Firemask by Chris Bunch

Author:Chris Bunch [Bunch, Chris]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, War & Military
ISBN: 9780451456878
Google: fKF0AAAACAAJ
Amazon: 0451456874
Publisher: Roc
Published: 2000-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

For three days there was nothing from the Musth except an ominous silence.Then, at dusk, they struck Camp Mahan out of the setting sun, arcing around from their base in the Highlands and coming in vertically from space, from Silitric, E-Cumbre.

Velv and mother ships held altitude, lobbing missiles down against the feeble antimissile barrage. .

It was as if they'd surprised the Force garrison again, and the missile batteries were taken out within minutes.

Wlencing ordered the landing force down, and wynt poured out of mother-ship bays, while aksai flew security.

Then the real Force missile stations on Chance unmasked and opened fire. The sites that'd been suppressed had been dummies or automated. Less than half a dozen Force troops died in that first attack.

The missiles came up in swarms, overloaded the Musth ECM operators, struck home in the wynt formations.

For a long moment it was boiling madness in the skies. Then Wlencing and his subordinate war leaders regained control, and the invasion continued.

Wynt landed in dead ground behindCampMahan , or on the beaches, and Musth warriors bounded out.

The beaches and approaches to the base had been mined, and Musth screeched and died in sandy explosions.

Furies bank-launched, and the rockets harrowed the Musth ranks as Force cannon fired canister at point-blank range, shrapnel spraying the attacking aliens. The Musth were so close that Shrike operators had to send their missiles on a loop out to sea while they armed. Some were hit by Musth antimissiles, but not enough to matter.

The first wave hesitated, fell back to the shelter of their wynt , and Shrikes were guided in on them.

The surviving Musth commanders called for immediate support, or permission to lift off, abandon the attack.

Wlencing denied it, ordered the second wave in, preceded by an all-out aerial attack.

Aksai and velv strafed the island, attacking any building or possible target. Barracks, hangars, and buildings on Mahan exploded, and flames built a whirlwind into the darkening skies.

But the Force was far underground, in bunkers, gun positions, and launch stations.

More missiles came out of the smoke, and more Musth died.

The second wave came in, was riddled, and pinned down in a thin perimeter around the Force base.

Wlencing hid his rage, claws moving in and out as he paced the bridge of his command ship.

A few minutes later, his intelligence analysts reported all Confederation codes had been changed.

He needed no explanation. If the codes could be changed that rapidly, that meant the Confederation knew he'd been reading their "secrets," and were sophisticated enough to make sure they weren't real secrets at all, but false data they wanted him to believe.

And believe it he had, Wlencing thought in fury. He'd thought the Confederation were passively kneeling under his whip, whereas it was obvious they were waiting for the right time to react. Perhaps they'd lost the initiative at the beginning, but now it appeared they might have been calling the shots for some time.

The first question was: How long?

Wlencing growled aloud, wanted to hurt something, anything, anyone. But he found control.

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