Tran sat there quietly, listening to the distant, dull rumbling of the engines through the bustle and shuffling around him. He caught the motion of the commander walking forward to the front of the group and immediately stood-

Around and under him, two tons of metal, synthetics, and electronics stood for him, silent as a ghost apart from the heavy, rubberized soles on the metal deck.

Ven Fierna backed out of the group with a grace that defied the bulk of her armor, walking back in the two ton powered armor as if she'd been living with it all her life. She didn't even bother to use the armor's built-in speakers as she barked out her order.

"Marines! At the ready!"

He stepped forward as well, yelling out to the soldiers assembled around him. "On your feet! Fall in, now!"

The bay filled with the clatter of metal on metal, rubber on metal, as the platoon stood and fell into the line, three lines of twelve, side-by-side, squad leaders in front of their line. Tran was one of the soldiers out in front.

"All right!" Ven boomed out, looking over the group. "Now we get to see if these last few months are worth it all!"

She paused, tapping together the fingers of the powered metal hand, watching over the group before breaking the silence again. "We'll be entering orbit in sixty minutes. We'll be on the ground less than thirty minutes after that. And I trust I don't have to remind you of just what's waiting for us down there."

She grinned, "And we all get to make a couple firsts here. We're the first uplift powered infantry unit to see combat. We're the test subjects, we get to see how good these two ton chunks of scrap can perform!"

There were some chuckles around the room.

"And second, and even more importantly... This is the first time in this war that we go on the offensive. We bring the battle to them! Before now, they've always come to us, attacking us on our planets, in our cities. They brought this war to us here on this planet, pushed us off. Now, we bring the war right back to them! We will take the fight back to them, and we'll reclaim what they took for us. We will let them know that we won't be bullied around, and we will make this every bit as hard and painful on them as they have made it for us!"

There were a couple yells from the lines, soldiers grinning. She was grinning, an almost devious grin. She was enjoying this...

So was Tran.

"They took this planet from us just over four months ago. In that time, they scrambled to deploy a garrison after their attacking force was almost entirely decimated. They control the planet, the two thousand people living there have all been imprisoned, but they have less than a battalion of combined arms as a garrison. One company armor, one company mechanized infantry. They also have roughly one company assembled from previous action."

She paused again. "And two teams of Army Rangers from the assault four months ago. Powered unit... They are our primary concern, the main reason we are here." She thumped the bulked-out powered forearm against her heavily armored chest. "But thanks to Dawson we have armors built with complete, detailed knowledge of all their designs, including the Ranger armors. They're designed to counter all the strengths of their designs. We not only outnumber their power armors two-to-one, but for once in this war, we actually have technological superiority."

"Now then..." She turned, ducking down to pick up a board, showing a long-range photo-image of the planet below. "The area of the Berrin aerospace port, which is really an over-glorified concrete slab in the middle of a wide valley. To the northwest is the city of Berrin."

She pointed to the ridge far to the northeast, then southwest of the aerospace port. "Conventional infantry forces will be landing following orbital bombardment just beyond the ridges of the valley and secure it, two platoons on each side, and hold it while a light armor company is deployed to reinforce them, again, two platoons per side. We..." She pointed to the southeast end of the valley. "...will land here following orbital bombardment, disembark, and proceed through the valley, clearing this small commune. We don't know their exact disposition of forces, but we know there are people there. Who and what, we don't know, but estimates are around one to two hundred. That means civilians."

"So... I don't want anyone going wild and letting loose with a good barrage of explosive rounds and chewing up a bunch of non-combatants! Save it for the enemy!"

"Once we get through the commune, there is a military base just south of the aerospace port. It should be taken out by orbital bombardment, but we may need to clean up. Then when everyone's ready, we lead the assault on the aerospace port, and later, on to Berrin."

"We're the tip of the spear, time to show them what we're made of!" She looked over them one last time, then nodded. "Okay! Final check, get all your gear set and ready, all systems checked, and assemble in thirty minutes to load up! Dismissed!"

"How's the arm, Ganny?" Tran was checking over his squad, and had seen the fox slowly flexing his right arm.

"Still acting up a little," he replied, watching the thick metal arm flexing around his own. "I'm surprised Dawson got it working at all after I nearly crushed the thing, but I think some of the flex cables are out of sync or something like that. It keeps stuttering! How am I supposed to shoot when my arm keeps stuttering back and forth?"

Tran reached up and took hold of the arm, as if to feel it, though he knew it'd take quite a bit to feel it through this heavy armor. His own hand was almost a foot behind the powered hands of his armor, gripping a control stick. "Let Dawson take a final look over it, he should get it straightened out. Hopefully that 120-kilo gun will steady it up some. Just keep a good two-handed grip on it, should be fine."

Ganny grumbled. "Still don't like it. Would be nice to have a suit that works right..."

"You'll be getting the first replacement and repairs that I can get ahold of, Ganny." He half turned, looking over at the rest of the squad. "Tell you what, if Diesel doesn't shape up, I'll be swapping out his best parts for you."

"Aw, come on, Tran!" Diesel said, with a big grin. "You know if I go out, there won't be a piece of this suit left on the surface of that planet. But if anything, I bet you I'll be the only one to walk away from this."

"Yeah, if you don't scrap your suit first." Diesel was well known for finding any excuse to "accidentally" strip off the rubberized soles of his armor, because he liked the loud metal-on-metal clunk as he walked. He even damaged some servos once so that his suit made a quiet whirring sound whenever he moved instead of being so absolutely silent, but the damage cascaded during training and left him with a worthless suit for a couple days. Tran was none too pleased, however, and had made Diesel drag his driver cannon back to the barracks... After hauling a half-ton gun back, he was a little more careful about his modifications.

Tran was, actually, surprised he had made it. Huskies can be strong, but Diesel was more than just strong; He was completely stubborn about finishing something he has started.

He knew he himself probably wouldn't have been able to do it, even though he was probably the strongest of the group apart for Dan. Tran wasn't particularly big for a komodo dragon, but he was still one of the "tough guys" in the group. Diesel was just... Well, Diesel. Stubborn to the end.

"First squad. How's everyone's suits today?" It was Dawson, who looked more than a little out of place in the current company. He was human. A slightly tall, lean-looking man who had spent most his life in weapon and armor development projects, and would have all the looks of the stereotypical research scientist if it weren't for looking a bit stronger than average. He was the one responsible for making these power armors possible. "I hope Diesel hasn't broken yet another suit for me to repair?"

"Haw, haw," Diesel snorted, though he was grinning a bit more than before. "I may be stupid, but I ain't going to break my armor right before a firefight! Besides, I have to take it easy on you every now and then."

It still seemed odd to Tran, but Diesel and Dawson had actually developed into pretty good friends, despite the extra workload Diesel had created for him. Probably because of all the time the two had spent in the workshop while his armor was being repaired.

Grey was another matter, though, the only acknowledgment to Dawson's existence was when he glared at him for a moment before returning to ignoring him. There had been trouble with him from the start; He just didn't trust humans. No, more than that, Tran corrected. He hated them. "I'm fine," He growled, when Dawson came up to check his suit.

"Grey..." Tran glared at him, and the wolf fell silent as Dawson checked him over quietly. He rather obviously felt uncomfortable around him.

Eventually the checks were over. Ganny's arm had a slightly loose cable that had been missed earlier, leading to a slightly irregular signal, and was functioning much more smoothly now. Grey still seemed a little worked up, though. Time to deal with him, Tran thought.

"Grey-"

"I don't care, Tran," Grey snapped, cutting him off. "I don't care if he's helping or not. I still don't like those humans. And I don't see why I should, they're trying to KILL us! They hate us, and as long as there are any humans left, they're going to go on hating us!"

"Grey, cool off. You know damn well Dawson doesn't 'hate us.' He risked his own life to switch sides and help us. Treason, punishable by death, they would have -killed- him if they caught him and he still came!"

"Yeah, they'd kill him. Not only do they want -us- dead, they want anyone that helps us dead, too! They all hate us, and it won't be over until we can deal with them once and for all."

"They don't all hate us. Hell, most of them don't care about this war. They're starting to care though -- oh yes they are. Every time their news sources list ships lost, casualties from an attack, the whole thing grinding slowly on, the people side against this war more and more. We're fighting a popularity war now every bit as much as we're fighting a real war -- even more! If the Confederation were to throw its whole military might at us, we probably wouldn't stand a chance, but they can't because of their own people. Even when they attacked Dachen-"

Grey interrupted angrily, "I had fami-"

"I know!" Tran yelled in his face, grabbing onto the wolf's chest-plate. "I know you had family there! Lots of people had family there! But that one attack almost ended the whole fucking war! When those people found out what their own military had done, wiping out an entire colony, thousands of people, destruction broadcast across all their planets, they all noticed the war, and that almost ended it. They don't hate us, they never did! They just didn't take notice, didn't care. Now they're starting to care."

Grey leaned forward in his armor, gritting his teeth and spoke forcefully. "That doesn't mean I have to like them."

Tran looked squarely back into the wolf's eyes, silent for a moment before leaning forward as well, pulling down a little on his subordinate's armor. "No... But you do have to follow orders. Now let me make myself clear, Private. You will behave yourself perfectly while we are down there, especially when we're near any civilians. If you don't, I will be sure you'll be out of this unit before we dust off. And if you do anything... ANYTHING out of line to cause harm or target those civilians, I will shoot you myself!"

He shoved back on the other power armor, and Grey stumbled back, falling to the deck with a loud crashing slam of two tons of metal on metal. Tran glared down at him, then turned and walked off. He was going to have to talk to Ven about him...

First squad was falling in now, helping each-other mounting their heavy back-mounted ammo drums. Tran himself was armed with a heavier weapon than most of them, a three-barreled 28mm gatling autocannon, instead of the standard single-barreled unit. Unfortunately, he got no more ammunition than a normal load, just the two back-mounted drums, feeding to his gun with a flexible powered belt. His weapon had a huge thick shroud around the barrels with a single opening for the muzzle, instead of looking like an overblown assault rifle like the normal 28mm gun.

He regretted the fact that having a gun heavier than the standard autocannon meant that he didn't carry an anti-vehicle missile, like all the rest. He couldn't do much to defend himself from a vehicle unless he were above it. But that's what the rest of the squad was for.

Diesel, of course, loved his gun. The heaviest, most expensive, and most powerful gun in their arsenal, which was probably the only piece of equipment he tried to keep in good condition. It was a rail-cannon, though everyone called it the "driver" cannon. The driver fired a depleted uranium dart nestled in a jacket of ferrous material at over a dozen times the speed of sound. Everything about it was high-tech and expensive, even the relatively simple and inert ammunition; depleted uranium was rather rare and hard for their rather limited production abilities. But it gave a great punch, able to take out most light vehicles, and even heavier armored vehicles if it hit the right spot.

Then there was the heavy autocannon of the squad, a huge 38mm gun carried by Dan, a beast of a bear, who was clad in the larger Mk3 armor. The Mk3 was the heaviest version of the Griffon armor, designed for the larger creatures. All the rest of the team wore the standard Mk2 armors, except Sarah, a small mouse who wore the smaller Mk1.

All the suits were roughly comparable in ability, though the Mk1 couldn't carry the heavier weapons like the 38mm or the driver. Sarah didn't mind, something like that would just get in her way. She was rather proud of being small and light, and took naturally to the role of scout and observer, or taking point. Despite how often they had tried, she was impossible to catch by surprise.

That's one of our problems, Tran thought. So many species, all different sizes... So much energy spent to make something compatible with more species that could have been used instead for other efforts. Humans certainly have an advantage there.

Everyone else was getting assembled, and Ven was walking back toward the front of the room. Tran flipped down his mini-visor, checking over his suit one last time, even pausing to spin up the barrels of his autocannon briefly. Everything was ready.

Hopefully, he thought. The anxiety of taking these armors into combat for the first time was starting to build. He hadn't felt quite this way since the first time he deployed for combat as a standard infantry soldier.

Ven called out to the squad leaders, checking that everyone was ready, then sending each squad to their transports. They'd be landing in aerospace shuttles following a bombardment, rather than attempting a combat drop. They hadn't had enough time to practice that yet, and it was decided that landing in shuttles would be safer. Still, they couldn't shake the uncomfortable feeling of being stuck in a large can.

"Everyone be combat ready the very moment we touch dirt," Ven called out over the radio, voice distorted a bit over the radio. "Don't wait for contact to make sure everything's working right. When you touch down, unload and form a perimeter. Just like training, by the book. I want the first soldier out before the shuttle even stops moving, and immediate dust-off as soon as the last soldier clears the ramp!"

"Keep it together, watch yourself, and I'll see you on the ground!"

Tran took in a long, deep breath, sighed slowly, and then closed the dome-like helmet, a quiet, mechanical click sounding as it latched shut. No weak visor, just 4 solid centimeters of armor composite, with displays showing the inside of the shuttle around him. The radio crackled slightly in his ear-piece as the shuttle jerked slightly, then moved, exiting the ship.

"Going down..."

It was a few minutes before they felt the buffeting of the atmosphere, and a few more before they approached their destination.

"Squad!" the intercom crackled out over the roar of engines and atmosphere. "LZ ahead, thirty seconds! Clear the ramp quick and watch the back-blast. Good luck!"

There were a couple boisterous calls across the radio as they descended. Typical pre-mission bragging, tempered a bit by this being the first combat mission this unit as a whole had been in.

The shuttle seemed to tilt as it quickly shed velocity. Tran's auto-map system showed them approaching the LZ quick, his armor's inertial navigation system tracking his exact position through calculated velocities and forces. The shuttle slowed over the LZ, ramp already starting to drop as it lowered toward the ground.

Then the shuttle suddenly rolled toward its side and pitched back further, intercom clicking as the pilot started to yell out something that didn't quite make it out, drowned out by the thunderous, drum-like explosion. The shuttle suddenly rolled back the other way, then slammed down heavily, engines winding down, one sounding more like it was grinding to a halt.

Tran was stunned for a moment by the impact, but quickly recovered as he stood in the slanted bay. "Move out, clear that ramp!"

The two armors closest to the ramp moved quickly, and Tran immediately heard the high-pitched cracking and stuttering of smallarms fire, even before Ganny yelled out over the radio.

"Troops!"

A flash enveloped one of the armors, which spun and threw itself to the ground in a small crater, autocannon to its shoulder as the other darted forward to other cover. "This is One-One Alpha, LZ is hot! Repeat, LZ is hot, we have troops at our position!"

Tran was stepping forward to move out of the shuttle himself as another thunderous explosion detonated right next to him, a brilliant bright flash of white flaring across his view, the thermal image flaring brightly from something hot... An anti-vehicle round had just hit the shuttle and passed right in front of him!

He stumbled and fell onto the ground, another soldier moving past him. One of the autocannons thundered, followed a few moments later by several rapid, loud thumps as the 28mm explosive projectiles detonated against the ground or trees, each one like a grenade.

Tran pushed himself back up, hefting the autocannon over his shoulder as the barrels spun up. He grabbed the forward handle, the auto-stabilizer kicking in as the gun went almost perfectly smooth and level. His armor flickered as the surface stealth system kicked in, his armor seeming to go translucent, almost invisible. Then he moved forward again.

His squad had spread out almost perfectly on clearing the ramp. Ganny had laid down suppressive fire into the tree-line less than 50 meters off to the right, splintering several of the trees and throwing shrapnel throughout the area. One soldier lay motionless there, some sort of rocket launcher laying beside him. A couple bright flashes from inside the trees made him instinctively duck, even though he knew the rounds likely couldn't do much to him. The rest of the squad was forming a rough line facing the trees and a small ridge off to the left.

Tran swept his gun across the tree-line as he hustled forward, then turned and threw himself to the ground beside a large rock. Most of his squad was firing now at targets which appeared to him only as marks transmitted to his display over the radio net. One mark suddenly appeared as a couple suits picked up a new target, and this one caught his attention.

"PC south!!"

He scooted forward and turned around the rock, then catching sight of the light armored vehicle as it rolled quickly up the crest to their left, turret tracking toward, followed closely by a few soldiers using it as cover. He immediately depressed the trigger as he started to call out on the radio, but stopped as he saw diesel's huge driver rise up and turn. Even with the stealth system, he could easily pick out his form in his thermal imager as it shimmered with his movement, the system trying to keep up with the motion. But while he was plainly visible to him at this range, he'd be nearly invisible over several hundred meters if he weren't moving. And even here he'd be hard to see if it weren't for the suits' vision enhancement. Unfortunately, these troops weren't having any trouble with it.

His own rounds struck the side of the APC and the ground beside it, kicking up a huge flurry of dust that made a ghost-like image in his thermal view, small explosions masking the troops behind the vehicle, then Diesel's gun boomed loudly, sounding like a loud thunderclap as the round ripped through the air, slamming into the rear flank of the vehicle. It must have hit the track inside the armor, as that side's track immediately seized up, the vehicle skidding around to present the other side to Diesel.

The gun thundered again, then again, and on the third shot the turret jerked and fire belched from the rear of the vehicle as it brewed up. He didn't see any sign of the troops that had been behind it.

"Left side, move up to the ridge-shit!" He jerked again as a rapid series of little *plinks* sounded on his armor, some small-caliber rounds striking his armor, he turned in time to see the image of a soldier with a rocket launcher leveled. He reflexively depressed the trigger, and the soldier disappeared in a rapid succession of flashes.

He caught a faint image from just inside the tree-line, but the chatter of smallarms had died down. Pushing himself back up from the ground, he took a kneeling stance, then swept his gun across the tree-line. The weapon churned out the rounds as explosives threw debris and branches wildly just inside the forest, while at the same time he yelled out over the radio. "Squad! Assault, assault!"

The entire squad immediately rose to their feet, a few autocannons thundering for cover, and rushed forward. Tran followed right along with them, calling out again, "Assault, advance two hundred meters and hold! Left flank, cover the southern clearing!"

Another autocannon stuttered for a moment, a red person-shaped mark appearing on his screen to show another troop contact, just in front of a similar, blue-colored mark showing a friendly power armor, showing their position, hidden by the forest. The red mark went dark almost before Tran even saw it; Another soldier down.

Up ahead he could see the trees parting to show the field beyond.

"Take cover at the tree-line. Right flank, watch north."

He hurried forward, then dropped prone again, right beside Diesel. The field ahead was brown and cratered by the orbital bombardment earlier. Two more armored vehicles lay in the field, both shredded by impacts.

Another squad of armors was coming up quick behind their position. Third squad, and an extra; Must be Ven.

He rose to a knee, sweeping his gun across the far edge of the field, watching for anything there, but it looked vacant. "Sarah, Bray, did any get past north through the woods?"

They both replied back negative.

Tran slowly stood, lowering the gun barrel a bit as the barrels spun to a stop. "Okay... Looks like the area is clear. Everyone regroup, we're moving on to the commune. But keep an eye out."

The rest of the squad started regrouping, forming a rough line as they started their advance, eyes and ears (And thermal and mikes) searching for any sign of soldiers.

"Hey," Tran called out on the radio. "What's the status of those pilots?"

Ven's voice came across the channel. "Shuttle two is circling around to pick them up, right now."

"Good. I'm glad they're all right."

"Looks clear..."

Sarah was just a few meters further ahead, the sensor drum of her armor protruding mere centimeters over the ridge in front of her, letting her look over without being exposed. Tran moved forward, as did the rest of his squad, taking a firing position over the crest, scanning the face of the buildings facing them. The only three contacts were individuals, labeled an annoyingly vague "uncertain" by the armor's target-designation system. Tran could see plainly from here what they were, though. A couple and their child, quickly moving to a house, pulling a small cart heaped with supplies of some sort.

"Go inside," Tran muttered. "Just go inside..."

A few moments later, they turned to enter a door, and quickly disappeared.

"Okay! Diesel, Ganny, cover from here, everyone else, ready for assault"

"First squad, ready for assault."

The other squads checked in, then Ven's voice, calm. "Roll Zombies, ready for assault."

Tran flicked a little scroll-ball on the control stick, laying out a set of points on his tactical map, then clicked on a button. The small pack above his ammo drums clicked open, followed by a hissing sound as a small rocket ignited and launched one of the four small Zombie drones, the tiny winged craft, maybe ten centimeters long, arcing somewhat clumsily overhead as the wings snapped out. The rocket died and dropped free to fall to the ground, as the little propeller kicked in, and it quickly made its way toward the commune ahead. A little arc on Tran's tactical map showed its sensor coverage. Hopefully, it would find any enemy units before they did.

Ven again. "Platoon, start assault."

"Let's go," Tran said, rising up with the rest of his team. The Zombie was already passing the front of the little town, no soldiers spotted yet. The line of armors from each squad advanced at a quick trot, guns holding unnaturally level by the stabilization system, despite the bouncing terrain. The squad looked at most like a vague distortion in the air, an odd wave moving briskly toward the commune's edge.

300 meters later, the squad came to a halt, crouching or going prone behind cover, weapons fanned out as they secured their little foothold while the two covering soldiers hurried to return to their squad. It was already looking like trouble.

"Contact, contact front," Sarah called across the radio, a red soldier-figure appearing superimposed on Tran's vision to indicate the soldier just out of his line of sight. "Looks like a civilian with a light rifle."

"Oh shit, you're kidding?" He quickly called up a secondary display and patched her sensor feed through. Sure enough, a human male, maybe early thirties, with some sort of simple hunting rifle. "Oh boy... What the hell is that guy thinking?"

A very sarcastic voice came across the radio. "Well, he's armed, you want me to shoot him?"

"Fuck off, Grey," Tran grunted back. "Squad, split by fireteams. Delta, trail behind and secure behind the assault force. Alpha goes left, Bravo up the middle, and Charlie right, one block separation and watch the line. Delta, once we move up 50 meters, go vis and take that guy's weapon."

He paused a moment, watching the human. He was near the front of what was probably his house, looking out rather nervously over their heads. He had almost surely heard the shooting a few minutes earlier and was worried it was coming his way. And just as surely had no idea that he was looking for power-armor clad soldiers.

"Okay, move out."

The teams quickly got up and spread out, advancing in a loose group down the roughly defined streets. Tran trailed about 20 meters behind team Bravo, all the armors crouching low as they advanced on the far side of the street from the human. He was still looking out into the field. Then he looked over right at Tran.

Tran dropped to a knee and froze instantly. The man looked at him, barely over 15 meters away. He had to see him, that ever-so-slight distortion in the air. He quickly glanced back toward the field, then to him, pulling the rifle up a bit more to his shoulder. Tran stared right back, eyes darting occasionally to the tactical map and other info, but then returning to stare right back into that man's face. The vague greenscale color of the thermal view gave the man the look of a ghost, some unworldly creature staring at him. He quickly flipped the view to a normal visual mode, and then he saw the man's eyes. It looked almost as if he were staring straight down the camera lens and into Tran's own. He stayed there, frozen, looking right back at each-other.

Then the man looked away, back to the field.

Tran heaved a sigh and started moving again, slowly at first to avoid suddenly drawing his attention again. Several seconds later he heard a voice boom out behind him, accompanied by the startled yell of the human.

"Drop the gun!"

The man cast a quick glance back, catching the sight of a pair of two-ton Griffon armors, autocannons leveled at the nearly panicked man, who immediately complied by dropping the rifle. It clattered to the ground, and one of the armors stomped down hard on it, crushing the weapon. The sensor drums atop the armors turned one way, then the other, like the antennae of some huge metal insect as they stepped back, then almost simultaneously blurred out of sight again, returning to being vague distortions in the air, though rather defined distortions in Tran's image-intensifying cameras. He switched back to thermal now, and could see them a little better, slight ghost-like blurs of heat advancing slowly behind him.

Tran turned back and returned to following the team. A little later he glanced back again. The man was crouching at his doorstep now, peeking over a concrete garden box to watch the retreating backs of the almost invisible armors, as if entranced.

Tran saw the soldier display on his tactical map turn a darker blue, and heard the sudden and abrupt shriek of pain across the radio well before he heard the shot.

"Oh- Damn!" It was Bray's voice. "Kata-" There was a sudden burst of static across the radio. Indicators were already popping up across Tran's tactical display. Charlie team had just been ambushed. Another shot boomed out, then a third.

"Tran!" Bray again. "Ambush, Kata took a hit and we're pinned down behind the corner, I can't get to her!"

Tran darted forward, past the simple intersection. He could make out the two armors crouched behind the corner of a house off to his right, a third completely immobile just up the street from them, completely visible. Power was out.

"I copy, where are the shots coming from?"

He caught a glimpse of Bray starting to lean forward again, then jump back, before he passed the intersection. "Unh... Somewhere on the next block, I can't stick out to give a good look, but I think the gunfire sensors pinned it at, um..." The radio went dead, then clicked to life again, as a marker appeared on Tran's display. "TRP-zero-five. That should be the one-Ah, fuck!"

Tran heard the loud BANG across the radio before he heard the shot boom out.

"Bravo, double-time it to the next block, now! Bray, what happened?"

"Unnngh.. I'm okay, but damn that hurt! Caught a round on the side of my chest, didn't penetrate but it knocked me on my tail." He muttered a few more words, then called out loudly, "I have to fall back, he tried shooting us through the building! Can someone flank him?"

"We're on it," Tran returned, quickly looking over the tactical map. "Terry, with me, rest of Bravo hold at the intersection!" Terry quickly separated from the team and hustled over to join Tran as he darted between a pair of houses. It figures it would happen here, the one place where the layout of the commune wasn't a simple grid of square blocks and straight roads. The curve had been a perfect ambush point, and he couldn't help but think it was stupid of him to have not seen it.

He caught quick glimpses of a few rather startled people as he darted through one yard, then emerged onto the street right next to the marked building. He just about threw himself to the ground as he heard another loud boom of the weapon firing, and his own gunfire sensors localized it exactly in building he came out right across from, the same one Bray had marked. Perfect.

"Terry, enter second, secure first room while I move on." Tran lead the way up to the door, going as quietly as the thick rubberized soles would let him. He barely even heard Bray's voice, but didn't catch what he said. "Ready?"

"Roger that," Terry said, sounding eager.

Tran reached down, delicately moving his hand near the doorknob, switching over to precise hand control. He carefully gripped it, careful to make as little noise as possible. "Okay... Go!"

He threw the door open, his hand immediately returning to the front grip of his autocannon as he charged in, Terry sticking so close behind him that Tran's tail thumped up against the other armor. He only gave a very hurried glance over the room as he advanced straight for the door across the room. This door didn't receive as gentle a treatment as the other had. Tran brought down the barrel of his autocannon, turning a bit to put his shoulder into it as he connected with the door, immediately bringing the barrel up as the wooden door splintered.

As the wood fell away, he immediately saw the human turning, trying to turn the huge and unwieldy anti-material rifle around in time. Tran immediately snapped off a single round from his autocannon, but missed, the round punching through the wall before detonating on the far side, kicking up a bit of rather harmless fragments. Tran didn't wait a moment, and brought the barrel of his gun up before swinging it, connecting solidly on the man's chest. The blow knocked the wind out of the man, and probably broke several ribs, but more importantly, it made him drop the gun. He fell back across a couch, knocking it over backwards and tumbling behind it... To the sound of someone else yelping out.

It barely even flashed across Tran's mind that this man had also not been in a uniform as he stepped toward the noise, releasing the autocannon's grip as he reached out and knocked aside the other couch, leveling his other arm and its anti-personnel minigun-

Right into the faces of a young girl and her mother, her arms wrapped protectively around the child.

Tran jerked back slightly, immediately pulling back his arm and the weapon held inside it. He hadn't expected that at all.

He stared silently a moment before he suddenly snapped back. "Clear!" Terry was already advancing into the room, and stopped for a moment before Tran heard him mutter some curse.

"W-what?..." The woman was staring up at him, looking disturbingly through him.

He stopped a moment, unsure, then called out on the radio. "Delta! Bring Kata to my position, we're establishing a temporary CP and medic point. All other teams, setup defensive around this position."

A couple acknowledgments came across the radio net as the fireteams moved to respond. "Terry, check around, see how secure we are. Um..." He glanced out the window opposite of where the man had been shooting. Good view, at least. "Put the couches up in front of the windows on the northwest side for now."

He looked back over at the two cowering in the corner, sighing slightly, and flipped off his stealth system. The two jerked back a little in shock, letting out little yelps of surprise. Then he reached up, unsealed his helmet and flipped it back.

"Stay calm," he said, trying to sound as soothing as he could, but knowing it was something he wasn't too good at. Besides, humans seemed to see reptiles as... More alien than most other species. Neither of them seemed too reassured by it. The mother looked more confused and disbelieving than anything else. Maybe even angry.

Tran looked up to the window, speaking into the boom mike. "Delta, hurry up with Kata, we need to give her aid as quick as possible! Move it!" He was already opening the chest of his armor as Grey replied that he WAS, indeed, hurrying.

The chest panel folded down, the limb restraints relaxing as he slipped free of the armor, a somewhat clumsy job that he managed with more grace than most, and dropped onto the floor, his hand instinctively reaching up to pat once at the short submachine gun strapped across his chest, a constant check he always did to make sure it was there, before walking over toward the fallen man.

"Wh-what... What are you doing?" The woman asked in a first broken, then an almost desperately demanding voice.

"Don't worry," Tran replied quietly as he crouched, reaching down to him. "I'm just checking to see if he's okay." It seemed a little absurd to him, but he had nothing else to do until Kata was here.

The man groaned slightly as he touched him and turned his head, but didn't wake up. Tran pushed on the couch, moving it just a little until he could lay the man out better, then lightly ran his paw across the man's chest, pressing very lightly to check for broken ribs. Sure enough, several of his left ribs seemed to give more than they should, and the man twitched a little at the light touch.

The woman apparently had no idea what he was doing, seeming on the verge of crying, and at the same time, sounding quite angry as well. "You... Wh-you... You killed him, didn't you?"

"He's okay," Tran replied, then stood. "A couple broken ribs, and his arm seems injured, but he should be fine for now."

Now she seemed completely lost, words slurred behind the tears. "W-... W-why? He's my husband, you could have killed him, you freak!"

Tran had to bite his tongue to not snap back at that. He could have killed HIM? "Your husband shot two of my soldiers," he managed in a not-quite-aggressive voice. "I'd say that makes him lucky."

The front door was slammed open again, and several more armors thumped in. Kata must be here now.

"W-well," she continued, haltingly. "You... You can't just leave him like that! You... Have a medic or something like that, r-"

"He SHOT our medic," Tran snapped back. He'd had quite enough of this now. He stooped to pick up the huge anti-material rifle, then walked up to the door.

Three more armors filled the room, one frozen in place like a battered statue, a scorch-mark scarring the bottom-left edge of the torso where the round had struck. Terry was already out of his armor, and had already opened up the backup medical panel on the armor's chest. It had its own little reserve power system, accompanied by a small battery of drugs in case of injury. Tran could see even from here that she was still alive. Lucky girl.

"Come on, pop it," he said.

The two armors beside her both reached up, each taking one of the little latches and turning, then pulling...

"It's not opening," said grey, tugging roughly on the chest.

Not good, the suit's frame must have deformed on impact. Nasty hit. Tran paused a moment.

"Well, blow the hatch, then."

"Okay... Everyone stand clear!"

Tran leaned back into the other room, looking over at the woman, who was now kneeling next to her prone husband. "Keep low."

He turned back just as a dull *pop* sounded, the chest-plate jerking forward a centimeter as the catches were severed by small explosives. Tran felt almost cheated; They'd never blown the hatches before, but he expected a little more of a show from explosive bolts. Probably for the better, though.

The armor shrieked a bit as the helmet was forced up by the chest-plate, then was immediately followed by a loud shriek of pain. Kata slumped forward as the chest-plate fell away, hanging there by her arms from the restraints, groaning loudly as she seemed to try and pull herself free.

But Tran's first reaction was to look at the injury. Her light ballistic fatigues were scorched along the left side of her belly, and a hole that seemed a good five centimeters wide was ripped through them, and continuing right through her, fur and flesh scorched a bit from the round as it passed through. And the blood. The scorching had cauterized most of the wounds, but it was still bleeding.

Tran moved in immediately. "Get her out, we've got to get her out. And someone get the medical supplied from her pack!"

They grabbed her as carefully as they could, one of the armors helping to lift her from her immobilized suit as she groaned, trying weakly to curl up. Tran started and almost dropped her as her eyes suddenly flew wide open, jerking roughly in his arms. "Ah-Shit! Put me down, put me down!" Her voice was rough and halting, and she was panting in hard, groaning breaths. They quickly set her down on the floor as she asked.

The moment she was down her hands went to her abdomen, grabbing at the wound. Tran started to reach down to restrain her, to keep her from worsening the injury, but stopped, rather surprised when he realized what she was doing. She wasn't gripping at herself in injury, she was probing the wound with her paw, gritting her teeth as she growled and groaned out short sounds of pain. She was still doing her job; She was the medic for the squad, and apparently, she wanted to do her job.

"What is it, you okay?"

"N-n-No... But I-I should make it f-fine." She leaned her head back as she withdrew her paw, the fur matted and soaked blackish-red. "Bleeding a little, not... Not too bad. No vital organs hit. Little... S-some internal injury, can't do anything about that here."

She rolled her head to the side as Terry set the medical pack down heavily beside her. "N-need an IV. Get out an IV needle, tube, one... One unit plasma. Loosing t-too much blood. And find one of the spray-coagulants, and a bottle of saline, n-need to s-slow the blood loss."

Tran carefully placed a paw on her forehead. "Kata, you-"

She cut him off, pointing past him. "Pillow. Need a pillow for my head... And elevate my legs. C-... I can't move them like this."

Tran sighed slightly as he stood and took one of the discarded couch cushions, lifting her head a bit as he slipped it under. Then he stood, placing a paw on the ear-piece as he spoke into the boom mike. "Ven? I've got one wounded over here, needs a medical evac, high priority. And if you can spare it, we could use another medic over-"

"I-I c-can handle it," Kata grunted out as she shakily snatched the IV needle. She brought it to her left arm, pausing a moment as her paw hovered over it, then looked back over to Terry. "Get... The trimmer. I need you to clear a patch just above my wrist. Cut... Cut it close, I need t-to find a vein."

Tran ducked a bit as he heard a burst of distant gunfire, followed almost immediately by calls across the radio. A tank had apparently survived the initial bombardment and had hidden, hidden from view and masked from thermals by the rubble. It didn't last long. The Talisin was parked in geosync orbit, tank-hunting with its single laser, there until all tanks were confirmed dead. Even better, the Anderson was in low orbit. It would only get a single pass every hour, for just a few minutes, but with eight point-defence guns easily in-range at that time, plus the two lasers, the amount of firepower it could level in those few minutes would be a devastating and awesome force.

Tran peeked through the window, to see if he could see anything. Hardly thirty seconds after the first gunshot was heard, a soldier cheered out over the radio that the tank had just blown up. A few seconds later, the sound of the secondary explosions reached them, the sound of the tank’s reactive armor and ammunition detonating under the blast of heat from the orbiting laser. One less tank to worry about.

He turned back, looking down at Kata for a moment. "Terry, why don't you give her a painkiller shot, too."

"No!" she grunted out, loudly. "N-no, the... Emergency medical system in my armor... Already gave me one. Any more and I'll pass... Pass out." She turned her head again. "Terry, give me the scissors.

"Kata," he sighed as he crouched down beside her.

"D-don't even start, Tran," she interrupted. "As long as I'm conscious, I'm doing my job."

He shook his head, sighing again. "You're almost as stubborn as Diesel, you know?"

"Hell no, man. She wins that one, hands down!"

Kata halfway laughed, then cringed again before snatching the scissors from Terry's paw. She slipped open her outer fatigue jacket, then slowly cut up along her shirt, from the bottom up, then carefully peeled it back from the wound, wincing in pain. When she finished opening her shirt up, she leaned her head up, grunting a little as she looked down. "Nng... Shit." She set her head back as she brought the scissors back down, and started cutting through the pants, starting at the bottom of her belly and cutting diagonal, then carefully peeling back that patch as well, finally leaving the wound bare from the clothes.

Tran grunted slightly and stood, grabbing a few supplies before heading back to the other room. He didn't much care to watch the rest of it. He was still shocked she could even move, much less that she was close to doing minor surgery on herself.

The woman was looking at the door as he entered, her hands places over her daughter's ears, trying to shield her from the sounds of pain in the other room. The girl wasn't taking too well to it, struggling and crying a little.

"What...?"

"My medic took a very nasty gut wound. She's getting patched up before the evac arrives." He motioned to the husband. "He's still out?"

"Well you hit him hard enough, yeah," she replied, rather sharply.

He let it slide. "I can splint his arm, it might be broken. And if you can hold him up, I can wrap his chest to help with the broken ribs. Not a whole lot else I can do right now, unless you want me to evac him to the support ship, too."

"No!" she replied, abruptly. Not surprising.

He started to work on him, trying to distract himself from what was going on in the other room. The splint was simple enough, just slip the cuff over and inflate. The ribs took a bit more work to wrap up, and he kept noticing the woman's eyes wandering... Down to his gun. He cast her a rather sharp glare at this, and she obviously thought better of it.

As he was finishing, the radio crackled in his ear. "Tran. Evac is inbound, ETA ten mike."

Tran grunted. "Crap. Thanks, Ven."

The woman looked up, startled. "W-what?"

He shook his head. "Nothing. Radio. Just that we won't be able to evac Kata for ten minutes or so."

"Kata?"

"My medic," he replied, sitting back against the upturned couch.

"Oh."

He sat there a moment, then leaned over, looking into the other room. "Kata? How're you doing?"

He didn't hear her say anything, but he did see her give a thumbs-up. It wasn't very reassuring, though, seeing as how soaked her paw's fur was.

There was relative silence for a few minutes, apart from a few groans from the other room, or quiet requests for a new piece of equipment, until the woman spoke up again.

"Why... Why are you here?" It was voiced half in fear, half in anger.

He leaned his head over, feeling remarkably tired already. "I could ask you the same question. It was your military that attacked us here, first. We're here now because we established this colony, and we'd like it back. You'd be better off asking your military why they insist on attacking us."

"What? So you think that justifies attacking us?"

Tran looked at her, hardly believing he heard that comment. "Attacking you? We're taking back what is ours, and we're counter-attacking. Do you even remember how many systems your military has taken already?"

She didn't answer right away, trying to choose her words carefully. "You people are the ones who started all this. You attacked us first."

"What, that research post? What would you expect us to do, let them exterminate us like regular terran animals? I was just a kid when that all happened, and I still remember that hell as clearly as when I was there. But they aren't too proud about talking about that stuff, are-"

He stopped abruptly as the radio crackled, immediately putting a paw against the ear-piece to hear.

"-ave troop movement north-west, inbound from Berrin, ETA 15 mike. As soon as you get that evac, setup defensive at the edge of the commune, second and third squads are already taking flanking position."

"Roger," he replied, "We'll be there in about five to ten minutes, tops."

He stood. "Excuse me."

Returning to the other room, he found Kata laying still now, eyes looking back and forth across the ceiling and the faces she could see from there, smiling just slightly when she saw Tran. The wound was loosely covered in gauze, which was still clean enough to show she had managed to stop most of the bleeding. But her eyes had a disturbing glazed-over look to them, and it was obvious that she was on the verge of loosing consciousness.

The evac shuttle seemed like it was taking forever to get there, but in reality, it only took a few more minutes. A couple soldiers showed the medical crew into the house, where they carefully loaded her onto a simple stretcher and hurriedly rushed her back to the shuttle. A couple more drug her armor out of the house and pushed it into the rear of the shuttle; Ven and Dawson had both been quite specific about not leaving any armors around for non-uplift to examine, even if they were just civilians.

Finally the shuttle lifted up, turned, and sped off, quickly arcing upward as it rushed to get Kata back to a ship. Everyone else started getting ready to move out. Tran climbed up and slipped down into his armor, restraints and pads cinching down securely around his limbs and body, then the chest folding up and latching securely into place.

He turned his head to look back at the woman. "Stay inside, and be careful, especially if you hear any shooting. You don't want to get in the middle of this." He looked back at the child, who had gradually drifted from an expression of terror when she had first seen him, to a look of shocked awe, and who had remained silent throughout the whole encounter.

He turned away, his helmet coming down and latching in place, and he disappeared.

"You're almost late."

"Shuttle took too long," Tran replied. His squad was rapidly deploying along the edge, mostly centered around a large courtyard. It was the most developed area of the commune, featuring some heavy concrete construction, instead of the simple pre-fab metal and composite structures throughout the rest of the commune. It might actually give a degree of protection. He dropped to the ground at the back of the courtyard, behind a thick concrete planter filled with just a few small sprouts. Sarah and Diesel each took spots in the two only two-story buildings of the small commune, the best vantage point they could find. They probably wouldn't stay there once any fighting started, though, the positions were terribly obvious.

It was only a couple minutes wait.

Sarah saw them first, as she usually did. "Contact on the troops," she said, even as the contacts started appearing on Tran's display, spreading through the datalinks from Sarah to the rest of the unit. "1200 meters, coming in slow."

"Copy. What're the numbers?"

"Looks like..." She paused, apparently counting a moment before replying. "Platoon strength, looks like they've geared up for anti-armor work. About twenty with carbine/launcher combos, about five with frame-mounted heavy weapons, looks like M88 electromags, I see a pair of AMRs, and what looks like a dedicated anti-armor team. And most of them are packing some sort of missile. All in standard armor, hard-plate, and visored helmets. Probably got visual systems in those helmets, judging from that first squad we hit."

Tran panned slowly across the horizon, catching sight of one of the soldiers between a gap in the bushes and the edge of a hill. It would be so easy to hit you from here... "Okay, get down and take position." Too much terrain and foliage, they'll have to be close to get a really clear ambush. "Hold fire until I say, we'll try ambushing at 300 meters, but be ready for anything unexpected." Should give about... 5 or 6 minutes. "Ven? How long until Anderson's next pass?"

"Eleven minutes until next pass. It's already plotted for bombardment on it's pass, all it needs is the word and a target area and it'll hit right away."

Tran settled in to wait. The minutes seemed especially long, waiting for the soldiers to close in on them, bringing all the firepower with them.

"Ah, shit!" Sounded like Grey.

"What?"

"I... Got a little problem here."

Tran glanced over, and immediately saw what it was. Two white humanoid figured were lit on the threat display, overlapping grey's blue symbol. "What's going on?" He barked out abruptly, spinning around to face that way, gun snapping around. He never had trusted the automated systems to differentiate between neutrals and hostiles, and the white "uncertains" were always worrying.

"A couple kids... I think they saw the soldiers coming and dropped into here to watch them march into town. I don't think -- shit, no, they see me."

The lead soldier was hardly over 300 meters away, now. Pretty soon he'd be able to see those sensor drums poking out from their cover, and then that whole platoon would open up. "Grey, you've got to get them out of there. Talk them out, drag them out, whatever, but get them out of here now!"

Grey cursed something, under his breath.

The soldiers were advancing in a cautious formation, spread well out and keeping near to cover. A good number of them would wait at one position, covering from there before again darting forward. It was only a few more seconds before something caught the lead soldier's eye.

Tran saw his head suddenly turn just a tiny bit, and didn't wait any longer. "Engage, engage!" The soldier was already dropping to the ground, carbine rising to his shoulder as the squad quickly rose up, and quickly the air filled with the deafening blast of autocannon fire.

The first few soldiers hardly had any time to react before the rounds started striking amongst them, a couple even struck directly by the explosive rounds, immediately torn apart by the blasts. But most of the platoon avoided being struck right off, and began returning fire. Most didn't bother with their carbines, and instead started firing their grenade launchers. Probably had HEAT rounds judging by the amount of anti-armor weapons they had. A few seconds into the firefight they were firing them more-or-less blindly, the rounds that had shredded the first few soldiers of the formation kicking up a spray of dirt through the air, turning the air into a strange ghostly-bright fog in the thermal imagers. Not a problem for long, Tran thought, as his thumb went for the buttons on his control stick.

"Squad, echo free." He pressed one button, then another. The world flickered a moment around him before coming into perfect focus, greenscale like the thermal view, but with a rather artificial-looking lighting, rendered by the armor's computer; The view from the sensor-drum's imaging ladar. The spray of dirt and debris from the rounds striking didn't entirely disappear, but were turned to fog-like flickers, revealing the soldiers behind, a few running for the cover of the tree-line.

More dirt and debris started kicking up, but this time it was from nearby, a thick concrete planter shredding in half as it was hit by a burst of heavy fire. Tran tracked immediately back along the yellow "tracer" line his ladar had drawn over the projectile's flight path, but the soldier was just out of his view. He snapped of a burst with a quick tap of the trigger, then ducked as a yellow line darted his way. He could feel the reverberation inside his armor as the round detonated against the planter he used for cover, followed by a shower of dirt and concrete pebbles raining down on.

So much for the cover, he thought as he pushed himself up a bit, glancing back to check on Grey. The view was rather odd, as Tran could see his head -- his actual head, not the helmet, which he had slid up -- in perfect detail, while the rest was somewhat blurred out, stealthy. Grey was ducking a bit as well as he shuffled forward, gun held back like a shield as he tried to hurry the two kids on, staying right behind them.

Tran grunted and turned, rising to a knee as he brought his gun back up. Full-auto fire from at least one of the enemy soldiers was ripping into the thick concrete wall along one side of the courtyard in rapid bursts, while several of his own platoon were either ducking for cover or firing back. Tran was just lining up to add his own fire when a shrieking warning tone started pulsing through his ear-piece, stopping him cold. Artillery inbound.

"Arty!" he yelled out loudly over the radio, thumb punching at the button to turn off his ladar as he ducked down, several of his squad doing the same before they even received his warning. "Arty, cover! Echo one!"

The source of the warning had been a round-tipped "can" arcing high up into the air from several kilometers away, which his ladar had picked out, traveling at several hundred meters per second. A moment after Tran threw himself down to the ground against the planter, the can split, disgorging a half-dozen smaller missiles, fins spreading to angle their descent as the small seeker heads searched the metal and concrete landscape for signs of targets.

It sounded like several rapid snaps all around him as the rounds struck in rapid succession, followed by a few garbled curses over the radio net. One round struck close enough to Tran that he could plainly hear the chunks of concrete it threw striking his armor.

"Who's hit?" Tran called out; someone was yelling out urgently. He glanced over the unit display, checking the quick readout for injuries, damage, death. Nothing popped up. No, Bray had a 'peripheral' note, something small was damaged. "Bray?

More yelling. Tran rose to shoot over the planter as another grenade hit nearby, throwing rocks into the face of his armor. "Bray, calm down! What's your status?"

"Tran? Shut up Terry! Tran! I'm okay but my gun's out! I'm not breached."

Tran jerked in surprise as a soldier opened fire from the cover of a bush, the rounds punching at the already shredded wall. Tran had switched back to thermal when the artillery came in, to give the missiles as little to track him on as possible, but there was no flash of heat when he fired; Must be one of the electromags. Tran centered the reticule on the soldier, thumbing a button as it corrected for range, and depressed the trigger -- Immediately jerking back as a threat-warning tone sounded. He cursed silently when he realized it wasn't directed at him; the sound accompanied an orbital-shot marker that appeared on the tactical map, some three kilometers away, and his armor's warning systems had for some reason decided it was a threat.

"Ven! Anything I need to know about?" He looked back to where the soldier had been shooting from. The bush was gone, several new divots left in the ground where rounds had detonated. And what looked like a longarm resting on the ground, severed from the heavy frame mount it had just been attached to.

"I think Talisin hit whoever's firing the artillery. What's the situation down there, I can't see anyone."

He looked quickly across the open field, but he couldn't see anyone. Neither could anyone else. "Out of contact, they had to take heavy casualties, but they're falling back... We're going to move up before they can dig in at the port."

There was another bright flash in the same location as Talisin fired again.

"Affirmative, One-One Alpha, will support."

"First squad, form line on me and advance. Bray, dig in here and wait for a call up." He rose, placing a foot onto the planter and stepping over, casting a quick glance back behind him. Gray was hurrying back to rejoin them, a block back from the courtyard.

A few moments later, he started forward at a jog, the rest of the squad holding a rough line at his sides. It was a short 100 meter dash across the field to the first small rise, which gave a little better view. Still couldn't see anyone.

He slowed as he approached the second and larger rise. Just beyond it were the remains of a few of the first enemy soldiers. It wasn't a very pretty sight; There wasn't a whole lot left whole when a 28mm HEAP round strikes a living being, and the hard armor they wore gave little protection from something with that much power.

In the clearing beyond, he caught a quick motion by the tree line. He turned to look just as a red icon popped up in his view over the soldier, jogging away, 300 meters. Tran looked right at him, thumbing the range and auto-lead, then depressing the trigger for just a moment, not even breaking stride. The soldier disintegrated in a large puff of fragments and fell to the ground.

Another soldier opened fire on a second target, quickly joined in by several others. A yellow line darted back across Tran's HUD, and he glanced over to see where it ended; The enemy soldier had fired an armor-piercing grenade that struck less than a meter away from one of the power armors. A second came much closer, passing so close that Tran was amazed it didn't hit. It was his last shot, though, as the icon representing him turned dark. Another soldier down. That whole engagement had taken maybe 10 seconds, tops.

"Watch it there, that was close," Tran said over the radio, still jogging forward. The soldier that had been almost hit stood from where he had thrown himself to cover, and quickly rushed to catch up.

Tran snapped his gun around as several target icon showed up suddenly on his HUD, but they were out of sight. A couple went dark a couple seconds later. Another unit had engaged them. Tran heard the distant rumbling of autocannons a few moments later. The other icons went dark in slow succession... But so did a pair of blue icons.

"One-One Alpha, this is CO Alpha, what is status?"

"Clear here, CO Alpha, proceeding to assault point. I'll take a count." He pressed a button to call up a tactical display, counting over the darkened icons.

"CO Alpha, this is One-One Alpha, accounted for all but two enemy soldiers."

"Thank you, One. Keep an eye out."

Half a minute later, they had almost gotten to the edge of the clearing, and another voice came across the radio net. "This is Two-One Charlie, contact, troops, just south of the port. I count two."

"Take them out."

"Roger that." There was a long pause, followed by the same calm voice. "Got them, troops are down." Two more red icons turned dark. It was several seconds later that he heard the rumbling boom from the tank's cannon echo across the valley.

Just another moment later, a short blip sounded over the radio. Someone out of the radio network was broadcasting to them, and with the same scrambler codes. Who... A voice immediately followed the beeps, sounding hushed. "This is Remain, does anyone copy?"

Tran heard the voice of the commander come across the network, from his position up in the orbiting marine assault ship. "Remain, this is Return, good to hear from you." Resistance code-words? Someone actually managed to escape and stay out there this whole time? "What is your position?"

"Hah, it's good to hear from you, too! I'm on the ridge northeast of the port, but I don't know where that is compared to you guys. I just heard a tank fire a couple seconds ago, couldn't have been more than a couple hundred meters away."

"Roger, we'll move up a unit to get you. Give a description for them."

"Short, yellow-brown fur, and dirty. Mongoose. Got an assault carbine, light armor, and a pack. I can see pretty good off to my south, so I'll give a wave once they're near."

"Okay, Two Charlie, Two Bravo, move north-west until you find him, then take position there. All other units, go phase three. Take the port and hold."

"Thank you. Hey, there's another artillery position, they dug in about half a click to my north-north-west a couple days back. And it looked like they had mobile SOMs, too."

"Okay, point out the position to the troops when they get there."

Tran's squad cleared the tree-line, just a couple hundred meters from the destroyed military base. Second and third squads were moving up on either side to flank it while they moved through the middle. As soon as it was clear, they could start the next phase and advance across and secure the aerospace port.

But plans rarely stayed so simple. Tran yelled out as he saw the light tank parked less than one hundred meters away, nestled between two gutted buildings and hidden under a rough overhang. He started to scramble back, falling on his back. "Fuck! Tank! Contact, tank, at our position!"

There was the loud BOOM of Diesel's gun firing, sparking a small fireball on the tank's front armor as the depleted uranium round smashed against it uselessly. Several autocannons immediately followed.

Tran scrambled around to lay on his front, letting loose a long burst from his autocannon; He couldn't kill it with that thing, but at least he might distract the crew some. Maybe even do some minor damage to the sights, or blow off reactive plating. "Someone missile it!"

A couple soldiers were already pulling out their missiles as the tank kicked into reverse and backed away, firing a shot from its cannon. Tran felt almost sick as he saw the round strike Terry's armor, enveloping him in a flash of fire before the armor collapsed on its side, the chest-plate nearly torn off, the suit half shredded from the hit.

The tank turned to the side a little, backing into a building, its shredded track falling from the road wheels, split by the autocannon fire. A small hot object darted out toward the tank, curving up a little before diving at the roof, then disappeared into two simultaneous explosions. The missile didn't do any more than jostle the crew, though, as the tank's gun bobbed a bit, then snapped back towards the next target.

Just before it could fire, a second missile darted over it and detonated. This time it struck where one of the explosive reactive plates had been stripped away. Flame jetted from the rear of the vehicle as the ammunition erupted, the force of the explosion blowing open the crew hatches.

Tran pushed himself up. "Move up! Assault!"

The squad quickly rose and ran forward, someone firing a couple more rounds into the tank. The rubbled remains of the base looked clear, now. "This is One-One Alpha, we have a casualty, KIA."

He listened a few moments, then growled in annoyance. Terry just died, the least they could do is answer him.

The charred chunks of concrete and other debris crunched beneath his feet as he passed into the base itself. A soldier would occasionally dip into a ruined building to confirm it was empty, but the base was completely lifeless now. Reaching the far side, there was nothing left but the flat expanse of the aerospace port, a reinforced slab for landing heavy-lift shuttles and other craft, with a few hangars set alongside it. A platoon of light tanks was advancing quickly along the base of the hill, barely visible as wisps of heat, moving smoothly across the rolling terrain at over 80 kilometers per hour, guns tracking across the port and the woods beyond.

Tran lead the advance up to the first hangar. Sarah snuck up to the door as the rest held back a short distance, leaning to peek her armor's sensor drum around the doorjamb. A small shuttle sat in the bay, along with refueling and maintenance gear.

The platoon continued to move across the port. Some hangars had a shuttle, some were empty, but there were no people here. One hangar had an entire side scorched, metal warped a bit from the heat, with a finely smashed tank chassis smoldering a few meters away in a small depression, obliterated by an orbiting laser.

Tran and four others entered the final hangar at the end of the pad while the rest took positions alongside it. They advanced a bit more carefully now, guns tracking back and forth across areas someone might be hiding in. Sarah entered the "office" room of the hangar with Tran following close behind; Empty.

"This is One-One Alpha, we are in position. Objective secure."

The clouds drifted slowly across the sky, moving slowly but steadily, slowly changing shape. Some wisps of clouds much lower seemed to move faster, giving a strange double-layered effect to the sky. Tran couldn't help but think that it was good the cloud coverage was so sparse now, it would be bad if it obstructed the orbital support from finding targets.

Crap. Now that he thought of that, the serenity of it all just seemed to die. He sighed and slowly sat up, resting his elbows against the nose of the shuttle he was laying on. Not a great place to relax, but better than laying on the tarmac.

"So... How long is HQ having us sit here, Sarge?" It was Bray, who had been pacing rather impatiently. He wasn't happy having to leave his armor while the techies quickly patched it up.

"Not a clue," he replied. It looked like one of the supply shuttles was getting ready to take off again, having disgorged a huge quantity of supplies. Repair and replacement parts, equipment for a temporary ground-base HQ... And ammo. A lot more ammo then seemed necessary. There were enough drums to outfit a battalion of griffons, let alone a single platoon. And some of those drums were specialty ammo.

His radio ear-piece started up again. Ven. "One Alpha, assemble and prep for briefing, five minutes." She hadn't left the hasty HQ setup ever since it had landed, but was now jogging toward the set of hangars they were milling around.

"Looks like we have an answer," Tran said as he slid down the nose and dropped to the ground. "Your suit fixed up?"

Bray nodded, watching Ven.

"Good." He started to climb into his own armor. "Move it."

Bray nodded again and started jogging over to his power armor.

Tran sighed as he settled into his armor, flipping down the mini-visor before slipping his arms into the armor's arms. He gripped the control stick and closed up the hatch, the solid machinery latching firmly in place.

Ven was just arriving when Tran noticed the IFV rolling across the tarmac at high speed. On the pavement, he could just barely start to hear the tracks a hundred meters away. Much like his armor, those vehicles used all sorts of different measures to keep themselves stealthy, even active sound-suppression. His armor registered it more clearly, the sensor computer catching slight patterns of noise and amplifying until it sounded just as loud as a non-stealthed vehicle would to his ears.

The low-slung vehicle came up quick and just about slid to a stop, the back ramp dropping to the tarmac as several soldiers started to come out -- one, shorter than most the rest, looking rather dirty and tired.

The mongoose shrugged off the strap for his rifle, walking along with the soldiers as they approached the hangar. He wasn't just tired, he looked almost malnourished. His fur was matted in dirty clumps, his fatigues stained with mud. Despite it all, he still carried himself as well as any other soldier; Upright, alert, and ready to fight.

"You must be Ven?" he said, looking up to her.

She nodded, holding out a paw. "I am. Glad you made it."

He smiled a little, shaking the offered paw. His paw almost disappeared in the griffon's. Good thing Ven was precise with the controls. "Corporal Joseph Kander. I was wondering when we'd get our own power troops."

Ven smiled just a little, then stopped, motioning toward the hangar. "We'd better get the briefing under way. We've got some work to do."

Ven had brought a large panel-projection viewer with her, which was now setup on a table, displaying a rendered video image of a building complex, surrounded by cityscape. "Okay everyone, we've got an important mission right off, here, so pay attention."

"As you know, your military background, as well as the training during the past year, makes each and every one of you qualified for special operations missions. As of now, HQ is considering first platoon SOC. Special Operations Capable."

There were some rather alarmed murmurs across the room. Being designated as a SpecOps unit was cool and all... But that meant bad news was just ahead.

Ven didn't pause a moment, pointing to the display. "This is the city center of Berrin. City offices. Community center. School complex." She pointed to each section of the complex in turn. Each one was also marked on the map, as well as several smaller peripheral buildings.

"Joseph," she motioned toward him, "was scattered along with the rest of his unit during the initial attack, and managed to evade patrols when the rest were rounded up. He's been observing the terran forces' movements and operations in the nearby area."

"The inhabitants were rounded up after the attack, and are being interned in the school complex, most likely in the gymnasium, as well as the cafeteria center between the school and community center. There has also been a lot of activity around the community center, and the doors have been barricaded from the outside. Likely there are more being interned there, inside the main hall or auditorium. Unfortunately, we have no intel on movements inside the building, but orbital analysis shows that the thermal signature from this area of the complex is consistent with the long-term residence of about two thousand individuals."

She paused just a moment before continuing. "The Terran Confederation has generally been known for avoiding civilian casualties in wartime-" at least one person snorted at that, followed by a sharp glare from Ven. "...Despite some recent events, but their record is much more wavering in terms of the fight on our planets. In addition, they have recently been claiming that the standard rules of war, and basic "human rights," do not apply to us. We have to consider the possibility that the people interned here could become hostages or even be executed. In light of this, we will be moving first to secure them, and remove this possibility."

Oh boy.

"This city center is located as it sounds, right in the middle of Berrin. We have to move in quick to secure the center before they can redistribute their defences around it, so we're conducting an armor assault. First and second platoon of Bravo and Charlie company will be giving One-Alpha a ride to the target area. They've erected a chain-link fence around the compound, to keep the people inside, and maybe impede regular infantry, but it should be no barrier to powered troops."

"First squad is the primary ops team. Your rides will spread and crash the fence, trying to make a good-sized hole. Dismount, and move inside, through the main entrance to the community center, and the side entrance of the school." The map changed to a diagram of the floor layout, and she motioned to various parts of the map, pointing out the places where the people were likely being held. "There's also been a lot of activity on the east side of the compound, around the city offices. The area has probably been converted to either a barracks or headquarters, maybe both. We need to secure the entire compound, but this area is secondary. First objective should be to take control of the hallways here," she pointed to the map again, "to prevent them from moving into the rest of the compound. Tran, work out the details of your squad's assault, but don't split up too much, we don't know where the Rangers might show up."

Tran nodded, and she continued.

"Second and third squads will deploy here... And here." She motioned to the east and west sides of the compound, where a small series of peripheral buildings, concrete ground-work, and other features, should give some measure of cover. "Outside the fence. Bravo and Charlie will take position behind the lines, give them cover, we need to keep them safe in case we have to evac quickly. They'll move up if they're needed somewhere, but will mostly be pinning down the city offices, keeping everyone inside. They're support only. Conventional infantry from Bravo will be securing the rest of the perimeter."

She stepped back a bit, looking over the platoon. "Also, there's a good possibility of fighting close to unprotected civilians. Standard HEAP rounds would shred anyone within ten meters, so everyone is swapping out one of your drums for armor-piercing loads. We've brought down a full load of tungsten-core saboted ammo, much better chances against any other powered armors, and no blast to worry about. Sorry, don't have any depleted uranium rounds."

"Any questions, comments?"

Someone spoke up immediately. "Where are the Rangers?"

"Don't know," Ven replied. "Joseph saw them a couple times near the center, but they seem to either stay indoors, or stealthed. They could be anywhere." Not so good news...

"What do we do when we've secured the compound?"

"Hold it," she said. "There are too many people there to evacuate them all under fire, so we're taking the compound and securing it. Once we've driven into the heart of their territory, we can count on every soldier they have converging on our position. The third and fourth platoons of Bravo and Charlie companies will be conducting a diversionary attack on the edge of town, and then rolling up once the defences start softening up. If they try to retake the compound, we'll be finishing the fighting today, but it will be a big fight. If they go for it, they'll lose. If they fall back to another area of the city, we can take it easy and slowly press them."

There was a pause before Tran spoke up. "About how many soldiers do they have left?"

"Little bit more than we thought. About three platoons infantry, and the Rangers. All their armor is confirmed destroyed, but nobody has seen the Rangers yet. They're probably digging in, inside the city. It's a bit more than we thought, but we've got them outnumbered now."

He nodded. Not too bad, at least.

"Okay... Okay. This one's important, every one! Keep it together, and kick some ass! Op starts in... Twenty eight minutes. Get your ammo swapped, and double-check your gear. Dismissed!"

"Sarah, Dan, you guys swapped out yet?"

"Just finished, we're set."

"Good," Tran said into the radio, walking alongside the row of tanks, then called out, "Grey! Come here."

The wolf hopped off of the side of the tank, taking a couple steps over to Tran. "Sarge?"

Tran motioned to Grey's helmet. "Open up, let me get a look at it."

"It's okay," Grey replied, as he punched the release, then pushed his helmet up. A bandage was wrapped across his cheek and muzzle, a few streaks of red showing through the gauze, the fur around it matted with dried blood. He hadn't closed his helmet during the artillery attack, and a sliver of metal had sliced across his face.

"Yeah..." Tran looked at it a moment. "You'll need to go back to the ship after this fight, that's a bad cut."

"Okay," Grey said, looking down. He didn't want to be out of the fight, but at least he wasn't getting dropped from the mission.

He looked up a few moments later, and saw Tran smiling a little. "...What?"

"I still think it's kind of funny," Tran said.

Gray snorted and gave a half-hearted shove. "Yeah, yeah. So I have a thing about kids."

Tran turned, giving a dismissive wave as he walked back to the front of the column. "Yeah, sure." Grey risking his own safety to protect a human just seemed incredibly ironic.

"It was a momentary lapse in judgment," Grey called out after him. "Won't happen again, honest."

The rest of the squad was already mounting up atop the vehicles. Tran stepped up to the second tank in the line, reaching near the top of the side and folding out a handle, latching it into place, then placed his foot on the tread skirt, lifting himself up and clinging to the side of the tank.

Another armor started climbing up behind him, and he looked back to see Ven on the same tank. "Huh? You're not stealing my squad from me, are you?"

"No," she said. "But I'm going with you. I want to keep an eye on how things are going inside, and it'll be the best place to coordinate everything."

"Okay... Hell of a mission we got."

She nodded. "Yep. But just think of how surprised they're going to be when we kick their ass off this planet."

Tran smiled and nodded. "Yeah... First squad is ready to go."

She nodded, then flipped down her helmet, sealing it, before calling out on the radio. "Assault force, move out!"

The tank lurched forward, a column of near-invisible vehicles snaking across the tarmac towards the tree-line to the east.

The rough forest ground was almost completely muted by the tank's suspension, the small eleven-ton vehicle gliding along with slow bobs and dips as it crossed rocks, fallen trees, and other obstacles. The path had been pre-picked, running through an area where the trees were far enough apart to let them speed through.

"Thirty seconds!" Ven called, just as the column cleared the edge of the forest. They had swung around the ridge to the east, and were coming at the city from the north east. They were approaching the ridge now; on the other side, a 300 meter dash to the edge of the city. "Stack up!"

The vehicles slowed a bit, closing up the formation until there were only a few meters between each vehicle. They slowed more as they approached the top of the crest.

"Orbital, status?"

There was a pause, followed by the voice of one of the gunners in orbit. "Entry path looks clear. Sky should be clear for at least 30 minutes."

Tran could hear the sounds of gunfire now. The diversionary forces had apparently run into a fight, a few tank cannons punctuating the sharp crack of rifle fire.

"Assault force, go for assault. Cresting in three... Two... One... Go, move it!"

The tank immediately leaped forward, and Tran squeezed his control stick hard, intuitively trying to hang onto it. It was hardly a second before the call and the time the vehicle reached the top of the ridge, but he swore those tracks left the ground. It plunged back down the other side, picking up more and more speed. They had easily topped 100 kilometers per hour, and the tank was still riding as smooth as ever.

Tran swept his gun across the face of the oncoming buildings, looking for any threats, but if there were any, they didn't have any time to react before the vehicles shot down the street, then speeding around a corner onto another street.

"This is Three Charlie, we've lost a tank!" The gunfire was echoing across the city. "We've got... At least three power armors at the edge of the city!"

Tran rocked hard to the side as the tank whipped around another corner, hanging out over the ground at full speed. The radio clicked as someone in the lead tank spoke up. "Barricade ahead, watch for troops!"

A light car was thrown aside by the first tank, crashing against a pile of debris, then the tank bucked a bit as it passed by, crossing the remaining roadblock like it was a speed bump.

Around another corner, the fence around the compound came into view. The vehicles sped toward it. Only a few more seconds.

One of the soldiers on the lead tank pointed up to a balcony on one of the compound buildings just outside the fence, right as a pair of "unknown" contacts appeared. "Camera."

Tran glanced over momentarily, the stabilized targeting view showing the two humans, one peering north through a full-size video camera. Civilians.

"Hold on!"

Tran snapped his head back around as the lead driver called out, then pointed his gun's muzzle up into the air a moment before the tank plowed through the chain-link fence, a loud crash of metal-on-metal as the fence tore apart, slapping at his armor.

Inside the compound grounds, the tank slammed on the brakes, the armors leaning forward under their inertia, the thundering of the tank's machine-guns sounding before they'd come to a full stop. Several enemy troop icons started showing on the tactical map, by the city offices. Tran dropped off of his ride, sweeping his target reticule across the area. "Dismount, dismount!"

The other power armors were already dropping to the ground, a couple autocannons firing at troops, giving cover fire while the rest of the squad and the conventional infantry dismounted. A few moments later, the entire squad was on the ground, and most of the enemy soldiers were down. They probably hardly had time to realize what was happening.

"First squad, move!" Tran stood, walking toward the building for a moment before building up to a jog, staying near the center of the squad.

Reaching one of the side doors of the school compound, the lead soldier barreled into the door, ripping it from the hinges. Tran was inside a few moments later.

The hallway was dimly lit, more than enough light for his sensors to see clearly in. The soldiers cast quick glimpses through the open doors of the classrooms as they hurried down the hallway. The hallway branched up ahead, a few soldiers splitting off to the left, the others going right. Tran followed to the left.

"Charlie, in position!"

The soldiers ahead of Tran drew to a stop at a set of double doors. Diesel had his big gun pointed against the door. "Bravo in position."

Tran glanced at the tactical map once more, checking. "Bravo, Charlie. Go!"

Diesel lowered his gun as he slammed a shoulder into the door, battering it open, his gun immediately snapping back up as he disappeared through the doorway. Several voices boomed out loudly. "Everybody down!"

Tran was inside a moment later, following close behind. He quickly swept across one side of the room. Several hundred people were in here, some cowering down, others, surprised, looking in Tran's direction. But no humans.

Diesel glanced back and forth. "Clear!"

"Clear!" Gin echoed from across the room.

Tran stepped forward, letting his gun drop down as he deactivated his stealth systems. To everyone in the room, one of the blurs moved forward and solidified.

"We're here to free you! Everyone stay down and stay inside until the fighting is over." He looked down toward a group sitting on the floor nearby. Some were only children. "Where is everyone else?"

"In the cafeteria," one replied, with a somewhat shocked look. "But I don't know where they took the soldiers, we haven't seen them for weeks!"

"Okay. Stay here!"

His suit blurred back out of site as he moved on. "Keep going."

They exited the gym, jogging down the hallway, passing more empty classrooms. Up ahead, the hallway opened along the side of the courtyard, automatic fire echoing in from the outside.

"Tran, this is Alpha team! We're at the fall-back position. They moved quick and already took the hallways, but we've got them blocked off from here!"

"Thank you, Ganny. Be careful there."

Diesel slowed as he stepped up to the corner, then slid around it, gun sweeping across the courtyard... Then a moment later, snapping up. "Tro-oh!"

He stumbled and fell back, the concrete surface cracking under the impact, a bare moment before the wall behind him exploded, showering them in debris and concrete chunks. Diesel scrambled back around the corner, then stood.

"Crap, got a guy with grenades, in that little third-floor area."

"I see him," Tran snapped back, stepping up next to the corner, keeping an eye on the icon Diesel's armor had placed over the soldier's location. "Giving cover. Go!"

He quickly stepped back a few steps, depressing the trigger as he cleared the corner. The soldier fired the moment Tran cleared the corner, and the grenade arced through the air, passing just beside him and destroying what was left of the wall. His burst tore through the wall and nearly blew out the whole room; he had switched to his high-explosive rounds for the shot. There wasn't much chance the soldier had survived that. He flicked the selector to return to the armor piercing rounds.

"One-One Alpha, come in! Tran?"

"One-One here!"

"Powered troops are attacking the perimeter on the west side of the compound. We lost three armor to a surprise attack, and Three-Alpha is pinned down by infantry fire from the office." Tran scaled out his map, looking over the situation. A few conventional infantry were stuck between the rangers and the edge of the compound. They'd never be able to hold. "We're digging in a second line at the cafeteria and city center rear-wing. Get over here, quick!"

"Almost there," he said.

"Delta here," Grey called out. "Cafeteria secure. Got about eight hundred in here, I'd guess."

"Clear them out!" Tran said. "Get them to the gym, and hurry!"

On the other side of the cafeteria they entered another hallway. It was a little less than a hundred meters to the cafeteria, and the hall was already crowded with people hurrying back the way they just came. Again, the stealth systems came off.

They slipped in between the groups of people. Ven and half of team Delta were gathered here, already taking cover.

"Tran!" Ven motioned, then pointed behind herself. "Send one team to secure the rear wing, take the rest to the rear-"

"Troop!" Diesel yelled out, nearly lost in the boom of his cannon. Tran spun just in time to see the small fireball from the round, as it struck the power armor that had just emerged from the kitchen area. It went rigid and fell forward, unmoving. It was a much more elegant looking armor, smooth and somewhat smaller.

"Cover! Take cover!" Tran knelt down, gun centered on the doorway, the rest of the squad scattering a bit and taking what little cover there was in the room. A moment later, chunks started blasting from the walls as rounds ripped through it. Tran snapped back as something impacted, a little red warning message popping up; He'd lost his armor's high-magnification visual systems. Nothing important, but he was HIT!

He immediately squeezed the trigger and swept his gun across the wall, the rest of the squad immediately following his lead and firing blind. After the first sweep, he settled into short bursts, trying to aim where the first shots had come from.

"Tran!"

Tran stopped firing, sliding back half a step to slip behind a pillar. "What!?" The sound of sporadic autocannon fire was almost deafening inside the confines of the room, especially with Diesel firing his driver as fast as he could.

Ven rose and darted over to him, kneeling down behind the pillar. "Tran!" she yelled into the radio. "We've got to get this outside, we can't get pinned down in here! Move a team to the rear-wing of the center building, then close in-"

Tran felt a burst of heat along his forearm as his left arm was pushed forward. He didn't even have time to realize what was happening as a second round struck the side of Ven's chest with a bright flash of fire, followed by another, then a sudden blast as her drum of 28mm HEAP detonated just in front of his face; his vision swirled in the flame. An alarm screamed in his ear, telling him that, yes, he was hit. He spun, maybe even left the ground, he couldn't tell. Then an impact on his back. His vision cleared, systems compensating after the brief flash of brightness, and he was looking up at the support beams on the ceiling, with the huge muzzle of the driver cannon pointing down over him, thundering as it fired back on whoever just shot him.

"Shit!" He sat up, keeping low to stay out of Diesel's line of fire, and looked over at Ven. The rear of her armor was smoldering where the ammo had detonated, and a pair of small, jagged holes were punched in the side of the armor's chest.

"Sarge!"

He reached out to Ven, placing his armor's hand on the chest. Two penetrators to the chest, she couldn't have survived that, could she?

Diesel thumped him in the back to get his attention. "Tran! What do we do now?"

He snapped back, looking back at Diesel for a moment. "Shit... Delta!" He stood, pointing back to the left side of the cafeteria, where a fresh pair of ranger armors were smoldering. "Move to the left flank, take the hallway, kill anyone over there!" He flinched a bit as a round struck the pillar next to him, then pointed in the direction it came from, as a couple autocannons blasted back in return. "Bravo, left-side center! Charlie, right-side center! Gin, keep an eye on the right flank."

"Alpha? Come in."

A few moments later, Ganny replied. "Alpha here! What's going on?"

"Fall back, take position in the rear wing of that building, overlook the rear yard behind the cafeteria, wait there for orders!"

"Roger, we're on it. There in a minute."

He looked back down to Ven. "HQ, this is One-One-Alpha, come in."

"HQ here."

"Ven Fierna is dead."

A pause. "...Roger that. Um... Take charge of One-Alpha."

He sighed. "Okay."

The shooting had stopped.

Tran waited a few moments. "Delta, move up the end of the hall, take position in the corner classroom, help Alpha covering the rear. Don't let them get out!"

"Okay!"

"Con-" The transmission was cut short immediately as a burst of automatic fire echoed in from outside, and the indicators for two of Alpha's three armors went dark. Ganny and Dan's armors were both out.

"Alpha? Sarah, what's your status?"

She was breathing hard. "Tran, they moved in just before we got in position. Ganny and Dan are down, I jumped into a room and they're bypassing-ah!" Another burst of autocannon fire sounded across the radio, a red icon appearing and going dark, just like that. "Shit!" Another, longer burst. "They're moving back to the offices!"

Tran started walking toward the right-side door. "Delta! Assault on Alpha's position, get there and dig in! Bravo, on me, Charlie, check the kitchen and join up with Bravo. Move!"

He started to jog as the rest of the half-squad got up with him. He misjudged the size of the doorway a bit, bashing the top of his sensor drum against the top (Probably damaged the doorway more than the armor, he thought), and almost had to squeeze to get through. More autocannon fire sounded from down the hall. Sarah had left her room and caught a Ranger armor from behind; Another darkened red icon. Then the icon representing her moved up. Second floor. "Tran, they're going for the auditorium!"

Shit. "All teams, assault to auditorium lobby! Move!"

Around him the other soldiers broke into a run, slowing only for the corner in the hallway. It was turning into a maze of corridors now, but the tactical map had a complete layout of the building, telling them where to go.

Up ahead, Sarah had stopped. A red "armor" icon appeared near her on the floor below, then another, and with a couple short bursts of automatic fire, both went down. "Tran! I have them cut off from the auditorium! If there's any left on this side of me, they're right below me! Otherwise, they made it to the offices."

"Roger. Thanks, Sarah." Now don't do that again. If the Rangers had seen her, she'd probably be dead now, too.

"Hold up," he said as they approached a corner. They drew to a stop, approaching it carefully; This was the only hallway leading to the rest of the complex, apart from the one directly above, where Sarah was. "Check it."

Bray leaned over, peeking his sensor drum around the corner, then immediately jerked back; A new red icon appeared, showing the single Ranger in the hallway. "Shit, he saw me!"

"Crap." He looked over the map again, "Delta-..." He stopped. Screw that, we'll take him now. "Diesel? Shoot him."

Diesel hesitated, then lifted the gun up. "All right!" he said, followed immediately by the blast of his gunshots.

"Bray, go!" Bray stepped out immediately, his gun, just like Tran's, tracking down the hallway. It wavered a bit, then the muzzle dropped a little before firing off a long burst.

Bits of debris flew from his point of aim as Tran came around the corner as well, the doorjamb and bench shredding to reveal the Ranger hid behind it, falling to its back, the front pocked in impacts. "Cease fire! Move up!"

They moved up to the auditorium... But beyond that, there was no place left to go. Only a single hallway gave access to the city office building, and attacking directly like that would be asking for more casualties. Tran almost wanted to go for it anyway, but... It would be better not to. It didn't stop him from looking, however. While Delta escorted the remaining prisoners from the auditorium, he and Sarah checked out the defences. A couple Rangers and a couple conventional infantry held the hallway, and nearly took off Tran's sensor drum with a burst of gunfire; No way in there.

He returned as the last of the prisoners were leaving the auditorium. The last ones were leaving the auditorium, the wounded ones that needed help moving, all these months later. The rest of Bravo and Charlie platoons were moving up through the mostly-vacant city now, to meet up with the rest of the force; They'd have to hold on until they could evacuate the wounded to the aerospace port in Bravo's IFVs.

Ven. It had to be her, didn't it? The one person that had finally gotten him to join the infantry forces, and to volunteer for this new unit...

Shards of plexiglass clattered off the front of his armor as the large panel windows of the lobby blew out with the sharp boom of an explosion. Tran staggered, but from surprise, not the blast. The last few newly-freed prisoners didn't fare quite as well, most of them thrown down by the explosion. Those that still could got up, and hurriedly helped those who couldn't.

Tran stepped through one of the shattered windows, sweeping his gun up toward the face of the office building. One of the tanks from Charlie was nearby, turning a bit and backing up as the remote machine-gun atop it raked fire across a set of windows. He could already hear the sound of more smallarms fire nearby, but it was difficult to tell direction just from the speaker systems inside the helmet.

A glance at the map showed what was happening. The remainder of the conventional infantry had fallen back near the northern edge of the compound, and coordinated an attack with the Rangers inside, trying to punch a hole in the perimeter. And they were doing a good job of it, One-Bravo was almost completely destroyed, and Two-Bravo and One-Charlie had both taken losses.

A few autocannon bursts sounded from inside the building. They'd tried probing the hallway again, but it was secure. The Rangers wouldn't get out there.

He jogged across the courtyard, keeping an eye on the building. Up ahead was some walkways and more concrete construction, good for at least a little cover. Half of the squad -- the half that hadn't stayed guarding the hallway inside -- moved with him, taking cover.

It wasn't until he'd gotten there that he noticed the bodies. Four soldiers were laying in the courtyard a short distance from a smoldering IFV, a couple shredded by autocannon fire. Another lay just down the walkway, amidst bullet-pocked barriers. His head was almost entirely gone, just a tuft of fur poking out above the neck.

A warning chirped in his ear, and his eyes snapped up just in time to see a flicker of heat dive down on the tank. There were a bright pair of explosions as the tank rocked, a few panels tearing open, flame belching from crew hatches.

"Shooter, top floor!" There was a glimpse of movement above, the squad sending a couple rounds into the window, but whoever it was had already moved back.

He glanced back at the map; One-Bravo was gone. The soldiers they had been fighting were moving quickly toward the building, caught by the high-power cameras of the ships in orbit.

A blip of movement caught Tran's eye, and he swung his aim-point down to it, entering the range. Then another quick motion, as another soldier ran across the three meter gap. He pressed the trigger lightly, firing a single round, but the soldier crossed before he could react. He flicked a switch and fired off a short burst, using explosive rounds this time; He couldn't tell, but he thought he got one.

Explosions suddenly ripped out around him, chewing up the concrete barrier, and throwing him back as the thermal view suddenly went completely dark. Several members of the squad were already firing back by the time he switched back to visual systems, and caught the last bit of small explosions pocking the surface of the office building's third floor. He couldn't see behind him, but he had no doubt his sensor drum was a smoldering mess of metal; He had no sensor input apart from the backup wide-field visuals and his gun's sight.

Bray hadn't fared so lucky. A round had hit just inside and above the shoulder, his armor laying rigidly on its side.

That's enough. He looked at the map, pressing a button to set a marker over the building. "All points! Engage structure, TRP Three-Two! Flatten that fucking building!"

He squeezed the trigger, holding down as he swept the gun across the face of the building. Chunks of concrete were blown off by the blasts, slowly tearing into it. The rest of the squad followed up quickly, and a few seconds later the loud blasts of tank cannons thundered out, sections of the wall blowing out with their powerful explosive rounds.

A couple Rangers and infantry hurried to escape the building under the intense fire. The first few were caught in the open and shot down before they could reach cover; The last Ranger might have made it... If not for the entire face of the building caving in as he started to exit, a moment of freedom before being buried under several tons of concrete and metal.

Moments later, another wall buckled, the entire building listing before sliding a bit, metal supports snapping like twigs as they failed, the building crumbling in on itself.

Tran stood, gun lowering a bit. A pair of tanks were already rolling past, taking new positions. But there was no more gunfire.

He pressed "transmit" again. "HQ, this is One-Alpha. Compound secure."

Twenty nine. That was the final count, twenty nine dead. Some 20 or so more wounded. It was, surprisingly, less than it could have been; Both Bray and Dan emerged from their armors' destruction, entirely unscathed. And it was significantly better than the TC forces had fared.

Now they were digging through the rubble of the city offices. Several Rangers were dragged out from the rubble, their suits opened, and stripped of weapons. The non-powered soldiers didn't fare as well. Some came out on stretchers. The rest in bags. A few of the uninjured human soldiers helped out in freeing their comrades, willing to overlook the awkward position of being prisoners for the opportunity to help free some friends and comrades.

But they had done it. And despite the losses, the soldiers' hearts were high. After five years, this was the first time they had turned things completely around. It wasn't just another struggle to protect another world, but to take it back, and they had every intention of celebrating the accomplishment. Things were good. They were even carrying on with a few of the humans, as well; The two humans that had been pointed out earlier with the camera were a news team, who had remained one the planet after the initial report of victory to do a full follow-up, and were now eager to talk with the uplift soldiers, free of the restrictions of the Confederation's military. Even Grey was joking and carrying on with the reporter, seeming to enjoy being on-camera.

Tran, however, was laid back on the nose of a disabled personnel carrier, not feeling much like joining the rest in celebrating. Not yet. He was still thinking too much, idly fiddling with his submachine gun. He finally lifted it up, slowly going through the familiar routine of checking it over, slowly cycling a round, checking the power cell, magazine, sights. It seemed odd to still be so obsessive over this gun, especially now that he fought in power armor now, but… It was habit.

He finished the check, folding the stock again and letting the weapon hang on its straps, against his chest, and sighed softly as he lay back, mind finally clearing. The sky was clear, peaceful, calm. Unlike the surface, torn up by the battle. He didn't feel happy about the victory like the rest of his squad did, he couldn't. Too many dead. Again. But here, he could at least feel a bit of peace, if for a short time. And yet, there was something new.

For the first time in five years, Tran could feel hope, once again. And if he couldn't have happiness yet, he would take hope.