The factory roof had a large ragged hole blasted into it, as a result of the two days of intensive bombardment. The sunny, cloudless sky of Gamma IV was visible through it, and it leaked water heavily. Conditions were less than ideal, but it was the best they had under the circumstances.
The sergeant and two other medics led Nikolai to a bed where Steel lay.
The general tried in vain to struggle into a sitting position, agonizing pain racked his body however and he collapsed back onto the bed; he was weakening.
“ Don’t try to move,” Vargev said solemnly.
His Generals uniform, hung next to his bed was torn and bloodstained, his exposed chest covered in crimson bandages. “You were right colonel,” he coughed.
“ About what sir?”
“ About everything; about deploying the forces in the hills, I’ve been a fool and now I’ve doomed us all.” He sunk further into his pillow, a small tear of sadness ran down his weather beaten, wrinkled cheek.
“ Try not to speak.”
“ I guess this means you’re in charge now Nikolai.” Steel coughed, a small trickle of blood escaped his parched cracked lips.
“ Yes sir, it does.”
“ Just do one thing for me colonel?”
“ What’s that sir?”
“ Win this damned war.”
“ I’ll try my best sir,” Vargev smiled wanly, his dark moustache curling up at the corners as he did so.
Walking slowly away from the bed, and out of earshot of Steel, he spoke to one of the medics. “How’s he doing?”
“ Not good, he has sustained severe shrapnel injuries to his chest and stomach, he has a collapsed lung, a ruptured spleen, and he’s bleeding internally.”
The medic solemnly shook her head as she let out a sigh, “we are doing everything we can for him, but I don’t think he’ll last the night.”
“ Do whatever you can for him.”
“ We’ll keep on trying colonel.”
Vargev and the woman saluted each other and he left sickbay, all Nikolai could think about was the fact that there goes a good man, and he will be sorely missed. He couldn’t allow himself time to grieve, there will be plenty of time for that later.
He walked towards a group of soldiers smoking and leaning upon the pitted track armour of an Apollo main battle tank. He was weary, and in a daze with the sadness he felt at the loss of General Steel.
A young Lieutenant quickly dropped his cigarette after realizing who it was, saluted and asked. “What are our orders sir?”
“ err..what?” Vargev shook his head slightly as if to lift the fog from his mind, before his thoughts snapped back to the task at hand. “We are going to re-organise the entire defence, I want your section to deploy heavy machine gun nests at the front gate, two men per nest; got that.”
“ Yes sir,” the lieutenant snapped to attention. “Is it true what the men say sir?”
“ And what is that lieutenant?”
“ That we may not last the night out sir,” he said weakly.
“ We can; and we will Lieutenant. We’ll fight to the last man if necessary,” Vargev replied, not really believing his own words.
“ Yes sir,” the lieutenant replied, a slightly relieved look spread across his young features.
They both saluted for the last time and the lieutenant immediately set about ordering his section.
Nikolai could hear the distant ‘boom’ of entrenched groundhog artillery pieces resuming their day-long shelling of the Krenaran positions.
Sandbags were quickly stacked up near the front gate throughout the day, with heavy machine guns placed behind them. More sandbags were piled up near the breach in the perimeter fence near the warehouses. Vargev had ordered two Dominator assault walkers, and two more heavy machine gun nests there, manpower was on the short side, with so many dead and injured, the men were tired and battle weary, he knew that. But they had to carry on the fight, they couldn’t just give up yet.
Troops were ferried past the Krenaran held buildings in much heavier cougar armoured personnel carriers held in reserve, rather than use the lighter raiders. The buildings surrounding the Krenaran occupied areas were garrisoned once again and more heavy machine gun emplacements were prepared at strategic positions on the rooftops.
Finally, after many hours of re-organising and planning, Vargev finally said to himself, “now we are prepared.”
In orbit far above, the mood was tense, the Honduras and the Eurinades had docked with the station, and had transferred some of their crew onboard. They were performing a thorough search of the facility, trying to find out what had happened, they found some evidence of weapons fire, but little else, and were about to detach from the station to resume their previous positions.
“ Sir, I’ve got something for ya’,” Kinraid said in alarm as he turned in his seat towards Michael. His station came alive with information, data flashed across it with such speed that it was all he could do to read it.
“ Put it on the viewer.”
The holographic viewer blazed into life again, and they could just about see a small black cloud emerging from the far equator of Gamma IV, silhouetted by the jade green upper atmosphere of the planet itself.
“ Magnify.”
The viewer zoomed in on the cloud, and they quickly found that it was not a cloud, but instead a gigantic Krenaran fleet heading straight towards them. It showed hundreds of enemy stealth ships, and several of the deadly command carriers bringing up the rear.
“ Jesus Christ!” Michael shouted, as he looked upon the size of the enemy fleet bearing down upon them.
“ I’m readin’ over three hundred ships, and six command carriers,” Kinraid said, his eyes wide.
“ Have the rest of the fleet detected them?”
“ Only the Solarian ships sir, they are awaiting orders.”
“ The enemy fleet has increased speed, they are closing fast,” Eldathar said.
That is how they had taken the station, a fleet of that size would have breezed through the defenders. The crew onboard the shipyards would have been outgunned and quickly overwhelmed, they would have had no choice but to surrender, and in so doing becoming more slaves for the Krenaran war machine, either that or simply eaten, Michael thought sadly.
6. The great battle for Echo base
The enemy Krenaran fleet continued to close at a tremendous pace.
Michael had now realized that it was all just a monumental trap, the Krenarans knew full well the E.D. F would be sending reinforcements, so they laid in wait on the far side of the planet where they would not be detected. The E.D. F fleet was outnumbered almost two to one, and no less than six of the deadly command carriers were now bearing down upon them.
The Hermes had put its entire fighter and bomber wings on alert status.
The Liberty was already on full alert, its fusion cannon and high energy torpedo launchers, were powered and ready. More power was shunted to the thrusters and main engine. The load on the Solarian power core was almost at maximum, he would have to be careful.
The Krenaran fleet continued its inexorable advance, and Michael noticed that the deadly multiple torpedo launchers on the massive Krenaran command carriers were steadily rising into their firing positions.
As the two gargantuan fleets closed, the signal for battle came from the Hermes. “E.D. F fleet, break and attack!”
At once the two forces set upon one another furiously. Dozens of Solarian battlecruisers, together with their smaller frigates and escorts opened fire together. Multiple incandescent blue fusion cannon beams streaked towards the Krenaran ships, some managed to evade the ferocious fusillade. Several more were caught and torn apart by the sheer power of the Solarian weapon systems, their hulls spinning wildly out of control.
A huge wave of torpedoes launched simultaneously by the Solarian shipping followed this initial strike, slamming into more Krenaran ships at close range, their high power charges smashing into the hulls of the enemy vessels before detonating in huge explosions, lighting up the space around them.