Night Song (The Guild Wars Book 9) by Mark Wandrey (best ereader under 100 .txt) 📕

“Piss off,” Rex replied, laughing. Others chuckled as well.

“Cut the chatter,” Alan said softly, and the laughter stopped. His radar had just picked up the telltale heat plumes from small fusion power plants. Vehicles were leaving the sally ports on the enemy firebase. A second later, several of their missiles made it through the enemy fire and blossomed into flame on the side of the base. This time Alan didn’t stop the cheers of his men as they bounded down the hill.

“There are at least two dozers,” Bana said on their private channel.

“I saw the fusion heat plumes,” Alan replied. Tanks. The Zuul were known for some badass tanks. Naturally, the Zuparti hadn’t listed that in their reports of possible armament. “Captain Anderle, I didn’t see any tanks in your report.”

“No, sir, this is the first we’ve seen of them. Of course, we’ve never managed to get this close.”

Alan’s sensors zoomed in on the monster. His CASPer’s computer automatically took a radar cross section and ran a comparison.

[JF-9 Fusion Powered Heavy Tank—Main Gun: Particle Accelerator—Zuul Design]

“Well,” Alan said with a sigh, “isn’t this just ripper?”

* * *

Veska had been on enough missions in her career to be considered experienced, even by someone as venerated as the captain. It had been ages since every meal she’d ever eaten had decided to send their ghosts climbing up her throat.

This battle, though…ancient meat and bile mixed with the pooling saliva in her mouth, and she pointed her nose at the sky to fight back the urge to pant.

Combat had always been the path meant for her; she hadn’t doubted it even when she’d nearly lost her left leg to a Flatar’s lucky shot, nor when she’d lost half a squad to a MinSha ambush on an allegedly abandoned moon. Life and death were all of a cycle, one walked the path for the cycle they were given, and this was hers.

But for the first time, it writhed between her nerves, setting her muscles to jumping, her ears flattening against every noise. The incoming air attack she could dismiss, she had run through such before.

What waited on the other side of it…

She held the breather close to her face and climbed to the lookout on the wall along with her squad mates. They’d receive the order soon enough to jump down in this inadequate gravity and engage. At least the biting cold of this dwarf planet would take her mind off the building heat in her close-fit suit, though she’d forget all about temperatures once the shooting started.

Something large ground open below them, and she craned her neck to see. Though she couldn’t smell anything over the breather’s dutiful flood of proper air, her mind supplied the scents of metal and grease that must be there. The smallest of whines pulled itself from her chest, and she cleared her throat to hide it.

“Are those—”

“The tanks! Yes!” Arvek, an old friend, had been on this contract from the beginning. His enthusiasm should have pulled her tail side to side, but instead she dropped her head and looked away.

“I didn’t know we were using them—they weren’t in the captain’s plans.”

“They’ve only just been repaired—the mechanics were able to strip connections from the Gheshu, now that we know the Paku is here to replace the worst of it. They want the fight done, and this will make progress on that!” A small yip of excitement emphasized his words, and Veska swallowed back the mess collecting in her mouth.

“We should have discussed this—the captain—”

“I believe the Rei’Shin was in all the meetings,” Arvek interrupted, bounding up to get a better view. He settled next to her and dropped his jaw in a grin. “When in doubt, go to overwhelming force.”

Veska gestured above at the streaks of the lasers working overtime to empty a sky full of missiles. “The Humans and Lumar have had the same thought, it seems.”

“They are worthy enough to meet in battle.” Arvek snapped his jaw, then grunted. “Wish I could be in a tank. Bombers get all the fun.”

“Not all,” she murmured, though her heart staggered against the words. Her rifle pulled against her arms, though she’d carried it blissfully countless times before. She secured it to her side and leaned forward against the wall, focusing her long sight on the horizon.

Glints on the horizon slowly resolved into the suggestions of over-sized Human shapes. The Humans had pulled together a full complement of their armored suits, which allowed them longer strides and stronger ammunition. It would make it a more than fair fight against the Zuul, and certainly against the Pushtal.

“First rank, long shots!” their commander bellowed, and a line of Zuul above them slammed a response. In perfect alignment, a barrage of large caliber shots thrummed through the building. There was little chance of fully disabling hits at this distance, but any damage done out there would help them in their attack.

She couldn’t fault the other mercenaries’ bloodlust; it was their discipline she was worried about. There was little room for error in combat, and against the powered suits and guns the Humans had, there was even less.

She worried over the likelihood of the Pushtal following the plan for a handful of seconds, but even that couldn’t distract her eyes, still scanning, which had picked out irregularities in the approaching formation of battle suits. On the right, if she wasn’t mistaken—and the immediate flood of adrenaline said she was not—the glints resolved into four suits. They were slightly larger than the rest, differently proportioned, their different gait…Zuul-like.

“Kobo Ask’sha, Rex,” she whispered, then threw back her head into a full-throated howl.

All around her, her compatriots joined their voices to hers. They were too full of battle-readiness to hear the sorrow threading her call, their urge for victory outweighing the weight of her mourning