Starfist: Firestorm by David Sherman & Dan Cragg Page B

the natural order of things—only a fool would think otherwise, and Charlie Bass wasn’t a fool.
    First squad and one gun team remained in place to make sure the Coalition soldiers that third platoon had pinned down stayed pinned during the coming action. The other gun team and the entire assault-gun section shifted to face the threat from the forest along with second squad. The threat wasn’t long in coming.
    The forest facing third platoon suddenly erupted with massed cannon, fléchette streams, and small-arms fire all aimed in the platoon’s direction. Charlie Bass hunkered as low as he could to stay below the incoming fire, and examined the download from the circling UAVs displayed on his UPUD. The infrared images weren’t smooth, as the UAVs were still jinking to evade the sporadic fire aimed at them, but they were clear enough to show the Coalition vehicles forming two lines inside the forest, infantry interspersed among them. The pattern of movement along the second line told him those were the troop-carrier lorries, unloading troops for deployment into assault formations. That left the front row as the armored vehicles.
    The pattern of fire coming at the Marines told Bass that the enemy knew approximately where third platoon was, but not exactly, which was why none of the Marines had been hit yet. Still, with the amount of fire coming their way, casualties were going to happen—and sooner rather than later.
    “Kerr, Kelly, DaCruz,” Bass said on the platoon circuit, “stand by for a HUD transmission.” He pressed the appropriate code into his UPUD and transmitted the current UPUD image to the comps of the squad leader, the gun squad leader, and the assault section leader; three adjacent vehicles in the front row were marked. “Can you see where they are?”
    The three leaders looked at the image on their Heads-Up Displays and correlated them with what they saw of the fire coming from the forest.
    “I’ve got mark three,” Kerr reported. He couldn’t actually see the vehicle, it was too far back under the trees, but his infra screen showed its location.
    “I see mark two,” Sergeant Kelly said. He also used his infra to locate his target.
    Staff Sergeant DaCruz, the assault section leader, was the last to reply. “I’ve got all three spotted,” he said. Again, the infra screen showed the precise location of the targets.
    “Second squad,” Bass ordered, “kill target three. Guns, kill target two. Assault, kill target one, then shift fire as needed to assist guns and second squad. Questions?”
    All three leaders understood their orders.
    Kerr said into his squad circuit, “Second squad, on my mark, concentrated fire on my spot. Use your infras.” He sighted his blaster on the infra glow of target three and pressed its firing lever. Before his bolt had time to reach the enemy vehicle, nine more bolts were on their way. “Fire,” Kerr whispered to himself as he squeezed the firing lever again. “Fire, fire, fire.” To his flanks, the nine Marines under his command were doing the same, sending hundreds of plasma bolts downrange at their designated target.
    The target vehicle didn’t cease its firing, but within seconds after the deluge commenced it began to move in an attempt to get out of the concentrated fire. But the Marines were looking at it through their infras and saw it move; they moved their aiming points to keep hitting the vehicle.
    At the same time Kerr gave second squad his orders, Kelly told Corporal Kindrachuck, “Watch my spot, then kill that bastard.” He aimed his blaster at the vehicle he saw through his infra and fired. First gun team, with Lance Corporal Tischler on the trigger, sent a lengthy stream of plasma bolts at the armored vehicle Kelly had marked. The target’s cannon stopped firing almost immediately, but it wasn’t dead; it went into reverse and tried to run from the gun’s fire.
    DaCruz gave his orders and sent his spotting round at target one. A second