The Assault of Orion I

Part Four

Rhame felt the impact of several hits on the turret but readouts showed no armor breaches. He highlighted the units firing at him and fed them to the gunners station. He then checked the status of the rest of the Platoon. All indicators showed green on the other three tanks so Rhame went back to finding more targets for his gunner. Rhame felt his tanks Plasma Gun fire and grabed the targeting feed to check Cpl. Dunphy's aim. He saw the bolt of plasma strike dead center of an Antaran battleoid and when the smoke of impact cleared all that was left was a glowing melted lump on top of a pair of chicken looking legs. Rhame smiled and thought "Dunphy may be a complete pain in the ass 95% of the time but at least the kid knew how to shoot." "I guess thats why I haven't dropped a grenade in his sleeping bag no matter how many times he deserved it." The main gun rocked the tank again and Rhame saw a battleoid completly vaporize as its reactor went up. Rhame looked down at the gunners station and saw shocks of red hair sticking out of the bottom of Dunphy's helmet. Rhame smiled and thought "Keep making shots like that kid and I won't give you hell about getting a haircut"

Rhame saw the last battleoid to his front go down and watched his gunner start raking the wreckage with his secondary weapon . Multi blaster fire reached out across the battlefield seeking the surviving battleoid pilots and the infantry that were supporting them in this attack. Looking over the debris strewn desert he saw the Antarans starting to pull back out of range. "I guess the ground pounders dont want to take us on without their battleoids." "Well " he thought "even the infantry can learn if you smack them on the nose often enough." Checking the Troop status he saw that only a 1st Platoon tank was showing red across the board. Rhame closed his eyes and leaned his helmet against his command board when he saw which tank it was. He keyed his com " 1st Platoon this is Rhame , number one tank shows red across the board , any chance of survivors ?" There was a brief pause before a reply came " Negative Rhame , they took a gauss cannon round under the turret and their fusion bottle must have ruptured , at least it was quick" Rhame thought of PSgt. Cheng , 1st Platoons commander and realized that with Cheng gone he was now the only original member of the Troop left. "Time to mourn him later Jake" he said to himself . He keyed his mike and just replied "Yeah , may we all go just as quick when it's our time"

General Parker stared at the holo image of her commander and wished she could rip his throat out . Even through the holo projector General Matthews the commander of Army Group Center could feel her rage. "It was an unfortunate occurence Parker , it could not be forseen." "you cant blame the Navy for what happened so we have to mark it down as on of the 'fortunes of war' , we are doing what we can to correct the situation." There was a silent pause and Gen Matthews thought the color tint on his holo was going out of sync until he realized that her face was actually turning that color red. "FORTUNES OF WAR !!" "Sir , the change of battle plans at the last minute was a 'fortune of war'." "The ability of the Antarans to throw up a few orbital defenses was a 'fortune of war' " "The Antarans launching missiles off those platforms before the Navy destroyed them was a 'fortune of war' " "But General" she paused for a deep breath "THE NAVY FAILING TO ENGAGE THOSE MISSILES WITH POINT DEFENSE BEFORE THEY DESTROYED THE FOLLOW ON TRANSPORTS WAS INEXCUSABLE !" General Matthews barely nodded as though too much motion would draw another attack from her. General Parker realized that further screaming would not be productive and took a few deep breaths. " If I can ask General when can we expect follow on forces to help expand the beachhead we took and continue to hold as ordered ?" Gen Matthews pretended to look at some files on his desk and gathered himself to say the words he knew would set off another tirade. " The Navy says they can land a Marine Division in 24 hours by combining all the Marine detatchments on their warships in system." The calmness of her reply was more disconcerting that another explosion would have been " Yes sir , the Marines will be very useful for digging graves for all my Troopers that have died so far." she continued on with words as cold as ice "And when can we expect support and follow on forces from the rest of the ARMY Sir ?" When she saw General Matthews grab a file and fail to meet her eyes she knew the news was bad . "The second troop waves were forced to retreat when the missiles fired on them and it will be a little while before they can turn around and return." "We have pulled all the reserve armor formations and have them headed your way along with the newest battleoid armies." The power of her next words hit him harder than bullets " The truth Sir , how soon ?" Meeting her eyes was the bravest thing he had ever done in his whole career but saying the next four words felt like he was pronouncing a death sentence on her and her troops "Three weeks , no sooner." There was a pause as his words sunk in. He couldn't read the look on her face as she replied "Three weeks sir , we will hold you to that . XV Corps will be here when you get back. Parker out." Gen Parker stared at the wall of her Command Post and thought for a moment. She strode into the Operations area of her CP and placed her hand on the nearest Communications specialist. "Son , patch me into all frequencies , I need to talk with everyone"

Rhame wanted to punch something but he knew that would just upset his crew. "Damn all officers to hell anyway. Here we take a beachhead , fight off a major attack , and now we can't exploit it because the Navy skrooed up and we are left hanging here with no support until High Command can figure out how to find their asses with a roadmap an a flashlight." Dunphy looked over his shoulder and just smiled. "Don't sugar coat it Sarge , tell us how you really feel." The hum on the com told him Cahill was transmiting from his driving compartment. " Don't worry about it Sarge , Christine here will look after us until the rest get here." Rhame wondered again where Cahill had come up with the name he painted on the front slope of the tank. Rhame couldn't ever remember seeing Cahill with any girl named Christine , heck with any girl. Captain Lewis cut in on the Troop com. " All tanks stand too . We have movement in our sector. Lets whip them back to their kennels again."

"Right" thought Rhame "again ..... and again and again and again until we kill them all or they kill us" He saw motion in his fire zone and highlighted it "Gunner. Target battleoid." And so another day began.