He was scything away at the tentacles, trying to stop the pack from closing on the line that First Platoon had formed but the crabpus seemed to be shrugging the fire off. Some of them had dropped tentacles and just kept coming.
“…Concentrate on that curved patch.”
“What did Top say?” Rad-Man screamed. Lance Corporal Radovich was pouring cannon fire onto the beasts but while the cannon had some effect on them, it wasn’t much more than the Gatlings.
“Fire at the patch under the mandibles,” Sergeant Dunn said. If he was perturbed by the distinct possibility of being torn apart by giant crab-octopi it wasn’t apparent. He readjusted his fire and hit his laser designator. “On my spot!”
The combined fire of two Gatling guns and a cannon managed to punch through one of the crabpus’ armor and it immediately started to spasm in death throes, its tentacles jerking wildly as it rolled to the side.
“We got it!” Walker screamed. “We got it!”
Just as the rest of the pack closed.
“That’s what I needed,” Berg said, breathing deeply. “Sergeant Jaenisch, permission to move myself to the support of First Platoon?”
“What?” Jaen shouted. “Are you grapping nuts? No you can’t ‘move to the support of First.’ ”
“Sergeant,” Berg said, drawing one of the pistols. “This has got twice the penetrator power of one of the cannons. Those are grenade rounds, not penetrators. Forget the 7.62s.”
“Grapp,” Jaen said, wincing. “Go. Just grapping go. Gunny Hoc…” he said, switching frequencies.
“Are we down to runners, now?” Runner asked as one of the Marines vaulted a sanger and stared sprinting across the veldt. A few of the big herbivores were between him and the action and Runner hoped the Marine went around them. Pinging the armor he got the name “Bergstresser.” It took him a moment to figure out which Marine it was, but then he noted that the armor was wearing pistols.
“Two-Gun!” Runner said, direct linking the armor. “Are you grapping nuts?”
“Fifty cal pistols, Master Sergeant,” Berg said. “They’re about the only BMG systems except sniper rifles on the boat. I can kill these things.”
“Watch out for the herbivores, Two-Gun,” Runner warned. “They crushed Dr. Dean.”
“Got the solution for that issue,” Berg replied.
Going around the herbivores was out of the question. Sensors indicated that there were more of the predators closing on the Marines and they still hadn’t finished off the first group.
Berg wasn’t sure if he was an idiot or a genius. But if the patch under the mandibles was a kill point, he’d be able to prove it on the herbivores. If the pistols killed them, they’d kill the carnivores. If not… Well, they looked slow enough to outrun.
So he kept sprinting forward, drawing the right pistol as he approached the remaining elephant crabpus. There were three of them, spinning from side to side as if they couldn’t figure out which was the bigger threat, the predators they knew or the Marines. Berg didn’t intend to let them guess.
One of the massive beasts, fully nine meters tall at the top of the shell, started rumbling towards him on its stumpy tentacles and he paused, bringing up the pistol in a two-handed grip.
He carefully targeted the patch the first sergeant had noted and fired. The round punched through the refractory armor but the thing kept coming. After a second round, though, no more than a hand’s span from the first, the giant herbivore practically jumped into the air, then came crashing down.
It slid to a stop less than three meters away but from Berg’s perspective that was perfect. He took a running jump onto the top of its shell and then bounded off the far side between the two remaining herbivores. Dropping to a knee, he fired left in a two-handed grip, punching two rounds into the patch of the left-hand monster, then fired one-handed to the right, dropping that one with his last remaining round.
Bounding to his feet he dropped the clip, an unfortunately cumbersome operation with the converted rifle, and slid another magazine in place.
“Third Platoon,” he said, the system automatically switching to that platoon’s frequency. “Gang way. Two-Gun coming through.”
“Back, back!” Mammoth shouted. “More coming in from the south.” The lieutenant swept his Gatling gun to the right and shook his head. “Gunny, we have a situation here.”
“That we do, sir,” Big-Foot said. The last team was backing on their position, firing in a continuous stream at the pack. But, worse, there were motion sensor readings indicating more of the beasts no more than fifty meters away. The gunny targeted one of the remaining three carnivores, whose tentacles were shredded, not that it seemed to care, and began pouring rounds into the patch under the mandibles. Most of the rounds bounced off, some of them doing more damage to the tentacles. But if you put enough kinetic energy on a spot, it tends to crack. Finally, rounds began to punch through and the predator slid to a halt.
Mammoth had finished off another. But Wangen was down, the last predator’s mandibles fixed on his arm.
“Mothergrapper,” Wangen snarled, hammering at the beast. “Maulk, I can’t get up.”
“Gunny,” Mammoth said, chopping at the mandibles with his combat knife. The monomolecular blade rapidly broke through one of the mandibles and the arm was released. But the predator still pinned the suit.
“Sutherland,” Frandsen said, grabbing one side of the beast. “Other side. And a one, and a two…”
“More!” Lance Corporal Corwin shouted as another pack of the predators broke cover. There were more this time and, if anything, they were bigger. These were striped in red and green. The first pack had been flat red.
“Retreat,” Captain MacDonald said. “Just grapping run. We’ve got it.”
“Too close, sir,” Mammoth said, dropping to one knee and targeting the nerve junction. “Get Third out of here, sir. Semper Fidelis…”
“Third Platoon,” Captain MacDonald said. “Prepare to retreat…”
“Two-Gun, what the grapp are you doing here?” Top snapped as the PFC barreled past.
“Penetrators, Top,” Berg panted, holding up the modified sniper rifles. “Get… going… Got… it.”
“PFC Bergstresser…” the CO said, then paused when the first sergeant raised a hand. “Go get ’em, boy.”
“Go, sir!” Sutherland said, dropping to one knee and targeting the lieutenant’s beast.
“Staff Sergeant, this is an order,” Mammoth said. “Get your team out of here.”
“Sir…”
“I gave you an order, Staff Sergeant,” the lieutenant said. “You will obey it. Go.”
“Sir,” Sutherland said. “Alpha Team. Make for the boat.”
As Alpha retreated, Berg seriously reconsidered his sanity. There were nine of the charging monsters and only three remaining Marines. He knew he was pretty good, but he’d hardly used these things.
On the other hand, these things were much faster than a Wyvern. If somebody didn’t slow them down, they were going to be all over Alpha Team, and Third Platoon, like stink on maulk.