The panicked, helpless moments that Neil took to watch the marauders on their way back, and if their second pass had been another run on their location it would have been the end. However, the seven ships veered off and away to the east, and from his vantage point Neil saw something that should have affected him more. The marauders opened fire again, this time targeting not only the hangar bays with their airborne mobility capabilities, but also the barracks where half the pilots were sleeping, or trying to get themselves in some semblance of battle readiness. It was also the hub of the battalion leadership. The rest had been outside, but when the marauders had finished emptying their payloads they were all dead.

Now they were stranded.

The marauders pulled up and away, their engines screaming as they once again charged off into the night and turned away again. Their bank veer was wider this time, and Neil felt the crucial parts of his mind click. Spinning around he saw the other private he had fallen on, a young man called Staples, standing there looking shellshocked with battle fatigue. They locked eyes, and Neil pointed. “Kit and weapon, find my mortars and my heavy weapons and get them down to the center hold. Repeat my instructions back to me.”

“Uh…” The private shook his head in focus. “Get my kit, my weapon, find the heavy weapons squad and the mortars. Center hold.”

“Execute your taskings.”

“Sergeant Ziggenbor?”

Neil whipped back around. “Quickly private, they’re coming back around.”

“What if they’re all dead?”

“Execute your taskings to the highest level of your ability.” Neil snapped, and then ducked back into the ruined building that had been his home for more than a year. Recovering his own kit he moved as quickly as he could through the wreckage to the center hold of their operating base, always keeping his eyes on the skies as the marauders flew a patrolling spiral pattern thrice around their location. As he thanked luck for the tactical failure, he fumbled with the comlink in his pockets.

“Hey. Hey!” He called at a group of five milling about. Neil was past caring about rank at the moment. “Go get who you can and go up to the ASP and get as many boxes of 60 rounds as you can, then get them down to the center hold.”

“Roger.” Two of them said, and they took point.

Neil kept moving, but as he came up on the center hold, the marauders came into alignment again. “Take cover!” Neil bellowed at the top of his voice. “Take cover and darken all light source--” he slid and rolled under one of the Stripehopper universal terrain vehicles. The concussion of a blast rattled his teeth again, but otherwise Neil rolled out from under his cover without incident. As he sat there for a heartbeat, a beeping from under his left thigh alerted him to the comlink with a messaging channel open to his brother, the last contact that he had pinged. Neil held the device up, staring into the little green light at the top center.

Then there were footsteps running up on him. “At the stripes!” He shouted, pointing out to the rest of the stripehoppers. “Green and Troy, go around and set that--FUCK!” There was the rushing scream of the marauder’s engines overhead and another missile snap-hissed to life overhead. But either the shot had been misplaced or the round had been a bad lot, because the felhound zipped off a hundred meters in a random direction and exploded, doing little more than showering the area with sparks and some heat.

“Set that APES here,” Neil was already on his feet, gesturing to the middle of the center hold. “Goddamn it, here.” What was left of the heavy weapons squad, two specialists, a private, and a Lieutenant, set the Aircraft Prevention Electronic Suppression weapons system on its tripod and began running the necessary systems check.

“What pass are they on, Sergeant?” The Lieutenant asked.

“Third pass,” Neil said as he saw the mortar team emplacing. Glazing over his shoulder then he saw twenty or so soldiers coming towards them with the ammo boxes. “And our last if those motherfucking mortars don’t get those rounds so fucking move!” They did, getting the rounds to the mortars, who deftly started popping the metal boxes and tapping activation button sequences on the rounds.

The marauders were still in the wide angle of their pass, and Neil held the comlink up to stare into the little green light. “Dunno if I’m getting out of this one bro. Top is dead, they hit HHC if what I saw is right. Just letting you know, cause hell.”

“Gun up!” One of the mortars yelled, and Neil turned to the APES. The senior Specialist gave Neil a thumbs up. Turning his gaze back to the comlink, he said, “Gotta let the best of us know to, right? Thanks for everything. Love you guys. Z3 out. GET THE FUCK DOWN YOU LOT!” He bellowed at the soldiers who had brought down the ammo. “Or better yet start moving between the stripes and making sure they’re ready to move at a moments notice, ten of you do that, the rest go through the rest of the outpost and round the rest of anyone still alive and tell them to get the fuck down here, I don’t give a fuck what their rank is. Grab whatever ammo you can and meet back up here NLT ten minutes, as quick as you can, go!” The soldiers, now with a measurable and executable goal, moved.

Neil walked over to the APES and squatted next to Troy, the senior Specialist. “How long you been running an APES?”

“Ten years.” Troy said at once. “Made my level six two months ago.”

“Congratulations.”

Troy beamed. “You too, Sergeant Z. What do you need me to shoot?”

“Target of opportunity to cause the most disruption in their flight pattern, and I would love to get one or two on the ground.”

“I can do that. You want them cooked?”

“To a fucking crisp.”

“What are the mortars for?”

“Contingency.” Neil said grimly, remembering his first time on Mars. “Praying to god I don’t have to go to my bench.”

Troy nodded once, and a businesslike look spread over his face as the marauders turned back around. Keeping his profile low, Neil went to the mortars. Specialist Morgon gave him a small nod. “Mortars are hung, Sergeant Z.”

“Hold until we have eyes on for direct lay or a broken arrow bit of fuckery.”

“Are we taking the systems with us when we exfil?”

“Too fucking right we are. I’m not going anywhere on this shithole planet without the ability to cover my ass.”

“Where will we be headed, Sergeant?”

“Olympus Mons, per emergency evacuation protocol. Where are the--”

A thwump-chunking sound filled the air. It wasn’t loud, but the sensation of the APES going off in the careful, measured, and well placed bursts that Specialist Troy was putting down made Neil’s skin crawl.

“Sergeant?” Morgon said, leaning close.

“Coms.” Neil said through gritted teeth. “Do we know where any of our com units are?”

“I saw one or two, but their building got hit the same as yours did, sergeant. I don’t think most of them got out.”

“Fuck.” Neil said. “If you see any of them, send them my way.”

“There.” One of the other mortars said, thumping Morgon on the shoulder, and the Specialist pointed to a young woman kneeling over an open backpack, many different colors playing across the equipment within. Neil started to move, but Troy’s voice rose above the sounds of the APES. “Errybody get your head down and your asshole puckered!” His rusty drawl came out in the excitement of his voice as the APES chunked through the marauder second to the front, sending it into a spin and causing it to collide with the two immediately following it. The rest of the formation pulled up and veered off, a few errant rounds from their hard guns peppering harmlessly around the perimeter. “Keep it up!” Neil called, and moved to the comms Specialist, Flint. She held up a hand to forestall any questions.

Turning, he pointed at five who had just come down from the main outpost. One was a Sergeant he knew. “Vane, take who you can and hold security on those downed fighters. Don’t engage unless necessary, and be ready to disengage on my signal.”

“I haven’t been able to send out any word, but I can monitor the channels going out, to a point.” Flint said, ripping the headset off. “It’s bad everywhere. We might be second best.”

Neil looked at her, trying to process how they could be doing ‘the second best’ when the unnerving sound of the APES started up again. “Get to cover and continue monitoring.” Neil said, and turned in the direction that Sergeant Vane had taken the security force. They were holding in position, and for now that had to be good enough for him. So he jogged back over to a safe distance away from where Troy was still laying down a thurm of electronic fire. “One more down, I think that if I can peg one last they’ll veer off.”

“Right then.” Neil said, gritting his teeth and looking around. The rest of those he had sent hadn’t come back with survivors yet, and he didn’t want bits of falling ships taking out any of the surviving soldiers of the 3-95th. But that wasn’t a problem he had a solution for, so Troy kept up his fire. It turned out that he didn’t need to bring anymore down. The remaining marauders closed in their formation and zipped off to the north, away from them and disappeared over the horizon, bringing an anticlimax to the hellish sequence of events.

The sound of the APES ebbed away, but Troy stayed where he was, eyes on the place where the marauders had disappeared, and the mortarmen stayed alert and ready, looking to their team lead, who looked to Neil. Somewhere off down the slope there was a dull thud, and a plume of fire.

“Vane?” Neil yelled.

There was an exchange at the security force, and a small figure came sprinting through the darkness, a private first class that Neil recognized by face only. He was completely naked, though the water from the shower he had been in the middle of was mostly dry at this point, and he gripped his weapon at the low ready. “They blew the fighters, sergeant.” The PFC breathed. “That or they cooked off and the reserve gas tanks ignited, but Sergeant Vane thinks they were purposefully done in.”

“Survivors?”

“None that we can see, he’s holding in position waiting on your word.”

“Send him to me and have him leave the most senior in charge.”

“Yes sergeant.” And the naked PFC sprinted off again. A minute later, Sergeant Vane materialized out of the darkness.

“Who did you leave in charge over there?”

“Langley, and he’s doing a better job even without a stitch on him than most would.”

“He’s the highest ranking?”

Vane considered that a moment. “Honestly, no. There’s two L.T.s, but you said the most senior. He’s got them beat.”

“Right.” Neil said. “I need to know personnel. I need to know who made it out, what they can do. I need a roster, can you do that?”

“Yeah, I can handle that, I’ve got a supply specialist over there.”

“Right, good. I also need the highest ranking enlisted to come to me as soon--”

“That’s you.” A voice came from behind him. Neil turned to see a group of thirty or so soldiers appearing in the center hold. At their head was a woman, her grey hair disheveled out of the tight bun it had no doubt been in when the night had begun. Her arm had been severed at the elbow, a tourniquet firmly in place.

“Major Darrow.” Neil said, going to her. “Goddamn, ma’am are you--”

“Maimed, but hardly the most pressing matter right now. Focus, Sergeant, because it’s you, now.”

Dumbly, Neil just stared back at her for a moment, the words not quite reaching home. “Ma’am… I don’t--”

“Should I say acting Command Sergeant Major of the 3-95th, would that make it more clear?” She snapped without heat. “It’s you, Sergeant Ziggenbor. The next up is Staff Sergeant Taylor, but unless our other medic is able to scoop his intestines back into his gut, perform enough surgery to get them right and burn him shut the next after will be Sergeant Vane. From my understanding you’ve got six sergeants who made it through this shit show and the rest are all junior enlisted, specialist and officers. So, it’s you. You are who you need right now.” She lowered her voice. “And it’s who they need too.”

Neil looked over her shoulder. The survivors were looking at him. He turned to look at the mortar crew, and Troy with his gun team, and the few standing there in the center hold. They were all looking at him.

“Well fuck.” He breathed. Then he remembered the basics that had been drilled into him at RAPIDS, and the NCO academy, and his prior years in service. Next man up. Nodding more to himself than anything, he turned to Vane. “I need that roster. And I need security posted up here to make sure those bastards don't try to spring us again.”

“Roger.”

“Have whoever isn’t doing that get the stripes ready to move, we can’t stay here any longer than we have to. Get five to go back up and bring down any mission critical equipment needed. Destroy anything we don’t need. SP in half an hour.”

“Roger.”

“Execute.”

“Roger.” And Vane went, and began barking out orders.

Neil watched him go, trying to fight down the bile rising in him as his heart sped up, racing away from him like a runaway supply friggit. Panic coursed through him, pounding against the inside of his skull as he stood there trying to look confident while he floundered.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He muttered. “Flint! You’re with me.”

--

“And if I may make an additional suggestion, General?”

“Admiral?”

“To my understanding we have not been given confirmation of the 3-95th’s destruction, and we shouldn’t move on this situation like they’re lost yet. I would recommend a small team from Detachment Echo be sent to, at the least, ascertain their status if not perform extraction.”

“We have reconnaissance out for confirmation now.”

“Indeed. And do the ground forces still use the 7th series Falcon Class short range vessel for its reconnaissance?”

The General’s neck colored slightly. “We do.”

“The capacity of the Falcon Class is fifteen personnel, if my memory serves me correctly. This would be insufficient for extraction, if even a weapons squad has survived.”

“Admiral, in the event extraction is needed we will have crafts inbound within the day--”

With the tap of a key, Neil’s face leaped into holographic relief again. The message, in all its chaos and carnage, played through again, and when it winked out, Fleet Admiral Richard Neerson’s face looked decidedly less diplomatic. “If they are able to be saved, they might not have a day.” He said. “They might be in a conflict that your reconnaissance team is ill suited to handle. Members of my fleet will be inbound already.”

The General said nothing for a moment, though his eyes flicked around the room for a moment. “My team will perform reconnaissance.” He said in a brittle tone. “If they haven’t done their job by the time you arrive, proceed as you would. Until then, let them handle it. Now, excuse me.” The General spun on his heel and left the room, the soldiers leaving with him. After them, the naval personnel filed out till it was only Martin and the Admiral left sitting there. Martin shifted, bursting inside, but unsure if he was permitted to speak.

Sighing, and running a hand back over his greying hair, Neerson shook his head. “Fool. Bastard fool. Honestly, I know your brother is an admirable soldier, but oftentimes the ground forces places too high a regard on medals earned in battle rather than the merits learned around battle.”

“Yes sir. Though by Neil’s own admission, he’s a good soldier at best. Big mouth, quick temper. Low tolerance for stupidity.”

Neerson regarded the more junior officer, the look on his face seeming as though he was torn between irony and exasperation. Then he tapped two keys, the image of Neil’s face that had been left hanging in the center of the room changed to a picture of the youngest Ziggenbor brother in his dress uniform and an inscrutable military bearing on his face. Lines began appearing next to the portrait. “Indeed.” Neerson said. “Though you’ve just described nearly every competent soldier I’ve had the pleasure of working with over the years. Here,” He gestured to a line racing through the air. “His first tour into the Martian Sector, when he argued openly with his company commander about a patrol he was supposed to lead through Third Moscow. A week of extra duty and placed on a third-mark probation if such action occurred again.”

“I heard about the incident sir. Loudly, and at great length. With profanities in three languages.”

“While he was arguing with his officer, two timed explosions took place, one of which was L-718 nerve agent. His insubordination saved his own life, and those of his men.” Neerson flicked through the lines. “His initial denial into the NCO academy… did you know the reasons for that?”

“That one he didn’t want to talk about, sir.”

“Indeed not. Three of his soldiers had been taken to EMAR station, and he hadn’t seen to their well being yet. It wasn’t a denial so much as it was a refusal through action, but when he did go, full marks in leadership and strategy classes. His drill and ceremony,” Martin winced as the image of a foot impaled on a bayonet appeared. “Something to be desired. Still, if we move on to his time as a Staff Sergeant we see, well… I suppose Staff Sergeants are more inclined to receive… what was the term?”

“One private ass chewing rather than forty public lashes.” Martin said at once. “Yeah, he told me, sir.”

With a last tap, the hologram dissolved and Neerson turned once again to Martin. “Your brother might be dead.” He said bluntly. “But if he is not, he’s a military asset worth saving.”

Martin felt his temper flare and his fingers tighten on the arm of his chair. “Is that all he is to you, sir? An asset?”

“The only way you achieve rank as an officer is to look at everything, everyone, as an asset.” Neerson said. “The beauty of achieving rank is that you can change that.”

Martin calmed himself, forcing himself to nod. “You want me to go get him.”

“If you are the one to make the attempt, it will likely be more successful.”

“Some would call that a conflict of interests.”

“Indeed.” Neerson stood. “Return to your ship, Lieutenant Commander, and execute your orders. Should the orders transmitted not be followed by your ship Commander she will be relieved of duty, and you placed in temporary command of the Vindicator.”

Martin would have choked. “Sir?”

“Your orders, Commander.” Neerson said, without breaking step. “Do not make me repeat them.”