An infested colonist collapsed with one hole in his head and two in his chest.
The female marine didn’t know if it was the eighth or the ninth infested she put down. Or maybe it was the tenth? She lost count of her kills a while ago.
Her shots were no longer the amateur continuous strings. After depleting half her arsenal in the first minutes, she realized that she needed to be more careful, so she started learning from what other, more experienced, marines did.
The battlefield was one of the best places to learn. It didn’t take long for the female marine to learn to condense her bullets into precise bursts.
It had been almost ten minutes since the first infested got past the wall. Since then, the infested kept on pouring in. At first it was just one or two through the breaches and the marines could easily gun them down, but as time passed more and more of the wall fell apart, and the infested started coming in dozens at a time. The marine firing turned from short, patient shots to rapid bursts as the Raiders tried to put down every single infested.
As of now, dead infested formed a pile of bodies almost as high as the wall itself, and not one of the infested managed to make it to the Raiders.
Unfortunately, a large portion of the Raider arsenal was gone. Every single marine was given a large amount of bullets before the mission, but the continuous firing and the firing rate of the gauss rifles made the bullet count drop faster than ever.
A string of clear cracks came from behind the female marine. She sneaked a look and realized it was the goliath at the back opening fire on the pile of zerg. The support unit had been quiet the entire time because a few infested weren’t worth his precious autocannon rounds, but now that the infested were in large numbers, the autocannons could truly shine.
Dozens of bursts of blood erupted in front of the crowd of infested, and all of those shot either lost a large part of their chest or a limb. Autocannons technically did single target damage, but their penetration capability allowed them to go through the bodies of the infested in the front and hit those in the back.
The female marine pulled her trigger again, but instead of the familiar feeling of her arm shaking in recoil, she heard a loud tap in her helmet that warned her of a lack of ammunition.
She almost automatically reached into the storage space of her armor and touched nothing.
She wasted too many bullets at the start of the battle. When everyone else were still opening fire, she was out of shots.
The female marine frowned. Staying in the battlefield with an empty rifle not a good idea. She turned around to the veteran marine, wanting to ask for help.
That was when she heard a gunshot deeper than standard gauss rifles. The next second the veteran marine collapsed with a hole in his helmet.
His bulletproof combat shield fell on the ground. Usually terran marines wouldn’t be killed by a single bullet. Their combat shields could deflect most of the bullets while the body platings of their CMC armors made sure the gauss bullets couldn’t do significant damage. A bullet to the head could’ve went through the high density glass and kill the man, but the helmet was very small compared to the size of the entire marine. Anyone who had sufficient carefulness and some luck would be able to cover their head.
But the infested couldn’t shoot back, or at least that was what the Raiders thought. Almost every marine lowered their shields in favor of an easier firing position, exposing their head in the open. That wasn’t the wisest decision, but in the horror of the battle even the most experienced warriors would make mistakes, and sometimes the price of the mistake was a marine life.
When being shot in the head, a veteran was no different from a fresh recruit.
The man’s heavy armor made a loud sound as it hit the ground. Beside the body, the female marine’s mouths hang open in shock.
“What the hell was that?” The voice of the marine’s captain appeared in the radio. The infested themselves weren’t that surprising. Infested terran appeared in the Brood War as well, but infested terran that could use weapons? That was a new kind of horror.
Above the mountain of dead, an infested popped his head out. Unlike the infested civilians with colonist clothing, this infested wore a CMC armor. He was a militia marine. He used to be the protector of the colonists, but now he was their nightmare. A gauss rifle was connected to his tentacled right arm.
As if inspired by his first kill, the infested marine raised his rifle and fired again. Bullets started flying, but this time it came from the side of the infested.
Unfortunately, the Raiders have recovered from the initial shock already. Their past experience with fighting other terran forces saved their lives as they hid themselves behind bunkers and combat shields. The gauss bullets could only graze the bunkers and slightly shake the combat shields.
Raiders marine fired back, killing the infested marine instantly, but more and more infested marine poked their head out of the half destroyed wall and started firing.
The Raiders retaliated.
The female marine knelt down on the ground and raised her combat shield. Her body shook continuously as she felt her shield shaking as bullets hit it.
She knew she needed to get more ammunition. Being pinned down like this with no way of fighting back wasn’t the brightest idea.
She set her eyes on the dead marine…
The drop pods hit the ground and came to a screeching halt. The red light that previously glowed in the drop pods turned green, telling the reapers it was safe to exit.
The reaper captain coughed. The shock absorber built in the drop pods saved the occupants from being killed the moment the pods hit the ground, but the crash landing was by no means an entertaining way to travel.
Still, knowing the urgentness of the situation, he didn’t complain or curse. Instead, he merely glanced at the two reapers at the entrance of the drop pod, and the two men opened the door and jumped out. The rest of the reapers followed.
All eighteen drop pods landed very close to their meant destination. The fifty reapers quickly assembled together. Their weapons were ready for any infested that were attracted by the landing, but no enemies came. All the infested near the tunnel were killed by the Yamato Cannon.
The reaper captain counted his men and suddenly frowned as he remembered something. He turned around and looked at the eight drop pods that didn’t belong to the reapers.
Not one man came out.
The captain didn’t know who were in these drop pods. All he knew was these men were friendly.
In the Hyperion, Horner looked at Jean questioningly. He had faith in both her and Swann, but he couldn’t help but think the Warden marines somehow malfunctioned.
Jean didn’t see the doubtful look of the captain. She tapped a silver earpiece in her right ear.
“Warden Squad M001. Activate all units. Form formation outside drop pods.”
In one of the drop pods, all five Warden marines, previously dormant, were suddenly turned on. Their T visors shined in blue. Simultaneously, they stood up, held onto their shields, reached behind and grabbed their rifles, and turned to the exit.
The AIs within the Warden marines connected to the Warden network and started processing. One by one they exited the drop pods.
Outside, the reaper captain stared in awe as all eight pods opened at the exact same second. Eight lines of marines walked out in a machine-like fashion. Without a word, they formed a rectangular formation.
“Ahhh…” The reaper captain’s mouth hung open, not knowing what to say or do.
Neither Jean nor Horner wanted to explain to the captain who the Warden marines were. The captain might be employed by the Raiders, but he was a mercenary, and he worked for Mira Han. Mira wasn’t an enemy, but she definitely wasn’t a friend. There was no reason to tell her one of the Raiders’ best cards.
“Proceed with your mission, captain. These men will support you.”
The reaper captain nodded. It wasn’t a mercenaries’ creed to question his employer.
Without much conversation, the reapers and the marines reached the entrance of the target. The original entrance was ripped apart, revealing a dark hallway that led downwards.
There wasn’t any sort of light in the tunnel. Zerg units didn’t need to use their eyes to see, and a dark environment might be able to act as a defense against hostile terran units, who were severely weaker without their sight.
The reapers were equipped with night vision goggles, but they were always more troublesome, and sometimes a few seconds of delay might be the difference between life and death.
Without wasting any more time, the reapers jumped down the mouth of the beast.
The Warden marines followed...
“Uh.” One of the reapers complained as he stepped on a pile of purple goo. Cursing, he stamped his feet on the soft ground.
The reapers were approaching in a formation as scattered as possible. Their gauss pistols were ready to open fire on a moment’s notice.
The Warden marines formed two tight groups. One of them was in front of the reapers and the other was behind. Suddenly, simultaneously, the marines stopped.
“What the?” The reaper captain frowned.
Thirty nine of the forty marines had blue Ts in their helmets, but one of them had a purple T. It was the captain of the Warden marines. It was equipped with a slightly more advanced AI, a stronger armor and weapon, and a set of advanced scanners. Jean designed this unit to command other Warden units and deal with abnormal situations as she couldn’t constantly monitor everything in the field. Its slightly stronger ability to comprehend might be helpful in certain occasions.
As all the marines stopped, the Warden captain turned around and walked to the reaper captain. His heavy legs slammed down on the ground with every step. His purple helmet shined dimly in the dark tunnel.
The reapers gripped onto their pistols tightly, slightly aiming at the marines.
“What is it?” The reaper captain said both impatiently and cautiously. The sooner he could complete this mission the better.
Plus, he didn’t see any reason these Raiders would want them dead, but the mercenary part inside him couldn’t help but stay alert. Backstabbing wasn’t a strange thing in their line of work.
“Zerg units detected in front.” The marine spoke with a mechanical voice.
The reaper captain was confused. The mechanical voice of the marine could be a result of some sort of odd communication device, but there was no reason behind the meaning of the marine’s words.
“I don’t see no zerg.”
The reaper captain was experienced, but he never fought against the swarm before. His combat experience against terran forces didn’t help him to maneuver against the zerg. The closest thing he had compared to this mission was one time when he and his squad took out a group of feral zerg and secured a mining facility. The feral zerg were fierce, but they were stupid. All they did was charge at the reapers and be gunned down. Subconsciously the reaper captain thought the zerg were simply beasts whose tactics were limited to attack and retreat.
He never knew the zerg could burrow. None of the feral zerg burrowed, and his past experience with the feral zerg made him underestimate the swarm.
Neither Raynor nor Horner thought about the problem with experience. Since they were extremely experienced with fighting both the Overmind’s Brood and Kerrigan’s Swarm, they subconsciously thought it was the same with everyone else. In reality only very few mercenaries had the chance to take on the zerg swarm and still be alive enough to keep being a mercenary. Most of the times experience against the zerg didn’t matter and a few files about the basic information about zerg units were enough, but in a situation like this the knowledge of how infested terran attack simply wasn’t enough.
“Incorrect. Zerg units are detected in front.” The Warden captain repeated. Its AI calculated the situation and realized that the ideal response was a coordinated attack between the Warden marines and the mercenary reapers.
“What the hell? We need to get moving!” One of the reapers groaned impatiently. The heart of the swarm wasn’t the best place to start an argument. The infested near the tunnel were taken down by the Yamato Cannon, but reinforcements were certainly on the way. The more time they wasted, the more likely they would be caught inside the tunnel by an endless wave of infested.
“Step aside.” The reaper captain finally demanded loudly. “I don’t know who you are, but I’ve got a job to do. Step aside.”
If the Warden captain was a human being, then he would know to contact Jean and use her to inform the reaper captain what happened, but it was an AI, and all it knew was to deal with the enemy forces directly.
Since the reapers couldn’t help them, the Warden captain AI went to the next best thing, which was to take down the zerg by the Warden marines themselves.
Without wasting another word, the Warden captain turned around and retreated to among its fellow comrades. The reaper captain took a breath of relief and wanted to keep going forward and get the job done, but that was when he saw the marines raising their rifles.
The reapers raised their pistols at the marines.
“Wait!” It was fortunate the reaper captain stopped his men. He realized the marines were pointing their guns forward...but the space before them was empty…
Twenty rifles opened fire. The gauss bullets formed a web of death as they smashed into the ground in front of the squad.
The sound of infested screeching covered the tunnel.
The reaper captain gulped.
