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  Tiberius helped him up and two others, while the other three went to Captain Hamilton and his gunship. They pulled away from the rooftop and Tiberius saw the look on the sniper’s face. He had a hard face with leathery skin, hen had to have been fighting on worlds for years to get that kind of leathery face. “Where is your captain?”

  “Captain Sidonia, has gone to meet the gods. So has her second, so I guess I’m the Captain now.”

  “My condolences. I’m Karst, Karst Budgen.” He attempted a smile, but the scar on his upper lip kept the left side of his mouth from rising.

  They shook hands and Tiberius felt some respect grow for the sniper. “I know that name, you aren’t a captain are you?”

  He shook his head. “Hell no. They’ll never stick me with that type of title. I’m a specialist, heavy weapons to be exact.”

  “I’ve heard about you guys.”

  “I’m sure you have, and I’m sure it hasn’t all been good or truthful. Look, we are good guys, we just don’t like dealing with all the politics.”

  “Coming up on the base folks, get ready.” It was the pilots voice coming over their comms.

  “Okay men get ready, I want everyone in position.” Karst said.

  He moved to the back of the bird and they could hear what could only be described as death raining down from the sky, they all knew it was the forward guns on the gunship, they just didn’t know how effective it would be against the base.

  Tiberius stood beside Karst and together they would exit and fight back against the traitorous scum.

  The back of the gunship tilted down and once it touched the concrete of the street they rushed the ramp, Karst rounded left, Tiberius rounded right. Their men followed.

  Tiberius saw the carnage of the battlefield, his spirits dropping as he beheld the enemy base. It was three times as large as the headquarters they’d assaulted just an hour ago, three places were fitted with autocannon turrets and shields to protect the gunners. The entire base protected the soldiers within, a decent bit of them were stooped or sitting behind the half walls that led to openings in the building itself.

  The autocannons fired at the Sparrowhawks as they dropped their cargo at a safe enough distance. Two of the birds that dropped the original squads off were charred, smoking wrecks that couldn’t even be used as decent cover unless you stood a few feet behind them.

  It looked as if the enemies were running drills when they were attacked since they saw some different sized steel hurdles at intervals and a wall with handholds for scaling. It wasn’t the best cover, but at least it was something. He saw a few soldiers behind half walls that separated the parking lot from the base itself, some were even behind cars trying to stay safe presumably until help arrived.

  He led his group to the nearest one and took cover near them. “Second Squad, Third Squad, and Specialist Squads reporting sir.” He said to the man, he saw the stars on his uniform and knew it was the Captain for First Squad, Kaiden Gallagher.

  The Captain looked shaken as he nodded to them. “They were ready for us. Those gun nests were put up before we even got here, they tore eighth squad to pieces with those guns and with their heavy weapons, they have launchers and they don’t seem to fear using them in here.” He pointed to the wreckage of the Sparrowhawks as evidence.

  Tiberius nodded, “I brought some snipers and some heavy weapons with us. Do you have any kind of plan?”

  “We did before we saw how fucked we were.” The captain looked defeated, he looked like there was no hope for them to win this battle.

  “Captain Hamilton, Karst, have you been able to listen in?” they both affirmed they had. “Good, I have an idea, I just need some help from your scope Karst.”

  “I’m ten feet to the left of the Sparrowhawk behind a low wall.”

  “That’s great placement. Can you see into any of the gun nests?”

  Karst looked down his scope and changed the magnification from 2x to 4x, then 10x before he had the best visual on the nearest nest. “So far I can see them, from here I can put a round through their necks.”

  “Does anyone have any smokes?” he asked, there were enough squads gathered together that someone had to have some.

  “Captain Devlin always carried some with him.” Captain Gallagher said mournfully.

  Tiberius looked at the smoking wreck that was Captain Devlins’ Sparrowhawk, “Do you know if he carried it on his person?”

  “He always did. His body is out there by his bird, I don’t know if we can get to him or not.”

  Tiberius looked back at the wreck, the wheels turning as he thought about it. “Karst if I go for the Captain’s body can you and your men cover me?”

  “You wound me. We can cover you. But those men have visors one which means they’ll have access to low light and infrared spectrum's. The smoke will do nothing to cover us.”

  “I have a plan, I just pray to the gods it works. Can you trust me Specialist Karst?”

  The silence was palpable until finally Karst said “My crew trusts you Captain Vesper.”

  It was the first time anyone had used that, it was a battlefield promotion so it probably wouldn’t last past the battle, but it felt good to hear that rank. And it sent chills down his spine. “Captain Hamilton I’ll need some cover from your men as well since you’re close by.”

  “You have it.”

  Tiberius looked back to the wreck, then to the spot where Karst knelt.

  “You know I’m coming with you.” Quintus declared as he came up behind his friend.

  He glared at his friend and chuckled, “I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t have a crazy friend to help me. Lets go.” He checked the area once more and eyed the gun nests again, the bullets had stopped and he could only assume that meant they were waiting to see what the loyalists would do. He’d give them their answer. “Now!”

  He and Quintus bolted from cover and zigzagged towards the downed Sparrowhawk. Bullets whizzed past them into the dirt as the traitors tried to stop them. Tiberius reached the bird first and dove behind it followed by Quintus. When he looked up he saw one of the gun nests go silent as the specialists went to work.

  Spying the late Captain’s body he saw there were canisters hanging on his vest that he took to be smoke grenades. “Cover me, I’m heading for his body.”

  “Got you.” Quintus said.

  “You’re covered.” Karst replied.

  “First Squad has you.”

  Tiberius smiled to himself, crouched and bum rushed the body. He could hear the rapport of gunfire, but none was close enough to hit the ground around him. Crouching he held his hands down as he approached the body and grabbed the shoulder straps and lifted him over his head into a fireman’s carry. The late Captain was heavier than he was in life, sucking in some air he rushed back to the continued rapport of gunfire.

  “Six hostiles down. One gun nest is cleared, gun is disabled.” Came Karst’s voice over the comm.

  He arrived back at Quintus’ position with the body and dropped it onto the ground. “Good work everybody. Karst get ready for more. First Squad I’ll need all of you to follow me. Oliver and Brown follow me, we need as many friendlies inside as possible.” He was pulling grenades off of the late Captain’s body and searching his vest for more supplies.

  “We’re with you. Where do you need us?” it was Captain Gallagher who spoke next.

  “Stay where you are for now. I’m going to throw these and mess with their visors. Once I yell ‘go’ start towards me, our objective is to get inside the enemy base.”

  Everyone began saying affirmative and he steadied himself for what he would have to do. Counting to five he threw the first smoke grenade and it went off letting out a cloud of smoke to cover them. He threw a flashbang grenade he’d brought from the ship, “Flashbang out!” he called, their training would kick in and they’d close their eyes. After his helmet muffled the bang he opened his eyes and moved around the ship. “Go, go, go!”

  Everyone started
into the smoke, the flashbang would mess with the rebel’s eyes. Basically their sensors would show where they were, but with their eyes blinded by the flash they wouldn’t be able to focus on the outline and they’d miss. He heard the rapport of bullets as the Specialists fired on the nests and the stragglers at the half wall, it sounded like Karst was getting in a lot of shots as the echo of his rifle filled the air.

  With the lowlight filter on their visors they could see somewhat even in the smoke, they were making good time to the closest entrance to the base and once they were close enough they could see the outlines of four men. Tiberius brought his rifle to bear and fired right at them. Plasma slammed into the first man’s chest and he was thrown backwards as Quintus fired at the man next to Tiberius’ target. Two were down and they took aim at the next one as he tried to fire at them, he had better aim than the others and Tiberius realized he wasn’t outside when the grenade went off. His vision wasn’t affected.

  The rapport of Karst’s sniper rifle reached them just after the new threat slumped backwards into the door and slid to the ground dead, the top half of his head missing. He was just turning his attention to the last man as Captain Gallagher dropped him with a three-round burst to his chest. Slowing to a stop at the doorway Tiberius looked in and smiled, there were sure to be many more men waiting in the base. He just hoped they could find the communications array and destroy it before they were overwhelmed.

  “Okay everyone, be careful and form up on me. Quintus, you’ll be at my right, Oliver, Brown follow us. The rest of Second Squad you’re to guard the entrance, anyone who comes down that you don’t know shoot, we can’t let anyone escape.” They all nodded to him, “First squad on me.” he opened the door and led his friends into hell. He just hoped First Squad lived up to their hype so he wouldn’t regret leaving his men to guard the door.

  Chapter 16

  The security forces returned to the Integrity, First Lieutenant Watson sat stoically. The Sparrowhawks landed in the hangar bay, the ramp at the back of the ship lowered to the floor. As the forces unclipped their webbings they stood so they could walk the traitor Captain to his fate.

  Watson was the fourth man off of the ship, the first two were security forces that had their weapons trained on the traitor walking backwards, then the traitor himself as Watson kept a hold of his shoulder so he couldn’t get too far ahead of them. As he stepped off of the ramp and onto the ground he saw the ships Executive Officer standing there with a smile on her face.

  “The Admiral will be happy to see you, traitorous scum.” She said disdainfully.

  In response the Captain spat at her feet and tried to curse them all when Watson’s fist found his side and knocked the wind from him. “You will treat them with respect or I swear to the gods I will beat that respect into you.”

  “First Lieutenant.” Her tone was threatening and the glare she gave him told him he was one strike away from an incident report. “If we begin acting like these traitors we are no better than they are. Now take him to the brig, I’ll inform the Admiral he’s there and waiting.” When he started to push the traitor away she held a hand up to stop him. “Not you, someone else can take the Captain, I need to speak with you.”

  “She’s got to speak to you boy.” The traitor Captain said in a mocking tone that earned him a glare from the XO, that was all he needed to shut his mouth and keep his eyes on the floor.

  Once he was out of ear shot she leaned towards Watson. “He’s getting a court marshal, we can’t give them anything that they can use to make us look bad.”

  Anger clouded his face. “Make us look bad? They fucking rebelled against the Emperor! They rebelled against the Imperium, they killed their former battle brothers! How could punching that old codger in the side make us look bad?”

  But Doyle was a seasoned Executive Officer, career military like her father and mother before her, so she took the outburst in stride and smiled at him. “You will calm yourself and take a lap or hit the bags because you need to get your aggression out. We don’t know who is and who isn’t with this rebellion. We know who the leader is, but other than him and a couple of his lieutenants we don’t know who else is in Rising Anvil. For all we know I’m a part of it, or hells even the Admiral could be.”

  “That’s traitorous talk XO.” He warned as he gave her a dark glare.

  “But it’s true. He could be, I could be. Your entire security team could be. We just don’t know. But what we can do is hold a court-martial, let everyone see how bad these terrorists are and how they need to be stopped. It’s better than flying off of the handle and just killing an entire ship full of people just to snuff out one or two bad eggs.”

  “Didn’t the Emperor’s message say that we are to use any means necessary to bring them to a permanent end?”

  “Yes, but that also means using kindness and cunning to stop them, not just brute force. That is how benevolent our Emperor is. And I for one am thankful he is so benevolent. Now get to the gym and work that shit out.” And with that she turned on her heel and left the hangar bay, and left Watson to think about what he’d said and done. Specifically how she said some things.

  —

  Tiberius entered the foyer of the base, there were three hallways off of it leading to different places and presumably different hiding spots for the General or for the stairs leading to the roof and the communications array.

  “Captain Gallagher you’ve been in bases before, which way would the roof access be?”

  He thought about it a moment and said, “This way,” and headed to the right down the hallway. They followed the veteran hoping that he was correct. They passed a few rooms before he held a hand up to stop them, then they heard what he had and tried to open the closest door. He drew back his rifle and jammed the butt into the doorknob and it broke off, the wood cracked and the door swung inwards. “Get in!” he spoke softly, but his words carried the weight of importance.

  They rushed into the room, it was small and barely fit all of them. Tiberius shut the door behind him as a dozen soldiers came running past towards the front of the building. He looked at the Captain who shook his head.

  “There’s a dozen armed soldiers heading for the front.” He said over the open comms, he just hoped Karst could start taking them out.

  “Roger.” He said back.

  “Okay, we should be safe to leave the room.” Tiberius opened the door and checked both sides of the corridor. When he didn’t see anyone, or hear anything he led them towards the end of the long hallway and checked around the corner. “It’s clear, lead on.” He said to Captain Gallagher as he took point.

  They made it five feet down the hall before a door on their right opened and a pair of soldiers walked out with their rifles drawn, they stopped in front of the group of Imperial soldiers and hesitated. It was a fatal mistake as the Imperial soldiers didn’t freeze.

  Eight rifles fired at them and the traitors bodies jerked with each round as they fell back against the door and slid to the ground, leaving a trail of gore down to the floor.

  “Okay, someone had to hear that, weapons free men!” Captain Gallagher said as they moved through the hallway. All of them knew what it meant, weapons free meant if any enemies came into view they were ordered to terminate them on sight. There’d be no more hiding to try and get through as stealthily as possible. It was a full on firefight from here on out.

  They continued down the hall until they encountered another group of soldiers and fired, only one of their own went down. It went like that, running up stairs, down hallways, entering firefights that lasted only a minute or two, but felt like an eternity. Tiberius sent up a silent prayer of thanks to the gods that they didn’t lose any more soldiers. And they kept running, until finally they found a fork in their road.

  “Which way do we take?” Quintus asked. One the wall in front of them were signposts marking where to go, and they’d followed one to this point with the assumption it was heading them towards the roof, and the array
. But now they saw a signpost leading to the roof, and one leading to the communications center.

  Tiberius stared at the signs for a full minute before he looked back at the Captain. “Sir, how about if you take some of first squad to the comm center and I’ll lead other half of the men to the array. You take the center before we reach the array and we can decide from there.”

  “That sounds good to me soldier.” He turned around and began speaking to his men and led them down the hallway towards the communications center, and hopefully a sound victory over the rebels.

  Meanwhile Tiberius smiled at Quintus and said “Well at least it’s not a boring mission.”

  “Yeah…” Quintus wasn’t sure what the mission had been so far, but boring was assuredly not the word to describe it.

  They followed the signs to a commercial grade lift that would carry them easier than the equipment it took to the roof on a daily basis for repair and recycling. Once the doors closed the lift became it’s own little world they were encapsulated in. It took forever for them to rise the last four floors to what they hoped was the roof, it was probably only two minutes, but it felt so much longer to Tiberius because he was closed in with no where to go.

  When the lift finally reached the floor there was a loud echoing sound that construction machinery still had to alert everyone they were backing up. “Weapons free men, we don’t know what’s on the other side of this door.”

  It was a horrid plan to say the least. In unfamiliar, not to mention enemy territory and they were going in blind essentially, which was ill advised to say the least.

  As the doors slid open, one going up the other down, the men aimed their rifles waiting for an ambush of some kind. When no one jumped out and shot at them or so much as shouted boo they all felt more on edge. How could it be this easy for them?