The assault continues.
Herculean fire begins to pick up as they get closer. “Stay low in the carriers,” says Blake, “Don’t pop your head out for anything!”
If they can’t see them, they can’t kill them. Where’s the fun in that?
The city burns with fires that must be tens of meters tall. Black smoke darkens the sun creating an artificial dusk.
They trek under the shade of their own destruction.
The city has to be destroyed in order to save it.
The advancing humans cover about four hundred meters when the next congress of death is called. At this distance the Herculeans are now able to exploit their once armored Goliaths protecting them. They shoot diagonally through the gaps at the marching rows.
“Stay in cover!” says Blake, as he grabs Peter’s collar and throws him down into the armored hull of the carrier. Plasma bursts smack against the hull melting away chunks of plating and covering them in hot splinters. Volleys of bright beams streak through the gaps of armored columns from the Herculean defenses, showering the rest of the advancing force.
Corporal Kaiden peeks out to help a desperate marine into the dolly when he is struck by Herculean fire. His helmet cracks all the way to the rear as he falls backwards, and gore spurts out making a liquid arc in the air as he hits the carrier floor. The open face wound cauterizes from the plasma hit, leaving a smoldering burnt crater of bone and distorted flesh.
Blake looks at his once to be NCO stone faced. “I said stay down.”
A wave of gunships hover above the advancing line, raining missiles back at the Herculeans. A bright blue beam—a Herculean projectile the humans have never seen before—strikes out from within the city ruins against one of the helicopters’ propellers knocking it out of the sky. After the gunship crashes against a marching column, additional beams zip out from the city upon the forces. Further helicopters are hit by the beams and they collide into the marching soldiers causing chaos. Some of the Goliaths blow apart from concentrated fire, bringing the entire vehicle to flames as meter high gusts of dark smoke billow out from their destroyed frames.
Easy Goliath’s treads are hit, sending hot white rotation gears flying off and impaling nearby marines as it grinds to a halt immobilized. They pile out quickly without need of Blake ordering them. A shell lands in the carrier throwing out chunks of crewmen too slow to escape. A mortar crewman tries to ditch his gun port on the rear end of the Goliath, but only stumbles out on fire to land into the exploding shell that tosses Easy onto the ground.
Peter looks up from the dirt at the other rows of pinned comrades and Goliaths. The Herculean cannon beams swallow entire lines of soldiers in single strikes. Fellow brothers are burned alive before they even hit the ground. Some charred into place like crumbling statures. Herculean plasma fire picks off stragglers. They fall in demented shapes and forms like fucked up gymnasts onto the scorched ground with their hissing scorched wounds. This is no respectable way to die. Fight them fairly!
The rest of their line hits the dirt for safety. A commanding officer runs up Peter’s row to try and lead the suppressed forces. He comes close to Peter then a blinding beam zooms past them, and the officer falls into a shell hole. After the beam dissipates Peter crawls into the crater and discovers the remains of the officer, his entire left side is charcoaled black and singed beyond recognition. His mouth opens but the burnt check restricts its function, and instead the man’s face and exposed muscle tears open from side to side forming a deranged smile. Out of his untouched eye tears form.
“My god, brother!” says Peter. He then notices another marine in the hole, towards the top of the crater. The man fires blindly out of the hole, stops, glances at the dead officer at the bottom and slides down. He leans his head over the officer to give CPR. “He’s gone brother,” Peter tries to tell him. The man looks up at Peter—a wild red glazed look is in his eyes; his visor cracked away and face completely black with smut. The features of his face shrunk inside his own flesh revealing where all the bones are, giving the impression he is not wearing a face accurate to the dimension of his head, but one stolen and wrongly sized. The man crawls back up to the top, fires off a magazine, and slides back down to the corpse. His head hovers over the officer’s, then he bites his neck sucking on the flesh for a moment. Peter turns to leave. The marine behind him crawls back to the crater top to fire, and once again back to the corpse, repeating the process over. On his next time back to the top, he loads an empty magazine and shoots nothing into the distance.
“Take cover!” says Blake, “Get to the shell holes and destroyed vehicles!”
A Herculean bombardment has begun.
Peter pauses at the top of the shell hole for cover. Boots stomp on him and he falls back into the hole. Piles of soldiers and marines squish into the crater and Peter fights to escape the crushing boots.
“Peter!” says Vance, discovering him clustered and dazed in the hole. His hand breaks through the mob of limbs and dying brothers. “Come on!” Peter latches onto the arm and squirms out. He lies on the ground at the base of the shell hole recovering his breath, then places one hand in front of other and pushes himself upwards from the ground. Vance, then Isaac who spots them and comes quickly to their aid, raises him the rest of the way and they take cover inside the burnt skeleton of the Goliath they were riding behind.
“Now we’re really deep in the shit,” says Vance, checking his XM and gear while they cough inside the dusty metal skeleton. Isaac performs a self-body check to confirm no injuries. Peter pokes his head through a gap in the Goliath to view the situation outside. The columns break apart into a disorderly fraught rush for anything to take cover behind. Some soldiers run back towards the shield wall.
“Turn back!” says a microphone. “Forward onto glory! No cowards!”
Peter spots Ray in a search for cover, straddled by his heavy LMG.
“I’m gonna go get him!” says Peter. He dashes outside of the Goliath as more marines pile in.
“Ray!” says Peter. “Brother!”
Ray spots him and makes a run for his location. Herculean artillery pounds the terrain between them, and Peter hits the dirt for cover. He rises looking for Ray after the salvos land, crawling through shell holes in search of him. Multiple hands of his injured comrades grope about in the air and latch onto his clothing, begging for help.
“Soon brothers!” says a Commissar walking by holding a bloody machete. “Stay strong! Your pain will not be in vain. We will come back for you!” A hand tries to grab his boot and the Commissar swings the blade before it.
Peter hops from crater to crater to find Ray, pushing aside injured men trying to grab him. Peter spots him, crawling back towards the shield wall the Party Reps warned not to do. “Ray! Get over here!” Peter reaches him and discovers that his helmet has been thrown off, and the back of his neck has been sliced and bleeds freely. Peter slides to his side placing a hand over the wound. Ray kicks and flails in a frenzy to get him off. “What the fuck! Stop! I’m trying to help brother!”
“Get away from me! I have to get out of here! I gotta get back to my girl—we’re gonna die!”
In the tussle, Peter feels a lump on his neck that loosens and falls into his hand. It’s a piece of tubing, in fact it’s his drug distributor cord—he should really put that back in. Another shell lands near them, and the force sends Peter rolling sideways back into a crater. He crawls frantically to the top so he can help Ray again.