The clouds hung low in the sky, dark and heavy, snowflakes falling upon the land as the heavy amount of debris in the stratosphere cooled down the planet. Lightning snarled in the clouds, both from the planet's magnetosphere as well as ambient electrical charges generated by static electricity and the constant use of high energy weaponry. Even when an atomic blast pushed back the clouds they rushed back in, as if to cover the scar on the planet from the sight of space.

By a lake, where luxury manors had been in the process of being torn down to make way for schools, was a hastily built striker base, a place for attack hovercraft to refuel, rearm, repair, and rejoin the fight. Tanks were services, infantry fed, communications handled, a field hospital cared for wounded, but most of all, it was the striker base.

The south side was against the lake, normally used for striker landings, it was a flurry of constant activity as armored troop transports rolled it, clattered in with treads, or landed on thrusters, were loaded with patients, and took off again. Inside the striker base the Army infantry, the Marines, the Navy and Aerospace troops handed a rifle, slowly moved back in a steady retreat as the wounded and dying were loaded onto the evac vehicles. The base was filled with the roar of combat, the screams of the enraged and the dying, and the silence of the dead.

It was surrounded by a thick dirt berm woven with multiple integrity fields, surrounded by heavy battlescreens interlaced with psychic shielding. Point defense systems clawed incoming indirect rounds and missile from the sky, air defense systems hammered on any air-mobile Precursor machines, and counter-battery fire punched back at any artillery system the Precursors fired at the base.

The problem was, there was a lot of Precursors on the south side of the striker base, opposite of the lake. The battlescreens were taking a pounding, a gun emplacement took a hit and exploded, a point defense system overheated and shut down, a psychic screen exploded into a shower of purple and blue sparks.

The ammo dump took a hit and vanished in an atomic fireball that destroyed the entire east side of the base, almost collapsing the battlescreens surrounding the fuel and ammunition dumps.

The situation was getting desperate, with dozens, hundreds of more wounded to evac, not to mention the medical staff, the medical supplies, and the surgical equipment.

From out of the S-twist that acted as the south gate stomped a hodge-podge of pieces of armor and attached equipment, bulky and rough looking, unfinished and obviously function over form rather than the smoothing hand of engineering starting to apply form over function that appealed to politicians and tax-payers.

It was the size of a Terran, bulky, 30mm twin barrel rotary guns on each arm, a 66mm rocket launcher on the right shoulder, quad-barreled rotary-40mm grenade launcher, four ammunition nano-forges on the back as well as a everything the two armored green mantises could weld to the refabbed 'prosthetic rehabilitation exoskeleon' worn by the Telkan inside.

--we ride this Telkan into the loving embrace of the Digital Omnimessiah brother-- the Mantid 640 broadcast with glee.

--into the liberating hands of Enraged Phillip we ride this Telkan into fire and fury-- the Mantid 222 AKA Triple-Dee screeched over his comlink.

**Four and four is eight Marine polding hold the gate** Kelvak broadcast to his two companions over the datalink that had been his only mode of communication for so long as the surgeons tried to put his destroyed spine back together. He could speak, but his speech was slurred and stuttered. Six-Forty had run a neural splice back to the display unit and hotwired his power armor neural jack to run the exoskeleton rig and the attached gear.

He stopped just inside the battlescreens, staring at the rippling field of energy that blocked the incoming firepower from the Precursors. The entire battlescreen was visible to the naked eye, much less the sensors that were embedded in Kelvak's eye socket and the armor.

Kelvak had been blind in his left eye since Doctor Screams had managed to save him from a stroke two days after he had been recovered. At his suggestion 640 had removed the eye and put in a warborg cyber-eye, not bothering with much of the housing beyond cooling arrays and the structural necessities to keep the eye locked in place.

He hadn't even bothered with the microgears to allow him to move the eye.

--screen at 31.58% and falling-- 640 said.

--wont last more than eighty-three seconds-- 222 answered.

**then its up to us** Kelvak said.

--no hope Telky we die here-- 640 warned.

**then we die** Kelvak stated back.

--ride or die-- both green mantids replied.

**ROLLER HELP**

**BURPY HELP**

Kelvak could see the clankers. The remaining Terrans on the wall were putting holes in their formations, stopping what they could, but for every one destroyed the large ones squatting in the craters or climbing out vomited out a dozen, a hundred, a thousand more attackers.

"Soft podling, brave podling, clever podling, strong podling. One and one is two, two and two is four. Marine podling hold the enemy at the door," Kelvak whispered to himself.

He planted his feet and leveled the two heavy autocannons, the exoskeleton following the command his mostly numb arms couldn't respond to.

Kelvak opened fire at the same time as he tagged targets for the 80mm Hellbore and for the twin linked chainguns.

The whole frame shuddered for a moment before 640 kicked the inertial dampener that belonged on the belly of a striker. The exoframe stopped shuddering as Kelvak slowly panned the guns back and forth. He began walking forward, the exaggerated overly careful movements he had first learned in power armor training, when he had first learned to augment his movement with the neural linkage.

Kelvak stepped through the battlescreen with over-exaggerated steps, each step thudding into the baked dirt and raising up puffs of energy weapon dehydrated dust.

Return fire smashed into the battlescreen, flaring it brightly, but the glowing crimson cybereye compensated for it even as his flesh and blood eye was dazzled.

222 fired off dazzlers, ripjacks, microprism, ferrite smoke, high density smoke, and every other defensive munition he could cook up, the 10mm rapid fire gun on his back spitting rounds at any missile that got too close.

640 ran the nanoforges as the two autocannons tore through the ammunition, monitoring the coolant lines that were wrapped, against protocol, around the barrels.

Kelvak kept marching forward, remembering his training that over half of his advantages was mobility and repositioning to maximize his firepower and minimize the enemy's.

**ROLLER ROCKING!** the little gunnery assistant chirped. It fired the 80mm Hellbore in rapid fire mode, rocking out a round a second, slamming the 250kt overcharged directed nuclear explosions straight into the larger Precursor vehicle's shield.

ATOMIC just kept flashing in Kelvak's vision.

**BUUUUUURP!** sounded out as the little gunnery assistant cut loose, quivering with excitement due to the lockouts being removed and the massive heatsink normally reserved for a warborg strapped to the rear deck of its body. It didn't bother letting off the fire, just raked the entire front line of the oncoming Precursor machines with the 20mm chaingun. **BURPY HELP! BUUUUUURP!**

Kelvak felt the tingle the last battlescreen projected from the striker base as he passed through it, felt the taste of tangee berries on his gums from the psychic shielding, and triggered the guns again, emptying the rocket pack on his shoulder in one lurching step, using the forward shoulder movement to offset the kickback.

--heavy tanks right side-- 222 said, jamming his cybernetic bladearm, the only one he had, into the firing molycircs of the right gun and overriding the maximum heat tolerance.

--rocket launcher ammo pack reloaded-- 640 said.

Kelvak turned, upper torso first, step and swing right leg, pivot on left leg. The tanks came in sight and he tabbed them up real quick, firing the rockets, stepping forward and feeling the missile launcher reload and firing again. The tanks exploded in a quick row, the 66mm missiles going hypersonic less than five feet from Kelvak.

The inertial dampener howled as plasma packets strong enough to pack signifigant kinetic punch slammed into his shields but it did its job and Kelvak barely felt anything beyond a light tap on his shoulder. The three Precursor aircraft, their thrusters sputtering, angled to rush forward faster, the domes on their tops dark.

Turn the torso right, left knee up, swing leg left, plant left leg, step forward right leg.

The heavy guns his hands were on, engineer tape wrapped around nerveless fingers, shredded the aircraft, sending them spinning and tumbling even as Kelvak kept up the fire for a second on the rapidly disintegrating wreckage.

Three more heavy dropships came roaring down, smoke pouring off their armor, their guns firing to provide a little support, vanishing to the south.

The battlescreen generators were howling, overheating, overworked, but Kelvak ignored them, striding forward into the enemy's fire. More and more vehicles were orienting on him.

ATOMIC ATOMIC ATOMIC

**ROLLER ROCKING**

The gun fired again, pounding through the last of the shields and Roller overrode the thermal warning, firing two more shots into the suddenly vulnerable hull of the Precursor ship. The first blew a crater in the armor, revealing twisted wreckage that had been internal components.

The second blew the entire back out of the ship and obliterated the Squad huddled in the armored core of the ship. The ship behind shuddered as the shrapnel and the remainder of the 250kt directed blast hit it.

Not that Kelvak knew, he was still stomping forward, firing his guns, ignoring heat warnings, ignoring slush levels.

640 kicked the creation engine's top, making it rotate, and it dumped out its contents, looking like steaming watery milk being poured from a pot. 640 pulled it back up and dropped a silver looking ball into the nanoforge. The heat woke the nanites up and the nanoforge took less than a second to rapid-integrate with the new nanites. 640 tossed a nanite buster grenade on the shimmering spot where he'd dumped the nanites and turned his attention to the secondary thermal cores.

With a heave 222 got the round unjammed from the cannon, making Burpy beep happily. The mantid jumped from the gunnery assistant, fluttering his vestigal wings to get more airtime, and landed on Kelvak's right hand gun, pulling out a can of liquid nitrogen and spraying the warsteel barrels.

One of the tanks got a shot and a 75kt blast went off against Kelvak's battlescreen, overloading it, making him lean into the blast that caused his heat to spike up. The inertial dampener howled as the shockwave hit him, the secondary battlescreens flared as the fireball slapped him, but he kept wading into the fireball regardless.

Kelvak stomped out of the fireball, still firing. Burpy spotted something shooting straight up from one of the ships and beeped with glee.

Its twin linked guns shredded it in midair in less than a second.

His radio clinked and he twitched an ear he'd left in his helmet two months ago. His flesh and blood eye was out, the retinal link gone with it. Blood and vitreous humor leaking from the socket, down his cheek.

Still the red eye taken from a dead warborg glowed.

A heavy maser, usually used in space, hit him square, rocking him back slightly.

He fired a pair of rockets back and the weapon emplacement exploded, gouting fire and vaporized metal.

"We can't support you out there, kid," a voice came in over the commo channel.

**doesnt matter get them out** Kelvak sent back. **strong podling brave podling see the pretty square death is coming Marine podling brave so dont care**

There was silence for a moment.

"Digital Omnimessiah be with you, brother," the Terran said and cut the link.

--we ride this Telkan to Enraged Phillips loving hands--

--to immortality and the arms of the Digital Omnimessiah we die free--

**blue square is square yellow circle is round Marine podling has fun guns to pound**

---------------

Mukstet circled the striker base twice, his instruments sweeping the wreckage. He could see that the fighting got all the way into the base. Five Precursor landing ships were nothing but scattered and shattered wreckage. The radiation detectors howled but a glance showed him that he was within tolerances.

He set down, strangely enough in his usual spot, surrounded by shredded Precursor machines. The neural jack disengaged with an aduible crack. He unbuckled, staying linked to his striker through his datalink, and moved down into the back of the striker, jumping down onto the ground from the open troop bay.

A Terran he'd picked up somewhere, he didn't remember where, dismounted the heavy doorgun and jumped out, looking around with his burning red eyes.

"They all get out?" the Terran asked, his voice neutral is if he was discussing the weather.

"Except for a couple who stayed behind to hold the line," Mukstet said. "Going to sweep, see if any of them survived. We need to get Striker Base Boop back online as soon as possible. The Clankers in orbit might be finished, but there's still plenty of ground fighting to do."

Two more strikers landed, crews climbing out.

"I'll accompany you," the Terran said, unnecessarily in Mukstet's opinion.

Mukstet searched the striker base carefully, checking inside buildings.

The evidence of heavy fighting was all there. The operating room was gutted, it looked like someone had used rockets inside, and the wreckage of Precursor machines showed why.

"Boss, over here," the Terran said. "By the evac pad."

Mukstet moved around a gutted Precursor tank and saw the Terran. He was standing in the opening of the berm that surrounded the evac pad that prevented debris from hitting its surroundings.

The wreckage was thick on the ground and Mukstet could see where explosives had been used to blow breaks in the mounds.

He counted one, two, two and a half, maybe three with that one, four, no, still three, four, five Terrans. Six, no, still five, six, maybe seven... yeah, seven Terrans total. Most of them still held weapons in their fists.

The Terran with Mukstet bent down and inserted a wire into the grenade pin hole on the implosion grenade still held tight in the dead hand, disarming it.

Mukstet climbed to the top of the third rise of wreckage, careful where he put his feet.

A happy beeping sounded out from the wreckage in front of him. He moved toward the beeping and found a half demolished Telkan gunnery assistance drone. It's hologram projector showed a happy face icon that flashed a few times.

The beeping slowed and stopped.

The magic smoke curled up from the cracked computer core armored housing.

Mukstet looked up at what it was in front of. Robotic exoskeleton, mismatched pieces of warborg and Terran combat armor, heavy weapons, a burnt out nanoforge with a mantid engineer flattened and baked onto the surface, a computer combat assist module with half of a mantid engineer hanging from a single cybernetic bladearm that was jammed into the access port.

All wrapped around burnt and ravaged meat.

It took Mukstet a minute to realize that what he was looking at was a Telkan.

Or what was left of one.

He was missing his body from the upper thighs to just below his ribcage, the bones of the ribs exposed, blackened and charred meat from multiple plasma blasts filling where his lower torso should have been. The charred meat at the bottom of his ribs had armor sealant sprayed on it with heavy cables running off of what looked like exposed cybernetic linkages, running from the Telkan's exposed spine to the half-missing legs. Half of his helmet was torn away to reveal bare bone, seared meat, and an empty eye socket. The visor was torn off, revealing a single warborg eye jammed into the other socket.

A solenoid in the heavy autocannon kept clicking until the Terran reached down and pulled the power lead from the side of the gun.

Mukstet squinted at the body, trying to get his implant to recognize who it was. It took his implant three queries to get an ID back.

PVT KELVAK - SECOND TELKAN MARINE DIVISON

222 - MANTID COMBAT ENGINEERING REGIMENT, SECOND TELKAN MARINE DIVISION

640 - MANTID COMPUTER REPAIR TECHNICIAN, NINTH SUSTAINMENT BATTALION, FIRST CALVARY DIVISION

"He made them pay for it," the Terran said.

"Yeah," Mukstet said, turning away from the corpses. "Time to get to work, Boop isn't going to rebuild herself. We'll get Graves Registration out here to collect up these poor brave bastards."

Another striker set down.

And the war went on.