“Three three, uh, roger. Uh, out.”
“Wake the hell up, three three.”
Galen saw the mission heading. It matched the compass heading of the tank. He brought the situation map on-screen. A line of blue tank symbols were on line approaching the objective. There were seventeen blue symbols. Galen’s third platoon was the right flank. Tad’s first platoon was the left flank. Second platoon was the five tanks in the center. Two tanks cruised side by side a hundred meters behind second platoon. They were the company commander’s and executive officer’s tanks, commanding the charge.
The flat plain was covered with powdery dry rocks that churned into dust as the tanks rolled across them. The brownish-pink color stretched to the horizon where it met a green-grey sky. On the rear-view screen Galen could see craggy blue mountains and green-blue foothills. There were still ten kilometers between the company of charging light tanks and their objective.
“Hey Sergeant Boggs, why doesn’t the enemy take advantage of the better defensive terrain of the mountains?”
“They did. Our panzer grenadiers kicked them out of there. Now they’re in the open, using heavy weapons to ward off a slow-moving infantry attack. Now we go and finish them off. We’re the only tanks fast enough to get to them and kill them before they can run away.”
“We couldn’t strafe them with close air support?”
“They got bitchin’ air defense.”
The objective was three klicks away. A trail of blue glowing shells streamed out of the objective area for a second. The upper hull of the tank on Galen’s far right vaporized, the burning hulk of the lower hull rolling along on its road wheels as it careened to the left and flipped end-over-end. Laser cannons from second platoon returned fire. The discharge temporarily slowed their vehicles, causing a brief sag in the charging line of light armor. An explosion blossomed from the center of the objective area and a smoke ring rose above it.
“Scratch one flak gun, Chief.”
“Too bad for the guys in three four.”
“They’re fine, Chief. They were auto-ejected by their tank’s computer when it realized the vehicle was doomed. Check your auxiliary status screen.”
Galen did. The vehicle was black but the two symbols for the crewmen were still green. The rear view screen showed two parachutes floating to the ground.
“Dismounts to the front!”
Chapter Fourteen
Galen sprayed grazing fire from his coaxial machine gun. He put the weapon on auto-fire and then popped his hatch to stand and fire the copulas’ machine gun. The charged rail of the gun pulsed a magnetic field down its length. Steel balls pulled into the field from the ammo feeder sped away at a velocity of twenty seven hundred meters per second. Five rounds a second, accurate to within a centimeter at a range of three hundred meters. Powerful enough for a single round to explode a person from the inside out with hydrostatic pressure if they weren’t wearing a combat suit. Galen hosed rounds into a two-man crew preparing to fire an antitank cannon. They blew apart. Their weapon flew to pieces. Galen searched for more targets. Soldiers popping up from fighting positions to fire anti-armor rockets or flamers. Targets were trashed as soon as they appeared in Galen’s sights. Targets blew apart before Galen could get to them, the coaxial machine gun taking them out on automatic mode. Then, not enough targets. No more targets.
Galen dropped back into his seat and took the weapon off automatic.
“Slow up, driver. Let our subordinate tanks get in front of us so we can watch their backs.” The status screen showed the two other platoons doing the same. The charge slowed to a walking pace as the company picked its way through the objective.
Two seats ejected from the tank to Galen’s left front. Tank three-one. An instant later the turret of the tank lifted into the air as the tank’s hull warped outward and lifted a meter off the ground. It landed sideways with black smoke billowing from a hull that glowed cherry red. Three-one’s fusion bottle, a half-meter spherical lump of lead and titanium alloy with reaction mass at its core, rolled away. The turret fell on the ground behind Galen’s tank.
The company commander’s voice came over the command net, “Hold up! It’s a mine field!” The tanks of the company stopped on line and continued to scan for targets. Nothing moved in the objective area. “Stay where you are. The grunts will finish this.”
Galen’s status screen showed two tanks as black but the crewmen showed green. Three one and three four were destroyed. At least he hadn’t lost any troops. The main screen showed friendly infantry carriers approaching from behind.
Ten minutes later the tracked vehicles stopped between the tanks and their infantry dismounted. The squads fanned out and picked their way along using mine detectors to find and mark mines as they went. The tanks and infantry carriers crept along behind them, avoiding the mines and shooting any raiders who offered to surrender. The raiders weren’t part of any legitimate military force and had to be dealt with harshly. In accordance with the unit’s charter with the bonding commission, illegal combatants had to be exterminated here to discourage combat activity by every little hooyah who thinks they have the right to just decide all on their own they can take up arms and kill people. After an hour the objective was clear. The infantry carriers picked up their grunts and drove back to the rendezvous point.
“Okay, troops. Fire up the mines.”
The tankers drove back across the mine field and fired their laser cannons at the marked mines. The mines left craters in the ground a meter deep and five meters across when they exploded. Galen buttoned up his tank to keep out the dust and dampen the shock waves of the explosions. Galen’s platoon broke from the company and picked up the four crewmen who were ejected from their tanks. A troop, the former driver of three four, stood in the auxiliary gunner’s hatch of Galen’s tank. Another troop sat on the turret. Galen stood in the open hatch of his cupola.
“So how do you feel? All right?” Galen asked the troop sitting on the turret.
The troop pointed to the side of his helmet. Galen reached inside and pulled out a commo spaghetti cord and connected it to his helmet.
“Yeah, Chief?”
“You feel all right?”
“Not bad. Some guys get their neck broke when they punch out but I’m okay. Too bad about my tank.”
“That ejection modification is a good idea. I never heard of it in Hornets before.”
“We adapted them from Hellcat tanks. When you think about it, light tanks need it more than heavy tanks. But it doesn’t always work. The computer doesn’t always get you punched out in time.”
Galen’s platoon joined the tail of the company as it moved in column toward the mountains. He glanced at his situation map. Eleven tank symbols were in the column. Eleven left from the original seventeen. Six tanks killed in the charge. Two troops from second platoon showed a black status.
“So what do you figure we’ll do next, Sergeant Boggs?”
“After-action review, then we re-deploy to the fleet. We have raiders on other planets to pick off.”
“Same bunch as this?”
“Maybe, maybe not, I don’t know. It depends.”
“Right, it depends.”
The convoy moved along a dry stream bed in a valley through the foothills. Scrubby pioneer plants, the beginnings of the organic stage of terraforming, grew at the edges of the dry stream. Galen wondered how long it would take for dense forests and grasslands to cover Hobart. Hopefully a better name for the planet would be found before it was covered with life and human settlements. The light armor company convoyed into the mountains and parked in a box canyon. The rest of the Panzer Brigade detachment was there, the infantry carriers parked in a neat row with green tents set up behind them.