Read Online First Casualty by Mike Moscoe - Free Book Online Page B

tube. Damn, we needed it ten minutes ago.”
    “Get it out there.” Ray turned back to the battle. Assault rigs still ran arrow straight across the broken terrain. Dumb. “Sensors, did you pass the missile alert to them?”
    “Didn't want to juggle their elbow, Major. They've got their own warning system beeping in their ears.”
    “Don't look like it. Tell 'em for me.”
    “Yes, sir.” There was a pause. When sensors came back, his voice was low, like a man who'd bet his wife and lost. “Sir, the beepers went off as I started talking.”
    On the plain before him, speeding carriers started to turn. Laser rifles fired. From where Longknife stood he would see the twisty way the missiles came in, making the gunners' job damn near impossible. Carriers started exploding. Here a missile went wide. There a rig dodged. One slid sideways into a boulder. The missile smashed against the rock. Troopers poured out of the demolished carrier, some running, too many crawling. Unable to look away, the major watched in disbelief as sixteen of his troop carriers met the missiles head-on. Nothing survived the collision. But those carriers each had ten of my troops!
    “Major, Tran here. Request permission to withdraw B and C companies.” There was a tremble in the officer's voice. He was hit, or had just watched D and E companies die—or both.
    “Permission granted. Get back here any way you can. We'll lay artillery on their positions.”
    “Thanks, sir.”
    “I'll try to get some transport out there for you.”
    “Don't bother, sir. We'd rather walk.”
    “Major, we got four more missiles incoming,” sensors squeaked.
    “To where?” The major came heads-up.
    “Us!”
    Longknife swung himself out of the van. No damn Earth platoon had missiles with that range. What was he facing? Why hadn't they used them sooner? Was this the start of a counterattack? The missiles were above him. Jets of fire pushing them over, plunging them down. No laser bolts rose to meet them. All the rifles went with D and E. After all, they were going in harm's way. We were sitting back here safe and sound.
    “Duck, you idiot,” somebody called.
    Whether to the major or some other idiot, Ray didn't know. But Ray hadn't ducked and he was an idiot. He ducked, shouting, “Staff, bail out. Take cover.” In the low gravity of this moon, ducking took a while. He was only halfway down when the rockets hit.
    Strange how you fall slowly in low gravity, but explosions move just as fast. To his left, a rocket launcher was halfway through reloading when the missile hit. With its own rockets not yet in the armored launch canister, not one but nine rockets blew. Fuel, flechettes, and jagged chunks of wreckage flew, consuming another launcher, stripping a gun mount of its crew. White phosphorus blew in all directions, taking out a second gun.
    As if awed by that spectacle, the next two hits were hardly noticeable. One rocket hit one launcher. Another rocket demolished a gun. Then the fourth missile hit. It had the major's name, rank, and serial number on it.
    Landing between two guns, its shower of flechettes wiped out half their crews. That covered two-thirds of the perimeter of expanding gas and plastic. The major and the command van took the rest. Pain came from a half dozen pinpricks. Worse, they threw him against the bumper of the van. Something crunched, and he quit hurting. I don't want to quit hurting. For the moment, he had no choice.
    It seemed like a year before people started hopping around among the fire and debris. Two found him. “You hurt, Major?”
    “Mind patching these holes? My arms aren't working and my ears are popping.” They pulled goo out of the med pouch on his belt; his air quit getting thinner. As they lifted him off the bumper and settled him on a stretcher, he got a glance at the inside of the van. He'd only caught the low edge of the explosion. His staff, still at their stations, had taken the full force. They were pinned to the