“You want to do what?” Barker asked.
The storm was closer. He and I were at the mouth of the cave, while Trix and the Polytrots were crowded close behind us. Down in the valley, the Orrkasi were scurrying around like insects trying to prepare for the approaching storm. Many had already retreated to their sleeping domes. I had even seen the Orcs pull the Polytrots from the mines and put them back on board the ships where they were being housed.
“We use the storm for cover,” I said.
“That’s crazy,” Barker complained. “We probably wouldn’t even get off the mountain without getting killed. That wind is too strong.”
“We should move while we have an advantage,” I insisted. “Our heavy armor suits are made for environments like this. And we can use Scout 2.”
“The drone won’t be able to see anything in that storm,” Trix pointed out.
“Not in the normal mode,” I said. “It should pick something up on thermal imaging, though. We can keep it right here in the cave to watch out for movement from the Orrkasi.”
“I’m not worried about the Orcs,” Barker said. “We go out in that storm, and chances are we won’t come back.”
“That’s what we do,” I replied. “We face danger on the battlefield. We’re Marines , Sergeant. That storm is the perfect cover, and it’s our best chance to take out the weapon on the butte. The Orrkasi are learning from us. You can see that they’ve increased security around the camp. The odds are against us sneaking into their camp without being seen, even at night.”
“So why not just snipe at them from a distance?” Barker asked. “The Gnashii rifles will reach the butte.”
“Once we start shooting, the Orcs will know we’re here,” I said. “They have more firepower than we can take on. There’s no way out of here.”
“Maybe, let’s explore the cave,” Barker suggested. “It’s got to be safer than going out in the storm.”
I shook my head. Barker was clearly afraid despite his TAC training. He didn’t want to be anywhere near the Orrkasi and the foul weather. He wasn’t completely wrong about the storm, either: the winds could make descending from the mountain treacherous. It was still the best opportunity we would have, and two operators working together would have a better chance of success than one.
“I’ll go,” Trix said, with only a slight tremor of fear in her voice.
“No,” Barker snapped. “That’s insane. This whole idea is completely mental.”
“I’m going,” I said calmly. “Trix, you’re on overwatch. You stay right here with the Polytrots and keep the scout drone focused on the butte. Sergeant Barker, you can come with me or you can stay here—it’s up to you. Just keep in mind that this is what we train for. Taking out that weapon is priority one.”
“Mogar!” Mook yipped. “Polk!”
“If I can,” I said. “I’ll help your people if I can. I just worry about how they’ll fare in the storm.”
“Cho!” Mook said, his voice echoing in the cave behind us.
I didn’t want to keep debating the merits of the plan. It was crazy—Barker had a point. All that mattered to me was that there was the barest whisper of hope. I knew that our suits did give us an advantage, and I might have a chance to set charges around the cannon. Once the storm passed, we could target those explosives with the Gnashii sniper rifles and blow up their weapon.
“Trix, have the scout create a digital map of the valley,” I told her. “Everything between here and the butte should be identified and marked. We can use that to help navigate through their camp during the storm.”
I picked up the satchel with the explosives inside. I had my LAR slung onto my back and hung the satchel around one shoulder.
“The winds nearly flipped the cargo hauler,” Barker said as he got up from his watch position at the mouth of the cave. “You go out there, and odds are you’ll be blown away by the wind.”
“If that happens, then you’re in charge,” I told him. “Get Trix and the Polytrots back to Havvar.”
Barker shook his head, clearly frustrated. I leaned against the wall, waiting for the storm to arrive.
“Scout 2 is mapping the valley,” Trix said. “The storm should hit in a few minutes.”
The Polytrots whined nervously; they could sense the change in the weather. I could just hear the distant roar of the wind as I picked up my spear.
“You shouldn’t be going,” Barker said. “You can barely walk as it is.”
“I can walk just fine,” I told him.
“You’ll never make it off the mountain.”
“Getting down the mountain is easy,” I said. “All I have to do is fall.”
“Very funny,” Barker shot back. “What if the sand compromises your armor?”
“I’ll deal with that if it happens,” I said. “I’m not worried—this armor was made for harsh environments. I’ll take my chances.”
“Fine, then,” Barker said. “Who wants to live forever anyway?”
“Does that mean you’re coming with me?”
“I guess so,” Barker said. “Somebody has to carry your sorry ass back up the mountain when you realize what a mistake this plan of yours is.”
“Storm’s here,” Trix interrupted.
Barker and I both turned and looked out of the cave. The sunlight had already dimmed as thick clouds of sand and dust billowed over the mountain. I couldn’t see the butte anymore, and the light looked strange, almost ghostly. It wasn’t too dark, certainly not as dark as night, and I hoped we would be able to see at least a short way ahead of us.
“Leave your sniper rifle,” I told Barker. “The LAR should be enough, but let’s not take chances with the batteries. I’ve got a few in my satchel. Otherwise, I’m leaving the rest here.”
“Roger that,” Barker said, pulling off his tactical vest and rotating his LAR around on its harness until the weapon hung off his back. “I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.”
“Let’s do this.”
We walked to the entrance to the cave. The brush we had piled around the mouth of the rocky tunnel had already blown away. Trix was pressed against one wall, the scout drone hovering over her head.
“Do we have the digital map finished?” I asked.
“Everything is marked,” she confirmed. “Just not labeled.”
“No need for labels, as long as we can find our way through their camp.”
“What else can I do?” she asked.
“Stay here and keep your Gnashii ready,” I said. “And don’t fall asleep on us.”
“Will the com-links even work in this storm?” Barker asked.
“Probably not,” I said, putting a hand on Trix’s shoulder. “If we don’t make it back, you wait for nightfall and get out of here. Go back to the city.”
“We don’t leave people behind,” she said softly.
“You won’t have a choice,” I told her. “The Fleet needs to know about the weapon here. Take the drone and get back to the city.”
“Yes, Staff Sergeant.”
I gave her shoulder a little squeeze, then bent down and ran my hand down Mook’s back. It never even occurred to me that I was touching an intelligent creature in a way that it might not consider appropriate. Fortunately, the Polytrots didn’t seem to mind. They loved attention and had no hands, which made my stroke down Mook’s back a luxury. He gave a sigh of satisfaction and leaned against my good leg.
“You keep an eye on her,” I told Mook. “All of you stick together.”
“Stop talking like you aren’t coming back,” Trix said.
“Cho!” Mook yipped. “Van! Whovat!”
“Don’t worry...I’m coming back.”
The wind was howling outside of the cave. In my first steps outside, it felt like I was going to be blown over. After the first abrupt gust, I just barely got my bearings. Even more disturbing was the sound of the dirt and grit being blown into my heavy armor suit. I could hear the sand as it blasted onto my helmet. Visibility was down to just a couple of meters, and walking through it felt like the world had become a spooky, shadowy version of itself. I leaned heavily on the spear and worked my way slowly down the mountainside.
Three times, I was hit by a gust of wind strong enough to blow me down. I landed on the steep mountainside the first time and scrambled to keep from tumbling down. Besides that, the stronger gusts were intermittent, and, even with my weak left side, I managed to get safely down to the valley. Barker fell twice and even slid down the hill for nearly ten meters before catching himself. We were tired yet flushed with success when we reached the valley.
Our com-links worked if we were close, but more than a few paces apart and the signal became so distorted that it was impossible to make out words from the static. Barker leaned close to me and offered a thumbs-up.
“We made it,” he said, sounding triumphant.
“I never doubted we would,” I replied.
“Whatever you say, Staff Sergeant.”
We took our time crossing the valley. The wind was behind us, pushing us forward. There were times when I felt like I was leaning so far back that I would fall; the wind held me up. It wasn’t long until the Orrkasi vessels loomed up out of the swirling maelstrom right in front of us. The only warning was the map overlay on my helmet’s visor. I could turn my head and see the outlines of ships and even the butte itself in the transparent overlay, as if I was moving through a virtual reality landscape.
The Orcs were nowhere to be seen. Unlike us, they wore no armor, even in combat, so they certainly didn’t have heavy armor suits that would protect them from the storm. Lightning crackled overhead, and sand blasted around us. Even in my protective gear, it seemed foolish to be out in the stormy conditions. We made straight for the butte, which was several kilometers from the mountain where we’d started our journey. Progress was slow, as we were forced to combat the elements the entire time. I had no idea how much time had elapsed. As we moved around to the far side of the butte, where I remembered that the slope was much less severe, I realized with a start that it was starting to get dark.
“We’re losing the light,” Barker said, his voice tense.
“That doesn’t change anything,” I told him.
In the end, it did change how we moved. Our visibility dropped to nothing, and there was no map overlay to guide us on the far side of the butte. We were completely on our own, which meant we had to go even slower. The low-light magnification on our helmets didn’t help in the storm. I began to use my spear like a blind man’s cane so that the ground itself would show us the way. At least, partially blocked as we were by the butte, the wind gusts weren’t as strong. As long as we were moving up, we knew we were headed the right way.
Barker had one hand on my back and the other on his LAR as we walked. We both expected the Orcs to suddenly appear out of the darkness and strike us down. I set that thought aside as irrational and kept climbing.
“It feels like this hill just goes on forever,” Barker complained.
“Yeah—we’ve got to be getting close, though,” I replied.
“Who knows? I can’t see anything.”
“Agreed. Let’s just keep climbing and get this over with.”
My leg hurt, my hip felt like it was on fire, and my knee sent stabbing pains through the joint with every step. I knew that my tension was making things worse. With the wind howling and the threat of the Orcs so nearby, I could hardly have loosened up; nor could we pause for a breather, since we were going too slowly to justify taking a break.
“What’s that?” Barker asked.
We were close enough to the summit that the computer mapping application was flickering on the HUD that appeared on my helmet’s viewscreen. We were on the wrong side of the butte, and the structure the Orrkasi were building actually got in the way of the mapping program’s identification. Still, I felt a wave of relief knowing that we were close to the summit.
“That’s the cannon,” I said. “We’re almost there.”
We trudged on and reached the top, only to be hit with much stronger winds. We had gone from being shoved forward by the wind at our backs to facing directly into the powerful surge of the storm. I had to lean forward and push my way toward the cannon.
“This is crazy,” Barker yelled.
I couldn’t disagree. “Just a little farther.”
Just like the laser that I had blown up at the first Orc encampment, the aliens were constructing their weapon on top of a boxy building. I pushed my way toward the structure and felt the winds let up as we reached the leeward side.
“I’m going to switch on my helmet LEDs,” I warned Barker.
“What if the Orcs see it?”
“That’s a chance we have to take. I need to see what I’m doing here. Besides, no one is out in the storm.”
“Doesn’t mean they can’t see out of their domes,” Barker said.
“Even if they do, I doubt they’ll come out to fight us,” I said.
I gave the verbal command that activated the lights on my helmet. They were made to be bright, but the light was dim in the swirling dust and sand. Reaching into the satchel, I pulled out a block of plastique. It was shaped like a brick and could be pressed into any shape. I just needed to find the best place to put the explosive so that it would do the most damage. Unfortunately, to set off the charge, we would have to shoot it with our laser rifles. That meant it needed to be on the far side of the building, facing the cave and straight into the wind.
“I’m going around,” I told Barker.
“Copy. I’ve got your six.”
We moved together. I had the spear in my right hand, the brick of explosive plastique gently gripped in the left to avoid exacerbating the wound. On the far side, I looked up, trying to find a way up on top of the structure where the laser canon was being built. We came to a place on the building where there were recessed rungs that could be climbed like a ladder. I reached out with one hand and took hold of the rung, then stopped. I could feel a vibration running through the building. It wasn’t from the wind, or even from the sand blasting into the metal. It was the feeling of machinery, and there were cables running down from the top and feeding into the building.
“Barker, feel this,” I ordered.
“What?”
“The building. Touch it. Tell me what you feel.”
“You losing your marbles, Staff Sergeant?” Barker asked, but he reached out and touched the building. For a moment, he didn’t speak; then he said, “It’s vibrating.”
“Exactly,” I replied. “What do you think it is?”
He leaned closer to the building and put both hands on the metal. “It’s like there’s an engine in there.”
I had no idea what was going on inside the structure, beyond my instinctive certainty about one thing: it was built to power the cannon. I remembered the smaller lasers the Orrkasi had used against us, first in the mountains when we sent the original message to the Fleet and then again when they sent their army to find our first base camp. Those weapons had come with large, boxy power supplies too—not as big as the building, but pretty big. It took several Orcs to move the power generators, and when I shot them, they’d exploded like miniature nuclear bombs.
Trusting my gut, I pressed the block of plastique into the area where the cables fed into the building.
“What are you doing?” Barker asked. It was an inquiry, not an accusation. He wanted to know what I was thinking. It was a good sign that his mind had shifted from the fear of discovery and was focused on the task at hand.
“Trusting my gut,” I told him. “I think these cables are the power supply for the cannon.”
“Okay,” he said, prompting me to go on.
“That vibration must be from the power generator inside the building. We blow that, and it will destroy the cannon completely.”
Barker nodded and gave me another thumbs-up. “Good thinking.”
I pulled out the other two bricks of plastique and pressed them into the narrow space around the cables, alongside the first brick. Sand was coating the explosive material, and I knew that soon it would be covered. It was going to be difficult to see from a distance, so I pulled out a bullet from the supply in the satchel, one of the slugs for my pistol with a brass bullet casing. I pressed the bullet into the plastique and left it sticking out just a few millimeters, enough that it stood a chance of being visible from the cave. An infrared marker would have been much better, I thought ruefully. My only consolation was that the sand and dirt wouldn’t stick to the brass casing.
“It’s done,” I said. “Time to get out of here.”
“Music to my ears,” Barker said.
We circled around and moved back down the far side of the butte. At the base of the rock formation, we started toward the mountains. The wind seemed even fiercer, an almost tactile force. It was like walking in a stream of fast-moving water against the current. We struggled to make headway and had to stop frequently to rest. My legs were cramping, and my back felt like it might spasm at any moment. The spear was a lifesaver, but we were going so slowly that I feared dawn would break before we got out of the enemy’s camp.
When we reached the landing field, we were able to use the big ships to block some of the wind. My map overlay was working better as we moved among the Orrkasi vessels. None of the ships were marked on my display with any sort of name or classification except for the three where the Polytrots were being kept, which appeared in green.
“Hey, we need to get inside this ship,” I said at the first of these vessels.
“Why, what’s going on?” Barker asked.
“The Polytrots,” I said. “We have to help them escape.”
“Are you serious? There could be guards in there.”
“I don’t remember seeing any of the Orcs stay inside the ships. Besides, they paid us no attention when we were locked in their cages.”
Barker nodded tersely at that. I knew he didn’t like thinking about his time as a prisoner, and I didn’t blame him. I turned the LEDs on my helmet back on and looked for the panel that would open the rear hatch of the ship.
“I think the storm is dying down,” Barker warned. “The Orcs might come out and see your lights.”
It was possible, and yet I knew I was doing the right thing. The only advantage we had left was speed. The quicker we freed the Polytrots, the quicker we could get out of the camp.
“Go to that ship over there,” I said, pointing through the darkness.
Just the fact that we could even see the shadowy outline of the vessel attested to Barker’s observation about the storm. We were on its tail end, and soon it would blow past the camp. We had to hurry.
“Get in and open the cages,” I told him. “The Polytrots can’t come with us. They’ll have to wait until the storm ends. At least they’ll have a chance then.”
“You sure it’s worth the risk?” Barker asked, clearly scared.
“Move your ass, Sergeant,” I said, channeling my best drill instructor voice. “That’s an order.”
He reacted as if I had poked him with a red-hot brand. He left me at a trot, leaning into the wind as he hurried to the other ship. Even with my LEDs lit, I couldn’t see him after he was three meters from me. I turned my attention back to the ship and found the manual release lever. I’d never seen anything like it: the device was nothing but a circular protrusion that had to be pushed into the ship. I had to lean into the vessel and push with two hands to pop the hatch, which opened slowly. From inside, I heard frightened growls and whines of complaint as the wind blew sand into the transport ship’s cargo hold. I leaned into the dark interior and shouted, “Cho!”
For a second, there was silence. I could see the Polytrots, at least twenty of them, covered in dirt from the mines and locked in metal cages exactly like the ones I had found the survivors of the Rihla locked in. I had even spent time in a metal cage as a prisoner myself. The four-legged aliens were clearly frightened, but I knew enough of their language to remember the word for ‘friend.’
“Mogar!” I shouted as I climbed into the vessel.
The ramp was only halfway down, with more sand blowing in relentlessly. I moved quickly to the nearest cage and knelt down in front of it.
“Mogar,” I repeated as I pulled out my combat knife.
The blade slid into the gap between the door of the cage and the locking mechanism. With a quick, downward motion I snapped the thin lock bar and pulled the door open. The alien inside the cage didn’t move, instead watching me with suspicious eyes. There was no time to reassure the alien. I hurried to the next cage and broke it open. My back hurt from bending over by the time I had all the cages unlocked.
“Good luck,” I told the Polytrots. They couldn’t understand my words, but like Mook, they were intuitive. The aliens picked up on my body language and understood the opportunity to escape.
I hurried back out into the storm, or at least as fast as I could ever move, lumbering through the swirl of wind and dirt. I could see the next ship, the third and final vessel being used to house the captive Polytrots. By the time I had opened the hatch and called out to the aliens, Barker was by my side, unscathed despite his ignorance of the Polytrots’ language.
“Sun’s coming up,” he noted. “I could see light in the east, even through the storm.”
We were breaking open the cages, and I felt my heart hammering in my chest. Every instinct told me to get as far away from the Orrkasi camp as possible, and as quickly as possible, but I ignored the feeling and kept opening the cages.
“The storm’s almost over,” Barker continued. “The Orcs will spot us trying to get back to the cave.”
“Then we’ll go in a different direction,” I said.
When the last Polytrot was free, Barker and I hurried from the transport. The sky was a shade of dirty gray overhead, and I could see the dark shadows of the Orrkasi vessels. The Polytrots hadn’t left the ships yet. The wind was still blowing, less aggressively now, and there was less sand in the air. Our time was running out.
“You up for a run, Sergeant?” I inquired, trying not to pant.
“Yes, Staff Sergeant,” he replied. It was an automatic reply. We were both exhausted—of course Barker didn’t actually want to run. In the Fleet Marines, however, when an NCO asked a question like that, there wasn’t much of a choice.
“Then get moving. Try to raise Trix on the com-link.”
“Aren’t you coming?” Barker asked.
“As fast as my broken parts will allow me,” I said. “There’s something I need to do first. You’re right that the Orcs will see us. They’ll come after us too, unless we detonate the explosives.”
“We can’t do that from here,” Barker said, thinking out loud. “We don’t have the right angle from where we are.”
“Exactly,” I said. “So raise Trix. She can make the shot.”
“The Orcs might see where the shots come from in this dust.”
I knew he meant that the dust and debris in the air would make the laser blast more visible. It was an unavoidable consequence and a risk we’d have to take. The storm had given us the opportunity to carry out a daring plan, but it had also slowed us down so much that we had taken too long to get to safety. We were going to be exposed on the floor of the valley, with no cover and no backup.
“No matter what happens, you keep moving, Sergeant,” I told him. “Get to cover and lie low.”
“Copy that, Staff Sergeant.”
Barker began to run in a steady jog—not even a sprint, and he still outpaced me quickly. I could see that there was a slight flaw in his gait and hoped it was just from fatigue and not some injury that he hadn’t bothered to mention. TAC training was clearly ingrained: he would run because I ordered him, whether he was hurting or not.
I was just past the ships, moving out into the open, when I heard barking and howling from behind me. The Orrkasi were on the move. A glance over my shoulder showed that I wasn’t the target of the alarm: the Polytrots were racing from their shelters, all three groups going in different directions. It was a sound strategy. There was no safety in numbers for the Polytrots; they were a brave species, but they didn’t have weapons and couldn’t fight the Orcs. Instead, they would spread out and hope that some of their number reached safety.
Increasing my speed wasn’t really possible, despite my best efforts. My hip and knee were too stiff, and the jarring impact of running would cause so much pain I would probably pass out. Still, I hobbled as fast as I could manage. The air was clearing, and Barker was far ahead of me. I even heard his static-laced calls over the com-link.
And then I heard the first Polytrot yelp in pain. I looked over my shoulder. There were Orcs on cargo haulers pursuing the Polytrots, armed with some kind of stun whips or electrified ropes and bearing down mercilessly as the creatures raced across the open plain. The Polytrots were fast sprinters but didn’t have the stamina to keep up the pace. Once the aliens slowed, the hovercraft gained on them. Those unfortunate enough to lag behind were shocked by the ship and left huddled and shaking on the ground. I didn’t think the Orcs were killing the aliens, since the Polytrots were too valuable as slaves. Obviously, the Orrkasi didn’t mind inflicting pain in the process of recapturing them.
I should have kept running. To my knowledge, the Orcs hadn’t spotted me yet, as they were occupied running down the Polytrots. I just couldn’t stand the thought of them being recaptured. Or maybe I didn’t want to keep running: I was so tired and angry that the thought of dying in battle didn’t sound bad to me. At least the pain, which had enveloped my entire left side, would be over. With a well-practiced shrug, I slung my LAR around and took hold of the pistol grips as I raised the rifle to my good shoulder. I had to let the spear drop, and I stood on trembling legs as I took aim at one of the Orcs whirling an electrified whip. Time seemed to slow for a moment as the aiming device settled on the alien. I pulled the trigger. A blast of light shot across the distance. The Orc, which was only two hundred meters away and moving perpendicular to me, got hit in the shoulder. The brute dropped its whip and crashed into the Orc driving the cargo hauler. It slewed around, and they peered through the dust. I fired again, this time taking out the driver with a well-aimed chest shot.
My com-link crackled with a frantic voice. “Staff Sergeant! What are you doing?”
It was Trix. I had no time to explain myself—the Orcs I had fired on were fleeing. The whip holder had pushed the lifeless body of its companion to the ground and turned the cargo hauler back toward the camp.
“Giving them a chance,” I said, realizing for the first time what a struggle it was to catch my breath.
“They’ve spotted you,” Barker’s voice said. “Get out of there.”
It was too late for that. I saw the cargo hauler coming for me, carrying more than just two Orrkasi troopers. There were two in the front on the vehicle’s bench seat and at least ten more on the cargo bed. They were armed with their heavy plasma rifles and racing straight for me.
“Trix, target the building on top of the butte,” I said. “Use the Gnashii to look for the explosives where the cables go into the wall. I put a brass marker in with them. Look for the reflection.”
The sun was just starting to rise over the mountains, and golden light stretched across the valley. In the distance, the activity in the Orrkasi camp was manic. I flicked the firing indicator on my LAR to the burst mode and leveled my weapon at the approaching hovercraft. The Orcs screamed their savage war cries and pointed their plasma rifles at me. Unaccountably, I felt a sense of calm. Strength seemed to rise up out of the ground to anchor me and stop the shaking in my legs. My rifle felt solid against my shoulder. I could see the enemy clearly through the aiming reticle. They were out of range, but getting closer every second.
“Wait,” Trix said. “I think I see it.”
“Shoot!” Barker cried.
I didn’t know if he was talking to me or Trix and didn’t care. I stroked the trigger, and a rapid burst of laser blasts shot from the weapon. They stitched across the front of the cargo hauler, just a little below my targets. I was shocked when it suddenly nosedived into the ground and pitched to catapult the Orcs out. They flew through the air and landed hard on the ground. A few tried to get up; all were clearly hurt. The driver and its companion were dead, crushed by the cargo hauler, which had flipped onto them.
My thumb dialed the LAR’s rate of fire back to semi-automatic. I waited to see which Orc would get up. The first one that rose up from the dust was shot through the side of its blocky head. As the injured Orcs struggled to get up, I picked them off one by one.
“It’s too far,” Trix complained in the com-link. “I can’t hit it.”
“Keep trying,” Barker ordered. “Staff Sergeant, you’ve got more company.”
I turned and saw another cargo hauler coming my way. Looking down at my rifle, I saw that it was down to a quarter of its battery power. The air was filled with whine of engines spooling up. I reached into my satchel and found one of two spare batteries, wanting the battery in hand when the time came to change it. Unfortunately, my fingers were stiff and weak on my left hand. As I pulled the battery from the satchel, I fumbled and dropped it. The Orcs were closing in, and there was no more time to waste.
Turning and bringing my rifle to bear sent a stab of pain from my left shoulder down into my artificial hip. The pain took me by surprise; I gasped with the shock of it, my hands wavering. I pulled the trigger, but my shot missed wide. I tried to bring the weapon back under control, only to find that the strength and calm I had felt a moment before had vanished. I was a trembling, quaking mess, with barely enough strength to stand. When I fired again, the jolt of my LAR’s recoil was all it took to knock me down. I fell back, trying to stay upright, and hit the ground hard, bruising my tailbone and causing my back to spasm. Arching, I fell onto my back while my LAR thumped into the dirt.
I knew the enemy was coming, but I was helpless to do anything more than stare above me. The sky seemed strangely clear and calm. The world was completely unaware of the danger I was in. With a desperate kick of my good leg, I rolled over onto my side and tried to lift my rifle. Before I could do anything else, the world suddenly flashed with a blinding light, and I lost consciousness.