Vivid Stars Online

My heart thundered in my ears as I sprinted through the frigate’s hallways. I would never get used to people under my command being injured in a fight they’d trusted me to lead, and being responsible for someone's death was far worse.

Nor was this a stranger; I’d trained with every member of the two elite teams for at least a few days each before coming on this trip. These were people I’d talked to, people I’d dragged out here to work towards my goals.

It wasn't easy to face, but now was not the time for recrimination. Instead, I only pushed myself faster, cursing the limitations of my low Agility. While my high Toughness stat let me sprint far longer than this without losing my breath, there was still a hard limit on how fast I could move.

And every second counted.

Trying to track the ongoing battle on my watch was impossible at the speed I was moving; all I could do was rely on Mira to relay anything critical. The fact this might cause even more problems from a lack of leadership was one I couldn’t ignore, yet I also couldn’t stand by when I could make a difference in person.

I was so focused on pushing myself as fast as possible that I barely reacted in time as I skidded around a corner and came face to face with a wall of guns. Four enemy soldiers were halfway down the corridor in front of me; they’d already penetrated deeper than I expected.

It was likely that the surprise visible on their faces was the only reason I wasn’t immediately riddled with plasma fire. That split-second grace gave me enough time to frantically back-peddle towards cover, and I made it with only a singed arm for my trouble.

Once again my new amour proved its worth; what would have been an agonizing — even for me — barely made it past the protective plating. That was a level of staying power I’d need to overcome such odds.

With a practiced motion I drew my rifle and sank back against the wall. I was only inches from where it turned at the corner, but that was enough to shield me from errant fire.

My ears strained to catch any hint of what the enemy was doing, yet all I heard was the occasional scrape of boots against the metal floor. If they were communicating with each other, they were doing it without speaking aloud.

Biting my lip under my helmet, I spent precious seconds surveying my options. This would have been the perfect time for grenades if I’d taken to carrying them. Unfortunately, there was only so much I’d had time to drill with, and I’d had to make hard choices about what to focus on.

Having intended to be surrounded by other soldiers, I’d left the grenades to them while I focused on marksmanship, teamwork, and overall leadership. Without that as an option, the safest choice might be to wait, forcing them to come around the corner into my line of fire.

That might prevent all four of them from being able to draw a bead on me at once, but it had two major flaws. First, they would know the danger, and take it carefully and slowly, stalling my attempted rescue.

Second, it gave them all the initiative, leaving me on the back foot, forced to react to whatever they did. That was not a position I wanted to be in, not when I was already outnumbered.

Instead, I chose action and ducked into a tight crouch to reduce my profile and throw off their aim. Forcing myself past a moment of terror, I swung out into the hallway just enough to bring my rifle and head around.

Trusting in my armor and superior cover, I opened fire on full auto, heedless of any return fire. Near instantly half a dozen bolts sizzled over my head, then the enemy was frantically diving out of the way of my fire.

Here the lack of cover in the hallways proved just as deadly for them as it had my own troops earlier. Stuck dozens of feet from any protection, the best they could do was to split up and try to return fire.

Within a couple of seconds, I’d already dropped one almost by accident as my wild line of fire cut across his chest. My heavy rifle packed some serious firepower, and the man went down with a scream of pain.

My second victim was far more deliberate as I aimed a three-round burst at the man directly to the right of my first target. He too went down, slumping against the wall he’d retreated to as my shots struck both of his shoulders.

A momentary surge of elation hit me at my success before a wave of fire from the other two forced me backward. Much of it struck the wall to my side, but at least two blasts hit the rifle in front of me, while a third splashed across my faceplate.

A curse burst from my lips as I blindly fell back around the corner, my visor already shutting down to spare me from being blinded by the brilliant illumination of close-range plasma. A couple of burning droplets against my cheeks suggested that it had at least partially failed, but the lack of complete agony suggested it had mostly done its work.

For a moment I sat there in blind darkness, the shock of being directly hit struggling to shut down my body. No part of me wanted to go back around that corner, and worse, my visor was showing no sign of clearing.

Either it had been damaged to the point of shutting down or was simply still covered in burning plasma, or melted armor. Frowning, I dropped my rifle and reached up with both hands for the quick release on my collar.

A hiss of air filled my ears, and then the helmet lifted off my head, bringing me blinking back into the light. It only took a glance at the faceplate to see it was melted beyond use; still dripping with burning metal fragments.

It was a level of damage I wasn’t used to being directed at me, though it was one I should have expected. This was the military, after all, it was no wonder they had equipment as powerful as the latest gear I’d been accessing.

If the enemy had rushed around the corner in those few seconds I might have seriously been in trouble, however, it seemed I’d made them just as cautious as they’d made me. I suppose losing half your number in as many seconds would do that to you.

Straining my ears caught the scrape of footsteps once more. Closer, but not directly at the junction yet. Unless they rushed me I had a little time to prepare.

With a delicate movement, I placed the helmet on the ground, avoiding making as much noise as I could. Reaching for my rifle proved useless, the barrel just as melted from the two shots it had taken as my armor.

Suppressing another curse, I drew my backup equipment; Psi blade in my right hand, and my trusty old plasma pistol in my left. I hadn’t practiced firing with my offhand much, but I didn’t need accuracy for what I had planned.

After that display, they would no doubt be ready for me to duck around again, and with two of them, they could cover high and low. I needed a different strategy, a second shocking tactic they wouldn’t be prepared for.

I just had to convince my shaky knees to play along. They wanted nothing to do with any plan that might involve being shot again, particularly when I was not down a helmet. There was a chance my Toughness would prevent my face from being melted off entirely from a second shot, but even if it did the result would not be pretty.

Still, this was far from my first life-or-death battle, nor even my first time fighting other people. They might be better armed and better trained than I’d faced before, but I could overcome them all the same.

I waited until I heard movement again, this time only a few feet from the corner, then lifted my pistol and launched myself around the corner firing wildly. As I’d planned the two soldiers dove aside, undoubtedly expecting another accurate barrage from me.

Unfortunately for them, this was nothing of the sort; I’d have been unlikely to hit them even if they stood still. The plasma fire was nothing but a bluff to cover a screaming charge as I dove at them, already swinging my sword.

They fired as they moved, but most shots went wide, targetting the corner I’d already rushed past. A couple clipped my left side, but I pushed onward, ignoring the spattering of pain.

I was fully committed at this point; it was do or die and flinching away from their attacks would only get me killed.

It was an insane plane, yet it worked nonetheless. My sword was already cutting through the soldier on the right even as my left hand awkwardly tried to track the other, spraying cover fire as fast as the pistol could fire.

My sword strike was devastating, my Psi blade still holding a mono-molecular edge even without my powers to push it further. Whatever armor the woman was wearing might provide some protection from plasma fire, but it did next to nothing against a sharp blade.

She slid to the ground in a shower of blood, and I turned my focus to the final soldier. None of my awkward left-handed shots had even come close to hitting him, however they had kept him on his toes.

He was now several feet to my left, already bringing his gun back up to aim. It was going to be close; my pistol was now clicking empty when I pulled the trigger, and I was still committed to my forward motion at right angles to him.

Charging would risk a full burst of fire at point-blank range, and seeing what it had done to my helmet I didn’t have high hopes of coming out of that unscathed. Instead, I dropped to the ground and rolled, pulling the woman's corpse over mine to shield me as I released my weapons and scrabbled for her rifle.

A moment later the expected barrage of laser fire drilled into the corpse's back with the nauseating smell of burning flesh. Splashes of molten fire spilled over my arms and legs. They melted tiny puddles in the surface of my armor but lacked the power to cut through.

If he’d kept firing he might have managed to drill a hole straight through my macabre cover, however, the barrage stopped after only a few seconds. The sounds of cursing and the clicking of metal told me the reason; he’d run out of ammo.

It was the break I needed, and a moment later my hand landed on the handle of the woman’s fallen rifle. Pushing her off with a grunt, and the faint whirring of my armor’s servo-motors, I leaned forward into a sitting motion and sighted on the man just as he was slotting in a fresh plasma pack.

I could see the horrific realization cross his face as I squeezed the trigger, sending shot after shot into his chest. Pushed by my terrified adrenaline, I didn’t let up until the rifle clicked empty.

That had been far too close, and it was only four of the enemies on this side of the battlefield.

The final soldier’s smoking corpse sunk to the ground with a meaty thud, and instantly guilt surged through me. I hadn’t killed anyone since I’d found out this world was all real, and it was hitting me far harder than I expected.

Sure they’d been here to kill us, but I’d still just snuffed out four lives just now. It was enough to make me want to crawl into bed and hide from the world, but the fight was far from over.

Pushing myself past the guilt, and the exhaustion from the fading adrenaline, I forced myself upright and began reloading my freshly acquired rifle. It wasn’t exactly what I was used to, but I’d learned firsthand that it was more than powerful enough.

With no immediate sign of more enemies, I pulled my battlefield map up again. While I might not be able to use the ship’s internal scanners, I still had the data from my soldier's watches, and my own watch sensors could pick up at least a corridor or two ahead.

It was something I should have thought up earlier; I’d just been in such a rush to arrive that I hadn’t paused to even consider trying to gather more data. My heart almost burst out of my chest when I saw another of my dots had vanished, and three more were blinking rapidly.

That was bad, but at least the now five injured ones were with my two remaining troops. It looked like they were holding out on an intersection to the right; one of the two main pathways further into the ship.

The four I’d encountered must have bypassed the blockade, leaving their remaining troops to pin mine down while they pushed further into the ship. They could have made it to the bridge or engineering If I hadn’t taken them out.

And I rather doubted my poor pilot's ability to hold off four determined attackers. Even I’d almost just died and I'd had the advantage of better armor and a considerable amount of luck.

Wasting no more time considering what ifs, I survey the possible paths I could take to get to my troops. Either I could loop back around the way I came, reinforcing our position, or I could push forward and try to take the enemy from behind.

Unfortunately, my map only gave me limited data, and at this range, I couldn’t make out the enemy forces arrayed against us. The only thing I could be sure of was that there weren't any around the next corner.

I tried to place a call to my troops, only to get a failed connection. That was extremely odd given I still had the data streams from my troop’s watches; it suggested a kind of jamming that targeted specific kinds of communication.

The sort of pseudo-mystical thing a Psion could pull off with Technokinesis. Once again they were messing everything up.

A glance at the rest of the map at least showed that the other main battle at least seemed to be going better. Six of my troops flashed with varying degrees of injury, but none had disappeared yet. The advantage they had with well-prepared cover was showing its worth.

I would have to trust them to keep holding the enemy for now; they were on their own until I finished up here.

Taking a final, deep breath to steady myself after the fight, I made my decision and moved on.