersection as if they were maddened. The problem were the two armored bugs that were rushing towards them with unimaginable speed.
Antares who was first barely managed to get off a shot, the SHEAP exploding harmlessly right before hitting the wall behind the bug, he was sent flying and crashing onto the wall by the combined kicks of the bug’s two frontal legs. Hood who was right behind him tried to bring his weapon to bear but the bug was too far; it dexterously pivoted itself on one of its hind legs, knocking his weapon aside with a kick before grabbing him and stabbing him repeatedly with gleaming metallic spike that protruded from the bug’s right metallic hand.
Him paying attention to what happened in front of him nearly cost him his life as the second armored bug kicked the marine behind him and tried to stab him in turn; he parried the spike with his rifle at the last moment before ducking beneath a swipe by the bug’s left arm. He tried to bring his weapon to bear as well but the bug once again tried to stab him with lighting speed; he parried it away with his left arm but the bug instantly grabbed it with a razor sharp metallic claw that protruded from the back of its left hand as it brought it back for another strike. Despite his armor the claw closed and cut his left arm off before he could feel any pain.
He felt his severed limb burn as if it was on fire while the bug brought back its right hand to try and stab him again before stumbling forward and falling onto him, sending him sprawling on the floor with his legs pinned down by its armored corpse. The unmistakable flashes and telltale bangs of firing MD-45s lit the room as the two standing marines finally fired and killed the two armored bugs before taking out the other two who were still blindly firing their blaster pistols from behind the barrier.
“Clear!” Somebody cried out. The whole fight lasted less than five seconds and all of the bugs guarding the intersection were dead but they paid a price for that.
“Hold on sir!” Sergeant Antares said as he took the armored bug off him before grabbing his bleeding stump in order to apply coagulant foam and close it off with an emergency tap. His own armor had already applied the local anesthetic dose and his entire left arm had gone completely numb by that point.
“I see two dead.” He managed to say once he paid some attention to the flashing status of Beta squad, the rest of his force being just marked as out of range as the sounds of the ongoing firefight still reached them.
“Just one, Hood. The other was stabbed on the shoulder and got grazed by a blaster which plaid havoc with his HUD.” Sergeant Antares said as he inspected the closed off stump.
“The others are still at it…” He said as he looked around. “Find whatever the bugs were protecting but keep it alive and in one piece.”
Chapter 16, part 3:
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