Ymir: War Horses Book 2 by Scott Warren

Author:Scott Warren [Warren, Scott]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 19 - Xenotia

Even from orbit, Xenotia looked frigid. A blue-white marble of wind-swept tundra and glaciers spider-webbed with magma flows waited to greet us after a six-week transit across four wormhole jumps. We’d spent longer traveling before, but quarters still started to feel a bit close around the month mark. I almost looked forward to the sub-zero air just for a change of pace from the perpetual dirty-sock smell of the starship billets.

The transit had passed quick, what with formation sims, studying the local geography, wrenching on Ardennes, and getting rolled up in Cortes’ combatives class. A month of hard knocks had seen me bruise several ribs, but I could feel my stamina increasing. Three minutes of sparring no longer left me gasping for air. And I no longer dreaded the bone-deep pain of waking up each morning. As loathe as I was to admit it, Swift’s double-PT punishment detail idea was working. But I still had a month to go.

Rocco eventually calmed down. But he stayed busy throughout most of the transit. I didn’t get a chance to play some Feedback with him until the last days, and even then I was so off my game that he cleaned me out. I blamed it on still feeling like an intruder in the cavalry officer’s lounge. I still couldn’t get used to the second lieutenant’s pips after being a maintainer for eight years. Rocco was sweeping a decent portion of my cred chits to his side of the table when the call to general quarters blared out on the primary circuit.

“What in the twin peaks is that about?” asked Rocco, throwing down his hand and grabbing his jacket.

“Got me,” I answered. I followed him out to the staging area to gear up. We pushed past a team of ship gunners heading to their stations and down to the hangar deck.

Stag joined us outside the ladders at the junction, pulling his coveralls over his broad shoulders. “What’s going on?” he asked.

“Let’s find out,” said Rocco. Inside the staging area he tuned the tactical repeater to the command frequency, and sensor reports started to spill out.

“Wyking contact cluster, inbound to Xenotia, 300,000 kilometers. Class aspect: troop carriers, fighters in escort. Xenotian planetary defense engaging.”

“Shit, they’re in the middle of an attack,” said Rocco. He swiped through repeater screens. “Where the hell is the 57th?”

“Looks like the communication blackout during the wormhole transit left us blind just long enough,” I said. “The Wykings got their own wormhole stable and slipped through it ahead of us.”

“Bad luck,” echoed Stag.

The growler rang, and Rocco grabbed the handset off the wall and pressed it to his ear. From the way he straightened, I assumed he spoke to Colonel Swift on the other end. The other Third Formation jockeys filed in while he spoke to her. After a brief conversation, he hung up and turned to us, customary grin gone.

“Suit up. Combat center puts projected ground levy of the raiding party at battalion strength. First and Third are high-altitude dropping, along with two companies of marines.

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