United Star Systems Marines

14 Surface of Gardner IV, Pericles star cluster, IO research facility Marines from 1st squad brought down three more Ares Alliance commandos in a hail of gunfire as they attempted to overrun the two squad’s positions in the corridor. Sergeant Yao noticed that this created an opening to a hallway that could allow his Marines to flank the remainder of the enemy forces. “First squad! Bound forward, get a foothold in that far room! Hunt, what’s the status on the door breach!?” Yao said forcefully. Hunt turned and yelled back. “Give me two more mikes and we’ll be ready to blast a hole through it! We’ve got to clear out of this corridor though. The detonation radius will be at least fifteen meters!” “Roger that…Chambers! We’ve got to push everybody forward out of this corridor to that far room, time now!” Sergeant Yao relayed to his fellow squad leader. “Roger, bounding forward now,” Chambers sent his squad into action. The Marines systematically moved from crate to crate out of the corridor and into the adjacent science lab room, one team provided cover fire for the others as they moved. They were beginning to push the enemy commandos back, isolating them into one small corner room. The Ares Alliance special ops team had now lost their initial advantage. Corporal Hunt keyed up his remote detonator for the breach charge attached to the steel blast door that would be their exit. A green light indicated the charges were linked and set. He picked up Lieutenant Freeborn and threw him over his shoulder fireman’s carry style, running into the science lab that 1st squad had just cleared and established a foothold in. “Sergeant Yao, do you want me to blast the door?” Hunt transmitted over the squad net as he carefully lay the wounded Lieutenant Freeborn down on the deck. “Not yet, we’re gaining the advantage! Clearing the last room at this time! First squad flash and clear!” Sergeant Yao yelled. * * * * Kaleb followed right behind PFC Smith as they quickly maneuvered down the first two floors inside the darkened bunker. They snuck quietly around the halls and corridors using their night vision image enhancement on their head’s up displays. Corporal Martinez and PFC Colby fell in line directly behind them, covering their backside. “Look at all the bodies…” PFC Smith said quietly as they made their way down the bunker. “I don’t see any of ours, that’s a good sign, just keep moving,” Kaleb answered. They had been unable to locate the team of four special ops commandos that entered the bunker ahead of them. As they descended down the long stairwell to the bottom floor they began to hear a faint sound of gunfire. “Shit, you hear that? They’re in a firefight down there!” Corporal Martinez stated in his Mexican-American accent. “Shut up and stay alert. This should be the bottom floor, those enemy dismounts have to be down here,” Kaleb whispered back. They came up on a dark corner and began to hear the sound of a low-pitched voice grumbling on and on over what sounded like an open radio net. Kaleb held up his fist to indicate for his team to freeze in place. Slowly, he peeked around the corner, his green-tinted night vision made out a large human silhouette standing with his back to him just a few feet away. Kaleb froze. His heart felt like it was pounding through his chest. The Ares commando in front of him had his assault rifle at the low ready, luckily facing away from Kaleb at the time, talking into a handheld radio. Kaleb slowly reach up with his right hand towards his combat-knife sheath located on the upper left chest of his ABAS suit. He gently gripped the handle of his ten-inch long, serrated edge, Marine standard issue field knife. Pulling the knife out of the sheath, Kaleb took one faint step towards the still oblivious enemy commando who continued to rattle on over his radio net. “Yeah, this is Ziggs…..no…..nothing yet….did you find the access door? Negative…ok…I’ve got our rear covered….keep me posted-…..” Suddenly, in one swift motion, Kaleb reached around the Ares Alliance commando’s helmet with his left hand, pulling as hard as he could, wrenching the enemy’s neck and head to the left side, exposing a gap in his armor between the neck collar and helmet. Almost a half a second later, Kaleb forcefully dug his field knife into the exposed, right half of the commando’s neck, burying the blade all the way to the hilt. The ten-inch blade sliced through the man’s main arteries with ease and stuck itself into his upper vertebrate, paralyzing him instantly. The commando let out a faint grunt as his final breath of life expired a few seconds later. Kaleb carefully grabbed the man’s body, quietly laying it down on the deck so as not to make any noise. He turned back and motioned with his hand for the rest of his team to move up, the hall was clear. One down, now just need to find the other three, Kaleb thought as he led his three Marines further down the hall to what appeared to be another corner that wrapped the corridor around to the right. Once again, Kaleb slowly peered around the concrete wall down another dark passageway. Standing by a large blast door at the end of the thirty meter-long passage were the remaining three Ares Alliance commandos that Kaleb witnessed dismounting from the armored rover earlier. They were standing in an un-guarded posture, attempting to override the security lock on the blast door. One of the men anxiously punched the keys on his data pad, attempting to decrypt the access code. The two other men paced back and forth, cursing. “Goddammit, I knew we should’ve left more men down here. How the hell did we not pick up their drop ships on radar?” one of the men said angrily at his counterpart. “Calm down and get ready, I’ve almost broken the security code. They shouldn’t expect us to come in from behind them. Where’s Ziggs? Tell him to stop guarding the hallway and get back over here.” the one holding the data pad whispered back. Kaleb reached down to his assault belt on the waist of his ABAS and pulled out a high explosive grenade. He twisted the top, activating the five second fuse. “Frag out,” he whispered to his team behind him. Kaleb took a step around the corner and with his left hand he side-armed the grenade down the corridor towards the blast door. The sound of the grenade bouncing off the concrete floor alerted the Ares Alliance commandos to his presence. All four of them turned in unison towards the sound, assault rifles pointing down the corridor towards Kaleb. The grenade rolled to a halt just below one of the commando’s right foot. “Grena….!” The enemy soldier didn’t have time to finish his words as the high explosive detonated beneath him, shearing his body into pieces. Standing in a tight cluster, the other two men were immediately thrown against the concrete walls of the corridor, plopping down on the ground after the impact, killing at least one more of them. The surviving commando proceeded to get back up on his feet, stunned from the concussion but protected by his high-grade body armor. He started to reach for his weapon but not before Smith, Martinez, and Colby shot out from around the corner and took aim with their sniper rifles at close range. Three consecutive bursts from the Marines’ MR-40A2 rifles echoed through the hallways as they knocked the enemy commando back down to the floor, blood began to spew out of the holes pierced in his chest-plate armor by the 9.45mm rounds. By this time Kaleb had readied his rifle and fired three more quick shots into the lifeless bodies of the special ops soldiers. The deafening sound from the rifle salvos echoed throughout the halls of the bunker complex. Corporal Martinez grabbed Kaleb’s shoulder, “Sergeant Taylor, they’re dead already….you ok man?” Payback for what you guys let happen on Hastati…. Kaleb thought to himself as he let out a deep breath, clicking the safe